Edgar and I recently got many hours of play time with the new Call of Duty game, World at War. I’ve never played a CoD game before, but Edgar was peeing his pants he was so excited. Specifically about the mutliplayer. Much to both of our delights the games turned out to be great and the developers really listened to what gamers wanted out of the new CoD game. You should have seen the hilarious Powerpoint they had showing all the stuff they added. We are still trying to get a copy for you guys, because the presentation was priceless and also showed just how much the developers care about the game and the gamers.

Anyway, read below for Edgar’s impressions of the Wii version of the game and my impressions of the DS version.

Edgar’s Impressions of Call of Duty: World at War for Wii
I was quite surprised to see Call of Duty: World at War on the Wii. The game is running on a modified engine of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, which never made it out to the Wii, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Treyarch did a great job getting this running on the Wii. Everything from the PS3 and 360 single player made it over on the Wii. Yeah, the graphics were toned down a little, but it still looked great. I had a chance to try out the Single Player mode and the Squadmate mode with Nick. What’s Squadmate? It’s co-op on the same screen. Anytime when playing the single player campaign, your friend can jump in with a second controller and his cross-hair will appear on the screen. So while the first player is controlling the movements and his own gun, the second player can shoot, with his own guns and ammo supply, helping out the first player through the waves of upcoming enemies.

One of my favorite weapons during my play time was the Flame Thrower. The fire effects in the game were awesome. You could aim at a crate and the fire would stay on it for a while. Burning enemies and watching them roast on the ground. Burn down enemies hiding in tree tops. It was sickly gratifying.

It was nice to see the game supporting the Wii Zapper. I don’t know why, but playing FPS games with it makes it a totally different experience. Since we’re talking about controls, I was happy to see the amount of customization available. The first thing I asked was for the option to set the “deadzone”, that area where you can move your cursor and it doesn’t move your camera. That option was first available in Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 on the Wii and it’s an option that should be in every FPS from now on. You can set it so that moving your cursor will immediately move your camera, like playing with a mouse on the PC. That way your cursor is always at the center of the screen.

There’s also online multiplayer in the Wii version, but we couldn’t try it out. I’ve been told it will support up to 8 players. It will have most of the modes we had in Call of Duty 4 (360/PS3), including character customization, upgrades and perks. If you compare the graphics to the 360 or PS3, you’re going to notice a difference. Even more so with the PC version. But if you only play on the Wii you will honestly be impressed with how good it looks. And the fact that the single player game content is identically is a huge win for the Wii and proves that a Wii version doesn’t have to be inferior.

Nick’s Impressions of Call of Duty: World at War for DS
First, let me admit that I’ve never played a CoD game. Honestly, I stay away from FPS’s because I can’t control them on consoles and my PC is too old to run them, the Metroid Prime series being the exception. Speaking of Metroid, this games closest DS brethren is Metroid Prime Hunters. Only, get this, you won’t get Bob Dole claw hand playing CoD way you did with Hunters. That’s because this is much more about shooting and not platforming. In fact, there is no jumping ability. And it never became an issue.

The graphics are fantastic (again, think Hunters, or if you played CoD 4, I’m told the graphics are pretty similar) and the controls were spot on. I never once died because of the controls… only because I sucked. A lot of what you can do is in the console versions is mimicked on the DS to great effect. You can aim and shoot normally for all weapons, but they also all have a zoomed in, more precise, view. It comes in handy. This isn’t a FPS where you run in guns blazing. You definitely have to be careful and strategic. While playing this and all the versions of CoD on the floor at Activision’s event I kept thinking one thing over and over; how the hell did anyone make it out of a real war alive? Shit, I can’t even make it through a level without killing one of the good guys or getting myself blown up.

Anyway, the game uses the DS to great effect. The audio on the game is absolutely the best I’ve heard on a DS game. And it’s important. In the build I played you were given a ton of orders and info via the copious amounts of speech in the game. With a pair of headphones on the gravely sergeant yelling at me sounded positively certain to kick my ass if I didn’t do what he told me. But even cooler are the DS specific actions. Disabling a landmine was one of the coolest moments I experienced in the game. It’s like a delicate game of Operation, only with a deadly landmine. Way cool. And then there is the World War 2 equivalent of Guitar Hero; Telegraph Hero. At one point I had to send a urgent telegram to to someone and it was a fun (yet hard) game of tapping the Telegraph pad to send a morse code message.

Finally, and maybe most importantly for CoD fans, the multiplayer seemed like it was going to be good. Edgar and I played a local ad-hoc game and it was quick and responsive and the level design seemed good. One of the guys from developer n-Space gave us the dirt about the mutliplayer, informing us that up to 4 players can play both locally and via WiFi in a variety of modes. Keep a lookout for more details on this, but from what we saw, I think multiplayer on this game is gonna be huge for DS gamers.

Call of Duty: World at War Site