The year is 2011, and civil war has broken out in Russia between the Russian government and Russian ultranationalists under the command of Imran Zakhaev who seek to restore Russia back to its former Soviet-style leadership. A revolution has toppled a regime in an unnamed Arabic country which has ties to the Russian ultranationalists, with Khaled al-Asad coming to power. These two simultaneous events are causing fear that al-Asad and Zakhaev might form an alliance and use nuclear weapons against the West. In response to these concerns, the United States and the United Kingdom conduct joint operations to put down both uprisings, without putting their own nations' security at risk. Will they succeed?
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By January 2008, Activision was able to say Call of Duty 4 had sold over seven million copies worldwide and was officially the number one title across every format for all of 2007, based on combined NPD, Chart-Track and GfK data.
At the 11th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, the game didn't just take home Overall Game of the Year, it also picked up Console Game of the Year, Action Game of the Year, and Outstanding Achievement in Online Gameplay in the same night.
Studio head Vince Zampella confirmed to press that the game had passed 10 million copies sold worldwide, with the Xbox 360 version pulling ahead as the top-selling platform, not bad for a game that had launched barely a year earlier.
Protecting the Abrams tank named War Pig gets you 'Save the Bacon.' Cutting the power gets you 'Dancing in the Dark.' Carrying an injured MacMillan gets you 'Piggyback Ride.' Whoever wrote the achievement names was clearly having fun with it.
The M1A1 Abrams your squad frees during The Bog isn't just 'the tank,' it's nicknamed War Pig, and that nickname goes on to become the title of the mission right after.
The gunship mission doesn't start cold. It's a direct continuation of Hunted, where Price's helicopter gets shot down and the squad has to survive on foot until an AC-130 shows up to save them, at which point the player takes over as the gunship's own operator. It's a smoother handoff between missions than most shooters bothered with at the time.
During the F.N.G. training level, Gaz holds a squad record of 19 seconds on the obstacle course. Beating it isn't required to progress, but it is tied to an achievement, so plenty of players have spent way too long trying to shave off a second or two.
If you let the credits roll all the way through the first song, someone introduces a rap track that name-drops both Call of Duty 2 and Call of Duty 4, a little bonus most players never sit through long enough to catch.
All Ghillied Up is the thirteenth level you actually play, but story-wise it's the very first thing that happens in the whole game, set a full decade before the rest of the campaign. It's an unusual structural choice for an FPS campaign of that era.
During Charlie Don't Surf, Al-Asad's speech plays on a bank of TVs scattered around the level. Shoot every single one out and you're rewarded with the achievement Your Show Sucks, which might be the pettiest achievement name in the whole game.
