Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

A slightly sad feeling crept into our thoughts as we sat down with Infinity Ward’s creative strategist Rob Bowling to watch as he ‘leeted’ his way through a virtual Favela, somewhere on the outskirts of a distant matte interpretation of Rio De Janeiro. Sad because the only further excitement left to look forward to is having the finished game in our hands. Not that that will be a bad thing, but rather that we’ve rather enjoyed it as each minor detail has been eked cautiously out like a fart during a eulogy.

To be absolutely honest, it’s been pretty hard to separate Modern Warfare 2 from its predecessor thus far. Not because the two games are terrifically similar in terms of level layout, story, character and so on, and not because the gameplay mechanics appear ostensibly unchanged outside of what’s purring away under the hood. It’s because we, and in turn you, the gaming public have been shown so very little of it. A chase on snowmobiles here, some rock climbing there, a couple of fire fights; truly, when it comes to single player, that’s really been your lot – and the game’s out in 26 days. How’s that for perspective?

But credit where credit’s due, the sheer volume of buzz created by the game owes a lot to Infinity Ward’s refined sense of restraint. And you owe them too. Because when you do hand over the big bucks for this game in 26 days time (25 if you’re reading this tomorrow) you’ll be in for plenty of surprises. And it doesn’t take an emeritus professor of extreme cleverness to figure out that the single-player campaign lives or dies by them. It is an unfortunate duty then, to ruin a whole bunch of them for you. Which is exactly what we’re about to do. We shall surely go to hell for this.

The level, or section, or whatever you want to call it – we’re not sure the term ‘level’ really applies to many games anymore – comes slap-bang at the end of act one. As with Modern Warfare, the story is divided into three acts, with each act split into five or six sections.

It starts, as these things often do, with a little calm before the storm. Your floating FPS eyes hover over the passenger seat of a civilian car as it tracks a van full of ne’er-do-wells to a meeting point on the outskirts of the Favela. But when it comes flinging shit at fans, a modern Warfare game should be considered more capable than a whole colony of sweaty chimps. Milliseconds later, the urgent request to get down is lost in shock as the driver’s brains frap their way across the dashboard as if an invisible Italian chef were checking to see if they were cooked.

The following moments are a blur. The occupants of the van were cut down by experienced slum militia as we struggled to leave the vehicle and give chase to a pair of suspects as they scampered into the safety of the Favela. Taking out the first wave of resistance, we catch up with our first target and are instructed via comms to use non-lethal force for interrogation purposes. Careening his way into a narrow high-sided alley, he creates an inescapable kill zone – a couple of shots to the back of his knees and he flops to the deck like a meat-filled bin liner.

… continued