I don't actually find the elements described that troubling, in fact, I need these elements like vitamins to ensure the normal regulation of my body.
You may have read Gabe's bit about Call of Duty 4 on the day before yesterday, and he's already given the game away to a friend, which should tell you two things: one, I guess you should add a cover system to your game? I guess? Try to get one in. We may also be certain now that he is missing out on something incredible.
He and I have defended bases with care, with guile, and with precision for going on twelve years now, and our hearth focus never really leaves us. I think the turning point for Gabe in Halo 3 was realizing that there was a role for him as a driver that collates both his deep drives and the requirements of the gametype as a kind of roving, defensive aggressor. If you want to see a film that epitomizes his style of play, feel free to check out this clip he recently uploaded. You'll see a spectacular missile from four to two from Kelp, and Kiko also has a cameo, but Gabe will avoid conflict altogether when that conflict is not in the direct service of team goals. If he can insult you while he's doing that, all the better.
Call of Duty 4's core virtue is Aggression, which is outside the type of experience we usually enjoy, but I like it precisely because it makes me play in a way that is counter to my instincts. When I play with my regular group, I have a defined role that typically doesn't involve getting up in an opponent's grill-piece. I don't actually know what my role entails in its entirety, I just know when I'm acting outside of it. Mostly I tell people to "watch out," because "there is a jeep."
The person who plays Call of Duty under my handle is another person entirely. He is, in fact, a horrible person, the man pummeling your tender flank down to the bottom of his hundred shot clip. I don't know if I like him very much. I can't say I approve of his methods. But I can't argue with his results.
I would be done with the single player campaign already if the multiplayer were not so engrossing, as it is both short and great. You really can't help but complete it, and since I bought the game for the online play anyhow it's like a complimentary entree. There is some extremely canny storytelling here, brilliantly executed, that really should be seen. It is Call of Duty though, which is to say that you need to press forward constantly to tick the script forward and progress. If you try to play it defensively, your opponents simply have corrals of these corn-fed thugs, Gauntlet-style portals from which Soviets pour until you trip some imaginary wire.
Gearbox took Brothers in Arms back to the drawing board and added a full cover system, most likely anticipating that the player expectations had moved on. This is largely true for me, and certainly for our group, but to cast away the rest of what they've accomplished that basis is churlish. Killzone 2 and Rainbow Six: Vegas both prove that first-person gameplay and a complete cover system need not be mutually exclusive. It's sobering to consider what Infinity Ward will accomplish in another two years' time.
(CW)TB out.
