Hitmas The Second: Modern Warfare Part 2

By Josh Posted Saturday Aug 11, 2012

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 188 comments


Link (YouTube)

And so our impromtu romp through Modern Warfare 3 continues. For those of you wanting more complaining and merciless mocking of the game, you might be happy with this episode.

 


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188 thoughts on “Hitmas The Second: Modern Warfare Part 2

  1. AJ_Wings says:

    Ok, that scene where Chris is run over by a random car is seriously one of the most hilarious things I’ve seen in a very long time.

    Spoiler Warning at its best.

    1. StranaMente says:

      You’re forgetting Steve, the brave antlion that surfed to space on a door.
      We’ll always remember you laughing, Steve.

      1. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

        For added irony, it comes in the midst of a monologue about how easy the game is to play if you just follow the directions.

        But it wouldn’t be spoiler warning without the Cuftburt play.

  2. Nyctef says:

    You can definitely criticize Modern Warfare games for a lot of stuff, but the sub and boat chase was a pretty cool sequence that was both “cinematic” and a bunch of fun to play through, if only once (the multiplayer is where all the replay value lies). Yes, you get punished if you try to go off the rails, but there’s really no incentive to do so. It’s just not that sort of game.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      The scenes are awesome,but the thing is,you could get the same effect by watching a movie with awesome scenes.Im not playing video games in order to watch some movies where I can tilt my head a bit.

      1. Nyctef says:

        Eh, I disagree, I think the fun gunplay and extra immersion (probably mostly from the first-person perspective) add enough to the experience to make it more enjoyable than watching the same sequences as a movie.

        I can see where you’re coming from, though – this game easily has as many low points as it has highs – and without the multiplayer mode it definitely wouldn’t be value for money compared to a movie.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Yeah,I dont find such a constrictive gameplay fun.Maybe because the novelty for me wore out looong ago.

          1. Zukhramm says:

            What I’d like to see is a shooter-themed WarioWare type game where they just shove random three-second challanges at the player at a fast pace.

            1. avpix says:

              I can see it already. “Pick your nose with this AK-47 in the next 3 seconds.”

              1. Olly says:

                and they could use a light gun so you actually shoot, and they could call it something pun-tastic like “Point Blank” … oh wait, that already happened and it was awesome!

    2. 4th Dimension says:

      Unless you know anything about military, then that entire mission is heache inducing stupid. WHY is the entire Russian navy in the bay 200m from the coast that is by the way still contested by the enemy. Freaking land based artilery can hit those ships. And that sub is for some reason crusing in like 10m of water. WHY!! oh WHYY!!

  3. NonEuclideanCat says:

    Hey Josh:

    Chris says you have the audio to the session that FRAPS didn’t record. Any chance of that getting posted? It sounds like it’s worth listening to.

    1. Josh says:

      Really it’s just full of commentary we made sure to touch on when we redid everything. The only significant thing I can think of that happened during it that we didn’t see again was that Chris cooked a grenade in his hand until it blew up in his face.

      But then you’d really want to see that, wouldn’t you, and that would still be a problem.

      1. McNutcase says:

        I think we do need to hear everyone’s reactions to that. Shove it in the pregap of the next show, please?

    2. SougoXIII says:

      If you want to see it so much, you can catch the whole thing on Chris’ livestream.

  4. Friend of Dragons says:

    I think I’ve figured out in why in these games I compulsively switch out to every different gun I come across. I’m desperately searching for same variety to keep it from becoming mind-meltingly dull. (It doesn’t really help)

  5. LunaticFringe says:

    During the boat chase through New York, you see that aircraft carrier that is partially sunk? You know, the one that looks like an awesome ramp? I’m pretty sure that you fail if you try to go up it. I mean, there’s obviously some issues with trying to use it as a ramp in a ‘realistic’ setting, but come on, the game’s already abandoned any kind of logic or realism long ago. Dammit Modern Warfare 3, if you’re going to do insane set pieces do them right.

    Also, I really love the fact that Price says that the controls are in Russian, yet as it boots up it’s clearly Russian written in English, not Cyrillic, for some reason. Then at the end when the warning sign pops up, it’s in Cyrillic. So confusing.

    1. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

      Do Russian computers have cyrillic keyboards?

      1. Torsten says:

        They do. Russian language still mostly uses cyrillic alphabets, although I think there is a writing system for western alphabets in Russian also. So the keyboards have cyrillic or the option to switch into them.

        1. Tse says:

          That was a huge problem several years ago. Programs and websites in Cyrillic were showing as a garbled mess, but things are mostly fixed now. Most Slavic languages use Cyrillic, It’s usually a bad idea to use Latin characters in a language with Cyrillic characters, it’s the same as using leet speak, leaves a very bad impression on the reader.
          BTW, you can use the Cyrillic alphabet to override most profanity filters. You can say “fuсk” “аss” “с…”. Sadly, you can’t use shit, unless you spell it like this: “SНIT”.

          1. 4th Dimension says:

            Except Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Slovenians, Croatians and Bosnians. Honorable mention to us Serbs who have both the Latin (western characters based) and Cyrilic alphabets. So you can’t say MOST Slavic languages use western characters. It’s 50/50 especially if you count all these ‘new’ post 90s languages.

  6. X2Eliah says:

    Wow. Having never really played the modern generation of these shooters, I didn’t actually appreciate how goddamn noisy they were.
    For instance, the latter half, after the whole sub scene, was just a massive non-stop metallic trtrrrrtrrrrrtrrr. How can people’s ears take such abuse? I shudder to imagine how it would be when truly playing, when even through a muted youtube video the noise was severely annoying and borderline painful.

    Is it a method of inducing auditory shock to players?

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      The thing about the sound isnt that its too loud(well,it wasnt for me),but that everything just meshes into one huge noise.The gunfire,the explosions,the talking,everything jumbles together and in the ended I simply stopped noticing the differences.I still have no clue what half the games were about.

    2. Shamus says:

      I feel the same way. It’s just fatigue-inducing. I would enjoy it more if the game had more highs and lows.

    3. Eärlindor says:

      Yeah, the whole time it felt like all the gun noises were competing with the commentators and it was almost EXHAUSTING to listen to.

    4. Winter says:

      Is it a method of inducing auditory shock to players?

      Yes, it’s the videogame version of the “Loudness Wars”.

      1. Neko says:

        Yes, and it is my #1 complaint about all these modern games. Gears of War is a particularly noisy offender. Dialogue will be low and mumbled, but all weaponry will be right at the maximum volume.

        I think it’s some sort of attempt to make gun noises “realistically” loud. But I don’t need or care for that. When a flashbang goes off, does the TV need to produce a light of sufficient intensity to actually blind me? Then why are they trying to use the speakers to deafen me?

        1. Peter H. Coffin says:

          And they’re still not even close to realism. Gunfire is, practically speaking, the loudest thing most people are likely to ever encounter, louder than jackhammers.

          What I really want to know is WHERE DO THESE SOLDIERS CARRY THEIR AMMO? As often as that little “RELOAD” flashes on the screen, they ought to be dragging around shopping carts full of magazines…

    5. newdarkcloud says:

      Yes. Whenever I play games like this, I always find myself turning the volume down more than other games. The sound doesn’t help playing since it all blends together. It seems like developers are trying to beat Micheal Bay at his own game.

    6. Eruanno says:

      Yup. I just picked up a copy of Battlefield 3 for some leftover credit, because I had heard the multiplayer was fun.

      Well, turns out the single player is this:
      “BANG BANG BANG TTRRRRTRRRTRRR GRENADE GTRRTTRTRRRRTRRR SHOOT HIM SOLDIER TRRRTRRTRRTT BANG BOOM BOOM KERPOW BANG BOOM KAPOW TRRRTRRTRRTRRR”

      Why the fuck didn’t I just get a discount on Spec Ops: The Line instead? Gaaahhh, regrets…

  7. SougoXIII says:

    Oh no Chris, don’t skip the cut scenes – the story make no sense as it is!

    You know it’s funny watching Chris die at random spots because I get the same feeling from watching Josh played the final part of Alan Wake where he just doesn’t care about anything and just want to push forward. It says a lot about MW3 when this just the 2nd level of the game.

    1. bit says:

      I also like how he’s completely ignoring the cover mechanics and basically playing the game like it’s Half-Life. Makes it look almost fun.

      1. Daemian Lucifer says:

        Well he did put it on easy.

        And half life has the same cover mechanic as this.You only dont need it unless you put it on hard.

        1. Aldowyn says:

          I didn’t even realize CoD had cover mechanics. Didn’t seem like that kind of shooter. Certainly no one ever uses them on MP

          1. Ateius says:

            Well, “cover mechanics” as in “you can hide behind things”. There’s no sticky-cover system. At least, there wasn’t in MW1, who knows what they’ve done since.

            1. Eruanno says:

              Nope, no cover system besides “hide behind things”. Yet.

        2. Tse says:

          He put it on medium.

    2. Irridium says:

      I don’t know, actually knowing why all this is happening probably makes it worse.

      Kind of like with Champions Online. It’s best to not read the quest text.

      1. Bryan says:

        But, but, but, this is NO ORDINARY STORM!

  8. David A says:

    On submarines:

    Yes, there is a locker on board the submarine that holds weapons. It is opened and the weapons distributed so that every time the boat is at port, a sailor on watch has a weapon and can protect the boat.

    If the submarine is ever boarded, for any reason, then figure that the situation has gotten so FUBAR that it wouldn’t even matter.

    And if the boat were ever invaded while at port, it takes too many people, too many specialists, to operate a modern American submarine that a threat of being captured is nonexistent. What I’m saying is, the only people that can crew an American submarine… is an American submarine crew.

    1. 4th Dimension says:

      From that it is obvious that no crew in the world other than a Russian crew can pilot a Russian sub. Meaning the couldn’t have possibly lunched those missiles. Especially if the hardware was old and strung together with duct tape.

      1. ? says:

        I must say, how embarrassing for United States of America and especially to all branches of its military to be pushed to such desperation by a nation that has to import duct tape to keep its equipment operational.

    2. decius says:

      Further, why did they open the hatch after surfacing? If the special ops team could blow the hatch, blow the hatch with the sub underwater, and fill the people space with water. That disables everything in the sub that relies on the steam plant or electrical plant (which is everything except a few systems operated by compressed air).

      It takes a week or so of training for the people who work on the sub to know where the missile controls ARE. It takes another two months for a missile tech to know the basics of how to operate said controls, and years of training and live-fire exercises to learn how to operate them effectively in a rapid manner.

      Oh, and there are at least 5 people in the engine room (which wasn’t part of the sub which was shown), who could have shut off all AC power at any time, acting independently: There’s an officer who could do it by giving orders to any of the below; the person who is in charge of the electrical system, the person who is physically near the breakers, the person who is physically near the steam-powered generators, and the person who is physically near the main steam cutoff valves. The person who has control of the hydraulic accumulator and pumps could also dump and disable those, which would result in the external bays not being able to open. All of these people would be able to recognize that boarders were in the sub, (based on the gunfire) and that the missiles were being prepared for launch without the orders of the captain. If they put 1 and 1 together and get 2, they can stop the launch.

  9. RCN says:

    Johnny 5… is… alive!

    This means… Johnny 5… has… to KILL!

    1. Jakale says:

      Johnny Five: Copter Killer. That’s literally the impression I got from watching. You killed just as many regular dudes in the bit before, and you ran the same course after. Five’s purpose was solely copter killing…and letting them make you fall into a river for a currently unknown purpose.
      I also like that Chris shot the dudes he was protecting when the story told them to come out. No friendly fire issues there.

      1. Jarenth says:

        Luckily, story NPCs are immune to Killer Five’s enormous minigun.

  10. Spencer Petersen says:

    Why didn’t they just go in the submarine hatch that led directly to the control room?

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      I was just about to ask the same thing.Why enter the one farther from the control room when the one closer was just as available.And even less guarded.

      1. Irridium says:

        But then how would they be able to shoot everyone in the submarine?

    2. Eric says:

      Yeah, I was… yeah.

      Am I the only one who burst out laughing when he realized that?

      EDIT: Okay, sliding down the hillside with stuff exploding everywhere was probably even more hilarious.

      EDIT 2: And falling into the river. Jesus what the hell.

    3. 4th Dimension says:

      GAAAAAMEEE LOGIIIIC.
      Stop thinking and enjoy explosions

    4. decius says:

      Because the hatches lock from the inside. I can’t figure out why the other hatch was opened at all, or by whom.

      If you’ve got the explosives to blow open the hatch, you’ve got the explosives to blow open any other spot on the hull- the hatch is NOT a weak point.

      1. Peter H. Coffin says:

        Hell, once you’ve got four square feet of hatch covered in a couple meters of depth pressure, you don’t even need to lock it. It’s NOT going to open, even if you cut the hinges off. THAT’S why they need to do it at the surface instead of underwater, a la upthread.

  11. Christopher M. says:

    1. Why are they shelling Random Megalopolis anyway? Why not, say, a military base? Or if they’ve run out of those, aren’t they effectively victorious (and just reducing their end-of-war rewards)?

    2. It would actually be pretty cool if they made a Modern Warfare game with the “Small pawn in a big conflict” thing they had going on in CoD 1+2. Put together a plotline for a plausible WWIII, treat it seriously, and play out important battles – maybe in a “50 years after the fact” vignette style. No more heroes!
    …Or maybe that’s just me.

    1. Aldowyn says:

      Definitely not “random megalopolis”. Definitely, DEFINITELY new york, as shamus complained.

    2. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

      That was Gears of War. And there are dozens of reasons you’d want to seize New York. The harbor, for one.

      1. Zombie says:

        This is one of the only things that makes some sense in the plot of this game. After having failed to take D.C. and make it a quick victory, the Russians are trying to take New York so they have an area to bring in supplies, and heck, they took over the stock market. They probably just destroyed the nations economy. After that, its like “There’s a plot to this thing?”

        1. Keredis says:

          Why not Norfolk/ the Hampton Roads area? In addition to being a great harbor without as many skyscrapers as NYC, it’s also got the added advantage of being where the Newport News shipyard is. Capturing/destroying it would mean that we could no longer produce aircraft carriers and reduce us to one location to produce nuclear submarines. In a war such as this, why WOULDN’T you want to cripple your enemy’s production capabilities?

          It’s also, if I recall correctly, the home base of the Atlantic Fleet. Yet another advantage to capturing/destroying it.

          1. Zombie says:

            I guess we could assume that they did attack it when they attacked D.C., or they’re doing it at the same time as the attack on New York. Plus, New York is basically the center of the economy, and it has more symbolism. I mean, saying “We took New York” sounds more like a victory to the world then “We took Norfolk”.

      2. 4th Dimension says:

        There are plenty of other harbors on eastern coast I guess than don’t have a city full of skyscrapers. City fighting is dangerous as it is without trying to fight in giant steel canyons where snipers could be on any floor of any building. And buildings have hundreds of floors.

    3. Winter says:

      cool if they made a Modern Warfare game with the “Small pawn in a big conflict” thing…

      You mean Metal Gear?

  12. Eärlindor says:

    I use to enjoy the Call of Duty games. I think CoD 2 is still my favorite, or preferred, of the franchise, if I had to pick. Everything else ranges from “okay” to “outright stupid”. I enjoyed the WWII setting. I was in to history, appreciated the nods to the vets, and liked the quotes. CoD 2 could potentially get a player interested in picking up a history book on the subject. From a gameplay perspective you have distinctive factions and weapons that look and behave differently–your SMG, your bolt-action rifle, etc.

    The modern setting never appealed to me. It lacks the… I guess “romanticism”, for lack of a better word, WWII has. In addition (and Chris brings this up) while the WWII CoD games seem to nod in, at least some respect, to the so-named “greatest generation”, the MW titles feel like they’re glorifying war. Gameplay wise, everyone–enemies, friends–all look the same; even 90% of the games feel exactly the same.
    Then there’s the noisy (both visual and audio) levels, the totalitarian linearity (of the single player), etc.

    1. Simon says:

      I loved the WW2 CoDs. It’s ironic, when they were new their approach of heavy scripting and cinematic moments felt genuinely refreshing and original. I thought it was really cool not to be the lone hero for once, but just be another russian soldier in Stalingrad, not even worth my own gun. It was half-game half-movie, but the movie part was so good I didn’t realize there could be anything wrong with that.

      Of course now they’ve replaced Saving Private Ryan with The Expendables… Maybe if they just had a good script the railroading wouldn’t actually be so bad?

      1. Eärlindor says:

        Those were great moments–feeling like you’re part of an army, and not just a silly Rambo loner, but a small part of something greater. :)

      2. Keredis says:

        “Maybe if they just had a good script the railroading wouldn't actually be so bad?”
        I think that sums up just about all railroading. If the writing is good, and it makes sense in context of the character, then the rails aren’t as bad. So continue the ‘railroading’ analogy, no one minds being on a train if it’s headed where they want to/expect to go. It’s only when the track direction starts making no sense or leads somewhere ‘wrong’ that it starts to annoy people.

    2. Zombie says:

      I hold the first 2 CoDs (and their expansion packs) and the PS2’s CoD: Big Red One as some of the greatest Shooters I’ve ever played. The Point Du Hawk mission in CoD 2, The beginning of the Russian campaign in CoD (the “One man gets a rifle, another man gets the bullets” thing was awesome). And Big Red One’s storyline was epic. You were a member of a squad, and by the end of the game your squad of like 7 to 8 people in the beginning is down to 2 of it’s original members. It hit home that whole “It is good that war is so terrible, lest we grow to fond of it” vibe, because you really got to know your squad, and they picked ways to kill them that made you angry that they died. Farewell CoD. You will surely be missed.

      1. Eärlindor says:

        I enjoyed Big Red One (rented on the Xbox), but there were times when it got really goofy, such as when your one squad holds off an ENTIRE division. -.-

        1. Zombie says:

          And the one time in Italy when like half your squad held off like a battalion of tanks with like 3 rocket launchers. But overall, it was an amazing game.

    3. Eärlindor says:

      Oh shite! That was suppose to be “90% of the GUNS feel the same”! >.<

      (Though all the games kinda play the same don’t they? xD)

  13. tjtheman5 says:

    Shamus, in response to your query, yes, that thing where you drive the boat into the helicopter is totally a real thing done by the Nave SEALs. I have a video of it here: <a http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wsq8ol9XJPY

    1. Paul Spooner says:

      All I’ve got to say is, if your helicopter has water sloshing into the cargo compartment, your either doing it very wrong, or very right. Seriously spooky sight when the pilot dips in the drink like that.

  14. Simon says:

    Seeing the helicopter extraction in MW3 was pretty cool. Seeing it done for real though is even cooler.

    Edit: Blast it, took too long to find the clip!

    1. tjtheman5 says:

      So wait, did I ninja you? Sorry. Still, that maneuver is awesome.

  15. Daemian Lucifer says:

    That thing with johny 5 was exactly what Ive mentioned a few days ago.Mandatory lose fights arent bad unless you make them like this:You lose if you get killed,but in the end you get killed just as well,only its ok this time because the plot says so.Its so stupid.

    Also,Im surprised you didnt mention the turrets in spec ops.There were some mandatory ones,but usually when there is a turret,there are a bunch of guys and you can either take them out conventionally,or you can rush the turret,kill the gunner,flip the turret and mow down the rest.

    1. Aldowyn says:

      There was a turret half way through the video they didn’t even mention, and I REALLY wanted to see Chris try and see if he could get to it and completely blow up their current argument XD

  16. RCN says:

    You know what an effective War Shooter would be? One where you’re just a soldier, and not the hero. Where you die and it isn’t back to the checkpoint, but “now you’re one of your surviving squadmates”. And once you’re out of squadmates you either go to another squad sent after or to another squad on another mission altogether. And sometimes you’re with a full platoon and get many “lives”.

    Now that I think about it, it sounds an awful lot to the first Rainbow Six. Haven’t played any after first Ghost Recon so I don’t know if it is an accurate portrayal of the series anymore…

    Oh, it also sounds like X-Com too. Neat!

    1. Spammy says:

      Battalion Wars kind of does this in a very loose sense. There’s no one unique player character and when the soldier or vehicle you’re controlling dies you just jump to another person or vehicle. Although what that usually came out to was just controlling the most specialized unit to keep it from getting killed by the AI.

    2. NonEuclideanCat says:

      What I would really like to see is someone actually make good on the promise of a “truly realistic military shooter” game. You’re some nameless soldier in the middle of fucking nowhere, doing set-pieceless missions. You go in with as much guns and ammo as a standard soldier would go in with, with standard body armor, and can only carry as much weight as trained soldier could be expected to carry.

      No regenerating health and no health bar. You can get shot between one and three times before you go down. The damage modeling is realistic, too: you get shot in the leg, you either stop walking or at least slow way the hell down, and in the latter case, your balance and aim are right fucked. You get shot in your right arm? You’re gonna be one-handing pistols in your bad hand for the rest of the game. No checkpoints, no continues; you die, you’re dead. And God help you if you get downed but don’t die and your squad doesn’t come back for you: you get to sit there, listening to the wind and your own breathing until your either die of thirst, bleeding out, or an enemy wanders by and shoots you. Your squadmates get the exact same, too.

      You want to take your enemies ammo? Sure! You just have to stop, manually look down, locate the ammo on their body, and pocket it. Also, ammo is not conserved between reloads; you throw away a half-empty magazine, you either lose those bullets completely or you’re carrying around a half-empty magazine that gets reloaded in at a random moment.

      For multiplayer, the same damage/death rules apply, but you also get permabanned from the server if you die.

      We’ll see how much these 9-year olds love their hyper-realism then.

      1. Eric says:

        So, basically, ARMA?

        1. 4th Dimension says:

          The only game to truly show what an insignificant little cog a single infantryman is. You could get killed in the first mission of Operation Flashpoint (predecessor of ARMA) without even seeing the enemy.

      2. monkeyboy says:

        Red Orchestra

        You will most likely be carrying a bolt-action rifle.
        You will most likely end up bleeding out without ever seeing the enemy.
        You fight over some pretty insignificant real estate.

      3. SoldierGeek says:

        Heh. Hyper-realistic shooter: Eight weeks of terrifying but ultimately boring patrols followed by a mortar attack while you’re sleeping, getting woken up in the middle of the night by outgoing artillery, having a truck get hit by an IED and getting to fire three rounds at extreme long range at a guy disappearing on a motorcycle, and spending three hours hiding behind cover due to an enemy “sniper”.

        Probably won’t sell very well.

    3. Keredis says:

      It’s not a War Shooter (at all!), but that’s pretty much the mechanic in the Disgaea spinoff “Prinny: Can I Really be the Hero?” You play as a mook with a special scarf, and if you die, the scarf passes on to another mook and you play as him. Until you die again.

  17. psivamp says:

    I only served on a sub for training, but I know that they don’t give guns to over half of the crew — ever. To repel boarders on a sub, the engineering crew turn off the lights and get fire hoses and wrenches — no joke, that’s what we’re instructed to do. Although, we’re also under the impression that it would never freaking happen ever.

    Oh, and further caveats, the procedure I’m referencing was from an out of service hull type that had been converted to a training platform and was no longer capable of diving or even moving under its own power.

    1. decius says:

      MTS 635 or MTS 626? When I went through Nuke school, the security procedure was “hit the red button to alert security, who will remotely lock down the doors and break out the heavy weaponry if needed”, where security was a detachment of bored marines who spent their entire day watching the cameras and inspecting the garbage truck for bombs.

      Don’t underestimate the value of firehoses and three-foot open-ended wrenches, although I think that cutting the lights basically requires cutting both AC and DC power, which would knock out the trim and drain pumps (which pressurize the firehoses). Or just hitting the bulbs with any object.

    2. Paul Spooner says:

      Right on. No sane person would ever board a submarine while there is someone alive aboard. It’s the ultimate “cornered wild animal” territory. There are too many places to hide, to many heavy objects, and way too many people jammed in there. Raven = case in point.

      Best plan, put on gas masks and gas the whole thing. In fact, the whole team is wearing re-breathers already, so all they have to do is not take off their masks and bring a few gallons of nerve gas or chlorine or something. But that would not be as “awesome” I guess.

      1. Jarenth says:

        Nerve gas is only slightly an atrocious war crime, which would go against the War-Hero-Captain-Awesome jingoism a little.

  18. Pteroid says:

    On a different note, what are the odds of a Spec Ops: The Line season? Or at least some small scale episodes in the vein of Half Life?

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      The game really isnt that interesting when you watch it.Especially if its chopped into episodes and you have people talking over it.

      1. Aldowyn says:

        Gameplay wise Spec Ops is like a really boring cover TPS. With sand. Not that interesting, TBH. Story wise I think we can (already have?) cover it in posts like he’s been doing it.

        Although I haven’t actually PLAYED it so I may not be qualified to say that :D

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          It is like that on the surface,but there are subtleties that pop up as you play,like the choices,and weird death screens,and stuff like that.

  19. Aldowyn says:

    I was under the impression that enlisted men on any navy ship don’t typically have guns unless they’re security or MP or whatever. I think some hulls are actually penetrable from the inside, certainly interior walls, and there would definitely be a lot of ricocheting going on. I’m sure in the event of boarding they could be distributed, but random crew members aren’t gonna pull M16s out.

    1. psivamp says:

      On a carrier, the MA’s (Master at Arms — basically security, but dumber) have M16’s, shotguns and pistols. Those jerks don’t even let the nukes fire guns for qualifications. And they’d probably not even fire a shot off if there were actual boarders — they’re pretty soft. We had a speed boat cross our bow without getting warning shots because they couldn’t follow orders to shoot on any incoming craft.

    2. Daemian Lucifer says:

      I think in most situations you have to worry about boarding on a sub when it is in dock.In which case it would be in a base,already full of armed personnel.

      1. ehlijen says:

        Ideally, but unusual situations might require the need to be able to secure a sub in a non military port, just in case.

    3. evileeyore says:

      As psivamp said, yes there are armaments on subs kept secured. Are there enough to outfit every man with an m16?

      Probably. Shotguns are a standard, not enough full a full crew, enough for Security personnel. M16s and M9s would also be present, probably enough for the full crew.

      I don’t have any handy friends in the navy at the moment, but the handful of nukes I’ve known over the years indicated they never trained with anything bigger than a 9mm pistol (the Baretta M9 specifically). But then, they were nukes (technicians and officers, not “fighting men”)

  20. Keredis says:

    I’m curious as to why the sub didn’t broadcast some type of distress call along the lines of “We’re being hijacked!”

    Also that apparently one submarine’s missiles being subverted is enough to sink enough ships to make the Russians pull back from their major, all-out assault on the super-strategic target of NYC. Apparently the ENTIRE REST OF THE US ATLANTIC FLEET was weaker than one Russian sub in terms of firepower? Or did the US fleet just weaken the Russians enough that this one single event was enough to tip the scales?

    1. RCN says:

      Its almost cute people think they actually gave that much thought to it.

      No offense. I too wish they did. But of course this is just yet another MW setpiece that’s there just so you can feel you’re winning the war single-handed.

    2. Torsten says:

      It is kind of comical how the game apparently tries to show the greatness of US army, but in this episode we see two times the heroes using enemy’s weaponry to win the fight. First the submarine missiles and then the Russian battle robot. The first rule of combat in Modern Warfare seems to be “get yourself an enemy weapon, they are better than ours.”

      1. Raygereio says:

        “The first rule of combat in Modern Warfare seems to be “get yourself an enemy weapon, they are better than ours.””
        Make that shooters in general. I’m flatout shocked when it’s not the case.
        Also, nice callback to the Operation Anchorage portion of FO3’s Spoiler Warning.

        1. Zombie says:

          What, is the sub five Sids long or something?

      2. Irridium says:

        It never really felt too overbearing with “US army is best army!”

        If anything, I’d say they’re glorifying the SAS. The US is constantly getting spanked, the US soldiers you control keep getting executed in cut-scenes, and the SAS just keep on truckin’, being badasses and the only memorable characters and whatnot.

    3. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

      I’m still wondering what on earth both navies are doing that close to the city? The guns on those ships can shoot over the horizon, let alone the missiles. Why would they park their fleets that close together and within range of any defenses in the city? I’m sure that if the army could bring up an MLRS battery, they could ruin the fleet’s day. So why are they so close?

      Why? Because we want New York City in the background, that’s why.

      *sigh*

      1. Syal says:

        What they don’t tell you is all those ships were supposed to be sunk to form an artificial reef. All the main character did was take credit for the Russian’s strategic ship-sinking. :)

        1. Jakale says:

          Perhaps they were, but I think New York is a bit far north for a proper reef climate. Russian oceanologists, of all people, should have known that. Could be they’re going for cold-water coral, but I’d still think a bay of New York would have pollution issues, which are likely to hinder the efforts of these brave ship scuttlers.

          1. Phantom Hoover says:

            I’m not sure if you’re joking, but even if you are it doesn’t really work because a reef is any hard object lying beneath the water.

      2. utzel says:

        It’s because the weapon range in a modern shooter is set to a mandatory maximum of about 200m. Some exceptions are allowed, for example a sniper section, but the next part has to compensate for this by having even bigger/longer range stuff used in what could be a hand-to-hand fight to maintain this average range.

        Either this or all military personnel is seriously near-sighted and the first attacks were launched against the strategic spectacles reservoirs :D

    4. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Ah,but you see the ships were shielded,and using their rockets bypasses iff,so they can get a direct hull hit.

      1. 4th Dimension says:

        And increase power to the deflector dish to reverse the polarity of tachiyon flow.

        1. newdarkcloud says:

          But wouldn’t a negative charge to the power matrix cause a subatomic phase shift!?

          1. Daemian Lucifer says:

            Not if you compensate with the flux capacitors or anti-neutrino condensators.

            1. newdarkcloud says:

              Of course! Ready the phozon emitters and activate the Lazarus vector!

          2. MintSkittle says:

            Does this mean they go back in time, pass into an alternate reality, or just jump to the far side of the galaxy?

            1. newdarkcloud says:

              (Shhhhhh. You’re not supposed to ask that. It might make people aware that we’re just talentless hacks.)

              What could you possibly know about this? Do YOU have a theoretical degree in physics?

              1. Daemian Lucifer says:

                I have 211 doctorates,including the ones in sub space physicism and negative alignment vectorology.

                1. 4th Dimension says:

                  and physics and computer science and astronomy and medicine and biology and geology and ….

  21. Keredis says:

    Also, I’d totally wear a T-Shirt with the saying “Failure is not permitted until it is mandatory” on it.

  22. St3althPyr0_37 says:

    I’d buy a failure is not permitted until its mandatory T-Shirt.

    1. psivamp says:

      Yeah, if someone can get some snappy graphics on there too, I’d pick one up.

      1. somebodys_kid says:

        Spoiler Warning should totally make a line of TShirts with many of their famous quotes! “Stop Shooting Me!” would make a good shirt (though not if you routinely run from the cops)

        1. JPH says:

          During one of the hangouts I specifically told Josh they need to start selling shirts with Reginald Cuftbert on them.

          1. ehlijen says:

            Also “I’m not a mercenary!”

            1. newdarkcloud says:

              “No children were harmed in our attempts to murder the children.”

        2. Hitch says:

          “Max carry weight=150+(Strengthx10)-Incinerator”

  23. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

    In one of the Spec Ops threads I speculated that this might be a culture/interest thing. I give additional evidence. Listening to the Spoiler Warning crew opine on the military matters is painful to this Army brat.

    Patrol boats are used all the time – in fact the USCG deploys ships to the Persian Gulf for harbor defense right now. And those ships out there are missile boats, a pretty standard piece of hardware in many navies which can’t afford something the size of one of our Ticonderogas.

    I’ll defer to people who have been around the military more recently than 1992, but having sergeants barking orders about who’s going to do what is pretty standard. The squads work as teams with many moving parts, and everything is done under orders. Beyond that, command and control from grunt to general is a major part of the American way of war (perhaps even modern warfare generally, though I don’t know how China fights). It’s part of the reason that the most dangerous person on a battlefield is a soldier with a radio, a compas, and a map (which these days can be very advanced, like the IVIS system). Asking for a chaotic battlefield where no one knows what’s going on is asking for a battlefield the army has spent 2 centuries trying overcome.

    The US is, right now, fighting a war with unmanned drones. They are mostly airborne, but the military has been trying to develop effective ground drones for at least a decade – and for exactly the reason the crew is joking about. We’d rather lose hardware than personnel. A remote controlled drone like this is not out of the question, but their use is currently limited to -well, something like this -a road. They just don’t handle rough terrain well.

    It’s definetely a Hollywood treatment of this stuff, going a long way on cool and not accuracy (you want accuracy, America’s Army is the game to go to). But for someone who is like me and finds this kind of thing interesting it is neat to see it in action -even if it is the Hollywood version (and some of that is overblown so much it feels like Roger Moore era James Bond, which killed the mood in places). On the other hand, if you don’t follow this stuff, don’t find it interesting, and generally don’t care about advances in drone technology, radios, future-soldiers, et cetera -then it might come across as a bit silly.

    1. False Prophet says:

      Asking for a chaotic battlefield where no one knows what's going on is asking for a battlefield the army has spent 2 centuries trying overcome.

      And yet friendly fire incidents still happen–in the open countryside of Afghanistan and Iraq, yet. How much more likely would they be in a major urban battle not seen since Stalingrad 1943, with one side not being poorly-armed insurgents, but between two well-equipped, highly trained professional national armies? Accurate maps and compasses are great and all, but how easy is it to get accurate floor plans of hundreds and hundreds of buildings, some of which are around a century old? The Bravo Two-Zero SAS team were some of the best special forces guys around, and still had their cover blown by a random goatherder. Much weaker enemies sometimes get lucky, shooting down stealth bombers or UAVs, or suicide-bombing destroyers. War is chaotic.

    2. False Prophet says:

      Actually, come to think of it, you hit the nail on the head. The MW are completely context-free, infantry/SpecFor porn. They show modern weapons and small-unit tactics being used in the most romanticized and fantastical possible, completely removed from any real-world political context, the limitations of geography or logistics, or human beings acting in a sensible manner.

      The Russians don’t act anything like a modern nation-state with limited resources, national interests, and some level of responsibility for their citizens. They’re more like COBRA from the 1980s G.I. Joe cartoon: they have limitless uniformed soldiers, can immediately land thousands of them on US soil as if the US Air Force and Navy don’t exist*, and what paltry motives they have are simplistic, juvenile ones like vengeance or sheer destruction, and not those of a modern nation-state.

      *Way back in the days of extremely limited resources, most military games were flight sims, submarine sims or some kind of strategy game. Nowadays it’s all Army, Marines, Delta Force and SEALs. When’s the last time the Air Force or Navy had a decent game title?

      1. ps238principal says:

        If you think this game is high on the unrealistic side, just wait until Red Dawn comes out.

      2. 4th Dimension says:

        Naval War: Arctic Circle is supposed to be a decent RTS that simulates naval combat in arctic circle circa 2020.

      3. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

        does HAWX count?

        1. 4th Dimension says:

          You mean that arcady FPS in the skies? No.

  24. Tam O'Connor says:

    You keep not picking up the P90s, and it saddens me. It’s the only assault rifle I’ve ever loved (From 007: Nightfire).

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      For some reason *coughcounterstrikecough* I hate that gun,and usually avoid using it.

      1. ehlijen says:

        But for other reaons *coughholygrailfornightfightinjaggedalliance2cough* I really like it for no good explanation.

  25. Torsten says:

    It took a moment for this to occur to me, but what is a Typhoon class submarine even doing in Hudson river during an attack to New York?
    They are the largest subs in the world and they are armed with ballistic nuclear missiles, so they would not take part in an attack to conquer anything but to destroy. And if they’d attack, they would do it from Russian territorial waters firing the nukes to the orbit.

    The meta-answer is it is there because it makes a cool setpiece, and because The Hunt for Red October made them famous, but isn’t this game about using real military hardware in real life like scenarios.

    1. Raygereio says:

      There’s a lot of stuff here that makes you go “Hey, wait a minute. What?” a few moments afterwards.
      For instance: why is a bomber-drone-thing doing a fly-by at most a mere 50 meters over a town that’s being bombed?

      1. 4th Dimension says:

        They are in India right. Then question is WHAT IS AN USA DRONE DOING IN INDIAN AIRSPACE!

    2. McNutcase says:

      It’s an Oscar-class. Smaller than the Typhoon, designed for anti-shipping work with conventional warheads.

      1. 4th Dimension says:

        Still no reason for it to be inside a bay where due to the smallnes of space it’s difficult for it to hide.

    3. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Well,to be fair,even with intercontinental missiles,its still preferable to be near the target when you fire them.Shortens the delay between deployment and impact.Although being right in the vicinity of enemy boarding teams is ridiculously close.

      1. Winter says:

        I think the bottom line is, if you’re in a sub and have to shoot the enemy with handguns something has gone horribly, horribly wrong and you should probably file a complaint with your superiors or something.

    4. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

      And why are they putting command and control on a submarine rather than, I dunno, Admiral Kuznetsov (and serieously, if you can look up the Flagship of the Russian North Fleet on Wikipedia…).

    5. ehlijen says:

      And why do the russians mine the very waters their entire fleet is parked in?

      You go from dodging mines to clamping charges on a sub in less than a minute of swimming!

    6. 4th Dimension says:

      Answer to above questions:

      GAAAAAAAMEEEEE AWEEEEEESOOOOMMMEE “LOGIIIIC”
      Shut up and enjoy exploding those filthy un-Americans.

      Basically you give WAAAY too much credit to developers when you think they thought about anything other than “How do we add MORE explosions! And AWESOME!”

      1. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

        The developers in previous games did a much better job. MW1 had the wire-frame cutscene showing the MEU’s ships far off the coast and then helicoptering in, for example. It’s evidence that “they” can do it, they just chose not too. MW3 was a major step down from MW1 and MW2. Even MW2 was a step in the wrong direction, but it was recoverable.

  26. FlashFire344 says:

    “I’m a shooter guy… shooter guy…” Will always run through my head when playing MW.

    1. Stash Augustine says:

      Laws of physics and logic need not apply… yeah I was just gonna post that.

      1. Aldowyn says:

        +1 to you guys too XD

  27. McNutcase says:

    Shooting inside a submarine would definitely be a recipe for having your eardrums meet in the middle, no matter how much ear protection you use. As for “one hole won’t sink it”, well, that very much depends on the size of the hole, how hard it is to get to, which compartment it’s in, and how close to the surface you are at the time, but the short answer is unintended holes in the pressure hull tend not to be survivable for a sub. Bear in mind, these things are built to go a thousand feet underwater; that’s a LOT of pressure to keep out. A hole at that depth won’t result in the crew drowning; the water will come in fast enough to cut them apart, and unless you can get to the surface RAPIDLY, to get that pressure off, you’re going to lose the ability to get to the surface. At which point, your choices are find some way to suicide, or wait for crush depth and get splatted into mush with everyone else.

    Now, that sub in New York harbour? That thing was barely submerged anyway. I’m not entirely sure it would actually be deep enough for an Oscar-class to get its sail under without scraping the keel on the bottom. So there’s that. Then there’s the fact that the pressure pulse from the mine would have fairly handily pulped the entire team; those things use high-brisance explosives, which means powerful shockwaves that water transmits very well. You’d have several wetsuits full of jelly, and no dudes ready to go sacrifice their hearing for America.

    My sole comment on the Johnny 5 murder extravaganza is that finally someone’s figured out what a minigun is for: insanely high rate of fire WITHOUT overheating. It drives me nuts when games give miniguns an overheat mechanism, because they’re specifically designed NOT to do that.

    1. Rosseloh says:

      They’re also designed to teleport rounds from some distant storage location directly into the chamber, correct? Because that’s what I’m seeing on this gun.

      And yeah, he was what, 20 feet from that explosion? Pulped or not, I would have at least expected to see him get thrown around a bit.

  28. postinternetsyndrome says:

    The boat sequence is nice, at least as a spectacle set piece. The UGV part though is a huge failure in game design. As they say in the video, the thing is destroyed by a scripted sequence anyway, but if you get it mangled before that point, it’s all utter failure. Also, they had that neat animation that showed the drone being all wrecked when it was destroyed by the game, but when you just get killed by enemy fire, it fades to black and gives you a text message. Resorting to text messages like that just shows that you suck at game design. Additionally, the gameplay design is so lazy. The vehicle movement is not modelled in any way at all, you just play as a slowed down ordinary player character with a minigun glued to your face. No sense of physical presence at all.

    I don’t have a huge problem with the basic premise of games like this. Like Josh says in the previous episode, I believe that there is a place in the world for them, but its method for keeping the leash short are so crude. Like that “follow this character” text that is visible in the middle of the screen at all times. Why is that needed? Because all characters look the same! If they had been designed so you could clearly tell Price apart from standard soldiers you could easily follow him without help. The text could at least be away in a corner of the screen where it is not covering up the action! And that text telling you that you can’t damage the helicopter with your gun is just pathetic. For years, the visuals of games have been capable of conveying “your bullets do not affect this target” by making them clearly bounce off and stuff like that. Such subtelty is beyond the workers in the modern warfare factory though. Why even bother to tell the player such a thing? The helicopter is only on screen for a couple of seconds. Letting the player waste a few bullets on it can’t possibly be a problem.

    There is no love put into the making of this game, only money. That is the real problem.

    1. Aldowyn says:

      That “your bullets do not affect this target” (or whatever it was) was IMO the most grievous insult that game could ever give… Just how dumb do you think we are?

      I am continually getting the impression that MW1 was a much, MUCH better game, and IW is going to get folded under in favor of Treyarch before too long…

      1. Gruhunchously says:

        Pretty sure IW doesn’t even exist any more. Most of them jumped ship after Modern Warfare 2.

  29. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Oh hey,you got an intel.Thats an interesting thing I wanted to discuss for quite a bit.

    Remember back in the day when shooters were new,and levels were huge,and we had both health and ammo to worry about.Back then,finding a secret rewarded you with much needed ammo and health.Sometimes you could even get a powerful weapon before its “regular time”.Not to mention that plenty of those secrets also were guarded by tough enemies,so we had to weigh in whether we want to get that secret stash,or if the ensuing battle wont be worth it.

    These days,thats just gone.You have practically unlimited health,and your ammo is either insanely large,or so minuscule that you cannot stockpile it between encounters.And having only two guns on you makes rare guns even less necessary.So having something meaningful in a secret stash is out of the question.Therefore,we get only crappy achievements.

    It really is a shame how health regen and 2 gun limit has not only diminished the strategy of resource management,but also stifled the exploration part of the games.

    However,there is one more path for having secrets/collectibles,but rarely do the developers want to bother with it.And thats flavor backstory,like in spec ops.Those little trinkets were really interesting,and in fact they are what made me endure the first few bland levels.

    1. SoldierGeek says:

      This was a feature that I thought HALO:ODST did well. There’s a great depth of backstory in the little discoverable audio and video clips. You don’t need to find them to understand the game, but if you take the time to track them down it can bet pretty rewarding. (It also helps that ODST is probably the least on rails of any of the HALO franchise.)

  30. Gruhunchously says:

    “You are hurt, take cover”
    “Your weapon cannot damage this vehicle”
    “Friendly fire will not be tolerated”
    “Shooting bullets at your enemies will hurt them”
    Right, okay.

    1. X2Eliah says:

      Laugh as much as you want, I personally kinda like the “Your weapon can’t hurt this vehicle” – I don’t like that it stays on for so long, but in the general sense, hell yes I want to know that kind of info, otherwise I’ll spend two/three minutes doing absolutely nothing beyond wasting bullets. When a game doesn’t inform you what works and what doesn’t – either by such a message or by visuals – then something’s very wrong with the designers. And frankly, shooting at a far helicopter with bullets among a Charlie Foxtrot of particle effects, idk how the game could visually inform you of the bullets doing 0 damage vs. bullets doing miniscule but cumulative damage over a long time.

      1. newdarkcloud says:

        Some things like “Take cover” are better left implicit. But pop ups that show useful information are quite welcome.

        True story, I nearly went through two helicopter fights in Half-Life (just started my first playthrough) without knowing that the energy rifle had a secondary fire. I was trying to dodge them and didn’t realize I could kill them just as easily.

      2. Eruanno says:

        I guess one of your teammates could scream “Shooting the helicopter with your rifle is useless, soldier! Let’s use those bullets on these unshaven filthy non-Americans instead!”

        1. Gruhunchously says:

          It would be rather odd if they said that verbatim, seeing as how neither you nor they are American. But it would be less intrusive than a message across the middle of the screen.

        2. X2Eliah says:

          Aye, something along those lines would actually be a decent solution to that.

      1. Daemian Lucifer says:

        That is brazillion kinds of awesome!

  31. Spammy says:

    Breach moments were cooler and made more sense in the Goldeneye remake because you were breaking down the door as James Bond. And of course you always know what your next objective is, you’ve got M watching you to make sure everything goes off right. Basically, Call of Duty gameplay makes mild amounts of more sense in the context of being Daniel Craig’s Bond.

  32. Lunok says:

    uhh as you guys were talking about none required turrets chris starred at one.

  33. JPH says:

    Call of Duty 4 actually had a decent amount of that illusion of player agency you guys were talking about.

    Man, that game had an extended stealth level. A real stealth level! You were in a Ghillie suit and you were sneaking around in these grassy areas. And if you got caught you could even keep going through the level, just with enemies hostile instead of patrolling! It was great.

    Compare that to every Call of Duty game since, where the “stealth sections” have just been exercises in following the orders of the guy immediately next to you.

    1. LunaticFringe says:

      I really liked the part in Modern Warfare where the SAS cuts the power to a building and you sneak in with night vision goggles and find soldiers stumbling around in the dark. It came off like a clever tactical move that showed how the SAS would take advantage of a situation. That move, grounded in a realistic idea, came off as more impressive then a silly invasion of a Russian sub that raises too many questions.

    2. False Prophet says:

      That stealth level was maybe my favourite part of the whole game. Probably because I always gravitate towards sniper rifles in shooters, and unlike most modern-era shooters, that level felt like how snipers in the bush would operate. And the climax was just visually great, since I played it well before the Pripyat ferris wheel became such an over-used icon.

      1. LunaticFringe says:

        What other game used the ferris wheel besides the STALKER series?

    3. Eärlindor says:

      Without a doubt my favorite level in all of CoD 4. The most freedom you ever had in those games.

      1. SoldierGeek says:

        The first stealth level was great. Later stealth levels lost a lot when they forced you to use stealth to succeed. Stealth should be the preferred way to perform the level, but the game should still continue if you come up with another, non-stealthy way to achieve the objective.

  34. Hitch says:

    I’ve been listening to Rutskarn too long. I can’t believe Shamus wasn’t making the greatest/worse (same thing) pun even at the beginning of the episode, but no one reacted. Coming up through the water underneath the submarine and he says, “This is totally breaking my sense of immersion.” You can’t get more immersed that that!

  35. I love how at around the 11:30 mark Rutskarn pretty much turns into a Max Headroom Jr.
    No clue what I’m talking about? Here’s some nostalgia for ya. Max Headroom, for comparison. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEIE2q7kvxQ

  36. Cody211282 says:

    I take it the next MW is just going to cut the pretext and be a rail shooter?

  37. ps238principal says:

    Since Mumbles isn’t here, I’d like to point out that Rutskarn’s pronunciation of “ricochet” as “reckishay” needs to be added to his wiki, next to “composs.”

    1. Dante says:

      I was just about to post about that!

  38. Ian says:

    Talking about being forced to perform actions to progress. Spec Ops also forced you to execute that guy in the tutorial. I tried to just shoot him and it forced me to put my gun away and stand over him until he recovered enough and then I could shoot him again. But it would never be fatal. It was comedic after 4 or 5 times.

    It’s certainly better but it’s still a forcing and jarring thing if you don’t want to kill a wounded man who can’t hurt you. Or perhaps he is Connor MaCleod of the clan Macleod and he will only die if you take his head…

    1. Stash Augustine says:

      Mass Effect 3 ends the tutorial mission when you run out of ammo, which was an issue for my second playthrough as a level 30 adept.

  39. WILL says:

    Oh, Modern Warfare THREE.

    Oh. There’s your problem. Should’ve played 1, 2 or Black Ops. Any other is awful.

  40. TMC_Sherpa says:

    Ah progress.
    When did the industry loop back to Get Lamp? I mean the net progress seems to be pretty pretty pictures and automatic saves so the Grue never eats you.

    *Old man voice*
    Back in my day you could lose a computer game because of something you did or didn’t do 8 hours ago. Now Get off my lawn!
    */Old man voice*

    I think one of the problems with gaming is if you’re going to make me the protagonist in whatever grand story you have cooked up heck yeah I’m going to try and do things my way (Ask any DM worth their salt how ‘cooperative’ their players get when you try and railroad them). If you’re putting me in a position where I have to open the dang hallway door in a horror movie (for example) you just turned me into an idiot. Thanks game, that’s totally the character I was trying to play (I think that’s the biggest reason I HATE the boss fights in Deus Ex:HR. I just spent the entire game sneaking around in the frick’n air ducts but I’m going to walk right into that cut scene and get jumped. Go me!).

    I have more to say on the subject but right now I’m kinda frothing too much so I’ll sit back and cool my jets for awhile.

    Sherpa

  41. Winter says:

    Yeah, i’ll just leave this here.

    Please note: this is a different game from what they’re playing in Spoiler Warning. I know it might be hard to tell them apart, but it’s true!

  42. Thomas says:

    I feel like Rutskarn and Josh have the better position on this than Shamus. There’s space for games like this and they aren’t all out awful (some of that I kinda wanted to play) but there are things which they’re lacking which they could learn from other games.

    Part of it though, is these games are definitely meant to cater for people who like military stuff (and this is time to think of that West Wing speech gun control speech) and a lot of the guided stuff actually gives a better sense of that than it would if it were free reign. People talk about One Man Army with these games, but actually it’s Half Life that’s the One Man Army, these are One Squad Army and part of the purpose is to convey a sense of a squad doing cool awesome things, like opening doors together, and walking together through a battlefield

    1. Sabrdance (MatthewH) says:

      Agreed. Though I wish they would implement a little better. Black-Ops has this great stack-up on the door mechanic and it’s done, maybe twice in the entire game. I’d love to be able to do that on any door. Mass Effect 2 managed bullet time in the campaign and Republic Commando managed to stack up on the door. Combine the two together and it’d be a great way to get that “squad based shooter” feeling that the original CoD was trying to promote.

  43. Cyranor says:

    Its odd how I can like a game like Cryis 2 that is the same vein as these Modern Warfare games (with a sci-fi twist). But then the MW series is just blatantly boring. I’ve played MW 1 and 2 and while 1 was decent 2 was just awful and 3 looks even worse. Is it because Crysis 2 actually seemed to care about the single player campaign where as mw 3’s sp campaing is the dev’s excuse for why they can charge $60 for multiplayer deathmatch?

    I did however feel crysis 2 dumbed down all that was good in crysis (Instead of cool flying octopus aliens we get those aliens in humanoid exoskeletons that make them slower, and easier to kill) but it was still a fun game to play. You had some player agency as to how you approached thing unlike the MW games

  44. SoldierGeek says:

    About the Zodiac exfil … that’s a real tactic. I haven’t seen it performed with a CH-46 like in the game, but have seen it with a Chinook. Aircrew hovers just over the water with the ramp flooded so the Zodiac can run right up the ramp into the bird. It’s pretty high risk, so not a “normal” operation. Neat to see it in the game.

    I do think the series has degraded since MW1. I’d like to see a return to more open levels where you can vary your approach and tactics and succeed with a variety of strategies. There were levels in the prior games that weren’t so much on rails and were more fun: the sniper levels and the seizure and defense of the McDonald’s are good examples. CoD has better overall individual gameplay but Ghost Recon 2 did a bit better for allowing more freedom of maneuver.

    I like the CoD series for the cinematic set pieces (fighting through Washington DC up to and through the White House in MW2 was pretty cool), but have to turn my brain off in between missions because the linkage between and the overarching story just make no sense whatsoever.

    One thing beyond Michael Bay-scape cinematography that CoD:MW does well is the weapons and other military hardware. While there are certainly Hollywood elements to them (*cough*mingun-UGV*cough*) most of the small arms and sights are pretty accurate to look, feel, sound, reload technique, and so on (minus lethality … lots of Hollywood there). I’m a military professional and have handled a lot of the weapons that show up in the MW series and they mostly get it right. It’s fun to see some obscure bits of hardware pop up, from the AA-12 automatic shotgun, to the XM25, to the SCAR, and so on. (CoD:Black Ops screws this up, though — they insert a bunch of hardware that was invented in the late 90s into their Vietnam-era scenario.)

  45. Chauzuvoy says:

    I am way too young to have the Boat-helicopter transition remind me of Night Rider.

  46. lucky7 says:

    And seriously, subs are CRAMPED.

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