I know, CoD4 was modern warfare but I just wanted to make that picture.
I’ve been putting off playing Call of Duty 4 (I know, I know) so I can catch up on the rest of the last year’s excellent crop of games (Bioshock, Crysis, Persona 3, Mass Effect), but literally everything I’ve heard about it has been positive, which is pretty rare. I’m sure it’s in no small part due to its amazing scripted sequences and cinematic in-game experience, which were already excellent in the first Call of Duty (the beach landing was brutal). Well, the lead AI programmer from Bungie thinks so as well.

As an AI programmer, he obviously is biased toward the emergent combat system of setting up a “room” and filling it with occupants (something Halo did pretty much all the way through, love it or hate it), but he admires how good a game can be when a good writer and scripting team get together and make it work for the player. A hybrid (a la Half Life 2 at its best) is probably the best approach, but it’s also the most difficult. It’s nice to hear, however, that the people on the bleeding edge of game development aren’t afraid to say they have a lot to learn from each other.