Xbox Gaming in South Africa

The Call of Duty: World at War BETA is finally upon us and some of us were fortunate enough to get codes to download and play it. The BETA will apparently go on until just before release day. I played a few sessions on games hosted by international players and unfortunately the lag was terrible. The movement seemed fine but the latency between firing a bullet and hitting the enemy was pretty poor (bullet lag). I have a 512 DSL line and I've heard that it is much better using a 4 meg DSL line. Games among only South African players was a lot better. The game feels almost just as smooth as Call of Duty 4. This being a BETA, I'm sure things will be better on the final product.

In terms of the game itself, it feels like a World War II themed total conversion of Call of Duty 4. You get different weapons and maps but the ranking system and challenges are almost identical. Whether this is a good or a bad thing... i don't know. They have added and changed a few things. Instead of calling in a chopper after a 7 kill streak, you get to Unleash the Dogs. You send a couple of your best trained K9's to hunt down the enemy. The opposing players can dispose of these dogs if their reflexes are good. This is a really fun new addition, especially if you are being hunted down. The game features the normal array of WWII weapons such as the Thompson, MP40, Springfield and more. Most of these can be compared to weapons featured in Call of Duty 4 but fans may be disappointed to find that there are no assault rifles. Nor are any of the new weapons comparable to them. Still, the game features a good selection of guns and ammo including flamethrowers, Molotov cocktails, gas grenades and sticky grenades. Some of which are locked in the BETA version with your rank being limited to level 11. A lot of Call of Duty 4 regulars were worried about not having the infamous Red Dot Sight attachment. But don't despair! Call of Duty: WaW does feature an Aperture Sight which is basically the same thing. However, this can only be attached to certain weapons like Sub Machine Guns and not on Light Machine Guns. The sniping feels a bit strange and more difficult too. One nice new addition is that you can unlock additional Custom Class Slots. You get up to the usual 5 by ranking up early on. You can then get an additional 5 lots by going Prestige a few times. This is a good incentive for people to go Prestige besides the crappy badges next to you name.

The BETA features three maps and a bunch of game modes. This includes the usual Team Deathmatch & Free-for-All, with Capture the Flag as a new addition. The BETA does not have Hardcore Mode for any of the games though. But I'm pretty sure they will add it in the retail version. One of the maps also has two tanks which any two players can get into and fight off the opposition. Vehicles are a great addition and they handle well. The only problem is balance. Four players from the same team can control both of the tanks. If those players are even as competent as a lemon, they can still easily sway the battle in their favour. At least the maps are well designed and flanking maneuvers can be executed with style!

Other things that seem a bit wonky is the sound. Footsteps don't sound quite right, Kiefer Sutherland's narrative voice becomes annoying very quickly and I find it more difficult to determine where bullet fire is actually coming from. The movement is good but you tend to get stuck more often than in CoD 4. Bullet penetration through surfaces and explosion damage has been cut down as well. The other worrying thing is that we had difficulty setting up a proper local only lobby. Players couldn't connect for a while, invites didn't work etc. But this is a BETA and those things are the developers' main area of testing. Once we did get it set up, everything went smoothly. No one dropped out of the game, the lag was stable and there were very few bugs in the actual game.

In closing, the game is good. Probably a bit too much like Call of Duty 4 though. I think that the hardcore online Call of Duty 4 players will just keep on playing that and the others will try it out for a while and then forget about it. Hopefully I'm wrong because I'm really enjoying this. It is only a mutiplayer BETA, but I cant wait for the Story Mode Co-op. The game feels solid and the single player and Co-op should be more than enough reason alone to get this game.