Sorry, I was typing on my phone and had too much to say. The deadlines are set by some marketing/corporate schmuck and also driven by the releases of COD as well. Rushed software is not good software. My company learned that quite well with our last major release (biggest and buggiest in company history and released to be out at the beginning of a big trade show).
Yeah I had some crashes the first few times I played but there have been consistent patches recently and I played 14 rounds last night with 1 crash. I'm not complaining.
And the gameplay is unparalleled IMO. A guy tried to knife me the other night and I was able to fucking BLOCK that shit. HOW COOL IS THAT? And some of the other stuff you can do in this game is just crazy-town.
@Micah, don't bother with 3. You'd just be wasting your time. The weapons are different in 4 and the gameplay/configuration/menus are different so you'd have to learn some of it all over again. Plus you don't have the commander aspect in 3.
I think the MP is pretty spectacular even without being part of a big group. You get put in a squad immediately when joining a server and most of my squads seem to work together on some level and you can friend people that do play well together and hook up with them again later. I found a random guy back in 3 and he and I hooked up again last night for a half dozen rounds. It was a blast. :-) I won't say it wouldn't hurt to find a platoon or whatever they're calling them in 4 but it's not a must IMO. Hell, find me (ober0330). I usually play a couple nights per week from 10:30-12:30ish EST if that suits your game-time (and you're on PC).
Also, I've been playing Commander on my iPad randomly too and I have to say that is pretty damn cool. I can be anywhere and still be having a blast with the game, even on my phone although I haven' tried that yet.
Anyways, I'm going to get off my soapbox. I just wanted to say I fuckin love the game.