Another year and another Call of Duty multiplayer mode is upon us. One of Call of Duty’s biggest criticisms has been the lack of innovation year after year. Few changes have been made to a franchise that has desperately needed something fresh to entice fans that had left the series years ago. Fortunately, long time die-hards will immediately notice differences in everything from ADS speed, map design, and fresh new modes that fans didn’t even know they wanted.
Run and gun has been the style most gamers have grown accustomed to and this year Infinity Ward made some much needed changes to the formula. Aiming down sights takes a tiny bit longer and so does simple movement around maps. This alters the flow during matches and in between kills and respawning. Most notable, the three lane design for all maps is gone. While they do still exist to some degree, there are now places to hide inside buildings with multiple floors that will take an adjustment for seasoned players. Weapon balancing, particularly with starter weapons, is handled better compared to prior games where people found themselves in as severe disadvantage until they reached certain levels for many guns.
At launch there were a couple of guns that should’ve been tweaked prior to day one. You shouldn’t be able to snipe with a shotgun… Thankfully, Infinity Ward has been on top of patches since launch almost weekly, but some big issues still remain with spawns and hit detection. You’d think after over a decade of Call of Duty games spawn point issues would have been figured out. Nope. A number of times we’ve found ourselves being spawn killed over and over and trapped in some maps where a team would push you into a corner and camp the spawn of another team. These types of issues shouldn’t exist in 2019 but they do.
Some maps are welcomed additions to the franchise and some need to be removed from playlists until they can be reworked. In total you will find 20+ maps across all modes. These include Day, Night, Ground War and Gun Fight maps that are unique to their own mode. Meanwhile, the new, larger TDM maps are something the franchise needed to improve the matchmaking experience in my opinion.
Team Deathmatch is Call of Duty’s bread and butter and this is immediately made apparent when you venture into other modes like Search and Destroy, Hardpoint, and Domination where the same maps are recycled. Many times, the maps simply aren’t well suited for all modes. Thankfully, Ground War has seen a big update from past entries by having its own maps at launch. This mode is not for everyone and you can tell they’ve attempted to give Battlefield players a tease. Many times a match of Ground War is plain chaos while others it can be fun if you’re coordinating with a team. New to the franchise is my favorite mode, Gun Fight. This is a 2v2 game where its the first team to reach 6 round wins on substantially smaller maps. It’s quick, tense and super fun. It’s an absolute must if you have a friend to play with.
The Call of Duty Modern Warfare multiplayer suite brings so much new to the table but also retains many issues that have plagued the franchise for so long. It’s beautiful, runs really smooth and has had very few issues since launch. While not the best multiplayer ever for the series, it’s off to a great start and is seeing updates weekly that could propel it to people’s favorite.
