Wasted ideas and the games that could have been

Several game publishers just saved me a load of money... but that's NOT a good thing. In fact as far as my gaming standards are concerned, it's downright horrible.

Ideas are a dime a dozen; some good, some cliched, some awful. At most the more original, untried and yet workable the idea, the more potential such a game would have to--you know, stand out. Be noticed. Be fun.

And then it all falls to a crashing disappointment.

Case in point: Call of Duty 4.

Don't get me wrong; I loved the original Call of Duty and the way its sheer intensity kept me hooked to the PC for hours and hours. Brutally difficult, visceral and by virtue of the fact you died a lot but still kept coming back for more, developer Infinity Ward had a winner.

Such a winner they made Call of Duty 2. Better polished, better shooter mechanics, crisper graphics. Would that make a better game, surpassing the original CoD? I naively hoped so... but on trying the demo it turned out to be another run-n-gun German kill-fest. True, there was fun to be had--but the liberties the designers took with the WW2 setting left something to be desired. We ended up buying CoD2, but only after prices went down. Fun, but our $50 could've been better spent.

Fine, I thought. Give them another chance.

Which brings me to the core idea behind Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Set in the contemporary War on Terror, CoD4 serves up a new story-driven campaign about American and British efforts to stop a power-mad Russian nationalist who enlists Middle Eastern terrorist factions to do his bidding. You shoot baddies up with M4 assault rifles instead of Garands, Javelin AT missiles instead of Panzershrecks.

Intriguing? Yes. Fun? Yes... for a while. As long as it takes the free demo to run.

Come on, Infinity Ward--I know you can portray the US Marines better than that--the player is supposedly a Sergeant in Force Recon, but where is his squad? Why must Lt. Vasquez personally assign troops to cover the player when squad control should be up to player action? Why does every friendly rifle have a targeting laser?

And why oh why does the Javelin go so high in top-down attack mode? (I won't even go into the player's ability to carry an unlimited number of missiles, something only possible with the cartoon concept of "Hammerspace".) Basically the design decisions in the game are so stupid it's laughable--but sadly, the only laughter will be by IW all the way to the bank. And unless something happens they will come away thinking this game succeeded and make more of the same.

I loved Call of Duty and frankly still do--in fact I wanted CoD4 to be compelling, realistic and make sense. It may be the first, but it sure isn't the second and third... and until they can show they've done research into how Force Recon works and added a player command ability I'm not showing them the money. I'm not a hardcore military nut by any standard, but I know fakery when I see it so blatantly placed in a game I want to love but can't.

Good idea, bad execution. Good point on releasing the demo, though--I now know to wait till this game lands in the bargain lot.

And don't get me started on World in Conflict; the demo of this glowingly-reviewed (and creative, I admit) RTS left an awful taste in my mouth. Even Company of Heroes featured more advanced squad mechanics and off-map support than this alternate-history game. Set during a Soviet invasion of Europe and America in 1989 and featuring a great story and whiz-bang action, the following found their way in:

-- the need to wait 10-20 seconds for artillery and airstrikes (compared to five in CoH)
-- the inability to update co-ordinates
-- the need for units to precisely line up or they won't move; a fat lot of use in a firefight

Another great idea, long on promise but short on execution. And those are, to me, the worst gaming letdowns of all :(

Next time I'll talk about cliched and in some cases unoriginal or inherently boring ideas that actually worked. You know... can you say Company of Heroes?