Modern Warfare 2

Four Zero Two interview: revamping the multiplayer

The second and third parts of the GamerZines interview with Robert Bowling are now live, and make for fascinating reading. It seems that far from resting on its laurels, Infinity Ward is taking the risky step of making several adjustments to what’s widely regarded as the finest multiplayer game on the market. It would have been all too easy for IW to stick to its guns and just make a few minor tweaks, but wholesale changes are on the board, at least from what Bowling has to say about perks and killstreaks.

“We do have expanded Killstreak Rewards now, some of which are user controlled. For example, where you previously could call in UAV, Airstrikes, and Helicopter Support but had no control on how helpful they were, there are many more options which allow you to take control of the gunner or control its success a bit more for a limited time. Such as the AC130 gunship where you can fire any of the three weapons on it during its limited time in the air.”

What’s unclear is exactly how this affects your character on the ground – is he effectively teleported into the gunship and out of harm’s way? Does he remain on the ground in temporarily invincible form? Or will it still be possible to die while controlling the gunship – thus meaning you’ll have to find a relatively safe place before calling in the gunship? It’ll be interesting to see how IW handles this, as it could potentially affect the realism of the experience.

As far as perks go, again the news is good, with a number of upgrades to this popular mechanic. “We’ve made extensive additions to the perk system and create-a-class system as a whole”, says Bowling. “As I’ve stated, you can now customize killstreak rewards in addition to your weapon loadout, so your reward for multiple kills without a death can be customized to how you like to play. For example, I forego any 3 Killstreak or 5 killstreak and focus on the bigger payoffs for longer killstreaks. This new addition along with the ability to rank up Perks from their base benefit to an upgraded Pro version with additional bonuses allows you to really customise your Classes to your preferred play style per gametype.”

It seems to be a way of allowing the player to personalise his or her approach to the game to an even greater degree – letting you play the game exactly the way you want to. But can IW balance this level of flexibility? Will exploits be found? With such a wide range of options, the latter seems a near-certainty. Yet if players do find exploits, it seems the publisher will quickly clamp down on them.

“We stay extremely connected to our community on a real-time basis,” Bowling insists. “I credit a lot of that to our presence on Social Media sites like Twitter (Follow @fourzerotwo) and Facebook where we can get instant reports from our players. We’re extremely aggressive about listening to what our community is saying and responding. Whether it’s an issue or suggestion, we’ve got our ear to the ground for what’s coming.”

It seems just about every angle is covered, then – at least if Infinity Ward’s walk is as good as its talk. 74 days and counting…