**”Call of Duty: Ghosts” was played on the Wii U/Playstation 4/Xbox 360 versions of the game.**

“Call of Duty: Ghosts” once again brings the annual shooter to consoles and PC with another campaign, another million hours of multiplayer and other tricks made for the same old dog (no pun intended). 

Ghosts’ campaign is the typical Call of Duty campaign that fans of the series have come to know and love. It is short, it is epic and it has Call of Duty written all over it.

The story centers around the Ghost squad whom are a special forces unit that specialize in special tactical missions. The setting takes place in a future where North America is brought down by South America and the Ghost squad are instructed to bring enemy down. Basic Call of Duty structure, just this time with space missions and what feels like more slow motion epic battle sequences. It may be more of the same, but the game itself stands out among the other campaigns featured in this series for that particular setting.

This time around the campaign brings in the dog character “Riley” as a bonus. Riley had the potential to bring a lot to the game but was highly under utilized as the character disappears from the campaign throughout the middle and returns only for what feels like a few minutes.

Though this campaign may not live up to the classic campaigns of the Modern Warfare series, Ghosts offers a fun interesting epic campaign that is a much needed improvement than that of Black Ops II. 

Beyond the campaign the game features three separate other modes; Multiplayer, squads and extinction. 

The multiplayer this time around changes things up by simply slowing it down. The maps are larger in this game and unlike previous installments in the Call of Duty franchise the multiplayer feels less chaotic and more team based. It is a nice change for the franchise to keep things interesting and to give players a reason to pick up Ghosts multiplayer.

For those looking for the faster style of playing, smaller maps and a new mode called ‘Cranked’ which forces players to get kills within 30 seconds of their first kill or get blown up. It is a good way to keep players on their feet and forces them to make quick actions, but in the end barely anybody really explodes from the 30 second timer and makes the mode feel overall pointless.

Squads is a nice new feature that pits squads against squads. This mode can be played with AI’s as well as other players online and offline. This can be played solo as well. This feature is a fun addition but will not stray the player too far away from the real multiplayer mode.

Extinction is another brand new mode that is very identical to the Zombies mode featured in Treyarch lead Call of Duty games. This mode sets players out on a alien infested town that has you go through hordes in a survival type game. Overall this game does not give you as many options as Zombies does but is a nice replacement till the next Zombie installment. 

Graphically Ghosts looks like a typical Call of Duty game. It is the best looking one in the series and is the first game to be featured on the next generation consoles Xbox One and Playstation 4. The Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions of the game feature good looking textures and overall the same graphical experience, while the Wii U version features graphics that fall in-between the next generation and previous generation versions. Overall when playing the game, the differences are barely noticeable. 

The games controls are still the same, this time adding in a slide options while running versus a lead in midair to lay on the ground. It is a nice addition for a very frustrating control that was heavily overused in previous multiplayer modes in previous versions of this game.

The Wii U version of Ghosts features some exclusive game play options, such as playing on the game pad screen and playing with the Wiimote and numchuck from the original Nintendo Wii. The Wiimote is the most precise controller to play with for perfect aim, but is very hard to control for players are more used to playing with analog sticks. The gamepad’s touch screen is never used within the game (except as a map for multiplayer modes), so players who own a Wii U pro controller are opted to use that instead. 

Overall “Call of Duty: Ghosts” is a good sequel to a series that is getting less exciting by the year. Good campaign, wonderful multiplayer, but over all the same tricks. Fans of the Call of Duty franchise will feel right at home with this installment, but video game players looking for something new and revolutionary will once again have to put a Call of Duty game to the side. 

4/5