Now the single player is just half of the equation as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 also features a robust multiplayer feature set. First off, Special Ops is new feature of the series where you can partake in a few objective based scenarios in various locations either alone or with a friend. Take the Epilogue of Call of Duty 4 and expand it into multiple missions and you get an idea on what Special Ops has to offer. There are various different objectives though such as surviving waves of enemies or hunting down militia members without killing hostages to name a few. Depending on how you do, you'll be award one to three stars and you'll need to collect a certain amount of stars to unlock more Special Ops missions. Some of the Special Ops missions need two people so make sure you have a friend who can help you out on these. While I'm a little disappointed that Modern Warfare 2 didn't feature a co-op element for the campaign, Special Ops is a nice alternative.
The formula for the rest of the online multiplayer aspect follows Modern Warfare with some tweaks. You'll earn experience points as you play allowing you to unlock various aspects such as weapons, perks, and other things as well. New killstreak rewards are also now available. Numerous game modes, which can be accessed when you earn enough experience points, give you plenty of options to play with. A new feature that was put in for Modern Warfare 2 is the ability to play in third person mode. While only a multiplayer feature, it’s an interesting twist and something different for you to experience.
No doubt about it, this is the mode that will have players coming back for more. The gameplay’s still fast and furious and those that liked how Modern Warfare played will enjoy the gameplay here as well. It is rather easy to die though so you have to not get frustrated easily to play this. Enemies do come at all directions because the maps are made with very little areas to hide in. It can get a little out of hand though should one team start racking up kills and start calling in helicopters, missile strikes, or harriers. After a while, I just resigned to the fact that I was going to die often and started to have some fun with it since I am terrible with the 360 controllers in a first person shooter. I was able to get some good rounds in after some practice though and most of the time I enjoyed playing with others online.
An improvement over Call of Duty 4 is the ability for the host to be migrated should the person drop out. No longer will a game end when the person hosting the game gets cut off or leaves. I wish more games on the console would implement this feature that use listen server as the method of hosting.
I did run into a problem with the server every few games though. If you're a veteran of online FPS games, you'll know what I mean by the rubber band effect. You'll see your character just bounce around uncontrollably until the connection stabilizes. It was pretty frustrating when this happened, especially when I got on a roll a few times only to get taken down without any warning. This happened even with my connection bars showing full green status. This sadly, is something I've come to expect after playing online games on the 360 where it's usually a listen host model where one person acts as the server. Also, that person has the ultimate advantage of being at an almost 0 ping whereby his shots are always pure. I've seen many times where I would see shots fired on my screen but when the replay shows me dying I didn't get a single shot off. I don't know if this is an issue with the replay system but playing many online games, I noticed a slight lag in almost every game I played where I wasn't the host. I'm not going to get into the debate about dedicated servers here as this is a review on the 360 version though so it is what it is on the console.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 doesn't do anything innovative but like the previous Infinity Ward efforts what it does it does pretty well, for the most part. It does feel a little bit of the same ole same ole at times and there are some over usage of the same techniques used to generate drama. The single player campaign is pretty short but the robust multiplayer features make up for the shortness of it. While the story is a bit of a stretch, there are some nice little reveals and fighting on U.S. soil is an interesting change. Some will be shocked by some aspects of the game but I didn't find it all too disturbing. I have to say though, I was more wowed when Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare came out than playing through Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. I think it's a solid game, but as a player of all previous Infinity Ward Call of Duty games, I think the magic has slipped a little bit. Perhaps my expectations were set too high or I've just played too many of their games but I wasn't impressed with Modern Warfare 2 as I thought I would be. That's not to say it's a bad game as it's a fun on most fronts but for some reason I feel it's missing something that made the other ones instant classics.
B+
Overall, I found Modern Warfare 2 to be fun but it's starting to lose the appeal it had for me after the fourth time around with Infinity Ward. The campaign is really short and the story's pretty weak. Also, there will be parts that offend people but at least you can skip the "one" mission. Multiplayer can be fun and addicting if you don't get frustrated easily.
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