modern warfare

(fyi: Cpt Hammer is my PartnerNET gamertag, not my secret XBL account)

Just got finished jumping into some of QA’s playtests of the new gametypes. While they’re ensuring there are no bugs to be found, I wanted to jump in and test out how fun the playlists were. Hardcore HQ is a lot of fun because it’s a lot more fast paced than normal and HQ’s are falling a lot faster. Not a lot of waiting around in this gametype. Not to mention it’s a lot more tactical when you’re not just spamming the HQ with nades. I think I’ll be playing the Hardcore Ricochet version of Hardcore HQ a lot. 

We played several games of Second Chance Search and Destroy, which essentially just adds 1 respawn per player. A small addition, but makes a big difference in the tactics you use. Plus, it wasn’t as frustrating to be taken out early in the round because you get a second chance to do some damage. No more dying early and waiting around the entire match. The only problem I can foresee with it is the occassional spawn kill if someone gets past your defenses and gets in a position to kill your second wave of respawns before you get him out. Other than that I actually prefer Second Chance over standard Search and Destroy. I found myself missing the second life when we were playing standard. There were a few UI (user interface) bugs, but those can be taken care of really easily, just need to shorten the name of the gametype. 

Still on the fence with Sudden Death Sabotage, what do you guys think of that. It essentially just turns into Team Elimination because no one has any respawns, so everyone starts camping and never goes for the bomb. In a way, I like that, because it’s a sneaky way to get Team Elimination into the game with an extra twist, but on the other hand the rounds end really quickly. I’m worried this one might not make the cut, but we’ll see how the rest of testing goes this week.

Hardcore Ricochet is the answer to my prayers. Team Killing is non-existent and you no longer have to say “my bad” to a team mate you accidently blow to hell with a badly placed grenade. If you fuck up, you’re the only one hurting for it. Not to mention you never have to worry about having a team mate shoot an RPG into the ground at the start and killing everyone in Hardcore Search and Destroy. That alone makes this entire playlist worth it to me. 

Things are looking good. I’m still working hard on that upcoming Xbox Live promotion I told you about. Getting some final thoughts from our Art Driector on the Ads I designed for it, and securing the rest of the details. 

On a more personal note, I finally got my automatic office defense system online and operating… 

… and by that, I mean big ass NERF cannon; Which I have mounted on a mobile defensive position (aka office chair) for maximum effeniency. This battery-operated, belt fed, automatic rapid-fire dart cannon is exactly what I needed to the turn the tide of the war in my favor. You see, there’s been ongoing skirmishes with the radicals in IT for quite some time now…. around the time they covered my Master Chief in Peanut Butter while I was out of town for GDC.

Dare’s a war a’comin… pik yer side!  

It was awesome putting together this bad boy late last night after work. I felt like I was 8 years old again, sitting on the floor with one of our producers assembling and test firing it. Some toys you’re never too old to get a kick out of. If the day ever comes I think other wise, kill me…. preferrably death by NERFing. 

Back from PAX means back to work, and while it’s a short week thanks to Labor Day it’s the one time I wish it wasn’t because I have a lot of stuff to get done. I’m currently working on getting everything organized and together for an upcoming Xbox Live / PSN promotion we have coming up the weekend of Sept. 13th - 14th. Which isn’t this weekend, but next weekend. I will have exact details on what it is in the near future but I have a gut feeling it’ll have Double XP attached to it for all those hungry for some power-leveling on Call of Duty 4.

Currently working on designing some Xbox Live banners to promote it on the marketplace and attempting to get everything together for it on our end. This promotion is technically unrelated to the new Playlists, but I won’t lie that my hope is to finish them up in time so that we can make it all one big promotion. How epic would that be? Our awesome QA team and producers are helping me push hard to make it happen by the weekend of the big promotion, no promises, but as always I’ll keep you updated on the progress.

I knew there were a lot of us out there, but just how many? Well, I received the reports this week and it looks like our COD4 online community stands at over 10 million strong (Xbox 360 / PS3)! That’s all unique players too, so 10 million different people have logged on for online multiplayer since buying the game in November. Those stats don’t include people who have never logged into MP, only those apart of the Online Community.

That’s insane. With a little over a million players logging in everyday for multiplayer, I can’t say I’m too surprised. It’s awesome to think that we’re all part of building something so massive, and when I say we, I mean me, you, all of us. Everyone who logs on to play with their friends, reads the blog, contributes on the forums, took part in the beta. You guys shaped this game and what it is today. We have one massive, powerful, community and all of you should be proud because there is honestly no other game community I’d rather be a part of. So when I say this, know that I mean it… THANK YOU!!!

We have some new multiplayer playlists in the works to breath even more life into multiplayer, in addition to that I’m working on a few other things behind the scenes that I can’t talk about just yet (in case they don’t come to fruition).

This really makes me want to have another Community Party (anyone remember the COD2 all night?). If any Los Angeles locals are interested in having a COD4 Community Meet-up / Community Party, let me know and let’s put one together!!

Just got a fresh shipment of shirts in, and I’m sure you all know what that means…

… one less day I have to do laundry. YES!!!

As you know, We’ve been playing around with a lot of different playlist variations for the last several weeks and we’ve got quite a few cool mash-ups and gametype tweaks in the wings. It’s no secret that adding new playlists (or anything to multiplayer) takes a long time. There is a lot of careful planning and consideration that goes into anything new we add to the overall gameplay experience of the game, and nothing is added unless we’re completely convinced it will add to the overall experience. So as you can imagine, we play the hell out of any new addition we even consider before we consider it “good to go”.

That said.

The good news is, we have a few playlists that can be implemented via a playlist update (no patch required) and a few that we’re determining now if they can be added; the bad news is a few of them that can only be implemented via a patch. We’re still in talks to see if a small patch is feasible within our current production schedule, so I’ll let you know as that’s determined.

Remember though, nothing is final until it’s actually released. I don’t want you guys to be disappointed if something doesn’t pass QA, but to give you an idea of what we’re currently testing and where we stand with each playlist:

Hardcore Headquarters - No Patch Required

Testing is completed for Hardcore HQ. This playlist has standard HQ rules w/ Hardcore Settings. Limited HUD, Increased Bullet Damage, and Friendly Fire Enabled.

Hardcore Ricochet Playlist - Currently Testing

We’re currently testing this playlist now to see if a patch will be required for it or not. We should know soon. This is the No Teamkilling playlist. Any damage a teamkiller attempts to do to their team mates is reflected onto themselves only. Therefore, if they attempt to shoot an RPG into the ground at the beginning of the match; the only person who will die, is the Teamkiller. This eliminates the fear of being shot in the back by some asshole, but still encourages players to play tactically and not throw random nades, because if you accidentally hit a teammate, you’re only going to end up killing yourself and they’ll go unharmed. No Teamkilling, No Random Nades. This playlist will include the variant for Hardcore Teamdeathmatch, Hardcore Search and Destroy, and Hardcore HQ.

Sudden Death Sabotage - Currently Testing

Sabotage with no respawns. Fast-paced and intense Sabotage. No more hiding with the bomb until time runs out for sudden death. Increased XP per kills to encourage Team Deathmatch mentality. Defend your objective, while attempting to secure the bomb and plant on theirs. Once you’re dead, you’re dead. No second chances. We’re currently testing to see if this can be implemented without a patch.

Second Chance Search and Destroy - Currently Testing

Search and Destroy with 1 respawn each. This completely revamps your Search and Destroy tactics. No longer will lucky frag or well-placed claymore end your chance of victory. Each player has 1 respawn, creating longer more thoughout attack / defend strategies. Eliminate enemy players, and cut off their reinforcements while you defuse.

——–

If all these get past Quality Assurance (Test) with zero bugs, then we’ll be able to implement these four new playlists rather quickly (once QA and Localization is finished). In addition, we plan on adding Killhouse to more playlists and adjusting the amount of XP you get in certain playlists. (i.e. double XP in hardcore and new playlists).

Hit the jump for the playlists we’d like to do, but would require some code work to implement.

Read the rest of this entry »

Monday is here again, and hence our weekly Monday Morning Meeting here at Infinity Ward, which will from here on be referred to as M3 now that we’re all on the same page. For those not aware, the Monday meeting is the first thing we do every week. It’s a great way for the company as a whole to meet up and go over what’s happening internally.

We’ll give a status on our current projects, any new employees will come up and introduce themselves, talk about their favorite games and where they came from, and what they do at IW now. As well as any IW / Call of Duty related news, rumors, updates, etc. that we think should be shared among the company as a whole.

In the case of William, you have to introduce yourself twice. Will originally started in QA as a tester for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Just like I talked about in my last video blog, it was all about being proactive and passionate. Once we ramped down the QA department at the end of the project, William has bigger plans and became an Art Intern and as of this morning, is now a Full-time artist here at Infinity Ward. Congrats!

In addition to Will’s promotion, these past few weeks has been busy for new-hires; Mario, Jordan, Simon, JT, Joe a bit ago. It looks like it’s well over-due for another Employee Spotlight feature. You can check out all the new additions and the full IW here (www.infinityward.com/team).

Other than that, we discussed future project stuff that I can’t go into detail here yet. In addition I snagged our Lead MP Designer Todd for a chat prior to the meeting to discuss the upcoming playlist updates we’re working on as I know you guys are dying for an update.

Essentially, there’s some things we want to do that go above and beyond what a playlist update allows us to. So we’re discussing the options available to us. We’re working on getting it all worked out as soon as we can and as always I’ll keep you in the loop. Trust me though, if we’re able to do what we’d like, the little bit of longer wait for it to happen would be worth it in my opinion. Regardless, if we can and it does cause a delay, I’ll see if we can go ahead and do the playlist update while we wait.

Regardless if this is “real” or not, you have to appreciate the “Blair Witch Project” approach:

Zombie animation + Vacant’s empty halls and fog + creepy ass Halloween music = Creepy as hell!

Now THIS would be an awesome iPhone app.

Death From Above, IN YOUR POCKET!

Just imagine:

Control the cross hairs with your finger. Easily switch between 25mm, 40mm, and 105mm quickly with your thumb, double tap on the screen to fire, or trail your finger across for the 25mm rapid fire. Climb the leader boards for highest kills in set amount of time.

I say I’d much rather do this than pop virtual bubble wrap. Who’s with me?

Any iPhone devs out there up to the challenge?

Nothing ruins a game of Hardcore Search and Destroy or Hardcore Team Deathmatch faster than an excessive team killer being a douche. So, all this talk of new playlists we’ve been doing around the studio recently (with the help of my raw hatred of team killers) got me to thinking about some Hardcore playlists variations we could possibly introduce when we do the playlist update.

What do you guys think of having the option of playing your favorite Hardcore playlists standard (HC S&D, HC TDM) in addition to Hardcore (Friendly Fire Disabled). Essentailly, standard Hardcore rules with limited hud, increased weapon damage, etc. minus the dread of team killers?

I mention it, because I think it’d be a nice option to have once we introduce Hardcore HQ and give those who love Hardcore but hate team killers a haven for some honest hardcore gameplay. So what’s the verdict? Would you like the option to play Hardcore Standard and Hardcore (No Friendly Fire)?

Note the word, option. Meaning, you can still play the way it is now (with friend fire on) or have an additional option to play without friend fire. I’m not proposing change all of Hardcore. I’m saying give an option for Hardcore lite in addition to the normal hardcore playlists there already are.

Thanks to everyone who helped play test the new playlists last weekend, as well as everyone else who volunteered to help! I received an overwhelming amount of messages, emails, and other friend invites over the past week from the community offering to help out! THANK YOU and I’m sorry we couldn’t include everyone, but the good news is the tests went great (helped us find a few bugs with the new settings) as well as come to final decisions.

That said, we’ve already begun the process to add the new playlists to the game. Don’t get your hopes up just yet, as there is currently no ETA on when you can expect to see them go LIVE, but as soon as I know when you can expect them, I’ll let you know. I’ve walked you through the process we’re going through now at the end of this post. It’s not a long process, but still a process nonetheless.

Hit the jump for a full breakdown of the playlists we’ll be adding, as well as the process involved in adding new playlists to the game.

Read the rest of this entry »