For years I spent my time trawling through apocalyptic wastelands and futuristic versions of planet earth and beyond. I visited other worlds and vanquished foes from all over the universe. I was and still am a single-player story mode gamer but as I grow older my time is now more precious than it used to be. I am as the web address aptly describes, an adult gamer.
I am nearly 40 years old and have been gaming for the last 35 odd years. My love affair started when I was given an NES by my parents when I was around 5 years old. Since then I have tried out most systems and played many hundreds if not thousands of games.
For the longest time, I looked forward to the yearly iterations of the Call of Duty franchise. My first outing being the very first game. It wasn’t until Modern Warfare showed up on the PS3 did my attention dial-in.
Modern Warfare, to me, was the perfect game to lose myself in. I enjoyed FPS games that had compelling story modes and this issue ultimately where I always looked when a new FPS was released. The main story in Modern Warfare and the missions contained within were simply joyous. They were filled with every element that makes gaming great. Exciting action, suspense and a narrative that makes you care for the characters you control.
Once finished I truly considered myself a Call of Duty fan. They had made a game that contained a superb single player with some truly iconic moments.
After sampling the delights of another great Call of Duty – World at War – I naturally gravitated towards Modern Warfare 2. Both games were truly excellent in their own right and they, for me, continued the high-quality experience I had come accustomed to when playing the original Modern Warfare.
Next on the roster for my gaming pleasure was Call of Duty: Black Ops; a game surrounding the Cold War / Vietnam War. It was another superb addition to the COD family. Black Ops was also my first real foray into multiplayer. Up to this point, I had merely dabbled with that particular game mode but with Black Ops, something seemed to click with me. I spent a huge number of hours online and my social life probably took a hit because of it (haha).
The Zombies mode was also included and with Black Ops again was a great addition to the game and series. I spent many a late night with Call of Duty: Black Ops and regularly shouted loud and far to tell all of my friends and acquaintances how good a game it was.
After Black Ops, the bar had been set and sadly this is where my love affair with the series started to take a downwards trajectory. Next up was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. I enjoyed this particular iteration of the Modern Warfare series but something was missing. It accomplished nothing new in my eyes. This possibly stemmed from 3 amazing games; Modern Warfare, Modern Warfare 2 and Black Ops but it did feel lacking in quality when measured against those.
Activision continued to churn out games yearly. Black Ops 2, Ghosts, Advanced Warfare, Infinite Warfare etc. I sampled most of these games but only fleetingly as I felt that, in the main, the series had hit a bump in the road. All of the games mentioned were purchased by myself, played for a small amount of time and then traded for something different. I was no longer surprised or gripped by the single-story mode elements despite them containing Hollywood digitised characters and famous screenwriters on the roster. I had, for want of a better word, become uninterested.
I didn’t play Black Ops 3 or Black Ops 4 due to reviews and friends saying they were much of the same. Additionally, I was very much disappointed when I found out that they were looking at rebooting my favourite title from the entire series; Modern Warfare.
I did not for one second contemplate picking up the reboot at launch as I was still of the opinion that the series had stagnated. The once championed story mode I yearned for had even been left out of Black Ops 4. I thought to myself, this is the end for me with the series.
Or so I thought.
Bored with the backlog more than a year ago now, I downloaded the sizable free to play Call of Duty: Warzone with little or no hope that it would pull me in. I have dabbled in battle royale games in the past such as PUBG, Fortnite etc., so I decided that Warzone could be a decent shout to drop 30 minutes into every now and then when bored of other more time-consuming games.
40 wins later (mainly team-based plunder), I am now truly back on board with Call of Duty. I even purchased the single-player game and multiplayer as I was so impressed with the entire experience. The gunplay is superb and the game itself is just a joy. When you purchase the whole game there is so much content it seemed overwhelming at first. Upon reflection, the campaign, multiplayer, plunder and battle royale modes could easily satisfy my gaming needs for the foreseeable future.
Furthermore, I cannot undersell the team element of Call of Duty Warzone. During this difficult time (Covid-19), I reconnected with friends who I rarely see in real life. Our bond was reinvigorated and it certainly helped me in some of my more difficult moments recently. I am certainly grateful that my friends and I all stumbled upon this excellent gaming experience. Additionally, I am also aware that as an older gamer (married with kids) many aspects of life have curtailed my gaming. Playing warzone for a few rounds is the perfect getaway from daily life and being connected with like-minded friends it makes it all the sweeter.
I cannot speak highly enough of all aspects of this game and I am 100% behind future iterations as long as they keep the updates flowing to improve both the game modes and performance.
See you in Verdansk,
Phantom
