By Craig Pearson on January 23rd, 2012.
I’m unusually fascinated by this video of Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision. He was the man who had to deal with Kotaku‘s massive scoop of Modern Warfare 3 information in May Last year. Immediately following the leak Activision released trailers of the game. It wasn’t coincidence: Activision treated the leak as the launch board for their marketing campaign.
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By Adam Smith on January 23rd, 2012.
The games journalism equivalent of binology involves scouring the job advertisements that developers post, seeking clues as to the content of future titles. Say Popcap were to exhibit a desire to hire a Masters degree wielding “actual unicorn-handler with three years experience of rainbow-wrangling” I would assume Peggle 2 was a glorious physical playground rather than a digital toy. That hasn’t happened, but a poster at NeoGAF spotted that Blizzard are looking to recruit a Franchise Development Producer for their “next-gen MMO”, with one of the main responsibilities being to “work with major consumer brands to facilitate product placement and licensing within the world of Blizzard Entertainment’s next-gen MMO”. Hmmmm.
By Adam Smith on December 16th, 2011.
A new dev diary for Prototype 2 makes it look more interesting than some of the previous tentrailacle-themed gorefests. The men who speak in it appear to have good ideas about both hunting and killing, and the kind of freedom on offer, even if it will eventually lead to bloody murders in every instance, is something I can imagine myself enjoying. It’s also worth noting that I don’t think I’ve heard a better quote from a developer this year than: “Someone just fell out the sky and landed on a guy and then ate him”. That comes complete with excited hand motions, as you’ll see if you join me below.
By Jim Rossignol on November 30th, 2011.
Seems like the Activision bossman thinks that Electronic Arts aren’t going to be printing spacebucks with their forthcoming Star Wars MMO, and said as much to his investors. As reported over here by Reuters, Kotick poured scepticism onto the up and coming MMO, saying: “Lucas is going to be the principal beneficiary of the success of Star Wars. We’ve been in business with Lucas for a long time and the economics will always accrue to the benefit of Lucas, so I don’t really understand how the economics work for Electronic Arts.” He went on to say “”If you look at the history of the people investing in an MMO and achieving success, it’s a small number.” And his company are, of course, one of that number, and must be a little nervous about possibly losing subscribers to the enormous Star Wars project. EA, meanwhile, claim that SWTOR will be a success if it hits just 500k subscribers, a figure that looks to be well within their reach.
By Jim Rossignol on November 19th, 2011.
Blue noticed that Radical have put out a trailer detailing their approach for New York in Prototype 2. The so-called “NYZ” will be far more detailed this time, with the city divided into three zones, allowing them to increase the visual fidelity and density of detail in the city. There’s loads from the devs and a bunch of game footage in the video, which I have posted below. It’s looking more and more promising.
(Echoes of a BLDGBLOG article wot I wrote.)
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Feel The Noise
By John Walker on November 18th, 2011.
Yes, this is a touch late. As you’ll know, Activision aren’t really ones for providing review code ahead of launch to the likes of us, and then by the time we had it to play, Skyrim was out. You’ll understand. But I’ve persisted, and now finished the campaign for the third of Infinity Ward’s Modern Warfare games, and thus shall tell you wot I think.
By Alec Meer on November 11th, 2011.
6.5 million copies in 24 hours. That’s the record-breaking figure Contemporary Combat The Third is celebrating today. Not only does this make it the fastest-selling videogame of all time, but one Robert Kotick, Esq observes that this means “Life-to-date sales for the Call of Duty franchise exceed worldwide theatrical box office for Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.” Only box office, so not DVD/VHS/Blu-Ray/Laser-Disc sales, but even so: wow. Ouch. Wow.
Oh, and Modern Warfare 3 made $400m in the space of that first day, beating prior record-holder CODBLOPS by some $40m. $40m? Pfft, I spend more than that on breakfast every day. That’s why I weigh 418 stone.
By Craig Pearson on November 8th, 2011.
We don’t have it, so we can’t do an unboxing. We weren’t even invited to the launch party, which we instead pretented to attend by huddling around Twitter and watching for tweets from those who were there, then reading them out in mock versions of their voices. But it would be remiss of us to not point out that Modern Warfare 3, which is not even on our Steam press accounts, is now out.
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By John Walker on October 25th, 2011.
There’s a launch trailer floating about – it’s been around for a few days now, but it’s still not out for another couple of weeks – for a game called Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. Whatever that might be.
By Adam Smith on October 17th, 2011.
I barely played the first Prototype, so when it comes to the sequel anything plot-related is a bit hazy. Angry men are killing each other with appendages they should not have, that much is clear, but what about the soldiers caught in the middle of it all? Do they deserve to be torn asunder? Judging by this latest trailer, they sure do, casually shooting defenseless animals and then snickering about it. And if you don’t want trouble, don’t hang around with a bunch of tanks and guns in a place called The Red Zone. Leave the weaponry at home and stick to The Mauve Zone, or even the pedestrianised zone, it’s hard to imagine all this mayhem going on there.
By Jim Rossignol on October 8th, 2011.
A big old Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 trailer appeared last night. It’s very exciting. I’ve posted it below. (Via Blue.)
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