SANTA MONICA, Calif., Jan 21, 2010 / Infinity Ward announced today they are creating a new category in the the multiplayer game space -- the First-Person Knifing game. The FPK puts a twist on the popular First-Person Shooter (FPS) genre by making knives much more lethal than guns.
Yes this is sarcasm. I am a loyal devotee of the Call of Duty franchise, but I think there are several flaws in Modern Warfare 2. One of those flaws is the implementation of the knife and tactical knife weapons, and the perks that can increase their impact.
For background there are two types of multiplayer game play: normal and hardcore. In hardcore mode you can kill someone with two to three bullets, depending on where you hit them and your distance from them. Using most guns in normal mode, which constitutes the vast majority of the Steam-hosted multiplayer games, it can often take six or more bullets to take someone down. The knife-related flaw is most evident in normal play.
There are two components to the flaw. First, a knife slice or stab is always a kill, no matter where on the body you are hit (if someone slices your forearm you die). Second, shooting someone who is running doesn't really slow them down, not until you hit them enough to kill them. They way the designers see it at Infinity Ward, pumping someone in the chest with an AUG HBAR a few times from 10 feet shouldn't really slow them down. They'll keep running at you until you get that 8th bullet in them, or you get a head shot. The result is that unless you have a powerful weapon, and you have 10 to 12 yards between you and your attacker, they can just sprint at you and knife you before you can gun them down.
For a game that stresses realism this strikes me as a problem. Yet, the situation can get worse with perks. Perks are improvements to your character or weapons that you gain over time as rewards. The Marathon and Lightweight perks allow you to run faster and sprint for longer periods of time. The Commando perk increases the distance from which you can knife someone. You also run faster if you are carrying a lightweight gun. Add that all together and suddenly Kid Flash is knifing you in a blur from six feet away.
The result is a First-Person Knifing game. Many good rounds are ruined, from my point of view, by players who simply sprint around and knife people, no matter how many rounds you pump into them. The only way to kill them is from behind or while they are busy killing one of your teammates. You can try and knife them, but if they have the Commando perk and you don't they can kill you by slicing you arm as they run by and you can't even reach them.
It isn't as bad in hardcore mode, where bullets do more damage, but of the 15-plus game modes offered only two are hardcore so your options are limited. There are other problems with MW2, but that is the one I find the most annoying. Modern Warfare 2 has racked up more than $1 Billion in retail sales so I doubt Infinity Ward is going hustle changes into the pipeline to make me happier.
Players of the first version of Modern Warfare, COD4 could tweak the settings on their servers and create multiplayer games that met their tastes, and were that the case with MW2 there would be a lot of hardcore games out there with modifications (mods) to the knives. The lack of dedicated servers is a subject for another day.
