My Thoughts on Modern Warefare 2

I always said I was never going to get Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (MW2).
This because of Activision’s total disregard for the consumers, Infinity Ward’s ingnoring of anyone else but the Xbox 360 gamers and the extreme overpricing of the game itself.

I have to admit now, though. I bit the bullet and got myself a copy of MW2.
I must also admit that I was always curious about the game, as Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (CoD4) is one of the best titles released, and the multiplayer is nothing short of excellent. And since MW2 is a direct continuance of CoD4, I never actually doubted that MW2 would be a great game. The pre-release teasers and previews were all looking excellent.

MW2 is excellent. It has improved on every aspect of CoD4. The weapons, the gameplay, the sound -especially the weapon sounds,  the storytelling and last but certainly not least, the multiplayer. From the kill awards to the the kill-streak awards, and the new post-match Accolades, it’s all sewn together as one awesome experience. It’s all very satisfying.

But, there is a downside to it all. It’s not such a major downside which many PC gamers predicted, including myself, but it’s still something that needs vast improvement in my opinion -a PC gamer’s view. IWNET is that downside.

Mostly, IWNET works as Infinity Ward promised, no doubt about that. The private matches are excellent. The integration or rather combination with Steam is also working excellent, it makes many things very easy when it comes to playing with friends and playing together publically as a party. This works, and mostly smoothly.

What my problem is with IWNET, is that the matches are hosted on the “most suited host” ie. player of the match. Sometimes this leads to some laggy matches, high latency and host migration if the host leaves or IWNET suddenly changes it’s mind. This can all be very frustrating at times. I would also want to maybe play with the same people again at a later time, without having to befriend all these players on Steam and forming a party with them.

The matchmaking system of IWNET isn’t very satisfactory either. If it is accurate, I must be amongst the top players on the planet, which I am most certainly not! I always end up as MVP or in the top 3 spots post-game. This shows that the matchmaking isn’t very accurate, as I’m 100% sure there are plenty of way more skilled MW2 players out there than myself. This all proves yet again, that dedicated servers would be a better idea.

Dedicated servers, yes. IWNET, yes. Steam, yes. Player hosting, no.
I think a combination of IWNET and dedicated servers would be a great way to go. Include all aspects of IWNET, even the game search, party search and playlists,  and include Steam with everythingh it brings to the table. This would be ideal, as IWNET and Steam both works excellent. All this will up the experience and improve on the matches, gamers can meet up on a community hosted server and always be able to find the exact gaming experience they want. Servers can be administrated and policed, griefing and hacking will be controlled and removed. Because let’s face it, IWNET’s promise of a cheat and hack free online experience was demolished the very first week.

Lastly, just a short note of what also should be in the MW2 PC version.
Activate the console with the possibilites it should add. I’m just thinking of adjustment FOV and other settings we could adjust on CoD4. And also, in my opinion, by all means restrict a few variables, which I’m sure was the intention when removing the console.