Play!: Call of Duty – World at War

Box art

After the success of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Activision has recently released their fifth installment of the franchise, World at War.

Set back in World War II, the game offers a gameplay which is pretty much similar to Call of Duty 4. When I tried the game, I instantly recognized the controls and system; middle-mouse click for throwing grenades and back, the call for artillery strike is exactly like how you call a helicopter in COD4 in one of those SAS missions, and regenerating health after taking damage. Nonetheless, this game was indeed based on COD4’s engine, so expect a lot of similarity.

Graphics wise, the game offers slightly improved graphics over COD4, while the requirements were just a little higher than the previous installment, which is good. A GeForce 8 series shouldn’t have much trouble playing this game. I even managed to enhance it further with nHancer, allowing me to use more effects like smoother anti-aliasing, and my 9600GT can still handle it without lagging.

Treyarch, not Infinity Ward, has made this game quite interesting by putting in tactics hardly seen in other shooters such as digging spider holes, snipers on the tree, and rushing Banzai troopers. Also the flamethrower makes very good use in the game; there’s nothing better than clearing out trenches and emplacements with a long stream of burning goodness. Enemy flamethrowers can be put to good use too; shoot their tanks and see how gloriously they explode, killing nearby soldiers in the process. Sadly Molotovs aren’t effective, most of the time they don’t give serious damage and were very slow to throw.

I’m yet to try multiplayer, but sadly I don’t have a good access from my rig, so I just have to keep that to myself.

Maybe World War II has become overrated by now, but as long as they are good games, who cares? However, as I’m too used to play as Americans, playing as Russians seems to be a little more interesting to me. Maybe killing zombies after a long battle with the Nazis/Banzais would be some sort of refreshment?