Multiplayer

This new COD's multiplayer was never in danger of being anything less than excellent, being as it is essentially an extension of COD4's already perfect online play. All we really needed was more of the same, reskinned for World War II with a few extra bells and whistles, and that's pretty much what we've got.

That said, we do have slight reservations about a couple of those extras Treyarch has - understandably - added to make the experience its own. The vehicles, while fun, felt a little superfluous to us, not really adding much to the game despite their imposing presence. The problem is, when you're building on a game as tightly balanced as COD4's multiplayer, there's very little that can be changed while maintaining cohesion, As a result, the vehicles just didn't feel like they gelled with the rest of the game.

Similarly, we weren't too sure about the new replacement for the gunship. This time around, racking up enough kills in a row gives the option of unleashing a pack of dogs on the opposing team. It's very cool indeed to be on the dispensing end of, but it just feels a little unbalanced when you're the victim. Wheras the chopper could be avoided by going indoors, or even used as a distracting advantage to make more kills of your own, the dogs home in on anywhere you might be, and as far as we could tell bring about an instant kill every time.

You can shoot them down if they attack from the front, but if they come from any other direction, you are, to put it plainly, utterly screwed. They're a cool idea; it's just a shame that they feel a little too much like a delayed-action smart bomb in practice. We found the flamethrower a little overpowered too, particularly indoors where it will demolish everyone in a room in a mere second or two.

Negatives out of the way though, COD: WaW's multiplayer remains an excellent slice of military shooting. The core gameplay remains as great as it's ever been, the weapons feel meaty despite their vintage, even after COD4's brutal tools of perforation, and the levels we played, while not as tightly focused as Infinity Ward's, still provide an excellent blend of skirmish areas, cover, contestable bottlenecks and indoor and outdoor fighting. All in all, very pleasing stuff, and while we're not sure that WaW is going to be a COD4 killer online, we can see ourselves having some very enjoyable times with it nonetheless.