Recent reviews by Madison Rootbeer

A follow-up to one of my favourite CoDs in recent time. It's ambitious, expansive and no doubt a huge project for Treyarch... but I don't recommend it.
But I'll start with the best part of the game first and it's the campaign. It is one of the most fun in the series, every setpiece feels like the final mission or like you are part of a big-time heist and while it doesn't hit as hard as Cold War (a tad weaker story and a lackluster ending), it was still a very fun campaign.

The big open missions feels a lot more fleshed out compared to last year's open combat missions. It also helps that every mission is a lot longer than your typical Call of Duty mission, coming a step closer to feeling like an actual videogame...
The reason why I'm saying that is because when you are done with the campaign, you are eventually going to play the multiplayer and zombies and that's where the game kind of falls apart.

The multiplayer is some of the most fun I've had in a CoD game, hitting shots I would've never hit in other fps multiplayer games thanks to the omni-movement and while it is definitely an addition to the game, it doesn't add too much to the game's core, but just enough to change it up a bit.
But after a few dozen hours, it just becomes an infuriating mess. The maps are nothing to write home about since they lack innovation and the layouts are terrible. It feels like there are two proper chokepoints and 90 percent of the map is filler. The game is too safe regarding map innovation.
The game is filled with cheaters and sweats that knows every exploit that would hinder your experience, like spawncamping, meta loadouts, napalm strike placements etc and there is no counter-play regarding that.
And don't get me started on the netcode. I could unload a full magazine into a player but the server would only register 2 of them actually hitting before the player would turn around and kill me in mere frames from their peashooter.
And this might be a very hot take, but map voting was a mistake. I would love to give all maps a try, especially the ones that I actually like, but it's going to be nothing but Stakeout or Nuketown once given the chance, which just gets old quickly after awhile.

Zombies however, is a bit nicer. I'm a casual when it comes to it, so it's nice since it feels way more chill than your average multiplayer lobby.
It's a fun way to level up your weapons and it becomes a good challenge in the higher rounds until... you get to fight against not only a horde of zombies, but also 3 manglers, a bunch of flying insects and the worst designed mini-boss; the amalgam. It is nothing but a meat shield that runs as fast as the player sprints and grapples you with a lengthy animation that takes away more than half of your health and forces you to stay still for awhile.
Other than that, it is a fun game mode you can relax with at least for awhile.

And then there is the obvious problem of the game which has plagued the recent games and that is the QnA aspect of the game or lack of thereof.

To put it simply, the whole game feels AI-generated and it wouldn't surprise me if it actually was. But there is no doubt that they used AI tools.
All from voice acting that even led some voice actors quitting the project entirely, to AI artwork being sold in bundles!
And the latter being the absolute reason why you shouldn't buy this game at all. You are being fed slop from a machine that will happily take your money and even with your support, you only get a terrible experience in return.

And the fact that they charge this game at a minimum price of 70 bucks, or 100 bucks if you really want to, for a battle pass that no doubt also uses AI artwork and items that will not benefit you whatsoever.

In conclusion, if you are looking for a fun but short campaign, an infruriating yet decent multiplayer and a chill zombies mode that lacks creativity, this would no doubt be your kind of game... but please, spent your money wisely. There exists a ton of great game with more replay value than this one and at like, 1/20th of the price (I'm not even kidding).
It's sad to see what the CoD franchise has become, money and greed. This will no doubt be the last CoD game I will ever buy, even if they make a decent one after this one.

Before playing the game: eh, it's just a silly card game, can't be that good.

After: .... I'm too busy playing the game to come up with a punchline.

I can fix her

How does a game running on the same engine but released 5 years prior to Fallout 4 run better and crashes way less? This "Next-gen" update crashes, even on the lowest settings possible.

Super average game. Style with no substance. Half of the game is scrolling through menus and waiting on loading screens, which would've been no problem since I'm using a state of the art SSD's, but it gets super tiring after so many.

Shooting is a carbon copy of Fallout 4 which was fine, but there is little to no innovation which was promised by Bethesda.
Traveling through space has never been more boring. The space is just a skybox and the planets are the exact same but with different weather effects, even worse that there is a point where you can't go further than 4km which is laughable for a game that advertises itself as a space exploration game.

The "story" is so mind-numbingly boring. Most of the time you're just finding the artifacts (which essentially, are just glorified perk points). I thought it would just happen three times throughout, but no, you do it every single mission.

Playing on the highest difficulty is so easy.. The only real "challenge" is when the enemy count is high and there are mostly bullet sponges which just artifically increases the difficulty. Otherwise, enemies just stand around and takes potshots at you.
There was a point in the game which had a surprising amount of enviromental storytelling. There were dropped logs of people fearing that certain enemy, telling it was a dangerous enemy that should be feared, your companion mumbling about how they've heard rumors of said enemy, bodies everywhere and having its own unique soundtrack. It was something I was excited to fight, especially after so long of almost nothing happening in the game.
And after its reveal and finding its somewhat cool design, it was dead after about 6 or 7 shots from my rifle that I found in a random corner about 2 missions after the introduction..

And what's up with the performance? Even with an RTX card it still runs so bad at medium settings with DLSS which was implented months after launch?????????? The technical engineering of this game is so bad and it makes it worse that Todd was so cocky about the criticism of bad performance. It worries me that the next Elder Scrolls, a franchise that I hold very close to my heart (and has games a million times more interesting than Starfield) is going to use the exact same engine...

And that is just a taste of Starfield, take it how you want it..

Despite my negativity, I still liked the game the first few hours. The setting can be impressive at times, I like the skills since it is as advertised still a Bethesda game. There are many outcomes to each and every mission yet very marginal in difference.

Starfield, I want to like you but you just put me to sleep after an hour or if you're very lucky... two. Also you cost 70 bucks (!?!?!?).

Look inside
Expect Tetris
Uplay.
Uninstalled.

*lays off developers, even people who shaped the most iconic parts of the franchise* "please nominate us for labor of love award! :P"

Maximut

Squirrel

I hate this game with boiling blood and yet I still play it.
It just sucks that heroes are now behind battle passes which hurts my experience. I would love to play the diverse roster of characters with so much representation behind them and yet you cannot play them unless you pay for it...

I hope Activision learns from their greed and focus on a better Overwatch, a game that I used to fondly look at and enjoy playing...