Infinity Ward and Beachhead Studio recently rolled out Overwatch, a new map for Modern Warfare 3, as well as the Clan Operations portion of the Call of Duty Elite service. While Overwatch reaffirms my faith that Infinity Ward still knows what it’s doing with the design of the new maps, much like the first two maps did, the launch of its Clan Operations once again proves to me that the Call of Duty franchise has issues launching anything without a hitch.
Overwatch is a large, multi-leveled map set on top of a New York skyscraper. With the city in the background and airplanes cruising through the air, Overwatch is certainly a unique map. However, with all of its levels and rooms, does it end up being a serviceable map?
To me, the answer is a resounding yes. In fact, I believe it’s one of the best maps to date in Modern Warfare 3. The upper level provides plenty of opportunity for ranged firefights, while providing ample cover to either duck away from the fight or wait for an unsuspecting opponent to pass by. It also allows for close-range firefights with its selection of rooms. The lower-level is much the same with the outskirts of the map being ridiculously wide-open and even providing opportunities to get off of the building and onto a few cranes. The lower-level is also littered with various rooms to use SMGs to their full potential.
Clan Operations, however, is an entirely different beast. The idea was that clans could compete in operations to earn clan experience and prizes. As such, the first operation was a simple one: capture as many points in core Domination as you could within the timeframe of the operation. The top six finishers in each clan would then have their captures added up, and the rankings would be determined from those numbers.
Clans would then be awarded “badges” on the Call of Duty Elite website for their finish in the overall standings. Clans that finished in the top 50% would be awarded a bronze badge, and the requirements would continue higher and higher throughout the silver and gold tiers. The champion would be awarded a unique badge showing off to the world that they placed first.
The event itself went on without a hitch. Although most Domination matches became a game of musical chairs, with each clan capturing, losing, capturing, losing and repeating for the length of the match, everything worked as advertised. Apart from a few boosters (the “winning” clan had 3200 captures) who would fill up the lobby with members and trade captures. Everyone was playing fair. No problems there.
The issue came after the event ended. Yet again, Activision and Beachhead were unable to handle the amount of traffic to the Call of Duty Elite site, and the servers crashed. Gamers were stuck waiting for hours before the servers finally went live again with the results. Unfortunately, this was an entirely unwanted case of deja-vu, which was reminiscent of when Elite first went live.
What did you think of the new map and Clan Operations, gamers? Let us know below.