Call of Duty 2 demo out

By Kristan Reed Published 27 September, 2005

All 665MB of it

Infinity Ward's hugely-anticipated sequel to Call of Duty 2 isn't due out for another two months, but while we await the game's PC and Xbox 360 release you can now check out a huge single player demo that shows off some of the game's new features in all their glory.

The Activision-published game promises players hugely improved enemy and buddy AI, along with a much greater degree of player choice that no longer forces players to follow a strict linear path. Needless to say, Infinity Ward has also taken great care to ramp up the visual quality, with frankly jaw-dropping smoke effects that add an even more cinematic touch to the proceedings.

This weighty 665MB demo (now available via Eurofiles) is the Egypt-based mission El Daba, and tasks players with taking out four artillery guns located on the beach. What are you waiting for, get downloading!

Picture of Kristan.

About Kristan Reed

Kristan is a former editor of Eurogamer, dad, Stone Roses bore and Norwich City supporter who sometimes mutters optimistically about Team Silent getting back together.

Read more articles from Kristan by visiting the Kristan Reed archive page.

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Comments (33) Latest comment 7 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Razz #1 7 years ago

    \o/

  • Hunam85 #2 7 years ago

    meh, some changes in this arnt great, guns are mostly useless with out iron sights and the health system is pretty silly, and unfortuntly the textures on the demo are pathetic, antistropic makes it all so much nicer but the base textures still let it down

    on the plus side the smoke effects are amazing, animation seem smooth and nice and has that CoD atmosphere that we all loved, just think of it as a different looking brother to CoD over a sequal
    Edited by Hunam85 at 27/09/05 @ 11:40

  • Eraser #3 7 years ago

    yay, another generic WW2 shooter.
    The first one was boring as hell as well.

    edit:
    although I'm not sure whether hell actually is boring (I imagine it's not, though one can argue that "eternity" is a very long time), I think my point comes across well enough.
    Edited by Eraser at 27/09/05 @ 11:43

  • kangarootoo #4 7 years ago

    Have to disagree there. I thought Call of Duty was a great game. Horses for courses I guess.

  • skillian #5 7 years ago

    Yeah, few games have ever produced the atmosphere of Call of Duty. One of the best single player FPSs ever.

    I had no idea there was a demo coming - did anyone else know? Unfortunately I'm at work so it'll have to wait 'til I get home, but I can't wait.

  • RobertFoster #6 7 years ago

    I hope the multiplayer is as good as it was for CoD (is? I stopped playing cold turkey...I played CoDMP too much)

  • vegard #7 7 years ago

    i dunno about this. i loved the first game, but this level just isn't doing it for me. still, will have to wait for the full game before i can judge. and my 9800xt just isn't up to par anymore. it hurts to start realizing that;)

  • freedumb #8 7 years ago

    Is there a hige difference between running this (and most games in general) in 1280x1024 over 1600x1200? I've got a good gaming pc (Athlon64 3800+, Nforce4SLI, 6800GT, 2GBDDR400), but my 17" CRT Monitor is capped at the 1280 resolution, and its annoying.

    Then again since this is supposed to be a next gen game, its probably meant to run at 1600 and above.

  • Talha #9 7 years ago

    Skillian: I thought work was the best place to download such huge demos and generally muck about! That's where I am right now!

    By the way, VEgard, if you are giving up on your 9800 XT, should I give up on my spanking new 6800 GT too? Noooooooooo!!!

    The game looks OK but disappointing for XBox 360 at least as far as the trailer is concerned.
    Edited by Talha at 27/09/05 @ 12:09

  • space_ace #10 7 years ago

    the original made me deserter and i see no reason to enroll. maybe on 360...

  • skillian #11 7 years ago

    @Talha - yeah, you'd think working for an online retailer we'd have a decent connection, but my line at home is actually faster. I'll pop home at lunch and set it DLing, then be ready to play when I get home.

    Hopefully my 9800 Pro will be up to the task - it's served me well 'til now.

  • Talha #12 7 years ago

    @skillian: My sympathies with you. Fortunately at our connection speed the demo will be fully downloaded in 2 hrs, The only problem being how to get it home, since I only have a 512 MB USB. I guess I will have to split it with WInRAR and take it home in .... aaaargh... two instalments, thus extending my waiting time to 2 days.

    Hold on to your 9800 Pro brother, it is not bad by any means contrary to what ATI and NVIdia will have you believe. I plan to cling to my 6800GT for at least a year. Let's unite in our destitude, shun the high-end setups being touted by the hardware makers, keep our money safe with us, tolerate resolutions of 1024x768, and blast these miserable scoundrels out of the water!!!! Ooops, guess the spirit is getting to me.


    WHY CAN"T THESE DEVELOPERS MAKE SMALLER DEMOS???!!!!!!

  • Talha #13 7 years ago

    Only eight years ago 1024X768 used to be the HIGHEST resolution a PC could reach, and mine flickered and shuddered like hell when it did.

    Oh, how time flies.

    But I agree that most games look quite good on 1024 and you don't really need to crank it up, considering the performance hit.
    Edited by Talha at 27/09/05 @ 12:32

  • kangarootoo #14 7 years ago

    " I find games look better in 1024x768 with 4xaa than 1600x1200 with no AA."

    I agree completely. I rarely set PC games above 1024x768, even to find out what it looks like or whether it is still fast with AA turned on at 1600.

  • Talha #15 7 years ago

    Wow, and I thought it was only a problem with me!! At higher resolutions games do look too clean for their own good, and any defects are readily apparent. That is why many console games look so fantastic - paradoxically, because of their low resolution.

  • jiveguy #16 7 years ago

    Does it run at a constant 60fps though?

  • skillian #17 7 years ago

    Does it run at a constant 60fps though?

    Lol, don't bring your console arguments in here :p

    edit: Bah, still learning the tags.
    Edited by skillian at 27/09/05 @ 13:15

  • Artemus #18 7 years ago

    And this is a 'next gen' 360 game...?

  • Artemus #19 7 years ago

    ^ What I'm thinking. Along with Quake 4 and Oblivion.

  • kangarootoo #20 7 years ago

    This may have been the delopers brief lets remember, lest the "devs too lazy to port properly" arguments start raising their heads :)

  • Polyphonic #21 7 years ago

    What a strange game.

    It's honestly as if the developers couldn't make their minds up as to whether it was going to be a 'next-gen' game or not.

    I've just played the demo and a few things stood out for me. The smoke was absolutely fantastic, along with the soundtrack and the sense of immersion (rather overwhelmingly), yet the graphics were rather poor as the textures were low quality. The environment didn't seem to be interactive (perhaps no bad thing but it does stand out) and the physics were noticeably absent.

    I cannot make my mind up as to whether the demo suffers from the lack of physics (rag doll etc) or whether the immersive gameplay makes up for it; it's an odd one.

    Still, I don't think I'll get it.

  • MyWifeNowDave #22 7 years ago

    This looks absolutely stunning, for once smoke grenades are actually useful. Was anyone else surprised by the lack of reflective water though, given the high standards of presentation elsewhere?

  • RandolphScott #23 7 years ago

    Bit disappointed. The level just seemed a bit controlled and pedestrian.

    Great soundtrack and immersion but seriously underwhelmed after the first one.

  • skillian #24 7 years ago

    How long does it take to run through? Longer than FEAR I hope.
    Edited by skillian at 27/09/05 @ 14:17

  • crashVoodoo #25 7 years ago

    anyone took any good screenies .... i know i could go find some somewhere but they're usually the 'presentation' angles and not what i'd normally see when playing.

  • MyWifeNowDave #26 7 years ago

    Well, any faking of shiny water is going to use pixel shaders, unless you're doing per vertex specular highlights, which I don't believe have been used for a while. Its just a blue plane with moving textures, and its completely opaque so the waterline of any floating objects looks rubbish.

  • Darren #27 7 years ago

    Call of Duty was fantastic and on the basis of this all-too-short demo it looks like the sequel is even better. The graphics, which abandon OpenGL in favour of DirectX, are fantastic with some nice detailed textures and high-polygon modelling complete with real-time shadows (at last!). I can't wait to play the full game on the Xbox 360!

  • Talha #28 7 years ago

    Darren, buddy, no offence - I haven't played the demo yet but everybody else here seems tremendously disappointed in the graphics. Are they ,missing something?

  • Talha #29 7 years ago

    Well looks attractive to me. I will take the goddamned second instalment today, combine the executable at home and install the demo. Although by the looks of it it will be a choppy ride considering I have a P4 3.0, with 1GB RAM and just a 6800GT. And I hate to set the visual settings at less than the very highest.

    I hate the fact that this game will make my recent investment in a 6800GT look bad. Christ!

  • jienn #30 7 years ago

    Nice ingame-intro but..

    The verdict is....... not very good. Same shit different gfx. scripted sequences and the usual "the player must be stupid so we must lead him/her to the only one way path"....gasp!

    Wake me up when opf2 is out... Zzzzzzz

  • Talha #31 7 years ago

    Thanks Mr Fluffy, I needed that. It was just unsettling that finally having some money to spend, I read all these rave reviews of the GeForce 6 series, and I decided to bite the bullet this time by not going for the very good value for money 6600GT, instead opting for the full deal. 6800 Ultra was still out of reach btw.

    And bang! The next frigging week 7800 GTX dropped from nowhere and suddenly it looked like I had made the worst deal ever and making me feel like an inadequate after mere seconds in the bask of glory.

  • Talha #32 7 years ago

    Mr Tucker, your last para is the SANEST piece of advice I have come accross for a while. Yes, they realease new cards every other day, and developers do not fully utilize the existing HW, making it all look like a bloody scam. Which it is, probably, since it is only PC these HW gods can turn to, consoles being blessedly non-upgradeable.

    Actually I did precisely what you suggest - till two months ago I was still using my Radeon 9600 XT. I am so in love with that brave boy that I refuse to sell it even now when it is gathering dust- it provided me SO MUCH value for money, and even last month I was playing Far Cry on it with all the settings cranked up, albeit at 800X600 which is not bad at all. Doom III also ran fine, only at 800x600. Considering the age of the card, I would say that is nothing short of astounding and goes completely against what ATI will have you believe.

    I reckon the best way to go is to buy the top card from the last generation - that is the ultimate price-performance compromise.

    By the way, how do I overclock my 6800GT? I looked on the web but could only find out about overclocking the fX series.
    Edited by Talha at 28/09/05 @ 12:08

  • Cheezit #33 7 years ago

    Didn't think the graphics were bad at all meself. Running it at 1280x1024 with x2 AA and it looked fine. The physics seemed to work pretty well, and the weapons 'feel' great. I think they've sacrificed a bit of absolute graphical fidelity in exchange for lots of objects on screen tbh. The only negative (that a few people have already pointed out) is that it still feels fairly scripted by the latest standards. But I loved the gameplay in the original so more of the same ain't the worst thing in the world as far as I'm concerned. I'll definitely buy it, but probably only to play in SP mode, as I doubt multiplayer will wean me off BF2...