Call of Duty: Modern Warfare multiplayer hands-on: Realism and fantasy combined

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

Telephone call of Duty: Modern Warfare is an odd title, not least because there's already a game with that name (insert Modern Warfare vs. Modern Warfare joke here). Yet, the new title harkens back in a lot of ways to the older 1, therefore creating this affiliation of new and old, nostalgia and originality, which programmer Infinity Ward hopes volition appeal to all types of fans. In a world of fast-paced, colorful shooters, it'southward attempting to slow information technology all downward.

"We started on this three years ago and nosotros definitely wanted to re-imagine Mod Warfare," Jack O'Hara, the game managing director in charge of multiplayer, told Windows Central. "Nosotros wanted to make a more than tactical, reflexive kind of game where yous'll be able to remember a trivial more through what you were doing."

Modernistic Warfare (2019) in multiplayer is still quite fast. Regardless of mode, expiry can hitting your fast, and rounds tin can be over inside minutes. Still, it's not fast because of its gameplay, merely rather in spite of it. Even with all the promises of "realism," especially in regards to its unmarried-histrion campaign, the multiplayer mode manages to still exist a fantasy well-nigh separate from the other parts of the game.

We got a chance to test out the multiplayer mode this week. Here's what we institute.

Realistic fantasy shooter

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

With multiplayer new and old

The new Modern Warfare takes elements from the old games and freshens information technology upward for 2022. Even so, with realism beingness a huge goal for the game, elements slow everything downward.

Modes upon modes, with more to come up

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare with a molotov cocktail

There are iii game modes for the multiplayer section of Modern Warfare. The beginning is Gunfight, which is a 2v2 duel on a wink map. Players get spawned on a minor map with a random loadout and confront off until there'southward just one team left continuing.

The multiplayer way manages to still be a fantasy well-nigh dissever from the other parts of the game.

The second is a traditional 6v6 game on a tactical map. Teams of half dozen (obviously) face off against each other in either Squad Deathmatch, where you just set up out to impale members of the enemy squad, or Domination, where y'all have to capture and defend a set number of points. In the maps I tried, there were three points and the lucifer ended when a team reached a certain score.

The last style concerns large actor count battle maps. It was congenital from the ground upward and so information technology could support an expanded number of players at once according to Paul Haile, a production managing director on the game, but at the issue, the map supported 40 players. Manifestly, this mode can back up more than 100 players. On this manner you tin play what is chosen Ground War.

Beyond the traditional Deathmatch and Domination modes, in that location are ones like Cyber Attack, which is like to Search and Destroy. O'Hara also confirmed that different modes will be released subsequently launch.

Hither'due south some Gunfight.

Personally I enjoyed Gunfight the most. The random loadouts make the battlefield more even since more experienced players can't go with their prized configurations. Plus they're over apace and encourage more cooperation betwixt you and the other player on your squad.

Another characteristic to annotation: in that location will be crossplay across all consoles, in a move that production managing director Paul Haile says volition "bring the Call of Duty community together for the first time." He too noted developers worked to residue the game across all command schemes.

"That'southward been a goal from the very start of the game," he said. "We counterbalanced the entire game knowing that nosotros would accept multiple control schemes playing together in the same match."

How do you lot slow a game downward?

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare D-Day

Considering how fast a round of Modern Warfare multiplayer tin wing by, information technology's surprising Infinity Ward wanted to actually irksome the game downwardly in this new iteration.

It's all about planning out your every move in Modernistic Warfare instead of running in guns literally ablazing.

Even if you're non looking for it, the choices towards this goal are credible. The mounting mechanic, which allows you to lean against a wall or other surface for improve back up while firing, purposely keeps you in i spot. Taking abroad features like double jumping forces you to footstep dorsum and take in an environment before figuring out how to get to the second story of a building, for instance. It's all about planning out your every move in Modern Warfare instead of running in guns literally ablazing.

One of the biggest indicators of this tactical motility is in a new characteristic. As nosotros previously reported, Modern Warfare introduces a gunsmithing mechanic that allows you to customize your weapons on a gun bench in the loadout screen earlier a match. At that place are multiple slots — muzzle, eyes, and an additional perk — which allow for upwardly to sixty different configurations per weapon. Some weapons have more slots than others, only information technology allows y'all to customize your weapon to fit the strategy of certain maps.

The introduction of night vision goggles is also a purposeful move by developers to not only allow players to have fun on nighttime maps, simply to play effectually with calorie-free. With the goggles on you can see the infrared laser from guns aiming downwardly dark hallways, and so you tin can potentially run across an enemy weapon. Some maps likewise take light switches that give players the option to maybe ambush an enemy wearing the goggles. It's non a matter of just putting the goggles on, but knowing when to take them off too.

All of this strategy does seem to work to wearisome downward a multiplayer match and force you to recollect most your next moves. Your strategy begins in the loadout screen with gunsmithing. Since there are seemingly hundreds, maybe thousands (I tin't math), of different combinations for weaponry, special abilities, grenades, and more, y'all can plan out for the map. More experienced players will work to configure their favorite gun to their specific play manner, merely new players can try a number of weapons to see what works all-time.

More than fast-paced shooters tend to favor a more aggressive arroyo to gameplay, merely being a Modernistic Warfare tactician tin look different for each player. You lot could theoretically run in with an SMG and burn down away, just there are multiple avenues for getting to a location and certain weapons and attachments tin can impede your movement. However, you can add attachments to guns, for case, which quicken your movement speed or make it easier to run and aim. None of the maps are flat either, with plenty of places to climb and reach an ideal location to sit down and wait.

Camping isn't necessarily encouraged but you could theoretically do it if information technology works for you. You lot'll have to motility effectually eventually though because the maps aren't big enough to hide successfully for long periods of fourth dimension and there aren't many places that don't take at to the lowest degree one weak spot. Plus, there are killstreaks (more on this afterwards) that will either reveal your location to the enemy or will force yous to scatter.

"Fifty-fifty though we're encouraging moments to think about what your determination is going to be, what your deportment are going to be. It'south withal a game well-nigh motility," O'Hara said.

How do you straddle the line between realism and fantasy?

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare minigun

In the presentation Tuesday, which was held before we got our hands on the game, artistic director Patrick Kelly noted that the primary "dogma" formed the foundation of Modern Warfare was that gameplay was king. Despite the new game'south dedication to realism throughout and an authentic, gritty single-player campaign that'south ripped "straight from the headlines," according to Kelly, the game still needed to be fun.

These two ideas seem to be at odds with each other at the onset. If the game'due south story creates a grounded reality where war is death for both soldiers and civilians, then how can you promote a multiplayer mode that doesn't seem to take any of this into effect?

Telephone call of Duty: Modern Warfare is both realistic and not. It's gritty and serious just also fun and fantastical.

This has been a topic of chat this calendar week thanks to Infinity Ward's declaration that it was bringing killstreaks back. This feature rewards players for getting a number of kills in a row without dying and a couple sometime standards are beingness brought back for Modern Warfare, such as the Juggernaut. I of these newly appear rewards is white phosphorus, a gas internationally banned from warfare but was reportedly used by the U.S. in Syria.

In the end though, the multiplayer is a split entity from the single-player. At that place are elements both share — how weapons work is compatible across all modes, for example, and developers said that Operators' backstories will be consistent — just the multiplayer modes are not to exist taken as seriously as the story.

"The multiplayer is definitely a little more than fantastical than the single histrion," Paul Haile, a production manager at Infinity Ward, told me during an interview following the presentation. "The tone can differ quite a flake merely we're doing our best to make certain information technology remains feeling cohesive as any product."

"When you set off in the development, 1 of the hardest things, specially with a large studio, is keeping many people aligned on this northward star vision of the project. For us, realism was definitely one of those due north stars," O'Hara added. "There'south always compromises on either side, but information technology gives you lot a common management and a common language as well to be able to pressure test ideas against."

That meant the multiplayer team, at the very least, had to strike a balance betwixt going into territory that was deemed too realistic. Certain gamelike elements like double bound and wall riding were removed, but the team held dorsum from factoring in things like weapon jamming, which happens in existent life merely according to O'Hara, was but too slow a concept to use in a Telephone call of Duty game.

The squad as a whole was defended to realism as a concept. Developers tried out guns in real life to learn all the ins and outs of recoil, bullet penetration, and even how they work with night vision goggles all to come at Modern Warfare with as much knowledge as possible. Well-nigh of that was put into the game, but in the terminate, fun and gameplay were well-nigh important.

"Information technology's weird to say 'realism and imagination,' but it's this weird dichotomy of trying to align the 2 and falling in this world that's not quite Hollywood but it is realism and trying to notice the line," O'Hara added.

Bottom line

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is both realistic and not. It's gritty and serious, but besides fun and fantastical; information technology just depends on what style you play. Nosotros oasis't checked out the unmarried-player campaign yet, simply in terms of multiplayer, the realism is a feature, but non at the core of its foundation. Certain modes, like 2v2 flash maps, throw players into a more than casual experience while large maps put players in a situation where small-scale contributions can play a huge function.

Everything y'all need to know about Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2022

All of information technology is in service of ii ideas: to create a more realistic experience and to harken back to the original Modernistic Warfare games. The new Modernistic Warfare is slower and clunkier than more recent games in the franchise, but that's in service of hopefully creating a more grounded game. Ideas like killstreaks are dorsum and add together to the otherworldly aspects of multiplayer but also help in their ain way to go on everything on track.

We'll run into how it all comes together when the game releases on Oct. 25, 2022 on Windows PC, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4.

Realistic fantasy shooter

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

With multiplayer new and old

The new Modern Warfare takes elements from the quondam games and freshens it upward for 2022. However, with realism being a huge goal for the game, elements slow everything downwardly.

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