Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare TGS Preview: Derivative Warfare

[Steven Bogos]

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare TGS Preview: Derivative Warfare

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare goes to places Call of Duty has never been, but not anywhere other games haven't already explored.

Oh, it's Titanfall, I thought to myself as I passed Microsoft's Tokyo Game Show booth. But, when I did a double-take, I saw it was actually Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. I stopped and watched it for a bit, and eventually got in line to give it a whirl. Never before had I seen game deja-vu more than I did with Advanced Warfare and Titanfall. Even when I eventually got to play the game, I kept waiting for the titans to start dropping.

That said, you can't say that Advanced Warfare doesn't break new ground for the Call of Duty series. While Ghosts did see it dip its toes into future tech, Advanced Warfare is planted firmly in the realm of science fiction. It's a bold statement towards CoD's biggest competitor, Battlefield, which has opted to keep its feet planted in reality for its next installment. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/previews/9479-Battlefield-Hardline-Beta-Multiplayer-Gameplay-Lets-Play-Battlefield]

The demo I played featured two game modes - "the team deathmatch one", and a slightly more involved capture-the-flag type mode called "Uplink". Of the two, Uplink was the more entertaining and demanding, thought it makes sense that Activision would set it up that way, so we had a little bit of time to learn the ins and outs of the game in deathmatch.

As for those specific ins and outs. Well. Have you played Titanfall? How about Crysis? Or Halo? If you have, Advanced Warfare will feel pretty comfortable to you. It plays essentially exactly the same as every other CoD game before it, but with elements lifted from other sci-fi shooters. The most obvious one is the Crysis nanosuit - sorry - "exosuit", which allows you to give your character temporary power-ups, such as super speed, stealth, or a shield. You also have a "super jump" from the likes of Halo and Titanfall, that lets you traverse a lot more of the map than you'd usually be able to in a CoD game.

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Weapons, as usual, is where Advanced Warfare shines, as there are dozens of weapons with hundreds of different attachment combinations to discover. There's also perks, killstreaks, grenades and exosuit powers to pick and chose, mean that you can customize your character to a pretty great extent. Despite this, most of the cooler sci-fi guns, like the lazer minigun or the railgun, seemed to feel pretty weak, at least in comparison to the run-and-gun shotgun, SMG, or "crazy-man-with-a-knife" builds that have traditionally dominated the CoD leaderboards. Even the exosuit powers seem to feel quite weak in a game where kills are usually decided in fractions of a second.

One thing I do have to hand to this game is that it is smooth as silk. Finally, we're getting a title that is taking full advantage of the Xbox One's guts. It doesn't dip below 60 FPS - even in the most intensive firefights - and looks beautiful. It looks a lot like Titanfall, actually, so much so that I could have sworn the second map we played on was a smaller version of Fracture [http://titanfall.wikia.com/wiki/Fracture].

While the game is fun to play, and is a bold departure for the series, in the end it doesn't really do anything that we haven't seen before, and it seems to be derivative of those games that came first, rather than innovative. CoD fans as always will lap it up, but for those looking for something new, you won't find it here. If only they could take the expansive weapon/player customization system from Advanced Warfare and put it into Titanfall, we may actually have one really good game, instead of two mediocre ones.

Permalink

 

[RA92]

Titanfall: CoD with mechs.

CoD: Titanfall without mechs.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/Serpiente_alquimica.jpg/242px-Serpiente_alquimica.jpg

 

[Machine Man 1992]

So it takes all the parts of those others games that were good, trimmed the bad parts, and put them together. How is that bad?

Saints Row 4 was basically every superhero game ever, and yet everyone around here doled out praise like it was the second coming.

I'm not a huge fan of CoD, but neither am I a fan of it being the whipping boy of the internet.

 

[Gearhead mk2]

So it takes all the parts of those others games that were good, trimmed the bad parts, and put them together. How is that bad?

Saints Row 4 was basically every superhero game ever, and yet everyone around here doled out praise like it was the second coming.

I'm not a huge fan of CoD, but neither am I a fan of it being the whipping boy of the internet.

From what I can tell, the difference is that Saints Row 4 took the piss out of itself, its series, the stuff it was parodying, games in general, sci fi tropes, the people who made the game, politics, etc. And for the most part it did that really well. Advanced Warfare is just stealing parts of other games and playing them completly straight with no self awareness or levity, as if it's the one that came up with all this stuff. It's like comparing Guardians of the Galaxy to Man of Steel.

 

[Ferisar]

So it takes all the parts of those others games that were good, trimmed the bad parts, and put them together. How is that bad?

Saints Row 4 was basically every superhero game ever, and yet everyone around here doled out praise like it was the second coming.

I'm not a huge fan of CoD, but neither am I a fan of it being the whipping boy of the internet.

From what I can tell, the difference is that Saints Row 4 took the piss out of itself, its series, the stuff it was parodying, games in general, sci fi tropes, the people who made the game, politics, etc. And for the most part it did that really well. Advanced Warfare is just stealing parts of other games and playing them completly straight with no self awareness or levity, as if it's the one that came up with all this stuff. It's like comparing Guardians of the Galaxy to Man of Steel.

Well... Yeah, except Man of Steel couldn't have had anything to do with Guardians of the Galaxy, nor the inverse, so it's a bit of a forced comparison. This seems to me more like Darksiders to Legends of Zelda/God of War/Comic Books/DmC et cetera.

Either way, a game lifting functional gameplay elements from other games of its genre to iterate isn't new. It's CoD, not an original property. It'll play like CoD, except with some fun new toys. I'm not of a mind to give much of a shit anymore, even if I will probably end up playing it at a friend's house or somesuch nonsense. The series is so bombastically sterile that I can't be mad about it. It's like me being mad at fast food despite only going maybe once every two months.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

So it takes all the parts of those others games that were good, trimmed the bad parts, and put them together. How is that bad?

Saints Row 4 was basically every superhero game ever, and yet everyone around here doled out praise like it was the second coming.

I'm not a huge fan of CoD, but neither am I a fan of it being the whipping boy of the internet.

From what I can tell, the difference is that Saints Row 4 took the piss out of itself, its series, the stuff it was parodying, games in general, sci fi tropes, the people who made the game, politics, etc. And for the most part it did that really well. Advanced Warfare is just stealing parts of other games and playing them completly straight with no self awareness or levity, as if it's the one that came up with all this stuff. It's like comparing Guardians of the Galaxy to Man of Steel.

But then again, "super serious" is kind of CoD's thing. All these articles paint a picture of a load of critics who don't want to like the game before it even comes out.

It's like what Yahtzee said "Yahtzee have you forgotten Call of Duty 4 already? You must give every game a chance to surprise you or else you're no better than those dipshits who never played Mass Effect and yet condemned it as a child corrupting boobstravaganza."

I'm optimistic that this is going to be the next CoD4, a revitalization of the series.

 

[Gearhead mk2]

Well... Yeah, except Man of Steel couldn't have had anything to do with Guardians of the Galaxy, nor the inverse, so it's a bit of a forced comparison. This seems to me more like Darksiders to Legends of Zelda/God of War/Comic Books/DmC et cetera.

Either way, a game lifting functional gameplay elements from other games of its genre to iterate isn't new. It's CoD, not an original property. It'll play like CoD, except with some fun new toys. I'm not of a mind to give much of a shit anymore, even if I will probably end up playing it at a friend's house or somesuch nonsense. The series is so bombastically sterile that I can't be mad about it. It's like me being mad at fast food despite only going maybe once every two months.

GotG played with the tropes of its genre, had a good sense of humour, took time to flesh out the characters and make them likeable and believable, had a lot of colour and energy, and was well aware that it was following in the footsteps of others. MoS played every cliche straight, was devoid of almost any levity, reduced the characters to idols and stereotypes, was incredibly dull and slow, and seemed to think that it was some groundbreaking new thing when everything it was doing had been done before. That's why I compared them to SR4 and Advanced Warfare, respectively. As for CoD, I don't really care about it by itself, but what I really hate is that this bland, boring, empty explosion fest only notable for its borderline xenophobia is somehow the top dog in the industry, because I'm worried about what that says about the mentality of the public.

But then again, "super serious" is kind of CoD's thing. All these articles paint a picture of a load of critics who don't want to like the game before it even comes out.

It's like what Yahtzee said "Yahtzee have you forgotten Call of Duty 4 already? You must give every game a chance to surprise you or else you're no better than those dipshits who never played Mass Effect and yet condemned it as a child corrupting boobstravaganza."

I'm optimistic that this is going to be the next CoD4, a revitalization of the series.

Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE to see CoD become great again and really start earning its success, but I've all but given up on that. This is not a bold new step forward, this is a series that defined a genre cannablising its copycats and competitors to try and survive in a changing market. I honestly think that this will be the straw that breaks CoD's back.

 

[Ferisar]

snip

My reasoning was mostly that Man of Steel and Guardians had no influence over each other, whereas CoD borrowing elements from the other games was more relevant to the original quote, seeing as he was talking about actual gameplay elements that Saints Row took from other games. I see your comparison in what you explained, just don't see it as properly respondent to whom you quoted

Oh, and as pointed out above, I think the whole "we're srs aboot this" is kind of CoDs thing. It's up to them to make it worthwhile, but it'd be a bit of a polarizing change if they just up and went "CoD is now atom-busting explosive sunshine filled with nuclear rainbows." x)

Also, I think the subject of CoD's "elevated narrative and theme" has the same to say about the public as campy action flicks from a couple of decades ago. They're just dumb fun.

 

[faefrost]

Well of course Dice is going to keep Battlefield firmly planted in the real world. They already have the ultimate SciFi license under development using their battlefield engine. Dice is making the new Star Wars Battlefront. Forget this Titanfall stuff, they get to use ATAT's and Wookies.

 

[bjj hero]

Ill hang on for Starwars Battle Fronts. ATATs people!

 

[Sniper Team 4]

I heard that Titanfall was a pretty solid game. Alas, since it's on the Xbox One and it's multiplayer only, I won't be playing it, although it does look awesome. Hearing that this CoD looks like Titanfall gets my hopes up a bit more (still bitterly disappointed in Ghosts), but it's just about the multiplayer.

I'm judging this game on the campaign. I'm hoping they can bring the magic with this campaign that they've apparently stuck in the multiplayer. Yes, I'm one of those rare people who plays CoD for the single player, and up until Ghosts, I've had a blast with each one.

 

[Dark Knifer]

I heard that Titanfall was a pretty solid game. Alas, since it's on the Xbox One and it's multiplayer only

Just a quick clarification, it's on pc but origin exclusive so that could still be a deal breaker but least its not an xbone.

OT; That's pretty much what I thought of it when I first saw gameplay. Cheap fun but nothing special.

 

[Saulkar]

In that case, it is back to STALKER: Misery. At least every free-roam playthrough experience is completely unique.

 

[Ariseishirou]

A Titanfall that I can play on my PS3 or PS4 that has modes that I can play with my friends who hate MP, yet runs tighter and smoother and has more customization options to explore when I do want to play MP?

I'm okay with this.

(Also House of CoDs. But the SP campaign is always stupid to the point of hilariously entertaining and I expect no different with this one.)

 

[Whateveralot]

Of course it runs smooth. It's the same engine they've used for over a decade now.