8.1 hours played
Written 1 month and 10 days ago
After the difficulties I had with the expansion of the first chapter, I thought I had finally gotten past the technical obstacles of playing old games. But Call of Duty 2 put my patience to the test once again: figuring out a way to launch it without making my PC crash was incredibly frustrating. Luckily, by tweaking some game files, I managed to get around the issue. Given how much time and effort it cost me, I even made a guide to help others in the same situation.
From a graphical standpoint, I didn’t notice a major leap forward compared to the expansion of the first chapter, even though there’s a one-year gap between the two titles. But back in the early 2000s, hardware limitations were far more severe than today, so it’s understandable that there weren’t huge improvements. That said, it’s still a solid-looking game for its time, with well-constructed and varied environments.
The story, in this case, was noticeably longer than in the previous chapters. You can tell there was a real effort to create a richer, more complete campaign. The downside is that, despite the longer runtime, I ended up finishing it in roughly the same amount of time as the earlier games—mainly because of how much easier the gameplay was. The earlier games had fewer missions, but they were way more demanding. Here, the abundance of checkpoints seriously diluted the challenge. Practically every ten meters the game saved your progress, and that made it easy to just charge into the action knowing you wouldn’t be set back far if you died. In the previous titles, dying could mean repeating half the mission. It was punishing, yes, but also way more immersive. Here, it often felt like I was brute-forcing my way forward.
As for difficulty, it felt significantly toned down. After finishing the Russian campaign on "Soldier" difficulty, it became clear I wasn’t going to experience the same level of tension and frustration from the previous chapters. I cranked it up to "Veteran" hoping to get a proper challenge—and while I got it, it came with its own set of problems. The screen shake when taking damage was so extreme it became nauseating, and enemies instantly landed shots the moment I peeked out from cover. It stopped being immersive and turned into a test of sheer endurance.
If I had to pick out memorable moments—memorable in a frustrating way, really—it would be the last mission and the hill defense mission. Playing them on Veteran, with an absurd number of enemies all coming from one direction, made it almost impossible to engage in proper gunfights. At times I had to rely solely on grenades and a lot of patience, hoping the AI teammates would thin out the crowd enough to let me move.
Still, I have to admit the technical improvements were surprising. Smoother animations, more realistic enemy reactions, better ally behavior—these were all welcome details I didn’t expect to see already in the second chapter of the series.
And of course, there’s the legendary Captain Price. While he doesn’t yet have the narrative weight he carries in the later games, seeing him here again brought a smile to my face. A small but meaningful nod to what the series would eventually become.
When it comes to audio, I haven’t paid much attention to sound design or effects in these early titles, and I don’t think it’s worth diving into that just yet. I’d rather wait until I come across a game where the audio work truly stands out before discussing it properly.
Overall, Call of Duty 2 is an important chapter in the series. It has its flaws, and many of them are quite noticeable, but the ambition behind it is clear. I didn’t come away fully satisfied, but I can appreciate the effort to push the series forward.
