KMGR of Call of Duty: World at War (mobile)

Image via WikipediaCall of Duty 5, aka CoD: World at War, went back to WW2 for some of the most hectic and brutal combat available... Soviet defense of Stalingrad, American island-hopping in the Pacific against entrenched Japanese defenders, and a few SAS attacks on German positions in the war. However, the mobile game itself left out the Russian front, leaving you with a plain-Jane version of 2D shooter on a cellphone that spans a mere 9-10 missions, all of which are quite short. The sprites are tiny, and animation primitive. All in all, it's just a below average shooter.

CoD5, using the same formulas as before, does not set you as a particular soldier. Instead, you play different soldiers on different fronts. In Europe, you're with the British SAS as they chase down the Germans in town, while in the Pacific you're with the US Marines as you try to evict the Japanese defenders with flamethrower and other weapons.

As stated before, sprites are small, and there isn't much animation other than occasional trees waving in the wind. Enemy soldiers don't move much, though they are known to duck behind cover every once in a while, and some may even have grenades. Your allies will attack as well, but they pretty much just follow a script: run up to cover and shoot from cover, that's it. They can't dodge grenades or follow orders. Thus, they are merely cannon fodder, so use them wisely.

You can move up to cover and you'll hide behind it, and you can shoot from behind cover a bit. You can also throw a grenade (you only got 3) for those nasties who need a bit more persuasion to leave. There are occasional tunnels and rooms you need to clear, which takes you to new parts of the map. Again, sprites are tiny, and nothing you do is new. There's a section where you need to plant signal flares to help direct artillery, but that's just go up to "blue spot" and hit OK to "mark". Setting a satchel charge? Same thing. Go up to blue spot and "mark".

You get either your Tommy gun, or the occasional flame thrower (kinda fun lighting the defenders on fire... for a few seconds). To keep it rated G there's no blood, and bodies disappear after a few seconds.

The two areas, Europe and Pacific, do look and feel different, but the same ideas in map design make them feel more common than they should. There's only one way through the map, and that's pretty much the whole game: kill bad guys as you run up to cover, shoot enemies (if you use the single-shot better).

The graphics are average or below average. As least the game is quite responsive. Sound is rather bad as well.

All in all, COD:WAW is an also-ran on the mobile, and should be skipped if you like the genre.

Overall rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: responsive, simple to get into
Cons: not much there any way, below average overall