Call of Duty has a massive community on PC and console, and Infinity Ward’s newest game Modern Warfare introduces many new players to the franchise. But now, even a player who doesn’t own a pc or console should be able to play COD, thanks to Call of Duty Mobile.
There are already many decent mobile first-person shooters on the market like the Modern Combat series. So, let’s take a look at COD Mobile to see if it is just another mobile shooter, or a game worth playing.
Note: Call of Duty Mobile was developed by TiMi Studios and not by Infinity Ward, which produced most COD games.
Watch the trailer:
How is the gameplay of COD Mobile? Is it as good as in Modern Warfare?
Well, it can’t catch up with Modern Warfare in terms of precise controls, as you play it on your smartphone, without a controller or keyboard. Like in other mobile shooters, you have many buttons and one joystick, from which everyone has its own function.
Getting used to these controls takes some time, but after a few games, it works pretty well. When we start the game for the first time, Ghost will introduce us to the essential mechanics of the game. After completing the tutorial, we can play the online multiplayer, which is the second game mode, besides battle royale.
Note: If you own a Bluetooth controller, you can use him to play Call of Duty Mobile too. The game officially supports controllers, and the keybindings can be changed in the settings.
Yes, Call of Duty Mobile also has battle royale. So if you’re a fan of this mode, you can play it as much as you want.
However, the game tricks us for our fist matches, as we only play against bots until we reach level 7. Luckily, it doesn’t take much time to reach this threshold. After that, the game will match us against other players with similar skills.
However, the system fails sometimes, as I got matched against some high-level players (literally 10x my rank), so my team lost pretty dramatically. Aiming is probably the most challenging part of this game, especially if you are used to playing with a keyboard and mouse.
If you tap on the left side of the touchscreen, you can control your movement, and on the right side, the aiming. When we get into a close-up firefight, aiming gets pretty challenging. If your enemy is farther away, it gets easier. But as our opponents are not that dump, matches end pretty close most of the time.
COD Mobile is very skill-based, so whoever has the better aiming, movement, and positioning will win a 1v1 most of the time. So if we focus a bit on these components, the game is entertaining, even as a beginner. In addition to this, we can not only play team deathmatch, but also other modes like search and destroy hardpoint, domination, or frontline. Besides these modes, there are also special game modes like 2vw showdown, one shot one kill, gun game, and prop hunt.
All of these modes make a lot of fun to play, but I prefer the classic modes, such as team deathmatch and domination. By playing the game and making points through eliminating other players, we can unlock new attachments for our weapons, and increase our player-/ battle pass level.
Adding attachments to our weapons allows us to increase one of its stats, so they fit our playstyle a bit better. Silencers and bigger magazines are strong attachments, as aiming is not that easy, and most players don’t focus on the mini-map.
Note: If you don’t use a silencer attachment, every time you fire a weapon, you will get showcased on the Mini-map for all enemy players.
If you want to challenge yourself, you can play ranked matches to climb the leaderboard, up to legendary rank. By winning games, you will gain ranking points, but if you lose, your rank declines. By the way, there is also an option to play ranked battle royale.
Speaking of battle royale, I also tried myself in this mode to see if it is worth playing. Before you start, you can choose in which perspective you want to play (first person or 3rd person). To make battle royale not too complicated, the developers simplified the mechanics a lot. So, for example, every time you open a loot chest, your character automatically picks up better equipment or switches to better stuff that you currently use.
This mechanic makes everything much more comfortable and is an excellent addition. To move around the map a lot faster, we can use different vehicles like buggies or quads. However, the controls are very unprecise. But besides this, battle royale can be a lot of fun to play, especially when you play it with your friends.
Call of Duty Mobile is not a perfect game at all, but it offers big potential for entertainment. There is also a lot to do in the game, in terms of unlockable items in the battle pass, and attachments. Thanks to the broad customization (similar to Call of Duty Warzone), the game can also be played with a bit more strategic, by building specific loadouts.
Visuals – Does it look like Call of Duty?
Smartphones have clear disadvantages against PCs or consoles in terms of power, speed, capacity, and more. But that doesn’t mean that Call of Duty Mobile looks like trash. Depending on your graphic settings, the game can look excellent, but this will drain your battery much faster.
At the moment, I play it on medium settings to keep my battery alive for a bit longer. Besides the graphics, we can also adjust our frame rate, and other graphic parameters like depth of field, ragdoll, bloom, and real-time shadows. If we scroll down in the settings, we can also change the visual style for the battle royale mode.
Overall, COD Mobile looks like a real Call of Duty, but with fewer details.
What keeps people playing Call of Duty Mobile?
A game that doesn’t offer any kind of content to keep its players busy quickly loses a lot of its player base (Realm Royale is a good example for this case). Luckily, COD Mobile has its own progression system, which we can also find in other games from Infinity Ward.
The first fact that keeps people playing is that new players don’t have all weapons, attachments, loadout slots, perks, and gadgets unlocked. I’m the kind of gamer that wants to unlock everything in a game, ranging from weapons, up to gadgets, or even achievements. Another fact is the battle pass, that gives us unique skins for our collection, or entirely new weapons and gadgets.
These passes have become insanely popular in online games, as they keep the player base active. However, to unlock all the items from the battle pass, we have to buy the premium version (more about that later).
The third reason is that someone wants to become better in the game, to climb the ranking leaderboard. There is a visible learning curve in this game, as we can see when we compare an experienced, to an inexperienced player.
How is Call of Duty Mobile monetized?
Like COD Warzone, COD Mobile also has options to spend money on, which you should know (remember that this game got developed by TiMi Studios and not by Infinity Ward!). As I already mentioned, we have to buy the premium battle pass, to unlock all the featured items. But to buy this pass, we have to spend COD coins, which can be purchased in the shop.
In the shop, we can choose from six different package sizes, reaching from 80 coins, up to 8000 coins. The prize per package also varies, ranging from $0.99 for 80 COD coins, up to $99.99 for 8000 coins. With these coins, you can also buy many different cosmetic items, like parachutes, knives, and weapon camos.
Besides coins, you can also watch video advertisements, to get some extra credits, to buy in-game stuff.
Note: All the items that can be purchased in the shop don’t affect the gameplay, so no one has a clear advantage in a 1v1 match. So this game can be played without spending a dime on it.
Why is there no Zombie mode in Call of Duty Mobile?
When the game first launched globally, there was a zombie mode in the game, but it got removed on the 25th of March. The developers made a community update on Reddit, where they said that this mode didn’t reach the level of quality that they desired.
However, they also mentioned that there is a chance to bring Zombies back into the game when the quality is good enough. For now, they want to focus on development for the multiplayer, battle royale and ranked mode.
Last Words:
When I first played a mobile shooter (almost 10 years ago), I was not the best player. Still, I’m not the best one out there, but I got much better over time. Call of Duty Mobile was the first shooter that I played for years on my phone, and I didn’t expect that I like it that much.
The game does many things pretty well, and players have a lot of fun playing the game. Also, it is very F2P friendly, as we don’t have to spend a dime on it, go become a skilled player.
In addition to that, I’m not very familiar with the Call of Duty franchise, as almost nobody of my friends owns these games (Battlefield players). Warzone introduced me into the franchise a bit more, and shortly after playing Warzone for a while, I wanted to try the mobile version too.
But to get back to the text, I highly recommend trying this game out by yourself, too see if you like it. If you played Call of Duty Mobile previously, please share your own opinion about the game in the comments down below.
| ?? Pros of Call Of Duty Mobile: | ?? Cons of Call Of Duty Mobile: |
| Fun to play | Ping problems |
| F2P friendly | No Zombie mode |
| Weapon customization | Some glitches and bugs are still in the game |
| Progression system | |
| Different game modes | |
| Limited time game modes |
