Call of Duty Ghosts
For: PS3/360/XB1/PS4 (reviewed on PS3)
From: Infinity Ward
Four and a half stars (out of five)
The Call of Duty series is all about the spectacle.
They are one high-octane set piece after another and Ghosts carries on this tradition.
Particular highlights this time around include a level that is in the process of being flooded as you play through it, a mission on a moving and swaying train, and a mission in a space station.
It rarely lets up.
It's truly rife with cliches, completely predictable twists and overwhelming jingoism.
You play as Logan Walker and you spend much of the game hanging around with your brother hunting down a former colleague gone rogue.
Aside from a few obligatory vehicle sections and sections playing as a dog, it's the same old Call of Duty formula.
All in all I enjoyed the single player campaign.
It looks nice, plays nice and it was truly memorable after a few years of forgettable ones.
The Call of Duty series is split in two effectively: those developed by Infinity Ward and the ones developed by Treyarch.
As a result I think it's more effective to compare Ghosts to the previous Infinity Ward COD game, Modern Warfare 3.
Modern Warfare 3 included a Spec Op mode, and a survival Horde mode.
This time around, Ghosts has Extinction mode - effectively another horde mode.
To be honest I prefer the Spec Op missions.
These horde modes were great when the focus was on purely survival - how long you could last.
The minute they added a story and a million gimmicks to it, it completely lost the lustre that it once had.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
And there is, of course, the multiplayer, which to some (most?) is the main event.
This is where the developers realise that small modifications to a winning formula are the recipe for success.
You know what you're going to get and it's great.
Aside from some unimaginative map design in a few cases, there's plenty of enjoyment and life in the multiplayer of Ghosts.
Overall, Ghosts is absolutely worth picking up.
Call of Duty may not be the most innovative series around, but it's tremendous fun, and that's what counts.
If you've bought the PS3 or 360 versions you can upgrade to the next gen options, too, for a small fee, so it's certainly worth picking up now rather than waiting.
- Simon Bishop
