Call of Duty has been in my gaming library since Call of Duty 4 on the Xbox 360. I remember jumping on and playing with my then middle school friends and playing for hours on what was at the time one of the best multiplayer games ever made. Since then, I have been a regular buyer of CoD that has only increased with the inclusion of Warzone, the (frequently frustrating) battle royale free-to-play mode that took the gaming world by storm in early 2020. And with Activision taking the helm this year to bring us Modern Warfare II, I am happy to say the game looks and feels fantastic.
Story
First the bad. If anyone has bought a CoD game, most likely they skip over the campaign and go into the multiplayer. And most of the time that is for good reason. Similar to majority of CoD games, Modern Warfare II presents a disappointing campaign with a lackluster story and weak mission design. Compared to its 2019 predecessor Modern Warfare II and the much better 2009 namesake, Modern Warfare II's campaign is forgettable.
The six-hour campaign, surprisingly, takes you away from the Middle East and drops you into Mexico for majority of it. From there you sneak, fight, sneak, fight, snipe, sneak, fight and jump from truck to truck to get to the final objective of killing enemy #1. And while Modern Warfare II may look absolutely gorgeous from a graphical standpoint to bring a sense of realism to the game, there are instances where the game turns into an action movie. Thankfully, some of these bits are fun (helicopter dangling anyone?) even if they are unrealistic.
The campaign does have some new mechanics but are pretty outdated. In a couple of missions, you are forced to scavenge the area for materials to create smoke bombs and lethal weapons to get through the mission. While it is new to CoD (and most likely trying to give us a hint at what their Demilitarized Zone mode will be in the future), this mechanic was shown off and mastered two generations ago (i.e., The Last of Us Part I).
The campaign does have some nostalgia with characters from the 2009 game returning to fulfill their roles (and twists), but it does not have that much else going for it. Even the characters that we meet in the 2019 Modern Warfare (i.e. Farah Karim) only show up for one or two missions, which is a shame because they are not there long enough to grow or even seem relevant to the overall story Modern Warfare II is trying to make you care about.
The campaign is also much harder than many would come to expect from a CoD game. While many would see these campaign as a chance to shoot enemy soldiers with a ton of bullets, the AI has gotten a lot tougher. On normal difficulty, you will die in a couple of shots or if a rocket is even close to your vicinity. Which is annoying for gamers who are not looking for that type of challenge and is just trying to get through the campaign.
Overall, the story is nothing unique. It has moments of fun but outside of that, it can be a real snooze fest to get through.
Multiplayer
Multiplayer, on the other hand, is a fun experience. The assortment of types of matches has not changed much in recent years. While there are some new modes, majority of players will be happy with their Team Deathmatch, Kill Confirmed, Domination and Headquarters.
What has changed drastically year to year are the leveling up of weapons and Modern Warfare II is no exception. Every CoD installment includes a vast selection of weapons for you to use and level up in order to unlock attachments that effect your usage / dominance in multiplayer (and Warzone but more on that later). However, there's a catch to this year's game, which has divided the fan base.
The major challenge that majority of players would agree with is the actual leveling up of weapons. To start off the leveling up of a single weapon is limited - rarely will you see a weapon's level go past 25. However, when you do max out your weapon of choice (e.g., the M4 assault rifle), not all attachments will be unlocked. In order to further to unlock those attachments, you need to level up other weapons. On one hand it's great to have new attachments unlocked as you progress through the multiplayer process as it keeps older weapons new and fresh. However, it can be quite exhausting to do so. For instance, if you have a weapon you love to use in other CoD games (e.g., the MP5 submachine gun), it may not be unlocked until you unlock it through using a certain weapon, which may also be locked until you use a certain weapon, etc. The weapon tree diagram is complex for sure as the ability to use a sniper may require you to level up an assault rifle, battle rifle and submachine gun to get to it.
A new concept added to this year's mutliplayer is your ability to tune your weapon. Once you max out (level wise) a weapon, you will be able to tune each of the five selected attachments to further enhance the effectiveness for your weapon. When you activate the tuning option for any attachment, it will provide you with two sliding scales with certain attributes connected to each. The more you scale the weapon towards a certain attribute (e.g., Aim Down Sight Speed), the less effective your weapon will be in the other (e.g., Damage Range). This allows players to further modify weapons to their play style and possible negate, if just slightly, the possibility of a meta weapon to use in multiplayer and Warzone.
User Interface (UI)
Before we move on, I want to address the UI for Modern Warfare II. For gamers who have been around since Call of Duty 4 or the 2009 Modern Warfare II, you will remember when you would be able to see your primary and secondary weapons, tactical equipment and perks all on the same page. Granted the multiplayer system was not as complex as it is currently but the UI system is absolutely overdone. In order to modify attachments for weapons, you need to go through multiple screens just to get there. If you want to go to your perks, you need to back out of all of those screens and go into the perk section. It may not sounds like a big deal but it is a hassle to get through and the game does stutter quite often in the menus. Whether the UI system is at fault for this, I do not know but it has to have something to do with it.
Overall, the multiplayer system is fun and addicting. It has been quite a while since I had this much fun in CoD multiplayer (maybe Black Ops 2 or 4?).
Warzone 2.0
The major component, which will be the reason why everyone plays multiplayer, is the addition of Warzone 2.0. When the first Warzone came out in early 2020, it was a huge hit with the CoD community as the second battle royale (Black Ops 4's Blackout mode was the first). Players were able to take the loadouts they spent hours perfecting in multiplayer and brought them into a new game mode to play with their friends. However, Warzone became a huge problem as it continued with increasing issues of cheating and a movement system that probably destroyed joysticks, controllers, and fingers to properly use. While Activision did come out with their Anti-Cheating system Ricochet, the game was almost too stressful for players who wanted to play casually against other players who spent hours and hours perfecting their slide cancelling moves around corners of buildings and doorways. Oh...and let's not forget that the main map, Caldera, was terrible and majority of the player base switched to the smaller maps (e.g., Rebirth Island) to get their Warzone experience. However, Warzone 2.0 looks to be a huge improvement so far for the franchise with a map, some interesting in-game events and small quality of life changes to the overall gameplay.
New Map: Al Mazrah
Let's start off with Al Mazrah, a fictious game setting with a bunch of nostalgia points of interests (POI) and a drastic improvement over its predecessor. The map includes different terrains ranging from desert hill tops, industrial settings, and a new downtown area amongst others for you to explore. It brings the franchise back into modern times, which Caldera was lacking with its World War II setting.
Gameplay
Similar to the previous installment, Warzone 2.0 allows you to play solo, or in groups of two, three or four, with a total of 150 players per game. You start out in a plane and skydive off to go to various locations on the map. The first major change (at least at the time of this review) is the inability to shoot people out of the sky. This was an aspect of the original Warzone that seems to have been removed for better or for worse (guess you do not have to worry about going to the Gulag just yet).
Upon landing on the map, you start off with a handgun and two armor plates, which is the max you start out with but you can find 3-armor plate satchels across the map. The first major change is the looting system. Upon starting the game, you begin with a small backpack where you are able to store tactical equipment, killstreaks, money, and ammo as you scavenge for supplies on Al Mazrah. This backpack is separate from your person, which includes your primary and secondary weapon slots, your primary tactical equipment, armor plate satchel, mask, and self-revise slots. This new system will take time to get used to for a couple of reasons:
- You can no longer pick up every single piece of ammo you find on the map. Each piece of ammo takes up a slot in your backpack, which will limit your ability to pick up additional things (armor plates, killstreaks, etc.). Most players will focus on finding ammo that pertain to their weapons they currently have.
- You can hold as many of specific types of equipment as you want. Do you have 12 armor plates? Go ahead! Do you just want to hold killstreaks? Why not! Do you want to hold five different gas masks? I mean....sure if you want to. The game limits your ability to pick up certain pieces of equipment while allowing you to manage the types of equipment you want to horde as you go through the game.
You are able to find bigger backpacks that allow you to hold more equipment (and a third weapon) so there is room to expand your equipment base if you so choose.
The gas zones / circles have also been modified. Instead of having one circle continually shrink as it progresses, Warzone 2.0 has added the ability for the circle to divide into two or three circles that eventually collide together in the endgame. Personally, I like this change as it keeps the game moving and limit's the potential of campers in the middle of the circle waiting it out until the end of the match.
Another major change is the acquisition of your loadout. Similar to the previous installment, Warzone 2.0 allows you to create loadouts that you leveled up in multiplayer to be used during the game. However, the way you acquire your loadout has changed significantly. In the original Warzone, you were able to purchase a loadout from any buy-station across the map for $10,000. This has been removed, with the caveat that you purchase your primary weapon only for $5,000. In order to get your full loadout (primary, secondary weapons and perks, etc.), you will need to complete certain tasks that are made available throughout the map. These are in the form of strongholds where you need to complete a certain task (e.g., defuse a bomb) in order to get your full loadout. These POIs are surrounded by enemy AI, which can deal quite a bit of damage if not taken seriously. I am not the biggest fan of including enemy AI into this game mode but thankfully they are only limited to these POIs around the map (a horde will not show up in the final circle). The other way you can get your loadout is when the game automatically drops them around the 3rd circle. However, these loadout drops are community loadout boxes (aka everyone sees these boxes, and anyone can use them). No longer does your team have a specific loadout drop. It creates another level of uncertainty of getting your loadout with the possibility of someone camping it.
The buy-stations have changed a little bit as well. In addition to buying your primary weapon, you are also able to buy certain killstreaks of equipment (self-revive, gas mask, etc.). However, there seems to be limitations for the amount of what equipment you want. For instance, in the original Warzone a team could buy three UAVs at one time - this seems to have changed to one to limit a team's ability to progress around the map knowing where other teams are for a long amount of time.
The Gulag has also been revamped. Instead of a 1v1 match, it is now a 2v2 but the goal remains the same: kill the other team. If you die but your teammate kills the other team, you are brought back into the game as well. However, if the game takes too long the prison guard (in the look of a juggernaut comes in) to try to kill you. This creates the unique opportunity to join up with the other team and kill the prison guard. If you are successful, both teams come back into the game. How do you get the other team to do this...well Warzone 2.0 has a new mechanic...
The biggest change to the game by far is the use of proximity chat. If turned on, you will be able to hear other teams in the game that are in your area. This creates a fun aspect where you can communicate (aka trash talk) with the other team before you engage. It also lets you know if someone is in the area you are currently exploring...or are camping. The one hiccup with this mechanic is the inability to direct where the voices are coming from. In other games that use this mechanic (Escape From Tarkov comes to mind), you can have the ability to know where the voice is coming from on the map, which helps you navigate a certain gunfight. With a game that heavily relies on audio cues, it is surprising to see proximity chat not used to its fullest extent possible. However, I can see this being built upon as Warzone 2.0 continues to grow.
The last thing I want to touch upon is movement. At the beginning of this section, I mentioned how the original Warzone's movement was so fast paced with some of its mechanics (e.g., crouch sliding). Warzone 2.0 seems to have slowed down a bit to make it more realistic. Gone are the days of players using a stim to increase their speeds and crouch sliding into rooms and around corners. So far, the slowed down movement seems to work and the ability to take down teams has been focused on your ability to aim and shoot (which is the whole point of the game).
There are some things that need to be addressed throughout the lifespan of Warzone 2.0. The time-to-kill (TTK) for guns will continue to decrease as gamers find the right attachments (and tuning options) to find the next meta gun that majority of the community will use. It will be up to Activision and Raven Software to continue to modify weapons to ensure the game does not fall into the same holes the original Warzone fell in time and time again.
Demilitarized Zone (DMZ)
To be added later...
Graphics & Audio
Modern Warfare II, when put on the right settings, looks amazing. With an NVIDIA GeForce 3080, I was able to play the campaign at 4K getting 100-110 frames per second (FPS) with the GPU capacity at 98-99%. I was able to reduce the resolution slightly to play at a high framerate as well that maxed out around 120-130 FPS. Regardless, the game seemed to run smoothly throughout the campaign. For multiplayer and Warzone, I reduced majority of the settings to low or normal and was able to get 150-170 FPS, pending on the game mode. Again, the game played smoothly with the latency of 5.0 - 8.0 ms.
Similarly to Modern Warfare (2019), the audio is loud and sharp. The gunfights are immersive and the in-game effects of explosions, grenades and gunshots are top notch.
Verdict
Overall, Modern Warfare II is a great installment and a welcome back to modern times for the Call of Duty franchise. The campaign itself is lackluster but a strong multiplayer base, a fun Warzone and an interesting DMZ mode make this game a must play for fans of first-person shooters. It has been quite a while since I have this much fun playing a Call of Duty game and I cannot wait to see what Activision et. al has in store for this franchise moving forward.
Campaign: 6.0/10
Multiplayer: 9.0/10
Warzone 2.0: 9.0/10
DMZ: TBD
Score: 8.0/10