More Black Ops Coming in May

An accidental flyer was posted this morning on Game Australia’s website revealing the next map pack for Activision and Treyarch’s Call of Duty: Black Ops. Titled Escalation, the map pack will be released on May 3 according to the flyer. An Xbox Live banner is also shown, hinting that it will be hitting Microsoft’s platform first, similar to the first map pack, First Strike. The flyer has since been pulled from the website, but you can see a picture of it below.

DLC Dating

Call of Duty: Black Ops: First Strike for the PC

The first DLC map pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops, First Strike, was released for Xbox 360 over a month ago. On March 3rd, it was released for the PlayStation 3. On March 25th, it will finally be released for the PC. The announcement was tweeted by Treyarch’s Community Manager Josh Olin this morning. You can pre-order the map pack on Steam now. First Strike will sell for Activision’s standard price of $15, but if you pre-order, you can save 10% and grab the four new multiplayer maps and new zombie mission for $13.49.

Today in Gaming

The Worst Game in the World

Fox News posted an article yesterday asking, “Is Bulletstorm the Worst Video Game in the World?” They quoted several psychologists talking about the game’s violence and its effect on younger audiences, even though clinical studies have been inconclusive. One psychologist was even quoted as saying, “The increase in rapes can be attributed in large part to the playing out of [sexual] scenes in video games.” However, according to the National Crime Victimization Survey, the per-capita victimization rate of rape has declined from about 2.4 per 1000 people in 1980 to about 0.4 per 1000 people, a decline of about 85%. Beyond the fact that their statements are false, Rock, Paper, Shotgun reached out to the three psychologists for follow-up statements, but only heard back from one. Billy Pidgeon, a video game analyst with M2 Research, was quoted as saying, “Games without sufficient quality of gameplay -- games that include highly objectionable violent or sexual content -- often pump up the level of this kind of content to gain media attention. This tactic typically fails, as can be seen in the poor sales performance of titles such as BMX XXX and Postal,” but that’s only about a quarter of what was actually said, check out the rest here. Bulletstorm follows all of the ESRB’s guidelines for both gameplay and marketing and to be labeled as worst game in the world by Fox will only help in its promotion. Keep up the good work Electronic Arts, Epic Games, and People Can Fly. Bulletstorm will be available for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC on February 22.

2010 VGA Picks

The list of nominations for this year’s Spike Video Game Awards was released today. After going through the list, it really reminds me of how much of a great year in gaming its been. While there are some obscure nominations (Danica Patrick as Herself in Blur for "Best Performance by Human Female”), generally all the nominations I agree with. So while these might not become actually winners, they are who I would choose.

Sometimes I wish I was a Console Gamer

I love being a PC gamer. The number of reasons why PC gaming is superb is more than just a handful, as opposed to what console gamers might suggest. Mouse and keyboard support is the most precise control on any system. The ability to switch DPI on the fly for sniping is invaluable. An analog stick on a controller just doesn’t match. High resolutions and true HD gaming are a standard for the PC. While consoles of this generation are just now approaching 1080p, resolutions of 1280x1024 and higher have been a staple of PC gaming since the early 2000s. The fact that resolutions range as high as 2560x1440 nowadays shows how far ahead PC gaming is in terms of computing power and graphics. The modding community is a strong sub-culture in PC gaming. Fans of many games have taken their existing architecture and used them to create new maps, weapons, items, or entire new games. Counter-Strike originally started as a mod for Half-Life, and it grew into a full fledge title. The number of mods that can be found for Unreal, Quake, Half-Life, Left 4 Dead, StarCraft, Fallout, and many more games show that while the shelf-life of a title is finite, the modding community can extend it’s prevalence to near infinite.

New Call of Duty: Black Ops Singleplayer Trailer is Intense

When you think of the Call of Duty franchise the first thing that pops in many people's head is multiplayer. So much so that the same logic is being applied to the new Medal of Honor, which released today. Multiplayer has been a huge feature for the series since its inception and it shows no sign of stopping with the introduction of Call of Duty points and wager matches in Call of Duty: Black Ops. Singleplayer, on the other hand, has had more of a throw away feel to it. Many of the narratives told in Call of Duty games are derivative, short, and don’t have much impact on the game as a whole. However, with Call of Duty: Black Ops, this may change. Treyarch released a singleplayer trailer last night and it shows a heavy focus on secrecy, deception, and playing the lone wolf in missions that have been stricken from the record. Call of Duty: Black Ops will be available for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC, Nintendo Wii, and DS on November 9, 2010.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Outsells Modern Warfare 2 in Pre-Orders, and in 3D

In November 2009, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, developed by the now shell of its former self Infinity Ward, set the pre-order record by selling nearly 3 million copies before its release. Day one says reached almost 5 million between the US and UK, generating $310 million in revenue and making it the biggest entertainment launch in history. The game went on to sell over 20 million copies worldwide and amass over $1 billion in sales.

But that was so last year. The newest iteration of the annualized Call of Duty franchise, Black Ops, is already shaping up to break records set by last year’s model. GameStop’s Senior Vice President of Merchandising Bob McKenzie told Gamasutra that the game is looking to overtake where Modern Warfare 2 was last year.

“GameStop is tracking to all-time, record reservations on Call of Duty: Black Ops. We are ahead of where we were with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 last year, which previously set the industry standard.”

Treyarch, who is developing Black Ops, also announced this week that game would ship with support for stereoscopic 3D for all platforms. VG247 had a first hand experience with the 3D enabled version, which you can read about here. A 3D TV and 3D glasses are still required, but it is a nice gesture for early adopters who have already invested in 3D technology for the home.

I haven’t played a Call of Duty game since 2003 when the first one was released, so I’ll be picking up Black Ops, though I’m not sure how close it will come to actually breaking Modern Warfare 2’s record-setting sales. EA’s reboot of the Medal of Honor franchise, being released on October 12, is sure to take some of Black Ops’ potential customers, but Call of Duty: Black Ops will surely reach high sales numbers. Whether those numbers actually beat Modern Warfare 2’s in the short or long term, is a toss-up.