Map: Freight
Mode: Safeguard
Options - If you have a friend then play co-op, but if you are playing solo then go to a local game and in the options select double health and fast regeneration.
On the map go down into the tunnel and close the door at the far end. Then set up at the bottom of those stairs under the closed door and all enemies will file down right to you. The riot shield guys are a little tricky, but if you save your IEDs they shouldn't be too much trouble. That's pretty much it.
You can get the Safeguard achievement most easily by playing locally and setting max health and fast health regeneration.
Loot rounds always last 25 seconds and give you 8 care packages.
The more teammates you have the more enemies there are each wave. Playing solo wave 2 has 13 enemies, but with 4 players wave 2 has 20 enemies.
IGN previewed Safeguard this week, and while I'm not 100% certain this is the final form of Safeguard, the release date is close enough that it seems likely. So here are some things I've noticed based on the video:
Like in MW3's Survival you do not get to customize your class.
Unlike in MW3's Survival there is no mini-map.
The first "Loot Round" lasts 25 seconds and has 8 care packages. It also counts as a round, so the enemies start coming on round 2.
You can pick up 3 killstreak care packages.
You get weapon points in the top left, and it seems a hit gets you 10 while a kill gets you 20. Except at the 3:00 mark he gets +30, +30 and +50, and I don't know why. He was shooting a dog and the headshot counter in the bottom left stayed the same.
Weapon level-up tokens are dropped periodically from random enemies who you kill.
There are periodic "Ammo Resupply; Team Restock" times which happened in the video when the player picked up a support care package, and also when he got a weapon level up token.
The higher your weapon level the more damage it does.
There is no middle-of-the-screen XP like in MW3's Survival, but you are still earning xp that applies to multiplayer.
Enemies do not drop weapons.
The time between rounds is 20 seconds.
The Support Drop bar increases based on the entire team's activities and as soon as it's full it will drop. The support drop is 4 care packages with either a weapon or perk.
There is no enemy counter.
Field orders are for everyone playing unlike in multiplayer where it's a suitcase for a single player at a time. It seems the field order challenge stays until you complete it.
Bleed-out time is 25 seconds and you can still use your primary weapon.
The self-revive mechanic is calling in an AI friendly that revives you and any teammates that are down, and who will stay and help your team until it is killed.
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The Squads trailer has a couple more items in it:
You can have more than one perk at a time. (I presume you lose perks when you go down like in Treyarch's Zombies mode)
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Some things I got from other videos:
Game Options include setting your max health and health regeneration speed.
Able to pick up 3 care packages, no more.
Calling in a helo scout transports you from wherever you are into the helo, and then you are dropped off back onto the map after 30/60 seconds. Could be useful for tight spots.
Supply drops look to be about every wave.
Shotgunners are called 'Ravager'
Riot shield holding enemies are called 'Striker' (and they are the same character model as the shotgunners)
Charlie Don't Surf was the introduction a lot of people got into being in a modern military. The series' name, "Call of Duty" brings to mind (to me at least) that all men have an obligation to join the ranks and fight in the trenches for their country, which is what we saw with all of the WWII games. Charlie Don't Surf is the modern version of what that call looks like (albeit a somewhat Hollywood-ized version).
If you've played the game then there's no explanation needed, but for anyone who hasn't this is the single best reason to play the Call of Duty 4 campaign. The first time you go through play it slow and follow Macmillan's instructions. It's intense.
Modern Warfare 2
If you haven't seen Generation Kill you should. I'm pretty sure Infinity Ward used parts of that mini-series as inspiration for Team Player (as well as SSDD). Great pacing, excellent movement from action to quiet and back to frantic fight-for-your-life action.
This is the level where we are introduced to Soap. We played as him in CoD4, but here with Kevin McKidd's voice he instantly becomes a larger-than-life hero a la Captain Price (for me at least). And on top of that we get ice climbing, chasm jumping X2, stealthy snowstorm sneaking and spray-and-pray on a snowmobile. Two men take down an entire Russian air base.
A lot of CoD campaign missions have a quiet section, either a lull in the fighting or a stealth element to pace things better. This one though does it completely differently. It forces you to walk while your crew guns down civilians with some weird pulsing background music that creates a lot of tension while still being slow. It's a unique section with an atmosphere that I haven't seen in a video game before (not that I've played that many games, but I have played a few shooters).
I spent two years in Minas Gerais and went into a couple of small favelas while I was there so this level brought back some memories. From my experience they really captured the atmosphere, but beyond that the first time going through the level it seems like a massive maze of bricks and concrete while it's actually quite linear. I was very impressed that they could do that and guide the player through it in a way that doesn't disrupt the illusion. Plus it's an exciting level not knowing where you are going and having lots of enemies all around you all the time.
I want to take The Only Easy Day and The Gulag together because they take place one right after the other. I'm not sure I can really describe why I like them so much, but I think it's related to what I said for Charlie Don't Surf, except applied to a special forces team like the Navy SEALs. Of course that's on top of the fantastic gameplay.
Modern Warfare 3
Even though I didn't think Soap would die after MW2, the prologue of MW3 where Price is rushing him up to a doctor to get revived was pretty intense, so it was a satisfying relief to finally see that he was back in action here. After shadowing Price in CoD4 and Soap in MW2 here you are following along with both of them which makes you feel unstoppable.
MW3's story is much more straightforward compared to CoD4 and even MW2. Soap and Price are relentless in their pursuit of Makarov, so finally getting to the finish line, finally chasing him to the very end of the road is immensely gratifying. Yet it's also bitter-sweet. And the soundtrack really hits it home there.
Special Mention
The coup isn't really a campaign level in that you don't actually play, you just watch. But it's one of the best sequences in any game ever. This is one of the main reasons I hope we eventually get a CoD4 remake, to see The Coup again but with more detail, better lighting, better character animations, better facial expressions... I could go on but I won't. It was incredible for 2007, but imagine if it were redone for next-gen consoles in a few years...
So far everyone has said that the Juggernaut Maniac runs faster than normal so its possible it has build-in speed perks and possibly Extreme Conditioning, however that has not been confirmed.
At the 1:40 mark in this video the player unloads into a full-health Juggernaut Maniac with a suppressed Honeybadger. The suppressor shouldn't affect the gun's damage because it's at point blank, but I can't say that for sure.
From what I could see there was one shot that missed and the juggernaut died with the very last bullet in the magazine. The first 13-15 shots were in the head, then there were about 4 body shots, then some neck shots, the one missed shot, and back to the neck for the rest.
It seems reasonable to say that gun's damage is between 30 and 45 up close and a headshot multiplier 1.4 (standard for MW3 assault rifles), which would put the juggernaut's health between 1026 and 1575
Even if those numbers are slightly off I think it's safe to say that the Juggernaut Maniac has at least 900 and at most 1700 points of health.
Squads is like BO2's Custom Games (Black Ops' Combat Training) and MW3's Survival mode put together, and you rank up and prestige the same profile in both Squads and multiplayer. ============== Official Squads trailer:
So it looks like Squads will be the Special Ops replacement and likely will take up a significant portion of my time. Here's what was in today's reveal:
You create 10 characters to use in multiplayer - these 10 slots replace the normal Create-a-Class slots. The 10 character you create for multiplayer can be used in Squads mode to play against other players or against AI. You will earn XP and rank up your multiplayer profile in Squads, and all the ranking up and prestiging you do in multiplayer will benefit your squad for use in the Squads mode.
The AI dropshot, side-strafe, corner camp, jump shot. The weapons and equipment you give your squad affect how they behave. Very advanced AI.
Squad Assault
You fight against the squad of another player (without that player participating). The opponent chooses his squads loadouts and the map and game mode. You can play solo or with friends. If the opponent's squad does well he earns XP. Safeguard
4 player co-op mode inspired by survival from MW3. Includes all the weapons, perks and streaks from multiplayer. Safeguard also has field orders, and a timed "loot round" where I assume you pick up care packages from the support drop. Survive 20 rounds to win. Safeguard Extended - survive 40 rounds to win. Safeguard Infinite - survive 100 rounds to win. List of waves in Safeguard. Squad vs Squad
Compete against other players one-on-one with your squad as teammates. Wargame
Choose 5 of your squadmates to play against AI in every multiplayer game mode. Basically this is Combat Training or Custom Games, except you can choose the loadouts and streak rewards of your entire team which adds a larger team element.
The most XP you can earn in a game of Squads is between 2000 and 2500. The cap is 2000xp, but if you have 1950 and you get a double kill in Search and Rescue then it will still add the full xp amount (250 per kill plus a bonus 50 I believe) onto what you have giving you 2500 in this example. You also get a care package for maxing out the Squads mode xp in that game, and no xp will show up for kills from that point on in the game.
You get three perks for the build-up, and you need a streak of the point value of the perk + 1 to get each of those. Then the specialist bonus consists of 8 points worth of perks.
An example:
You select Recon, Scavenger and Sleight of Hand for your three build-up perks. You need to get a 2 point-streak to get Recon, a 5 point-streak to get Scavenger and an 8 point-streak to get Sleight of Hand. Then at a point-streak of 10 you get the specialist bonus which is 8 points worth of perks.
I wrote a comment on reddit in response to what seemed like a general backlash over the introduction of mini-dlc packs into CoD's universe:
Some people are willing to spend quite a bit more money on Call of Duty than others and this is a way to for ATVI to find out who they are and actually get more from them in exchange for pretty insignificant in-game extras.
No one is getting ripped off. We're talking about voluntary exchange here. When you purchased the season pass you knew you were getting four map packs and you decided it was worth it. No one promised you extra camos and you're not getting extra camos for that price. Now they're offering extra camos as a separate DLC pack and everyone can evaluate whether or not this new DLC is worth it.
I'm a season pass holder, I've been a pass holder since they invented the season pass...I'm a founder, I jumped right on board with that stuff. And when I buy a season pass I expect to get all the DLC they come out with that year....Season pass means season pass, you get the DLC for that year. Stop raping your best customers for more money....At some point you're just treating your best customers badly. At some point you're just chasing away the people who support you the most...What they've done is they've spent my good will. I hope it was worth four bucks.
My initial reaction isn't wrong, they did advertise the season pass as being only for the map packs, and no one is being forced to spend more money on the game. But, it's that part about good will, about treating your best customers in a way that will let them know they are appreciated. Invest in the long term viability of your product, especially when you have something like Call of Duty.
I guess it's 7 survival maps plus 1 Chaos mode map:
Seatown is probably the easiest survival map of them all, a result of it being a Tier 2 map and also having great cover and lots of close quarters around the market. There's always a fun element to easy-mode.
My best solo - Wave 32 - 15,600 on the leaderboards, which is the top 1.05%
My best co-op - Wave 45 - 17,700 on leaderboards, which is the top 0.46%
I consider Fallen to be one of the best looking maps in MW3, a combination of the style they chose, good lighting, and pretty good color. It has enough cover to make it enjoyable without making it too easy.
My best solo - Wave 25 - 3,000 on the leaderboad, the top 0.32%
My best co-op - Wave 25 - 60,700 on the leaderboard, the top 2.4%
I like Bakaara mostly because of the memories. I played this map dozens of times split-screen with a good friend, just having fun. It's a real challenge.
Best solo - Wave 25 - 9,800 on the leaderboard, the top 0.99%
Best co-op - Wave 28 - 26,900 on the leaderboard, the top 1.09%
Piazza's many levels and verticality work really well, more so than Carbon which has a similar hillside design. I really enjoyed Piazza in a lot of game modes including survival. Plus it's just a great looking map.
Best solo - Wave 39 - 222 on leaderboard, the top 0.092%
Best co-op - Wave 27 - 35,400 on leaderboard, the top 8.86%
Best solo - Wave 32 - 401 on the leaderboard, the top 0.32%
Best co-op - Wave 38 - 1,200 on the leaderboard, the top 0.56%
Off Shore would have gotten a spot on the basis of it's singular wave progression, but it actually has a great setup with lots of levels, stairs and hallways. All of it together makes for interesting and fun gameplay.
Best solo - Wave 24 - 1,014 on the leaderboard, the top 1.04%
Best co-op - Wave 25 - 2,700 on the leaderboard, the top 1.64%
Parish is small and frantic, just like in multiplayer. It would look better if they took out some of the cloudiness though.
Best solo - Wave 29 - 136 on the leaderboard, the top 0.31%
Best co-op - Wave 19 - 10,800 on the leaderboard, the top 19.64%
Chaos mode is technically a sub-segment of survival mode and Dome is the most fun of the maps included in that mode. I still think they should have made Chaos mode for the Face Off maps, but oh well.
Best solo - 18.32 million - 328 combo - 4,400 on the leaderboard, the top 1.93%
No co-op score.
CoD4 and MW2 maps that I think would be a lot of fun in survival mode:
This is the only mission in CoD4, but it definitely deserves a spot on the top list. It's fast paced and one of the most difficult things to accomplish in any Call of Duty game ever on Veteran. It set a great precedent for future missions. "We're going deep, and we're going hard." "Surely you can't be serious." "I'm serious. And don't call me Shirley."
Modern Warfare 2:
I really enjoyed the simplicity of this mission, that you have the area of a small multiplayer map and you have to kill 30-50 enemies. I could do it solo on Veteran if I really focused, and even on Regular I could challenge myself by seeing how quickly I could complete it.
In the CoD4 campaign you experience the AC130's support briefly at the end of Hunted, and then you man the craft in Death From Above. The MW2 mission Overwatch recreates both of those even better by putting two players together and forcing both to communicate effectively their respective view of the situation and how to best deal with it.
Essentially the CoD4 campaign mission All Ghillied Up, except solo or with both roles filled by players. High replayability factor in my opinion, and really captured the magic of the CoD4 level.
Exceptionally difficult on veteran because of the timer and limited equipment, this one took me dozens of run throughs to finally beat with a partner, but was incredibly satisfying once it was done. Breaching is always fun and the pace once you get inside is tremendous.
Similar to O Cristo Redentor in its simplicity, except with a very large map, and more difficult enemies that have all already spawned on the map (except the juggernauts). Defensive play is rewarded in a way that I imagine is true to life, and clearing the house then defending it is pretty cool. I also enjoyed the map itself, a lush mountainous area in western Asia.
Modern Warfare 3
Part of the appeal of Milehigh Jack is that it brings back the feeling of Mile High Club, and the other part is that it complements the campaign mission Turbulence by showing it from the enemy's perspective.
I contemplated wether to include Smack Town or Hit and Run since they both take place on the same map which I consider to be one of the most interesting. The rusted ship remains, the docks, it's just a cool environment. But Smack Town has a bit more variety to the gameplay with the first portion being on the helicopter so I think it gets the nod.
Starting off as a captive and rushing through each stage to save the other hostages is very engaging. Completing it solo on Veteran is very doable, but it does take some concentration to save the hostages in a timely manner which makes it rewarding. Also playing co-op and seeing your executioner murder other hostages while moving toward you is exciting.
This mission is one of three that are maps that were not part of the campaign, Arctic Recon and Special Delivery being the other two. It's not a difficult mission even on veteran but something about the variety appeals to me more than the average mission. There's sniping, sneaking around at night, an EMP, a great looking fiery bridge, and the reaper gameplay mechanic is very satisfying.
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In CoD4 there are 20 achievement points you can earn in Mile High Club.
In MW2 there are 340 achievement points you can earn only in the Spec Ops missions.
In MW3 there are 720 achievement points you can earn only in the Spec Ops missions (110 in the standard missions and 610 in the DLC missions).
The rumors are wide that Neversoft is working on a Call of Duty game and if they are announcing it in 2013 then it will be the 2013 release, and it will be Call of Duty 10.
But it won't just be Call of Duty 10. Because Infinity Ward was the only studio working on CoD in the beginning, and because they had a 2 year development cycle, Call of Duty did not have a full game released in 2004, just an expansion pack (United Offensive), meaning this year is also the 10th anniversary of Call of Duty. Oct 29 2003 - Oct 29 2013.
A few other items indicate that it is highly likely that Sledgehammer is also working on this year's game along with Neversoft. Treyarch did not do very well with their first game and so I think Activision decided to break the new studios in slowly, Sledgehammer with MW3 and Neversoft with this year's release.
CharlieIntel reported on Activision's 2012 Q4 report. ATVI expects 2013 CoD sales to be down from previous years. My guess is that this would be the case whether the game is released exclusively on new consoles, on both new and current consoles, and obviously if it were released just on current gen consoles. Some possibilities:
They'll release the game the regular 2nd Tuesday of November
They'll release it on Tuesday October 29th, exactly 10 years after CoD1
They'll release it whenever the new consoles are released, or along with whichever one is released closest to CoD's normal November release.
Because they're expecting lower sales this year and it's the 10 year anniversary of CoD1 I believe we'll see a remake of CoD1 (possibly a CoD1,2,3 combo) in which case they don't need to develop and write a story, pay voice actors, or create the maps from the ground up (the plans/designs are completed). That will keep the cost of production down which is more valuable when you expect lower sales.
Adding to my admittedly small amount of evidence that Neversoft and Sledgehammer are working on this year's title is Infinity Ward's extensive involvement in post-release support of MW3, and their subsequent move into a new office in February 2013 giving IW little time to have developed a new game. I think Activision is investing in Call of Duty's long term health by moving to a three year development cycle for new CoD games (or 2.5 years + 0.5 year post-release support). CoD more than pays for itself, so I think this is a good move. (see April 6th edit below)
Edited March 4th: On Twitter today Sledgehammer sent out a picture of their recruiting ad which is of a modern day soldier with sunglasses and a mic/headset. CharlieIntel hasn't ever seen it before, and I did a picture search and came up empty which means this is was not part of MW3's promotional material.
This makes me doubt all my WW2 theories a little bit more than I was before. Up to today I would have given the game a ~75% probably of being WW2, 25% modern day (as in Gulf War through War on Terror era). After seeing that poster I'll revise my estimates to more like 60% for WW2, 40% for modern era.
Edited March 21st: Drift0r put up a video with info from a "reliable source" about another Modern Warfare game titled Ghosts.
Now I'm doubting my WW2 guess even more. It's too bad, I really think a 10th anniversary WW2 game would have been the best bet this year. The big tip off that the rumor is not accurate is that he says it will be released only on next gen consoles. To me that just seems ludicrous.
Edit March 22nd: A mock-up of a poster that was posted to reddit.com/r/gaming.
Nope. Sorry about that. Bad info.
Edit April 6th: CharlieIntel visited IW's offices to talk to executive producer Mark Rubin along with others about the studio and presumably the studio's next title release. I'm confident that the only way IW could invite these types of guests is with ATVI approval (or even only under ATVI's directive) which means it's for this year's game. It makes sense too - they're reaching out even more this year to try to combat stagnating sales which will be exacerbated by the introduction of new consoles this year.
So once again we have IW working alongside SHGames, with Neversoft doing something as well. I'm very curious how this turns out.
Edit April 21st:
Tmartn was one of the people who visited IW's offices, and in the video posted April 21 he said that the reveal of CoD10 will be "probably even within the next couple of weeks" which is the most anyone as much on the inside as him has said. Everyone is already expecting it around now anyway, but history has shown some variation on when exactly the first teaser happens. I'd put my money on May 1st.
Edit April 24th: Driftor received a tip on twitter of a listing for CoD: Ghosts at Tesco Direct. The image is pretty good and I didn't find any similar images online, however IW and ATVI are the only names on the box, no Neversoft or SHGames which is almost certainly not correct. I highly doubt the box art is correct, and I have no clue whether ATVI sends out the name of the game to retailers this early so that's still up in the air. A leaked target ad (registration required, image here) confirms the name CoD: Ghosts, and it's listed on the 360 and PS3 in both places.
I put together some summaries of the sales numbers for the last 6 Call of Duty games from VGChartz, and here are the results. Unfortunately the VGChartz numbers don't include digital sales which means PC sales are lost and once a game goes up for sale on Xbox Live and the Playstation Store the numbers start to sour.
This shows the first 10 weeks of sales of each CoD game on PS3 and 360. You can see the first week makes the biggest difference between them. So let's take that out and see what the rest looks like.
The first thing I see is that WaW doesn't quite follow the trend of the others. It's hard to point to anything with much surety, but remember that September and October of 2008, right before the release of the game, was the financial apocalypse and the beginning of the mass layoffs that started the current low-employment phase, I'm sure that hurt video game sales at the margin. So CoD4 did better through the Christmas season than WaW. But it could just as easily be that WaW didn't get the good word-of-mouth that the other games got. BO2 was released later in the month compared to the rest of them so you can see it had it's Christmas peak a week earlier. Another thing I see is how much convergence there is among all of the titles at the 9th and 10th weeks, particularly the steep decline of MW3 and BO2, which had Christmas week sales higher than CoD4's 1st week sales, but MW3 had a lower 10th week and BO2 had a lower 9th and 10th week than CoD4's 10th week. According to VGChartz BO2's 10 week sales are lower than MW3 by almost 3 million, but higher than Black Ops by about 600,000. Here's another one comparing the sales of each game in it's first year (Nov and Dec of its release year), second year (1st full year) and third year:
Really only the first two years count. MW3 is already available for consoles to buy and download and I didn't pay attention to when past games were put up for digital sale. But anyway, it's mildly interesting. Added April 7, 2014: Charts updated to include Ghosts.
