Call of Duty 2 Review

-----At the end of my play with the original Call of Duty, I came off enjoying that title overall. It had some really fun, epic missions with period accurate scenarios and aesthetics, and had a certain strategic quality about it. That being said, I did have some choice words for it. While fun missions were definitely present, this quality was inconsistent throughout the game’s playtime. I also thought the AI Call of Duty built itself on was more invasive than immersive. Finally I found Infinity Ward’s use of WWII imagery to be both striking and inconsidered all at the same time. It was an interesting experience to say the least, but one I don’t wish to return back to. Still, I concluded with a feeling of excitement towards it’s successor: Call of Duty 2.
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-----Part of the reason for this is my knowledge of what Call of Duty would become. As I stated in my review of Call of Duty 2003, I generally look back at Call of Duty’s classic period (Modern Warfare - Black Ops II) positively. I think those games have their genius moments that are worth keeping and worth bringing into the future. Another reason for my excitement about Call of Duty 2 in particular has to do with hearing Youtuber Raycevick speaking positively on the game in one of his videos. Raycevick has made many great videos and educated cases for the Call of Duty franchise, so I hold his opinion in high regard. However, despite my excitement and the buzz around it, I ended up feeling as if Call of Duty 2 is above average like it’s predecessor.
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-----Albeit, that isn’t because the two are the same game. On the contrary, there are some key differences between Call of Duty’s 1 and 2 that make them stand out from each other. For one, Call of Duty 2 has the kind of features that would become synonymous with not only it’s franchise, but with the shooter genre as a whole for years to come. An example of this would be Call of Duty 2’s health system. Gone is the finite health system needing replenishing from health packs, and in comes the iconic regenerating health. I was surprised to see it implemented pretty much fully formed here, and honestly I think Call of Duty 2 is better for its use of this new health mechanic.
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-----This is for a couple of reasons in itself. Infinity Ward’s technology, or use of it, has a clear upgrade from its predecessor. Call of Duty 2’s environments look so much better, meanwhile the amount of stuff they can fit in a scene while not sacrificing performance is astounding. These levels can feel like true huge war skirmishes that you’re just a small part of. As such, a finite health system could only be detrimental and hamper pace. At its best use of it, Call of Duty 2 and its health system will have you making incremental, progressive steps through its levels while under heavy, tense gunfire. At the health’s worst use however has been a long standing pet peeve of mine: making the screen less visible the more hurt the player is. I’m still not a fan of that here, especially since while the arenas you play in look better, their color is dark and washed out. It’s hard to make enemies out of their surroundings, or your own allies, already without a piercing red blur taking over your screen.
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-----Another way Call of Duty 2 stands out from its predecessor would be the AI. Call of Duty 2003 was sold on it’s NPC helpers and their complexity. I think the game that actually delivers on that is it’s successor. Call of Duty 2’s allies definitely give off the illusion of better intelligence. They’re humanized with more photorealistic faces that are distinct from one another. As you go through the campaigns, some of these NPC characters stick with you. I noticed this the most during the British missions. It was quite fun hearing the banter between Capt. Price and MacGregor, or hearing my sergeant address by name when yelling out orders to the squad. Once in battle, you can audibly discern orders between the helpers, and can witness them follow through with these. It’s very impressive. I especially liked when they would call out grenades when they were lobbed at me.
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-----Speaking of grenades, the helping computers aren’t the only non-playable entities that receive an upgrade here. Enemy combatants also display increased intelligence. They’re able to flank the player pretty well and keep them on their toes. While Call of Duty 2 may have regenerative health, it also has the capability to kick your but if you don’t utilize cover. As hinted, their use of grenades is very aggressive compared to 2003, which I think is a good thing. Their explosive attacks caused me to move out of cover and think dynamically about escape plans and covering fire. These same enemies will also lob the player’s own grenades back at them. Unfortunately that same feature is not available to the player. I also think it’s a bummer that grenades cannot be cooked yet. Finally, my biggest gripe with the enemies has already been stated above: they blend into the environments too easily and can be hard to see.
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-----While we’re on the topic of gripes, and firefights, while battles can be fun at times, they can also be exhausting. Another one of Call of Duty’s changes seems to have gone on to its level length. The scenarios, while more theatrical in places, are also longer. This to me makes action moments more repetitive in the latter half of the game. It doesn’t help that Call of Duty’s “Wall of Noise” is back and in full effect. Sitting in for large doses of 2 is equivalent to giving yourself a headache. I also don’t think Infinity Ward does enough with their environments either to help things feel fresh. Quite the opposite: they often reuse environments back to back. Their reuse doesn’t stop at the scenes either. One type of scenario Infinity Ward likes to reuse a lot in Call of Duty 2 is the timed defensives. These are where you're given a minutes-long countdown to survive while being attacked by waves and waves of enemies. It’s tense the first time around, but quickly gets old and comical near the end of the game as these fights feel like blatant padding. The cherry on top is the cheesy and dumb strings they use for music at the ends of these segments. Infinity Ward tries so hard to invoke the feeling of Spielbergian heroism, but it comes off as transparent and manipulative.
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-----In conclusion, I think Call of Duty 2 is above average like it’s predecessor, but for completely different reasons. Its regenerative health and intelligent AI’s make for some immersive and aggressive gameplay, while the enemies are laid on thick. However, there is such a thing as too thick. Longer levels and roaring gunfire can make the gun fights seem dull while the environments are dreary and repetitive. I would say Call of Duty 2 is more interesting than what came before, and offers more of a memorable experience. However it’s storylines and gameplay isn’t the most essential in the series. For that to come, players would have to wait for Infinity Ward’s next, most seminal title.

All those World War II shooters we endured for an entire decade felt like a war on its own. Shooter after endless shooter bombarded our systems, and then there were the really bad ones in between the Call of Duty and Medal of Honor yearly releases. Call of Duty 2 was highly anticipated because it was the actual sequel to the award-winning original. Does it stand out like the first game did? Is it full of cinematic finesse and finely nuanced mechanics? Not really.

There’s not much of a story here because it’s based off WWII. Black and white footage with a dull narrator telling you about different theaters of the war, then there’s the typical journal entry during the load screen, nothing interesting at all, and even when the game came out I was sick of these WWII shooters. What does Call of Duty 2 build on? Nothing, it’s just more of the same, but at least it has high production values and it does the same stuff right. The game has you following three different soldiers from the Russian, British, and American side. One thing I did like was that you get to play a different side of the Normandy beach storming and that’s the Rangers. They climbed up the cliff side trying to shut down the German pillboxes and various artillery so our troops stopped getting slaughtered on the beachhead. Call of Duty 2 tries to tell the smaller stories in the war which is a nice change of pace.

The same weapons are here that you have shot a million times. Lee Enfield, M1 Garand, Mp40, MP44, Sten, and various others. Of course, not ALL WWII weapons are here, but I wanted to see some of the more obscure ones like the Browning or BAR. At this point in time, it was just about better graphics and who’s weapon textures looked the most realistic. Call of Duty 2 delivers the visuals and was a benchmarker much like Crysis is now back in 2005/2006. It was one of the first game to support SLI and really pushed PCs and made you get those $500 graphics cards. It was a must-have for PC owners, and was also a GPU seller. With that aside, the textures look great even today and the visuals really pop. The sound is great as well with gunfire chattering in the distance and soldiers yelling all around you. It may seem dated today, but you can really see how much the Call of Duty series hasn’t evolved. There are striking similarities to the Modern Warfare series because it’s all the same, shoot anything that moves.

The game can be pretty easy at times, I could just rush into a building and blow everyone away with one clip and survive. I still find it painful to know that grenade physics are still really bad and bounce around like rubber balls. There are various things I just really can’t stand about these shooters and that’s the lack of realism. When I shoot enemies blood doesn’t even come out, where’s the gore and violence? Brothers in Arms was the first WWII shooter to use this violence in the genre, but Call of Duty just feels like some sort of censored theme park ride.

CoD2 had a huge multiplayer following, but sadly no one’s online anymore. Even so, it’s just a typical online shooter and isn’t anything special. I was really disappointed to find that CoD2 wasn’t as cinematic as it could have been and just felt the same throughout the whole game. Blow up this door, defend this position, destroy that mortar nest, kill this Flak 88 crew. It’s the same stuff we play in every single WWII shooter and nothing ever changes. Sure it was mindless fun, but I have come to realize why I was so glad everyone moved on.

Foi um jogo que me surpreendeu.
Depois de 18 anos do seu lançamento e já tendo jogado os CoDs atuais, não esperava gostar tanto assim!

CoD2 é um jogo que marca conceitos que até hoje a franquia carrega; Campanha cinematográfica, batalhas focadas em
movimentação, missões com múltiplos objetivos, tudo isso já estava presente aqui (em uma menor escala).

Meus pontos negativos ficam por conta da falta de Feedback: Inimigos são praticamente camuflados com os seus aliados (e ter friendly fire também atrapalha nesse aspecto), mini-mapa no formato de bussola que leva pra lugar algum, dificuldade de confirmar se o inimigo morreu mesmo ou ainda esta no chão, atirando...

São várias arestas que vieram a ser polidas nos jogos posteriores da série, mas aqui você ainda as sente.

Apesar dos pesares, continua um bom jogo!
Recomento revisitar esse clássico dos FPS ;)

I don't like to drop games but I got soft-locked about halfway through the British campaign in this (so around halfway through the entire campaign as well), already wasn't having a good time, and decided I would probably be better off just leaving it there. Apparently, this is one of the "good" Call of Duty games and while the series is certainly in pretty abysmal territory now I don't think CoD 2 is anything to strive for either. It is cool to see a WWII shooter that has you play through campaigns as the Russians in Stalingrad and the British in North Africa before doing the generic American D-Day stuff, but the actual missions are monotonous, the gunplay is weak and unsatisfying, and outside of some decent skyboxes, the presentation isn't much either. Worst of all the game is painfully linear, something that stood out especially because this is the game people always bring up when criticizing the linearity of modern CoD games. I think everything I've played or seen from the series since Black Ops 3 has been awful, but outside of a lack of scripted setpieces there's not really any choice or freedom to the mission design here either. The game wants you to think there is, and constantly tells you that you can deal with mission objectives in any order, but each time it did the variety boiled down to two or three identical clusters of enemies or pieces of artillery that were never more than a quick sprint apart. If you aren't looking at the minimap you probably wouldn't even register them as various different objectives instead of normal enemies populating the level. The lack of flashy setpieces only highlights how weak the gameplay really is with nothing to break it up. I think playing Isonzo at the same time as this killed it for me, that game is both more interesting on every level and more fun and satisfying to play. Maybe that's an unfair comparison since Isonzo is an online-only game that came out just a couple of years ago while CoD 2 is two decades old now, but it's not my fault people hyped this game up to a ridiculous degree!

I feel like I should at least try to bring up some stuff I liked about this game so here are some notes:
- Again, it is really neat to do a WWII game that starts you off with the Eastern Front and North Africa, but I wish they went all the way and had the American campaign be in the Pacific instead of just doing Normandy again. I think World at War has a Pacific campaign so maybe I should try that instead.
- I like that you've always got a small squad with you that moves through the whole level and can cover for you at times, for a while every CoD game had this and I wish it would come back in modern shooters.
- Constantly seeing Patton quotes on the death screens reminded me that I really need to watch the George C. Scott movie about him at some point.
- The tank missions (before I got softlocked) made me want to rewatch Girls und Panzer or just finally start watching the Finale movies.
- most of these attempts at finding positive qualities in this game were just me wanting to spend my time watching/playing other, better things. Make of that what you will.


Maybe the only good games in this whole series are MW2 and Black Ops.