Just Like Old Times

"I'll wait for you at the exfil point. Three hours." "Don't bother. This was a one-way flight, mate." "Then good luck, my friend."

- Nikolai and Captain Price

Just Like Old Times is the seventeenth level of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. With most of Task Force 141 eliminated and nearly all out of allies, Captains Price and MacTavish resolve there is nothing left to do but neutralize General Shepherd. Now labeled war criminals and wanted fugitives, the two Captains embark on a suicide mission to infiltrate Shadow Company's command base with one goal only: kill General Shepherd.

Walkthrough
The mission starts with a sandstorm while the player (playing as "Soap" MacTavish) and Price are hiding in the sand. The two then proceed toward a ridge and ambush a group of Shadow Company soldiers. Soap hooks up on a bridge and rappels down with Price. The two take out the two guards below them standing in front of the cave and then head inside.

They later are forced to hide as a patrol of soldiers check out what happened to the group they took out earlier. They sneak past a group of soldiers having a meeting. Price warns Soap of two soldiers with tac lights coming down the stairs. They kill them and the two continue. Upstairs, Price stabs a soldier before he notices two more are behind him. Soap and Price learn that Shadow Company soldiers are about to breach the door.

The two quickly take out the group as they come pouring in. Price tells Soap to take a riot shield for cover and walk along the catwalk while Price takes out the group. They later learn that Shepherd is being evacuated. They take out several groups of soldiers before proceeding to a door that Shadow Company soldiers have locked.

The duo then breach the door and kill all the soldiers behind it. After the room is clear, Shepherd notifies the soldiers in the cave that the site has been breached and that he is going to set off explosives inside the cave to attempt to kill Soap and Price. Price and Soap quickly hack the door controls so that they can get out before the explosions go off.

During their escape, Soap is injured, but quickly recovers. Shepherd then calls in an artillery strike, "danger close," in another desperate attempt to kill the two, but they still manage to survive. Price comments, like Corporal Dunn, that Shepherd doesn't care about danger close. Price and Soap then proceed to the Zodiacs that Shepherd mentioned earlier.

More Detailed Walkthrough

In the beginning of the mission follow Captain Price. When he stops at the ridge, go to the very right. When the shooting is about to start, aim for a headshot at the soldier on the right nearest to you. You should be able to take the soldier and the soldier behind him out in one shot. Follow Captain Price and shoot when told. Rappel down carefully by using the Right Trigger to stop and let go to jump. There are two guys down below that you both need to carefully take out by knifing. When prompted, go close over one and hit the right stick. You'll knife him as Price takes out the other one.

You should automatically switch to your secondary weapon, a TDI Vector, though there is no need to do so. The Intervention, meanwhile, may be replaced, as there is close-quarters fighting ahead. Follow Price into the cave; hide from the bypassing guards, and kill the smoking soldier or not when prompted. Follow Price again, and kill when prompted. Follow Price again. You will then see a weapons rack with three ACRs. Take the one on the right as it has a suppressor, Red Dot Sight, and heartbeat monitor. You will want to keep this rifle for the rest of the level. The gun you switch out should be the TDI Vector. Clear the room and follow Price outside.

You can either switch the non ACR gun for a Riot Shield, or use the Intervention if you have kept it. If you took the riot shield, proceed along the catwalk until there is a slight bend to the left. Stop just after the bend, and wait until Price takes out the two targets behind the low wall. Price will not take out the soldier that is prone until you reach the bridge. Either go for a bash or wait for Price to kill him. Afterwards, you can keep the riot shield while another three soldiers appear or you can switch to your ACR and kill them yourself. The latter technique is faster. If you kept the Intervention and decide to use it, slowly move, while prone and scoped in, out of cover and take out the tangos when you see them. After taking out the last of the three, duck back behind cover and repeat, as a single replacement group will move in. After taking out the second group you can move up without trouble.

In the next area, you will see a squad of six soldiers fast roping down from a helicopter. There are several with shields, so killing them quickly before they can set up is advisable. Take out as many of them as you can while they fast rope and cook a grenade into them to kill the rest. Instead of going right with Price, go left with the ACR drawn. Watch your heartbeat monitor to see when the soldiers come around the bend and kill them all. Go back to Price to mop up any stragglers.

Another squad of enemy soldiers will fast rope down, about the same composition as the previous fast rope group. Take them out the same way. There will be enemies to your left. Get behind the crates and chose to either switch out your ACR for a SCAR with thermal scope (If you have two weapons with the same basic function, one will never be used), or keep the ACR. Go toward the marker and take out the enemies using a flanking maneuver. Go with Price and plant the breaching charge. Clear the room. When prompted, go to the computer keyboard, activate it, run out the door. Do it quickly before the rigged room explodes on you. Somewhat the debris will hit you, and you will then be knocked out for a little while.

When you are able to move again just before the artillery strike (VIA Shepherd's Careless "Danger Close"), go stand where Price is. Swap your non-ACR gun for the AT4 at Price's feet. Keep the AT4 out. When you near the beginning of the tents, you should be able to see a Black Hawk helicopter coming into viewing the distance. It will fast rope down troops. Shoot it down with the AT4 to thin out the resistance. If you are fast enough, you can do the same with the Little Bird. If it is already taking off, then it's already unloaded its troops. You can still shoot at it with the AT4 if you like. Take out the remaining soldiers. The heartbeat sensor on the ACR will help with locating them, or, if you still have the Intervention, you can lag behind Price and take out the tangos with less risk, though this requires more accuracy on your part. Follow Price, take out the soldiers that run out of the cave. You can take them out with an AT4 again if you don't feel like shooting at them. Go into the cave and begin the briefing for the next mission.



Weapon Loadout
In this level, the player will start with an Intervention Sniper Rifle with a Silencer, and a Vector with an ACOG Scope and Silencer.

Intel Items
(1/4 Intel) After you shoot the smoking enemy in front of a security monitor, head east, the intel is on a gray crate.

(2/4 Intel) After Soap knifes the guard at the top of the stairs you will be ambushed by a patrol. After clearing the room Soap will exit the cave to the east. Just before you exit the cave look to the northeast the intel will be between the last two red rights. The face of the intel will be pointed towards the cave wall so you can miss it if you just run by.

(3/4 Intel) As you engage in the firefight through smoke and riot shields (before breaching the control room), head north along the right side wall; the intel is on a crate with a MG4.

(4/4 Intel) This intel is located inside the breached control room with explosives. There is a table located on the left of Capt. Price as he is using the terminal, before you exit the cave.

Price's Speech
''"The healthy human mind doesn't wake up in the morning thinking this is it's last day on earth. But I think that's a luxury, not a curse. Knowing you're close to the end is a kind of freedom. Good time to take... inventory. Outgunned. Outnumbered. Out of our minds. On a suicide mission. But the sand and rocks here stained with thousands of years of warfare. They will remember us. For this. Because out of all our vast array of nightmares this is the one we choose for ourselves. We go forward like a breath exhaled from the earth. With vigor in our hearts and one goal in sight: We. Will. Kill him."

- Captain Price ''

Trivia

 * In the beginning cutscene when Soap MacTavish says, "We've got one good UMP, they've got a thousand." he probably means how out-gunned they are compared to Shepherd's men.
 * During the cutscene, the player can see Price and Soap's "inventory": a suppressed Intervention (x2), a suppressed Vector, a Colt .45, flashbangs, frag grenades, and a combat knife. Soap takes an Intervention and the Vector, however before abseiling down and stabbing the two guards Price will now have a SCAR on his back, the weapon is never mentioned in the cutscene and Price isn't seen picking it up. Soap and Price also have other knives, apart form the one in the cutscene. It is most likely just Soaps's inventory.
 * Directly below the hill that Price and Soap slide down after killing the enemy patrol, there is a spot where the player can jump off of the cliff and survive. When the player lands, a mission failure screen appears saying "Friendly fire will not be tolerated!"
 * In the room that Shadow Company has rigged to blow up at the end of the level, before the player breaches the exit, a table with a map of Shepherd's areas of responsibility can be seen. On the table lies X's and O's as if it were a game board, showing how radical Shepard's plans ultimately were.


 * In the beginning, if the player kills the first group without an alert, and kills the dog before Price does, Price will say "Just like old times," referring to when he and Soap worked together in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.


 * Early on in the level, when Price talks his lips do not move.
 * Shadow Company uses the same screams and cries with the Militia and the Spetznaz when shot or injured.
 * In the beginning of the level, if the player alerts the guards Price will say " Soap, these aren't your average muppets", referring to Blackout when the player had to snipe the Ultranationalists.


 * In the beginning of the level, Price is using a Cheytac Intervention sniper rifle just like Soap. Just before entering the caves, he will put it away and draw a silenced SCAR-H with a thermal sight. He will not use the Intervention again for the rest of the level, even in situations that would tactically warrant its use.


 * Before Price goes to kill the guard at the top of the staircase he would say, "He's mine." If the player kills the guard before Price does, he will say "Never mind, then." Sometimes he won't respond if the player kills the guard quickly enough. In the level "Cliffhanger," MacTavish responds the same way.
 * You do not need to brake when jumping off the bridge. You will stop suddenly when you reach the guards. They will not notice when you stop suddenly.


 * The Little Bird that arrives (after leaving the cave near the end of the level) with Shadow Company troops can't be killed until its soldiers disembark from the side of the vehicle.


 * At the beginning of the mission, the player can see civilian cars driving on the road across the canyon. Although they obviously can't see the cave system itself, the large flights of Little Birds do little to preserve the secrecy of the Site. Later on during the mission after Shadow Company acknowledges Soap's and Price's presence, they're forced to traverse the rock bridge. When moving across the bridge the player can see tanks and Humvees moving across instead of civilian vehicles.


 * Toward the end of the level, right before the first breach, it is impossible to kill the Shadow Company soldier before he closes the door.


 * When the player is in the tunnel system and the two soldiers come through the door with the stairs and the red light, if they can kill them both, Price will say "Impressive".


 * As Price lays under the camouflage at the beginning of the level, he raises his hand to Soap to tell him to wait. He does this much like how Captain MacMillan motions to Lieutenant Price at the start of All Ghillied Up from Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.


 * Price seems to carry four weapons: a SCAR-H with a thermal scope, suppressed Intervention, an ACR with a Holographic Sight (briefly visible when on the catwalks) and an M4A1 Grenadier which he has during Endgame. However, there are several SCARs with thermal scopes in the area where the Shadow Company pops smoke grenades, and an extensive amount of ACRs scattered throughout the cave areas.
 * It is odd that even after the airstrike on the final area, there are still red, explosive barrels that are apparently completely untouched, especially since merely knifing these barrels will ignite them.
 * It is possible to get past the troops firing at the player with MG4s without taking a Riot Shield, but it is very difficult to do.
 * If the player looks at the CCTV footage in the cave it is actually showing the inside of The Gulag.
 * After the artillery strike, there will be Shadow Company troopers wounded and on fire. Shooting or knifing them will extinguish the flames.
 * If the player alerts the guards at the beginning, they can run up the slope while the player can only slide down.
 * When Soap and Price are rappelling down the cliff, Price's shadow is visible on the ground near the guards. One will look at Price's shadow, but will not react to it. The guard below Soap however will look up and see Soap if the player takes too long to kill him.
 * On lower difficulty levels the game will brake automatically upon reaching the bottom as the player rappels down. On higher difficulties the player will fly off the cliff if they do not brake.
 * In this mission, Soap uses a unique black Vector. This would be considered rather unpractical, as the Vector is normally tan, and the black paint is much more visible as the level is set on desert.
 * For some reason, the two guards that Soap and Price knife after rappelling carry silenced weapons. The soldier that Soap knifed has a Vector Silenced ACOG Sight, the same secondary weapon that you start out with, while the other has a MP5KSD Red Dot Sight. This may be due to the fact that if a civilian is killed because of suspicion, other civilians may not raise fears of an enemy base, due to the lack of firearms being heard.
 * The two guards model appearance are always the same; the one Soap knifes wears a head balaclava, while the other guard wears goggles over the balaclava eye space.
 * When taking out the first group of guards, Price fires his Intervention faster than is physically possible.
 * It is strange that Price and Soap did not make it their objective to find intel implicating Shepherd, such as the DSM, as one of the perpetrators of the war in order to clear their names. This is most likely because they did not know Shepherd took the DSM from Roach, or that Shepherd sets off "Directive one-one-six Bravo", not giving them time to look for intel.
 * Some ACRs that have Silencers, Red Dot Sights, and Heartbeat Sensors on a rack in the cave that Shadow Company breaches have a unique black paint job and a max ammo of 1260.
 * In the briefing at the beginning of the level when taking "inventory" a combat knife is shown while at the same time Price says "We. Will. Kill him (Shepherd)." This is a foreshadowing of how Shepherd is killed.
 * The guard which Price tells the player not to engage when they first enter the cave seems to be smoking and blowing smoke through his balaclava.
 * It is possible to kill the guard smoking before the patrol comes without anyone noticing, but the patrol will almost never miss the body.
 * The player can shoot the TV before the guard walks up to it and he will not notice it.
 * In the cave among the other Shadow Company soldiers there are two men playing chess. This is similar to the Call of Duty 4 mission 'Blackout' where two enemies are playing chess.