Tag Archives: Xbox Live

Call Of Duty – World At War

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A first person shooter released as a followup to Modern Warfare (Call Of Duty 4), here we return to history. World at War hits different in comparison to the previous titles in the series, taking on a more gritty undertone with the games campaign, which can carry over to it’s multiplayer maps.

The game is set during World War II, depicting intense battles such as Peleliu, Okinawa, Stalingrado, and Berlin. It emphasizes the gritty and brutal nature of the conflict, including unique enemies like Kamikaze fighters and Banzai chargers. The single-player campaign is split into two perspectives. The American campaign follows US Marine Raider Private C. Miller in the Pacific Theater, covering battles like Makin Atoll, Peleliu, and Okinawa. A mission featuring US Navy Petty Officer Locke as a gunner during Okinawa is also include. The Soviet Campiagn centers on Soviet soldier Private Dimitri Petrenko, alongside Sergeant Viktor Reznov, from Stalingrado to the Battle of Berlin, culminating in planting the Soviet flag on the Reichstag.

The game’s campaign touches on a few political elements, specifically with patriotism and Nation Duty. While not overt, the game subtly critiques the dehumanizing nature of war through its graphic violence and grim tone, showing the cost of militaristic ideologies. The campaign doesn’t shy away from war’s horrors—flamethrowers burn enemies alive, civilians are caught in crossfire (e.g., “Vendetta”), and missions like “Eviction” depict urban devastation. This contrasts with the patriotic heroism, suggesting war’s toll on all sides, though it’s less critical of Allied actions. The game’s mature rating and gritty aesthetic (dismemberment, blood effects) aim to portray WWII’s brutality authentically, unlike earlier, sanitized WWII games. However, it stops short of questioning the Allies’ moral framework, focusing on Axis aggression.

The game reflects WWII’s propaganda-driven narratives, with each side’s campaign reinforcing their ideological stance—American democracy vs. Japanese imperialism, Soviet communism vs. Nazi fascism. Soviet missions use rhetoric like “For the Motherland!” to evoke communist unity, while American missions emphasize liberating the Pacific. The game doesn’t explore internal political tensions (e.g., Soviet purges, U.S. segregation) but mirrors wartime propaganda’s black-and-white framing. This reflects how WWII media shaped public perception, with clear heroes and villains. The game’s Zombies mode, while fictional, uses Nazi zombies as a shorthand for evil, reinforcing this narrative.

The Pacific campaign subtly touches on imperialism, as the U.S. fights to reclaim territories from Japanese control, but it doesn’t critique American expansionism. Missions like “Semper Fi” and “Black Cats” focus on retaking islands like Makin and Okinawa, framing the U.S. as liberators. The game sidesteps the Pacific’s colonial history (e.g., U.S. control of the Philippines) and Japan’s imperialist ambitions are villainized without nuance.

This reflects a Western-centric view, where Allied actions are heroic, and Japanese motivations (e.g., resource-driven expansion) are reduced to fanatical aggression.

Multiplayer

There are six multiplayer modes, including Team Deathmatch and Capture the Flag, with a ranking system up to level 65. You can unlock weapons, perks, and grenades as they progress, with a Prestige mode resetting rank for additional class slots. Killstreaks are rewarded following several consecutive kills In a row without dying, the rewards  Includes three killstreak rewards: Recon Plane (3 kills), Artillery Strike (5 kills), and Attack Dogs (7 kills). There are 13 maps included, with additional maps added as DLC.

Zombies Mode

This was the first in the series to include a Zombies modes, which is a PVE mode where a team of players have to face off against computer controlled zombies whilst scoring enough points to spend on weapons, ammunition and barriers. The vibe is spooky, the teamwork is clutch, and it’s got that “one more game” energy that keeps you up ‘til 3 a.m. The later DLC zombie maps, like Verrückt, just crank the insanity up. This mode basically birthed a whole subgenre for Call of Duty and has become a common staple of the series. It can be best thought as a competitor to the Horde mode from Gears Of War 2, Firefight from Halo Reach, or survival from Left 4 Dead.

Versions

Xbox 360: The only version that has support for achievements, along with standard Xbox Live features like matchmaking and leaderboards. You do need to subscribe to play on Xbox Live unlike the other versions but is playable on the Xbox one and the Series consoles.

PlayStation 3: Compared to the 360 version, there is a noticeable frame drop when the game gets busy.Trophies were added following an update.

Wii: The Wii version is a tailored adaptation of the game for Nintendo’s console, offering unique benefits despite hardware limitations compared to the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC versions. While it sacrifices some graphical fidelity and features (e.g., no online co-op, fewer maps), it leverages the Wii’s motion controls and accessibility to deliver a different experience. I cant say the motion controls are good for aiming, sometimes you get a benefit of accuracy if the Wii Remote is playing nice, but most times it s awkward to correctly aim which makes the game more clunky to play.

Windows: Avaliable on Steam, but appears to lack achievement support since Steam did not support this at the time. This version still works on modern systems and the servicers are still online. But various security expoits make this version risky to play.

Conclusion

Call of Duty: World at War is a straight-up classic. The campaign’s a wild ride, multiplayer’s got that addictive grind, and Zombies? It’s not perfect—grenade spam and some repetitive missions can be a buzzkill—but this game’s got heart, guts, and a legacy that kicked off the Black Ops series of games.

Midtown Madness 3

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The joys of rampaging through city traffic. Midtown Madness hits the Xbox, and the virtual streets of Paris and Washington DC.

Midtown Madness 3 is a fun street-racing game that mixes objectives from Sega’s Crazy Taxi with standard street racing. The story mode gives some absurd backdrop of being a private investigator who must impersonate various vehicle-based jobs like taxi driver, cars salesman, stunt car driver, policeman, limo driver, paramedic or a pizza delivery guy. It hardly matters though, since the gameplay consists solely of racing through the streets trying to hit checkpoints, usually with a competitor in hot pursuit (similar to TG Daredevil for the PS2)

If all you want is a cool driving game without an emphasis on violence, yet still laden with destructive opportunities, Madness delivers. There’s a lot of cars to select, unlock, and drive around at highly unsafe speeds, and all the cars have a noticeably unique feel to them. The arcade handling is responsive and highly entertaining (but don’t expect realism), and there’s a ton of things to run into and destroy including other cars, lampposts, fences, and storefront windows.

The freedom to just drive around, hit checkpoints, or go undercover and do some crazy missions? That’s the sweet spot and is what Midtown Madness 3 exceeded at. Winning races or completing missions earns you new wheels to cruise with, along with more races and missions. There’s no shortage of sites to see through the game’s two picturesque cities, either. In fact, this overload of missions, races, and game modes is really the high point. Want to just aimlessly cruise through Paris? You can even do it with a friend in the multiplayer mode. Straight racing by yourself or with pals is another option, and the game will even adjust its time limits based on the car you drive since the Mini Cooper can make far better tracks than a truck.

Visually, Midtown Madness is solid. The cars are detailed and shiny, offering impressive textures that the PS2 would cry for. The cities look excellent and the pedestrians look mostly human. The audio is fun, with great engine effects and ambient noises, and a zippy soundtrack. It really does take advantage of the Xbox sound processing capabilities, and has aged well even for today.

Multiplayer action thankfully includes Xbox Live support, along with system link, and a two-player split screen mode. There is also DLC available, which has long since been discontinued by Microsoft but has been preserved by the community. Online play is possible thanks to the Insignia project, although you will be lucky to find a lobby.

Even if you get bored with the 30-plus cars and a horde of missions and races, finding fun things to run over with friends never gets old. You can’t run over anyone, Pedestrians either leap out of the way or pass right through the car undamaged — including the mimes. The AI can be a bit… let’s say, braindead. Sometimes, it feels like you’re racing against NPCs that just learned what a steering wheel is. And the environments, while cool, get repetitive. After a while, you’ve seen all there is to see in both cities.

While there are other, more intense and innovative racers out there (Apex/Forza/PGR to name a few), Midtown Madness 3 is a fun and friendlier approach to street racing. You can crash into virtually anything and cause oodles of destruction with no penalty due to the cars being invulnerable. The fast-paced weaving through the streets of two different cities holds a wealth of interesting gameplay, and its fairly accurate to the city the level is based on.

Sadly the game wasn’t made compatible with the Xbox One or Series consoles. The only reason I can think of is due to the vehicle brands which is a shame, this would play and look very well though their emulator. Again this was one of the few titles that was only released for the original Xbox.

Ridge Racer 6

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Ridge Racer 6 is a fast-paced and adrenaline-fueled racer that’s easy to pick up and play, but difficult to master. The game features a wide variety of cars and tracks to choose from, each with its own unique handling and feel. The controls are responsive and tight, and the drifting mechanics are especially satisfying. However, some may find the game’s AI to be a bit too aggressive and unfair at times, especially at the last section of the world tour.

Like other Ridge Racer games, it features a mini arcade game based on a Namco property, in this case it’s the original Pac-Man. The interface is very similar to Ridge Racers on the PSP, with a very similar menu structure and HUD design, this would also carry over to the iOS version.

The game makes use of its own brands of cars that feature unique handling and statistics, with some cars performing better at drifts. Some examples of fictional cars that are known to be included in Ridge Racer 6 include the Kamata Fiera, the Danver Bayonet, the Assoluto Bisonte, the Terrazi Wild Gang, and the Himmel 490B. Each of these vehicles has its own unique strengths and weaknesses.

  • Harborline 765 – a city course that winds through a harbor area.
  • Southbay Docks – another city course that features tight turns and narrow streets.
  • Highland Cliffs – a mountain course with plenty of twists and turns.
  • Sunset Heights – a coastal course with plenty of jumps and high-speed sections.
  • Midtown Expressway – an urban course with long straights and wide corners.
  • Seaside Route 765 – a coastal course that takes place along a scenic seaside highway.
  • Lakeside Parkway – a course that features a long straightaway and tight turns around a lake.

The World Tour mode is a game mode in Ridge Racer 6 that allows players to compete in a series of races across a variety of different locations and tracks. In this mode, players progress through a series of Grand Prix events, with each event consisting of multiple races that take place on different courses. I believe this is also the first Ridge Race title to feature online lay over the internet, using Xbox Live, which remains active to this day.

As players progress through the World Tour mode, they earn points and unlock new cars, upgrades, and tracks. The difficulty of the races increases as players advance through the Grand Prix events, providing a challenging and engaging gameplay experience. In addition to the standard races, World Tour mode also includes a variety of special challenges and events, such as time trials, drift challenges, and lap battles. These challenges offer a unique twist on the standard racing gameplay, and provide an additional layer of depth and variety to the World Tour mode.

The Nitro game mechanic in Ridge Racer 6 is a system that allows players to temporarily boost their car’s speed and acceleration, giving them a strategic advantage during races. The Nitro system works by filling up a meter that is located on the game’s heads-up display (HUD) when players perform certain actions, such as drifting or drafting behind other cars. Once the Nitro meter is full, players can activate the Nitro boost by pressing a button, which causes their car to accelerate at a significantly faster rate than normal. This can be particularly useful during key moments in a race, such as when players are trying to overtake opponents or catch up to the pack.

In addition to the standard Nitro boost, Ridge Racer 6 also features a “Full Nitro” mechanic that can be activated when players have filled their Nitro meter to its maximum capacity. Full Nitro provides an even greater speed boost than standard Nitro, and can be particularly useful for closing large gaps between players or pulling away from the pack.

The game was only ever released for the Xbox 360, but was ported to the Xbox One as an Xbox 360 backward-compatible title. This isn’t Xbox One X enhanced which means it does not benefit from the higher resolution the Xbox One X provides.

Many of the tracks and cars appear in Ridge Racer 7, a PS3-exclusive game. Some of the music tracks that feature in R6 could also be downloaded for the PS3 as DLC.

Speaking of DLC there are numerous unlock codes to enable machines to be unlocked, and you can also purchase additional songs that were featured on the PSP version of the game.

The song downloads are rather large for their size, which makes me think these are using a lossless format, or they feature additional files. I always assumed Xbox 360 games used the WMA format for audio, or at least the Xbox version of it which should result in a smaller file size. It could also be for surround sound or additional channels, as the songs have additional effects when you fire off Nitorus.

A quick warning, the DLC become attached to your save file and you cannot load your save without them, this becomes more problematic as the Xbox 360 store becomes more ‘broken’. In order to redownload the DLC I had to navigate through the download list in the Settings/Account section of the Xbox dashboard. They no longer appear in the game information tile of the dashboard.

A better way is to purchase them from the Xbox One store (console or Web) which will then push them to the top of the download list on the Xbox 360, which makes it easier to download. Remember to save the files to the same storage location as your gamesave, the hard drive or memory unit is best.

Also a nice touch, you can change the race announcer from the standard voice to the robotic system voice, or Heiachi from the Tekken series. And there’s an option to lay the Mac-Man game from earlier.

Overall, Ridge Racer 6 is a fantastic racing game that’s sure to please fans of the genre. The game’s stunning visuals, tight controls, and satisfying drifting mechanics make for a truly exhilarating experience. While some may find the game’s AI to be a bit too aggressive, it’s a small price to pay for an otherwise fantastic racing experience. As it stands, it was a great launch for the Xbox 360, and a taste of what HD gaming would bring for racing games.

Unreal Championship

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A remake/port of Unreal Tournament 2003 for the original Xbox, and one of the first games to use Xbox Live.

A remake of Unreal Tournament 2003 for the original Xbox, and one of the first games to use Xbox Live. It can be considered a console adaption of Unreal Tournament, which it shares a lot of maps with.

Sadly this is one of the games that is trapped on the original Xbox, it was not made backward compatible with the Xbox 360 or the Xbox One, despite its sequel being supported. Perhaps this is deliberate since Unreal Tournament 2003 isn’t available on Steam, but the original and 2004 are, are Epic ashamed of these games?

Game Modes

Deathmatch: Standard deathwatch action, either team-based gameplay (two teams fighting each other, Red Vs Blue) or a free for all
Capture the Flag: Very similar to the PC original, you have to capture the opposing team’s flag three times (more or less, depending on the game settings) and return it back to base. If both teams have the opposing team’s flag, then no teams can score until the opposing team’s flag has been returned, which can be done by killing the flag carrier and picking up the flag.
Double Domination: Similar to capturing the flag, here you and your team have to capture two points for 10 seconds in order to score a point for your team. Kind of like a king-of-the-hill mode. Once either team reaches a predetermined score, the game is over. This is one of the games does that is better played online rather than offline since the bots suck at defending the captured base.
Bombing Run: Basically a reverse capture the flag, but kind of like football. Here you have to take control of the ball (Spawns in the middle of the map) and then fire it into the opponent’s goal. When you take control of the ball, expect to be target #1 by the opponent team. A nice side effect is the ball will replenish your health, slowly.
Survival: 1 vs 1, whoever gets the most kills wins, really deathmatch but with only two players.

Characters

There is a distinct story between the different characters, but this is only referenced in the characters biography’s, there is very few cut scenes in the game involving characters, aside from the opening with Brock and Lauren. Characters here have their own statistics, although many share the same voice lines, i.e human males use the same voice as each other, but the Aliens have their own, each with male/female versions. It’s not like fighting games like Tekken where each character has their own fighting style, more so they have unique statistics for their team.

  • Gen Mo’Kai: Alien looking species who take part in the tournaments, seem to be very agile but have weak strength
  • Automatons: A bunch of robots built by the Liandri corporation
  • Mercenaries: Regular humans, fairly typical stats for each character, ideal for newcomers to the game
  • Juggernauts: Big muvvafuckers, the strongest race that can take the most damage but are slow and the least agile characters in the game
  • Anubans: Look like humans but dress like they’re from Egypt, bit more agile than humans but are very high jumpers and acquire adrenaline more quickly
  • Nightmare: A bunch of weird and scary looking but have generally good stats. Supposedly their appearance is a result of the different experiments that have been done to them

Many characters would appear in Unreal Tournament 2003 and 2004.

Multiplayer – Online Play

As one of the first Xbox Live titles, Unreal Championship was a popular title that was played online and the game made full use of the Xbox Live features. Until Microsoft shut down the original Xbox Live in mid 2010.
On the flip side you can sill play the game online using the system link features, which was Microsoft terms for LAN play where multiple Xbox’s are connected to the same network. This can be done either by connecting a crossover ethernet cable from one Xbox to another or by connecting both Xbox’s to a router using a standard ethernet cable
xLink Kai can be used to play online by using the system link features to play games over the internet, this requires the xbox to be connected to a PC which will emulate an Xbox LAN network

Left: Score display screen, Right: Hidden third person view, avaliable by using a custom save file

DLC

Additional maps were released on Xbox Live that could be purchased and downloaded from around May 2003. These maps could then be played online or in instant action mode. These maps include:

  • AquaMortis: This area features a open ocean area that contains a shark, who will kill once a player falls in
  • Inferno: Hell themed map
  • Leviathan B: SciFi arena themed map
  • Otaros Run: Capture the Flag map, A large-ish map set in the forest, similar to Tokara forest in UT2003
Installed DLC, which uses a different format

These maps are installed in the TDATA directory and can be used for all profiles on the Xbox. I’m not sure if custom maps can be installed and played this way since they are in a different format, would be good if custom maps could be played like the PC version. As far as I know, you cannot use UT2003 maps on Unreal Championship.

More information on Xbox DLC

Weapons

Left: View from the translocator camera, and your typical Xbox Live Gamertag, Right: The lightning gun

  • Shield Gun: The weapon you will only use when you are out of ammo and have no pickups in sight, alt-fire fires a shield that can protect you from limited damage but can only take so much damage.
  • Assault Rifle: One of the weapons you start with, does basic damage and is really the gun you only use until you can pick up another. Alt-fire shoots out a grenade that explodes shortly after being shit.
  • Mini-gun: A chain gun or sorts, ideal for spraying bullets at multiple enemies. Has a slight charge time of around a second.
  • Flak Cannon: The GOAT, fires a bunch of small projectiles which disperse quickly. Best used in close combat as it almost functions as a shotgun
  • Lighting Gun: A sniper rifle of sorts, shoots out a lightning bolt. Alt fire can be used to zoom into an opponent.
  • Rocket Launcher: Fires a rocket, alt-fire will lock onto a target
  • Translocator: Not really a weapon but more of a utility, allows you to fire a beacon which you can use to teleport to where the beacon had landed, useful for teleporting to hard to reach areas but you cannot translocate when carrying a flog. Attempting to do so will cause the flag to be dropped, but it can still be picked up by a teammate or returned back to base.

Adrenaline

Throughout playing the game and killing opponents or by picking up adrenaline pills, you will acquire adrenaline which can be used to apply power ups by quickly entering a button combination whilst playing:

Regeneration – Press down four times quickly – Regenerates health to twice the staring health, and gives up to 150 shield points
Berserk: Press up three times quickly – Increases damage inflicted to opponents, and reduced the damage taken by the player
Invisibility: Press Right twice, then Left twice – Makes your character invisible to other players, not much use on instant action / campaign as bots have been reported to still attack the player
Agility: Press Down twice, then Up – Increases your characters running and jumping ability

Early Alpha

A build of Unreal Championship was leaked in 2011 which was an early alpha version but was compiled and running on PC (Windows). There are quite a few changes compared to the actual release, with many maps being completely different.

The menu interface is different, with it using a planet-like interface for the character selection screen, here you can see the actual3D models, complete with animations compared to the 2D portraits in the final release.

Poor Scarab

Some geometry errors when playing on more modern systems, this game would have been developed and tested on DirectX 8 compatible hardware, and would have used Nvidia based hardware like the original Xbox used.

In the menu, Up/Down is used to select the map, whilst left/right is used to select the game mode.

There is no settings section to customize the game, but the ini file can be edited to change the game rules, such as the amount of kills needed to win (1000 by default)

Some sound effects come from the original Unreal Tournament, notably the respawn sound.

To exit the game, bring up the console by pressing tab and then type ‘exit’
There is no pause menu, but pressing F1 will bring up the score/players.

The game can be played using a keyboard, but the controls are centered around a console control. Weapons can be selected using the number keys (1-9), the mouse wheel can’t be used to select a weapon
F9 – Take a bitmap screenshot
F10 – Adjust Gamma
F11 – Adjust Brightness
F12 – Adjust Contrast
The Numpad number keys will spawn a weapon, and the regular number keys can be used to directly select a weapon.

A vehicle can be spawned by pressing H, which can be used to travel through the map quickly, very similar to the hoverboard in Unreal Tournament 3.

A third-person view mode can be activated by pressing F4, however it’s very buggy, and the weapon aiming is buggy.

Don’t you just hate when this happens?