Call of Duty:World at War, Single Player

I somehow keep getting sucked into playing WWII games and their counterparts even though I’ve been incredibly sick of the genre since Call of Duty 2. CoD4 was surprisingly good so I don’t regret being pushed into purchasing that, but I am glad I was only pushed into borrowing Bad Company from a friend. The same thing happened with Call of Duty: World at War. My neighbor has a copy and Slevin has been playing it quite frequently, so I figured I’d give it a shot. I never bothered before because for one, Treyarch doesn’t really have the best track record when it comes to Call of Duty games and two, they went back to WWII as the setting. One thing I always hated about WWII games was the iron sights most guns required for aiming instead of the vastly superior red dot scopes. That and more importantly, how many bloody times can you tell the same story? I’ve sacked Berlin more times than I've stopped Ganondorf!

Anyway, the game is actually pretty good. It feels a lot like CoD4, but just about every war shooter I play these days does. Bad Company certainly did, with slightly more retarded controls. Still, they captured the feel of what made Infinity Ward’s series so popular to begin with. I applaud them for that, but I grew tired of that feel back with CoD2. 4 was a nice change of pace because it was a modern setting, they did some of the coolest stuff I’ve seen with first person storytelling (that ending still gives me chills), and they mixed up the action a bit better than just adding the standard plane and tank missions. That gillie suit stealth sniper mission was both an incredibly refreshing change of pace and one of my least favorite parts, but I’m still glad they tried. World at War on the other hand feels like more of the same with attempts at capturing what made CoD4’s first person cut scenes so interesting. I say attempts because they are on the right track, but something about them just fall short. They come off as cheap copies of Infinity Ward rather than clever expansions on their idea. They also use them far more often over the course of a much shorter campaign than CoD4, which only helped to cheapen them.

Also, what’s with ripping scenes from famous WWII movies in these games? I can now say I’ve played through a scene in every WWII movie I’ve seen. I’m amazed that there are not copyright laws being broken by the opening sequence of the Russian campaign in World at War. If you can’t tell what it’s copying you should go watch Enemy at the Gates. It’s a pretty awesome movie anyway so you won’t regret it.

One thing worth mentioning that I haven’t noticed in a game since the original Metroid Prime, is the games soundtrack. I’m not sure who wrote the score, but there is some quality tunes there. Of course there is the standard brass heavy orchestral music, but they mixed in electric guitar and some other things this time. It makes for some pretty memorable moments, especially in the Stalingrad parts of the campaign.

If you haven’t ever played a WWII game before, this is definitely a good place to start. It basically took the best of everything the industry has to offer and copied them. If you’ve played any others however, which I’m sure anyone reading this has, what you’ll find is all the same stuff that made the series great for the last decade and very little new to set it apart.

I'll be back with my comments on the multiplayer once I play it a bit more.