Downloadable Content

Gah - I’m finally back to twittering and blogging again after being pulled into my shell for the last few weeks. The time spent away has been productive, regretfully not the kind of progress I can talk about, as the last two weeks have been mainly focused on meetings, planning, brainstorming, and work on our future project.

In regards to Call of Duty 4, we just finished up our latest promotion with the PS3 and 360’s Double XP and Variety Map Pack sale which was a huge success. It pushed us well over 2 Million Map Packs sold on 360 and made us the #1 most sold DLC on both platforms. Thanks to everyone who picked up the map pack. 

Oh, International PS3 users: I almost forgot. Our international users on the PS3, you have not been forgotten. We’re currently working on bringing the Half off Map Pack promotion to you as well, it’s just taking a bit longer to get it all set-up with SCEE and Asia but it is happening. Just so you know, you won’t miss out on the deal.

I also wanted to let those with the Game of the Year edition, who have been attempting to redeem your free map pack token, that we’ve been going back and forth with Microsoft on getting us those tokens to refill the database as fast as we can and discussing how they can improve their ridiculously complex and time-wasting token distribution system in the future. Essentially it’s the most needlessly bureaucratic and mindnumbling extensive procedure you’ve ever seen.  It’s a serious joke, and not the funny kind, but we’re doing everything we can to get more tokens from them and to you. I’m sure the process of creating randomly generated strings of numbers and letters is complex something well deserving of the month (and counting) it’s taken to supply them. On the PS3 side, no problems. Their token process was quick and painless and GOTY tokens are fully stocked. /rant

The last bit of COD4 news is the playlists; which are currently in a holding pattern in MP design territory. They’re working on the issues I spoke about several weeks ago where the gametypes needed some gameplay balancing (i.e. Spawn Camping in Second Chance SD, Round ends too quick in Sudden Death Sabatoge). So at this point, I’m not going to make the same mistake twice and just hold off on saying anything until they’re completly finished. So…. just know we’re working on them and once they’re amazingly fun and finished, I’ll let you know. they’re coming out. Bummer. I know, but despite my willingness to cave under the sheer crave for the new playlists the MP Design team refuses to let anything out of their grasp until it is completely up to standard with their very high bar of quaility for multiplayer in Call of Duty 4…. and I don’t blame them.

Heads up that this weekend from Friday the 12th - Sunday the 14th on Xbox Live (PS3 event will be later, closer to the 18th), we’ll be having Double XP all weekend long on every playlist. In addition, we’ll be doing some DLC promotion on the Xbox Live Marketplace that will allow you to download the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Variety Map  Pack for 50% off, which means you’ll be able to snag all four maps for just 400 MS points. 

That’s not all though, thanks to so many of you who have written in and requested; we’ve been able to work it out to get the Prestige Gamer pic pack back on the marketplace for download for all those who missed out on it’s limited offering during our last LIVE fire weekend. 

Some of the IW crew and myself will be jumping on this weekend to prey on all the new Variety Map Pack owners wandering lost in Chinatown, ripe for the picking. Be sure to add the following Xbox Live gamertags so you can join in on some of the games:

The official Play With Devs time is Noon - 4pm PDT on Saturday, but we’ll be jumping on and off unofficially all weekend long. This is all going down exclusively on Xbox Live this weekend, but don’t worry PS3 players, because we’ll be doing the same for you guys ; but due to schedule conflicts we couldn’t do them back to back so the PS3 weekend will be closer to Sept the 18th  (I’ll have a dedicated post for our PS3 users on that event), but you can expect some of the same benefits and festivities. 

According to Microsoft’s Major Nelson’s report, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare has retaken the #1 spot as the most played game on Xbox LIVE, knocking GTAIV to the #3 spot. This is on the heels of the news that we just passed the 10 million copies sold mark!

THANK YOU to everyone who consistently continues to play the game every night!! To show our appreciation, as always we’re going to be holding a Double XP Weekend this weekend starting Friday morning and going till Monday (yes I know… we always say that, but we’re really going to cut it off at Monday this time… maybe).

The Double XP will be available in ALL PLAYLISTS and will be on both platforms Xbox 360 and PS3!

In addition, we will be tweaking all the playlist map rotations a bit so that the Variety Map Pack no longer shows up 2:1 to old maps. Therefore all maps (old and new) have an equal chance to come up in map rotation, so you won’t be seeing Chinatown pop up 8,000 times or any other new map over and over again.

Thanks again to EVERYONE who continues to support the game and keep it at the top of the charts. If you haven’t already, be sure to check out the COD4 T-shirt designs we’re working on and let us know which ones we should get printed up, because we’ll be giving away a lot of them to our loyal players when we do as well as making them available to you on the new Infinityward.com Online store that will launch in late June with the new site.

See you online!

Great news! Heads up that the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Variety Map Pack sponsored by NVIDIA will be available worldwide for our PC players next week on June 5th!

NVIDIA is making it possible for PC players to download the map pack for Free on the PC thanks to their sponsorship. In addition, expect to see quite a few promotions popping up leading up to the launch of the map packs on the 5th and beyond. I know NVIDIA has a lot of great things planned for PC users in addition to maps becoming available.

There’s going to be some PC specific previews going up online this weekend I believe that will cover how well the maps play on the PC version as well as some contests and promotions happening all next week. I’ll be posting up details on them as they get started all this week!

The Variety Map Pack includes four new maps for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare multiplayer including Broadcast, Chinatown, Killhouse, and Creek.

In addition to the map pack hitting, PC Players will be receiving the 1.6 Patch for the PC version of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare that will add support for the new maps, fix a server crash exploit recently reported by the community, and a few additional features / bug fixes. I will post a full patch notes list next week.

The Dtoid army is descending on the Cincinnati / Northern Kentucky tri-state area for their largest ‘No Apparent Reason Party’ (NARP) ever this weekend and I’ll be flying in from Los Angeles to join them.

With, whats growing to be nearly 1000, gamers locally and from all over the country making their way by land, sea (wait… it’s ohio..), and air to the event for no apparent reason other than to hang out with fellow like minded gamers (and COD4 fans of course); I’ve decided to come fully prepared and will be packing heat… in the form of limited edition Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare t-shirts fresh off the press. We’ll be throwing them out to the crowd during the party so be prepare yo’ snatchin hands.

Live locally or want to make a last minute spur of the moment trip across country to the hot bed of gaming activities Cincinnati Ohio? You can find all the details over at Destructoid.com, but be forewarned… those bitches crazy.

More importantly, I want to know who’s down for a trip to White Castles, Steak N Shake, and Skyline Chili this weekend? Drop me a message if you’re down.

Oh yeah… did I mention I got some awesome news coming down the pipeline at the end of the week for our PC players? I can’t say what it is now, but I’m sure most of you can see it coming a mile away. I’ll have that info for you around Friday hopefully.

Meanwhile, those of you subscribed to the video blog and those (nearly 9 thousand) of you who sent in messages and questions you’d like to see answered in the next video blog, I have a new one currently in the works that answers a lot of your questions as well as will be giving you a sneak peek at a line of new shirts we’re getting printed for Call of Duty 4 fans (and giving some away to subscribers), and one of the prototypes we already printed. I’m going to try to get that out to you guys as soon as I can (I want to capture some footage at the NARP event hopefully) to add to it, in addition to the fact that there is an awesome new Gaming site that’s preparing to launch in the not too distant future that will be playing a crucial role in the future episodes of the video blog series… details on that coming wayyy later.

Conclusion - See you all in Cincinnati, drop me a line if you’re in the area and we can hang out. Come to the Dtoid party, and be sure to check back at the end of the week for some great PC news!! Thanks everyone!!

For up to the minute status on what playlist we’re playing, go to:

http://twitter.com/fourzerotwo

It’s time! The Call of Duty® 4: Modern Warfare™ Variety Map Pack is available now for download through the PLAYSTATION®Network. To celebrate the launch, we’re hosting a Double XP Weekend, where players can earn twice as many experience points as they the new Variety Map Pack playlists on the new multiplayer maps starting at 12:01 GMT, Friday, April 25 through 11:59 PDT, Sunday, April 27 - although in all reality it’ll probably stop around Monday morning or so.

We’ll also be doing Play With Devs tomorrow on Friday, April 25, from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. EDT and 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. EDT.Make sure to add the following PLAYSTATION Network IDs to your friend’s list:

fourzerotwoiw

COD4DrewM

COD4Bryan

COD4Justin

COD4Brian

COD4David

The Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Variety Map Pack features four new multiplayer maps including “Broadcast,” featuring tight corridors and wide open parking lots where large groups will utilize close-quarter fighting and strategic maneuvers; “Chinatown” where night battles well lit by the full moon can play havoc against a backdrop of brightly colored lamps, antique shops and neon signs of the local district; “Killhouse,” a desolate warehouse under enemy attack where squads will need to move through building mock-ups and plywood walls in order to take control of the combat arena; and “Creek,” a wide open village in a heavily wooded area where battles are fought among high ridgelines and deep in underground caves.

Additionally, the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Game of the Year Edition for the PLAYSTATION 3 system will ship to North American retailers on May 6 which includes a token to access the new multiplayer maps featured in the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Variety Map Pack.

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UPDATE:

Great new guys! SCEE has really come through, here’s the latest from them:

Quote from: SCEE

The Store has been updated so that each product states which BLES code it works with.

Furthermore, the forums have been updated to explain how the download works. The call centres have also been updated about how to handle this.

I hope this clarifies the steps that SCEE are taking to ensure the consumer has a successful and enjoyable experience with the map packs.

It sure does. Thanks to everyone at SCEE for all the help in getting this straightened out.

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Hey Everyone –

Heads up for international users purchasing the Variety Map Pack for the PS3. The Variety Map Pack is Region Locked, which means that you MUST purchase the version of the map pack which is compatible with the version of the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare game disc that you have.

For example:

If you have the GERMAN version of the game, you MUST purchase the GERMAN version of the map pack.

If you have the UK version of the game, you MUST purchase the UK version of the map pack.

Just make sure that the Disc version and the Map Pack version matches up. If you have an UK version of the game, DO NOT purchase a German version of the map pack. It won’t work. The same goes for any other mismatched version.

For those of you who may have already purchased the incorrect language for the game disc you have, we are currently talking with Sony regarding any options you may have.

If you have any questions or concerns, please let me know. Thanks!

As of recently, my love for my PS3 has been called into question when a blog post from over two years ago was pulled up from the watery grave of the internet and posted on Digg as well as the Playstation boards. For some reason, a post I make two years ago is news today… I guess, but I wanted to put it into context as the posting on Digg surely doesn’t.

Essentially the post was made over two years ago and was about the closing of the game site called Lik-sang.com due to some legal trouble with Sony. Yes, I criticized Sony about their handling of the situation two years ago and was frustrated with the PS3. I also stole a candy bar when I was nine.

Does that mean (I repeat, two years later) I still don’t like the PS3 or Sony? No. It doesn’t. In fact, I actually have a PS3 in my game room right now that I love and a large selection of Blu-ray movies. Not to mention I’m quite fond of plenty of PS3 games (CoD4 of course, I love Drake’s Fortune, Warhawk is fun as hell, and I can’t wait till GTAIV.).

I know it’s shocking, but I’m a person. Most importantly I’m a gamer. I got frustrated, I ranted on my blog. It’s what I do. I mean come on… would I ride a roller coaster with something I didn’t like?… I think the answer to that is evident.
I hope that puts it in a bit more perspective. The truth is we have a FANTASTIC working relationship with Sony. SCEE has been a huge help in helping us get the Variety Map Pack to come out in line with SCEA so we have a simultaneous worldwide release this Thursday, April 24th.

We also have Play W/ Devs Event on Friday where the IW crew and myself will be playing with you guys on PSN all day to kick off the Map Pack release and DOUBLE XP WEEKEND! I’ll also be stopping by the Official Playstation Blog this week to chat a bit more about all of this and to you guys, so be sure to check that out.

Let me know if there is anything else I can address or answer for you guys and I’d be more than happy to.

Last week I let you guys know that the Variety Map Pack would be hitting PSN on April 24th for North America and May 1st for Europe, well NOT ANYMORE! I’m happy to say we’ve been pushing this past week and with the help of Sony Europe, are happy to announce that the Variety Map Pack on PS3 will be coming out at the SAME TIME, worldwide on April 24th for $9.99!!

The Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Variety Map Packfor PS3 will be available on the PlayStation Network on Thursday April, 24 for both the US and Europe!

Additionally, since they won’t be coming out on two different days anymore all the Double XP / Play with the Devs goodness will be on the same day. Enjoy Double XP all weekend for both continents from 12:01 AM GMT on Friday, April 25 to 11:59 PM PDT on Sunday, April 27. We are also making Friday, April, 25 a “Play with the Devs” day. The Infinity Ward team will be playing online on Friday, April 25 from 11AM to 2PM PDT and from 5 PM to 8 PM PDT.

I look forward to playing with you guys on PSN on April 25th and I’m sure (more than) a few of you can’t wait to shoot me in the face!

According to the NPD figures which were released today, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare has officially sold over 9 Million copies worldwide since it’s release!

In addition, the Variety Map Pack we recently released on Xbox Live and soon to be released on PS3 in a week; has broke Xbox Live Marketplace records pulling down over 1 Million downloads within it’s first 9 days. Not to mention pulling down Xbox Live Marketplace in the process when it launched.

Some cool numbers we pulled recently to see just how much gameplay that actually is, shows that Xbox LIVE members played more than 30 million sessions and logged over 30 million hours of gameplay!! We’re talking 1.9 billion minutes logged in the first 9 days!!

If you don’t have the Variety Map Pack yet it’s currently available on Xbox Live Marketplace for 800 MS Points and will be hitting the PSN store on April 24th wordwide for $9.99 and includes four new multiplayer maps.

I knew we had a huge loyal community and it’s always cool to pull specific numbers to quantify just HOW large it actually is. Also, don’t forget tomorrow night is the Xbox LIVE Fire Weekend for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare where you can play with the team here at Infinity Ward and myself from 3 - 6 pm PST (6 - 9 pm EST) as well as sign up to win a signed Xbox 360 Elite (which I have next to me right now here in my office) among other prizes. I look forward to playing with you guys tomorrow as well as our PS3 players in a few weeks when we the maps hit on the PSN. Full details on the Xbox LIVE fire weekend incase you missed the post I made about it earlier can be found here.