Call of Duty: Vanguard Review – Trapped in Time

Before I start this year’s COD game, I would like to highlight the fact that I have been a fan of this series since the beginning (in fact, I have enthusiastically played previous games from the creators of the Medal of Honor series) and the multiplayer, for example, was mine annual year-round relaxation with fun throughout the existence of the series, until Warzone came and replaced the traditional MP for me. So I’m all the more sorry that this year’s episode is a big disappointment for me, like WW2 in 2017, against which the Vanguard is actually even poorer. We got the traditional trio of game modes, but at what cost?

• Platform: PS5 (peer review), PS4, X1, XSX | S, PC
• Publication date: 5. 11. 2021
• Producer: Sledgehammer Games (USA)
• Genre: FPS
• Czech location: Not
• Multiplayer: Yes
• Data to download: 64 GB
• Game time: 5+ hours
• Price: 1999 CZK (Xzone)

Toothless Campaign

I entered the story campaign without prejudice, without learning anything superfluous either about it or about its creators. I was a little overwhelmed that the first mission took place on an almost monotonous rainy night, so it made a visual impact and didn’t use the leverage that the game’s solid design undoubtedly has thanks to its budget. I was similarly taken aback by the cannonading of very talkative plot sequences between missions, many of which take place in the same two rooms (jail and office), which also doesn’t add to the experience. If only the story was worth it.

But it’s not worth it most of the time. The promised plot of “the birth of the first special military unit” sounded interesting, but in reality it is a very weak concoction of something that Infamous Panchart desperately would like to be, but in reality it looks more like a chiseled toothless farce. The characters soothe each other, how scary they all are, but in fact they are soulless and boring. The only notable exception is Laura Bailey as Russian assassin Polina Petrova, not because of the script, but because of the acting. When I additionally found a presentation from the authors of the story, which said that “COD never had real heroes, we wanted to create such that we could build a whole trilogy of new games on them,” I had to bite the bullet. This is what it looks like when the reins of power fall into the hands of someone young, inexperienced, and at the same time incredibly vain. Something similar happened with Mass Effect: Andromeda some time ago.

A weak concoction of something that desperately wants to be Infamous Panchart.

I would like to say that this is at least fast, but this is also not entirely true. Although the campaign lasts only about five hours, I was not only fed up with countless repetitive cutscenes, but also with the game itself – either they were forced to slowly play through the game to show the next pre-scripted event or dialogue, or massive gunfights. in which in some places enemies were born for an indefinite period or killed with one blow if pushed in the wrong direction. The passage with Polina also stands out in terms of gameplay, although her wall climbing seems out of place in this genre. But it’s still better than a complicated and confusing transition in an airplane. While the story campaign is narrative and functional, it stands out with a relatively strong set that sets it apart from a long stream of similar, cheaper games.

Scrubbing inertia

Of course, a mandatory part of the game package is multiplayer, and Zombies are also present. Whether you’re looking for a mindless break before bed, whether it’s ten minutes, an hour, or even an entire evening with friends, this year’s COD multiplayer will once again offer the speed and wildness we’ve become accustomed to. Actually, maybe a little more, because most weapons seem to have an extremely fast TTK and two-hit kills to the body. The game really works effectively as a “leveling mode to prepare weapons for Warzone”, which is rather unfortunate (plus historical weapons have completely absurd attachments). Also forget about any interesting game modes, such as missing tanks from World War II. New should be Champion Hill, a sort of “small BR for eight teams of two or three,” but even that can not compete with the fun and complexity of Warzone. In addition, the system of specialists or “heroes” (though only visual) does not make it easy to recognize opponents on the battlefield by their uniforms. At least the individual game maps are a success, and among them there are no frankly weak ones, which is also helped by the system of (some) destructible shelters or walls.

Zombies are even worse: In the original packaging, the game comes out with little to no story or campaign, just a collection of maps and challenges where you can train and overcome increasingly tough waves of the undead. The story will not appear/begin in this mode until December. So the current shell is just a leveling mushroom from which you go on several types of repeatable missions and gradually improve your arsenal and special abilities in between. This year’s COD is well controlled and looks good, which is more or less the standard for this series, which has helped it sell tens of millions of pieces every year. But as someone who has been playing these games since the beginning, I’ve been bored as hell this year. Especially World War II games come to me completely exhausted and less and less relevant given modern threats and weapons. So while the makers are talking about a “planned avant-garde trilogy”, i’m swooning, on the contrary, next year’s cash on delivery leaks set in the present, with a modern arsenal and a focus on the morality of decision making or knocking down people’s stress on the battlefield sounds for me it’s like heavenly music.