Zero Punctuation: Call of Duty 4

[Helix Falks]

So, he folds to pressure and then enjoys the game?! My guess is that this is the only Call of Duty game Yahtzee has played, since if he'd played others he'd probably have mentioned the similarities in gameplay. Like, almost exactly the same.

"would real helicopters ever come that low?.."

Yes Helicopters do come low in fact most Attack Helis are Specifical designed to do just that.

Secondly I have played all the CoD games and COD 4 is not like the others other than the fact it is an FPS. It was refreshing to play a Modern combat FPS that did'n't leave me thinking why are there so many terrorists have i inadvertently strolled into a camp for training said cretins as the game has some how magiced up the whole of Al Qaeda in one level and then added some members of the IRA when i was'n't looking.

I see your point on the squad AI but I spent most of the game charging headlong into enemy ranks like a true brit yelling "for Queen and country" getting myself perforated at ever opportunity so it was not a problem for me.

 

[Bombader]

I played the demo but wasn't too impressed, simply since it felt like I was playing COD2 only modern setting, or Doom only with terrest targets. I wish they would look at COD1 and find why it was compelling, no man fought alone! And yet here it is all about the one man fighting alone, with people we don't care about.

The highlights of the COD series will be the Russian Beach charge, and the British tank push, simply since you felt like you WERE in a war, and your one man in it.

But then, the demo felt rather bleh simply since it wasn't chaotic enough, and it felt more like 2 sides shoot the neighbor until one wins sort of scenario, also I really wanted to hold position while the Allies move in, but instead they pushed me in, which doesn't feel too army like at all.

And I never had fun with the American guns... the enemy guns seemed to have more kick and sound which made them funner.

Great review reviewer-named-like-a-certain-dice-game.

 

[Murian]

Yes Helicopters do come low in fact most Attack Helis are Specifical designed to do just that.
...
I see your point on the squad AI but I spent most of the game charging headlong into enemy ranks like a true brit yelling "for Queen and country" getting myself perforated at ever opportunity so it was not a problem for me.

Oh, ok then. It just seemed that they'd be making themselves very vulnerable by doing that, seeing as there were loads of rpgs about.

Good to hear you enjoyed it but I don't think I could play another CoD game. I see through how everything works now, like knowing the secret to a magic trick. What was once great seems so naff now

 

[UncleWesker]

Didn't anyone else find the "CoD4 never sacrifices gameplay for story or vice versa" bit funny. Mainly because of the image. But still.

 

[OrenA]

Oh, ok then. It just seemed that they'd be making themselves very vulnerable by doing that, seeing as there were loads of rpgs about.

Thats a thing about Attack Helicopters. They are actually extremely vulnerable to both Ground and Air Fire. Seriously they drop like flies against any reasonably armed opponent.

 

[Surge]

BOINGO BOINGO WHOOPSIE KNICKERS

That's all that matters.

Also, the end of the chapter "Shock and Awe", the moment Yahtzee points out, is a hell of a moment. The intro to the game is also interesting in that you view this war-torn, disturbed place from a moving car set on a rail of sorts, trying to crane your head to see out of every window to get a glimpse as to what's going on.

Then you get shot in the fucking head, START GAME

Also, the ending (pre-credits, not that post-credits randomness) is very intense, down to the VERY. LAST. MOMENT.

 

[SinofMar]

@Frederf

I don't think, or even if they were I wasn't really paying attetion, anyone was bashing you for your opinion on CoD4. I mean in general and for the most part you are correct. The entire outcome of a perfectly executed military mission doesn't come from one man who leads an entire squad despite his rank and can take a barrage of bullets, hide behind reinforced metal and have the Jesus Christ power of regenerating himself.

Then again, the CoD series itself isn't really based around tactical playing. Something like that is more the Rainbow series, or like the old Xbox game Operation Desert Storm. That had you controlling a squad and having you give them precise orders to execute and each member had their own specialty. Heavy, support, sniper, etc you get the idea.

You can rip on CoD4 all you want for being unrealistic as possible because in all honesty it is. Your team does give you support, but they mostly just scare the piss out of the other enemies so you can run up and blow their brains out with a silencer pistol or a shotgun. Until you get to the more advanced levels and the enemies start to play to flank you and your squad, which with a down syndrome squad gets rather annoying and hateful.

Also, pretention to realism about reloading in regaurds to what The Negotiator said. It is pretty ridiculous how long it takes to reload some weapons, but then again 'Soap' or Paul Jackson aren't exactly specialists in one type of weapon, so they didn't have the time to study. I know I'm must be sounding absolutely bonkers for posing the idea that a fictional character can study, but the reload time is probably based off of what, I can only imagine, the developers saw and what the person portraying the solider did to reload. I also think the reload time was added as another dimesnion of difficulty so you can conserve your ammo and not waste it all by randomly blowing up televisions and computers so you don't have to go through the painfully drawn out process of reloading the fucking thing.

 

[RaDeus]

just realized that this game really suffers from a bad AI and some serius Whac-A-Mole gameplay...

your allies dont have initiative, would have been kickass with a "covering fire" and a "move up" function...
and they dont cover you, in the real military your teammates point their gun where you are not and cover you when you advance...

and the Whac-A-Mole gameplay, would rather have ace enemies then a stream of bad ones...

i didnt really mind this untill i started playing on the hardest level but comon, they should have added this...

 

[McClaud]

I agree on many points that Yahtzee points out, and the others that a lot of other commentors have pointed out. CoD4 is one of those games you hate to love, and love to hate, but still play MP anyway. I specifically hate the grenades and the AI of my own troops. That's something that never chages in these kinds of FPS games, though.

And I shouldn't ever read the comments past page 3. Because that's where the overly patriotic fellow American comes running in screaming that only liberals and terrorists like Yahtzee hate America to say such mean things about the stereotype we've created for ourselves in the past 20 years.

I served in the US military and I find that it's not insulting. In fact, I agree with him on a lot of things where the people who do play these games with a raging hard-on seem to be overly particular and happy about the horrible, self-important way that some Americans portray themselves. Especially to the point about how we're always right, and everyone else is always wrong, and we can't take a look at what is actually bad about our country long enough to care to fix it. If patriotism is all those things that liberfascist so blantantly pointed, why haven't we done anything differently in the worst conditions both economically and culturally this country has ever been in? Because of that self-important attitude that people like him support.

This is probably the last time I'll interject anything, since I can't stand people like liberalfascist saying that I'm "liberal" when I'm not - I'm actually Conservative and even I can see what is wrong nowadays. Apparently, however, being open-minded and intelligent is "liberal," which will "destroy America." My bad.

 

[olikar91]

I played BF 1942 last night. They are exsactly the same except one has a crapy crawling around dying scene and better graphics.

 

[The Negotiator]

Try saying that on a battlefiled while getting your guts blown out!

Good points on carefulness/heavieness, but we might be 2 different people scout, 4/5.

 

[SiCaRi0]

Yes Helicopters do come low in fact most Attack Helis are Specifical designed to do just that.
...
I see your point on the squad AI but I spent most of the game charging headlong into enemy ranks like a true brit yelling "for Queen and country" getting myself perforated at ever opportunity so it was not a problem for me.

Oh, ok then. It just seemed that they'd be making themselves very vulnerable by doing that, seeing as there were loads of rpgs about.

there is NO WAY that helicopters fly that low in real life , the cod4 helis were at 4 metres from the bulding witch is STUPID and suicidal , just one of the milliosns of hollywoods thing that this game has .

 

[TioH]

Seriously guys. This is a video game we're talking about. There's no way it can be entirely realistic. It's important to balance realism and gameplay so that it doesn't become entirely unmanageable. I see this kind of thing alot though, people with expectations so high that it's unfair to the game. Makes me ;.; that some people just can't enjoy themselves.

 

[Imhatepie]

Good review, but I just cant help but feel he missed alot of quality ranting materiel...

Where is the rant about the homing grenades that you must dodge EVERY SINGLE SECOND on veteran difficaulty, scratch that veteran difficaulty deserves its own dedicated rant period.

And where was MCMILLIN!?

Funny as always, but just a little too short.

 

[nightfish]

Hey hey! I've got an idea for a review! How about shuting up and let Yatzhee chose?
Maybe we will save us all those "oh yatzhee, this is dissapointing! this time you liked the game and you weren't as acid as always!" rants.

thats not the point. he gave into pressure and to be honest, we all thought he was a bit harder than that.

 

[Cowabungaa]

there is NO WAY that helicopters fly that low in real life

Yes, they can. I'm living under an airforce practice area, and one day some crazy ass Apache pilot flew his Apache under the bridge near my house. And that's narrow, they can.
Yes it's friggin hard and dangerous to keep a helicopter safe 4 meters from a building, but explain why it's not doable.

Anyway, indeed it's a quality reveiw as usual, very enjoyable indeed I so agree on the "I stopped playing because I had to have diner 2 hours ago" catagory, I started playing yesterday after work (about half past 5 in the evening) and when I checked my watch later that evening, I discoverd (while being amazed) that it was 23:15. I loved the switching between SAS and Marines, really good variation. I do understand the people who have issues with the Whack-A-Mole AI and yes it can get on your nerves. I didn't find it that troubeling, kamikazi-enemies are even more retarded. Shame they didn't implent at least a bit of tactical sense in the enemies, FEAR did it (roughly, after a while it got predictable anyway) already, why didn't CoD4?
I still love this game, the singleplayer is short though. Time to check how good the multiplayer is.

 

[Tatter]

Helicopters not only CAN fly that low in real life, they're actually designed to do so. They burn fuel much faster than any fixed-wing aircraft, are inherently unsafe to fly even on perfectly clear sunny days, and can be shot down by a single enemy soldier with an RPG or even a grenade launcher (when is the last time you heard of a fighter or bomber getting shot down by anything but a fully automated missile system?), but that's the price you pay for the ability to land damned near anywhere and fly through any space wider than your mom's buttcrack.

Kamikazi enemies aren't all that inaccurate either. Trying to make up for lack of technology with pure bloodthirsty fanatical indoctrination has its drawbacks, even though the "romance of the suicide bomber" that the media tries to feed us civilians at home has probably made you dismiss the entire rest of this post as the mere babblings of some FOX News fan. There's a reason why the number of US soldiers killed after five years in Iraq is a tenth of what were killed every month in Vietnam, and it's not simply because the enemy in this case is using the exact same weapons, resold through China.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Kamikazi enemies aren't all that inaccurate either.

Yes ok, but in this game we're not talking about completly screwed up religious fanatics (normal soldiers for the US Marine parts of the game, and nationalists for the SAS parts). Even Taliban are, most of the time, not crazy enough to run in a pack of US Marines with just an AK But the point is ofcourse, that it was a bit of a letdown that the enemies missed any tactical sense. It would've made the game more challenging, not necceseraly more difficult but more active instead of indeed some kind of Whack-A-Mole.

 

[renard]

Hey hey! I've got an idea for a review! How about shuting up and let Yatzhee chose?
Maybe we will save us all those "oh yatzhee, this is dissapointing! this time you liked the game and you weren't as acid as always!" rants.

thats not the point. he gave into pressure and to be honest, we all thought he was a bit harder than that.

Of course it's the point. Having 1'000 mails per day that say "plz, review Call of duty 4" can mine the patience of anyone. If it wasn't the point why the hell he would request for the next who suggest a game to simply "go fuck themselves" ?

 

[HeartlessHero]

LOL, I kinda agree with the Captain price joke.