Call of Duty 2

For years now, my friends have been playing Call of Duty online and raving about how cool it is to play war in a fake environment, competing against arbitrary dickheads who hate losing. A quick search of the internet will reveal montages of rage quitters, screamers, and pathetic losers who will threaten to come beat you up for being better at a game than them. As per previous reviews, my sheer will to avoid said dickheads means I will more than likely never play an online Call of Duty title. This made Call of Duty 2 appear to be the only viable COD game for me to play.

Call of Duty 2 is the first Xbox 360 release of the series. It doesn’t have any online achievements, thus no need for me to play it online. During the campaign, you play as various soldiers of Russian, British and, of course, American descent as you re-enact some of the battles spanning World War II.

The thing I liked most about the game play is that a head shot actually counts as a fatal wound for your enemies even on the hardest difficulty. Gone are the heads of the future which can take 50 plus bullets without so much as a flinch from the enemy and I absolutely love it.

However, that said, and I will probably be criticised for saying this, the aiming mechanic is shit. I am playing a game, I don’t want a real re-enactment of World War II where my guns are shit because it’s World War II and the only way to fire an accurate shot is to get a sniper rifle or be close enough to the enemy to poke him in the eye.

There is not really much to the game outside of killing enemy soldiers and advancing to the next checkpoint. Sometimes you have to defend certain buildings when you are getting attacked from all directions and there are a few vehicle sections where you have to ride along defending the vehicle from enemies. These are some of the most frustrating bits of the game. There is also a separate tank level where you actually drive a tank but this was thankfully quite easy.

It’s an early game so the graphics aren’t breathtaking and the in-game environments are the tragic brown-grey that symbolise the era’s attempts at realism. Also I did find myself getting caught on every piece of the environment going which is painfully irritating in the middle of a gunfight. I don’t enjoy being a sitting duck in the slightest.

Achievements – 1,000 Points – 13 Achievements

As with many early releases, the game didn’t really play around too much with the achievement system which makes this section of the review relatively easy to write. There is no variety, no collectibles or no get x amount of headshots. You simply have to complete every mission. On the hardest difficulty.

I’m not going to pretend to be good at shooters. Far from it. If my job was to pick up downed allies and hold a control zone, fine. But killing loads of dudes is not my strong suit. Thankfully Call of Duty 2 recognises this your AI companions/cannon fodder, of which there is nearly always an unlimited amount, can do most of the killing and dying for you.

That said, the game is still an unforgiving bitch to complete on the hardest difficulty and I must have died at least seven-million times. Generally the checkpoints are forgiving enough but sometimes the game is just ridiculous. In most areas, there is a finite amount of enemies but sometimes, and on one level in particular, I had an enemy spawn in behind me and then instantly kill me from point blank range, stemming choruses of ‘fuck off, you fucking game.’

Downloadable Content – N/A

Eventually I bludgeoned my way through although my sense of perseverance took a serious hammering. Call of Duty 2 has not inspired me to step into the franchise. I may give another title another go in the future but it won’t be for several years I think.