Okay, friend got the game and brought it over. Then left it here since he lives two doors down the hall anyway.
Impressions:
Single Player: I really enjoyed it. The story isn't the most interesting story you could tell in a war game, but it presents it well, and it got all the stuff right that no one else ever does. Lots of little things. Sprinting and dropping to a crouch slides you into cover. Reloading a weapon before you run out of ammo gives you a full clip plus one in the chamber. SEAL operators in Afghanistan do actually grow beards and dress like that. Supressors really don't help all that much unless there's some other environmental factor helping. The combat chatter is realistic (to the best of my knowledge) and believable. The weapons are all (mostly) different, and varied enough to make each one unique. Even though the story didn't grip me with an iron fist of interest, I could relate to characters, and managed to make me care enough to know who's who. The long range sniping was a real pain in the ass until I discovered the thermal settings, and then it got really awesome. I think my biggest gripe was that it still has the unfortunately necessary ridiculously huge enemy armies that the squad slogs through relentlessly, however justified. Oh, and the campaign actually calls the OpFor the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and (by nationality, still Al Qaeda by faction) Chechens. Kudos for the guts to kick political correctness in its face, Danger Close.
Multiplayer: OH DEAR GOD WHY?!?! It's a steaming pile of ****. You can't go prone, all the maps are ridiculously penned in, the two sides are literally identical in all but skins. Seriously, the M16A4/M203 is NOT identical to the ****ing AK-47. It doesn't even come with a fully automatic setting anymore! Compared to the singe player, the HUD and interfaces are hideous and annoying to read. Snipers dominate matchmaking, and death to anyone who dares try otherwise. The maps, individully, look good. But then you realize that they're governed by that retarded "don't leave this box, or both sides will kill you!" mechanic to make them look bigger than they are. And they're piled high with insurmountable-chest-high-walls that don't make any sense at all to be insurmountable. And THEN you get ridiculous sightlines that are absolutely a dream for sniping. Plus, an enemy on Hard in the campaign has roughly double the health you do in multi. Four shots with an M21 on single player to drop one with no headshot. Two to kill a player in multi. Just about the only cool thing to come out of this steaming pile is the ability to choose what kind of killstreak you want, offensive or defensive. Offensive are stuff like mortars, missiles, you know, explodey stuff. The other is match grade ammo to do more damage, flak jackets to take less damage, UAVs and jammers. The dynamic when you have to choose between the two for each killstreak bonus is interesting. But that's all that's interesting. And they call the Taliban and Al Qaeda OpFor. Way to not be awesome.
