So as it had come to be foretold, Modern Warfare 2 has descended from the Heavens for all to play and Infinity Ward looked upon us, their beloved Gamers and saw that it was good. Well, at least it was good for Xbox 360 owners. Despite the server issue with the Playstation 3 multiplayer, PC Gamers considerably upset about the lack of features (i.e Dedicated servers), as well as a bit of broken street date fever all over the world, it seems that Modern Warfare 2 has been considerably well-received by the masses. After all, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare just about walked on water as far as many critics were concerned, so it is natural that the sequel should be so well loved or at least expected to be loved. Infinity Ward has once again thrust upon us material that would be more comfortably presented in a cliche summer action movie, but somehow, it was developed in a way that it sells itself to the gaming community. Thus, submitted to you, gaming public comes the top ten moments of Modern Warfare 2. Now as any of my readers have come to expect, odds are there may be a spoiler or two tucked away in my list, so if you haven't finished the game yet, tread lightly or stop reading this list altogether. In the meantime, those of you who don't want to heed my words, I will do my best to indicate when something of importance will be revealed. Read on for the list of top 10 epic moments in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 2:
10. "For the Record" - Even the training mission has a memorable quality to it, however prior to that I am forced to comment on the opening crawl. Instead of a cinematic, players are treated to something that I would expect to see next summer during the beginning of an action film instead of a video game. Recapping the events in a relatively ingenious way, developer names are shown while the world is illustrated in green with various hubs and links between major cities. I remember when I heard Han Zimmer would be doing the music for the game and wasn't terribly impressed by his name being dropped at the time, but once that music starts dominating the introduction I realized this was a match made in heaven. As a small cinematic plays following this, you discover that Zakhaev, the villain of the previous Modern Warfare has been immortalized by his beloved Russia in the form of a statue. It's a bit off-putting at first considering the previous title ends with him chasing you, gunning down a fair number of the characters you had become accustomed to throughout most of the game and then kill him moments before he aims to put you down for good. As the gameplay begins, you fill the boots of a Private in Afghanistan in the US Army Rangers. Following the basics of shooting, which they now place a significantly higher emphasis on shooting down the sights than I remember in the previous title, and grenade tossing, you are assigned to enter 'The Pit'. The Pit is the training grounds for the Rangers with pop-up targets of enemies and civilians. It's certainly not an SAS Hangar, but it does the job. Running through, accuracy, targets hit and time all effect the recommended difficulty. 50 seconds and above is Regular, 40 - 50 seconds is Hardened anything under 30 seconds is Veteran. I admit that it took me a lot of attempts, but eventually I proved that I could hang with the best of them and got my Veteran recommendation and the achievement that goes with it. On a slightly different note, I am extremely impressed that instead of just pushing a weapon on the player, they are allowed to select any pistol or rifle they want. However, as soon as you exit The Pit, it seems everything has hit the fan and it's time to bring the pain to the enemy.
9. “Cliffhanger” - Cliffhanger is distinctly memorable for a vastly different reason than many of the other levels for the one express purpose that it's the first time we as players get to see the face of the character whose boots we stepped into in the original title. Having gone from being the F.N.G to a Captain in just five years, it seems that Soap has been doing really well for himself. But not only do we get to see his face in a way we'll never hope to see the Master Chief, he leads us through the entirety of the level. From the Ice Climbing portion in which he saves the player from a nasty fall to sneaking through a hostile base with nothing but a heartbeat attachment on our rifle and Soap providing the occasional overwatch, it's always a bit tense, but you always have MacTavish in your ear. After making your way across the facility though and into a hangar, Soap becomes compromised. Thankfully, having set some C4 on a fuel pump prior, you are casually instructed to 'go to plan B', which kicks off one of the best running gun battles I have ever played in a video game. Proceeding across the runway treats the player to an amalgamation of chaos. Planes are exploding, you seem to be taking fire from all directions, but you have Soap calmly instructing you to cover him and he'll cover you the entire way. It's cinematic in that I kept expecting a video to roll, but it never happened as I reminded myself I was playing Modern Warfare 2 and there really are no cutscenes. Additionally, the snowmobiles, which have to be one of the best vehicle sequences I've seen to date, primarily because it never feels cliché. I kept expecting the gameplay here to become cheesy, but it never did. I sat leaning on the edge of my couch as I roared through the snow, shooting whoever got in the way. As the stage comes to a close, with a helicopter landing, I couldn't help it, Modern Warfare 2 had firmly gotten it hooks into me.
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