Call Of Duty 5: World At War - Update

This weekend I've been playing more Call of Duty 5: World At War on the PS3.

It's double XP weekend and they have unlocked the Zombie Nazi co-op level which was previously locked until you completed the solo mission.

So far I've played the game for 17 hours. I've leveled up to Major III. My best kill streak is 22, one better than my COD4 best. I've learned the levels a little bit more, seen some bugs, and become more used to the game. So I thought I'd write about what I think of the game so far.

For me the biggest issue I have with the game is the crappy guns. Yeah, sure, it's WWII, and they had crappy guns. But seriously, it just ruins the game for me. In fact this weekend I switched to playing hardcore mode just so I could make the weapons a bit more potent. This was a little better, but tough to do when you are still a bit of a noob on the maps.

My Issues With COD 5

1. The shitty guns. They are just very limited, and it seems to take forever to get the good ones, and even the good ones suck.
2. It takes too long to level up. Sure, maybe I suck, but 17 hours to get to level 44? I imagine it will take at least another 10 to hit 65.
3. The guns at the low levels REALLY suck for the most part. For that reason I can't imagine going prestige on this game. I said I wouldn't on COD4, but eventually did anyway. But I really can't imagine spending this much time working on it. Especially as some of the cool looking weapons are only available right near the end. This means that if I do go prestige, I'll have to spend hours playing with crap guns all over again.
4. Error 33. For me I get this error every time I log in. It can take 5-15 minutes to login sometimes, with repeated Error 33s. It's tedious and annoying, and many times I've just given up playing because I can't be bothered to wait for the game to decide to log in.
5. Trophies are a new PS3 thing, and there are plenty to win on COD5. But sadly most of them are for single player achievements. That doesn't make any sense for a game that is predominantly played online.
6. The grenades annoy me. They are not as powerful as COD4, and I understand the reason why they did that, but it still annoys me.
   

The Good Stuff

1. I love the dogs. That's just a great aspect to the game, and far more fun than the COD4 equivalent of calling in a helicopter.
2. Much of the achievements are the same as COD4.
3. Most of the levels are very good. Interesting layouts, wonderful attention to detail, a lot more space to play than COD4.
4. Vehicles. The tanks are fun, and add another dimension to the game. On some levels that include vehicles it can really shift the balance of power in the game.
5. Guns with grenades. I do enjoy the COD5 equivalent of the noob tube. Sometimes when the enemy team groups together this can be a really nice way to wipe out of bunch of them at the same time.
6. Nazi Zombies. I've only played the co-op level once, and it seemed like a cool idea. Although it didn't seem to earn me much in the way of XP or weapon experience, which sucks.
   

In conclusion, I still like COD5. It's a good game, but it lacks some of the magic of COD4 for me. When you have a shooting game, the guns are important. Sadly I'm just not seeing anything too exciting yet. Now I am admittedly only about half way to top rank, but that said the crappy guns will make it impossible for me to justify giving up the good stuff only to spend hours grappling with the crappy guns again, should I choose to go prestige.

As for the single player game, it has its moments, but it is only as good as the COD4 single player in my opinion.

Call Of Duty 5: World At War - First Impressions

In April of 2008 I decided to treat myself to a Sony PS3. The price had finally come down to a reasonable level, GTA:IV was about to be released, and Bluray seemed like a nice addition to my HDTV.

I purchased the PS3 a few weeks before Grand Theft Auto came out, so found myself with a cool new games console and no games.

I took a trip to a local game store and asked the geek behind the counter to recommend a game. He instantly began a torrent of enthusiasm about Call of Duty 4, claiming it to be last years game of the year, blah blah. And I have to say, he was right. I've logged a fair few hours online reaching the gold cross level, and more recently getting my gold AK-47.

This fall Call of Duty 5 came out, and I decided to put a copy on my Amazon.com wish list. A relative purchased it for me, and on Christmas day I was able to try it for the first time.

Apparently this was a popular game for Christmas because I've never seen fewer than 70,000 people logged in at any time of the day or night. I also keep getting the unbelievably annoying Activision Error 33, which is basically some kind of overload when too many people are trying to play. This annoying error makes it impossible to play online, and as far as I know, the only fix is to wait and try again later.

I've not played the game a lot, maybe a few hours. But I have a few initial observations.

The single player game is a good way to pass time when the Activision Error 33 prevents you from playing online. Although frankly, if it were not for the multiplayer option I would not own the game.

The multiplayer option (when working) does seem a shade smoother than Call of Duty 4, although the makers have made a number of changes I am not especially thrilled about.

I don't like the lighting of the game. I can see what they are trying to do, recreate the washed out color look of old movies or something. But I suspect that for the people who were actually fighting in World War II, the sun looked pretty much the same as it does now.

The maps are big and detailed, probably twice the size of the COD4 maps, although my unfamiliarity of them may make them seem bigger than they actually are.

Much of the features COD4 players know and love are still there. UAV is replaced with a recognisance plane. The air strike is now a mortar attack. The helicopter attacks are now rather amusingly replaced with attack dogs that you can shoot.

But I think one of my biggest issues with the game is the weapons. Certainly in the lower ranks the choice of weapons seems limited. It is harder to get the equivalent of the red dot sights. There are fewer automatic weapons and a lot more slow loading bolt action things. I guess they have to remain true to the era, which is why I am not convinced they should have gone back to WWII.

It appears they still have ten levels of prestige, but have also added ten more ranks, so now you have to get to level 65 (not 55) before you can prestige up.

You can still get bonus experience (XP) points for head shots, but I don't think you can get different weapon designs (blue tiger, red tiger, gold etc) like you can on COD4.

It is now possible to drive a tank, or operate the machine gun on a tank, which is new (COD4 had no vehicles).

I guess my biggest concern at this stage is whether the weapons I have yet to unlock will make up for the general suckiness of the weapons I have already tried. This in turn has another point of concern attached. Even if the later weapons are as cool as they should be, it looks like I will have to play the game for long portions of time with sucky weapons each time I prestige (assuming that the good weapons are locked again, once you level up).

At least with COD4 you could get a nice LMG, and quickly level up to the good assault rifles nice and quick. But with COD5 you have to get 75 kills with a single gun (not 25 like in COD4) to unlock the optical sights (the red dot equivalent).

I'll need quite a few more hours to figure out if I really like the game or not. To me it all hinges on how much more effort is needed to unlock the later weapons, and how good they are.

Most importantly, I need them to fix the Error 33 that prevents me from actually playing the game at least 50% of the times I have tried to.

In the meantime I'll be playing COD4 (decided to get my gold LMG), and Tiger Woods 09, which is very good. I'm not a golfer, but I've always enjoyed that game, and I have not purchased a new version since the 2005 version I had for the PS2. So far the changes and improvements have been quite impressive, but that's probably another post at some point.