Eight months ago, I set out to finish all the games in my collection that I had acquired during my ball-breaking addiction to Left 4 Dead 2's versus mode. The road has been bumpy, with progress ranging from light speed to snails pace. This week, that inconsistency is set to continue, as I recall my time with a DLC chapter for a game I've already completed, and the multiplayer segment from another game I've already completed.

First up, Deus Ex: Human Revolution- The Missing Link. This was acquired during the Steam sales for something like £2 or so. Not much to argue with there, as its equivalent to a mere twenty minutes pay at my minimum wage pub job, for three to four hours of reliving one of my favourite games of 2011.
However, I mistakenly got my hopes up. The gameplay was solid, and it looked beautiful using AMD's Eyefinity set up, with the extra two screens at the side giving a more absorbing look into the dark dank world that Adam had woken up to find himself in. The plot was even okay, with a moral dilemma (which I cunningly found an alternative to) rounding out the game and spelling doom to Belltower Industries.
But the pacing was way off. Admittedly, this may have a lot to do with the fact that the DLC was designed as a standalone chapter within a larger game, which you could access independently from the rest of it so as to avoid mucking up continuity within an existing save file. But with only three hours to get absorbed, Eidos Montreal were going to have to work some magic on this short but sweet project. Unfortunately, thanks to continuous backtracking, repetitive environments and those fucking security checkpoints with the “Biometric Data…Assembled!” robot lady, this DLC is more “D…D…Diagonelly” than “Diagon Alley!” so it gets a 5 from me. Worth £2 or so for a slow weekend, but nothing more than that.

Now, finally, after a month and a half and 40 hours of gameplay, I have earned my first Prestige on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3- Multiplayer.
It’s been a mixed time with COD; some days I would revel in the slaughter as I picked apart my opponents from afar with my trusty CM901 and later my FAD, or perhaps a plucky knife throw from afar, or sprinting through the back alleys of Seatown with my golden Striker shotgun tearing through anyone unlucky enough to step out of that doorway. A highest killstreak of 13, a K/D ratio of 1.2 shows that whilst relatively new to the multiplayer component of the COD franchise, all that time with Left 4 Dead and Team Fortress 2 has helped me be a relatively worthy opponent to most people.
However, it’s not all sunshine, lollypops and flashbangs. There are several things that weaken the experience. Whiney complainers who are losing. Hackers who use their aimbots to unleash a nuclear blast with their 25 player killstreak, and of course, akimbo wielders and campers. Whilst it might seem harsh to say that these latter two are frustrating considering they’re legitimate tactics, it can be very frustrating when you’re trying to play in a competitive way. Where’s the fun in lying in some grass picking off every poor bastard who rounds the corner? Or the fun in running around with the most overpowered weapon combo in the game (dual machine pistols). Okay, yes, it is silly to get annoyed about, but these wouldn’t seem so bad if every other fucker on the server wasn’t bitching about it, rage quitting, or hacking everyone’s pants off.
But all in all, I really enjoyed it. Chances are, I’ll play enough to prestige one more time. But, I’m well aware that perhaps the only reason I was enthralled was because this was my first stint at COD multiplayer. Will I still be happy after COD BLOPS 2? MW4? Probably not, but only time will tell. To all the “COD Haters” I’ll say this. Yes, the multiplayer (which gets an 8 from me) is pretty much what you’ve played before, with even more plans for wallet fucking DLC on the way. But, the single player is amazing. Buy it for the single player after revisiting the other two MW’s.

Next time, a progress report on my 3DS backlog, with Super Mario warily taking centre stage (and he'll be lucky to be leaving alive), and maybe I’ll start Battlefield 3 multiplayer and do some kind of comparison... I dunno, whatever I feel like.