Very Long Call Of Duty 4 Online Impressions

Yeah, this is and FFT is what I've spent most of my time playing lately.

This game gets many things right and pulls from each of the online shooters I've played lately and some I haven't. I find this game more enjoyable than both Halo 3 and Team Fortress multi-player.

First of all... the online works great. They have a matchmaking system that is nearly as quick and as smart as Halo 3s. It works a hell of a lot better than the mess that is Team Fortresses lobby system. I've had no lag and speedy matches. Which is impressive considering...

The game looks amazing. Halo and TF2 definitely have their unique style, but this game is honestly in a class of its own. It's not just that the graphics are technically impressive, but it's the fact the the maps are so huge with so much grass, leaves, ruble, and other war torn artifacts. A sniper sitting in a bush can be amazingly hard to see even at close range. The game is detailed on an intimidating level. Never before have I felt so strongly that the people playing on large HD TVs probably have a decided advantage. The maps are not just nice to look at but also extremely well conceived. There are 16 maps and many have very unique feels to them. Yeah, you might have your "Black Hawk Down" looking level here and there, but I was surprised to see some of the venues I was placed in the middle of in some of these matches. When you play a map in TF2 or Halo or many other shooters.... it really does feel like just a "map." In this game it I'm immersed in these different environments, and the notion of map boundaries rarely crosses my mind.

The pace of the game is amazing. It's a very realistic shooter in the sense that only a few shots from any gun will take your opponent down. But unlike some other realistic shooters like Rainbow Six, the gameplay is fast and furious. When you die in a Team Deathmatch fight you can respawn instantly. You can get immediately get back into the fight or watch the quick kill cam clip which cleverly shows your death from the point of view of the person who killed you. This is useful not only because you see how the enemy outsmarted you or where he was attacking from, but it also lets you see what weapon he was using and what abilities or "perks" he had equipped.

And that is where this experience truly shines. The customization you can have for your character borders on RPG depth. As you level up in rank you unlock new weapons and new game modes. I think it's really cool that when you are level 1 you can only play team deathmatch, and as you level up, more objective based game types become available. This is a clever way at getting newer players used to combat before they start messing around with trickier strategic based objective modes. Also as you level up you unlock new perks and challenges. Perks are essentially abilities that you gain to customize your character in battle. This is a class based game, but after you hit level 3 (i think its 3) you are able to start creating your own classes. By customizing your perks you can fine tune new classes to your play style. I have one class made that uses heavy machine guns and perks set up so I can take more damage, have better wall penetration, and even rockets as backup. You get a ton of perks as you level up and can really get crazy. One of my favorites is "Last Stand" in which when you get shot and "killed" you fall onto the ground as if dead; but instead of dieing you use your last few seconds of life and can pull out your pistol and try to finish off the enemy that just killed you. It's very sneaky since you on the ground and appear somewhat dead. I can't wait till I get "Iron Lung" for my custom sniper class which lets me hold my breath longer while steadying my aim for snipe shots.

But there is more... really the game is so deep. You unlock these personal challenges as you level up in the game. These challenges are often specific to the many weapons in the game. One may say "get 25 headshots with this gun" and doing so might give you a nice new scope for easier targeting or a silencer preventing you from appearing on the radar when you shoot. You can also get other cool attachments and even new paint jobs. I've picked up some really badass weapons laying next to corpses of enemies and allies on the battlefield.

Bleh... just a little more. One of my favorite aspects of the online play is the streak reward system. In other games, if you go on a kill streak, you often just get rewarded with medals that don't mean much or nerd points that also don't mean much. Going on a kill streak in this game lets the player reach a battle high that needs to be experienced to be believed. If you get 3 kills w/o dieing you get a UAV (I think it's called that) which when deployed basically shows you where all the enemies are on the (extremely well done) player map. This gives you quite the advantage because normally you only see where the enemy last fired on the radar. Getting up to 5 kills will give you the ability to summon an air strike. You pull up a map and can basically choose where you want the planes to attack. Naturally a well placed air strike will get you more kills and when you hits a streak of 7 kills you have to ability to summon an attack helicopter which basically flies around the field and causes mass hysteria for the other team. By this time you are racking up insane kills and feel like quite the hero. My record as of now is about a 18 kill streak and it was far more rewarding than anything I ever achieved in Halo. OMFG bodies everywhere >>>>> "Killtacular!!!"

I know this sounds more like a review but I'm only Level 14 and feel I've only scratched the surface. My only complaint about the game so far is that there is no saved film feature. It's tragic that some on the moments I've had in the game were only seen by me and the killcam of the people I've killed.

I will go as far as to say that so far this is the best online shooter I have ever played. You people must must must get this game. Gamertag: King Hyral.