After my recent article denouncing the slew of World War II-themed games, I thought the genre couldn’t go any further. Yet “Call of Duty 2” (developed by Infinity Ward), particularly the Russian campaign, was the most emotional time I’ve experienced in a game since “Quake 1” and the original “Unreal.”

For those who haven’t played the first game, a brief recap: You play different soldiers taking part in various battles throughout World War II. The game begins with the Russians taking back Stalingrad, moves to the British fighting Rommel in North Africa and finishes in Normandy with the Americans.

This variation in role and location has carried over from the first game and prevents the game from becoming stale, since each campaign has different objectives and motivations. The Russians are passionate about retaking their homeland and personally I found this campaign to be mind blowing – it’s simply the best experience in the game.

A major change in this sequel is the removal of the health bar. Traditionally you measure your health, how many times you’ve been shot, by a small bar in a corner of your screen, and this is a tried-and-tested method for a whole generation of first-person shooter games. “CoD2” removes the health bar and instead represents your health by fading the edges of your screen to red; the more hurt you are, the more red is added.

This is a great visual indicator of your injuries that saves you looking away from the action. It takes a little while to understand the varying levels of health loss, maybe a couple of deaths before you can accurately judge your health state, but the overall effect is a deeper sense of immersion.

Health also affects your aim; the more hurt you are, the harder accurate aiming becomes. This can be deadly in situations where you play a sniper, but generally, it serves as a warning. Don’t get into any serious combat until you’ve picked up that nearby health pack.

Apart from the health bar and the fact that Infinity Ward wrote their own game engine, which seems to rival Epic’s and id Software’s technology, there is very little difference from the first game. But for a game, and particularly a genre like this, the immersion is what counts.

The game does an excellent job of placing you in real situations from the entire WWII period. I mentioned the Russian campaign earlier because for me it was the best. There are some truly epic moments during the retaking of Stalingrad. I’ll try to recount one, although it’s best experienced by playing the game.

You are crawling along a trench trying to reach your comrades in a field outpost. Gunfire is whizzing overhead. Further along the trench you see a wounded comrade being dragged towards safety. The ground starts to shake. You hear an ominous rumbling getting louder from somewhere above you, over the sides of the trench but you can’t place the noise. Suddenly, Tiger tanks are advancing over the trench, actually driving over the trench, and you can look up to see them as they thunder into battle. I just stood there in awe, not paying attention to anything except the sight of several huge tanks moving overhead.

Scenes like this are normally restricted to movies, and it was the first indication that something special was happening in this game. It really does demonstrate that games are blurring the line between passive and active experiences. I felt like I had control over the outcome of battles and was not just a spectator who had to follow a predefined path.

Unfortunately, these experiences begin to diminish after Stalingrad. The game falls back into tried and tested gameplay for the British and American campaigns, although each has its own highlights. Driving tanks was introduced in the first game but taken to another level here, making you part of a tank platoon rolling across the desert to drive Rommel back. You scale the cliffs at Point du Hoc, actually climbing up a rope with soldiers being shot and falling off, to assault German gun batteries. However, on the whole, it’s a lot of the same old stuff.

The “CoD” series has so far excelled in cinematic moments and “CoD2” only improves on this; everywhere you look during a cinematic scene, something is happening. You really get a sense of the chaos of war and this feeling is greatly enhanced by the sounds of battle, shots ricocheting, machine guns and their mechanical chatter, explosions, temporary deafness and dizziness when a mortar lands close by.

I still think the WWII genre is overplayed and getting tired, and while “CoD2” does have quite a lot of the failings I talked about in an earlier column, it really tries to stand out. There are serious attempts to make this not just a game but an interactive experience. I’m torn when wanting “CoD3” to be made; the direction that Infinity Ward is taking game experiences is really exciting to me, but I really don’t want to fight Germans any more.

The Guildhall at SMU is an intense 21-month graduate program in digital game development. The Guildhall offers a Masters of Interactive Technology in Digital Game Development degree or a professional certificate. The curriculum was designed by expert teachers working with leaders in the gaming industry to provide students with a solid foundation in game development. Visit http://guildhall.smu.edu