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Call of Duty Ghosts: Multiplayer In-Depth
Company: Activision
Product: Call of Duty: Ghosts
There's a lot to see in Call of Duty: Ghosts' Multiplayer - too much to put everything in the review, in fact. Instead, I hit some highlights in the reviews, and wrote this to go more in-depth. So, here's more on what to expect from the Call of Duty: Ghosts Multiplayer...

Create-A-Soldier

Continuing with customization introduced with Create-A-Class (introduced in Modern Warfare), Create-A-Soldier lets you customize not just one soldier, but your own squad of 10 soldiers. Do you play with a few different strategies? Now, you can create your own elite team; build out a female sniper inspired by La Femme Nikita or build up a heavy gunner to be extra intimidating. Use your imagination; you've got ten different soldiers to play with here.

You can customize appearance, gender, heads, body types, gear, insignia patch, Perks, uniform, name and multiple loadouts per soldier, for a total of 20,000 possible unique character combinations. Each customized squad member earns Multiplayer XP towards Prestige, individually. You can take all 10 of your soldiers up to Prestige level, with each retaining their own in-game progress and unlocks and earn a total of ten Prestige levels.

Loadout Budgeting System

The loadout budgeting system serves as a balancing and limiting factor and is present in Ghosts, but has seen some changes. Your budget is used for balancing your choice of primary and secondary weapon, lethal and tactical equipment and your Perks, but weapon attachments and Killstreaks aren't goverened by this budget in Ghosts, so you can use any that you've unlocked. You unlock these items with the same unlock tokens that are used for unlocking weapons, attachments and other equipment as you gain Multiplayer XP.

The Perks system

The perks system has seen a great deal of changes and there are more Perks now than ever before. The Perks have their own budget: you have a total of eight points to spend. Each Perk has its own value ascribed to it, from one to five points. Choose whichever Perks you like (well, from what's unlocked), grouping together your favorites and spending up to your full Perks budget. Still not enough? Well, you can toss out your secondary weapon and gain an additional three Perk points to spend, for up to eleven Perks.

The Perks have now been grouped into categories: Speed, Handling, Stealth, Awareness, Resistance, Equipment and Elite. For most of these categories, the names give you a pretty good idea of what you'll find.

Speed includes Sleight of Hand and Agility, for example. Handling gives you better ability to handle weapons, including the ability to throw further (Strong Arm) and to reload your weapon while sprinting (On The Go). Stealth is Stealth - how to keep yourself off the radar(s) even when doing things that would normally paint a target on you, such as taking out an enemy or firing a weapon. Awareness is the counter to Stealth, helping you locate hazards and enemies when you wouldn't have otherwise been able to detect them. Resistance includes things that reduce damage taken or speed up healing time. Equipment Perks let you carry extra equipment, additional attachments or more ammunition. Then, there are the Elite Perks. Basically, the Elite Perks are where they allowed themselves to get a bit more creative with the Perks, so they're definitely worth checking out. Ping , for example, will create a sonar ping when you kill an enemy, which can reveal nearby hostiles... and sounds a lot like an "Awareness" Perk, to me. Deadeye, on the other hand, increases the chance to deal more bullet damage with each consecutive kill... which almost sounds like a Killstreak or Strike Package reward, of sorts... and meshes really well with the new Specialist Strike Package.

Strike Packages

That's right, Strike Packages return in Ghosts. Here are the three options:
  • Specialist Strike Package - Perks, Perks, Perks! Consecutive kills earn players additional perks, culminating in a bank of 8 points to spend for your 13 kill Killstreak bonus.
  • Assault Strike Package - New Assault rewards include:
    • Sat Com (drop on the field for enhanced tracking of enemies)
    • Guard Dog (extremely loyal and twice as deadly)
    • Maniac (Juggernaut armor, but armed with only a knife for fast, CQC attacks)
  • Support Strike Package - New rewards include:
    • Night Owl (Advanced companion drone that detects enemies and explosives by proximity)
    • MAAWS (Laser-guided missiles on a shoulder mounted rocket launcher)
    • Helo Scout (controllable helicopter for providing sniper support)

Game Modes

Returning favorites include Kill Confirmed, Hunted and Infected. Along with these and other familiar modes are three new modes:
  • Search and Rescue - much like Search and Destroy, but well-coordinated teams can cut down on their amount of time spent spectating by "denying" kills as is done in Kill Confirmed. In Search and Rescue, if an enemy kills you and manages to confirm the kill by collecting your tag, you're out of the game until the next round, as in Search and Destroy - BUT - if a teammate gets to your tags first to "Deny" the kill, you get to respawn.
  • Cranked. Remember the movie by the same name? If not, think of the movie Speed, but instead of having to keep a bus moving at over 60 miles per hour, you've got to keep your soldier killing enemies. Kill an opponent and there's more time on your timer. Your timer runs out and you explode. Yes, you read that correctly. You. Explode.
  • Blitz is all about capturing the Flag, without that annoying concept of having to occupy it for a certain amount of time to "capture" it. Instead, you just have to stay alive long enough to dash to that finish line. Of course, you also want to keep your enemies from doing the same to yours. Oh, there's also a pesky ten-second delay between uses, so don't get caught standing in the goal for that ten second period, or you'll be the guest of honor at target practice.

Tactical player movements

The movement in Ghosts is smoother than in previous Call of Duty games, with more realistic motion animations, including a contextual leaning system that gives a natural, lifelike ability to lean around obstacles. Additionally, you can now go over objects in your way without unrealistically slowing you down. You can hurdle over low obstacles while firing your weapon, and you can jump over ledges to move across the rooftops.

My favorite new move, however, is the Knee Slide. Much like the running dive allows you to jump out of the way and get low quickly, the Knee Slide lets you transition from sprinting to crouching, sliding along the ground and still shooting as you go.

Dynamic map events

Up to this point, most multiplayer games of Call of Duty games featured a location, but no real event during the match. This was fine, but Ghosts is pushing the envelope a bit, creating a more interactive and dynamic environment by introducing dynamic map events. These range from map-altering events, such as destructible set pieces that alter visibility, paths and cover to player-triggered traps, providing the need to have more responsive strategies and tactics than before, as you adapt your plans to fit the shifting battlefield.

Field Orders are another newly added dynamic aspect introduced in Ghosts. These are randomized challenges that drop as in-game intelligence items and, when collected, present the player with a specific goal to accomplish. These can be anything from getting a kill with your secondary weapon, to getting a kill with a headshot, to humiliating the next opponent you kill. If you die before accomplishing the Field Order, you drop it and another player can pick it up and get a random Field Order. If you accomplish your task, however, you are awarded a Care Package and your ammo and equipment are refilled.

30+ new weapons... and More

Those who like sniping, but find themselves in closer quarters than they're comfortable way too often, should check out the new Marksman Rifle weapon class; they are more versatile than Sniper Rifles and have better stopping power than Assault Rifles. There are five Marksman Rifles to choose from, with the other 25+ weapons being found across several weapon classes, including: Assault Rifles, SMGs, LMGs, Shotguns, Sniper Rifles and Launchers.

If you're looking for a new favorite gun, might I suggest you try out the Honey Badger Assault Rifle, which seemed to be quite popular when I was playing. Some other new weapons which can be found include the SC-2010 Assault Rifle, the Vector CRB Submachine Gun and the IA-2 Marksman Rifle (with built in sniper scope with dual render sight).

For those who love things that go boom as much as the weapon selection, there are also new equipment options, including a 9-Bang (a flash grenade that plumps when you cook it), a Thermobaric Grenade and a Canister Bomb.

With all of the above, 20 new Killstreaks, 7 new Multiplayer modes, 14 maps out of the box, the Call of Duty App (for mobile devices) and Clan Wars, Call of Duty: Ghosts is providing just that... all of the above.



-Geck0, GameVortex Communications
AKA Robert Perkins
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