The Call Of Duty Elite Beta Is Like….

….Something I can’t talk about. Sorry the above image is from an e-mail I received BEFORE I had to sign a NDA about what’s going on in the beta. There will be plenty of time to talk about it when it’s been lifted (or for sites that don’t care about NDA’s and leak screenshots/info anyway.)

What I can tell you though is that the beta is neat, has some cool features, and I’m glad there’s a free/pay version because until they show us what’s so neat about the pay version I can’t really imagine spending a monthly fee on it. That being said it IS cool for a variety of reasons that… well unfortunately I can’t go into quite yet. Hurray for NDAs!

Call Of Duty Elite To Add Social Networking And Cross Platform Interaction

The Call of Duty franchise is trying to mix our love of the franchise with our addiction to social media. On top of that it’s also trying to finally give us some cross platform interaction in the frm of ranking and videos if not actually being able to play together quite yet.

On the one hand I’m wondering what took so long and on the other I am wondering why they are doing it. Well, why they are making a free AND premium service. I understand that subscriptions are a cash cow these days and there is a lure of it ‘being worth it’ but so far we don’t have details on WHY it’s worth it. Unless subscribing gets you all of the expansion packs early AND for a cheaper price what is going to be the true added benefit?

I suppose we will find out on November 8th when it launches alongside Modern Warfare 3. At the very least I’m sure we’ll all be signing up for the free version (those of us who are Call of Duty players) as I would LOVE to be able to compare stats and share videos with my PC gaming friends and 1.5 PS3 friends. With my iffyness of the pay portion hasn’t thrown you yet, good! It actually looks like it has a lot of useful and fun features to it. Also a LOT of time wasting features. Perfect for those long hours at a desk job? I’d say so!

It’s kind of neat that at least part of the social aspect is if friends on Facebook use Elite it’ll let you find who on Facebook that also play which you may not have known. The service should be available on the web, console, and mobile apps and will actually work with Black Ops and on.

The 4 major sections are: Career, Connect, Compete, and Improve. A VERY quick runtdown is that Career: Your full stats, Connect: connect with friends/etc, Compete: compare scores and videos with others and Improve: lets you see what guns/maps you are best on, where you die the most, where others die, etc.

BONUS! The following video has 6 seconds of Modern Warfare 3 at the end (and it’s entertaining! Even Leah laughed at a few parts!)

And Was Apparently A Success

Aside from a few bricked X-Box’s that they’ve got ironed out there is a new encoding format they can use to get extra room on the DVD’s that make 360 games. More room means more art, levels, music, etc. Win for us or is it just an ability to make programmers lazier?

For the titles that properly take advantage of the extra room I’d say it’s a win for us. So what did I get out of it? Well aside from my free copy of Halo Reach my avatar also got a Mark V Flaming Avatar Helmet! .. ….. yup. A free helmet. Don’t get me wrong I really have no complaints about a free game and a free avatar award but wouldn’t you say that the helmet just looks a bit – flaming?

Nintendo’s Money Printing Machine Returns

Rumors have been hitting the web for the last couple of weeks but it’s been made official – The second generation of the Wii is coming. While there is nearly no information on the next Wii it apparently IS coming out in 2012 (Assuming the world doesn’t end) and there will be a playable Wii at this year’s E3 in June.

The rumors that are supposedly leaks is that it will have the horse power to go head to head with the current ‘next gen’ consoles (the 360/PS3) which honestly isn’t going to be enough if you ask me. While the Wii flat out owned everything under the sun when it came out the long lack of quality games coming out has hurt the system and with a year or two away from an announcement of a new generation of X-Box’s or Playstations the current system specs just won’t be up to snuff for long. Of course, this is going off rumors so who knows what’ll actually end up being under the hood.

Still Nintendo has long proven they are a force to be reckoned with even without a highly powered system so with the new specs I’m curious to see how the next Wii will stack up. Maybe if they could rip off of the Kinect and add some FPS friendly controllers we could see something fun to play around with. Only time will tell but I’ve become such a 360 fanboy that I have no idea what I’ll do when it comes out.

(Maybe they’ll come out with a game Ali can play… I would so buy the first system that will let my dog play that will actually interest her in a way that won’t cause her to jump up on the TV and break it.)

X-Box 360 Beta Accepted!

So I was accepted into the new X-Box beta test. I think this is the third one I’ve been accepted into now and as usual there is not all that much to tell! This time isn’t due from there being any sort of NDA in place restricting my eagerly wanting to type hands but instead because there really ISN’T much to tell. We’re testing a new disc format with the update. We’re supposed to test out the full free game they shipped out to test (that I won’t name but I’m sure you can guess by looking at the image below which may have the full title in it.) We are also supposed to test out DVD’s, full games, and audi cd’s just to make sure there aren’t any issues with it.

So I get a free game to test out a beta that if they brick the X-Box they fix. Hell yea! While Halo isn’t my favorite franchise I’m not at all going to turn down a free copy of the latest (and from what I hear prettiest) iteration of the game. I guess if this beta goes well the rumor is that it’s a way to fit even more data on the standard DVD’s that the 360 uses for it’s games. So hey that means more game play, cut scenes, and art to suck my life away. Win!

Bioshock As Inspiration

One of the most impressive games that I have played on the current generation of consoles would absolutely have to be Bioshock. It had no multi-player worth speaking of and the single player action was “okay”, not even one of the top fun factor games that I have played – what did it was the plot, quotes, ideals, and characters. Primarily the character worth mentioning was Andrew Ryan – a scientist that had practically forsaken morality to build a better tomorrow.

Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?

I am Andrew Ryan, and I’m here to ask you a question. Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? ‘No!’ says the man in Washington, ‘It belongs to the poor.’ ‘No!’ says the man in the Vatican, ‘It belongs to God.’ ‘No!’ says the man in Moscow, ‘It belongs to everyone.’ I rejected those answers; instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose… Rapture, a city where the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, Where the great would not be constrained by the small! And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well.

With this statement we are thrown into the world of Rapture. It instantly is telling us that we are entering a world with an ideology unlike anything we have experienced. (Sure if you were playing the video game the fact that you were traveling to an underwater city could have said the same thing but.. that’s not the point!) It brings up a good point though. We are not slaves and we are what we make of ourselves.

No Gods Or Kings Only Man

To further the premise of this is the idea of “Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?” Andrew does not allow you to question it but says it as fact that only man matters. Only man should control his destiny.

A Man Chooses A Slave Obeys

Now this is a fun one, “A Man Chooses A Slave Obeys” is basically saying that there are leaders and followers. Leaders are men. Followers are sheep. This one has a particularly strong feeling in my life as I’ve been thinking a lot about work, what I do, what I want to do, what I can do, and what I should be doing as of late and the 4 are just not lining up as they should be.

We all make choices, but in the end our choices make us.

The break down is that we all have the free will to do as we please but in the end who we are and what we’re able to do with our lives is defined by our choices, not by what we are given or who helps us. It again goes hand in hand with the concept that we make ourselves and we are each in charge of our own ability to fulfill our potential – or create it.

What is the difference between a man and a parasite?

What is the difference between a man and a parasite? A man builds. A parasite asks ‘Where is my share?’ A man creates. A parasite says, ‘What will the neighbors think?’ A man invents. A parasite says, ‘Watch out, or you might tread on the toes of God… ‘

Another great one that plays off of the concept of “A Man Chooses A Slave Obeys” in that a man will DO and not worry about what other think. A man will create, move forward, do something with their life and not just sit there and be a waste of their life condemning others who try to move forward.

What Is The Greatest Lie Ever Created?

What is the greatest lie every created? What is the most vicious obscenity ever perpetrated on mankind? Slavery? The Holocaust? Dictatorship? No. It’s the tool with which all that wickedness is built: altruism. Whenever anyone wants others to do their work, they call upon their altruism. Never mind your own needs, they say, think of the needs of… of whoever. The state. The poor. Of the army, of the king, of God! The list goes on and on. How many catastrophes were launched with the words “think of yourself”? It’s the “king and country” crowd who light the torch of destruction. It is this great inversion, this ancient lie, which has chained humanity to an endless cycle of guilt and failure.

To be fair this one doesn’t really apply to life or my thought process at all right now but it’s one that is so open ended AND a great Bioshock quote that I couldn’t very well just leave it be. There are more quotes from Andrew Ryan and the series itself but I personally believe that those are the best and, when you think about them in a selfish manner, very motivating. Why am I doing so much that I do not for myself or to only really get by and not better myself? It’s an easy pattern to fall into and one that really has to be changed.

Guitar Hero Franchise Boxed?

According to reports from overseas (Eurogamer to be specific) the Guitar Hero franchise has been killed off. It actually started with Activision Freestyle Games (DJ Hero developer) with massive layouts before making that announcement.

One of Activision’s CEO’s had this to say:
“It’s no secret that not just Guitar Hero, but also Rock Band, and the music category in general, do not have the same mass appeal today that they did a few years ago,” he said.

“That said, I think that we would be foolish to not try and build on the strength of the Guitar Hero brand, because as you said, it’s a pretty strong brand with great recognition and great likeability, and there’s a lot to work with there.”

“I think the road to rejuvenating that category goes through innovation,” he continued.

There was a bit more after that but I felt it was a good point to think about that last comment. I guess in the last month that says innovation means cancelling a strong franchise that you still COULD do something with.

This is technically a rumor at this time but there seems to be enough weight behind it with announced layoffs through developers on Twitter that we may have seen the end to an era. I personally haven’t played Guitar Hero in quite some time, however with how much I DID play it in college and after. It’s hard to imagine not having new Guitar Hero games be announced.

How Big Is Call of Duty?

So for those of you who don’t know I’m a huge Call of Duty fanatic. I’m sure NONE of you knew that though, right? So how big exactly is COD? Well this little graph gives a good idea of it AND you have to keep in mind that it is out of date. This is Pre-Christmas sales.

And they are so angry with us that it’s not free on Windows!

Somewhere in the back of my mind I lied to myself. I really did. I told myself that if Angry Birds came out on a Windows platform it would be like Android – Free.

HOW STUPID AM I? I mean everyone else has to pay for it, iEverythings, on the PSP soon, etc, why wouldn’t Windows? Still the $10 price tag isn’t that bad (and if you pick it up SOON only $5 encourages us all to spend that little bit of extra cash.)

For those of you who don’t know what Angry Birds is, it’s a game dedicated to having a group of birds fight back against the pigs that they are angry at. Unfortunately they don’t turn them into bacon or that would really just be the icing on the cake for this game wouldn’t it?

It’s a simple game, but it’s a ridiculously addicting and fun game at the same time. I’m tempted to pick it up as my birthday present to myself. On the flip side my real birthday present will be a new phone when they announce we can get them for work and since I’ll be getting one with Android I’ll just get Angry Birds at that time!

The game initially includes 195 levels packed with hours and hours of gameplay. Customers can expect free updates and additional levels to the game. In addition to this, there will be unique enhancements not found in the mobile version, free of charge.

The game is available on PC’s through Intel AppUp

The Difference Between Console And PC Gaming

While Dueling Analogs just meant to say why they prefer games of old over games of new I feel it’s also a pretty great comparison on why I play console over PC games these days.

First off let’s be honest – I’m no longer truly a ‘gamer’ as I once was. I still love playing video games. I still play them in my off time. I even still play *1* computer game now and then (Everquest. Don’t give me that look it’s to talk to old friends I’m usually too busy to actually play it and it’s just loaded.) which PROVES the above point 110%.

The intent of the comic aside I just can’t comfortably play video games at a computer nowadays. Maybe it’s the lack of a 46″ display. Maybe it’s my dislike of a keyboard/mouse as my interface (I know I can get game pads from any system to run on a PC now but it’s just not the same for a PC game.) Maybe it’s just that I feel if I’m at my computer I should be working on any of the multitude of projects I currently have going on. Whatever the reason I both cracked up and agreed with this comic once I saw it.