COD: Modern Warfare
The Shoot House always wins
When it works it really works. When the smoke’s swirling and the sparks are flying, and you’ve racked up three hip-fire kills in a row on new 6v6 map Shoot House, this is the best slice of multiplayer shooting on PS4. It really is that good. A callback to COD’s past.
It took a free map to get us here, but Shoot House’s classic three-lane design offers the kind of fast-paced gunplay that made the original Modern Warfare a hit in 2007. It’s telling that Infinity Ward left this map out of the day-one release, as it clearly wanted the new, slower take on its core multiplayer modes to take root before wrapping you in this warm, nostalgic bullet hell.
It’s jarring to jump from tactical, steady-paced maps such as Piccadilly and Hackney Yard into Shoot House. Modern Warfare’s new approach – large, complex maps where verticality adds an extra dimension – means team play and strategic thinking are required to dominate a typical match, and it’s a revelation. Yes there are more campers in 2019’s Modern Warfare but there are also more ways to tackle players who love to dig in, and it often involves teamwork. Who’d have thought?
GROUND POOR
What remains a misstep is Ground War mode. A take on Battlefield’s large-scale skirmishes, this 32v32 mode looks fantastic on paper but in practice it’s a soulless scramble to find anything meaningful to do. Love a lonely jog through empty streets, waiting for a sniper to pick you off? Then you’re very strange and deserve Ground War.
The biggest success is 2v2 mode Gunfight. Essentially a duel in small, contained maps, Gunfight is the best thing
ESSENTIALLY A DUEL IN SMALL MAPS, GUNFIGHT IS THE BEST THING TO HAPPEN TO COD SINCE NAZI ZOMBIES.
to happen to Call Of Duty since Nazi Zombies. Each round lasts seconds, and the first player to win six rounds takes glory. It takes everything we love about Call Of Duty and distills it into 30 seconds of randomly selected loadouts and intense duels. Unshackled from nagging multiplayer goals, Gunfight offers clarity, and is everything Ground War isn’t – fun.
We complained in our review (OPM #169, 8/10) that Modern Warfare’s day-one multiplayer felt misjudged; a focus on trying to make Ground War a success meant maps felt too large for its core modes (even now playing Team Deathmatch on a map with the scale and complexity of Aniyah Palace can feel too random). The introduction of classic three-lane map Shoot House has tipped things in favour of those who love classic Call Of Duty, and with Gunfight too, Modern Warfare is rapidly evolving into the best online shooter on PS4.