Review: Call Of Duty Advanced Warfare

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare envisions a powerful future, where both technology and tactics have evolved to usher in a new era of combat for the franchise. Power Changes Everything.

Pros:

• Graphics are greatly improved from the last game. Boasting a new engine, Cut scenes now look more realistic, Environments look much crisper. Overall it is a much nicer looking game.
• Controls are the same as always with a handful of different layouts.
• Game modes are:
  • Single Player, The story part of the game
  • Multiplayer, Online,local, LAN party and combat readiness program.
  • Exo suit survival co-op, online and local co op play game mode.
• Four difficulty options for the campaign: Recruit, Regular, Hardened and Veteran.
• Voice acting is as top drawer as always, Introducing Mr Kevin Spacey, The game chat just got serious!
• Intel is back, Collect 45 pieces of Intel that is spread across all the levels.
• Companion App on iOS and Android to see results, Clan management and much more.
• Colorblind option.
• Paintball mode, A mode where every shot fired leaves a splat of paint. Handy for perfecting your shot and plus it looks funny as hell. Kind of makes the game look like a violent Art Attack set.
• Save and quit whenever you like in the story.
• Crosshair has changed in the way it displays shots. 1 crosshair means a body shot where a double crosshair indicates a headshot. Its only a small change but quite a powerful one.
• You can set co-op exo,multiplayer or single player as the default start screen.
• Frequent checkpoints throughout the story.
• Story has Exo side missions: Earn Exo upgrade points for grenade,kills,headshots and Intel collection. Improve stats like sprint,grenade capacity, fast reload and much more.
• Loads of new high tech toys to play with. Threat grenades will display enemy locations, Smart grenades that lock onto enemies and track them, Double jump, Air dodge moves, Easy grenade selection and so many more.
• New guns including laser guns.
• Story mode is your average 6-8 hour affair depending on difficulty.
• Killstreaks are earned through points not kills. This allows lower skilled players a chance at getting a kill streak going.
• story mode is a lot more explosive than before and could easily rival any michael Bay film, Variation keeps it all fresh and keeps you hooked. in the first few missions alone you get to use a tank, blow up planes, And use a powerful Exo suit.
• online has all your game modes you know and learn like TDM, CTF, Domination, ground War etc. Infected makes a return along with all the esport rules modes.
• new game mode Uplink makes its debut. Collect the intel ball and throw it into the enemies uplink sphere. sounds easy right? well when holding the intel you cannot shoot but do have improved armour. you can pass the ball among other players both enemy and allies. think oddball meets the Uncharted relic game type mixed up with some speed and you are on the right track.
• In depth emblem creator is back, Multiple layers are available and you can unlock new shapes,icons as you play.
• combat readiness allows you to play online with randoms and AI bots, giving you access to all guns,perks and killstreaks.
• private bot matches are back and still allow you to invite friends and do any game mode except Ground war.
• new maps are varied and incorporate more verticality than previous games. no room has only one entrance, Roofs are more accessible and make the playing field that much more unique. Dynamic events happen in game at random times. For example on Defender map a Tsunami strikes and floods the lower half of the level.
• Playercard allows you to show off any unlocked backgrounds which are earned from completing challenges. you can put a custom motto on there or add your clan tag. Also another place to display your created emblem.
• full Clan support, set up clan matches or objectives.
• All sound effects come through the DS4 and is a really cool feature.
• Supply drops can be earned from all modes. These drop random items and are Call of Dutys version of the briefcases from the Battlefield series.
• Loot/items vary from simple new costume items, new weapons, costume buffs with a time limit and you can get new emblem options.
• Fully customizable character settings for online. You can do the typical things cosmetically, you can add cards which grant more power like the ability to have two primary weapons, carry more grenades etc. You can also tweak your killstreaks and add things like more power or longer duration. It is a really powerful in depth system.
• Clean easy to use UI.
• Mute all button for online including mute all but friends or mute all but clan.
• Full Platinum trophy with only a few online trophies. Majority are for the single player and Exo co op modes.
• Auto saves at regular intervals.

Cons:

• Noticeable slowdown in certain set pieces and is more predominant in split screen play.
• On screen chat notification online is really obtrusive. using a horrible font, The notification invades the top part of your screen and despite its ugly appearance, Also puts you off.
• QTE sections are not that clear and can easily be failed.
• At the end of the level you cannot quit the level.
• Loading is not as fast as previous games.
• Melee hit box seems a bit broken and is more apparent when playing Infected game mode.
• Balancing is still shot to pieces with low level players getting chucked in with high level players.
• Despite all the talk of verticality and bigger maps, There is a lot of invisible walls and inaccessible rooftops.
• A few things i personally liked from earlier versions are not present again. Things like having bots take names off your friends list. instead we get names like Chemo, Wolf and other stupid names. The other feature i liked was playing bot matches offline would have its own offline rank, You could rank up and unlock new things. now however its done what it had on Ghosts and just given you access to the whole arsenal.
• Have instances of the whole game freezing when using the disc. This could be my PS4 but its the only game I have had this issue with.

In Summary, the game is an improvement over last years game, bringing better graphics, more modes and just elevating the whole experience. It still has the same niggling issues like you cannot assign melee to the right bumper button or that the balancing never seems to work. But for the players who like the story you will be glad to know that this is brilliant as always. Bringing a new set of soldiers in a whole new battle field. The story whilst just a cheesy action flick, It is a good story and with Mr Spacey at the helm, the story is some what believable and entertaining. I enjoy playing the game for brief periods but for long term play it is still just the same old game with a few little touches. Double jump is a short lived wow factor and the sliding ability is already being abused just like it is in Destiny and Killzone. Sliding shotguns FTW it seems. Anyway in short the game has glimpses of brilliance and the story is great fun. co op is great and multiplayer is basically the same again with a few little additions.