Eric “Walladog” Buwala has a sordid past with various FPS Games. First it was the Halo series, then the Call of Duty series, and now he has a new love. Is this one a keeper?
Well, it was not an easy letter to write but I did it. You see I have been playing and enjoying the Call of Duty (CoD) series for a while now. As Halo lost it’s luster for me, I found I liked CoD and its style of game play better. One of my biggest pet peeves with the Halo series was the finite number of power weapons. You could play game after game and see the same couple of people dominate with the weapons for the entire game. I needed a way to even the score.
An elegant weapon, for a more civilized age.
The Call of Duty series offered a solution to my ills. Since the current iteration is Modern Warfare 3, let’s take it for an example. If someone was sniping, you could pick a sniper class and try to counter. Someone noob tubing? Equip a heartbeat sensor and a shotgun and humiliate him up close and personal. The bottom line was, I could create custom classes that gave me a set of tools suited to my play style.
I found that I loved being a patient sniper. My Barrett .50 cal and I spent several long weekends laying in the grass together and enjoying each others company. I also enjoyed being the spastic shotgun sprinter. I could accommodate both personas as needed, depending on the style of the opposing team.
Add to the awesomeness, I could play along side 8 of my friends and not listen to kids screaming at their Moms for a sandwich. Or I could play along side 9 of my friends (outside an XboxLive party) and only listen to screaming kids in the lobby. Still, not bad at all.
Weapon and class specializations in Modern Warfare 3 were much more detailed than previous iterations of the game. I enjoyed ranking up individual weapons as well as my perks. Being able to add reduced recoil to gun that has a lot of muzzle climb was an awesome addition. Combining the weapon perks with your ability perks could really make for some awesome combinations that accentuated your play style.
I even enjoyed the tweaks to the killstreaks. Now you could choose “support streaks” where you got some bonuses for cumulative point score. I mean, killstreaks were fine...and I still enjoyed a good Barrett-earned AC-130 rampage. But, not every game or gametype allowed monster killstreaks if you wanted to be productive. Having the option to switch this up was awesome.
So why...WHY...you may be asking, would I step out on a good thing? Why would I go out for milk when I have the cow at home? Why would I even consider taking an evening away from the run n’ gun awesomeness that was MW3?
When will THEN be NOW? Soon.
It all started with a little pain in my ass called “Lag Compensation”. Allow me to digress a bit into the finer points of FPS gaming mechanics. This is a technical point but an important one.
Games like MW3 are what the good ‘ol boys like to call peer-to-peer. Simply stated, there are no “servers” you connect to in order to host the game. In each round of MW3 a dynamic process takes place evaluating the connections of every member in the room to every other member in the room. One person in the room is chosen to act as the “server” for that game session. You may have heard this referred to as getting “host” of a game. There was always an advantage to being “host” because your game actions have an effective latency of “0”. Your console is hosting the match so your actions are instantly reported to the “server.”
People who get their Internet connection by stringing together bits of bailing wire and running it to a rabbit ear antennae on the roof, patching into the free wi-fi at the 7-11 down the street are traditionally at a disadvantage. There is inherent latency in their connection. They experience “lag” and “jitter” which causes their game actions to sometimes arrive at the “server” host machine fractions of a second later than other people. This is why the person with “host” has the advantage. Both of these players turn the corner and see each other. Both pull the trigger at the same time. The “host” has his action registered a half a second before the 7-11 guy. Poor 7-11 guy. To him, he just keeps losing head to head battles and can’t understand why.
In an effort to alleviate the problem, the folks at Sledgehammer and Infinity Ward decided to introduce lag compensation. Since there was no way to make the bad connections better, the game tried to make the people with good connections worse. Yup. You heard it. The game structure itself built in lag to try to dumb down the connection of those with superior ping and jitter numbers.
1.21 Gigawatts, Great Scott! What the hell is a Gigawatt?
Back to me. I pay for two Internet pipelines into my house. A DSL 12MB connection that goes into a router servicing 2 Xboxs, 2 Wiis, 1 desktop PC, 3 laptops, 1 tablet, 2 smartphones, and a Tivo. The other line is 10MB cable line that goes right into my gameroom. The cable modem is plugged directly into my Xbox 360. Why? Aside from the fact that I am a badass? Because gaming is the only hobby I can still afford. When I kick back at night with my friends I want to make sure that the game works to the best of its ability.
Enter MW3 lag compensation. I couldn’t figure out how I went from a 1.85 Kill/Death ratio in Call of Duty Black Ops to a 0.64 Kill/Death in Modern Warfare 3. Oh, lag compensation, you smarmy slut. How dare you?! I paid for a better connection, I bought your game, I bought your Call of Duty ELITE membership, I bought your content...and this...THIS is how you repay me? You let people shoot me around corners? You don’t register my hits while the opposing player activates “instakill” on me?
I installed a router for the first time in my game room. I set it up to restrict traffic from the Xbox 360. Suddenly I could play again. I won some, I lost some. The games that had wild swings in kills were fewer and far between.
Should I work so hard though? Do you need to delve into the depths of network engineering to play a damn game on a console? Only then, unraveling it’s secrets atop a mountain of research, to be cast back into the pit of whiny pre-teen douchebag hell, crowd surfing around on a foamy sea of infection lobbies, prestige boosting lobbies, cheating invitations, rank glitches, weapon glitches, recoil glitches, lube, and of course modded controllers that allow instant drop shot execution.
No. I shouldn’t. I am better than that. I decided I was going to try to be different. I would try this Battlefield 3 thing people told me about. I would start making pancakes with REAL butter. I would take the big piece of chicken at dinner. When I opened the KY His & Hers lubricants, I would use BOTH on me! Why? Because damn it, I DESERVED better!
Meet the new Boss. Same as the old Boss.
I will preface my Battlefield 3 (BF3) experience with a few important facts. I downloaded and played Battlefield 1943 on XboxLive when it was released during the Summer of 2009. This was my first experience with the series and frankly, I hit that game like it owed me money. It was my go to game when I was bored or too lazy to change discs in the Xbox.
I played Battlefield: Bad Company 2 when it was released. I thoroughly enjoyed the single player campaign. I played the multiplayer for exactly two nights and then swore I would never play it again. I ran crying like a little girl back into the arms of Call of Duty.
So there I was. Battlefield 3 in my hands, standing there in my gameroom with the Xbox open. The first thing I noticed was two discs. Really? I needed to get up and change discs when I was playing single player and someone sent me an invite to play multiplayer? That was not cool.
Maybe we got off to a bad start but I actually didn’t make it through the installation process without rage quitting the game. You see, once I booted up the disc I was prompted to choose a special “install parts of the game to the hard drive” option. That is, if I wanted the full high definition experience of the game. Okay BF3, I will bite. Installed. Wait what? 1.7 GB? Okay, just calm down Walla. I got my tablet out and watched an episode of Rocky & Bullwinkle.
Once the install was done, I was ready to play! Wait what? There was an update from XboxLive? Okay, okay. Downloaded it. I mean, the game had only been out for a month right? How big could it be? Oh, 2.7GB. Really?
Balls.
Maybe I could watch Caddyshack again?
Okay. I am finally ready to play! Huh? Now I needed to find my MP token code? WTF is that? Looking through the box. Then entered, then re-entered because I could never enter one of those five-by-five codes correctly the first time. NOW! HAHA! Done!
What? OH for the love of....now I needed to purchase (for I think around $20) the add on pack so I had all the maps on the playlists. Screw this. I decided to go watch re-runs of House.
The next day though,OH, the next day how we did play! Finally! What was it like you ask? The promised land I left my one true love for, the special place where all would be right with the world. After all that dating. The dinner, the movies, the meeting of the parents, the 2.7GB download.
It sucked.
It didn’t just suck. It sucked albino African rhinoceros phallus.
It’s Mega Maid sir, shes gone from suck...to blow!
The lobby delighted in putting you on different squads and teams from your friends. There was no discernible way to tell that I actually got into a squad I was invited into. The squad could only contain 4 people in it. The spawn menu looked like it possibly did double duty as the main systems control panel for Boeing 787.
I spawned into the game armed with a slingshot and a marshmallow gun (okay, maybe I am exaggerating here but it sure SEEMED like those were the weapons I had.) Before I could get my bearings someone walked up to me, shined a tactical flashlight in my face so I could not see anything and then shot me.
I spawned again. Someone shined a laser pointer in my face, blinded me and shot me.
I spawned again. A sniper round attempted to cure the early stages of a headache the game was fostering in me.
I spawned again. I picked up a heavy machine gun someone dropped. Cool. Finally I had some firepower! A fully armed AH64 Apache gunship swooped over the trees, took aim and spread my remains over a full acre of beautifully rendered European forest. I marveled at the way the light played through the leaves as my optic nerve was inspected by a crow.
I spawned again. I ran through a gas station and out the back. I cowered in fear behind a dumpster trying to figure out the right button combo to wet myself. A 60MM mortar shell detonated adjacent to my rectum and launched the remains of my body onto the roof of the gas station. In the post kill respawn camera I saw the enemy who killed me. It looked like he was sitting in a field somewhere with a cooler and a beach umbrella. I couldn’t hear but I think he was listening to “Drift Away” on his Ipod while one foot made lazy circles in the kiddie pool and the other foot operated the M224 mortar he used to turn me into “Buster” from Mythbusters.
I rage quit.
After a day of careful meditation and coaching from some friends I attempted BF3 again. I played three games. All three games involved two douchebags in helicopters spawn killing my whole team. I was loath to find out that once I earned a launcher to take them out, it didn’t really work. You see, those douchebags had leveled up their helicopter perks so they got flares. That basically turned my Stinger launcher into a fireworks tube. Or, it became the worlds most expensive charcoal briquette lighter. Rage quit 2.
Nothing can stop the honey badger. He plays what he wants.
The third day I played BF3 was slightly better. I began to understand how to change the classes up. We played the Conquest game type instead of Rush. Basically in Conquest both teams have a set number of “tickets”. There are a number of objectives around the map that each team can capture and control. Whoever has a majority of objectives held bleeds tickets from the other team. For both teams, respawns cost a ticket. The first team out of tickets loses.
This was actually enjoyable. Having the action spread out made the game fun for me. Playing a 12 vs 12 game on maps that are orders of magnitude larger than Call of Duty maps was fun. If things got too hairy in one area, that was my cue to quietly make my way across the map to another objective no one was watching.
The environments are destructible almost everywhere in the game which adds a level of realism and fun. When I kept getting sniped from a third floor window I was delighted to find out that a couple of well placed RPGs would open the face of the building like a can opener and leave the enemy exposed.
Bullet drop is also realistic in this game. That means no centering a cross hair on a twitchy pixel in a window and getting a head shot. You actually must try to range your targets and allow for the bullet drop. It also means that there is no quick scoping! Yes, it’s true! There IS a place where you can be free from quick scopers (also referred to as the transvestite streetwalking prostitutes of the Call of Duty world.)
Being able to parachute from high structures was novel. I could repair vehicles, pilot jet planes, spot targets for friends to obliterate. As I unlocked more items I embraced the novelty of some alternate choices in kits. The mortar provided an interesting map based interface for instance. When a friend would spot a tank, it would light up on my mortar map and I could rain a satisfying high explosive “F#$k You!” down onto the annoying armored player.
The MAV (Micro Aerial Vehicle) is a little IR camera mounted to flying lawnmower. I found myself retreating to quiet storefronts when things got hectic and just flying my MAV around annoying the crap out of every camping sniper. It didn’t do much damage, unless you hit someone in the head at full speed.But, have you ever tried calming yourself for a tough sniper shot while a flying trashcan rhythmically humps your legs? It can’t be done.
Baby, you can have whatever you like.
If you like fast paced action, pick up Modern Warfare 3. If you thrill in the constant pressure of someone being right around the corner then this game will not let you down. It is all about reflexes and practice in this game. If you put some time into it you can definitely enjoy some competitive gaming.
If on the other hand extended periods of prolonged tension and taught reflexes are not your bag, you should consider Battlefield 3. It has a learning curve that more closely resembles a learning cliff. The lack of an adequate counter to aerial vehicles is an ongoing problem. A few maps are prone to getting spawn trapped and subsequently violated and sodomized, in that order. Despite these shortcomings, the variety of weapons, customizations, gear and perks available to you borders on role playing game scale. The incredible size and detail in the maps afford you lots of places to take the game at a slower pace.
So what did I learn? Mine is a tale of boy meets Halo, Halo gets fat and doesn’t want to dance, boy leaves Halo, boy meets Call of Duty MW3, Call of Duty MW3 shags the neighbor and invites her mother to live with you, boy leaves Call of Duty MW3, boy jets off to Acapulco with Battlefield 3, boy discovers once in Acapulco that Battlefield 3 actually has both sex organs, boy figures he is okay with that and is married in a quiet ceremony on the beach by a vegan minister named Maria.
In short. Both games suck. They both possess some gaping flaws in gameplay that need corrected. There are some exploits that need fixed. There are some behaviors in the respective gaming communities that need either curbed, or at least discouraged. If you are looking for the perfect First Person Shooter...keep looking.
Is that really what we want though? Is there a perfect shooter out there? Do we continuously bag on one title while swinging to the next? Or can we learn to find some common ground and be happy with what we have?
The only game worth the tears, is the one that would never make you cry.
Modern Warfare 3 is broken. The developer and studio wag their privates in your face because even though they know it is broken, they know that you know it is broken, but you can’t help yourself.
MW3 is that person you dated when you were young and impetuous. Your parents hated them. Your friends hated them. No one understood the connection you had to them. Sure they constantly tried to dress you in something ridiculous. So they occasionally made active attempts to alienate you from your friends and family. I mean, that’s innocent right? Everyone but you could see how dysfunctional the relationship was from the start. They could see the flaws. They thought you deserved better.
But DAMN! The sex was great! All the attention and affection blinded you to all the real world meathook realities of a long term relationship with this dysfunctional being.
Battlefield 3 is difficult. The developer and studio wag their privates in your face because even though they know it is difficult, they know that you know it is difficult, but you can’t help yourself.
Battlefield 3 is the person you date for months before going “all the way.” You wait for a ring before ever daring to pass gas in front of them. You learn to appreciate differences, strengths, weaknesses. You endure good times and bad. You become proud of paying the mortgage on time. In the end you are just happy that occasionally, someone wants to have sex with you after you changed a diaper, cleaned up cat barf and still have stains from last nights sloppy joes on the t-shirt you wore to bed.
This is a commitment. It isn’t as thrilling as having sex in the window of a public library. It is however, stable and secure. In the long term this is good for you, even if it is slower paced.
Which of these is you, dear reader? We each possess different tastes. We are all at different points along the journey of our gaming lives. Which one of these are you most craving right now?
Myself, I decided on an open gaming relationship with these two FPS games. While not necessarily a good thing in real life, I think I want to live with Battlefield 3 and still share some wild nights of fun with Modern Warfare 3 on the down low. It’s not always going to be fair to Battlefield 3, but hey, I deserve it.
About the Author
Eric “Walladog” Buwala lives, breathes, and embraces the lifestyle of the grumpy gamer. Crotchety beyond his years and cynical beyond his waist size, he spends most days starting sentences with “I liked it better the way it used to be” and “remember when...” Amazingly, he lives in Ohio with his wife, who inexplicably has endured his presence for over twenty years, seventeen of them as his spouse. His two children, ages 7 and 14, refer to him as the “Very Grumpy Bear” and the “Angry Wookie” respectively. He holds a private pilots license, advanced scuba certification, and an enlarged liver. He retreats to his cold, dark, damp man cave frequently enough to maintain a ten-thousand point addition to his Xbox LIVE gamerscore each year, but still cannot find a game he won’t complain about.
