Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare Reviews
Mixing futuristic tech with established fundamentals, Sledgehammer has created the first truly impressive Call of Duty in years.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is worth your time. It delivers with its story, great acting, dialogue, the realistic facial animations, cool weapons of the future, and the welcome change in pacing from combat missions to stealth missions. I welcome the idea of using great actors like Spacey in a big-budget game, and I look forward to future versions of the game that marry Hollywood blockbuster actors with the blockbuster-style game play.
Critical gameplay changes, more multiplayer customization make up for Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare's absolutely awful single-player story.
By bringing in a new developer with its own talent and fresh ideas, Activision has succeeded in shaking up its biggest franchise. Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is undeniably distinctive within the Call of Duty family. But it might take a game or two for Sledgehammer to start delivering on the same scale as its sibling studios.
Witnessing Advanced Warfare in its gamesuit made from chopped-up pieces of better games, it's easy to picture the series as a Pinocchio aching to be a real boy, but the sympathy you feel in light of its efforts does little to quell your instinct to escape.
Advanced Warfare creates the multiplayer shooter players have been craving for years. Inspired by the old guard and incorporating a host of new features, this is the new face and bright future of Call of Duty.
'Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare' doesn't change the franchise's identity, but its near future setting and tech help make the component parts exciting again.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare achieves that delicate balance of providing something fresh, without diminishing the game's historical appeal.
Activision would have us believe that the latest title in the series is a bold re-imagining. It's not, but it's still blistering entertainment
Sledgehammer Games hasn't reinvented the first-person shooter franchise, but it does give it a shot of adrenaline, making Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare one of the fastest, freshest and most thrilling entries yet.
Advanced Warfare might not be advanced enough for my liking, but it's a return to the typical fast-paced, explosive gameplay of CoD titles that aren't called Ghosts – and it works alright on PC, too.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare provides much needed change and variety to revitalize the franchise for the future.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare upholds the status quo and aims no higher than that. Its sci-fi trappings are but shallow appeals to progress, and while the multiplayer is still able to provide some entertainment, the CoD formula feels anything but "advanced" these days.
Overall, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare lives up to the franchise's expectations. It looks, feels, and plays like a CoD game, and there's been quite a few additions to make Halo fans like me interested. They've done some work to make the game more welcoming to newcomers, and a lot of detail has gone into the single player campaign to make it as cinematic as a summer blockbuster. And despite a few hiccups, it plays a lot like one. If you already like Call of Duty, and you're a Halo fan to boot- you won't be disappointed by this installment in the series.
There is no question a big risk was taken with this year's game. Does this risk pay off? It sure does as Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is about the most fun I have had playing a Call of Duty game in several years. Granted it remains very familiar but the leaps are significant and in the end pay off.
Punchy, futuristic weapons, even faster gameplay, and additional agility make Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare a joy to play, both offline and online. With a campaign that features several spectacular scenarios and a brilliantly robust and incredibly moreish multiplayer offering, Sledgehammer Games has succeeded in crafting a title that feels fresh but familiar, and does just enough to put the franchise back on track after the disappointing Call of Duty: Ghosts.
The question isn't if Sledgehammer succeeded in breathing new life into the Call of Duty franchise, it's more a point of how the franchise will cope in the future without them.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare isn't going to make people who hate the series suddenly take notice, but for those that have felt the franchise has been falling flat lately, it definitely re-energizes it. This is the Call of Duty game fans have been clamoring for, and I feel sorry for the team that has to try and top it next year.