Same old "Run & Gun" multiplayer, with a few minor quirks & a fun, but pitifully short Campaign.
Being a big shooter fan & after months of enjoying Gears of War, Halo 3 & Rainbow Six Vegas online, I was really looking forward to Call of Duty 4.
As with all shooters, I tried the campaign first.
I have to say, first impression was wow, this is intense..... then after that initial impression...... the campaign was over.
Yep, on default difficulty the campaign took me just 5 hours to complete. I read in other reviews that the campaign was short, but I didn't think it would be laughably short.
Don't get me wrong, a couple of the missions are really well done: "Death from Above" when you're in an AC130 gunship using nightvision & 3 badass guns to take out the enemy below will definitely make you say "Oh Snap !" at some point.
Also "All Ghillied Up" when you're part of a 2 man sniper team, dressed in full camo "Ghillie" suits sneaking up on & sniping enemies is great fun. This is probably my favourite mission, especially the intense conclusion, which was the only part of the game I found challenging on default difficulty.
Sadly though, while the rest of the campaign is intense & with lots of enemies to kill, it is very samey: Get from point A to B, kill everything in sight & blow up some stuff.
Now on to the multiplayer:
Like I said, I played through the campaign before tackling multiplayer, so off I went only to find that everyone else had more powerful weapons than me, they all had scopes for their rifles & they all had better "Perks". It wouldn't be so bad if the game could find you a match, where you play people of similar rank (Like Halo 3) but in some rooms, I was playing against a load of Generals, which normally wouldn't bother me, because I like a challenge & I am pretty decent at shooters in general.
But with the case of Call of Duty 4 which has this daft reward system, that unlocks weapons, weapon attachments & better "Perks" the higher you rank up.
"Perks" include: "Sleight of Hand" which decreases your reload time by up to half. "Double Tap" which increases your rate of fire. "Overkill" which allows you to carry 2 main weapons i.e. 2 assault rifles or assault rifle & shotgun or assault & sniper etc. etc. "Eavesdrop" which allows you to listen in on the other teams comm chatter. "Dead Silence" which allows you to move silently.
Unfortunately the really useful Perks aren't unlocked until you're ranked really highly, so if you're in a room full Generals you'll be playing against better players, with better weapons & all the good "Perks" which really unbalances the multiplayer a great deal. It's not too bad once you unlock the reflex & sniper scopes. Aiming becomes easier & you'll be nearer the top end of the kill rankings after a game, especially if you start getting kill-streaks to call an air-strike or chopper support. You also have the ability to lay traps, so if you're sniping from a rooftop, you can plant a claymore mine, so if an enemy tries to sneak up behind you, they get blown to bits !
But despite these fun & interesting additions, it lacks the innovation, shown by games like Gears of War & Rainbow Six which both utilise a simple, but well executed cover system to break away from the standard run around & shoot everything technique & allows you to be a bit more tactical. Or in the case of Halo 3, vehicle combat, which is just plain fun. Or even going as far back as Ghost Recon A.W. - issuing squad commands (In Single player)
COD4 doesn't utilise anything like this other than deciding where you want to place your airstrike & as a result the pace of the game is almost breakneck, so you either end up just running & shooting or staying in one place, picking people off, which was fine 10-15 years ago, when multiplayer shooters were still in their infancy, but nowadays, you expect a bit more.
COD4 might be the most polished "Run & Gun" game available, but it really doesn't bring anything new to the table & the unbalanced multiplayer might put a lot of rookies off the game.
The campaign is great in places, but disastrously short.
The graphics & sound are good, but nothing special.
I still don't understand why this won so many Game Of The Year awards, especially when you look at other games that could have won: Halo 3, Bioshock, Mass Effect, The Orange Box, Crysis, Warhawk, Forza 2, Assassin's Creed & The Darkness. All of which offered new innovations & had a lot more depth.
Ultimately Call Of Duty 4 falls short on both campaign & multiplayer. To put it simply, there are just better shooters out there. Although it is well polished & the controls are sharp, it does nothing new & plays just like a straightforward shooter. But this hasn't stopped it becoming hugely popular, which shows what you can do with a well-oiled Hype Machine.