Archive for the ‘call of duty 4 modern warfare’ Category
Wednesday, April 1st, 2009
SOURCE: GAMASUTRA
Check out the most recent feature on Gamasutra.com where one of our lead designers and I discuss Achievements in games.
Achievements are “like a topping on a pizza,” explains Robert Bowling, community manager at Infinity Ward. They enhance the gameplay experience and reward dedicated players for their effort and skill.
That is why unlocking all the potential points in a Call of Duty game is such a grueling process. They are badges of honor — particularly achievements like “Mile High Club,” says Bowling.
In reference to the question, “Do you design the game first, then worry about achievements, or do you design around achievements from the start?” - Achievements are “like toppings on a pizza”, as to say they are purely meant to enhance gameplay, not determine it. You make the pizza taste fantastic with it’s core ingredients, then you work on how to enhance that flavor in the same way you make the core game great, then comes the process of adding the extras.
Only 2.8 percent of the 10 million Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare players who have ever logged into Xbox Live have earned the achievement, which is awarded for completing COD4 on veteran difficulty.
Achievements like “Mile High Club” should be rare — perhaps only one per game, Bowling explains. “It is one of the hardest achievements to achieve and you lose some of that weight when they are all that hard. It would be more frustrating than fun.”
Players, however, complained that the achievements in Call of Duty 2 were too difficult to obtain, says Call of Duty 4 lead designer Zeid Rieke. All but three of the 13 achievements had to be completed on veteran difficulty. So the studio compromised for COD4.
What are your thoughts on it?
Read more about what we said as well as input from several other great developers on Gamasutra.com - Unlocking Achievements: Rewarding Skill with Player Incentives
Tags: achievements, editorial, feature, gamasutra
Posted in achievements, call of duty 4 modern warfare, infinity ward, interview, video games, xbox 360, xbox live | Comments
Thursday, March 12th, 2009
Plain and simple. The guys from Tango Down Gaming are the shit and they’re not messing around when it comes to making requests for what they’d like to see in Modern Warfare 2. I just met up with Stang98k and Unwashedmass - two old friends and just a few of the members from the Call of Duty clan TangoDownGaming who are made up solely of players over the age of 25.
The guys stopped by the Infinity Ward studios today to say hey and drop off the impressive gift you see above. See what I mean about not kidding around?! Why you ask? Well, the included encoded note says they merely want to show their appreciation. Their true motives? I think it’s bribery to attemp to coax us into adding some sort of Capture the Flag gametype back into the game. I have to say, I AM quite susceptible to both flattery AND bribery!
In all seriousness though, we REALLY appreciate this guys. The mere fact you guys are so devoted to our games is enough, but when you go above and beyond like this it’s seriously humbling and I can’t tell you how much we appreciate it. This is awesome, and I am already proudly displaying it in my office.
The guys told me they’re going to be looking for more members, so if you’re a hardcore mature COD player looking for some fellow guys to party up with and play some games without the general annoyance that come with pub matches online, then hit up http://www.tangodowngaming.com
Tags: tango down gaming
Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, community, infinity ward | Comments
Thursday, March 12th, 2009
THANK YOU! - To everyone who took the time to show your support and vote for the GAME Award of 2008. I just got back from BAFTAs last night, and have had a bit of time to re-coup from the whirlwind trip. While there, we were lucky enough to walk away with THREE BAFTAs (Best Gameplay, Best Story / Character, GAME Award of 2008). A feat that is absolutely humbling. Most importantly though, the GAME Award which is the only award voted on by the players really meant a lot because it meant all of YOU took the time out to show your support for what we’re trying to accomplish here at Infinity Ward.
At the end of the day, it’s all about how the players feel when they play the game. We make these games for all of you, so awards voted on by the people ALWAYS carry a lot of weight.
That said, the entire trip to London was fantastic. I met a lot of great people and was floored with how friendly EVERYONE I met was. I left with a fantastic impression of London and it’s people and can’t wait to return in the not too distant future. Be sure to check out the BAFTA’s official site for a complete list of everyone who won awards and check out some of the videos.
Thanks again to everyone who voted, and of course to the Academy for everything.
Tags: BAFTA, call of duty 4, London, modern warfare
Posted in London, UK, awards, call of duty 4 modern warfare, infinity ward | Comments
Saturday, March 7th, 2009
I’ve booked a last minute flight into London / Heathrow Airport for Sunday night to attend this year’s BAFTA Awards (http://www.bafta.org/) which will be held in London on Tuesday the 10th. We were blown away on Feb. 10th when this year’s BAFTA nominations were announced and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was up for 8 AWARDS, including:
- Best Game
- Best Multiplayer
- Best ACTION / ADVENTURE
- Artistic Achievement
- Best Story and Character
- Best Gameplay
- Best Use of Audio
and last but not least the GAME Year of 2008 Award! While the rest of the awards are voted upon and decided by the British Academy, the GAME Award is the only one voted on by the players ( http://www.baftagameaward.com/ ). Of course, it’s a great honor just to be nominated in the British Academy awards and I’ll be in Londay by 7 AM Monday morning ready to show our appreciation if we’re lucky enough to win. If you’re in the London area, drop me a line and say hey. As always I’ll be twittering live from the award ceremony via @fourzerotwo on Twitter.
Tags: awards, BAFTA, call of duty 4 modern warfare, London, UK
Posted in London, UK, awards, call of duty 4 modern warfare, infinity ward, life, video games | Comments
Thursday, January 8th, 2009
If you’re not already addictively twittering, then I’m sure you’ve at least heard about it by now. As it’s hard to miss my personal account @fourzerotwo which is syndicated on the left-side of this blog. Twitter is a micro-blogging (140 character limit to be exact) service, which allows you to make quick and easy updates regarding “What you’re doing”, wherever you are. With the help of web and mobile apps like Twitteriffic on iPhone or TwitPic online, you can also attach photos and GPS coordinates to your updates.
Simple concept that seems to be oddly polarizing for people. Either you totally get it or you are completely boggled by it’s usefulness. I for one, LOVE IT. It was literally my life-line for the 3-something weeks I was on vacation with no access to a computer.
I kept tabs on the Gaza Strip Conflict via CNN’s Breaking News twitter @CNNbrk , stayed in tune with some of my favorite bands as they went through the recording studio, via Bad Religion guitarist and Epitaph Records head-honcho Brett Gurewitz twitter @OblivionPact (which led to the official Epitaph twitter being made @EpitaphRecs), and kept up on Gaming specific news among many site’s Twitter feeds, including @Kotaku.
In short, Twitter has personalized, summerized, and made the internet intimate again. Providing me 140 character bursts of information every minute, straight to my phone / email / other device of my choosing albeit the fact it also helped to further destroy my already limited attention span - but honestly, who needs one of those in this day and age.
While I’ve obviously been using Twitter personally for quite sometime, I’ve finally launched an Official Infinity Ward Twitter @Infinity_Ward this past week. Which I plan to update strictly with PR friendly updates, studio news, job postings, and some free DLC codes every now and again.
(Download a custom Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare twitter background here)
Essentially, if you’re not on Twitter yet, you should be. As it’s quickly becoming THE place to source exclusive and raw news regarding just about anything, as well as giving a voyeurtastic look into the personal lives of just about anyone you could imagine, from @MCHammer to more gaming note-worthy @djaffe .
The big reason I mention it though, is because Twitter (specifically @fourzerotwo and @Infinity_Ward) are going to play a key role in getting quick and raw updates regarding the development of our future games. As I can easily update them with info, news, and even photos from anywhere I am at anytime. While @Infinity_Ward will be focused on top-level news, @fourzerotwo will be chockfull of a more personal look and more in-depth details throughout development of our future games.
So try it out, go to Twitter.com, sign-up, and start tweeting. You’d be surprised by the people who are interested in listening or the amount of people you’d be interested in following. To get you started, here are just a few of the people I find interesting to follow:
CNN Breaking News - @cnnbrk
Brett Guerwitz of Bad Religion / Epitaph Records - @OblivionPact
Felicia Day of The Guild / Dr. Horrible - @Feliciaday
Amazon Game Deal of the Day - @amazongames
Valve Software - @valvesoftware
Naughty Dog for Uncharted 2 updates - @naughty_dog
Jeff Gerstmann of Giant Bomb - @jeffgerstmann
Kotaku - @kotaku
Just to name a few of the 107 I actively follow.
Update: Sam “QforQ” Houston posted a comprehensive list of all the video game companies and people on Twitter for you to follow. Pretty handy resource for those new to twitter. Check it out here.
Tags: blogging, infinity ward, twitter, updates
Posted in IW4, blog, call of duty 4 modern warfare, community, infinity ward, internetz, twitter, video games | Comments
Wednesday, January 7th, 2009
We decided to pull some numbers on Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare this past week, which Slothy (one of our coders) so graciously put into a perspective we can all relate to.
As of Jan. 3rd we hit 10,006,606 unique users who have ever played Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Xbox 360 and have connected to Xbox Live at least once after playing.
That number got us curious as to how many of those 10 Million+users finished the F.N.G. mission, or beat Airplane on Veteran (among other things). Well, it turns out:
71.1%, or 7,111,508 people have completed F.N.G.
That’s more than the entire population of Hong Kong (which is 7 Million).
68.8%, or 6,886,509 people have completed Cargo Ship.
This is the same number of adults in the US who were morbidly obese in 2005.
46.5%, or 5,654,643 people have beaten the game on any difficulty.
This is more than the current population of Finland!
2.8%, or 283,632 people have completed Airplane on Veteran difficulty.
The population of Stockton, CA is 280,000.
So if you’ve beat Airplane on Veteran difficulty, then congratulations. You’re in a very elite club. Considering less than 3% of players have been able to do it.
Now keep in mind, these are only players on Xbox 360 (who have also connected to Xbox Live at least once). So there are more than this playing Call of Duty 4, we just can’t track them. For PS3, we pulled MP-numbers only, and it looks like theres approximately 4,381,276 unique users playing PSN (not including SP-only players).
Tags: call of duty 4, cod4, fun statistics, infinity ward, modern warfare, stats, xbox live
Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, community, xbox 360, xbox live | Comments
Saturday, December 6th, 2008
Will Arnett, Justin Theroux, and Jon Glaser swung by the studio late today to talk games, check out an early sneak peek of the project we have in the works, and to hang out to play a little multiplayer during our weekly Friday Night Fights. Arnett is best known for his role as Gob from Arrested Development while Justin Theroux and Jon Glaser are probably more known for their awesome writing. Justin’s most recent work was the Ben Stiller, Jack Black, and Robert Downey Jr. comedy Tropic Thunder, as well as being announced as the writer for Iron Man 2. Jon Glaser was a Conan O’brien writer for 5 years before breaking off to do various other TV shows and projects such as Assy McGee and the Human Giant series recently. Funny guys, but most importantly, fucking hardcore COD4 players.
I started playing MP with Will, Justin and their crew awhile back after a Conan O’brien appearance where Will spent most of the interview talking about playing online in COD4. Ever since, everyone pictured above have been meeting up regularly on COD4 for some RPG + Knife only private matches where we entertain ourselves by jumping off roof tops and attempting to RPG and / or knife each other as they fall (DON’T JUDGE US!) - as well as whatever other drunken rules can be come up with at the time.
Regretfully we all live on separate coasts (IW on West Coast / Will + Justin on East Coast), so this was the first time we all met in one place while they were in Los Angeles on some business. Jon Glaser typically isn’t part of the regular crew, but after today he said he’s going to finally give in and join our 10 pm - 4 am gaming sessions. So hopefully he’ll feed into the COD4 addiction and join in on the fun in future matches.
It was great to finally meet in person after playing online together for so long. We’ll be meeting back up, hopefully late Jan / early Feb, to blow shit up. I’m in the process of planning a weapons shoot for early next year and there is no better reason to get together with friends than to blow up cars, watermelons, and anything else we can talk the range owners into letting us destroy with automatic weapons and explosives.
Tags: infinity ward, IW4, jon glaser, justin theroux, Will Arnett
Posted in IW4, call of duty 4 modern warfare, infinity ward, life, los angeles | Comments
Wednesday, November 26th, 2008
I’m back from Las Vegas and most importantly the Call of Duty 4 National Champsionships that were held there this past weekend as part of the MLG National Finals. While I was there I met with up team FeaR (seen above) who took home the title as the best Call of Duty 4 players in the country. I watched over their shoulders as they shut out EnvyUs three games straight in some of the most impressive COD4 skills I’ve ever seen.
I caught up with (Robert) FeaR Assass1n, Kevin (FeaR Choppy), Joey (FeaR Moho), and John (FeaR PacMan) just after their win, before they scored their giant check, to congratulate them and talk about flying them out to the Infinity Ward studios at some point in the future.
While team FeaR came out as the best, 2nd place EnvyUs, 3rd place Head Trauma, and 4th place TBRE (seen below) were still some of the best Call of Duty 4 players I’ve witnessed. The fucking speed of some of these guys was incredible.
While sheer speed and skill will get you far, it definitely won’t get you the National Champion title which takes a lot more than just the ability to get quick headshots. The most impressive part of watching professional teams play is the level of communication they use (keeping the mics clear of useless information) and relaying the location of every enemy, what weapon they’re using, and any other useful information as they see it.
Overall the entire event was impressive, and a great debut for Call of Duty 4’s first live national champsionships. It was great to meet up with the MLG staff, and I have plans to meet up with them more formally once we get back to the studio and talk about how we can make Call of Duty 4 and it’s professional players a more prominent role in future seasons / tournaments.
Congrats again to FeaR on taking home the cash and title. Expect to hear from me once I get back to the studio.
In addition to those competiting in the tournament, I met up with several of our community members to talk “shop” and discuss Call of Duty 4, Infinity Ward, and get some of their direct feedback on what we can continue to improve on in the future (in terms of game development and a CRM point of view). I had lunch with Chase (Th3 Wiz4rd) and Brett (Th3 VerDict) on Saturday as well met with DpG Witness (when he wasn’t coaching teams). It was great to meet you guys and learn the meaning of “Jugger-twatting”.
Tags: call of duty 4, cod4, FeaR, MLG, national champsionships, professionla gaming
Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, event, infinity ward, video games, xbox 360, xbox live | Comments
Monday, November 17th, 2008
The MTV Game Awards is this weekend in Berlin, Germany and we’ve been invited to attend thanks to our nominaton for the “Let’s Play Together Award” for Best Multiplayer Game. Regretfully, we won’t be able to make it out to Berlin for the live show, but we’ll be recording a little video tomorrow morning to show our appreciation and thanks to all of our German players who voted and supported the game in the awards, just in case. So if you’re part of our German game community, be sure to check the show this weekend, more info here www.mtvgameawards.de.
My Fallout 3 character. (Feral Mask + Chinese Spy Uniform)
Over 60 hours of gameplay later, and I’ve finally finished Fallout 3 this weekend; Holy hell was that an amazing game. You can definitely beat it in half that time, but I savored the gameplay, and completed every main and side quest before beating the main story line - as well as maxing out my character at the level 20 cap. I love the amount of detail and thought that went into every aspect of this game. Bethesda did a great job of really immersing you in their world and I’m kind of depressed it’s over. I still need to find a few bobbleheads and do a few random achievements, but for the most part it’s over, and I’m gonna miss it.
Although, thankfully I can get back to living a productive life now that it’s over, not to mention focus on finishing up Gears of War 2 (on the last level) and Mirrors Edge (on Chapter 6).
Hopefully I can finish them both up before Friday, because my entire weekend is being spent in Vegas. I’ll be flying in to attend the first ever LIVE tournament for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare at the MLG’s National Championships. There will be over $340,000 in cash prizing up for grabs overall this weekend - which will promptly be blown on hookers and blow immediately following the event. So be sure to drop me a line if you’re in Vegas or competing in the tournament. I’ll be held up at the Hard Rock where the event is taking place, so stop by and say hey. We can get together and gamble our life savings away in a horrible drunken rage.
Tags: call of duty 4, cod4, fallout 3, MLG, mtv games awards, tournament, vegas
Posted in awards, call of duty 4 modern warfare, community, event, infinity ward, life, pro gamers, video games | Comments
