Its one of those weeks. I just don’t feel like playing Single player games (Peggle aside) right now. So I’ve been playing a variety of multiplayer games online. Killzone 2 was not enthralling enough to keep hooked so I went back to a few old standbys. Its pretty barren for new games over the next few months so its a good time to indulge in MP shenanigans.
Firstly on 360, I picked up the map pack for CoD WaW, which offers three multiplayer maps and one new map for the awesome zombie Nazi mode. The maps are very nice and are a blast to play. No tanks which means one of the more common complaints is not as much of an issue as is in the main game. For a game that supposedly meant to be from Activisions ‘B’ shooter team, CoD WaW manages to offer very playable maps.
I’ve been playing a bit more PC CoD 4 Modern Warfare multiplayer and alternatively getting frustrated and enjoying myself. It basically sucks enjoyment out of a game if you just want to have some fun and you play with serious players. Apparently its considered cheating to use either the rifle grenade or the Juggernaut (extra strength) perk. The Last Stand and Martyrdom are also often frowned upon. Its not cheating children, its not even a ‘sploit. Its just that people who have level up can’t stand being killed by anyone with a lower ranking. I even dipped my toe into some Hardcore and found I played better that normal servers. Is it because I’ve been playing a lot of Day of Defeat as well?
Day of Defeat Source is such an old game with such little depth. I am still intrigued why updates to TF2 also mean updates to DoD:S but either way this is a game that has a grip on a select few who play every day. You don’t level up but choose a class and yet the in game chat isn’t full of cries of noobs with rifle grenades and rocket launchers. I mean, yes people complain about being owned by snipers and machine gunners but it’s generally restrained. There’s so much anger in CoD 4 players.
And I’ve been playing Peggle. I like Peggle. It is fun. You should play Peggle on whatever platform you have access to.
I’ve just bought World of Goo as part of MacHeist so I expect to give that a spin over the weekend. Also, there’s the Modern Warfare 2 (note no CoD) teaser and even cooler, the original Call of Duty is coming to PSN and XBLA soon. Day 1 purchase! It will be really cool to have access to all of the major Call of Duty games on Xbox 360 (since I also have CoD, 3, 4, and WaW on 360)- and 1, 2, 4 and WaW on PC as well. That’s nothing, I have one colleague who has CD 4 on PC, PS3 and PC.
CoD be praised!
I don’t usually have much of an up-to-date PC gaming machine. Over the last few years, I’ve only really had a work PC that was semi recent. My latest work PC is a screamer with a 1GB videocard, that also thankfully restarts itself when some new games get busy and has firewalls blocking everything but WoW, CoD4 and Steam. So I’ve been playing Day of Defeat Source, which is a remake of the original DoD. I hear there’s another graphical revamp of DoD (though I’m not sure if its official or unofficial) in the works.
‘S funny because a week ago I was getting kinda sick of getting nowhere in Fallout 3. Turns out that despite the fact its an open world game that scales enemies with you, there is definitely a lot to be said for sticking to the script rather than just wandering aimlessly. Now I’m back on track and have banished the thoughts I had a week ago of giving the game away after 10 hours.
10 hours was as much as I got into Oblivion, but I later regretted not keeping the game and going back to it later. Fallout 3′s setting is much more palatable to my more SF influenced mind. Cyrodil as fun to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there. Not to say post-apocalyptic Washington DC is much better, but it just speaks to me more than pseudo Tolkien. I’m glad I left a bit of a buffer in between playing Fable II and this because my lack of attention and disposable time meant the commitment you need to make in order to get the most out of Fallout 3 is large.
Fallout 3 is definitely not a hopeful game. You can’t save the world because its already been mostly destroyed. So there’s often a hint of sadness in a lot of your wanderings. If emo teens ever discover this game, there’d be a severe razor blade shortage worldwide. I’m invested enough in the game now that its currently my intention to finish the main story. We shall see. Looks like Prince of Persia and Banjo will have to wait a little longer. There’s not a shitload of new games I’m interested in coming out (apart from Killzone 2) so maybe there’s nothing to be gained by rushing.
Day of Defeat Source has been getting the afterwork PC gaming bug out of my system. There’s maybe one server I can connect to, though I’d probably prefer to go and give the older Call of Duty games a bit of a spin but there’s not a huge community for those anymore. For some reason, anytime there’s a major change to DoD, there’s always a TF2 update at the same time. Why- because in many ways TF2 is a very similar game. I have some time each day where I have a high powered HP PC as my timewaster and I’ve been trawling Steam for some interesting older games to play but nothing’s really taken my fancy.
Reviewed on PC. Developed and published by Valve
The original Day of Defeat was a free WWII mod for Half Life and after Counterstrike was one of the few mods to be successful enough to be bought up by the makers of the originating game (as happened with Counterstrike and Left 4 Dead). In 2005, the game was ported with semi upgraded graphics to the Source Engine, though with only 4 maps at launch though others were added intermittently. At some point, spurned on by the success of Team Fortress 2, DoD: S received a mini makeover with a film grain effect and killcams straight out of TF2 (yes Call of Duty did them first but these are literally the same as TF2′s down to the sound effects and the ability to take screenshots). Now you have nemeses and can gain revenge on those who kill you too much.
The game is a really simple class-based game with two teams (one German, one American). Most maps are simple capture the flag deals, but with a very fast paced capturing system compared to the eternity it takes to capture a control point in a Battlefield game. Other maps involve demolishing enemy installations (tanks, anti aircraft guns, etc) but basically its a “shoot and respawn until the map runs out of time” game. There’s a simple, yet deep game here that’s been keeping a loyal band of people still playing in this PC shooter environment ruled by the trio of CoD4, TF2 and L4D. People use grenade launchers and there’s no nasty n00btube comments like there would be in CoD4.
It doesn’t hurt that the Source-engined version of this game is over four years old and will run on almost any PC still in circulation. On a modern machine it looks ok but you may be missing the graphical OMFG you get with Crysis. Call of Duty 1 and 2 were bigger sales successes yet I can’t find a game on my ISP’s servers. There’s that typical Valve feel to the way it works and sounds, with the nasty touch that when you lose a round, the winners have about 10-15 seconds where they can kill any enemies still alive with impunity. Ouch!
So here’s the question- why has there never been a sequel to this and why not a console port? CoD WaW’s success proves there’s still a large market for good shooters, even WWII ones. I guess the new Wolfenstein will just have that Nazi-hunting FPS market to itself this year.
For those who can’t let go, I have some advice- Let go. Where I work, people regularly use their PC’s to play multiplayer games at lunch and after work at the end of the week. Because the place is so big and stuffed with geeks there are several different games going on around the building. There’s the WoW fraternity, TF2 players (whose ranks have been thinned recently), Left 4 Dead and CoD4 Modern Warfare. Yesterday we had some interesting conversations on our private CoD4 mailing list and it highlights a problem when you play a good multiplayer game for a long time and tire of, but have no immediate successor lined up.
So these guys have basically played Call of Duty modern Warfare at lunchtimes for over a year. They don’t like CS or TF2 or LEft 4 Dead, they love CoD4. They are very good at it and most are ranked level 55. They also play a mod, so they’ve levelled up using this bot mod only with the bots turned off so they’re basically playing standard CoD4 but one where they can only play against each other if they want to preserve their rankings). This is why its hard to tear away the TF2 guys from their game or WoW players to a new MMO. They’ve invested so much time in the game but are so sick of it but they’ve invested so much time in it but they are so sick of it but, well, you can guess the rest.
So back to this group of CoD lovers. One guy, who’s one of the better players, and the one who wrote the bot mod we played, has basically had enough. I know because I’ve played him on the 360 version as well as the PC- He’s spent more time on that one game than I have on sleeping in the past year by the looks of things. you know the type, complaining about others using the grenade launcher (the n00b tube) So he’s trying to rally the troops into playing something else. So what about Call of Duty World at War? Nope- WWII, buggy, yada yada. Which is funny because he hasn’t played it. Ok, then what?
Operation flashpoint was suggested. The group was all excited but apparently was a colossal let down. I could have told them that. Then Codename:Eagle, apparently a pre EA DICE made this before BF1942. Apparently buggy too so that went down in flames. Its funny, but I’m sure many games have this same dilemma. What do you play when you’re sick of something. I recall years ago, when we played Medal of Honor Allied Assault multiplayer, we moved straight onto Call of Duty (the original). When that grew stale, there was no immediate successor until the UT2004 demo came out. Battlefield Vietnam came out and filled the void for a while but that didn’t last. Eventually someone suggested the original Counterstrike and they went back to that (without me for the most part since CS has never gelled for me). WoW kind of killed the LAN gaming network for a few years (that and some other loopholes being closed by the IT department). Counterstrike source came and went a few times, lots of RTSes and MMo’s and then new FPSes becoming fashionable again amongst theses fairly PC-centric types with CoD4 and TF2 (and then Left 4 Dead).
But the habits are hard to kick. Left 4 Dead took away some of the TF2 players (not all), but CoD WaW has not pulled the CoD4 guys away. I’m guessing that either these dudes will be bringing in CoD2 next week or Battlefield 1942 or BF2. And it won’t last. I reckon give it a month before thy come back to Modern Warfare.
I myself played Left 4 Dead but i found the online wasn’t more fun than SP for me and I kind of lost interest after writing the review. Then I saw on steam my Day of Defeat Source needed an update so I patched it and tried it having not played it since CoD2 came out in late 2005. Well, you can see the TF2/influence now. Film grain effect and killcams straight out of TF2 (same sound effects) but that aside, this is still one of the better fast paced shooters. It has changed so little that I can’t help wondering if these guyus will ever get bored with playing these same maps over and over.
What makes guys play this sort of game over and over so much, even years later? CoD WaW has come out and sold very well, but I find the PC community to be quite small. My ISP is one of the larger server providers and there are only two normal TDM servers for CoD WaW compared to about six to eight for Modern Warfare. Hey, people are still playing Quake III somewhere.
Its hard to let go.
