MW2, the game that many fans of older entries in the series thought killed it for good...and it's the first one I ever played. *sigh*, time to don some juggernaught armor, I'll need it to deal with this much salt.

Is it as good as its predecessor? No, but that's due largely to the fact that COD4 was breaking new ground. It brought the military shooter to a mass market for the first time. It created the idea of the blockbuster video game. How exactly do you follow that? Short answer, go over the top.

COD4 is Die Hard, MW2 is Hard Boiled. The scenario is ludicrous, the set pieces are hilarious and it's all backed by a Hans Zimmer soundtrack. This is an interactive action movie, leave your brain at the door and shoot some bad guys. The missions in this game exist to provide a fun shooting gallery strung together by a plot that technically continues from the previous game, but tone wise is far less grounded. This pattern continued into the third game but that's a story for another steam review.

Sound design is a step up and a step down from the previous game. Much like BLACK from the previous generation, satisfaction and gun porn was emphasized over realism, fitting the new more tongue in cheek tone nicely in my opinion.

Level design is excellent, with a few unfortunate smudges. There are a few times when you are charged with proceeding through an alley of doods that just will not stop coming until you move up, but to move up you need to get them out of the way. This leads to gridlock for quite a while as you scoot forward, pick a few off, duck back to rub the jam off your face and then repeat as they've all respawned. That being said, it is more than possible to complete the game for any shooter fan without more than a handful of "Oh come ON!" moments.

As above, keep in mind this was my first forray into the series, so I do very much have my nostalgia beer goggles on. My highschool afternoons were filled with 4 player splitscreen games of free for all on my old 360, and I maxed out my level on XBL. The big thing that people seem to miss is that this is not a military shooter, it's a military THEMED arena shooter. Time to kill is short, run and gun tactics are encouraged, it's all about those RPG elements of leveling up to get more gear to play around with. This was a game from before the formula got stale and was the first to introduce customizeable killstreaks. The online is on the deader side these days but there's a great way around that.

Google "i w 4 x". It's a fan rebuild of the multiplayer portion that sports a whole bunch of servers, LAN play, increased field of view and mods. If you don't feel like dealing with the modern server, just download a bot mod and populate a listen server for some of that old fashioned COD, smack talk included if you run the bot mod I do. Be forewarned the program WILL break the singleplayer mode, so you'll have to delete and redownload the game if you want to play the campaign or Spec Ops again.

TL;DR: It is braindead, thrilling, satisfying, and scratches all the itches of someone who just wants to play a movie made by John Woo and Micheal Bay, and remains one of the most beloved video games in my collection.

MW2, the game that many fans of older entries in the series thought killed it for good...and it's the first one I ever played. *sigh*, time to don some juggernaught armor, I'll need it to deal with this much salt. Is it as good as its predecessor? No, but that's due largely to the fact that COD4 was breaking new ground. It brought the military shooter to a mass market for the first time. It created the idea of the blockbuster video game. How exactly do you follow that? Short answer, go over the top. COD4 is Die Hard, MW2 is Hard Boiled. The scenario is ludicrous, the set pieces are hilarious and it's all backed by a Hans Zimmer soundtrack. This is an interactive action movie, leave your brain at the door and shoot some bad guys. The missions in this game exist to provide a fun shooting gallery strung together by a plot that technically continues from the previous game, but tone wise is far less grounded. This pattern continued into the third game but that's a story for another steam review. Sound design is a step up and a step down from the previous game. Much like BLACK from the previous generation, satisfaction and gun porn was emphasized over realism, fitting the new more tongue in cheek tone nicely in my opinion. Level design is excellent, with a few unfortunate smudges. There are a few times when you are charged with proceeding through an alley of doods that just will not stop coming until you move up, but to move up you need to get them out of the way. This leads to gridlock for quite a while as you scoot forward, pick a few off, duck back to rub the jam off your face and then repeat as they've all respawned. That being said, it is more than possible to complete the game for any shooter fan without more than a handful of "Oh come ON!" moments. As above, keep in mind this was my first forray into the series, so I do very much have my nostalgia beer goggles on. My highschool afternoons were filled with 4 player splitscreen games of free for all on my old 360, and I maxed out my level on XBL. The big thing that people seem to miss is that this is not a military shooter, it's a military THEMED arena shooter. Time to kill is short, run and gun tactics are encouraged, it's all about those RPG elements of leveling up to get more gear to play around with. This was a game from before the formula got stale and was the first to introduce customizeable killstreaks. The online is on the deader side these days but there's a great way around that. Google "i w 4 x". It's a fan rebuild of the multiplayer portion that sports a whole bunch of servers, LAN play, increased field of view and mods. If you don't feel like dealing with the modern server, just download a bot mod and populate a listen server for some of that old fashioned COD, smack talk included if you run the bot mod I do. Be forewarned the program WILL break the singleplayer mode, so you'll have to delete and redownload the game if you want to play the campaign or Spec Ops again. TL;DR: It is braindead, thrilling, satisfying, and scratches all the itches of someone who just wants to play a movie made by John Woo and Micheal Bay, and remains one of the most beloved video games in my collection.