Examining Call Of Duty's Scariest Level



Aftermath is one of the greatest missions to ever appear in the Call of Duty series, and is also, for me at least, by far its scariest.

Having read the title of this video, I bet I know what you might have thought – that this was going to be something to do with Call of Duty’s zombie mode. Well, I’m sorry to disappoint some of you!

As much as I’d love to spend an age ranting on and on about how Call of Duty: World at War’s zombie mode still reigns supreme some 14 years post release, what I actually want to talk about is the level Aftermath from Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and why it’s such an amazing level.

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#callofduty #callofdutymodernwarfare #modernwarfare

Content:
00:00 – Intro
00:31 – What’s The Story?
02:25 – Why Aftermath Is Genius
06:29 – Hearing Voices
07:23 – Remastered Mayhem

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30 thoughts on “Examining Call Of Duty's Scariest Level”

  1. During this missions and I guess technically the one before where you rescue the pilot, my heart was in my mouth! Always is when I replay it.

    It is tense and terrifying. Plus I mean, plot armour so it is very rare they kill off a playable character.

    Side note. WaW Zombies is amazing. Shame anything after became completely over the top and convoluted.

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  2. What I really liked about that mission was the risk reward system being completely negated by the nuclear blast, just the fact that you had to help the downed pilot and take them to safety just to have everyone meet their ends is pretty sobering, and idk I think this and many other aspects of MW that kinda made this trend in the other games of making the stakes higher and scenarios more intense. The fear factor for me about this is the reality of everything and how things might go down if that ever happens Otherwise great video and love the older stuff getting attention too!!

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  3. I don't know if you've seen Raycevick's video on Call of Duty 4, Ben, but that video in its totality was what really convinced me of the importance of the game as a pioneer in FPS.

    I'd always considered CoD4 as the "less fun" version of MW2, and for good reason – the sequel improves on basically every aspect of the original in terms of gameplay and player freedom, and has directly led to what a lot of our expectations are for a modern CoD.
    However, upon watching the video I mentioned above, along with your analysis, I think it became clear that part of CoD4 being "less fun" was by design – and where MW2 removed the brakes and barreled down the track into the bombastic action movie style at full speed, CoD4 showed a tremendous amount of restraint and awareness in its campaign. The most memorable and awe-inspiring sequences in CoD4's campaign are almost always contrasted in some way with a much more muted depiction. This nuke scene, for instance, has the ridiculous destruction of a nuke going off in a city juxtaposed with your quiet and haunting final moments as someone who was there to witness it. The fan-favorite "Death From Above" has the result of invincible firepower being shown to you as disconnected white blotches on a black and white screen.
    This restraint was something that was definitely left behind in the sequels that followed, and in my opinion, a bit of a shame. Call of Duty has always been debated on whether or not it is "pro" or "anti" war, and I think that at least with CoD4 (to paraphrase Raycevick), it quite masterfully navigates both. Neither option is shoved in your face because CoD4 tries its best to actually depict what the reality is for the people who have the task of saving the world in this manner, and sometimes, what happens is just "another day on the job," so to speak.

    Great video Ben, and if you haven't seen his video, I'd highly recommend you watch Raycevick's retrospective. It's 1 hour but well worth it.

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  4. When I played it I didn't understand it… Why wasn't it a cutscene? Comes to mind now… I don't get how it can be scary if the Player could have done nothing to prevent it… Which the Last stand in Halo Reach was more impact full on me because I can last longer then the devs would like. Like to me in order for a video game to be scary you MUST have agency like DCS:World can be a horror game at times due to you think everything is ok then wack a black screen and your dead killed by surprise missile to the face which you could have prevented by being better. So yeah what I dislike about COD is cheap stuff like this and the lack of player agency…

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  5. This might sound weird but I never found the Aftermath mission scary in the OG 2007 game, but as soon as I played the Remastered and seeing the soliders in pain and seeing the more destruction and death made me feel fear and a harrowing experience

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  6. The hours me and my brother wasted trying to find the "secret" survive ending to this mission. I don't think it was cheap at all Ben. Call of duty revels in kick ass action and over the top military violence. Moments like this sober you back up to the horrors of real war. I also really like the scene in MW where Price executes the terrorist prisoner without hesitation. A call to the real life saying regarding the SAS which is "if you've escalated the threat you pose to the point where the SAS have had to get involved, you won't be getting out of the situation alive, Those gas masks will be the last thing you see"

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  7. I sort of prefer the original over the newer one. While the newer one looks far better graphically it also removes all the haze and dust from the original so you can see the destruction and other soldiers better, which feels far less immersive in my opinion. A nuclear blast such as that and the resulting shockwave would make everything look hazy and unrecognizable, rather than being as clear as the newer version makes it look

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  8. I gotta say the ending of this mission in the og modern warfare is better in my opinion. The fact that you're the last "survivor" really adds to the atmosphere. The actual nuke going off part is better in the remaster tho

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  9. Infinity Ward said during interviews that in All Ghillied Up Captain MacMillan was there not just to look cool and lead you, but to remind you of what you looked like as well. The addition of fellow soldiers in Aftermath was Raven Software doing what IW did with the nuke

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  10. To be honest, I think the original game's Aftermath is a lot scarier than the remake. No saying the remake is bad, but there's something about how the devs designed the level and color scheme that gives the OG level more of an impact for me personally. I was never a huge CoD fan, but I have to give credit where credit is due.

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  11. OG Aftermath in COD 4 felt so much better than the remaster imo. I love all the details the remaster adds though don't get me wrong it's really cool but the OG version felt more horror, the orange dark tint made it darker because that's the situation you're in, you're alone walking towards a mushroom cloud slowly waiting for death as that's all that's left to do, no dialogue, no music, literally nothing but the moment you're in making it feel even more realistic in a way.

    It's a shame though since they were warned about the nuke and could've 100% left with everyone else and clearly survived, but it's also sad since it goes to show how caring your team really was, they went in to save a friend despite knowing they'll die in the end.

    Alot of people forget but when COD does horror, mostly the older games they really really knock it out of the park.

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  12. While I liked their commitment to drama with aftermath and Davis' family vacation, I think the actual scariest level is Hypocenter from Black Ops 3. Derelict technology company headquarters, research division, labs, killer robots coming from all directions, even out of water in a near-pitch black area. That mission gave me goosebumps.

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  13. Pay attention to what Nikolai says after you rescue him earlier in the campaign and he'll say that the US is making a major mistake sending in the marines. Great foreshadowing for what eventually happens.

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