Call of Duty Vanguard Review

"Alternate World War II"

Campaign

November 9, 2021 at 10:23pm
By Jason Stettner

The latest yearly release in the Call of Duty franchise, entitled Vanguard sends us to an alternate history World War II setting. That means it essentially allows them to play within the space while applying modern concepts to the era. For the most part it’s very much a World War II game, you just get some fancier scopes and a more diverse cast with that.

It takes place across a range of unique theaters of war from the time. You’ll get to head out to battle in Normandy, face off against invaders in Stalingrad and take to the skies during the Midway scene. It’s basically little slices of war during an interview scenario that is painfully predictable.

It was still an enjoyable time with some more visceral scenes at the start of the game as it aimed to introduce Vanguard’s multiplayer operators. The visuals here were quite stunning and it was neat to see them sneak in heavy cinematic portions with in-game scripted segments. They hid the transitions very well.

Anyways, it’s linear as usual with heavy action portions where you take on typical historical foes that used their proper symbols this time around. Note that the symbols are not used in the multiplayer portion of the experience. Anyways, there’s a decent amount of game time that’s similar to previous releases so that was fine.

I do think that the latter half of the campaign wasn’t quite as strong though overall a fine time. There was a neat balance of being able to use stealth, or other mechanics to make your way around. It also featured a first, the first time we’re able to become a parkour wizard as the strongest character of the cast featured in Stalingrad was able to climb or slide around with high finesse.

That aside, the general themes of not listening to your commanders was a tad odd. Although I suppose talking back against authority was something that made this elite team of operators come together for this random mission that seems to setup other future missions?

Multiplayer

This is really the stand out portion of the overall package. It’s an element that feels vicious, fast paced and action packed. If you enjoyed Modern Warfare 2019 it feels similar to that but with aspects that help expand the multiplayer to brutal lengths. The best part is that it features sixteen core maps that are actually, I think for the first time a selection of maps that I entirely enjoyed. I’m a bit tired of some due to the weighting of maps showing up, but other than that I can’t really choose one I don’t like.

It’s a huge stack of levels with a variety of unique biomes to them. There are some other maps too, those largely being in the new round based Champion Hill mode that I care little for. The other modes are largely back in terms of the traditional options such as Team Deathmatch or Domination. We also get Patrol here which is fun, a moving Hardpoint to capture.

Perhaps the most fascinating part of this multiplayer is the whole combat pacing setting. You can choose how many players you want to go up against, it starts with the traditional numbers and goes up to Blitz which just stacks players into a space. I prefer this mode as it’s pure insanity combat the whole way through. Other than that it plays it largely safe in comparison to recent entries.

You level up, adjust classes and improve weapons to take on others across the range of modes. It’s quite straight forward in regards to what it provides and generally I really love it. It’s been a blast and I’ve piled up the others playing. For fans of World at War you’re also in for a surprise since it features remakes of Castle and strangely Dome alongside a reimagining of Sub Pens.

Zombies

The zombies mode is a coop focused option that can also be played solo. It’s quite honestly worthless in regards to value to this package and I heavily suggest skipping it entirely. If I could delete this mode from my game install, I would. It’s a single tiny hub map that sends you off to lazily cut multiplayer maps with ultra lame objectives.

Shi No Numa is also there, for some reason. This is a big thumbs down from me Treyarch, the developer which handled this mode. Shouldn’t have even included this in the game as it’s pointless, and a complete move away from what makes zombies mode fun. I actually consider this to be a negative in regards to its inclusion, a poor excuse for what zombies used to be.

I would have rather not have had it, then see it in this half-assed condition. I do hope someday this zombies mode goes back to its roots as I just don’t care for it anymore, and this is the absolute worst case scenario for how it could have ended up. It was probably time constraints or something, but just a worthless offering.

Gameplay

As mentioned prior this plays very similarly to Modern Warfare 2019 which is such a good thing. It does have an insanely fast pacing to it with a very quick time to kill so keep that in mind. It’s brutally quick and overall quite violent as one might expect from a shooter of this type.

I thought it handled well in how you move about with the option to slide swiftly, and to use the environment for cover which is awesome. The door smashing returns alongside some awesome destruction elements. There are whole walls and other objects that you can break apart with bullets or hitting them to open up new paths or ways to shooter your foes. The visuals in the game were absolutely stunning in regards to their quality.

On the Xbox Series X we’re getting two options. The first targets a 4k resolution at 60fps being dynamic. The second aims to provide 120fps at around 1600p dynamic which looks fairly great and incredibly smooth. The higher frame rate was the one I desired the most. There’s also HDR support among a whole host of options from VRR to Dolby Atmos for sound and also mouse and keyboard.

You might need the VRR as the campaign exhibited a frame drop here or there, but nothing too drastic, the rest of the game seemed to run fine despite larger groups of foes. Anyways, visually it is most certainly a gorgeous offering and particularly in the campaign. The player models were particularly impressive in this one. Now, there were some spots where you can see some weaker textures that stick out, but unless you’re looking for them you likely won’t see them.

The Conclusion

Call of Duty Vanguard is a solid package featuring an enjoyable campaign experience, fast paced expansive multiplayer and a rather drab zombies mode that actually lessens the overall value. Again, that zombies mode is just straight up abysmal. There needs to be a major overhaul to what they’re doing with zombies or I’m just checked out going forward.

The campaign was definitely something I had fun playing with an okay cast of characters and really neat set pieces. If they would have focused further on the historical elements I do believe this might have been considered one of the best campaigns.

The weaker parts were focusing on the operator aspects instead of just telling a story of heroics, which this franchise really used to excel at back in the day. This is very much a typical sort of Call of Duty campaign, in terms of length and the linear style. The multiplayer shines the most out of the package, providing a great amount of content and very enjoyable action.

The multiplayer spawn points could use some work, but for the most part I loved what they’ve done with the pacing. Oh, and the MVP thing at the end should be gutted as that’s just silly and I don’t like seeing it over and over. Anyways, I quite enjoyed Vanguard finding it to be quite an upgrade over Black Ops Cold War.

Read our Black Ops Cold War Review
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Call of Duty Vanguard Review on Xbox Series X
Review Code Provided by Activision

Rating Overall: 7.8