The Brave News

by Ryan Tavera

In 2007, developer Infinity Ward changed the video game industry for years to come and sparked an extensive amount of shooter games to be released, namely Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. The game exploded in popularity and was what many considered the glory days of the Call Of Duty franchise. 

In recent years, however, the franchise has begun to take a dip in quality and originality. The majority of fans are simply not as excited for the new games as they used to be. This year Call Of Duty returns to its “modern roots” with a reboot that many are considering the franchise’s greatest moment.

Call of Duty is a military first-person shooter that continues to be one of the biggest franchises in gaming. Publisher Activision annually releases a new entry developed by different studios and it’s always one of the top-selling games for that year.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is exactly what fans have been wanting for the past 5 years, simple boots on the ground modern military shooter. Modern Warfare ditches all the futuristic themes and weaponry seen in previous installments such as Black Ops 3 and 4 likewise the hero-shooter aspects of previous games have been removed, there are no more special powers cluttering up multiplayer matches.

Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare is a reboot of the Modern Warfare franchise. The game takes place before the events of the first installment Call Of Duty 4 Modern Warfare and since this is a reimaging of the franchise, Infinity Ward has plenty of room to reimagine previous events and create new ones, likewise, Infinity Ward can play around with characters how they see fit.

Speaking about the story one of Modern Warfare’s strongest aspects is the Campaign itself. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the Modern Warfare’s Campaign it is easily the strongest one I’ve played this decade.

Each level is constructed to play different and give a sense of variety one mission you play as a swat team raiding a house in the suburbs at midnight taking out enemies one by one silently with your squadmates, clearing each floor slowly and methodically.

The next you play as a marine sitting on top of a building fending off waves of enemy soldiers that slowly make it closer to the point you’re defending, yet you continue to hunker down and defend the point guns blazing.

Somewhat innovative, but effective, yes. This generation’s Call of Duty campaigns has a “thrill ride” reputation, a procession of set piece moments with no time to catch your breath. Modern Warfare is more deliberately paced, and better off for it

There’s an intimacy to Modern Warfare’s campaign that I find frightful and fascinating all at once. The game has a gritty realistic tone to it, Infinity Ward really nailed making the player feel as if they were in a real war.

There are only two cons that come to mind when thinking of Modern Warfare’s campaign, sadly its to short for its own good and lacks any real controversy. Modern Warfare hopes to garner prestige from its realistic weapons, great graphics, and lively landscapes but at its core, it tries to be a serious commentary on present-day conflicts yet falls short due to the lack of confronting anything that’s actually controversial.

Ultimately what I took away from the campaign was that Infinity Ward wanted to remind players that “modern warfare” isn’t black-and-white as it was in earlier Call of Duty games focusing on the heroes of World War II.

Neither the enemy nor the “good guys” tend to play fair. War is ugly and messy, and Modern Warfare is an attempt to replicate that. It refuses to gloss over the horrors of war and glorify it in the same way as the previous Call of Duty games.

Moving on to the meat and potatoes of the game, the multiplayer. Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare’s multiplayer comes with two halves: Competitive multiplayer and co-operative Special Ops. Progression carries over between these two modes, and bits of the story also cross over between the campaign and Special Ops, while multiplayer maps are often clearly inspired by levels in the campaign.

Modern Warfare’s multiplayer maps have changed quite significantly and possibly for the worst. For starters, Infinity Ward has essentially ditched the three-lane map layouts that players have become used to. Now the maps are quite large, maybe too large for the average six vs six-match, most maps are littered with positions for players to hunker down and sit it one spot. This combined with the very fast TTK (time-to-kill) can lead to a much slower and methodical way of playing.

Personally, I welcome the change of pace to the multiplayer, although at first, it was harder to get used to the slower gameplay and bigger maps. However, the more I played I began to adapt to the new gameplay and found myself having better games and more fun.

Although running and gunning may not work as well as in previous games there are plenty of ways the player is able to tweak their classes to the way they like to play. This brings me to my next point the customization that is given to the player.

Modern Warfare has introduced a new class system called the gunsmith which allows the player to choose up to 60 different attachments for each weapon. That may sound a little overwhelming but the game tells you exactly what each attachment will do to your gun and how it will change its performance.

Each attachment has a clear set of pros and cons, listing exactly what stats are affected and how. For example, you can change the stock of your rifle and gain ++ Aim Walking Movement Speed and + Movement Speed, but at the expense of — Recoil Control, — Aiming gun steadiness and — Idle Sway Control.

What this amount of customization means is you can precisely change and fine-tune your weapon to suit the way you play. The gunsmith opens up a whole other aspect to the multiplayer and way more replay value. As each weapon has up to 60 attachments this will allow players to grind the game and choose the weapon that best suits them.

All in all Modern Warfare is desperately what the Call Of Duty franchise needed. Its a return to form with added features and a great campaign, it’s really the whole package. I can easily recommend this game to anybody who enjoys FPS (first-person shooter) games. The community is excited to see what Infinity Wards plans are regarding Modern Warfare in 2020.