Battlefield Bad Company™ 2

The ultimate Online warfare

Battlefield Bad Company™ 2 brings the spectacular Battlefield gameplay to the forefront of next-gen consoles and PC, featuring best-in-class vehicular combat set across a wide range of huge sandbox maps each with a different tactical focus. New vehicles like the All Terrain Vehicle (ATV) and the UH-60 transport helicopter allow for all-new multiplayer tactics in the warzone. Extensive fine-tuning ensures that this will be the most realistic vehicle combat experience to date. Tactical destruction is taken to new heights with the updated DICE Frostbite engine. Players can now take down entire buildings or create their own vantage points by blasting holes through cover, thereby delivering a unique dynamic experience in every match.

Players can also compete in 4-player teams in 2 exclusive squad-only game modes, fighting together to unlock exclusive team awards and achievements. Spawn on your squad to get straight into the action and use gadgets such as the tracer dart in conjunction with the RPG to devastating effect. Excellence in the battlefield is rewarded with an extensive range of pins, insignias and stars to unlock along with 50 dedicated ranks to achieve. Variety also extends into the range of customizable kits weapons and vehicles available. With 4 distinct character classes, dozens of weapons, several gadgets and specializations, players have over 15,000 kit variations to discover and master. Players will be able to fine-tune their preferred fighting style to give them the edge in combat.

All of these features combine to deliver spectacular and unpredictable action moments found nowhere else in a modern warfare experience. The game also sees the return of the "B" Company squad in a more mature and intense single player experience where the stakes are higher than ever.

 

 

Game specifications
Publisher Electronic Arts
Developer EA Digital Illusions CE AB
Street date 2010-03-02 North America, 2010-03-05 Europe
Category First person shooter
Platforms XBOX 360™, Playstation® 3, PC

Preston

Private Preston Marlowe

Preston Marlowe (You)

Raised on two generations of war stories, Private Marlowe joined Bad Company to get some combat under his belt. Now, as Bad Company's latest "recruit," Marlowe's getting all the action he can handle. Maybe more. 

Sarge

Sergeant Samuel D. Redford

Sarge (Squad Leader)

Sergeant Samuel D. Redford is the only soldier to actually request transfer to Bad Company. Some paint that decision as crazy or suicidal, but Sarge has his reasons. He used to buy into the whole military lifestyle, Mom and Apple Pie, all of it. Not anymore. Especially not after Sadiz. 

Haggard

Private George Gordon Haggard, Jr.

Haggard (Explosives Expert)

Private George Gordon Haggard, Jr. actually likes being in Bad Company. His better personality traits include low-impulse control, consistently poor hygiene, and an encyclopedic knowledge of explosives. The upside is that Haggard's a hell of a soldier. He's just a little … unorthodox. And loud. 

Sweetwater

Private Terrence Sweetwater

Sweetwater (Technical and Communications Specialist)
Private Terrence Sweetwater is too smart for his own good. He enlisted for the college scholarship his recruiter dangled in front of him, figuring his brains would keep him in the rear with the gear. And maybe they would have, if he hadn't "accidentally" uploaded a virus to a secure military network he wasn't supposed to access in the first place.

WEAPONS AND VEHICLES

XM8 Prototype

An experimental US military project, the XM8 P fully automatic rifle was created with a unique versatility, allowing the operator to perform quick repairs and barrel changes in a hot spot.

3,020 ASSAULT SCORE

 

SCAR-L Carbine

The Scar Light model is designed for various barrel size modifications and is compatible with a bevy of ammunition types. The rifle's stealthy silencer and frame has made it the weapon of choice of the SOCOM forces.

2,510 ENGINEER SCORE

M60 LMG

Utilizing design elements from the WW II MG42, the M60 was introduced in 1957 and has been the workhorse of every branch of the U.S. Military. It has gone through several modifications throughout its service life but is slowly being phased out by the M240.

24,700 MEDIC SCORE

 

 

 

GOL Sniper Magnum

With outstanding accuracy and Mauser reliability this rifle provides exceptional performance in difficult operational situations. It's extremely long range and pinpoint accuracy makes it the rifle of choice with German police agencies and counter terrorist units.

20,500 RECON SCORE

 

 

 

M1A2 Abrams

Details

U.S. Main Battle Tank (MBT) armed with a 120mm smoothbore cannon and a remotely operated .50 caliber HMG. The M1 is heavily armored, and highly mobile and designed to dominate armored ground warfare and urban operations.

 

 

 

AH-64 Apache

Details

U.S. Attack Helicopter armed with a belly mounted 30mm chain gun firing HEAT rounds and dual 70mm Folding-Fin Aerial Rocket (FFAR). It has a crew of 2 and is armored to defeat small arms up to and including .50 caliber munition.

 

 

 

Anti-Air Gun

Details

Russian dual barreled 23 mm auto cannon used primarily as an anti-aircraft weapon it can also be used in direct fire support against soft-skinned armored vehicles. Its towing cradling functions as a weapon mount eliminating timely set up.

 

 

 

 

 

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

Over the years the Call of Duty series has set the bar for immersive, action-packed, cinematic FPS gaming, and no matter what camp you're from there's no denying the franchise's influence on the industry. When Infinity Ward moved from the classic World War II setting and blazed new ground with Modern Warfare we saw the first obvious split within the world of Call of Duty. The series dropped its historic focus, created a new cast of characters, and began treading on new ground by taking the first-person shooter genre to new locales, and pushing the boundaries of what military games are willing to show. With Modern Warfare 2, the sheer amount of hype has been practically inescapable, with preorders alone setting it up as one of the biggest selling games of all time, the addition of even more multiplayer modes and features, and the game's new Special Operations mode has set Infinity Ward's lastest up as the game to beat this year.

The real question: has it been worth the wait, and can Modern Warfare 2 live up to the precedent set by over half a decade of Call of Duty tradition?

Modern Warfare 2 is by far the least traditional of the series, with the core package broken up into three main pillars of gameplay. Single-player fans have their main campaign, if you're down for more co-op gameplay either locally or via online connection you've got the new Spec Ops mode, and Modern Warfare's groundbreaking multiplayer is back, and truly better than ever. There's an overwhelming amount of content to experience, but with each mode being 100% standalone in nature, you're getting three completely different experiences all in one. That, however, also plays a huge factor into how your final opinion of Modern Warfare 2 as a whole turns out.

 

First and foremost is the single-player experience. As the anchor of the Call of Duty world, campaign mode is back, and it's intense. You'll instantly get a sense of just how far the improved engine has come when you're thrown into the bustling streets of Rio de Janeiro's favela, the ice-capped mountains of Kazakhstan, the dusty roads of Afghanistan, and other unexpected locales. On the visual side of things, Modern Warfare 2 is an obvious step up over Call of Duty 4 and World at War, with a stronger emphasis on complex terrain in the environments, weather effects, destructible objects, and the overall sense of action and chaos that comes with so many visual improvements. This is only complemented further by the increased attention to sound design, with the effects of many returning weapons being re-recorded,even more in-level chatter amongst your allies, and a truly captivating score by Hans Zimmer which builds based on specific in-game moments. Modern Warfare 2 feels like an action movie through and through, with the production values alone dating Infinity Ward's last game, Call of Duty 4, quite a bit.

At the same time, the single-player campaign has its issues. For starters, it's short. I've been playing Call of Duty 4 steadily since its release, and my first completion of the Modern Warfare 2 campaign came in at just under five hours on regular difficulty. Playing through on hardened will add another hour and a half onto that. Modern Warfare 2 is definitely more chaotic this time around – partially due to the new visual effects and upped production values – and with the improved enemy AI and tough scenario design you'll be fighting for every checkpoint. One of the larger visual changes to the game's heads-up display this time around is the blood splatter system. In previous Call of Duty offerings you'd get damaged, the screen would start to shade red, and you'd be required to seek cover before your vision returned to normal. Modern Warfare 2 employs a new system, actually having a thicker blood layer added to up the realism. There's been some discussion on whether the splatter is too distracting, and in my experience with the game it's far from an issue. You'll be able to take more hits on easier difficulty settings, so while a few well-placed shots will drop players on hardened or veteran modes the added splatter is an acceptable trade-off for more overall health

Campaign's story might be a little farfetched and slightly cramped, but there's no denying the spectacle of it all. 

Modern Warfare 2 will blow you away.

Thankfully many of the glaring issues from last time around have been fixed. You won't find unlimited enemy spawns in areas, there's always a waypoint icon on-screen showing you where to go or who to follow, and the amount of in-game chatter from your team is simply astounding. It isn't often in games that you'll hear your squad call out specific areas on the map and have it mean anything. When your friend shouts, "Two tangos behind the yellow station wagon!" you'll actually see two enemies behind a yellow station wagon. It's a pretty engaging experience. You'll still have random issues with friendly AI, specifically with blocking your movement or deciding to walk in front of you mid-firefight, but for the most part it's a better experience than the first Modern Warfare.

Where Modern Warfare 2's campaign drops the ball, however, is in its actual storytelling. With no historic anchor it's up to the Infinity Ward to not only put players in the moment, but also build and develop the world around those moments. That's one area where Modern Warfare 2 could have used more polish time or specific direction to get right. Events fly by, story is told only through load screens or in-game via NPC chatter (usually amidst firefights, where reading text isn't exactly priority one) and the story is so gigantically over-the-top that you'll often find yourself catching your breath after a mission, feeling like you had fun, and then trying to figure out what you just did in the context of the story. Though this may prove an issue for some, I was able to catch the plot, enjoy the characters, follow the twists, and truly care about the story. But then again, I've also been dedicated to nothing but Modern Warfare 2 for the last six months. The game often expects you to already know the characters, extrapolate on one line of dialogue or a quick cut-scene, and then figure out the story from there. In the end though, there's no real weight to anything you're doing. Outside of playing a couple missions as a soldier taking orders from the top you never get a true feel for scale, or any actual emotional attachment to the events. Something as simple as a newscast reel, or moment of downtime while on the field would have gone a long way. The end result is a game that has the feel of an '80s action movie with huge plot holes covered by plenty of epic moments, but never a believable, cohesive set of events.

There are definitely still great moments to be had in single player though. There's a laundry list of awesome gameplay concepts and new tech at your disposal. It just doesn't stack up against some of the previous Call of Duty story modes, where single player was the obvious focus throughout the entire package.

Multiplayer raises the bar this time around with a huge emphasis on team play. Bring your friends, or get online and make some.

For the vast majority of the experience, Modern Warfare 2 is best enjoyed with friends either locally or via online. The core campaign may have taken a bit of a hit, but in its place is an incredibly well done debut mode called Spec Ops. For those that don't know, Special Operations mode is an arcade-inspired challenge mode that can be played single player for the most part (minus a few co-op specific challenges), but is obviously designed around two-person team play. The mode is broken up into five tiers, each with missions that have a possible three stars to gain based on difficulty level in each of the 23 missions. You'll see a lot of repeating areas, some pulled directly from the single-player campaign, but the actual objectives (and most of the time, the exact layout of the level) is all new. You won't find leaderboards for this mode, unfortunately. SpecOps mode is going to surprise a lot of gamers. It's addictive and surprisingly entertaining. It's longer, overall, than single-player mode, is a huge upgrade from the previously unlockable Arcade Mode in the first Modern Warfare, and some of the missions will have players going back over and over again well after all 69 stars are earned. The co-op only AC-130 mission, for example, is one of the biggest highlights of the entire Modern Warfare 2 package. One player mans the gunship while the other sneaks behind enemy lines on foot. The need for co-op play here is tremendous. In a similar mission, one player will man a chopper mini-gun and actually control the bird's fly speed as it circles a stranded soldier (player two) in a suburban warzone. Not only will you need to work in tandem to move from point to point, but the mission ends with an amazingly cinematic finale as the chopper pilot destroys countless buildings, lays down waves of covering fire for his friend, and then actually swoops in to pick him up on a rooftop. You may have thought you were buying Modern Warfare 2 simply for the competitive multiplayer or single-player campaign alone, but mark my words; you will be pulled in by Spec Ops, and when it's all said and done you'll be begging for more.

Seeing Modern Warfare 2 next to Call of Duty 4 is a pretty eye-opening experience. The engine has come a long way.

And then there's the competitive multiplayer. While there's a near-endless amount that could be said about the final and largest pillar of the Modern Warfare 2 experience, it really boils down to a few key aspects. First off, the visual overhaul. Multiplayer looks beautiful this time around, with the visuals trumping that of the single-player offering in the original Modern Warfare, and much more epic locales. There's a huge level of smoke and effects to be seen, electrical equipment and cars explode, and nearly every item in the levels are physics enabled, all amounting to an experience that feels like a true extension of single player, rather than some stripped down visual offering. There was a full team dedicated to multiplayer for Modern Warfare 2 and it shows.

Infinity Ward also made a point to focus on both user feedback from the first Modern Warfare, as well as overall balance across multiplayer modes. The class system returns with a set of both new and returning weapons, perks, and the new customizable killstreaks, but despite having well over double the amount of total content this time around Modern Warfare 2 retains its strategic feel across the board. In fact, this is easily one of the most balanced multiplayer games I've ever played, as every strategy has its counter, and players at every skill level can contribute to their team in some unique way. The entire experience is extremely rewarding, and the sheer amount of content will have you coming back again and again.

Simply stunning.

In fact, the killstreaks themselves are evidence that the game's balance is truly there. Killstreaks have been expanded from the original Modern Warfare, now allowing players to unlock rewards such as stealth bombers, AC-130 strikes, EMP blasts, and even a devastating 25 killstreak nuke that ends the game with a big bang, automatically handing your team the win if you can pull it off. With such devastating power at your fingertips though, balance was crucial, and Infinity Ward pulled it off. Many of the more annoying tactics in the original Modern Warfare have been removed, so you'll no longer have players throwing three frag grenades every life, martyrdom has been removed from the main set of perks, and with plenty of airborne attacks and a wide variety of equipment and weapons camping is far less of an issue. In fact, even the multiplayer maps themselves solve many of the common issues of COD4's multiplayer, and in turn make for a better experience. You'll find more height, more alternate routes to areas, and more diversity all around. There's an insane level of depth and strategy in Modern Warfare 2's multiplayer, and this is far from just an upgrade from COD4. Thinking about picking up one of the special edition Modern Warfare 2 packages? Check out our full review of the Hardened Edition, or the must-see Prestige Edition review.

 

Closing Comments

When you look at the total package, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is hands-down one of the best first-person shooters out there, and a truly amazing offering across any system. With that being said, our score comes with a disclaimer. For those planning to check out everything Modern Warefare 2 has to offer – online competition, full co-op Spec Ops mode, as well as the campaign – you’re looking at a no-brainer purchase. For the strictly single player crowd, however, Modern Warfare 2 is surprisingly short, and doesn’t live up to the standard set by previous Call of Duty games. The campaign can be completed in as little as four and a half hours, and the missions make better scenarios and moment-to-moment adrenaline rushes than they do a cohesive, well-told story. If you’re going solo, you’ve officially been warned. Look at the complete Modern Warfare 2 experience though, and there’s no denying its rightful place at the top.


 

ATI Radeon™

ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 Graphics 

ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 - The fastest graphics card on the planet¹

Engineered for speed, the ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 delivers an unrivaled HD gaming experience so you can play the latest, most demanding HD titles like never before.²  Featuring cutting-edge graphic, display and memory technology, this next-generation powerhouse delivers unprecedented performance straight out of the box.  Unlocked, this graphics card has massive headroom so you can take control and push your hardware to its full potential!³

 Features and Benefits

• Get unrivalled visual quality and intense gaming performance and for today and tomorrow with support for Microsoft® DirectX® 11
• Expand your visual real estate across up to three displays and get lost in the action with ATI Eyefinity Technology. ^4,5
• Using ATI Stream technology, accelerate even the most demanding applications and do more than ever with your PC.⁶
• Enable rich, realistic visuals with explosive performance so you can dominate your gaming competition.
• State of the art overclocking capabilities give you the control and flexibility to tune your rig for maximum performance and unleash its true potential³
• ATI CrossFireX™ technology in dual mode with support for up to 4 GPU's⁷
• Ultra-high bandwidth GDDR5 memory 

ATI Radeon™ HD 5970 Graphics Feature Summary

• Dual GPUs with a total of 4.3 billion 40nm transistors
• TeraScale 2 Unified Processing Architecture
  • 3200 Stream Processing Units
  • 160 Texture Units
  • 256 Z/Stencil ROP Units
  • 64 Color ROP Units
• GDDR5 memory interface
• PCI Express 2.1 x16 bus interface
• DirectX 11 support
  • Shader Model 5.0
  • DirectCompute 11
  • Programmable hardware tessellation unit
  • Accelerated multi-threading
  • HDR texture compression
  • Order-independent transparency
• OpenGL 3.2 support¹
• Image quality enhancement technology
  • Up to 24x multi-sample and super-sample anti-aliasing modes
  • Adaptive anti-aliasing
  • Super AA
  • 16x angle independent anisotropic texture filtering
  • 128-bit floating point HDR rendering
• ATI Eyefinity multi-display technology^2,3
  • Three independent display controllers
    • Drive three displays simultaneously with independent resolutions, refresh rates, color controls, and video overlays
  • Display grouping
    • Combine multiple displays to behave like a single large display
• ATI Stream acceleration technology
  • OpenCL support¹⁴
  • DirectCompute 11
  • Double precision floating point processing support
  • Accelerated video encoding, transcoding, and upscaling^4,5
    • Native support for common video encoding instructions
• ATI CrossFireX™ multi-GPU technology⁶
  • Dual card performance scaling
• ATI Avivo™ HD video & display technology⁷
  • UVD 2 dedicated video playback accelerator
  • Advanced post-processing and scaling⁸
  • Dynamic contrast enhancement and color correction
  • Brighter whites processing (blue stretch)
  • Independent video gamma control
  • Dynamic video range control
  • Support for H.264, VC-1, and MPEG-2
  • Dual-stream 1080p playback support^9,10
  • DXVA 1.0 & 2.0 support
  • Integrated dual-link DVI output with HDCP¹¹
    • Max resolution: 2560x1600¹²
  • Integrated DisplayPort output
    • Max resolution: 2560x1600¹²
  • Integrated HDMI 1.3 output with Deep Color, xvYCC wide gamut support, and high bit-rate audio
    • Max resolution: 1920x1200¹²
  • Integrated VGA output
    • Max resolution: 2048x1536¹²
  • 3D stereoscopic display/glasses support¹³
  • Integrated HD audio controller
    • Output protected high bit rate 7.1 channel surround sound over HDMI with no additional cables required
    • Supports AC-3, AAC, Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master Audio formats
• ATI PowerPlay™ power management technology⁷
  • Dynamic power management with low power idle state
  • Ultra-low power state support for single and multi-board configurations
• Certified drivers for Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP

 Speeds & Feeds

• Engine clock speed: 725 MHz
• Processing power (single precision): 4.64 TeraFLOPS
• Processing power (double precision): 928 GigaFLOPS
• Polygon throughput: 1.45 billion polygons/sec
• Data fetch rate (32-bit): 464 billion fetches/sec
• Texel fill rate (bilinear filtered): 116 Gigatexels/sec
• Pixel fill rate: 46.4 Gigapixels/sec
• Anti-aliased pixel fill rate: 185.6 Gigasamples/sec
• Memory clock speed: 1.0 GHz
• Memory data rate: 4.0 Gbps
• Memory bandwidth: 256.0 GB/sec
• Maximum board power: 294 Watts
• Idle board power: 51 Watts

1. Driver support scheduled for release in 2010
2. To enable a third display you require one panel with a DisplayPort connector or an active DisplayPort adapter
3. ATI Eyefinity technology works with games that support non-standard aspect ratios which is required for panning across three displays
4. Requires application support for ATI Stream technology
5. Digital rights management restrictions may apply
6. ATI CrossFireX™ technology requires an ATI CrossFireX Ready motherboard, an ATI CrossFireX™ Bridge Interconnect (for each additional graphics card) and may require a specialized power supply
7. ATI PowerPlay™, ATI Avivo™ and ATI Stream are technology platforms that include a broad set of capabilities offered by certain ATI Radeon™ GPUs. Not all products have all features and full enablement of some capabilities and may require complementary products
8. Upscaling subject to available monitor resolution
9. Blu-ray or HD DVD drive and HD monitor required to play Blu-ray / HD DVD discs
10. Requires Blu-ray movie disc supporting dual 1080p streams
11. Playing HDCP content requires additional HDCP ready components, including but not limited to an HDCP ready monitor, Blu-ray or HD DVD disc drive, multimedia application and computer operating system.
12. Some custom resolutions require user configuration
13. Requires 3D stereo drivers, glasses, and display
14. 14 OpenCL compliant driver and SDK release scheduled for later in 2010