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It's 2:24 a.m.
"It's the sound effect –" I freeze. Did I just hear the boom! sound? My friend and I grip our controllers tighter, staring intently at an open door just a few feet in front of us.
We wait a few seconds, then continue through the door, checking our periphery. I continue: "It's the sound effect that's scary, not the Juggernaut himself," I inform my friend. He nods.
Boom!
We both jump out of our seats, but quickly regain our composure and pull up our iron sights and wait for the inevitable, unstoppable menace, his only intention our demise. Not one, but two Juggernauts come barrelling towards us. I drop a claymore and my friend unloads a clip. "Reloading!" he yells. I begin firing, and we both backpedal to put some distance between us and the first Juggernaut.
Blam!
The first Juggernaut trips my claymore and stumbles; the second Juggernaut runs past him, guns blazing.
"Didn't I pick up the sniper rifle?" I yell to my friend above the gunfire, frantically trying to switch to a gun I obviously didn't pick up. He shrugs.
We both turn around and run to put some distance between us and the seemingly-unstoppable beasts. I drop two more claymores, and we both reload. My friend points to the corner of the television screen, and I see it — the sniper rifle. Without hesitation I bolt over and snatch the sniper rifle, just in time to see both claymores triggered by one of the Juggernauts. He goes down, this time for good.
We fist bump, then quickly turn our attention to the final Juggernaut.
My friend shoots without remorse or hesitation at the Juggernaut, spraying bullets everywhere, and I slowly, steadily ready my sniper rifle. The Juggernaut's head moves into view and I squeeze the trigger. He falls face first into the ground; he's not getting up. Amidst the excitement, my friend also goes down, but it doesn't matter — we beat him. I don't even bother reviving my friend because we finally did it!
We hoot and holler and take a big gulp of Mountain Dew. It's 2:37 a.m.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
We both jerk our heads back towards the television. We weren't done with the level yet!
I hurry over to try and revive my fallen comrade, but it's too late. The three Juggernauts are already upon me, and it's game over.
We bow our heads for a moment, each of us wondering why we hadn't realized we were three away from the total number of defeated Juggernauts we needed to complete the level. We then turn towards each other. "Again?" I ask. He nods.
But we take a break first and contemplate Modern Warfare 2.
"What makes this game so good?" my friend inquires. We discuss many possibilities, like the way the gunplay feels (pretty realistic), to how incredible competitive-multiplayer becomes (complete addiction), but we both come to the same conclusion: It's more about the role you take on. When we played these Special Ops missions, we felt like we really were the soldiers, up against incredible odds; at least, when fighting the Juggernauts. But after losing time and time again, we realized we had to change-up our strategy if we had any hopes of defeating the giant brutes.
It reminded us both of role-playing games, when a particularly difficult boss is reached and loss is inevitable. But then something clicks and a different strategy emerges from deep inside a recess of the mind, and victory is achieved. There's nothing quite like it.
Modern Warfare 2 does a superb job of imitating role-playing games, and even walks away as a prime example of how to envelop a player in the role they are playing.
We both agree: Modern Warfare 2 is one of our favorite role-playing games, which is also why it's so good.
It's 2:54 a.m.
Our bladders are empty and our strategy is in place; this time I'll pick up the sniper rifle first, he'll plant some claymores and lure the Juggernauts towards me, and I'll pick them off from a distance. It's a sure-fire plan. This time we won't lose.
Boom!…it begins again.