Sometimes you do not need original ideas. All you need to do is collect the idea of other and improve upon. I figure that must be Gearbox’s motto. Many reviews talk about the possible combination of weapons, how the game is like a first person diablo, etc… All these comparisons are so relevant, because they literally took the game mechanics from other games.
Luckily, they pretty much only took the good parts of games, and in some cased the addictive aspects. And, for the most part is all first together well for one important reason: the game built for co-op from the ground up.
The single player game play is pretty lack luster. It isn’t really difficult, and it is a bit tedious. But, add a few friends and what was previously mundane becomes amazing. This is not only because because its more fun to play a game with friends, the game also does a good job scaling up based on how many people are playing. Not only do you face more enemies, you encounter tougher, and more varied enemies.
There are a few other improvements on the typical FPS game style. Many FPS now have some version of an incapacitated mode, particularly co-op games. In these games you go down, and have to wait for an ally to come over and heal/revive you. Well, Borderlands added a new twist called “Second Wind.” Basically, if you are incapacitated, and you get a kill you regain a little health and mobility. It works quite well, and I would like to see it in more games.
Unfortunately, there are some glaring issues with the game that would have been unforgivable in a single player game, but are mostly forgiven due to the fun of co-op:
Poor AI. Running out into the open and engaging in a firefight with some one that is behind cover is never a good strategy.
Lack of boss battles. The trailers for the game mostly featured two of the three big boss battles in the game. And while there are other lesser bosses in the game, for around 30 hours of game play, I would have liked to have seen a few more epic boss battles. At least they let you go back and fight Skagzilla again, which is always fun.
Traveling sucks. Even though you can sprint endlessly, and you get a vehicle after a little while, you spend a lot of time in the first third or so of the game walking around. Part of this is due to the quest system. Seriously, humanity has colonized another planet, had physics defining force fields, wrist communicators, and you have to get and turn in quests in person? Lame.
And, while you do get a vehicle that helps cut down on travel time, there are some serious issues with it. The biggest may be that you only get one vehicle, and it can only hold two players. Seems a little weird in a game geared towards four players. The other big issue is the weird damage system it employs. You can ram into enemies and instantly kill them. On the flip side, you can be killed instantly by enemy vehicles, which is really frickin frustrating in some areas in the game.
Some of the missions tend to get a bit repetitive. While you do not do a lot of “get ingredients for soup” missions that are so prevalent in World of Warcraft, you do spent a lot of time doing the same kind of activities. For the most part, most of the missions basically require you to go somewhere and kill something.
Level caps, seriously, wtf? I view level caps as a built in deterrent of continued play. Borderlands has a built in cap of 50. This basically allows you to max out an entire specialization branch in your skill tree (which isn’t a good idea). I was able to easily get to level 50 without even coming close to finishing a second play through. And, when I hit 50, I turned off the game and haven’t played since. By this time, I had already done all the quests on the first play through, and earn all of the achievements.
The first DLC has been release for the game, but it doesn’t increase the cap, and doesn’t really offer anything for me. Sure there is a new area, but I cannot advance my character by playing it, so I haven’t come up with a good reason to play it.
The second DLC has been rumored to contain at least two additional skill points as quest rewards, so that could work as a defacto level increase without actually increasing the cap. And, it looks like it will add some more arenas into the game. And, since the arenas were one of my favorite parts of the game, I may pick up this DLC and skip the first.
So, based on my experience with the game, I am going to give it a split rating, first based on the single player mode, 0 (average), and second, for the online co-op, 3 (cult classic) on the undecim scale.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007)
Modern Warfare was one of the first “realistic” war games that I have been excited about in quite some time. I originally picked up the game because I was glad that someone find made a game that was not World War II, and it was well reviewed. And, yes, before I get any comments about the Tom Clancy games, I am aware that many of them are set in the near future, but they suck, so its basically like they do not exist.
There is one important thing to note about this game; it does not have co-op. Many people feel the strength of the game is its online multiplayer. However, I found it to be quite lackluster. I suppose I have been spoiled by games with more diversity, like Halo. MW consists primarily of death matches, which are not very fun. A lot of people have told me its so good because it has “realistic” weapons, and other such BS. If I wanted to fire realistic guns, I would fire real guns.
Other people feel the campaign is the highlight of the game. And, while it is not bad, it is nothing to write home about. The story they came up with is very formulaic, and is not better than anything you’d expect to see in a summer popcorn flick.
So, thus far I have established that the game is pretty average across the board. Which, is true, but there is one particularly irritating aspect of the game that I found to be quite frustrating (a common theme in the Call of Duty games I have forgotten about), choke points that you are forced to push through. I like to be able to element all the enemies in an area, and then progress. This methodology works pretty well in most video games, and keeps you from getting killed. Unfortunately, there are certain areas in MW where enemies continue to respawn endlessly, so you could never effectively clear out an area. Thus, you are forced to do a rush that will frequently result in your death if you are playing on one of the higher difficulty levels. But, this one really the only thing in the game that really bothered me.
Ultimately, I decided that the game had been considerably overrated. And, while it is a solid enough game for me not to feel ashamed to have it in my collection, it is far from the pinnacle. Thus, due to the lack of replayability, and general averageness of the title, I am going to give it a 0 on the undecim scale.
P.S. I need to get a proof reader.