I'm well aware it's hypocritical when considering my stance on the annual sports game franchises that never seem to change much and yet offer best-selling new instalments each year. I'm well aware it reflects a little poorly on my person to have such compromised opinions on a game series that frankly is a reflection of the sports franchises I've come to somewhat loathe, but none of this changes the fact each summer I start getting pumped for a new Call of Duty game. As the temperatures start to drop, a deep hunger develops where I find myself slobbering over the proposition of sinking tens of hours into another generation of tense arena shooter. I'm also self-aware enough to know Call of Duty games don't really change much year-over-year, and yet I can't stop myself from getting excited about what the autumn may bring. I know, I know, the definition of madness and all...

This desire for another era of Call of Duty tends to pick up throughout August and leads into the first betas for the game, where you can get a taste for what it'll bring to the table. The betas are usually a fantastic measuring stick as to whether the game is worthy of your hype or not, and looking back at last year's Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, I was fairly confident early on the game wasn't going to be the one for me. So where do I stand in regards to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4?

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For one, there's a lot riding on this game to be good. Well... more so not a trainwreck. After the disaster that was Black Ops 7, Call of Duty needs a win, but not quite to the same degree as say Battlefield did with Battlefield 6, as frankly Call of Duty will always be Call of Duty. Still, I desperately want this series to get back on track, to return to the highs it hit in the late 2010s and early 2020s, a peak it has continued to fall away from instalment after instalment.

While my time chewing away at the Modern Warfare 4 beta has been considerably more positive than the Black Ops 7 alternative, I can't say I'm completely convinced by this upcoming chapter yet, unfortunately. There are several key improvements from last year's game, but it isn't the return to form I was hoping for, but let me get into that.

For one, the Campaign mission of Entrenched feels like a night and day improvement over near anything Black Ops 7 offered. It's gritty, it's rooted, it's still a tad futuristic, and it's packed with action set-pieces, tense and hectic combat encounters, and a few gripping platforming sequences too. Where Black Ops 7's Campaign felt like an ayahuasca-induced nightmare, this comes across as more of a Michael Bay action film, overflowing with cliché, "oorahs", explosions, and demi-god-like heroic feats. It's exactly what I want from a Call of Duty Campaign mission (even if I do wish armour plates weren't a part of the Campaign), so thumbs up on this front, and fingers crossed the rest of the story will stack up to this example.

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However, moving over to the Multiplayer element, my opinions are a little more turbulent. It's clear this game is looking to tap into the boots on the ground action fans have been clamouring for while refusing to entirely cut out the over-the-top and hectic movement and pacing of Black Ops 7 and other more recent Call of Duty examples. The end result is an online multiplayer experience that moves at the speed of light, where you fly around the levels, flinging yourself around corners and slide-cancelling to evade enemy fire, cutting through threats and being gunned down yourself in a matter of three or four bullets. Simply put... it's too fast. The time-to-kill window is too low, the movement too bouncy and rubbery, the gunplay wobbly and lacking in precision thanks to this movement design philosophy. It's another example of a Call of Duty game where you will need to be jacked up on Adderall and energy drinks to be able to stomach more than 45 minutes of consecutive online play, especially considering the proposed matchmaking changes don't seem to have had any effect whatsoever, ultimately making every single unranked public match feel like Game 9 of the Call of Duty League Championship Weekend Grand Finals.

Then there's the maps. What has been shown so far doesn't give me all too much confidence this year's instalment will have too many (if any) hall of famers in their ranks. They're too small, too fast-paced, lack intricate and creative design, and ultimately the current shape of the Multiplayer experience makes every match feel like a round of Shipment 24/7. It's spell-bindingly fun for the opening 15 minutes, and then when the adrenaline wears off, soul-crushing and mentally exhausting.

There's improvements to be made to the HUD, which currently feels like a mobile game on-screen display, and the progression is once again suffocating in how its setup, with a core design philosophy revolving around appeasing the 1% of players who sink thousands of hours into the title and not the masses who will see the Combat Knife having 30 levels of progression and simply check out.

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Still, it's not all doom and gloom. The Gunsmith continues to be a well put together customisation suite that works effectively, the gunplay, while bouncy, is still top-notch with few rivals in all of the shooter space, the visuals are excellent and the performance (on console at least) is brilliant, offering fluid and responsive gameplay where you barely spend two minutes waiting for something to happen. Also, you could argue the beta is the best time to play a Call of duty game, as none of the crazy and ridiculous cosmetic options have taken over. I know Activision has promised to eliminate this nonsense in Modern Warfare 4, but it also promised to move away from skill-based matchmaking (SBMM) in unranked matches, and yet here we are...

My final note in regards to the beta is less of a Modern Warfare 4 criticism but a Call of Duty criticism, and it's about the launcher. This. Thing. Sucks. There are few things in all video game design that I currently loathe more than the Call of Duty launcher, which takes up too much space in a storage drive, is a pain to install new content, gives me options to jump between current and past Call of Duty titles that I never have a reason to use, and every time I want to access one of the games, it needs to 'restart to apply new updates'... The world would truly be a better place without the Call of Duty launcher in it.

So yes, a mixed bag, you could say. The current state of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 doesn't leave me as flat and disappointed as Black Ops 7's beta weekends did, but it also fails to leave me with a massive deal of optimism. This game will be popular once again, as all Call of Duty games are, and it is a step in the right direction too, but it's a much smaller step than I was hoping for and I'm not convinced this game will be enough to repair the damage Black Ops 7 ultimately did to the franchise and to the fanbase.

Gamereactor UK

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