Killzone 2's controls weren't criticised for their "lack of visual fidelity or bla bla bla", they were criticised for being slow and considered rather than being like aiming on crack, or at least that's how my online friends felt. In truth, this whole framerate argument is getting far more time than it merits, so I'm not going to argue this point with you anymore - if you feel framerate ruined Killzone 2 then fine, and likewise I'm going to just sit here confident that that's nonsense.

"... so having a more accessible game for people who aren't as familiar with using dual analogue sticks widens your potential market... Since reviewers don't tend to mark games for accessibility then there has to be some metric to judge and that has to be sales... "

So now you seemed to have changed your stance from "accessibility = quality" (wrong) to what I was already suggesting as the reason for Modern Warfare's success - "accessibility = sales". Thanks, I guess...

Accessibility on some level does relate to the scores in a review. Since these reviews are a measure of quality, so long as a game is considered accessible for the reviewers whom tend to be expert game players then they generally get an instant pass mark. However a pass mark from a reviewer does not mean that a game gets a pass mark from the general gaming public. I don't see how making a game less accessible can make it a better game when the game is a blockbuster title. If the game was catering to some niche then you would apply a different standard, however neither game is what you'd call a niche title.

Accessibility is a 'good quality' of a game which can be one of its many good qualities. The more good qualities a game has then the better the overall quality of the title.

All this framerate nonsense is funny. I never noticed any slowdown in KZ1, since I'm more of a casual gamer than anything. I never notice small issues like framerate or screen tearing. I find that some people put too much emphasis on it.

What I think matters more to casual gamers is the ability to join a game within seconds. Which MW2 is better at. I have played about 24 hours of KZ2 and 100 hours of MW2. I like the game play more in KZ2 but play MW2 a lot more since my FL is always playing it and I can join a game in about 20 seconds. No matter how much it lags..... Laggy POS.

I concur. My only gripe is the lack of weapon variety and co-op. Killzone 2 is a grown man's shooter.

People don't care for frame-rates in just the same way they don't care about the technology of the games engine. If a game looks good and plays good then thats enough for most people. Better frame-rates make a game play better and better game engines make a game look better. The fact that they don't know what anisotropic filtering is doesn't matter, anyone can see badly filtered textures and say that it looks bad. People like the responsiveness and speed of the controls and that would not be possible with the title running at 30FPS. It would be impossible to make a Call of Duty game as good if it ran at Killzone 2 speeds that sold as well as it did. Its a fact that a responsive game is easier to control than an unresponsive game.

Killzone 2's controls are a design decision to optimise the game engine for parellel loads which means they sacrafice latency for visuals. Its the same deal as Uncharted 2 having a completely linear game designed around their streaming system where the player cannot back track. A good design hides the design tradeoffs to make the game appear to be all pro and no con. Guerilla games failed to do this somewhat and the control system was dictated to them in order to hide the slow response.

As for Call of Duty World at War, yes I enjoyed that game more than both MW2 but less than Killzone 2 personally. In terms of some of the design choices with regards to gameplay I felt that it was a little bit lacking, but it never got in the way of the fun. I never finished MW1/2 but I did finished WAW and Killzone 2 more than once.