COD WW2 Is Nostalgic Trash (Review)

[Music] it's nine o'clock the day before this game technically releases it just struck midnight on the East Coast and the game is live my girlfriend is nagging me to do some trivial chore I don't want to do that I don't think even needs to be done but thank Christ I have an excuse tonight I can't babe God just dropped I gotta make a video and she leaves me alone cuz vids make money and that [ __ ] gets her off more than folded laundry and organized bookshelves ever will it's a lie of course it'll be three months before I put out a cod video because I'm crippled by ADHD or depression or both or maybe they will writing them just that [ __ ] lazy whatever it is I'm a shadow of my former self and I'm running out of ideas for how to crawl back deep inside I have this nostalgic hope that eventually everything will go back to normal everyone will be as happy as they used to seem the world will feel as docile and charming as it once was like we'll feel as secure innocent infinite as it did in the glory days of childhood this feeling never strikes harder than when I sit down to a new Cod for the first time you think to yourself this is it they'll finally get it right this time and everyone will love this game and all your friends will be playing it all the time the whole online gaming community will coalesce around it just like back in the day when it used to sell 25 to 30 mil of pop everyone swapping Cod stories at school and you'll be hooked and look forward to playing it while you slog through your day maybe this time everything can go back to how it was it's a version of what we all feel when we buy a Cod these days this faint hope for what once was that we can recapture that special time in our lives we all had on one Cod or another people get mad about the game not changing enough but why would it when they know that all we want is what we already had reply to any comment hating on Cod and asking what the ideal Cod would look like they'll have an example ready for you and it'll be a game that already came out Cod's been selling the stolid for the better part of a decade and we keep buying because we still gern for that golden era of oh wait to 11 I launched the game the multiplayer servers are down and I'm not as surprised as I should be great now I have to play the two-thirds of the game I always say I'll try but never do the campaign rapidly Falls into familiar patterns of overused cliché gameplay that you can't help but roll your eyes at the sequence where you save a wounded buddy by dragging him through an open field where you mow down entire platoons of bad guys with pistol it's the car chase sequence where every car you shoot erupts into a massive fireball the sniping sequence followed up by a collapsing building you have to escape everything is linear and predetermined when they want you to play with the flamethrower your captain will order you pick it up you know the cinah great enemies as they run blindly up to narrow pathways that were obviously designed for convenient flamethrower slaughter on any difficulty below veteran the enemy's accuracy will make the average stormtrooper look like Chris Kyle which is still not as bad as your own AI teammates whose bullets dissipate in the air it's not uncommon for a single bad guy to charge into the heart of your squad stab you in the face is your teammates scream at you to watch out while they shoot wildly in the air if you pay attention you'll soon realize that all the chaos and gun fighting going on around you is so much window dressing the AI rarely ever actually hurt one another and if they do they're immediately replaced by an off-screen spawn immersion in this game requires you not to pay attention not to ask questions God's favorite kind of customer the central theme to the story is that the main character let his brother hit eaten by a dog and now he feels like a dumbass what she should and doesn't want to repeat the incident with his buddies in the army even if one of those buddies is Jewish or at least that was my reading of the subtext it's largely derivative of HBO's Band of Brothers but without the substance there's no real moral dilemma or ever anything that makes you feel uncomfortable sometimes someone will say something snotty to the Jew hey that's mean how come Jews don't go to church we go to synagogue and I'm like from all the Americans have a chummy of what a drag this is kind of attitude you might expect in a locker room or a worksite but it feels out of place in the nastiest war zone in human history they're generally as generic as good guys get dad Joe quit the hard-ass commander who's hard because he cares men who regularly disobey orders to do the more dangerous thing it's all standard Call of Duty unambiguous good guys lip service to edginess without running the risk of actually causing a fence over-the-top interactive cutscenes linear whack-a-mole virtual treadmills all packaged in the same away graphics you know and loved by now I've rolled my eyes so far back into my head that I'm bleeding from the sockets I give up and quit on level 4 which is to be fair three levels farther than I usually get in the cod campaign but that was mostly just because the multiplayer servers were down a decade later and on a new generation of consoles there's been no marked improvement in typical Cod campaigns because they aren't selling a new game they're selling you nostalgia for that time you stayed up all night beating world at war watching YouTube guys for how to get through mile-high knife only the good old days when that kind of [ __ ] was your top concern if only I could give a [ __ ] about anything now as much as I gave a [ __ ] about general Shepards betrayal in mw2 two roads diverged and would and caught opted to stand still and spin around in circles for ten years it's as true for the campaign as it is for zombies I boot up the classic survival mode and once again you can't help but reminisce I might as well be walking through my [ __ ] high school campus reminiscing on when the squad would spend six period plan and tactics for the new zombies map trying to break the highest round on Ascension so you can take pics on your phone and brag about it to that other squad the next day of practice break in 44 with your cousin on keno before he left for the army 40 with tyonne shangri-la before he left for college the good old days when those friends were more than just memories coming home late from practice strung out on the worst diet imaginal and way too much exercise every day sucks but at night we get high and play zombies zombies is laughter addition on the day's gossip with your boys it's that special kind of game mode that can push you mentally and keep you stimulated engaged without all the added stress of the [ __ ] [ __ ] on multiplayer that [ __ ] you don't need when you already got beef with half your class all your teachers and arrival high school to boot zombies is warmth just laid-back chilling with people you like and the one thing that's still fun in your life I had hoped for zombies this year no more jet packs and other futuristic nonsense to pollute the gameplay simple World War 2 zombies just like it was in the old days because I want it to be like it was they'll get it right this time what is right right is whatever it was the time you had the most fun on it I miss some bees before Easter eggs became the point back when people gave a [ __ ] about the highest round you got back when you spent your time devising actual strategies to survive as opposed to just doing as the YouTube video tells you I choose a class and browse the other customization options this is cool there's some variety in how you play the game different roles to fill an added layer of strategy the mission objectives aren't as obscure and random as I remember Easter eggs being in the past like that only other time I played zombies in the last three years and rage quit after having spent 20 minutes looking for the right pinion to hold X on or some random statue off the map to [ __ ] shoot an arrow at there's one criticism I have it's that everyone spawns with Juggernog levels of health automatically making the game much easier meaning the average match will last around 20 even when people are playing like jackasses the first half-hour of each match isn't as intense or dramatic as it was back in the day when you could get to touch while trying to get power on and recovering from a down at a high round meant raising funds and dodging the two-touch while you snuck around the math to get jugg back getting through that and getting your friends through that was undoubtedly one of the more exciting parts of the game and that's gone now still if you had asked me what I wanted a zombie sequel to look like back in 20 I probably would have described something like this clear objectives and puzzle solving character customization and added replay value laid-back zombie slain that pushes you without pissing you off the ingredients are all there but I feel nothing because it's not the same I want it to be exactly like black ops 1 everything exactly how it was but a new map but why why should that even be that much more entertaining than what it is now the differences aren't that significant is that all I really wanted from this more black ops 1 I already own that [ __ ] game that I want to relive memories from my youth I own those too and very few will admit it but this is how we all feel about cod it starts with misguided optimism and answer thus thinking this isn't how it was when I play Call of Duty X so we feel stupid all over again and go on rage on the internet and next time instead of doing something like Call of Duty X they'll just re-release it as an HD remaster and will be stupidly excited and buy the [ __ ] out of it and it still won't be the same will still be disappointed with it they'll have made some tiny changes here and there and we'll blame those even though their impact on the gameplay is negligible at best because we're not ready to admit that we want something that doesn't exist two rounds of zombies is enough for me to know that this just isn't what I was looking for the games been out for three hours and I'm finished with most of it but most players don't care about most of the game anyways the devs have confirmed that everyone has a story for the first time they really got into Call of Duty's multiplayer it's as universal as losing your virginity in fact probably even more so I asked a dozen different people what made Cod so special to them the first time they got into it and not one of them replies back to say that it wasn't in fact special to them it was the novelty of being able to make your own classes it was the satisfaction of ranking up and unlocking [ __ ] it was the thrill of killstreak rewards and dominating people with your ac-130 it was the crisp beauty of that 60 frames per second Cod still has all that stuff why isn't it enough for most people anymore could it be because back then Cod was the first to have it they were the only mainstream title that did have it now every game has a version of that stuff class customization 60 frames killstreaks whatever they've all has done it they've all tried it and even if they didn't we've had so much of it in cod itself that it's lost its novelty these mechanics were an incredible dish at a restaurant we were trying for the first time but now that we've frequented that same restaurant for 10 years and every other restaurant has some version of that dish cod itself just isn't that special anymore even though we want it to be because it's not just cod by itself or a nostalgia for it's that feeling of stumbling on something new and exciting if the novelty of exploring something you haven't had before in probing its depth for thrills the joy of discoveries the first time you went to the first time you kissed a girl not the 10th the 10th can't be that it's the context it's like when you remember how the first halos graphics blew you away the first time you saw them but you go back now and it's blocky and comical think of all the industry resources spent trying to fill everyone's desperate need to relive nostalgia how many HD remakes how many copy pasta cod how much money have gamers wasted chasing the systolic dragon pouring money into games we are inevitably disappointed with it because we don't feel what we felt that first time think of all the incredible new memories we've missed out on of every game we didn't buy coz we wasted our money on [ __ ] cod the witcher's and rocket league in arcs and stardew valley 's of the world how many people missed out on those games cuz they dropped their 60 bucks on cod and it's not just gamers it's the whole goddamn country that's why we elected a president who literally copy and pasted make America great again from Reagan in law and order from Nixon that's why they make new Star Wars movies with the exact same goddamn setting and plot as the original trilogy it makes the original trilogy feel cheap when I watch The Return of the Jedi all I can think is wow what a waste of time this all is you're kidding yourself Luke because in 40 years when you're old is dirt everything will be exactly the same as it is now the Empire will still be blowing up planets the rebels even after overthrowing the Empire apparently will still be some ragtag group of homeless people that has to run away from the Empire which didn't actually get overthrown apparently they just changed their name the Emperor and Vader got replaced by more handsome versions of themselves so defeating the Emperor blowing up the Death Star it's all pointless none of this makes a difference the whole original trilogy is a redundant pointless meaningless joke now because they didn't want to make a new Star Wars movie because we didn't want one all we wanted was to relive watching the original trilogy for the first time and we got it and it sucked and now it's tainted the original memories themselves just like COD for mw2 and black ops one will always be tainted by ghosts aw an infinite warfare but it's not just about what Cod was it's about what purpose it served in the larger context of your life nostalgia is defined as a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past typically for a period or placed with happy personal association the word is derived from the latin roots homecoming and ache [ __ ] ache the other day i was listening to various game soundtracks on youtube and i stumbled across the black ops 1 main menu themed listening to it I was instantly flooded with emotion in these memories that play before my eyes spontaneously the good old days of cracking out on wings of redemption Kal of that giddy feeling on the way home known you were gonna get high and get on black ops with your pals when Tommy still played xbox when waffles still play video games that year I lived with Josh getting high out of cut up water bottles as he cheers me on during that 94 and Oh nuketown game and that stupid [ __ ] orphan tears song is playing my first youtube video these moments of carefree bliss simpler times when we bore less scars that ache in your heart when you realize those moments are over I load up World War 2 multiplayer and it's all there this game might as well been black ops 1 DLC albeit with shittier map design and boring kill streaks I struggled to think how I could even review it without being as unoriginal as the game is I've written this review three or four times already and I was stupid enough to do a beta first impression thinking there would be something new to add when the actual game came out but isn't that kind of what we wanted in the lead-up to this game for the last three years really what people have begged for is a return to the series roots boots on the ground get rid of all the futuristic nonsense so we can have some good old-fashioned Cod this game accomplishes that but everyone agrees it still sucks and will come up with a thousand reasons why and nitpick the game about this and that and ignore the obvious truth that what's done is done we just wanted the game to give us what we had that one time whatever that one time may have been for you Cod 4mw to black ops 1 halo 2 halo 3 but they'll never be able to do that because it wasn't the game by itself that made those times of your life special memorable and it's not the [ __ ] game mechanics you ache for the big youtubers you love aren't gonna be how they were Tommy's not coming back on xbox and waffles and gonna start playing games again I'm not moving back in with Josh the games not getting back together the carefree bliss of youth is over those scars aren't gonna heal they can copy-and-paste the game but they can't copy and paste your life no matter how much money you spend to that end and you know what when I really think about it I wouldn't [ __ ] want to copy and paste those times in my life even if it was somehow possible despite how nostalgic I may feel for them because I feel that nostalgia for the small little nuggets of goodness but I hated life back then I was miserable in fact part of what made called so great was that it was an escape I stumbled on to it at a time in my life when I was so bored I preferred not to wake up in the mornings when most of my day was this miserable boring depressing slob six hours a desk homework sleep repeat and gaming became this little nugget at the very end of the day that at last gave me something to look for when inevitably I did have to wake up I wouldn't go back to some version of those times just so I could play some [ __ ] black ops and you know what else back then I suffer from a nostalgic just as much as I do now except I was nostalgic for being seven and now I'm 23 nostalgic for being seventeen give me a [ __ ] break and ten years from now I'll be nostalgic for my time on overwatch in battlefield one and I'll regret not having cherished that as much as I ought to have because I was so preoccupied wishing they were more like the times from my past and my past past and it's this vicious cycle where we spend our whole lives chasing some elusive [ __ ] from our past and us forgetting to appreciate what we have now the best moments in life were never spent trying to recapture other moments I get bored the multiplayer pretty quick but I grind through it for a while anyways to get some clips here's another thing I sure don't [ __ ] miss so [ __ ] I jump in war mode it's the newest thing Cod's had in years and you know what people love it they love it so much in the beta in fact that by launch they promoted it to the top of the playlist right under TDM it's not exactly original they combine payload from overwatch with operations from battlefield and lifted their leg on it but it's new and it is fun the spawning isn't as random giving the fights a more strategic dimension it's no longer running around like chickens with your head cut off it's trying to break through a forward defensive line each section of each map offers a different kind of encounter there's some actual replay value and tactical incentive to utilize play styles that go beyond rushing around with an SMG there's a thrill and jumping on the tank to move it forward and trying desperately to survive the smoke grenades the desperate struggle of each side to keep the other suppressed there's an edge of your seat excitement and intense thirst for the wind that I think has been lost to Cod for some time now without a doubt the best part of this game is the newest part of this game the biggest mistake sledgehammer made was dedicating most of the playlists and maps to rehash in the same [ __ ] that's already been done they should have gone all-in on war mode keep your TDM Daum search and hard point put the other half of the resources into war mode or into other new things even if you're not a huge fan of war mode I bet you if they hadn't dedicated so much to the past they would have stumbled on something you could love - for the last few years Cod has been stuck in the strage cognitive dissonance where we said we wanted new but obviously we still wanted to relive the old and don't say we didn't because there's been dozens of remakes and risk ins from every franchise and we ate all that [ __ ] up and you know it you know it so Cod does something a little new with the mobility but then they still try to recapture the old at the same time and it's his hideous Frankenstein and we hate it but what if they just gone all in on the new maybe the mobility and jetpacks and wall would have been cool if they weren't just putting it in the same three lane Maps the past that were the same size with the same killstreaks and perks in the same game modes maybe the mobility could have worked but it didn't so we told him to go back and they did and it still basically sucks and we're just back to square one and now what you want a real in black ops one it's right here and don't pretend it's not I had 25 [ __ ] days on that game and I can tell you this is it right here war mode is the future change is the future and part of that is on the developers to have the [ __ ] balls to do it part of that is on us to let go of this nostalgic mindset that is destroying gaming I'm tired of [ __ ] remakes man I'm tired of copy and paste you know what else I miss extinction mode it was a gem and otherwise shitty game but they abandon it cuz it was new we just wanted zombies 10 times in a [ __ ] row you know what else I miss overrun on Gears of War that game mode was sick as hell but it was new and we hate new so they didn't do it again you know why overwatch took a hundred game of the Year awards and all this [ __ ] because it was one of the few games that unapologetically blazed a new trail in an industry that is pathetically played it safe in the past for the better part of a [ __ ] decade nostalgia is dead I killed it and if you ever decide you want to live you will to sign yours truly the call of duty community [Music] now you know I'm gonna get that mw2 remake that

Channel: BDobbinsFTW

Views: 223,874

Keywords: cod ww2, call of duty, Resistance, dlc trailer, Review

Id: hajcoTF_aJs

Length: 16min 46sec (1006 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 20 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/host_1]

I do agree with his rant. I try to give TC the benefit of the doubt since they've said they ended up rushing completion of gow4 due to spending more time working of the technicalities, and to be fair it is the smoothest gow game ever, the gameplay is the best its ever been. However it heavily lacks in content. Heavily. Their big new gamemode is basically domination (Which is great). All cosmetics are behind RNG, nothing to work towards. Only a few actual new maps. Lazy swarm design...reskins on reskins to please whiny children.

Sadly, I think TC are exactly the type of limp dick game developers that shy away from ACTUAL new content out of fear of alienating their "core" fanbase.

I hope they work on these things. I'm sure there are lots of people who have great ideas for the franchise in that building, but I get the impression money talks louder.

[u/[deleted]]

Gears 4 is infinitely better than any cod produced in the past 4 years lol

[u/XFiveOne]

I'm completely done with anything TC related after Gears 4. I love the game, but I just can not support a game so reliant on RNG crap and "micro" transaction garbage. If you're paying actual money, there should be no RNG. RNG is only fun when you don't have to collect fake currency to purchase something where you still have only have an extremely slim chance of obtaining something you actually want. Like a lot drop after killing a boss. That's fun. Not "spend 3 hours playing to collect a currency. Ok, now spend that currency buying boxes. Ok, now open those boxes. Nothing you wanted? You suck, play more."