Call Of Duty 2: Retrospective

Modern Warfare 2 may nearly be upon us, but let’s take a look at the game that started it all on the 360…

I realise that Infinity Ward has had quite a bit of coverage of late on our fair website, but as the excitement builds towards Modern Warfare 2’s release it’s fascinating to take a look back to the first iteration of the series on the then next-gen.

Call Of Duty 2 was for many of the X360 team the very first game they placed in their shiny new Xbox. As for myself, I actually spent one afternoon in a Virgin super store in Cardiff playing through the demo on a promotional pod, much to the dismay of the people behind me. The games mix of slick FPS gameplay, stunning visuals (for the time, but they still hold up today) and historical accuracy struck a chord with many new 360 gamers.

Though the multiplayer took it’s time to get patched, once it was fixed it’s simple Perk free setup provided some incredibly addictive gameplay that many people are still logging onto play to this day. Dan Howdle of Nowgamer fame swears it is more balanced than Call Of Duty 4.

There was no story here, just a set of characters and their harrowing experiences on the front lines of WWII. You hop from the Russian front to northern Africa, from Normandy to Stalingrad and each time you change the set pieces and the action comes thick and fast. Though the formula hasn’t really changed, Infinity Ward has certainly retained their eye for action, though Modern Warfare 2 could become over complicated. It’s a risk that many games take and ‘more’ is not always better, but you’d be hard pressed to find a developer more tune with its audience as Infinity Ward clearly is.