2old2play's own SgtPayback was fortunate enough to receive an invite to attend Infinity Ward’s “First to Play” event last Thursday evening in Hollywood, CA at Cinespace. Check out what he has to think of the latest in the COD franchise.
(If you have not read about my previous visit to Infinity Ward’s “Community Day” on my blog, I recommend that you check it out before reading about my latest IW adventure.)
Hollywood
Thursday morning I flew into LAX at 11am. For those of you that have never been to LA, it’s BIG! So big in fact, that all I could see out of my plane window was an endless sea of urban sprawl and smog.
Once I landed, I was met by my personal driver that took me to my hotel, the, Hollywood Roosevelt right on the strip in Hollywood and across from Grauman’s Chinese Theater.
I then checked into my room which looked directly toward the semi-smoggy skyline of downtown LA. The weird thing was that it instantly reminded me of the scene in Terminator where a nuke is detonated.
IW Developers in the "Library"
At 6:00pm my buddy UnwashedMass met me in the “Library” and we chilled with a couple other guys that I had met at the Community Day event. As we were waiting for our shuttle ride over to Cinespace for the “First to Play” event, we ran into two developers from IW.
During our discussions with the developers Mass had somehow managed to get an invite to go to the event with us… SA-WEET! We talked to them for awhile about COD4 and how the new kill streak bonus will allow you to call in a UAV, choppers, and air strikes.
During our pre-event discussion the IW team described in detail how the chaos on the battlefield grows more intense with each kill until finally reaching the climax of an all out air strike raining death from above on your opponent.
The developers also let us know that in the IW studios they have coined a term for this scenario… “WARGASM!”
The Venue
After a long wait the shuttle arrived and took us about 10 blocks down the strip to the event at Cinespace where I received a nice little surprise.
As you entered the event you were greeted by a main bar, a patio area, and a nice buffet line of some tasty grub (salad, pasta, rolls, steak, and brownies).
Right off the bat I ran into Fourzerotwo (the community leader at IW), Grant Collier, Jason West, and many of the IW developers that I had met during my last visit.
Finished with the introductions I then headed over to Grant and handed him a customized 2old2play/2old4Duty T-shirt with his gamertag on the back. Needless to say, he was STOKED! I gave Jason and Fourzerotwo shirts of their own as well, and each of them was really excited to get the shirt.
I was really happy to give them each a token of my appreciation and I know that they were all really jazzed to get those shirts! Each of them draped their shirt over their shoulders and carried it around with them all night – score one for 2old2play and 2old4duty!
First to Play Call of Duty 4
We were then escorted by Fourzerotwo into the back room which was a separate area with another bar and… an endless supply of COD4 GOODNESS!
In the back VIP area there were gaming kiosks as well as large LCD screens placed throughout the lounge in booths and on tabletops. Each setup had a pair of Tritton headphones attached to an Xbox 360 with the COD4 multiplayer beta in full effect!
Mass and Payback PWNING
The gaming area was set up with a total of two or three games running a never ending cycle of team Deathmatch, with rooms of 6v6 and 8v8. At one end of the lounge was a giant projector that was showing the action from one of the games.
The room was filled with action and without even straining your ears you could hear the constant sound of sub-machine guns, frag grenades, and of course plenty of hooting and hollering from all of the spectators!
As we made our way down toward the front, Mass found an open seat and jumped right into the action!
After Mass’s round ended, I jumped into the hot seat and off I went! Right off the bat it felt natural… the controls, the movement, the guns, everything…perfect!
I was a little worried that maybe there was going to be too much going on, with the sprint, the air strikes, etc…
However, it all felt really natural and I think that IW did a really good job an integrating those items into the game without changing the feel of the Call of Duty Franchise that we have all come to love.
I found myself using the sprint often and it was easier to use and control when compared to the sprint in COD3.
One thing that really stood out to me (besides the graphics, weapons, etc) was that the new melee with the knife felt even better than the COD2 melee!
The new melee feels perfect and it really gets the adrenaline pumping when you can sneak up on your opponent from behind and the give him/her the old slice and dice, muwhahaha!
Also, I often unintentionally melee while playing COD2 but this did not happen to me once during a couple hours of game play! That may not mean anything to most of you, but to some of us this has been a huge issue with both COD2 and especially COD3.
We then continued to take turns playing the beta, enjoying beverages, and just pretty much hanging out in “Call of Duty Land” for the next couple of hours. At about 9:30pm or so, Mass had to head home for the night. But on the way out we saw Adam Sessler, so we took a quick photo.
“WARGASM!"
After Mass left for the evening I was able to get myself into a comfy booth with a 42” LCD sitting on the table and get into some serious gaming.
As I was playing I noticed that four or five of the developers and Jason West, (with his 2old2play/2old4duty shirt draped over his shoulder), had gathered behind me and were watching me play.
I then put together 3 kills in a row and they started yelling “UAV…UAV!!” I activated the UAV and then snuck up behind 3 or 4 enemies in a building. “Knife um…knife um!!” they hollered. Sure enough I was able to stick one after another and my +10 +20 +30 experience points started to rack up.
This brought them to a near frenzy behind me as the whole lounge started to look our way with all of the commotion that was coming from my direction.
With all of those kills in a row they really let me have it with a unified “Air strike…Air strike!!!” Somehow in the frenzy of it all I managed to pull up the radar and pin point my air strike.
Within seconds, the jets came flying in overhead and dropped an arsenal of bombs on my opponents spawn area…+10 +20 +30 …. “WARGASM!!!!!!!!”
It was awesome! Imagine having the owner and key developers of Infinity Ward right behind you cheering you on to victory in front of nearly 75+ people!
After that, the party started to slow down and by 11:30pm the place was nearly empty. I thanked Fourzerotwo and then headed down to the shuttle.
Fight the Power in a thong!
By midnight I was headed to my room for a “pillow shot”, while a couple of the other guys headed into the “Library” where a late night party was in full swing. The next morning I met the rest of the guys in the valet area as we waited for our shuttle back to LAX.
While we were waiting they told me how they had seen Steve-O, from Jackass dancing around out front of the hotel in a red thong and then he ran off into the night. Right after we finish talking about that, here comes Flavor Flav walking out with his entourage. I tried to take a photo, but it came out terrible. At least you can see one of his infamous clocks hanging around his neck.
At about this time our shuttle arrived and just like that… my trip came to an end. As for in-depth technical reviews of COD4, there are plenty of them all over the net if you really want to know the details. In a nutshell this game is an absolute blast to play, even with the very limited weapons, perks, maps, etc. that I saw during the event. The game feels and plays just like I thought it would…wonderfully perfect! Also, the game never ever skipped a beat as I did not see any slowdown in frame rate no matter how much action was going on.
The bottom line is that if you enjoy playing true first person shooters and do not absolutely love this game… you seriously need to see a doctor! Nuf said.
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