Baftas: Black Ops and Bad Company 2 win awards
On Wednesday 16th March, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (or Baftas for short) held their annual video games awards in London.
Activision’s Call of Duty Black Ops was one of two of the most nominated games, with the second being that of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood.
Black Ops was nominated for half the available categories, but only managed to win GAME Award of 2010.
Battlefield Bad Company 2 was the winner of Use of Audio category.
With the overwhelming success of Treyarch’s approach to the outrightly awesome Modern Warfare titles by Infinty Ward, it’s surprising not to see more awards under Black Ops belt. Only having won an award based mostly on consumer thoughts and purchases, being that of the GAME award of 2010, isn’t something to complain about, but there were more engaging and polished games out there, like the overall best game winner Mass Effect 2.
Well, with the certainty that another Call of Duty title will be amongst us before the year end, maybe then can Activision reap the awards their beloved franchise most possibly deserves.
Let us know your thoughts below.
Black Ops: All time best seller
There is no denying that this was going to happen sooner or later with one of the Call of Duty titles. Black Ops however, has stolen the crown.
Although actual February sales figures are unknown, Black Ops became the best selling game of all time in U.S. history, having sold 13.7 millions copies since the game was released on November 9 last year.
The title had spent it’s entire top ten life at the top spot, which actually doesn’t seem that long since November’s release, would have been extended once the additional multiplayer maps, First Strike, was introduced. Not only that, Christmas was around the corner.
The previous top spot holder was Nintendo’s Wii Play, a title which launched back in 2006 with the console. This is a major feat, but also makes us wonder how many copies of Black Ops were sold in the rest of the world.
Not only this, it makes Activision’s next CoD game that ever more important if they are to top this. With Infinty Ward broken down since Modern Warfare 2, the next Modern Warfare instalment will be interesting. But it’ll be good to see some better competition with the likes of Duke Nukem and Battlefield 3 in the coming months. Lets see if they can do any better.
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Black Ops: First Strike now on PSN
You’ve not had to wait that long you PlayStation people, so you should now be fully complete with the release of 5 new maps.
Kowloon, Discovery, Berlin Wall and Stadium are the new, and fairly large multiplayer maps, with Ascension the also massive new zombies map.
With Black Ops being the PS3′s best selling title ever, this download should be picked up by all those hardcore CoD’er out there. For £11.49 from the PlayStation Network, and 1.4GB to download, you aren’t going to go wrong here, and it’s much needed extra life to a title many online gamers are getting frustrated with, so hopefully this will help ease the renowned CoD Rage.
Tell us what you think to the new maps below.
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Black Ops Demo available on Xbox 360 and PS3
Call of Duty: Black Ops has been available since 9th November. It’s sold and made millions. But that is not enough for Treyarch nor Activision.
Only today has Treyarch released a demo to further promote this mammoth of a game, on both Xbox Live and PlayStation Network.
It’s only a single-player campaign mission, but one of the finest. You start off in the cockpit of a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird. Yeah, that most advanced, strategic reconnaissance and Mach 3+ world record holding fastest manned aircraft. Yeah, you kinda fly it. With use of the Blackbirds sensors, you assist ground commandos through low visibility conditions as they progress towards a Soviet base, dodging convoys and killing enemies as they go.
This is a demo worth getting if you are yet to experience the excellence of Black Ops single player outing. So, leave your thoughts and comments of the demo below if you’re contemplating the full game. Or even if you have it and love the choice of mission selected for this demo.
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Black Ops: First Strike playlist, problems and ‘angry, entitled gamers’
With the release of the First Strike DLC map pack for the Xbox 360 edition of Call of Duty, the team at Treyarch have been doing the rounds to update everyone on what is happening behind the biggest-selling game around (in addition to sharing some stats). And three main topics have appeared:
First Strike, More Problems:
As you’d imagine, introducing DLC content to the world’s most popular game is always going to be challenging. First there were some problems reported which claimed to be affecting anyone trying to download the DLC via the Xbox 360 Xbox Live Game section (Not from within the Black Ops store, or via Xbox.com on the web). A support message was posted on the Xbox Live Support page but has since been removed, suggesting the problem has now been rectified.
Anecdotally, either the map pack or the resurgence in people playing yesterday, seemed to be causing significant connection errors – both in joining the Xbox Live CoD Black Ops server, and actually getting into a game, with several friends of FPSP, and our own team, all having problems in connecting and getting into matches. Hopefully this will ease slightly as obviously many people were logging on when they got home from work, for example.
And finally in the First Strike specific updates, it appears that a First Strike playlist has been added, due to comments and feedback from gamers who spent the entire evening trying to play on the new maps, only to be forced to endure the original maps as part of the playlist for every game type. Nothing better than paying 1200 MS Points for 4 new maps, only to spend an hour playing Arrary, Nuketown and Jungle! The original omission was from a claimed desire to avoid splitting the gamerbase (Despite the fact it would always by split by those willing to pay for new maps), but despite upweighting the First Strike DLC locations, it appears Treyarch have given in, and created a specific playlist for those just wanting new maps. From our own experience, the new maps were definitely appearing more often, but some maps appeared several times and others just once in the space of 2-3 hours.
The existing problems:
There’s currently no update on either the PC Theatre Mode problems, or the Playstation 3 connectivity problems which have been a major complaint since launch – despite patches intended to solve the PS3 issue, it appears to still be causing significant problems for a large number of gamers, and in the UK, an independent pressure group, Gamer Voice, has reported Activision to the Office of Fair Trading as Call of Dut:yBlack Ops is not ‘as described’ or ‘fit for purpose’ due to the following issues:
- Sudden disconnections from online multiplayer game sessions
- Inability to join servers that play host to multiplayer game sessions
- Freezing of PlayStation 3 console, forcing the user to reset it
- Main menu freezing as the game is started on the PC version
Angry, entitled fans:
In light of the above issues, it probably wasn’t the best time for Community Manager Josh Olin to claim ‘angry, entitled gamers’ and the social culture of videogames are the biggest problem with the games industry today. In a lengthy and interesting interview with NowGamer, he talks about a number of points before being asked to name the biggest problem with gaming and how to fix it.
‘I think the social culture of video games is moving in a more negative direction as technology and social media continues to grow. Rather than growing with it, the trend seems to be devolving. More and more gamers seem to forget what this industry is all about.
It’s a creative industry – the most creative form of entertainment in existence. Too many developers who try new things are getting burned by “pundits” and angry entitled fans who look to be contrarian, sometimes simply for the sake of being contrarian’
Whilst he may have been talking about developers who try radical new gamestyles or concepts, it’s all too easy to make the leap to ‘angry, entitled gamers’ owning Call of Duty and having connection problems with the radical new sequel to a series which began in 2003, and now has 14 PC, console and handheld titles in the franchise!
And while we wouldn’t try to claim gamers aren’t prone to air complaints about their latest purchase, it’s probably just the fact it’s more visible online than it was when a letter might get printed in a magazine a month later, and the rest of your complaints were just heard by friends and family…
Treyarch release Black Ops infographic: 1.1 trillion shots fired…
Call of Duty: Black Ops developers Treyarch have latched onto the current popularity of infographics by sharing various impressive stats in the image embedded below, including the fact that 1.1 trillion shots have been fired since Black Ops was released in November, 2010.
The number of online kills is currently nine times the total population of earth, and the game has led to 43 million user generated videos. Besides the impressive headline stats, the most interesting two bits of information for CoD players is that the top 3 guns are the Famas, the AK74u and the Galil (All of which I use), and the top 3 perks are Marathon, Sleight of Hand and Lightweight (I really should try switching to Sleight of Hand).
I suspect the fact that the RCXD is the deadliest killstreak is mainly down to the fact it’s a lot easier to achieve, and gamers are a lot more eager to bring any aircraft down with a well placed rocket. But the sentry gun is actually pretty low (I never find it particularly helpful), and the Valkyries are the least effective/used – which reflects the fact they’re pretty tricky to use effectively.
Click below for the full-sized infographic:
Black Ops nominated in Game Developers Choice Awards
Call of Duty: Black Ops has received two nominations in the prestigious 11th annual Game Developers Choice Awards, including becoming a finalist for the Game of the Year title.
It’s up against four top titles to be crowned Game of the Year, which pits it against Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar San Diego), Mass Effect 2 (BioWare), Limbo (Playdead) and Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood (Ubisoft Montreal). The Treyarch developed CoD is also in the running for the Best Visual Arts category, again fighting with Limbo, Assassin’s Creed: Bortherood and Red Dead Redemption, who are joined by God of War III (SCE Santa Monica).
The winners will be honored at the Game Developers Choice Awards show on Wednesday, March 2nd at the Moscona Convention Center, during the 2011 Game Developers Conference in San Diego.
The other FPS games in contention for awards are:
Halo: Reach (Bungie) and Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (DICE) who are in the Best Audio category (against Limbo, Red Dead Redemption and Mass Effect 2).
Fallout: New Vegas (Obsidian) for Best Writing – against Red Dead Redemption, Heavy Rain, Mass Effect 2 and Costume Quest.
Gamers hack medical computers as CoD server
An American radiology practice has revealed that hackers got into a server containing social security numbers and medical codes for over 200,000 patients – just to use the server bandwith to play Call of Duty: Black Ops.
Seacoast Radiology sent out letters to all affected patients after noticing someone had accessed an office server on November 12, 2010. The server contained patient names, phone numbers, medical diagnosis codes, procedure codes and social security numbers. But apparently there’s no evidence any of the information was misused, and an investigation claims the breach was likely to have been done by Scandinavian gamers looking for servers to run CoD:Black Ops.
We’re presuming the gamers had the Hacker perk equipped in their loadouts before trying this.
Would you buy a Call of Duty: Black Ops Jeep?
We might have bought Call of Duty: Black Ops at the midnight launch event. We may even have paid slightly more for the limited edition, considered special controllers and headsets, and worn CoD T-shirts. But even we’re not quite sure about buying the $30,625 (two door) or $33,500 (four door) 2011 Jeep Wrangler Call of Duty: Black Ops Edition.
To try and convince us, the Jeep Wrangler gets mineral grey allow wheels with 32-inch off-road tyres, Mopar taillamp guards, Mopar fuel door, and a blacked-out exterior with Call of Duty:Black Ops logos on the roof and front quarter panels.
But it’s up against tough competition, considering movie prop and special effects experts Weta once created a life-sized Halo Warthog for a series of Halo short films:
The addition of the turret gun would definitely make it more suitable for commuting to work, although the open-air nature of the Warthog does mean a problem if the weather turns bad and you don’t wear Mjolnir armour on a daily basis.
