Why They Don’t Take Boycotts Seriously…

12/11/2009 at 17:30 Ed says:

Yuck, I don’t know what to say.
Weak willed fools!

12/11/2009 at 17:31 Nick says:

Heh.. yeah, I’ll bet the l4d2 boycott group would have looked much the same on release too.

12/11/2009 at 19:45 Droniac says:

L4D2 will probably be much worse, considering the fact that its leaders became L4D2 promoters several months ago. And of course the demo proved that it definitely does go to new places and seems worth the pre-order. Although I have to say I still don’t much care for the daytime gameplay, nor the new cast of characters.

12/11/2009 at 17:32 Ratty says:

Bloody Splitters !!

12/11/2009 at 17:33 mrpier says:

LOL (no really :)

12/11/2009 at 17:33 morte says:

lol why am I not surprised?

12/11/2009 at 17:36 pkt-zer0 says:

833 members? A bit far from the 200K signatures on the petition. Not sure the Steam group’s entirely representative.

12/11/2009 at 17:37 Alaric says:

Hey Kieron, why not contact one of these people (since we know their names and all) and interview them? I’d love to hear what they have to say about both their hypocrisy and their being publically flogged like this.

12/11/2009 at 17:37 Ian says:

I lol’d.

12/11/2009 at 17:37 Alex McLarty says:

The best thing ever!

Many of the people I know who took part in the L4D2 boycott group bought the game as soon as it was available for pre-order.

12/11/2009 at 17:38 Heliocentric says:

I’m not boycotting mw2. I just aint buying it because its not something i want because of a lack of mod support and no dedicated servers, thus no sense of community. That said, i bloody love mw1.

I have no interest in dealing with those limitations. Not when other games exist.

12/11/2009 at 17:42 frymaster says:

ditto

i’ll probably pick it up at some point for the single player, when it’s reduced in price, but I ain’t paying the price it is, for the single-player length all reviewers say it is
12/11/2009 at 17:57 Nathan says:

Ditto too.
I don’t think that my decision not to buy a game because it doesn’t include the features I’m looking for at a particular price point constitutes a boycott, merely an informed decision, especially whilst I’m so busy with Dragon Age.

That said, I have no doubt that it’s a fantastic game (MW1′s SP campaign was one of my favourite ever gaming experiences) and exactly the sort of game that would make a good christmas figure.
12/11/2009 at 18:46 Po0py says:

Ditto three.

I’m not paying that price for a damn console game. I may grab it if I find a sale. But given that the first COD4MW1 sale I’ve ever seen was only last week I’m not too optimistic.

All my friends have pirated MW2. ALL OF THEM. Which is unheard of. I think they all found the perfect excuse. Many of the serious boycotters are actually pirating the game in this particular case.
12/11/2009 at 19:36 Wulf says:

Ditto four.

I don’t enjoy games that have no charm and can’t get even the merest of emotional reactions out of me, barring anger at least. I doubt it’d make me laugh, or cry, I doubt there’s anything there that’s stimulating for the old grey matter, I doubt there are any characters I’d become attached to, and the only things I’d probably feel is boredom, frustration, and anger. Those games… ehhhh.

It’s a game for the culturally, emotionally, and mentally landlocked if you ask me, something that many of these games are. ArmA II wasn’t my kind of game either, but at least that game encouraged some thought as to gameplay mechanics and tactics on part of the player, this is a good thing.

Plus, the £40 pricetag has “Buy this game to be KEWL!” written all over it, it seems to be more of a fashion thing and a status symbol amongst mainstream gamers than an actual game. It reminds me of those cans Coca-Cola tried to sell, you know the ones, the ones that were thin, tall, had less pop inside of them, but costed three times as much.

Same is true here. Not much of a game, loads of marketing, huge pricetag…

These days, I think it’s cooler to be uncool. Thanks but no thanks, Infinity Ward.
12/11/2009 at 20:57 Vandelay says:

Err… Wulf, the people you are agreeing with are saying that they like the look of the game but won’t spend the asking price for it, not that they think the game is for the “culturally, emotionally, and mentally landlocked.” So, I’ll be the real ditto four. (edit: actually, now that I read it back the original comment didn't show any real interest in the game, so I take that back.)
MW1 had some really clever touches in its single player component and had moments that actually did have power to them (you may disagree, Wulf, but many others found that some of it, particularly the ending and the nuke sequence, to be very powerful. If you watched Charlie Brooker’s Gameswipe, you’ll see that even the writer Graham Lineham agrees.) It was probably the best single player linear (not an insult) shooter since Half Life 2. The multiplayer was fairly enjoyable to dip into once in a while but wouldn’t be something I would buy the game for, so I would only be buying it for the single player. The asking price of £39.99 is just not going to entice me, particularly as the single player is meant to only last a few hours. I think the price is going to have to drop to at least £15 before I really consider it.

12/11/2009 at 17:39 plugmonkey says:

Ha ha! That’s brilliant.

Power to the people!

12/11/2009 at 17:47 piecoughed says:

Ouch.

I’ll report my personal MW2 boycott is still going strong! Of course by “boycott” I mean I’ve never played a Call of Duty game in my life and I’m having a good old time as a mage-tank in Dragon Age and pouring colors into random body sacs in The Void.

Here’s to different tastes!

12/11/2009 at 17:55 sfury says:

Same here, but a rogue. And looking forward to the Void. :)
12/11/2009 at 19:46 Wulf says:

Heh, same here. I really didn’t want to like Dragon Age, and there’s still a lot about it that really annoys me (like the ‘OMG LOOK BLUD EVREEWARE, MUST BE MANESTREEM LULZ!!!11′ nonsense, part of which I’ve removed with mods, but I’m still looking forward to a ‘Clean Journal Texture’ mod), and most of the characters irritate the snot out of me, but… it’s not bad as a World goes, it’s not Obsidian, it’s not even Spiderweb, but it’s not bad. And then there’s bloody Shale, whom I’m still bitter at for being so entertaining he’s actually making the game playable for me.

So I’m on the border of feeling both right and wrong about Dragon Age, it’s hardly epic, in fact it’s frequently dull, but it’s not a bad game. I just wish the script had been written by Obsidian, the characters wouldn’t have all been so flat then. As personable as Alistair is, he’s as flat as a pancake. Sigh.

Still… toolset tinkering made my character into a werewolf, I like Shale… and I quietly hope that Bioware will hand Dragon Age 2 over to Obsidian like they have with their other games. Dragon Age is definitely something with potential, something that can be built on, it just needs better writers.

At the moment though, I’m still not sure if I can recommend it, but I feel I’ll be more inclined to as the mods start rolling in. More anti-mainstream mods would be good, and some content mods with better writing. A good game can be made of Dragon Age, and it is borderline enjoyable.

I’ll stop rambling now.

12/11/2009 at 17:49 LionsPhil says:

lol, intarnet petitions

This is quite a hilariously zingworthy capture. Nicely spotted, hivemind.

12/11/2009 at 17:51 Aphotique says:

The one person playing DA:O in that image seems strangely out of place…

12/11/2009 at 17:52 futage says:

Now that’s comedy in games.

12/11/2009 at 17:57 Diogo Ribeiro says:

I only have one thing to say, but I’ll say it three times.

HA HA HA!

12/11/2009 at 17:58 mandrill says:

I second Alaric’s proposal! DO EEEEEET =D

Would be too funny for words.

12/11/2009 at 17:59 Pantsman says:

Oh my, that is a thing of beauty.

12/11/2009 at 18:01 Nootrishus says:

I loled

12/11/2009 at 18:03 Shadrach says:

Couldn’t give a rat’s ass about that game anyway, like Alec said “shooting virtual men of assorted ethnic origins” just does not do it for me. But LOL indeed. Also Minion’s got *good* taste!

12/11/2009 at 21:07 Vandelay says:

You prefer games where you only shoot people of a single ethnic origin?

12/11/2009 at 18:07 Taillefer says:

Tehe. Politics.

12/11/2009 at 18:07 PeteIRL says:

I have to agree. If I was given a free copy of MW2, I’d install it and play. I just don’t want Infinity Ward to get any of my money down to their cynical and frankly insulting way they conducted themselves in the run up to the game. And the lack of deicated servers, lean, blah blah blah blah. You get the picture.

12/11/2009 at 18:10 Taillefer says:

Yeah, that’s what they said…

12/11/2009 at 18:08 Whiskey Jak says:

So predictable, as all of those petitions and boycott groups are. At the very least, the “founder” of the group isn’t listing MW2 in his games, that would’ve been the funniest shit.

Can’t wait to read the PC reviews and their takes on the server/matchmaking thing.

12/11/2009 at 18:23 Whiskey Jak says:

Also, according to this : http://news.vgchartz.com/news.php?id=5826 PC sales of MW2 at retail are already close to 1 million. Now, I’m not sure how reliable these guys are but if they are even close, with sales like this after 1 single day, I think this dedicated server “scandal” will die pretty fast.

12/11/2009 at 18:10 Tei says:

Sad.
Also, somewhat related, this dude avatar.
http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197976096776

Sould ginger people be on concentration camps^H^Hre-education camps?

12/11/2009 at 18:57 Ging says:

Er, Tei… what the fuck?
12/11/2009 at 20:26 Stupoider says:

I’ve seen that picture on the website that must not be named. Frequently. Think nothing of it.
13/11/2009 at 15:59 Ging says:

It wasn’t the picture I was “what the fucking”, more his statement that ginger people should be put in concentration camps…

I sort of find that offensive.

12/11/2009 at 18:10 Matzerath says:

The true boycott is by people like me who don’t know what the hell this game is in the first place.

12/11/2009 at 19:06 Metalfish says:

Is there room for two under that rock?

12/11/2009 at 18:18 linfosoma says:

Im saving that picture, it will be useful in the future.

05/04/2013 at 08:54 El_Emmental says:

Very useful to show how game journalists never do proper research, yeah.
- 05/04/2013 at 08:56 Llewyn says:
  
  El_Emmental, why are you bothering to reply to comments from 2009?
  - 05/04/2013 at 09:03 El_Emmental says:
    
    Because such old articles are now listed on “More from RPS”, and leaving an article with misinformed and biased information is wrong.
    
    I tried to post more informations on that, but the spam filter blocks it – I have it in a .txt file, I just can’t post it.
    
    I’ve been in several “boycott” movements (even ones I didn’t cared about), talked to a lot of people there, and a lot of things here are very wrongly reported. Since RPS isn’t going to edit that article ever, I hope at least the comments warn people of how misleading that article is.
    - 05/04/2013 at 09:34 Llewyn says:
      
      “That article” consists of an image taken from a Steam group. There aren’t “a lot of things” reported here, let along wrongly reported.
      
      Put the contents of your text file in a Google doc and link to that, spam filter shouldn’t object then.

12/11/2009 at 18:21 Dante says:

Kudos to the one man who has stuck to his guns and masochistically played FM10 instead.

Now that’s some hardcore boycotting.

12/11/2009 at 18:26 Gorgeras says:

If on November 18th the Left4Dead 2 Boycott member list fails to show the same picture except on the few inevitable cherry-picked pages, will RPS point it out too?

12/11/2009 at 18:37 PeopleLikeFrank says:

I hope so!

Though maybe worth pointing out – that screenshot is taken from the first page of the member list, so it’s hardly ‘cherry picked’.
12/11/2009 at 18:58 Gorgeras says:

Actually, it is. I took a more careful look at the list and wrote up on it on the PCG Forum: http://www.computerandvideogames.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=1573585#1573585

I’m a bit annoyed that Kieron posted this tosh, I always thought of him as one of the more critically-minded writers at PCG and RPS.

Dead men tell no tales: those that didn’t buy Modern Warfare 2 come up on the radar less than those who did buy it, which is why taking the sample on the day of the Steam release is such an obvious and cynical misrepresentation.
12/11/2009 at 19:03 invisiblejesus says:

Actually, I just read Gorgeras’ writeup and he has a point, though “cherry-picked” is probably a poor choice of words. That screenie shows members in game, and it shows them on the day of the game’s release. Obviously that’s going to overrepresent the twats who went out and bought the game anyway without leaving the boycott group. The information presented isn’t exactly false, and personally I think the point is still well taken to some extent, but it’s not the whole picture.
12/11/2009 at 19:47 Taillefer says:

Writers are allowed to have a sense of humour.
12/11/2009 at 19:56 Gorgeras says:

I once stood on a box dressed as a chicken and proclaimed to all the people “Beware the lies that are not false!”. The King rebutted me “The lies that are nay false? What is the meaning of this?”. So I took off my dolphin suit and placed it in the box of hungry nations, begging me to get the UN to send food or if not, send them a UN so they can make the food themselves. They would only waste it on Ben & Jerry’s.

I took out the little piece of card, a bird on one side and bird in a bird-cage on the other, with twisted string tied at the edges. I closed the chest and left the hungry people to rot, the wretches. Royalty only understood magic and sometimes they even understood it wasn’t real and they were the most stupid royals of all. In a world where magic is real; the rational atheist and deluded mystic change places.

“I know this trick!” exclaimed the King, with an exclamation mark. “I won’t stand for this faggotry boy!!” he exclaimed with two. I didn’t betray my ignorance by asking how he managed to pronounce punctuation. I just showed him the trick; the one every child has seen: you twirl the string held out at both ends and the card spins: a bird on one side, a cage on another. A caged bird. The King was furious “you show me nothing” he insisted “but that trick which is known to me”. “It’s not what I’m showing, but what I’m hiding” I said. “What?? What are you hiding? You don’t have hungry nations stashed somewhere or anything?” which I thought a tad too interrogative, I might have to steal his kingdom, put it in a box and let it go hungry. “No your majesty” I said “Just my velociraptor costume in my chest and what I hold in my hands”. The King demanded I spin it faster as he looked closer and closer at the flickering bird and it’s cage.

“I see the bird” he said “yes” I replied”. “I see the cage” he said “yes” I replied. “But do you see the bird in the cage?” “Yes I see the feckin’ bird in the feckin cage!” he squealed. “Which one?”

“….”
12/11/2009 at 20:09 TeeJay says:

I just went and checked and there are currently 40-odd people in that group playing MW2, out of:

871 Members | 90 In-Game | 324 Online | 0 in Chat

Compare that with 46 in the RPS group, out of:

3,477 Members | 261 In-Game | 1,124 Online | 6 in Chat
12/11/2009 at 20:50 Gorgeras says:

Number 1: you don’t join a Boycott unless you seriously intended to buy the game in the first place. A boycott is meaningless if you never intended to get the game anyway. Hence, a boycott will be made up primarily of fans of the game. Comparing a group explicitly about the game to a group not about the game isn’t a fairer measure than before.

Number 2: *It’s the release day*.

12/11/2009 at 18:28 trillex says:

I bought MW2 despite not liking the direction they went figuring that you’d have to try it out before saying it’s shit.

So I did. It’s fun but laggy and I miss a community. :(

12/11/2009 at 18:29 Ralph says:

Online is really great the most online shooter fun I have had since the glorys days of old school CS. The Matchmaking systems is really good and nothing to worry about, It feels like a huge step up on cod4 and the people not playing just because of no dedicated severs are missing out and still playing a inferior game.

12/11/2009 at 18:37 goodgimp says:

Don’t make me cram a 360 up your analogical HDMI port, Ralph. ;)

12/11/2009 at 18:35 goodgimp says:

Thank you for summing up my thoughts of online boycotts / petitions in one succinct screenshot (and I’m *not* buying MW2 for the well known reasons).

12/11/2009 at 18:36 Mitthrawn says:

Remember too though that anyone can sign up for these groups. What probably happened is that a couple dozen tossers were invited into the group, joined, and then grabbed the game anyway. Steam groups mean very little, even less, I daresay, than internet petitions.

12/11/2009 at 18:37 Tiktaalik says:

I’m also very confused by how this is THE BIGGEST GAMING EVENT OF THE YEAR EVAR and I haven’t even heard of the game til last week. Clearly I’m not down with the kidz.

12/11/2009 at 18:45 IvanHoeHo says:

We are the crack whores that keep on giving.

12/11/2009 at 18:48 RC-1290'Dreadnought' says:

I’m boycotting this game untill it’s less than €20,-. It might take a year or two until they listen, but you will see they will go with my demands.

12/11/2009 at 18:49 suibhne says:

This is why we can’t have nice things.

12/11/2009 at 18:49 Psychopomp says:

Why do gamers have no fucking willpower?

12/11/2009 at 19:00 Gorgeras says:

Because those that do have it are treated like shit by those that don’t. The only choice then is to give in and go with the flow or become like me.

Like me!
13/11/2009 at 10:38 whalleywhat says:

Because our entire lifestyle is based on instant gratification and anything that defers pleasure for a greater purpose sounds good in theory but ultimately falls apart in practice.

12/11/2009 at 18:49 nihlus says:

That’s why I never sign online petitions cause I know 90 % of those that sign it are either fake or buying the product anyway.

I’m sure its a good game but it could be a lot better with dedicated servers.

12/11/2009 at 18:50 Tei says:

This will not invalidate the claim, or the petition. Sure there are some idiots out here, or people that may ask for support of feature Y, and buy the game anyway withouth feature Y. But It don’t make the claim false.
Is ridiculous and a /facepalm, but not much else.
The lack of dedicated servers is a buttet shot to the foot, and this will show on medium, long term. Some game are on a “new game” syndrome, and other are playing from USA where matchmarking probably almost work. On the long term a P2P MP game will show his ugly face. The BulletFoot effect will show in a fast decay, the dead of the MP part of the game, since withouth community, mods, or other motions, It will fall dead like a rock. Is not console games only played a few months/years, then most of then forget?

The evil side, the side of greed, corporativism, locked down interfaces and consoles, will never win the fight aganst the side of goodness, share stuff, open platforms, modding, communities and good pizzas.

12/11/2009 at 18:58 invisiblejesus says:

Well said, especially the bit about good pizza. :D
12/11/2009 at 19:25 Andrew F says:

Console games may only be played for a couple of months/years – I’m not sure why the developers should care, as long as the money is paid.
12/11/2009 at 20:20 TeeJay says:

*Some* developers actually want to make the best games possible (alongside making a decent amount of money). Not *every* developer simply reduces things down to “units shifted” regardless of how good or bad a game is.
12/11/2009 at 20:25 mandrill says:

Hear Hear Tei.

12/11/2009 at 19:00 MyLilPwny says:

Take a good hard look boys and girls…. remember these names, because if IW, Activision, or modding-coders give us dedicated servers.. this is your instant-ban list all nice and neatly packaged for you.

What a bunch of Uncle Tom’s crying about IW but doing it WHILE playing.

12/11/2009 at 19:03 Javier-de-Ass says:

yeah, I’m not boycotting it either. just don’t have any interest in it what so ever. bought mw1 and didn’t play it. hehe.

but yeah, this is absolutely pathetic.

12/11/2009 at 19:04 Chobes says:

You can always count on (CEKTA)MaDFun to keep fighting the good fight.

12/11/2009 at 19:09 Darth Nader says:

Really, what did you expect?

12/11/2009 at 19:11 Gpig says:

I’m curious as to how many of those people pirated it. I remember for CoD4 a lot of the people on my list playing it had pirated it.

12/11/2009 at 19:25 Paco says:

none is pirated, since it says “In-game” and if it was pirated it would say “In non-steam game”
12/11/2009 at 20:27 mandrill says:

Erm, yeah. That list is from Steam, which is probably the nicest anti-piracy measure out there. So what Pacos said.

12/11/2009 at 19:22 Paco says:

That’s sad and very funny at same time

I’m boycotting MW2 but not L4D2 and let me tell you why, and I’m making my best effort with my english…

- Valve is not a greedy company like Activision is, actually I bought L4D2 at 35 bucks and not 60!!
- Valve’s most important executives are not assholes like Bobby Kotick is, let’s say Gabe Newell, Doug L. etc.
- I was on the group boycoting L4d2 but the main idea were achieved and valve gave us a new DLC (a poor one I know, but better than nothing)
- Activision killed community with MW2.

Cheers!

12/11/2009 at 19:23 Hug_dealer says:

thats just sad :(.

This is exactly why it happen in the first place, IW knew that they could get away with turning the pc game into a port and peopl would still gobble up the horribly flawed multiplayer anyway.

12/11/2009 at 19:30 Redwinters says:

after checking for myself, almost all of these say “non steam game” thus are pirated copies.

12/11/2009 at 19:30 Fragman says:

Ditto (four?)

Also, I’m not buying it as I’m terrified of how the p2p system will work with my crappy Irish internet. Oh, and the price

12/11/2009 at 19:32 Krikey! says:

Fail on a bajillion levels.

12/11/2009 at 19:32 Feanor says:

I’m not buying MW2 because all the fun I had in CoD 4 multiplayer involved large scale games on lag-free servers.

12/11/2009 at 19:34 stormbringer951 says:

Nethack is better.

12/11/2009 at 19:49 Wulf says:

NetHack is brilliant, as is Noctis.

Procedural games need more love.
12/11/2009 at 22:54 ascagnel says:

Nethack is GOTY for every year. Bonus points: it works on my crappy cell phone, Macbook, and AWESOME PC OF THE GODS.

12/11/2009 at 19:37 Torgen says:

Good thing IW doesn’t allow dedicated servers, else people would be cheating

12/11/2009 at 19:50 PHeMoX says:

I think boycotting didn’t turn out useful with Left 4 Dead 2 either and Activision sure as heck won’t fly people over to convince them.

12/11/2009 at 19:37 Turin Turambar says:

I think the average CoD player doesn’t even know the meaning of the word “boycott”. I suppose they believe it means “to complain” or perhaps “to show displeasure”.

12/11/2009 at 19:38 Mac says:

nobs and mugs – the lot of em

12/11/2009 at 19:42 mbp says:

I give up

12/11/2009 at 19:46 Tyshalle says:

I’m renting this shit for the 360, because the single player will probably be fun, but in all seriousness I’ve never been hugely in love with CoD multiplayer and the single player games are always so damn short that it just doesn’t seem worth the price.

12/11/2009 at 19:56 Jad says:

While this Steam group is a BOYCOTT group and therefore this a fail, don’t take the same attitude towards the petition. I signed the petition, and I will be buying the game, because I read the petition carefully. It said nothing about a “boycott”, just that Infinity Ward should “reconsider” the decision to cut out mods and dedicated servers.

I will be buying the game because I am one of those “crazy” people who want it for the singleplayer, not the multiplayer. I played COD4 for the first time back in January, and it remains the most intense and memorable gaming experiences I’ve had all year. And I’ve played a bunch of great games this year. I don’t care that its only 6 hours long — I would gladly pay $60 for Portal as well — game length is not as important as game quality.

And for all of you saying “well I don’t care about this game” or “I’ve never heard of this game” or “I’m too busy playing Game X” in every Modern Warfare 2 thread — you’re beginning to sound kinda childish. You’re not special, and you’re not adding much to the discussion. There *are* people who care about these games — let them talk about the game in peace. There are plenty of games posted up on here that I don’t care anything about, but I don’t waste your time and mine telling you that, unless I also have something substantive to say.

13/11/2009 at 00:26 Shalrath says:

“and it remains the most intense and memorable gaming experiences I’ve had all year.”
Out of curiousity, and I’m being serious here, which never-ending-respawn-of-enemies part of the game was ‘intense and memorable’? I remember the street one, the building one, and the sniper one, but none of them was particularly intense, but I guess it’s memorable in that I can see myself sprinting to the x on the floor that prevented further enemy spawning in each of those locales.
13/11/2009 at 01:35 Jad says:

I’ve never had the antipathy to the re-spawning enemies thing that everyone else seems to have. Its a gameplay conceit, and one I’m quite used to, having played the previous COD games quite a lot.

I feel like its almost the reaction I have when playing a point-and-click adventure game: I’ve played so many of them that grabbing everything that isn’t nailed down and combining every item with every other item feels instinctive and natural, not gamey and illogical. Just like it feels natural combing every dead body for vendor trash in an RPG or moving towards the obvious story trigger points in a Half-Life game, etc.

In COD games, I find myself falling into a rhythm: crouch behind cover, shoot a bunch of guys, sprint to the next cover, shoot more guys, etc. The “cross line X to move on” thing didn’t seem forced or problematic unless you decide to buck the gameplay the game is trying to pull you towards — that is, if you just park yourself in one spot and refuse to move*. Which to me is like refusing to combine items in a point-and-click adventure game — you might as well not play one.

Also, what the respawning enemies design does is force me out of my standard mode of play, out of my comfort zone: I tend to be a sniper. I recently played Crysis, which has a suit with all these modes for in-your-face action — strength to grab exploding barrels and launch them at enemies, super speed to get right up to people and punch the building down around them. Yet I found myself spending vast amounts of time slowly sneaking forward, binoculars, sneak forward, see tiny dot in distance of enemy, snipe enemy, cloak & run away, do it again. Amusing for awhile, but eventually I grew bored and had to basically force myself to take the more aggressive approach. COD does not allow you to play that way, you have to keep moving forward, aggressively, into danger.

I’d talk about what parts actually did make the game memorable to me, but I’ve already written an essay about the respawning enemies thing and I’m tired now. If you’re actually interested maybe I’ll write more later.

* or if you’re playing on a too-high difficulty level, which is a mistake I think a lot of people make. Veteran is not any fun unless you’ve already totally memorized the game. I will also admit that there are a couple of places where the easy rhythm I described above breaks down because the signposting of where-to-go is not obvious; the most blatant of which is the TV station, which I know is what killed the game for a bunch of people. They needed a bit of that Valve-style constant playtesting there, I think.

12/11/2009 at 19:56 Brian says:

Please interview some of them. I would love to make out (in between the racial slurs and insulting my mother) where they’re coming from.

It really is pathetic how people are giving into activision.

12/11/2009 at 19:58 PleasingFungus says:

That is pretty magnificent. (Note that most of these people are playing it as a Steam game, and thus probably not pirated. You have to get Steam games legitimately to play them online, yes?)

12/11/2009 at 20:03 paddytehpyro says:

MW2 makes me cry at night. I love (still) CoD4 MP. Especially the bigger 32 and even 50 man servers. It was one of the few FPSs I have played online that, imo, is balanced. And was great fun in TDM, sabotage, domination S&D and all the others. I and 5 others would often play CoD4 in the evening chatting over skype. Always picking the one or 2 servers that we always played on as they had the options we liked. When I first heard it was going to be on steam I thought great. Love the steam server browser and fiends lists. And VAC isnt too bad. Still helps to have server admins but still, picks up alot of people. Then the rest of it started to appear…

MW2 seems to be the same MP as CoD4(Great) but limited to P2P, shoddy host mitigation and only 9v9 AT MOST! (Not so great…).

All I can hope is they fix it before people figure out out to make MW2 run reliably on dedi servers with cracks and other stuffs.

12/11/2009 at 20:05 Captain Obvious says:

You idiots do know that most pirated copies still use steam to play….therefore all of these people could be playing pirated copies. Way to over react…this site is a joke.

12/11/2009 at 20:07 Psychopomp says:

“Excuse me while I plant my foot in my mouth.”

Fixed that for ya’
12/11/2009 at 20:10 invisiblejesus says:

cool story bro
12/11/2009 at 20:13 Dominic White says:
12/11/2009 at 20:29 Taillefer says:

And I’m boycotting Nestlé products by stealing Kit Kats.
12/11/2009 at 20:53 Mithrandir0x says:

@Captain Oblivious: Obviously, sir, you don’t know what you’re talking about.
12/11/2009 at 23:04 bleeps says:

Pirating Modern Warfare 2 still isn’t boycotting Modern Warfare 2, genius.
12/11/2009 at 23:43 Down Rodeo says:

Captain Obvious Troll is obv….
obvious joke shouldn’t have been made :(

12/11/2009 at 20:07 cliffski says:

This is fucking hilarious. Excellent link

12/11/2009 at 20:23 Danarchist says:

Mocking guys like these scrubs is pretty much the same as throwing rocks at the retarded kid. The few of them that can actually comprehend words above 3 syllables (or even what a syllable is) are already so depressed by their lack of purpose in life its just pointless.

12/11/2009 at 20:25 Heliosicle says:

sure i gave into the big evil activision machine

watchagunnadoaboutit?

i want to play the game, and thats what matters to me…

12/11/2009 at 20:27 suibhne says:

In all seriousness, this is more sad than funny. With an eye to long-range trends in the PC game market, it’s much more important to take a stand against IW for MW2 than against Valve for L4D2. (Which is to say, it’s important period, since there was no far-reaching relevance to the L4D2 boycott.) I sincerely wish that IW would end up feeling real pain over its arrogant dismissal of best practices for PC games, but this is yet another reminder that the game will be a super-mega-ultra success no matter how much noise is made by gamers and journalists.

12/11/2009 at 22:49 Gorgeras says:

You’re going to have to help me here, because so far every rationalisation I’ve heard from people who support protests about the dedicated servers for MW2 and were utter twats about the L4D2 ones completely smell of ad hoc justification.

Looking at various different reasons for why they are supposedly issues miles apart, one deserving of support and the other deserving of all the ridicule and bias that was heaped on it, I am not the slightest bit informed about what standards people set, if any. I could not ever predict what possible future issues they would take a stand on and what they would dismiss.

Some of us stood like a rock over Left4Dead 2, are still doing and are going to keep doing so and will get nothing but shit and ignorance from people for it. But the protests over Modern Warfare 2 have had a very easy ride and I don’t understand why. Nothing has been explained.
12/11/2009 at 23:17 Jeremy says:

I think both boycotts are kinda pointless because these companies will still make millions and these boycotts will feel like a slight breeze on the backs of their necks. For every 1 person boycotting it, 5 new gamers just became fans. Unless you’re just doing it on principle, in which case, good on ya. IW doesn’t owe 1% of gamers anything, least of all me, and maybe that’s cynical, but I would like to think that’s just business. I don’t want to play a game without dedicated servers, so I don’t.

My principle is this: without dedicated server support, the multiplayer is useless to me (unless proven otherwise), so I don’t buy it. Not so much a boycott as it is a setting up of priorities for my gaming habits and following through. We can complain, we can be upset, but why? There are a ton of games that are available for any platform, if it doesn’t affect 99% of gamers, then what are we fighting? Should I begin by trying to prove to others that dedicated servers are better, and then start a petition? I do understand the complaint, getting rid of dedicated servers is completely stupid in my opinion, but only for PC, which is why the game will not be purchased by me. But think about it, most gamers play on a console these days, and of those that don’t, only a small percentage are “boycotting” the game (as in, I’m mad, but am still buying it anyway). So, have they even lost any sales? Now add the percentage they just gained from the hype machine and this is the most successful game of all time.

What reason do they have to change? If I made a game, would I cater to the smallest percentage to make them happy?
12/11/2009 at 23:42 Gorgeras says:

You’ll excuse me if I don’t think feedback should be left to the lowest common denominator.
13/11/2009 at 05:39 Jeremy says:

Well, I think the point I’m making is that we are the lowest common denominator.
13/11/2009 at 06:46 abhishek says:

That superiority complex that these ‘hardcore pc gamers’ have is one of the biggest problems for the platform.

12/11/2009 at 20:35 int says:

That is funny. Hah!

12/11/2009 at 20:36 Tworak says:

I’m confused. so because they’re playing mw2 they DON’T want dedicated servers?

12/11/2009 at 20:37 int says:

“A boycott is a form of consumer activism involving the act of voluntarily abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with a person, organization, or country as an expression of protest, usually for political reasons.”

-Wikipedia

12/11/2009 at 20:39 jonfitt says:

Are boycott breaker ‘Scabs’?

12/11/2009 at 20:40 Out Reach says:

this made me lol in real life.

12/11/2009 at 20:50 Brad Grenz says:

Very funny. I also like the subtle irony of people using Steam’s community creation feature to complain about the Steamwork’s game most of them are currently playing not being able to foster a community.

12/11/2009 at 21:01 TheSombreroKid says:

there’s 800 people in that group how many are playing the game?, how many of those payed for it? they do take boycotts seriously just not that seriously, if they had 1 million signatures they’d've caved, 100,000 an’t enough.

12/11/2009 at 21:02 Alan Au says:

I think it would be funnier if they set it up so that people who signed the boycott couldn’t actually play online.

12/11/2009 at 21:14 Sym says:

The thing I find the most amusing will be all the people that are so “this is the bestest PC game evar” will be all the ones crying a few months from now when a map-pack comes out and you have to drop more cash to download it or you’ll be the only one playing the old boring maps. Do you like being nickel and dimed?

I signed the petition – I didn’t buy it – and if I do someday want to play the 4 hr SP game, I’ll torrent it…and I’ll seed it. And nothing matters beyond that to me – my money will go to a company that supports PC gaming.

12/11/2009 at 21:16 rocketman71 says:

Pathethic. But not exactly surprising.

12/11/2009 at 21:45 Jorlin says:

How sad…
All those younglings that cannot resit the dark side of the force… is this our future?

12/11/2009 at 21:58 Radiant says:

I played some mw2 multiplayer last night on the 360.
Some kid made monkey and chicken noises for 30 minutes straight non stop over the voice chat.

Unfortunately he was also the top scoring player in every round.

12/11/2009 at 22:04 Radiant says:

I guess what I’m saying is that actual sentient human beings are no longer top of the food chain.
We’ve managed to create a sub species that will eventually overwhelm out eat and out pace us for the win.

We’ll have to live in the sky in airships and our downfall will be that we were smart but not smart enough to create enough foods that fly.
13/11/2009 at 01:44 Starky says:

It’s fine, I’m an engineer and come the xbox-tard (zombie?) apocalypse I’ll jury rig some kind of automated plankton and/or algae extractor.
I’m sure that the biochemists in our flying cities (or more probable floating in the middle of the Atlantic) can manage some kind of processing in order to make it digestible for us. Or at least plan it and then look at us engi’s utterly confused and helpless when it comes to actually building it practically.
13/11/2009 at 03:07 Bret says:

Of all the things for Mike Judge to be right about…

12/11/2009 at 21:59 Megamaj says:

I lol’ed. I played CoD4 for the single player, and I might play this game for the single player, and I’m glad I won’t have to cope with those guys in multiplayer. :)

12/11/2009 at 22:09 Jonathan says:

While I’m sure that there are tons of whiners who said they were going to boycott the game who ended up buying it, I don’t know if pointing to a boycott group where 0.04% of the total group is currently playing the game is big evidence that the boycott is a failure.

More interesting to me is that, at least in terms of revenue, Torchlight outsold all the MW2 preorders on Steam. That makes me really happy, because Torchlight is amazing.

12/11/2009 at 23:09 Baris says:

You know, I’m trying to take your argument seriously, but if you just look closely at the picture, you’ll realise that it hasn’t been handpicked in any way. If you go onto the group page, that’s what you see.

12/11/2009 at 22:11 We Fly Spitfires says:

LOL yep :) Gamers are too addicted to do anything but moan on forums :)

12/11/2009 at 22:23 Vadermath says:

Bah, it’ll probably end like the L4D2 one, but with a lot more rage. And IW is certainly mocking the PC. I mean, I’ve read an interview with them, in which the following question was asked;

“Ignoring IW.net, is the PC version a direct port of the console version?”

D’ya know what their answer was?

“Mackey-IW: No, PC has custom stuff like mouse control, text chat in game, and graphics settings.”

12/11/2009 at 22:40 Paco says:

yeah, they are totally prick, and Bobby Kotick (CEO activision) the most, if it were for him the price would even higher (said by himself)

12/11/2009 at 22:27 Praz-el says:

L4d2 is actually a good game, it plays totally differently from l4d. Valve looks like it came through on making the game a lot better and changing everything

12/11/2009 at 22:33 Ceebux says:

Anyone else remember not buying games and just not telling anyone about it? And getting on with things?

12/11/2009 at 22:40 Azazel says:

Speak not such thoughts – that way does madness lie!

12/11/2009 at 22:55 Vinraith says:

Further proof that people that can’t stick to their principles should just shut the hell up, they make the rest of us look stupid by association.

12/11/2009 at 23:13 Alexander Norris says:

It’s not like people have any fucking clue what a political conscience is these days.

12/11/2009 at 22:57 Shnyker says:

/facepalm.

Caught green handed.

12/11/2009 at 23:04 Railick says:

yuck yuck yuck.

I will not buy MW2 no matter what! Of course, there is the small fact that my computer can't play it, I can't afford it even if I did want to buy it, I have to many games already to play and seriously can't add another to them or I will physically create a black hole in my computer room that will tear apart the earth, ect. So I don't really count for a boycotter I'm just poor in every way (time/money/will power)

I played the L4D2 demo and feel a bit more for Vinraith's camp then before, it isn't really a diffrent game at all :( Sure it has diffrent locations and diffrent monsters ect but these are the sort of things you find in expansions all the time. I'm not saying I'm totally for L4D2 boycotters but I can see their point of view as I can the MW2 boycotters point of view. Both parties have some silly people in them though making the rest look bad. such is the case with any large group of angry people though some people join a group of angry people just so they can be angry.

12/11/2009 at 23:08 Jorgen says:

Eh… These people are just hopeless.

Guess we can expect even more crap from devs with PC games then, huh? Higher prices, less features, dumbed down experiences and all. Great! Something to look forward to…

12/11/2009 at 23:17 Ed says:

This is just like those people who call themselves vegetarians yet eat fish and chicken.

12/11/2009 at 23:24 Jonathan says:

Oh, I know it wasn’t handpicked at all, and I’m not trying to insinuate that (and I hope it didn’t come off that way). Seeing the screenshot made me curious, because it sounded like a huge majority of the group was playing the game, so I actually went to look at the group itself to see how many people were playing the game.

My point is that while the screenshot is funny and highlights a few people who are obvious hypocrites, pointing to it as “evidence that boycotts fail” seems a bit ridiculous given the extremely low percentage of people it represents. When I checked, out of the entire group, 0.04% of the total members were playing the game. I’m sure a whole bunch more in the group will go on to play it, and I wouldn’t be surprised the majority of people boycotting the game end up buying it anyway, but seeing this screenshot plastered all over the internet like some killer piece of evidence is weird to me.

That said, I have no idea if this “boycott” will be successful or not, and I don’t really have any vested interest in if it does or doesn’t as it doesn’t affect me in any way.

12/11/2009 at 23:42 Taillefer says:

It’s not meant as boycott failure evidence; that evidence will simply be simply whether anything changes or not. This is just as you said, a humorous way to highlight a few hypocritical people so we can laugh for a few moments and feel good about ourselves.
12/11/2009 at 23:42 Taillefer says:

Too simple.
12/11/2009 at 23:44 Wilson says:

I see what you mean, but really I think this kind of screenshot is just a way of pointing out that causes like boycotts often get a lot of people who sign up and make noise, but won’t actually go through with it. I don’t think anyone is saying boycotts will never work and everyone who signs up to a boycott is an idiot (there are clear issues with both L4D2 and COD:MW2, though I wasn’t personally bothered by any of it myself, I can see why people would be).

There is also humour there as you pointed out, which I feel is the main point of this post. I think (hope) most people are aware of the things you’ve mentioned and everyone else has brought up regarding taking stuff like this as evidence and the weaknesses of internet style boycotts and signature campaigns.
12/11/2009 at 23:44 Wilson says:

To clarify, I was replying to Jonathan’s post.

12/11/2009 at 23:27 Adam says:

This is what I said when L4D2 Boycott steam group was create. I bet Valve being Valve will use the stats of how many people who joined that group bought L4D2 as a PR stunt.

13/11/2009 at 03:54 Gorgeras says:

Gabe Newell already has, without actually releasing the data. He went down another notch in my book. I was only ever intending to get angry about L4D2 and leave it at that and continue supporting and buying Valve’s games. It’s getting harder to take that view now.

13/11/2009 at 00:19 DMJ says:

Ah, the MW2 “I’ll buy it, but I’ll harbour deliciously rebellious feelings of resentment” campaign is off to a great start I see.

13/11/2009 at 00:31 JimmyJames says:

Wouldn’t surprise me. What I would like to see are stats on how many people who owned L4D bought L4D2.

13/11/2009 at 00:34 JimmyJames says:

Wouldn’t surprise me. I would be curious to find out what percent of people who owned L4D bought L4D2 after a week or two of release.

13/11/2009 at 00:49 NykO18 says:

Actually, I wrote a script a few days ago whose only goal was to parse all the profiles of the people in the Boycott Left 4 Dead 2 group. I excluded private profiles and made a ratio. There was only 3.5% of all this people who bought the game. Looks like they’re taking it a bit more seriously, for the moment…

13/11/2009 at 01:00 Dante says:

Or at least those that changed their minds had the decency to leave the bloody group.

13/11/2009 at 00:49 Donkeydeathtasticelastic says:

Man, if I was a boycotter I wouldn’t half-arse it.

I wasn’t 100% sure on getting MW2 as is, and the lack of dedicateds was basically a giant middle finger. But seeing how the campaign is cheesy as fuck from what I read (hell, I thought /v/ were trolling the first time I read the synopsis) I really have no interest for it anymore.

It’s kind of sad how this will basically tell everyone else that they can get away with shit and still have people play.

I was kind of annoyed about L4D2, on the other hand, but so far they haven’t done anything dickish apart from maybe release a sequel too early. I’ll probably still be waiting on the reviews and Christmas for it, though.

13/11/2009 at 01:02 Dante says:

Yeah, I never touched the CoD4 multiplayer, so I honestly don’t give a damn about dedicated servers, but the price gouging? And the fact that they appear to have turned a single player story with a realistic, gritty depiction of war into a cheesy action movie?

Yeah, that can fuck off.

13/11/2009 at 00:50 NykO18 says:

Yeah Ok, I was bored.

13/11/2009 at 01:12 Some Guy says:

But surely with the console sales, all a boycott would achieve anyway would be the publishers deciding the PC market wasn’t worth it. Also: People going “I’m so pissed off, I’m going to pirate it, that’ll show them”

13/11/2009 at 01:39 Nero says:

Damn weaklings. I know I will never buy this game because I don’t want to support the things they’ve done with it.

13/11/2009 at 01:39 EBass says:

To be honest I don’t really know how this game has got the hype it has.

The first CoD was one of the best games of its day, the second kept the formula but built it up into a cinematic masterpiece. The Fourth pretty much did the same but in a different setting. MW2 is the same as the fourth except the plot is worse and the price is higher, apart from a few new weapons NOTHING IS DIFFERENT, hell they’ve reused 90% of the animations from CoD:4.

The basic gameplay of this series was tired by the time the fourth came along, now its just a dead horse.

This has made me far more sad than angry, “The Man” always wins. But I ain’t buying this shit.

13/11/2009 at 02:59 Simon says:

I forget where, but someone from ID Software (Carmack?) said “Great that IW ditched dedicated servers first, so we didn’t have to pioneer into the ensuing shitstorm. Now we’re just following behind in the clear path. ” – talking about Rage not having dedicated servers.

13/11/2009 at 04:04 DaCarmax says:

@Simon

http://weblogs.variety.com/the_cut_scene/2009/11/dedicated-servers-and-rage-news-you-probably-dont-want-to-hear.html

“It’s not cast in stone yet, but at this point no, we don’t think we will have dedicated servers,” he says.


Infinity Ward made the same decision for “Modern Warfare 2” and has been facing a massive backlash among its fans. The inevitable online petition has gathered over 183,000 signatures and even the developer has acknowledged the backlash.
“Modern Warfare 2” will use a matchmaking setup powered by IWNET for online play. It’s too early to say what Rage will use, but Carmack indicated he believed the servers are something of a remnant of the early days of PC gaming.
That said, he realizes the affinity many PC gamers have for them – and is glad “Rage” won’t be leading the charge away from them.

“The great thing is we won’t have to be a pioneer on that,” he says. “We’ll see how it works out for everyone else.”

The thing is, Rage’s focus is on single player with 4 – 8 player multiplayer like Doom or Borderlands.

13/11/2009 at 04:10 thefanciestofpants says:

I’m facepalming at the speed of light

13/11/2009 at 05:06 The Tingler says:

Yay him!

13/11/2009 at 05:13 Egoh Rtut says:

That is awesome and shows what spinless pussies most gamers are. They whine and crow, but don’t have the integrity to deny themselves.

Jackasses. (Proud L4D2 boycotter. Suck my unit, Valve.)

13/11/2009 at 09:16 Tei says:

The world is divide betwen these that want freedom ( elitist?) and these that are perfectly free with locked down interfaces. And you choose to blame these that want freedom, but I say that these that accept the lack of freedom sould also to be blame. No man sould accept the level’s of DRM that a videogames console support, is just WRONG on all levels, that you can’t install your mods on your console, that Microsoft dictate from his HQ what you can and can’t run on your console.
13/11/2009 at 12:33 Malibu Stacey says:

Make sure you land on something soft when you fall off your high horse Tei
15/11/2009 at 06:32 Spacewalk says:

The soft bodies of console gamers?

13/11/2009 at 05:45 Wally Kockenhiemer says:

This whole MW2-PC thing has really opened my eyes to why PC gaming has been in steady decline. The sense of entitlement PC elitest gamers think they deserve is absolutely ridiculous.

PC Gamers demand it all, and they demand it be free. I have no idea why developers are turning their backs to these types of people. The PC gamers, themselves are digging the PC gaming grave and their elitest attitudes towards those outside of their little community make them very hard to feel sorry for.

The PC Gaming Elitest Creed: Give me, give me, give me…AND GIVE IT TO ME ALL RIGHT NOW.

13/11/2009 at 05:49 MultiVaC says:

What does “sense of entitlement” have to do with anything? All people are asking for is the basic set of features that the last game had.
13/11/2009 at 05:49 Jayt says:

What part of wanting dedicated servers is being elitist? And calling MW2 PC gaming elitists at all is almost laughable. They are the mainstream/console version of PC gaming
13/11/2009 at 08:46 Heliocentric says:

When people talk about pc gamers sense of entitlement i’m right there nodding.

But what the hell are you talking about. These guys dropped from the protest, and even the still boycotting people are simply refusing to buy a product which doesn’t meet their standards.

Asshat.
13/11/2009 at 10:04 Azazel says:

When elitism is outlawed, only outlaws and Quakeworld players will enjoy elitism.
13/11/2009 at 17:03 Psychopomp says:

How does Kotick’s dick taste?
13/11/2009 at 17:55 Sym says:

Elitists? Why because the largest argument for the boycott was no support for dedicated servers? Maybe this needs to be explained to you…dedicated servers are rented on a monthly basis by the players. And ALOT of people that continually play on those renters servers donate money to the Clan renting it to keep it going and show support. So the price of the game and sometimes upwards of $40-$60/month to rent a server…I fail to see your logic about getting anything free.

Arguing about playing the game illegally is irrelevant since all show up on any torrent site, and anyone with half a brain can make them work on consoles as easy as PCs.

You can pay for your game, and your content…and play on your subpar console that will be replaced in 2 yrs – and you can let people tell you how to play your game, who your going to play with and how many people you can play with. Congrats on that.

You probably also own a mac, and are one of the first hypocrites to yell at your TV over National Healthcare.
13/11/2009 at 18:00 l1ddl3monkey says:

I wanted dedicated servers as it reduces my chances of having to play a game alongside people like you.
14/11/2009 at 20:37 heartless_ says:

PC gaming isn’t in decline. Its the most profitable platform of all the gaming platforms out there. You just have to step outside of your box and realize that PC gaming isn’t just a few select elite games the way that consoles are. There is a lot more to PC gaming than the AAA titles.
14/11/2009 at 20:52 Vinraith says:

This kind of trolling is why internet message forums are in decline.

13/11/2009 at 06:06 MultiVaC says:

Oh, and let’s not forget the way Steam organizes members in groups. Members who are in-game all show up on the first pages, so all of the people who are playing a game will be on the same page. I’m looking at the group right now and there are only about 3 people in the whole 800+ member group playing MW2. Everyone past the first page is players who aren’t currently in a game, so when you see 15-20 people playing MW2 in that pic it’s most likely that it’s ALL of the players who are playing it in the entire group. There are 50+ pages of people, and all the players who are playing MW2 will be on the same page.

13/11/2009 at 07:09 DarthBenedict says:

I’ve found accusing people of having a sense of entitlement to be a way of trolling requiring zero effort and providing great results. This guy is probably trying the same thing.

13/11/2009 at 07:11 Bumsplikity says:

Good eye/brain. You win

13/11/2009 at 10:24 bloodypalace says:

Why? only 19/833 are playing that crap…

13/11/2009 at 10:42 Darth_Normandy says:

There are only 33 people playing so nearly 2 thirds of the active group are playing Mw2.

Im not a big CoD fan but i was planning on buying it until i found out there was no dedicated servers. I love playing mods and i have dial up so matchmaking really sucks balls for me.

13/11/2009 at 11:00 neems says:

Well I was fully signed up to the MW2 boycott (not in the steam group though, not sure how that would help)… and I now have the game. And it’s very good.

Yes I am a scab.

A large part of my gaming time is devoted to playing with friends, and my friends were playing MW2 and having a great time. So I bit the bullet, and in all honesty I’m glad I did. I was wrong, although I would still prefer dedicated servers.

13/11/2009 at 11:35 armlesscorps says:

I’m disappointed in RPS that this picture was posted with the title “why they don’t take boycotts seriously” and no more information than that. It gives the impression that all the boycotter’s are playing mw2 which they are not when you actually look at the steam group only a tiny number are, bit more information or a less sensational headline next time please Kieron.

13/11/2009 at 13:33 futage says:

It’s just a funny picture. Because, right, at the top it says “Boycott Modern Warfare 2″ and then, under that, there’s a screenful of members, playing Modern Warfare 2! That’s funny.

And now you’ll say “well the headline shouldn’t have said whine whine whine etc.”.

Ok, see, because it’s a funny picture, rather than, say, an exercise in scientific or statistical research, it doesn’t need to adhere to the rules of the empirical and formal sciences.

There are many such fields of human industry. Many fields of human endeavour which are not limited scientific method including such popular pastimes as “art”, “playing with stuff” and “having sex”.

This combination of images and pictures was none of those three things, you could perhaps call it a joke used for rhetorical purpose, but outside of that imagined scientistic world so many people think they inhabit these days, some things don’t even have or need names! It’s the land taxonomy forgot! It’s actually a land of which the make-believe-land-of-science is a subset! Science isn’t actually flat, it’s a sphere which orbits the bright and shining ball nuclear powered fun we call culture!

So these words and pictures in this arrangement, which I will call item-of-funny-picture-and-words-for-rhetorical-purpose-1 henceforth, does not claim to accurately represent the habits of all, or even a majority, of MW2 boycotters. It’s just a funny picture of a screenful of people, self-proclaimed boycotters, playing the self-same (the very self same) game they had sworn to boycott! Which, while not directly representative, is illustrative of the fact (or assertion of the writer, if you prefer) that boycotters of games usually cave. The image, you see, is not used as evidence or proof of this, it is merely an illustration, a signifier, an evocation.

You know that lobster telephone what Dali did? It’s not intended for actual use. And apparently Picasso’s models didn’t actually look like that. Robert de Niro isn’t actually a gangster, he’s just pretending. There’s probably no land over the rainbow (where one goes to weigh a pie). Snoop Doggy Dogg can’t actually turn into a Doberman. Brancusi’s towers aren’t actually endless. Crab sticks aren’t actually made of crab. It turns out there was no cake at all. Female Egyptian Pharaohs probably didn’t have beards. Smoking does actually make you look cool. Those photos of fairies, they were just pictures cut out of a book. Distant things aren’t actually less saturated, it’s just aerial perspective. And they’re not actually smaller either. Genesis is probably allegorical. Big girls do cry. There may or may not be a party like an S-Club party. McDonalds aren’t actually loving it. And Dame Edna has actually received no such honour from the Queen.

The world is full of filthy lies :(
13/11/2009 at 13:53 AndrewC says:

Research done has proven that there actually isn’t a party like an S Club party, though the report noted that the assertion only posits ‘similarity’ as the criteria under contention and not any qualitative measure. Many believe this renders the assertion highly disingenuous, but S Club Parties were indeed not like other parties because Bradley made these lovely vol au vants especially for them that had little smiley faces on the top made out of an upside down slice of mushroom and two bits of diced pepper for the eyes. Also they were better than Steps.
13/11/2009 at 13:58 futage says:

I defer to my learned colleague on the subject of the similarity of other parties to S-Club parties. You won me over with the vol au vents with faces (it has a ridiculous name for a foodstuff AND a face!).

Having said that, and noting that the only criterion considered was ‘similarity’, I would assert that while certainly ‘unlike’ an S-Club party, a B*witched party would be immeasurably better.

13/11/2009 at 12:15 autogunner says:

yeah after kotick comments on his vision for the future of the industry I was right up for boycotting MW2 on moral grounds, then I realised I didnt really care that much about the developers and I should just enjoy the games, and bloody hell its a fantastic game.

13/11/2009 at 12:39 TotalBiscuit says:

The pathetic apologism and caving-in I’m reading here is hilarious and also saddening at the same time. Really? You can’t resist buying a generic FPS? What are you, a child?

13/11/2009 at 12:49 neems says:

Some might say that it takes a bigger man to admit you’re wrong, and to change your mind, than it does to blindly stick to your guns.

Anyway it’s my money, I’ll do what I want with it :-)

13/11/2009 at 12:56 Quercus says:

To quote Trillex “I bought MW2 despite not liking the direction they went figuring that you’d have to try it out before saying it’s shit.

So I did. It’s fun but laggy and I miss a community. :(”

So why did you buy it then? Because if you miss a community, supporting this game by buying it backs IW’s stance and means (as we have already heard from Carmack) that other pro-console developers will leap on the bandwagon and stop providing dedicated servers because now they know they can get away with it.

As for saying you had to “try it out before saying its shit” – and then saying “it’s laggy”, well, tell you what, why not try leaping off a cliff to see if you can fly. Thousands of people over the years have advised against it and all evidence says it will be a stupid thing to do, but how do you know until you’ve tried it out for yourself?
Or maybe next time you could try listening to people and apply some common sense.
Why do you think PC Gaming moved away from peer-to-peer and towards dedicated servers for almost all FPS games in the first place? Precisely because dedicated servers are superior to client-based ones.
Nobody (except IW apparently) would even try to argue that this is not the case, so why is anyone surprised when you try replacing a good and working solution with a downgraded version of the same thing and feck me – it doesn’t work so well as it used to.

Enjoy your fun single-player game and see if you are still playing the multiplayer in six months.
I don’t mean to pick on you particularly, but anyone PC gamer who visits PC gaming news sites has nobody but themselves to blame for falling for the hype and bailing out IW.

Although I hate having to do it, I have stuck by my morals and will not buy this game, because I hate what IW have done (and the way they have done it) even more than I hate not being able to play a game I was looking forward to.

13/11/2009 at 13:26 C4Cypher says:

You can bet I dmn well feel entitled to get a certain level of product for a certain amount of my money. I paid 50 bucks for Modern Warfare, and I got my money’s worth, and then some. You want to kick up the price for a sequel that offers less of a product to me? I’ll still feel entitled … but that doesn’t mean I have to buy the game.

I’m a big beleiver in companies that work to build relationships with the customer … this is why I trust Valve with the Steam platform far more than I would if I were looking at Steam without the history of positive treatment and support that Valve has provided me for over the past decade. If a company demonstrates that it is not interested in delivering the quality I want … I won’t let my money go to them.

If it does so in such a manner that insults my intelligence … I’ll be more drastic. I don’t know what it would take to get me to buy ANY Activision product after hearing Bobby Kotic’s “plans” for his company, but the way things are looking now, I’ll also pass on Diablo III and Starcraft II.

13/11/2009 at 13:37 Harper says:

If being pissed that they took away BASIC features from an established franchise while RAISING THE PRICE makes you an elitist, then yes, I am a PC elitist.

I like getting my money’s worth from a game.

Goes back to playing Dragon Age: Origins

13/11/2009 at 13:47 Duckmeister says:

Am currently playing Call of Duty 4 on the “MW2 Boycott Server”, which, while it is unique in name, is not unique in the banners displaying the rules.

Half of the available servers for CoD4 have banners saying “Cancel your preorder Cancel your preorder” “You wouldn’t be able to find this server without dedicated servers”.

Like I said before, after reading that developer chat transcript, I am never buying anything from IW ever again.

13/11/2009 at 15:45 bobby davro says:

I have boycotted MW2, not by not playing it, just by not buying it. If theres no point to the MP, then a warezd copy for the SP will do for me thanks.

13/11/2009 at 15:56 thansal says:

This really doesn’t make me happy. However at least we will get an actual explanation out of Carmack as to WHY they are going this path. IW’s “Our customers are morons” didn’t really fly too well with me, and Carmack tends to be outspoken.

I freely admit I’m a Carmack fanboy, and despite my gut reaction of “well, this is gona suck” I still can’t help but think that there is a chance he could be on to something, and it might work out. I still hold strong reservations (simply put, No Admins == People Suck)

13/11/2009 at 16:13 Tei says:

What is really behind this “movement” to use P2P stuff?

It deliver worst pings and limit the number of players. It make the programming more complex, and make cheating easier. Hell.. the cheater could be the server, so you could be in hands of the cheater. If the server is CPU bound, it will add extra latency, that will convert any fiery battle into “bullet time”. If the server is network bound, everyone will “warp” everywhere, even If his internet conection is godlike.

Is not that you have to pay for people to host, on the PC there will exist people that will fight for the privilege to host in data centers. And time has proven, that people will still be hosting as ~20 years before ( QuakeWorld servers still playing the original 2forts map )

It could be that on the consoles you have to host for all the players, hence there are cost for C2S hosting, but only if your game must run for consoles. So a game that is “PC only” can be C2S, but a multplatform title, is cheaper to make it solely “P2P”.
But.. I am wrong? I has been wrong before, so can be.. but I don’t know what other reason for a inverior hosting system like P2P exist.

offtopic.
Also, please add a filter to Borderlands game browser, please, I have a level 40 lilith, and I would love to be able to play with some people my level, but all I see is lots of level 1 to 17 games, with a occasional level 50 game. Damn… the PC world perfected the game browser idea. please copy it to the console world!. kthanks!

13/11/2009 at 16:40 Ravenger says:

If IW.net was as good a feature as IW claimed then they’d have announced it well in advance, before most of the pre-orders were in. They’d want PC gamers on their side, and would have released have released a multiplayer demo, like they did with MW1.

Leaving it to a dev chat to reveal it just before release (after assuring that nothing had changed in a previous interview), then being evasive about other dropped features and dismissive of the PC gaming commutity didn’t do much to convince PC gamers of its merits. It certainly turned me from someone who would have pre-ordered the game from someone who won’t buy it until it’s less than £15 or so, just for the single player. (And I spent hundreds of hours playing MW1 online).

Anyway, I’m too addicted to Dragon Age: Origins – a true PC game in every way – to want to play MW2 at the moment.

13/11/2009 at 16:55 CaseytheBrash says:

I didn’t join any group or lend my virtual sig to anything, but I have refused to buy it and will most likely not ever buy it. So many things about this and the attitude IW/ActiBlizz had about it put me off long ago.

13/11/2009 at 17:00 Cooper says:

What I don’t get about the boycott is the entire focus on the lack of dedicated server, ignoring the other faults.

Namely that I can’t bloody well afford that much for a single game. Seriously, I’d only probably want to play the single player and running at up to a fiver per hour of game is just not on.

Think of all the beer that could buy.

13/11/2009 at 17:04 Nick says:

“Carmack indicated he believed the servers are something of a remnant of the early days of PC gaming.”

Much like himself.

13/11/2009 at 17:07 Psychopomp says:

Was actually thinking that myself. They haven’t made a great game since, what, Return to Castle Wolfenstein?

13/11/2009 at 18:06 Sneaklemming says:

They are all pirates

13/11/2009 at 18:35 Haggai Elkayam says:

Have you tried searching for “Boycott” on the Steam Community? I can guarantee a post-worthy screenshot you’ll want to publish.

14/11/2009 at 02:39 AllAboutTheBenjamin says:

Seriously this was taken on release day. Only 1 person online in that group playing the game come Friday night now that the hoopla has calmed down. Better measure of this without the irony is the IGN reader reviews which is currently averaging 1.9 out of 10 after over 900 reader ratings.

14/11/2009 at 04:00 Wowzer says:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQpcO8x6NNY

Wot’s wrong with kids these days?

15/11/2009 at 00:06 donmolo says:

It really doesn’t matter how many people play the game today. What matters is whether there is a community to play the game six months from now, and dedicated servers have always been at the heart of such communities.

What really stinks is that everyone knows this, even IW. It wasnt an accident that they gave us all the middle finger, they knew exactly what we were expecting. And while we can only assume that this was the more profitable course, its a damn shame that it meant ruining such a good game.

21/11/2009 at 03:42 Nep says:

Sorry for the very late reply. But I just had to reply to this.

I think you are either very young, or have never played a pc game. Or it could be both.

The reason that the PC gaming is in a decline is because more money can be made from consoles. Because people like you will pay for a map pack. Which PC gamers would normally get for free. Not because PC gamers are elitist and spoilt. But because if they charged money, nobody would buy it. The reason they wouldn’t is because of the great modding community. The same community that inspired many of the features in the call of duty series. That created these features for free. But now they have been cut off and stabbed in the back.

And to make it even more laughable. Microsoft even charge to create indie content for the 360…. If only console games would open their eyes and realise the pc gamers that are complaining are not being elitist, but using something called common sense!