Softonic’s App of the Week highlights some of the coolest, most unique, and biggest app releases for Android, iOS, Windows, and Mac. This week, a classic shooter returns for its second foray into next gen, with Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare stands out for its story, like that of a typical action movie, something that the CoD series does very well. As a former US Marine, you join Atlas, the biggest private military company in the world. Armed with an exoskeleton that gives you extra abilities like boost jump or enhanced strength, you’re ready for combat with technologically futuristic weapons at your disposal. Check out the video below for everything you need to know about Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
Even though we did expect a bit more from the game, Advanced Warfare is definitely the best Call of Duty to date.
Cheating in online multiplayer games can be a real problem. It upsets the playing field, and while some players profit, they do so at the expense of other players’ enjoyment.
Activision has a new tactic in the fight against cheaters – taking down YouTube videos that explain cheats, exploits, and glitches in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. Eurogamer reports that game video network Machinima has discovered Activision issuing copyright notices against any videos highlighting game glitches that can be exploited by players.
While some YouTubers have claimed that Activision is censoring them, Activision says that it doesn’t censor videos of gameplay, just those showing players how to cheat. As Eurogamer points out, there are still many glitch and exploit videos online – it seems as fast as Activision takes action against them, more pop up in their place.
While this is one strategy against cheaters, of course Activision and developer Sledghammer Games also have a responsibility to find and patch glitches that players exploit in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, to ensure it remains fun for as many players as possible.
Activision comes out with a new Call of Duty every year. Now with Sledgehammer Games added to the list of developers for the series, the franchise has three studios working on separate Call of Duty games.
Sledgehammer Games previously helped Infinity Ward with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, but was given the chance to develop its own title. Taking the idea of future military technology and the rise of private military companies (PMC), Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare presents a new story and an updated, but familiar multiplayer on console and PC. Unlike Call of Duty: Ghosts, Advanced Warfare doesn’t use the old, haggard engine, but one optimized for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
An interesting, but by-the-numbers single player plot
While most people will ignore the single player campaign for multiplayer, Sledgehammer Games created a story that’s as compelling in its first act as the the first Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and as disappointing as the finale of Ghosts.
The story starts in Seoul, South Korea with North Korea invading the capital city. As Mitchell, played brilliantly by Troy Baker, you are introduced to future technology of the United States Marines. Using exoskeletons, soldiers are given superhuman physical abilities. This includes a boost jump, increased strength, and increased perception (played out in a bullet time mechanic).
Weapons are also given an update with recognizable assault rifles, sub-machine guns, and designated marksman rifles. The biggest change is that there’s no visible HUD (heads up display) and all information is shown as holograms on the side of the weapon.
This includes the two types of grenades with different functions like tagging enemies or blasting an electro-magnetic pulse (EMP) to disable electronics. Your offensive grenades can switch from Smart grenades that will locate enemies to the standard frag grenade. Each grenade has four different modes. During my campaign, out of the eight possible variations, I used three.
But even with these updates, Advanced Warfare doesn’t stray from the standard “action” movie pacing that the series uses. One thing Activision was proud to proclaim was Kevin Spacey was playing the protagonist/antagonist Jonathan Irons. His performance varied from excellent to boring depending on the cutscene. Spacey puts on a worthy effort, but on many occasions it doesn’t match what’s going on during the game.
It’s strange that while Advanced Warfare uses Baker as the main character, he plays a silent role throughout a lot of the game. He’s an excellent voice and motion capture actor, but he doesn’t get to shine as much as he should.
The basic plot of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is Marine gets disabled during combat, joins PMC, does missions for PMC, then has to stop PMC. The finer plot details are sometimes surprising, but overall the story isn’t anything spectacular. The secondary character that you work with through most of the game, Gideon, is excellent and helps support the lacking story.
Gameplay is standard for Call of Duty. You play single missions that connect plot points for the story. Between each mission you get to view a cutscene that explains what you’ll be doing next. One problem is that while the story moves through years, it never feels that way. Each mission in the first half of the game feels like a snapshot of time. It’s not until the end of the second act to the end of the game that things start feeling chronological.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare showcases a lot of different environments, most of which are graphically impressive. As the first COD developed for PS4 and Xbox One as primary platforms, there’s a lot of detail. Non-playable characters are rendered well, though there are a lot of generic character models in crowded areas. The environments are more believable and there’s a lot more action happening on screen, but it’s not jaw dropping.
The new abilities and weapons that you use slightly change the first person shooter experience, but it’s not anything that will surprise you. Levels are largely linear though it’s possible to explore a bit more and try different routes in certain areas. The boost jump lets you traverse areas faster, but it’s not that simple. There were a lot of times that borders on levels wouldn’t let me jump to a particular roof.
Later in the game you get a grappling hook that replaces your passive grenades and you use it a lot for about two levels, then it’s kind of forgotten. That’s the same for some of the powerful weapons, that you use a couple times, then run back to your assault rifle.
Quick time events are sparse and are more of an annoyance because if you fail, you’ll have to go to the beginning and try again. That goes the same for the driving missions which are absolutely the worst parts of Advanced Warfare. Since the game can produce a lot more on-screen elements, expect to crash and fail a lot. If these sections were meant to break up the “on foot” gameplay, then it does, but not with much success or fun.
I played through the single player on normal difficulty, but I’ve never gotten more frustrated with the enemy AI. Even though I like the fact that there are more enemies to fight, gameplay starts becoming repetitive when you’re wasting entire magazines into one enemy and they still don’t fall.
Since Advanced Warfare uses the same checkpoint system as older titles and if you don’t activate them, enemies will continuously spawn. Enemies will also use melee attacks using their exoskeletons, which will kill you instantly.
Essentially the same frustrations that are in previous COD games are also present in Advanced Warfare. The future tech that Sledgehammer Games helps the story, but there’s balance issues with the gameplay. It’s a bit uneven, sometimes unforgiving, and a couple times insanely annoying.
I’m one of the people who play Call of Duty games for the single player campaign. I usually find the stories of each game interesting and that’s no different with Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. There’s an interesting story, but it’s weakened by the gameplay. As much variety as the developer tried to include, it’s not as strong as it could be without the franchise attached.
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
Still the same frustrating multiplayer
When you compare popular FPS multiplayer games, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare has always been a twitch, run-and-gun type game. Of course, there are still annoying campers and snipers, but the action of COD has always been running around and killing enemies.
Advanced Warfare’s multiplayer takes the base of existing COD multiplayer and adds the exo abilities, a Pick 13 system, and adds in even more annoyances. The main factor is that there’s never a sense of “team” when playing multiplayer. Unless you’ve joined a clan, don’t expect people to really work together.
That’s the main weakness for people who aren’t that good at multiplayer. For COD fans, it’s perfect. The slight tweaks with verticality are excellent when fighting in cooperation, but if you’re alone, playing becomes frustrating. If you’re new to COD (which no one should be), there’s a beginner combat school which supplies you with loadouts and lets you play with other casual players. It doesn’t really teach you anything and plays like a elementary school version of what you’ll experience in real matches.
Sledgehammer Games’ Pick 13 system works well enough. You have 13 points that you distribute between your weapons, perks, and wildcards. Depending on the wildcard, you can have two primary weapons or up to six perks as well as different score streaks. Unlike Ghosts’ multiplayer, the progression of Advanced Warfare is more natural. It’s possible to remove everything except a primary weapon, but the option to customize to your play style is still welcome.
The perks are usual for the series, but the exo abilities make things a little interesting. You can unlock different abilities like cloak, health stim, hover, and others. They are limited use and helpfulness of the exo abilities widely varies. The most useful is cloak which gives you optical camouflage for a short amount of time, perfect for Domination maps.
Unlocking weapon attachments isn’t about spending points, but completing challenges. You’re able to equip different types of weapons from assault rifles, submachine guns, sniper rifles, shotguns, and even a laser cannon. There are five custom loadouts by default for you. When I played, I had different loadouts for different types of matches.
The leveling system is simple and based on experience points. As you gain levels, you get supply drops would could contain expiring upgrades like double XP, new weapons, or character customizations. It’s a nice touch because otherwise there’s not much to leveling other than unlocking new weapons.
There are 11 match types which additional ones with different rules like for eSports competitions and hardcore COD players. If you want to play without exo-support, there are classic match types. I played through all the different types of matches, but while the objectives are different they all have the same gameplay. Even Uplink, where you have to score against the opposing team’s goal with a small ball. While you have the ball, you can’t use a weapon, but you’ll probably be gunned down pretty quickly while running.
The different maps cater to different match types, but Advanced Warfare sometimes uses a map that is easily taken advantage of. In these early days of multiplayer, it’s obvious that there are balance issues, many camping spots, and other problems that need to be addressed. Team deathmatch works on any level, but some level design created lanes that can be exploited by snipers and campers.
I’m not saying that Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s multiplayer is bad, but it’s gotten to the point where novice players will have a lot of trouble. I think Sledgehammer Games did a great job implementing the exo into the multiplayer and streamlining the process of creating a class. The main problem is that multiplayer is so unforgiving that I wouldn’t recommend it to someone who has never played it before.
The experience that you will have in multiplayer can vary a lot. If you can play with friends, that’s the best way to play. If you’re playing alone, stick to match types that promote cooperation. When I started the multiplayer, there was a definite problem with matchmaking when at level one, I joined a party that had a level 40 player. That’s something that Advanced Warfare needs to fix soon because playing against high level players with highly customized weapons gets annoying when you’re trying to get a handle of a map but get killed once and then killed against at a spawn point because someone was camping.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s multiplayer sets a high standard with customization and the experience system. What’s really holding the series back is the multiplayer gameplay which hasn’t really changed since Modern Warfare. Returning players will be able to jump in quickly, but the series is showing its age and not even future tech can hold the weight.
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
Download Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare for Windows
One of the Call of Duty‘s standard story telling methods is the ‘quick time event‘, where your part in the narrative is reduced to ‘press X to do something’. It was excellently parodied by Saints Row 4 (press X to save the world), but Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare has taken quick time events to ridiculous new levels with a funeral scene. Watch the video below. There are spoilers!
In Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, you meet Kevin Spacey’s character Jonathan Irons at your best friend’s funeral. Jonathan is his father. During the funeral, you can ‘hold x to pay respects’, or not. It seems a ridiculous thing to do, and more so if some gamers are to be believed. Playing the campaign can give you experience points for the online multiplayer, and some have reported ‘holding x to pay respects’ results in a ‘your rank has increased’ message – so paying your respects, surprisingly, could give you a small advantage.
Check back soon for our full review of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be launched tomorrow, and as the first reviews come in, actor Kevin Spacey has been speaking out about why he took part in the game.
The early reviews of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare are based on a review event, meaning we won’t know some things – like how well multiplayer works for everyone – until after its release. It does seem, however, that this title, developed by Sledghammer Games, has reinvigorated the series after last year’s disappointing Ghosts.
Kevin Spacey says playing the part of Jonathan Irons was “an opportunity to do something that nobody had done, and also frankly to reach a new audience”. He also explained his amazement at seeing himself portrayed in the finished game, after acting out his scenes in blank studios.
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is not, of course, the first game to feature a CGI actor, nor is it clear how this advances gaming, as the actor put it. Nevertheless, the portrayal of Spacey in the game is impressive, and undoubtedly adds some gravity to the story.
With only 5 days until Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is released, a leaked (now deleted) video has revealed that zombies will be making some kind of appearance in the first person shooter.
There has been no official announcement by either Activision or developer Sledgehammer Games regarding zombies, but the videos we’ve seen look genuine. Soldiers have exo-skeletons as they will in Advanced Warfare, while the zombies are incredibly quick, rushing and leaping at troops.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is set in the future, and will be different to recent games in the series. As well as the exo-skeletons that give soldiers leaping powers and more, the single player campaign opts to focus on one character’s story, rather than jumping between protagonists as is typical for CoD games.
The zombie leak video, as many Reddit commenters point out, looks like a cut scene, not gameplay footage, so aside from knowing zombies are likely, we can’t say anything about what game modes they will appear in, or much else.
A long list of details about Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare has leaked, supposedly from a stream of the game someone put on Ustream this weekend. The stream has since been taken down for copyright reasons.
All of the information should be taken with a grain of salt though- it’s not from official channels. There’s a huge list of available weaponry, attachments, camouflage and more. If you think these are spoilers, stop reading now!
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be released on November 4th, and the gameplay has been shaken up with the introduction of futuristic exo-skeleton-clad soldiers, with abilities much like those of Titanfall.
Here’s the list of details taken from the stream: Gun camouflage list:
But COD: Advanced Warfare can’t ignore the millions of multiplayer fans who want something new, but familiar. What are the big changes in multiplayer?
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
Increased customization possibilities
The first major new feature of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s multiplayer is the lobby. The lengthy drawn-out menus aren’t included anymore. It’s also possible to modify your equipment, Perks, and the appearance of your character easily between matches.
This new system lets impatient players to try out new weapons in a shooting range. Female avatars are back in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare too.
A new class creation system
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
The perk selection system has evolved. The Pick 10 system introduced in Call of Duty Black Ops 2 has been abandoned for the new Pick 13 system.
These additional spaces will allow each player to customize scorestreaks as well as the exoskeleton’s special abilities such as the retractable shield or optical camouflage.
Advanced Gameplay
Slegdehammer Games adapted soldiers’ futuristic equipment to traditional controls of the series. The resulting gameplay is not only intuitive and accessible, but also brings important changes.
The side dash, temporary shield, and the new jump boost mechanic, pressing the jump button twice activates a double jump, are some of the new additions. Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s arsenal of weapons leans towards science fiction while at the same time maintaining conventional firearms for those old school players.
A complete facelift
The maps that I played put a lot of emphasis on verticality. The maps are a little bit larger and offer multiple paths. By using the jetpack you can take the high ground and quickly gain perfect positions for sniping. Without reaching the frenzy of Titanfall, the matches in Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare are more intense.
Six Million Dollar multiplayer?
New weapons and perks improve the game without changing it too much. Multiplayer matches are nerve-racking and the new maps encourage you to take advantage of your soldiers’ new movement capabilities.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is far from reinventing the wheel and it’s reasonable to question whether the changes will appeal to fans in the long term when compared with other new revolutionary titles such as Evolve or Titanfall.
Either way, the new installment is still conventional enough not to lose long time fans of the series.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be released on November 4th, and now publisher Activision has revealed the minimum requirements for PC users, which are almost identical to those for last year’s Call of Duty: Ghosts.
Running Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare requires at least 6GB of ram, which is no change. It will be more interesting to see what Sledgehammer games publish as recommended requirements. This game is the first in the series to be genuinely ‘next gen’, so PC users with powerful machines will be hoping to be able to take advantage of them.
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare aims to shake up the massive series in a number of ways. The near-future setting has allowed Sledgehammer Games to include futuristic technology like exo-skeletons, which makes multiplayer especially very different to previous games. The single player campaign also introduces a famous face, in the shape of Kevin Spacey, and there is only one protagonist – you won’t jump between characters and scenarios.
Will this be enough to freshen up a series that seems to have lost it’s way?
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare PC minimum requirements.
– OS: OS: Windows 7 64-Bit / Windows 8 64-Bit / Windows 8.1 64-Bit
– Processor: Intel® CoreTM i3-530 @ 2.93 GHz / AMD PhenomTM II X4 810 @ 2.80 GHz or better
– Memory: 6 GB RAM
– Graphics: NVIDIA® GeForce® GTS 450 @ 1GB / ATI® Radeon™ HD 5870 @ 1GB or better
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is out on Nov 4th, and Activision has released a seven minute video explaining all the changes and new features in the multiplayer part of the first person shooter. Watch the video below.
You’ll find out how the futuristic exo-skeleton will work, and what abilities it will give you. It promises to make Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare much faster and more ‘vertical’ than before. You can see that, even if developer Sledgehammer Games denies a connection, there are similarities with Titanfall’s fast paced parquet style movement.
Default player
brightcove.createExperiences();
The trailer also explains how you’ll be able to equip your soldier with weapons, attachments, wildcards, perks and more. The new ‘Uplink’ mode is detailed too, where two teams pass a satellite around, trying to get it to their opponents uplink point.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be available for PC, PS4, PS3, Xbox One and Xbox 360.
