Call of Duty: Vanguard Reviews

Call of Duty: Vanguard is ranked in the 48th percentile of games scored on OpenCritic.
Impulsegamer
Sean Warhurst
Top Critic
3 / 5.0
Mar 11, 2022

Overall, the new content on offer is a welcome addition but, honestly, I think many fans long for a return to the days before battle passes, microtransactions and arduous grinding defined the franchise.

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Nov 17, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard does have its moments, even if they are quite few and far between. The campaign goes back and forth between innovative and entertaining, to repetitive and bland, while the Multiplayer and Zombie modes don’t bring anything new to the table other than how impressive they look.

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Nov 9, 2021

Vanguard, then, feels more like a tasting menu than a balanced meal. You get to sneak through ducts, scramble up walls in a decrepit department store, commandeer a dive bomber, and wield a flamethrower in order to clear out some anti-aircraft bunkers. It’s high-quality stuff, but it’s unlikely that it’ll all be to any one player’s satisfaction, and there’s no option to skip through chapters of the campaign or to get more time as Lady Nightingale. But in fairness, that’s what the very customizable multiplayer modes and offerings are for.

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EGM
Top Critic
6 / 10.0
Nov 7, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard sometimes strains under the pressure of fulfilling its obligations to the all-consuming Warzone platform that the series has become. Vanguard's Gunsmith and Operators might dictate the game's World War II fiction in weird and hilarious ways, but it can still offer the same thrills you'd expect. Still, there's no denying that Vanguard feels like a watered down entry for the franchise, which is now more motivated by microtransactions than by telling a compelling World War II narrative.

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6 / 10.0
Nov 22, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard is not the full package fans have and should expect from a franchise that consistently tops the sales charts. There are not enough positives to overcome the fact that the amount and quality of its content is sorely lacking. This is a blast from the past in the worst possible way.

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M3
Top Critic
Nov 11, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard feels in many ways like a throwback to older Call of Duty titles. There is nothing wrong with stripped-down restarts, but in this case it feels more like time constraints have been the main reason for the simplifications. The single player campaign has few memorable moments, while zombie mode lacks a lot of content at launch. At least the online part offers plenty of content and chaotic, easily accessible high-tempo clearing – but it's not very new under the sun.

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Telegraph
Top Critic
Nov 16, 2021

A short but solid campaign and minor multiplayer tweaks suggest Warzone is still the main priority

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Nov 10, 2021

A band of inglorious stereotypes go on a covert mission to uncover a Nazi plan in a traditional instalment of the series

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Nov 8, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard's campaign and multiplayer are serviceable enough, but nothing exceptional for the series, while Zombies is disappointingly limited in scope and ideas.

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VG247
Top Critic
Nov 10, 2021

Judged on its own terms, Call of Duty: Vanguard offers a solid, albeit predictable campaign, an engaging multiplayer with deep progression systems and satisfying gunplay, and a Zombies mode that will only serve as a minor distraction in its current state.

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6 / 10.0
Nov 10, 2021

Overall, it feels like a game that doesn't want to disturb and has no soul of its own.

Review in Spanish | Read full review

PC Gamer
Top Critic
60 / 100
Nov 9, 2021

CoD's multiplayer is as dependable as ever, but Vanguard's campaign and Zombies mode fail to capitalise on what could be interesting ideas.

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6.5 / 10.0
Nov 18, 2021

Is Call of Duty: Vanguard a good game? It depends. If it is your first Call of Duty, it will be one of the best experiences in your life. However, if Vanguard is your nineteenth Call of Duty you will find a visually impressive, yet hollow, campaign, a multiplayer that soon becomes routine, and a disappointing zombie mode.

Review in Spanish | Read full review

6.5 / 10.0
Nov 14, 2021

After the disappointing Cold War, Vanguard was the game that many fans have put their faith in. But due to rocky start, the countless bugs the completely unbalanced multiplayer and the incomplete zombies mode, this year’s Call of Duty is just another nail in the coffin of once great franchise.

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6.5 / 10.0
Nov 22, 2021

It follows the formula of a Call of Duty game, but delivers each element just a bit worse than it's predecessors. Call of Duty: Vanguard is a game that will surely grow and improve over time, but what we have at launch is something that at least fails to cater to what I was hoping for in any aspect of the game. The single player campaign is ridiculous even if it does deliver some moments of high action; the multiplayer is a mess, at least for someone with my skillset; and zombies is simply unfinished. It'll get better, but what we've got right now just isn't all that good.

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6.8 / 10.0
Nov 9, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard is mostly more of the same, for better or worse. Sledgehammer Games has brought fresh ideas to a formula that desperately needs a shake-up, but the execution only leaves us desiring more. The inevitable Call of Duty: Vanguard 2 may further explore the designs seen in their infancy. And we sure hope it does because Vanguard could signal a notable change in the future. But for now, we have a relatively amusing installment that ticks the required boxes and little else for the annual series.

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7 / 10.0
Nov 9, 2021

Vanguard tries to satisfy all tastes with the usual individual, collective and collaborative content in each version with very limited changes.

Review in Arabic | Read full review

7 / 10.0
Nov 12, 2021

There are a lot of aspects of the game that I’m sure we will see future updates fixing, however, there are some that are wired into the game, especially in the campaign and Zombies that an update cannot fix.

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7 / 10.0
Nov 22, 2021

Call of Duty: Vanguard does everything except Zombies very well. The problem is, we’ve seen it all before. Over and over and over again. While WWII can still be enjoyable in CoD, it very much feels like Activision relies on the same bag of tricks.

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3.5 / 5.0
Nov 23, 2021

The story gets a little confusing at times, but overall Call of Duty: Vanguard is a solid game.

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