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Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was a monumental step forward for the FPS genre back when it released in 2007.

Many would probably argue this point, but it undoubtedly impacted the industry so much that its overall gameplay style and multiplayer setup was emulated by competitors for years to come.

But I'm not here to dissect the game so much as I just want to take a brief walk down memory lane to forget about some of the other shit going on in the world right now. Ignorance is bliss, they say.

I was still in my formative years when Call of Duty 4 came out. The PS3 was still brand new, and the next gen was full of promise of HD and online multiplayer. It was during the summer when my parents were out shopping for a bit when my dad called me to ask if I was interested in this game. I told him I was. I heard some Gamestop employee talking to him in the background and I was surprised.

At the time, I had mostly played platformers and beat-em-ups on the PS2. I always found FPS games to be a bit cumbersome to play on a controller, and didn't have access to a strong-enough PC to run anything more than Combat Arms (maybe we'll go over that whole era some other time).

So when they came home with that brand new package, I was extremely excited. Though I still had some summer homework to finish before I could dive into the game.

It's been nearly 20 years since then.

Looking back on the changes in the gaming landscape since the heyday of those PS3 and Xbox 360 days, it's almost blinding how different things have become. I'm not going to be one of those things were so much better back in my day kinda guys, but I mean...

Are we looking at the same series?

I didn't realize the UT3 modding scene made its way to Call of Duty. I mean, okay, I'm not going to pretend like COD is some sort of sacred thing that's only meant to be serious, but

No seriously, WTF?

Okay, I'm fine.

Let's take a step back.

Call of Duty 4 came out at the height of the War on Terror, a conflict that many of my generation grew up on. It was very gung-ho, very hoo-rah, very boisterous and in-your-face wherever you went. Movies and games were made to capitalize on that conflict. So many games.

But the reason why COD4 felt like such a refreshing experience at the time was because it came when World War II shooters (previously the king of the FPS genre) had died out. People wanted something new, something contemporary. And Infinity Ward came out swinging.

The campaign was relatively short, but it felt like an action-packed Michael Bay film. Although many people at the time criticized it for being too on-the-rails with practically no player agency. Combat encounters would happen in the same way, and would only stop once you reached an invisible checkpoint. But while the campaign was a pretty good experience overall, the main reason it became such a juggernaut was the multiplayer suite.

COD4 introduced a brand-new custom class system that spit in the face of previous FPS conventions. Prior to this, most FPS games either had pre-set classes (like Battlefield) or map-based weapon pickups (like Halo, Quake, or Unreal). COD4 allowed players to unlock weapons and equipment by leveling up in a consistent manner, and then choose which of those items they would bring into a match. I don't know why the concept was so new at the time (although Battlefield 2 did do something similar a few years prior, with unlockable weapons per premade class).

That constant progression system was, I think, one of the key factors that made the game so addictive. For every shot you land, you get a satisfying hit marker, and for every kill, you get a nice little pop-up on the screen showering you with points. It was dopamine on a disc. And players couldn't get enough of it. The class customization, while anemic compared to modern games, allowed for further replayability. You can choose an M4 rifle and add different scopes, or silencers, or grips to it and top it off with a colorful camo.

There is something about the simplicity of this initial system that feels nice.

In contemporary Call of Duty games, there's an inordinate amount of weapon attachments and unlocks per gun. In COD4, you can choose one attachment on your primary weapon (unless you sacrifice one of your three perks to allow for two whole attachments). This meant that you can't fully kit out your gun with a scope, a laser, a suppressor, a grip, and whatever else. You had to be economical with the attachments. It's plain, but also kind of nice. It's tidier in a way.

Speaking of perks, you had three perks that you can choose. These act as passive buffs for your class. They didn't really allow for any crazy specialization (you can't become a medic that revives or heals people, for instance), but you can do things like decrease your footstep sounds or hide yourself from radars or double your weapon's fire rate. Again, these were pretty limited in what they could do, but there were certain combinations that found much more use than others.

I recall playing the multiplayer for hours on end during the weekends and after school. I was never any good at it, and my Internet connection was pretty shit at the time, but it was a blast to play with some friends. Online. That was a big game changer for me. It was the first time I had ever really encountered online multiplayer, and at first I didn't really get what all the fuss was about. I figured it was basically just the same as the single player campaign, but with more unpredictability. But it was something truly special.

COD4 represented a time in my life when things were a little bit simpler. When things felt like they made a bit more sense and there felt like there was a structure in the world. Nowadays, it doesn't really feel that way anymore.