Welcome to my newest guide. Call of Duty 4, or CoD4 is a first-person shooter. This guide is based on the PC version of CoD4.
When you install CoD4 the first thing you want to do is to change the basic controls to your preferred settings. Here are the settings I changed:
Prone -> X
Sprint -> Shift
Steady Sniper Rifle -> Ctrl
You should change them to whatever is comfortable for YOU! Also, if you have a gaming mouse I recommend changing the Melee Attack/Knife button to Mouse Button 4 and the Throw Special Grenade button to Mouse Button 5, this just makes it easier to play, you will see the advantages in multiplayer, especially since you don't have to read for 4 to throw a flashbang and therefore taking your hand away from the move controls and you are always ready to knife an enemy without moving your hand.
Once you have done that play the single-player campaign. The first mission is a tutorial, simply follow the instructions and you'll be fine. If any controls are uncomfortable change them in the options menu. At the end of the mission you will be asked to select a difficulty, I recommend Easy for new players to FPS's or Regular for new players to CoD4 but experienced FPS players. The second mission is fairly easy, if you start to have trouble move slow, use cover and hang behind a bit to let the NPC characters take out the first few enemies.
Once you start to get the hang of the game you have two choices: continue the single-player campaign or play multiplayer. If you think the single player is too hard you should lower the difficulty and keep practicing, if you think it's too easy you should should increase the difficulty or start playing multiplayer. If you like the story so far it gets better so keep playing single-player! I won't go into detail about the single-player but if you need help there are many videos on YouTube or you can use a search engine to find some.
So you've decided to start playing multiplayer? First thing you should do is update the game. Just click on the Auto-Update button on the main screen. Follow the instructions given to you to install the updates. If you use Microsoft Vista you may have to click "Run As Administrator" to get the updates to work. Once you are fully updated click on the Join Server button and click the Refresh button in the top right. Wait for about 30 seconds and your list of servers should be loaded. Click on the Ping button once to sort it in descending order, click it again to sort it in ascending, once you have it in whichever order you fancy start looking for a server. When looking for a server your looking for:
- Low Ping (About 100 or lower, the lower the better)
- Good Amount of Players (8-20 is good for new players)
- Game Type (Team Deathmatch (TDM) and Free-for-All (FFA) are easy to understand)
- Hardcore or Softcore (I highly recommend new players play softcore. You will survive longer and will get some kills)
Once you have found your server double click it to join. Click Auto-Assign when ask to join a side. This way the teams will remain balanced. Pick a class you like, mouse over the classes to see the weapons. When you are in the game do not shoot people with green names over their heads - they are your allies. In your bottom right is your ammo bar, it is the same as single-player. The radar is in your top left, whenever an enemy fires a shot without a silencer they show up as a dot on the radar. The same applies to you. In the bottom left is the scoreboard and combat log. These show who has killed who and which team is winning, you don't need to look here too often. Along the bottom of the screen is your inventory. Pressing TAB (default button) brings up the scoreboard.
There are many things that are annoying and even banned in some servers, here is a list of them: (in order of inappropriateness)
- M203 Grenade Launcher, or more commonly referred to "Noob Tube", is the most commonly banned thing
- Martyrdom is a perk that drops a grenade when you die. It is very annoying and cheap and also highly unacceptable
- Last Stand is a perk that gives you one last chance when you die, it is also very cheap but allowed more that martyrdom
The key to CoD4 is thinking. The main things are to take the lesser used path and do the unexpected. Here a few examples of what to do in different situations:
