PixlBit

                                              

     This weekend, after I was finished with Just Cause, I played through Call of Duty 3 following the achievement guide on Xbox360achievements.org.

     The first thing to do was play the story on Veteran mode. I did this for most of the first level and quickly decided, after dying over and over, that this was going to be too brutal to enjoy. So I ratcheted it down a bit. A lot actually because you can do the story mission achievements on any difficulty. So I went for Easy. I figured, if it's really too easy, I'll move it back up, but it wasn't at all. It was still a good challenge. 

    Call of Duty 3 was the last of the WWII COD games. I found most of the game very familiar and I think it's due to the fact that the missions are so similar to COD 2. I mean, in a WWII game, where you are a grunt moving through Europe, the missions are going to be similar. You clear buildings, storm up hills full of trenches and sandbags, snipe mortar crews, place charges on heavy artillery pieces, hold positions being overrun with waves of enemy, and drive tanks and jeeps. That being said, the game did immerce me in it's world completely, and I enjoyed it right up to the end.

    When I had finished the story, I looked up the remaining achievements and went back into the game to get them. Several were tied to using one type of weapon through an entire level. Another was for picking up granades and throwing them back, a tricky little task, but not all that hard. The hardest one was getting through an entire level without firing a shot, using only melee and granade attacks. This I did on level two, and it's a good level to do it on because it's probably the shortest in the game. You spend most of the time clearing houses and trenches, so there's lots of close contact for melee attacks. You do have to watch out for multiple enemies though because while you melee one, the other fills you with holes. I wise tactic was to let your AI teammates do a little shooting before you go in to melee. Also, a well placed granade does wonders for clearing a room. The last part of the level was a little touch and go as you can't get close to the enemy who are firing at you from above, but wait 'til one of your guys throws a granade (I was out by then) and you can run in to melee the rest. That one achievement was worth 100 points, so it was satisfying to get, although, not as satisfying as a similar achievement in Half-Life 2 where you have to play the whole game with nothing but your gravity gun and melee attacks. Now THAT'S satisfying!

    Finally I looked over the multiplayer achievements and decided not to bother because to do them all you have to play 500 hours of ranked matches, or so the guide says. I was hoping there was a horde/firefight mode, because that's as close to real multiplayer that I get, but COD3 doesn't have it. Another mode COD3 doesn't have is co-op which is really disappointing, but back in '06 few FPS games had that feature, at least, not on console.

    I'm psyched for next weekend (if my friend is around, because it's way more fun when we're both going for these achievements) when I'll be tackling History Channel's Civil War: A Nation Divided.