Call of Duty: WWII (2017)

I also find it fascinating when Call of Duty returns to World War II. For those of us who have been with this series since the beginning, I often think that this is where the series belongs. I mean, these games were originally bringing to life real campaigns and shining a light on real soldiers, and now, with CoD, you can go to space, get in mech suits, and fight zombies. But for me, CoD belongs in WWII, even if the franchise often falters when it goes back to that war.

Call of Duty 3 showed that the franchise needed to try something new, while Call of Duty: World at War was an extremely poor return. And I was wary about Call of Duty: WWII going in. Starting this game off on the beaches of Normandy felt extremely obvious (and is something CoD has done before), and the decision to do health packs instead of health regeneration seemed like a step back. But once I got over these minor gripes, this reminded me of how great CoD could be with WWII.

One of the reasons for the health packs, I think, is to make you reliant on your squad. Other CoD games have certainly made you part of a team and hoped this would mean something to the player, but for the most part, it's fairly irrelevant. That's not the case at all with WWII, where you can call to your squadmates for help, you fight alongside them in almost every battle, and when you need them, they're there for you. It's a smart way to make this war feel more realistic.

Like most of the CoD games, this also finds a great balance of finding ways to try new things with these missions. I love that there's a whole undercover mission, or a mission that takes you to the skies, while you also fight on the ground. Sometimes, these missions that break from the usual mold aren't as effective as they are here, but it really works here.

I also think the story works quite well. As mentioned, you do care about your team, and while I worried the story of a wartime leader who's a douchebag until you learn his complete story was hackneyed, but it ended up really working for me in the final few missions.

Since this game, CoD hasn't returned to WWII too frequently, but this game makes a good case for why it should continue going back to this war. This is where this series started from, and WWII proves that they can still do it justice.

I saw this dropped recently on GamePass and had a free day and thought I could probably blast through it in a few hours... and I did!

The story was usual COD. It was odd playing as "the big red one" and not really caring.

I have been watching films, reading books, watching shows, and playing games about this war for literal decades! So it is really hard to not feel like everything is a retread.

The shooting gallery is the same it has been forever but the little QTEs and side missions feel more annoying and unfun. Possible because it is older and Black Ops 3 was so good.

The middest Call of Duty to ever mid, Call of Duty WWII represents an overcorrection from the futuristic/Jet Pack era of the franchise. If you've watched a couple of WWII films or shows, you've already seen this campaign's story. The campaign as a whole is also just a tonal mess. This one campaign has both the most absurd set piece in COD history (and, in my opinion, the moment the franchise truly jumped the shark) & a segment where you walk through a concentration camp.

As for the multiplayer... it's also very safe & forgettable. It tried a couple of new things, but they were walked back for a reason and I found the game boring to play both before & after the rework.

Zombies is fun I guess, but there's been plenty of better COD Zombies experiences both before & after this one.

Score: 5/10

FPS - Follows the story of Ronald "Red" Daniels, a young soldier in the 1st Infantry Division, as he and his squad fight through iconic battles of World War II, starting from the D-Day invasion of Normandy to the liberation of Paris.

PROS:

++ Good campaign. Though this particular setting has been done to death, I still thought that the campaign was good overall. It started off slow and with objectives that have been done in every past WW2 game, but it eventually picks up the pace. "Infiltration" and "Battle of the Bulge" were great missions. The train explosion set-piece looked cool. And there were at least three memorable moments that got a solid emotional reaction from me.

++ Solid cast. The cast was quite likeable. The main quartet were all stereotypes but I liked them all. Red was a likeable protagonist, and Zussman was a great friend and when he got kidnapped, I found myself caring for him a lot. Lieutenant Turner's death was genuinely one of the sadder deaths in the series. Sergeant Pierson acted as a "semi-antagonist", but I found his character to be most interesting.

++ Classic gameplay. The series returns to its roots with non-regenerating health, and boots to the ground gunplay. This easily has the best gunplay and feel out of all the WW2 CODs. It was nice to play with the older guns again and they all look, sound, and fire better than ever. Snipers are especially fun because time slows down when you hold your breath which makes it easy to pop headshot after headshot. There's also a new addition of "squad perks" where getting a certain amount of kills will activate your squad members' perks such as giving you a health pack, ammunition, or calling out enemies.

++ Fantastic presentation. The game is drop-dead gorgeous. The CGI cutscenes looked amazing, and my girlfriend even commented on how cinematic it looked. In-game visuals were equally gorgeous with fantastic lighting. Sound design was powerful, making each gun and explosion sound amazing. Voice-acting was solid too.

++ Atmosphere. I would say that World at War's atmosphere is still better, but this game is still pretty solid in this area. This entry also shows the horrors of war, and it is common to see soldiers getting their limbs and heads blown off. And the atmosphere is enhanced by the phenomenal sound design.

++ Zombies mode. Ultimately, this zombies mode is inferior to Treyarch's maps and Infinity Ward's "Zombies in Spaceland", but I still had a lot of fun. I appreciated that they leaned more into the horror aspect of zombies, and playing solo was actually quite creepy. Designs of the zombies were also quite grotesque. Gameplay-wise, it was quite fun because there were a decent amount of Zombie variations (standard, fast, brutes, and flamethrower-zombies) and they each spawned fairly frequently which prevents complacency. The two changes to the formula that I liked was the ability to easily share points (or jolts) to other players, and the "armor" system which I really liked. Armor is essential, but every time you buy it again, the price increases.

CONS:

-- Stealth sections. There's a few stealth sections in the campaign, and most were quite unenjoyable. Guards had finicky lines of sight. There was often only one correct route to the goal. Once you're spotted, you can't lose them. These sections weren't awful, but they weren't fun either.

-- Vehicle sections. There are instances that you get to use a tank, a fighter plane, and a AA turret. These three are usually fun to play in past games, but I didn't like how they controlled or operated in this entry. They felt too sluggish.

-- Multiplayer UI. The UI is confusing. There are too many things going on and it just feels too cluttered.

-- Microtransactions.

Played the game only for the campaign. Took about 5-6 hours Decent campaign length for a WW2 shooter I guess but nothing special. Though I think a large portion of that time were cutscenes.

The game looks and plays great appart from the 2 vehicle missions. The vehicles had aweful controls and made the mission feel really cluncky. The biggest problem for me is that is it waaay to scripted and "holding your hand". Call of Duty has always been scripted, but this game takes it to the next level. Almost no freedom in how you tackle or approach the various missions. If you don't play the level exactly as was intended, the game just kills you. And the game is constantly telling you wat to do. "Hey Daniels, grab that sniper! hey daniels, man the MG42. Hey daniels call an airstrike. The story is all about the squad and the platoon. But it seems like Daniels is the only one doing anything...

And if you neglect a suggestion, the voiceline just repeats over and over every 5 seconds. Daniels up that slope! Daniels up that slope! Daniels up that slope!

The game is an epic adventure, but you might aswell watch a movie..

Playing Battlefield V and 1 had me jonesin for a break. A CoD break. For those who haven't played it, WW2 is the last "good old CoD" game left, and yes, there are still players in the Domination lobbies.

Today I bought Vanguard so we will see how the newer WW2 Call of Duty holds up. I tried the new CoD mechanics awhile back and didn't like that Activision basically ripped off Battlefield. Now that I am more acclimated to "modern shooter mechanics" I feel it is time to give WW2 a rest and try my hands at Vanguard. I heard I can install it without the mandatory 150GB of Warzone so that was a selling point. I'll let you know how it goes.

Good Game, from COD Franchise after black ops.

The Story is really good, can understand the characters, instead of just random missions, the twists are good.

The climax is ok, but you can't make it any better though. 10/10.

The Impact of turner's death is heartfelt, that is how it should be made, we have to feel for the game, not just brush off things as you guys did in ghosts.

Will remember the game for the gameplay and storyline.

some missions are too long and hard, like the turner mission, mission after clock tower collapse, had to try those missions like 10 times to win. I did play this at a veteran level so that might be.

liked the graphics, ran smooth 45fps with gt730, some serious optimizations had been done, which shows the development team thought of all players, instead of just console players.

the music is ok, can't say anything about that, the cutscenes are really good and high quality.

Already played this entire game twice, feels like I was in the situation in some scenarios.

Keep up the good work, and launch a new one with an impact like this.

Current COD best games for me, in order of release.

1. modern warfare 1
2. black ops 1
3. world war 2 2017
4. world at war
5. ghosts

Thanks for reading.

It's pretty, in a horrors-of-war kind of way. It's largely slick and performs well. The actions is varied and some set pieces are impressive, but I wasn't emotionally touched by most of it, even the bits that were supposed to be touching.

Since I'm mostly a campaign player, I can't comment on the multipayer, but some of the auto-saving in said campaign is atrocious, and the AI is really lacking in places. There were also times that I couldn't understand what's being said over the background noise and music.

Overall, I think I'm pretty much done with WW2 shooters...

Beat on Veteran difficulty. I was given this game as a gift, otherwise I would not have it because I have been out of the CoD franchise for quite some time. As usual I favored taking it slow and steady with long range precision shots. Preferred sniper and all other rifles though I did have some fun with the flamethrower and had to use smgs and shotguns at times. I also used dismounted heavy machine guns every chance I got.

I struggled at a few points. The first flak gun turret sequence saved in the middle when I could only survive a single hit; the part after that was extremely frustrating and took 20+ times. On the first stealth mission I blew stealth in such a way that I thought it was supposed to happen, and then had to solo the entire level with a time limit. That was not happening. Had to check a walkthrough to find out that the stealth part was much longer. Why the hell did the game save right after I blew stealth? The first driving sequence was unforgiving because it was so hard to see where they wanted me to go. The final level was quite annoying with the constant smoke and terrible visibility; I ended up giving up on trying to shoot from a safe distance and just running the hell towards the enemy.

Surprisingly, I got through the second flak gun turret sequence on the first try and never failed a vehicle turret sequence; highly unusual for a CoD game on Veteran. I say that is because they gave the jeep its own health bar rather than relying on your tiny one. I overall enjoyed the game; the story was surprisingly good and the shooting parts were decent. I liked the stealth sequences (except the one with the little girl), though I have my doubts about how appropriate those are for this type of game. The level where you play as a female spy felt the most out of place and seemed like it should have been in a Hitman game. I liked the tank and flying level and would have liked to see more of those; perhaps as secondary mode, like zombies.

I did not like the on rail shooting gallery part with a pistol because it was too scripted and took too much control away from the player. I also noticed a common CoD trope of having enemies respawn infinitely (or some absurd number) until you move up far enough, which as a sniper is something that pisses me off. The part that I hated the most though were the quick time events. The simple untimed one in the first level for arming the Bangalore was bad enough; why can’t it be a cutscene or an equipable item for me to use? The timed ones throughout the rest of the game were much worse. Though they were not difficult, I vehemently oppose the very concept of quick time events. I especially hated how they use arbitrary controls that could change between tries. I remember one where you had to pick up a helmet and hit an enemy, which involves using the left stick and a random face button. Left stick is for moving your legs NOT your arms, and you should be pressing “use” to pick up the helm and “melee” or “shoot” to hit with it. At no point in this sequence should you press “jump” or “crouch”. Is it too much to ask that if quick time events absolutely have to exist that they use logical controls of the game? I found the visuals to be too drab and dark to the point where it was sometimes hard to see enemies and my iron sight; putting up the gamma too high makes everything look too grey. Overall, I find this game to be an increasing trend towards making games more like hyper realistic gritty movies, rather than its roots (Wolfenstein and Doom), and honestly I prefer the latter.

Tried the 2 zombies levels once each. I made a custom class with: Camouflage, M1A1 carbine, proximity mines, armoured up, flak jacket and discipline (though I never had a chance to use this and in retrospect should have chosen fully loaded). I had no idea what I was doing and was disappointed at the lack tutorial for what the stuff in the zombie mode does. I managed to make it to wave 19 before I got stuck on a little piece of fence which I had no right getting stuck on. I worked out a system where I would go around in a large circle trying to spawn all of the zombies in a line behind me and using the svt for accurate shots and the combat shotgun to get through the narrow part. The svt ammo was in the circle, so it was working well. The second map in the house did not go so well (got to wave 9) because of lack of space to move around. The darkness of the game with respect to difficulty in seeing iron sights was very noticeable here. Would be fun to play more but this kind of gameplay is only good for a little bit of fun.

Tried out some multiplayer against bots. I was very impressed at their AI; they would beeline for me whenever I fired and would work together to try to flank me (with 1 or 2 holding just outside of on entrance waiting for more to flank around the other side before attacking). I played solo against a team of bots. I like the sniping (both single and multiplayer) because the transition from hip to scope is so smooth and you can still see around the scope. I focused on practicing with the starter sniper rifle and LMG. I like the Armored division with scoped basic training. I also like Cavalry with the ballistic shield; I do not find shields all the useful as weapons (since the game does not allow you to shield and shoot at the same time), but just having it on your back to protect against flanking is awesome. Did not try out much else.

Not sure if I want to invest into the real multiplayer right now.

Finally since CoD WaW, we get another CoD set in World War II. And we play entirely different battles. We play the Americans fighting Nazis. I was excited to play this, and it didn’t disappoint.

My favourite part about playing a video game is a good story. This wasn’t just playing a series of grizzly battles - it told a story of the men of ‘The Might First’ and - most intriguingly - the personal conflict between the Sergeant and Lieutenant of the squadron. The friendship between the character we play and our good mate Zussman is well told, especially since we need Zussman in order to get medkits in battle! The flashbacks our character has with his Pop, hunting back in Texas, add a layer to our warrior emphasising that we aren’t supersoldiers. We’re just men.

I especially liked the odd twist - playing as a French rebel spy and memorising our undercover persona so the Nazis can’t catch us out. I’ve never done that in a CoD game before so it was an exciting element.

Not a perfect game. Some annoying things that always got me annoyed with CoD games. There are a couple of glitches that forced me to restart at checkpoints. When you die, you go through the same motions again and again until you reach your next checkpoint. Repetition is never fun. And the multiplayer? Just endless and mindless killing in typical deathmatch style that completely detracts from the depth of the campaign. Although that always annoys me with most games.

Overall a good addition to the CoD series. I love historical video games and I wasn’t disappointed. Had a lot of fun.

I will admit right off the bat I really have only played the COD series after Modern Warfare 2 solely for the campaign experience. I have played a bit of the multiplayer in the other games, but I just feel they have lacked in originality to make it worth playing.

So heads up this is more of a single player review than anything. Story: First off I feel like the game excelled in its characters. Though you can look at each of them as the generic holly wood (private, sergeant, lieutenant) stereotypes each of them are unique characters with an actual back story. The other games of the series have always felt to me as if you are just playing some cool military dude. This time I felt like an actual person with real emotions especially near the end of the game. I feel that was a good approach to their campaign.

Game play: My only frustrations were relying on a health bar system when it seemed I would lose most of my health every time I peak out of cover. Second the use of commands for others in your squad to help with ammo or finding enemy positions. I felt myself struggling to use them half the time because I wasn't close enough to the characters to activate their abilities. The action throughout was great with a lot of really amazing set pieces, though I did feel the DDay level was a little too quick.

Graphics: Of course this game isn't any Battlefield 1 , but the graphics were good. The graphics enhanced when the cut scenes were out of engine, but switching between the in engine and out of engine wasn't super noticeable. ( Feel free to correct me if not all of the cutscenes were in engine) Overall another good addition to the COD series. I haven't gotten too into the Nazi Zombie mode yet, but from the little bit I have it has improved over the years. Lots more customization and tons more to discover.

This is the first, and likely, last Call of Duty game I've ever owned. When it comes to this franchise I'm an outsider looking in. It just seemed like lots of over-the-top explosion with no real story or subtly, a "Michael Bay" the Game if you will. That being said, this seemed like an attempt to reign things back in and get back to their roots. As a history guy I always enjoyed WWII games, even when they were over-saturated, though I prefer my Call of Duty's to be called Medal of Honor or Brothers in Arms.

This is one of the first WWII games I can think of on this new generation of consoles, and it looks really good. For me, this generation is where we finally hit the mark of life-like graphics. There were times the characters looked like real people, which made some scenes all the more pertinent. The game also brings back the notion of health packs which brought back memories of Medal of Honor: Frontline.

The story mode is all I played, cause I'm not crazy enough to venture into the Hellscape that is CoD multiplayer. It's a short campaign, because story mode isn't the main concern. The campaign hits all the typical WWII story beats; D-Day, liberate Paris, go a bridge too far. That's not all bad, but what do developers have against showcasing the North Africa campaign, not everything starts at D-Day. But so, you follow a squad in the Big Red One as they cross France into Germany. You've got your typical soldier archetypes: the kid from Brooklyn, the college educated smart-ass, and the Texas farm boy, which is you. And there's the hardass sergeant, played by the guy from "Las Vegas". He's actually the most interesting character in the story, and CoD's take on depicting living with shellshock. There is an interesting twist for our player character out of right field at the end that was a bit clever.
There's only a few levels, and they keep it mixed up well. You've got your plane level, tank level, and an undercover level that was really neat. And they have toned back the extravagance in this game. You aren't leveling city blocks or blowing mountains in half. It does shine through a few points though, like a completely bonkers train crash.

All in all, it's a good story with some really solid shooting and welcomed return of the health bar. It's a beautiful game from French hotels to the snowy Ardeness forest. That being said, the story is only 10 missions long. This is a "beat it once then put it on Ebay" type of game.

On a history nitpick. You can't reload M1 Garand's mid clip. Unless my history of firearms is rusty, you had to fire all 8 rounds for the clip to eject. You couldn't just pop it out whenever.