Topic: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare coming to Wii 11/10/09

[Stratos]

LOL, I reversed our time zones and added three hours from your time so I thought you meant 2am my time. Silly me.

That's too early. But I don't work tomorrow due to a scheduling change this week so I could play then. (I'm closing manager Thurs-Mon)

[NWR_insanolord]

Sorry for not getting back to you Mop it up, I can be on at about 11:30 Eastern.

[Mop it up]

All right, I'm ready.

Stratos, tomorrow I'll probably be available any time after 10PM EST/7PM PST, so message me if you want to have a game.

[NWR_insanolord]

Boy, Stratos, you weren't kidding about that grenade launcher. I gained 4 levels tonight, mostly because of that perk. You've gotta make sure to get them on the first shot, though; it takes forever to reload.

I had this awesome moment where I spawned right behind a guy and shot him in the back, which his teammate heard and came running down the stairs at which point I nailed him with the grenade launcher. I also had something happened to me that I've heard is somewhat common in The Conduit but I've never heard about in this game, where I spawned and seemed to be stuck and couldn't move and the camera was moving really erratically. We tried some of the other modes, but they don't seem to work well without communication. If the game used WiiSpeak and we could get a team of us from NWR in them cooperating they seem like they'd be really fun.

[Stratos]

We could try to use skype or something.

Yeah, I finally figured out that the random explosions that would kill me were actually from grenade launchers. The icon is this rectangular thing and I was assuming it was the bazooka but that was not nearly as effective as this.

[Mop it up]

Do you still want to play tonight, Stratos?

For a long time I couldn't figure out what that icon was, either. At first I thought it looked like the pump handle of a shotgun, but since it was an explosion then it couldn't be a shotgun. I don't really like the grenade launcher though, because it only explodes if it hits the target, and not when it hits the ground. I usually can't hit targets with it, but with the rocket launcher, I can aim at the ground where the person is running and that usually does the job. Especially with the increased explosive damage perk.

If you could write a set of messages that you could display then that would be nice. Even being able to have simple phrases like "Follow me," "Wait here," and "Behind you!" could go a long way.

[Stratos]

Yeah, I'll play a bit. I just want to pull my laundry from the dryer first. When did you have in mind?

Does it really not explode if it doesn't hit a person? No wonder I sometimes bizarrely miss and they don't die.

[Mop it up]

I'm good to go whenever you are ready.

As far as I know the grenade only explodes if it hits someone, but I'm not entirely sure. I didn't use it that much, but it usually bounced past people if it didn't hit them directly.

[Stratos]

I assumed that maybe it took multiple bounces to go off if it hit other things.

I'm firing up the game now.

[Mop it up]

Well, that's what I meant, yeah. My point was that it doesn't explode when it hits the ground but it does if it hits a person which, when you think about it, makes no sense. If it's set to explode on impact, it would do so when it hits something, a person or otherwise.

[Mop it up]

Did your game freeze too?

[Stratos]

No, it didn't. I quit. though those last games I was not playing terribly well because my gf was texting me in the middle of it.

[Mop it up]

Well that's what happened to me when I disappeared.
Are you finished for the night?

[Stratos]

Yeah, gotta lock the thread and prep that stuff. Plus I have some chores to do before bed.

[Mop it up]

All right, so the grenade launcher has been cleared up thanks to the little information box which appears on the loading screens. Apparently, the grenade must travel a certain distance before it becomes "active," and at that point it will explode when it hits something, a person or otherwise. So at close range, it will bounce off of the ground. The strange thing is that if you hit a person at close range, it will not explode, but will still kill them. This is represented by the little icon that shows a grenade round and a person being knocked back. Weird.

What did you think of the Headquarters mode, Stratos? It's pretty crazy. Unfortunately, this is where I feel some of the game's quirks become even more annoying. The most notable one is the grenade drop perk becomes even more cheap. The bonuses that you get from kill streaks make things really one-sided; if someone calls in a helicopter then you're screwed until it leaves or is shot down. It adds up to an experience where strategy is almost irrelevant and you pretty much have to get lucky. There are still a couple of other modes I haven't tried yet, we'll have to test them out next time.

[Stratos]

I'd played Headquarters mode before but never was if so frustrating. I was really off my game that night it felt.

[Mop it up]

Just thought I'd drop a tip here. I'm not sure if the lot of you know this, as I just found it out.
If you aim down the sight of your weapon, this greatly increases your accuracy. However, you won't be able to move as quickly when you're looking down the sight. The Mobility stat of weapons determines your movement speed for this; sub machine guns and shotguns have the best, and light machine guns have the worst. Also, the Steady Aim perk increases your accuracy for whenever you're not aiming down the sight, so this can be useful for the less mobile weapons.

After finding this out, I put "aim down sight" on the C button. I kind of wish that the Nunchuck had three buttons so I could still put crouch/prone on there, but oh well, I don't have to hold that button so it can work as D-pad up. This has definitely helped me improve my game, and now I know how people can shoot me across long distances with seemingly inaccurate weapons. I'm still terrible of course, but now just a little bit less so.

[Stratos]

Yeah, I knew about the sight aiming.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Yeah, I knew about the sight aiming.

It's a mechanism designed for fixed-cursor aiming systems (mouse/analog), and is horribly implemented for the IR pointer.  It's something that shouldn't by copy/pasted into a Wii scheme, and needs to be completely rethought.  The Conduit was approaching the right idea in its scoped-view perspectives; the IR pointer isn't fixed to the screen nor your eyes, so the cursor+camera should reflect the floaty, variable nature of holding the device.

[Stratos]

I actually think it works fine. It's also less cheap than the 'lock-on' you can do in Conduit I think.

[Mop it up]

Yeah, I don't see anything wrong with it. My only problem with it is that I have to make it a button on the Nunchuk, because I find it difficult to hold down a button on the Wiimote and keep a steady aim. Although I kind of like the idea of having to aim for better accuracy, I do prefer the more streamlined action of The Conduit.

Yeah, I knew about the sight aiming.

Then why didn't you tell me that? I'm supposed to be on your side!

[NWR_insanolord]

How did you not know that? It's so fundamental to the way Call of Duty is that I never would have imagined that someone playing the game could not know that.

[Mop it up]

How would I know that when this is the first Call of Duty game I've played, nothing in the game explains it, and none of you folks ever told me?

[NWR_insanolord]

I knew about it before I played any CoD games. If I'd had any idea that you didn't know I would have told you. The fact that you're as much better at the game than I am as you are and you managed to do that while always firing from the hip is depressing.

[Mop it up]

I've never even discussed a Call of Duty game before buying this one, so there was no way I could have known about that unless someone told me. And before anyone says "You should have read the manual": guess what, I did. There was nothing in there about that. Is there anything else about this game which I might not know about? It seems possible that there is something else I'm missing.

The fact that you're as much better at the game than I am as you are and you managed to do that while always firing from the hip is depressing.

For some reason I feel insulted by this.