Posts Tagged ‘Uncategorized’
Friday, January 25th, 2008
The official Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare mod tools are out and we’re already seeing a huge creative outpour of custom maps and mods from the community.
So much so we’re looking at even more ways to get your creative juices flowing and even bigger ways to showcase the ‘best of the best’ of custom maps from the community.
The tools allow you, the community, to take map making into your own hands and make your own custom maps for the #1 selling game of this holiday season.
What’s your dream map? Wide open spaces perfect for sniping, or close quarters combat with plenty of cover to bound back and forth from? Maybe a nice mixture with plenty of avenues to attack from and some perfect choke points you can ambush from with the right amount of team work. Whatever you think makes a good multiplayer map, we want to see it. Most importantly, we want your best work.
Heres there deal, if you haven’t already, download the Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Mod Tools (IWiki - Download Here).
In the coming weeks we’re going to be kicking off a search for the ‘best of the best’ of custom community made multiplayer maps for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Now I can’t go dishing out all the details on the WHYs just yet, but just know that we’re looking for the best maps you can make, and we’ll be looking for them by March 31st.
No need to send them to me yet, just download the tools and start working on your vision of the perfect multiplayer map for Call of Duty 4, and I’ll have more details for you in the near future. However, if once you get started you want to show off some the WIP screenshots of your map as you develop it, some users have started a thread in the official Infinity Ward forums just for that, so head over there and share your progress (Forum: WIP - Custom COD4 Maps) as you await for more info.
One more thing, design your custom maps around your platform of choice, so just because you’re mapping on the PC doesn’t mean your maps have to be designed for Mouse and Keyboard, if you have a cool design you think would work great on the Xbox 360 or PS3 then make it happen, the possibilities are endless on where it could end up.
Don’t forget, we put together a IWiki just for the tools and custom mapping / modding community, so if you run into any trouble or need the help or advice of fellow mappers and modders be sure to check out the IWiki and Community Wiki Forum.
As always, feel free to send me your questions and feedback!
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, mod tools | Comments
Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008
Now I’m not one to argue back and forth about one game being better than another, I just don’t do it, because typically if your 1 of the top 10 most played games, then you’re probably a damn good game and no one should take that away from you.
So that’s not what this is about, it’s not about which game is “better” as that’s really just a matter of opinion and preference (and fanboi alliance). What this is about is good ole’ friendly competition between two solid games and a lot of mutual respect for one another.
That said…
Holy shit, we’ve done beat the Halos!!!
Is essentially what I was stoked to read all over the interwebs this morning when I woke up to the widely reported fact that Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare took the #1 spot as the “Most played game on Xbox Live” last week according to Major Nelson over at his blog (www.majornelson.com)!
This is huge because it means more people around the world we’re playing Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare multiplayer last week rather than ANY other game available. That’s amazing and something that honestly and simply NOT POSSIBLE with out the incredible support from the community who logs on to play every night.
So THANK YOU. This is a really big accomplishment and proud moment for the entire team here at Infinity Ward and I can’t express that enough, how grateful we are for your continual support of the game.
We won’t let you guys down, we’re still working hard on improving Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and have are working on a lot of cool stuff to improve and add to the multiplayer experience to keep it fresh and new. I’ll keep you guys updated on that when I can give you firm details and confirmations, but for now just know we’re still working on making the game better and better everyday.
For the full breakdown of the Top 10 games on LIVE be sure to check out the full post over at:
http://www.majornelson.com/archive/2008/01/21/live-activity-for-week-of-1-14.aspx
* Thanks to Kotaku.com for the awesome graphic (which I stole) because it was so awesome. I <3 Kotaku.
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, xbox 360, xbox live | Comments
Saturday, January 12th, 2008
A Week of Headaches
This week has been all about servers it seems. From Ps3 to Xbox 360 we’ve been running down leads on issues all week and to be honest, server problems are the most frustrating, simply because they’re not handled by us and means it’s not a problem with the game we programmed, but with hardware malfunction of servers ran outside of Infinity Ward.
Regardless of the source of the problem and whether or not we run the servers, we work just as hard to resolve the issue. Regretfully though, since we don’t run the servers, the most we can do is ensure we’re working with our community to get feedback and keep that feedback going to the server teams (at Microsoft or at DemonWare), so that they can stay on top of the issues at hand and resolve as quickly as possible.
The biggest contributing factor to the frustration and headaches though is that my biggest annoyance is life is the use of excuses. The act of chalking up life’s problems to something beyond your control and therefore nothing you can do. I don’t believe in passing the buck, just as much I don’t believe in taking flack for something that is out of your control. What I do believe in, is truthful communication, identifying the source of the issue, but still working to address it in every way possible regardless.
Which is why I want to make it clear, simply because the servers having problems are out of our control, the means to resolving the issues is not and I will not use that as an excuse to do nothing. No bucks will be passed, as I would rather have a problem we can address directly ANY DAY over a problem I have to rely on someone else to address for me.
With that said…
PS3 Server Updates
Earlier this week, via this blog, Steve Pearce made a comment regarding the status of the Ps3 online matchmaking servers for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. The DemonWare team has been working non-stop on troubleshooting and upgrading their servers this past week with the help of the PS3 community providing insightful feedback on their problems. The team rolled out a few major updates this past week, and we were seeing some minor improvements on connectivity.
Late last night / early this morning they rolled out another update to the servers as well as the smaller ones all this week. After this update I’m happy to say we saw a big improvement over the major issue they were having (a lot of users playing at the same time at peak hours). With this latest update we’ve noticed a 10% increase in users playing at the same time during peak hours with no major incidents or downtimes.
This is great news, because if the major issue has been addressed it will allow the DemonWare team to focus even more on the smaller occurrences and individual unique problems users may be experiencing. This in no way means the task is complete and improvements will stop on the server side, just means its a big step forward in the improvement of online play for the Ps3 version.
We’ve been getting a lots of reports of improved connectivity and matchmaking which I can vow for myself as I spent awhile last night playing online on the Ps3 version and didn’t run into any issues matchmaking or finding games. Ran into a few glitchers on Pipeline sneaking into pipes underground that I’m gonna have to talk with the level designer tomorrow about though. 
Xbox Live - Reports of Losing Rank
Over the holiday, Xbox reported record numbers of users online, which apparently resulted in some hiccups in their service (source: Xbox LIVE Holiday Performance) which we’re starting to notice some side effects as we’ve recently been seeing a surge of Customer Service calls, forum posts, and emails regarding lost rank online.
UPDATE: Fantastic news. Just got word from Microsoft’s LIVE team that they believe they’ve fixed the issue. It was apparently an SQL Storage Database issue which has been addressed.
If you experience any future problems with your rank, please let me know immediately so I can make them aware. This won’t correct any previously lost rank, however it will prevent it from happening any further.
On the PC Side, MOD TOOLS!
While the console side has been keeping me busy the most recently the PC side of things has a lot of cools stuff happening as well. The biggest is probably the fact that we’re closing in on the final version of the Mod Tools which means we’ll soon be releasing them to the community as a whole.
We’ve been having a Mod Tools beta over the last month (delayed by Holidays) with a few members of the PC community which were helping us test and optimize the tools based on their feedback. This past week we sent out the first release candidate to the small group of community testers which we hope will be the final version. If it is then we can expect to release the tools to the Modding / Mapping community as a whole very soon and start seeing some really cool Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare PC Mods being released.
They Wonder Why People Don’t Make PC Games Any More
On another PC related note, we pulled some disturbing numbers this past week about the amount of PC players currently playing Multiplayer (which was fantastic). What wasn’t fantastic was the percentage of those numbers who were playing on stolen copies of the game on stolen / cracked CD keys of pirated copies (and that was only people playing online).
Not sure if I can share the exact numbers or percentage of PC players with you, but I’ll check and see; if I can I’ll update with them. As the amount of people who pirate PC games is astounding. It blows me away at the amount of people willing to steal games (or anything) simply because it’s not physical or it’s on the safety of the internet to do.
Closing Thoughts and Conclusions
It’s been a stressful week but thankfully an extremely productively one. We’re moving forward on all fronts and we’re still working hard on improving Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare well after launch. Did some take-home testing of the new feature patch that’s coming out and the grenade kill-cam never ceases to be awesome. Especially when you watch it fly through the air, through some tiny window, and land right at your feet. It’s still got a bit of testing to go through before it’ll finish certification, but it’s looking good. Still working on getting the EU Connectivity Patch out, next week should be a big one for that according to Production.
As always, feel free to let me know any questions or feedback you guys might have. I try to respond to every email (via the email contact on this blog) and reply to comments when I can. Thanks everyone for the continued support.
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in Playstation 3, call of duty 4 modern warfare, community, infinity ward, pc, xbox 360 | Comments
Wednesday, January 9th, 2008
Hey Everyone –
As promised yesterday, we wanted to give you a full update on the status of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare multiplayer servers for the PS3 and let you know exactly what’s been happening, why it’s been happening and what’s being done on the server-side to address it. To do this; Steve Pearce, Chief Technology Officer of Activision Inc., gives us a break-down of the situation and the upcoming server maintenance to address it.
———————————-
Firstly, on behalf of Activision and DemonWare, I’d like to apologize for the difficulties you’ve experienced while playing the PlayStation 3 version of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare during the holiday season.
The fact is that we’ve experienced an unprecedented load on the DemonWare backend servers, which has steadily increased since late December beyond our expectations. In spite of all of our planning and precautions, the extreme load revealed several issues. These issues triggered unscheduled downtime this past month. As we encountered issues, we deployed additional hardware and/or optimized the server infrastructure to keep the service up and running. However, while the servers were active for the vast majority of the time, many players experienced significant wait times repeatedly when joining games.
To overcome this issue, we’ve implemented a fix today, which should dramatically improve the time it takes to join an online game. And, in order to make additional improvements we are briefly taking the servers offline tomorrow, Wednesday January 9th at 4:00 a.m. PST
As a rule, we try to avoid scheduled downtime whenever possible. However, at this juncture we will need 1-2 hours to update a number of server infrastructure components. We apologize for any short-term inconvenience this may cause, and appreciate your ongoing support and patience.
Our expectation is that the server load will continue to increase as system bottlenecks are removed. So in the coming days, we will continue to monitor our system and make further optimizations and improvements as necessary. We will be deploying additional hardware to improve our database throughput and load handling. In addition to the added hardware, we are further optimizing components of the underlying server software to improve performance. We hope to be able to hot deploy these updates while the system is live. In the event that the system requires further scheduled downtime, we will post a message both here and in-game via the “Message of the Day” to keep everyone informed.
Rest assured that we are taking every possible action to insure that your Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare online PS3 experience is smooth and trouble free. We apologize for the trouble this has caused and ask for your understanding and cooperation as we get things sorted over the coming days.
Thanks,
Steve Pearce
CTO, Activision
———————————-
As he stated, the servers will be down for maintenance as of 4 AM (PST) Wednesday morning for a few hours as they roll out this fix. You will notice the PS3 MOTD has changed to reflect this and will be updated once again with any updated information after the server update.
Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns, and I look forward to seeing all of you online.
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Posted in Playstation 3, call of duty 4 modern warfare | Comments
Sunday, January 6th, 2008
As promised, this weekend I went out with the sole purpose of coming back with a PS3 to add to my gaming collection (see side column), and I have come back with a bounty that does not disappoint, so I figured I’d share this triumphant moment with all of you. Regretfully my new camera isn’t here to snap a photo or two yet, as it’s a pretty impressive pile-o-gaming if I do say so myself.
So what did I end up getting this past Saturday? Well, first I stopped by my local Fry’s Electronics to do the bulk of the shopping and walked away with:
Fry’s Electronics
PS3 80GB Bundle w/ Motorstorm
499.99
PS3 Blu-ray Remote Control
24.99
Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune (PS3)
59.99
Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (PS3)
59.99
Warhawk bundle w/ Blue Tooth Headset (PS3)
59.99
Time Crisis 4 w/ Gundoc Light Gun
89.99
PS3 10 FT HDMI Cable
29.99
Resident Evil on Blu-ray
19.99
Resident Evil: Apocalypse on Blu-ray
19.99
Resident Evil: Extinction on Blu-ray
26.99
Zack and Wiki (Wii)
39.99
Superman Returns (Xbox 360)
19.99 - It was super cheap and needed it for the collection.
Wireless Racing Wheel (Xbox 360)
99.99
DiRT (Xbox 360)
49.99
And then of course:
Dr. Pepper 20 oz.
1.05
Dr. Pepper 20 oz
1.05
All in all I got a new system, the essential accessories to fully enjoy it, and some awesome games to play on it for a grand total of:
Grand Total = $1194.35
Not too shabby if I say so myself. That night I set up my personal PSN account and bought a few games off PSN Store (i.e. Lemmings, Pain, Everyday Shooter) and saw a few more I wouldn’t mind having.
I spent most of last night just trying out each of the games, I’ve played them all at one point or another whether at E3 or around the studio, but now I can finally delve into them here at home fully and complete them as they should be.
I’m gonna be jumping on Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and ranking up online most importantly. So if you’re playing Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on PS3 or own any of the above mentioned multiplayer games, or just want to be my PS3 friend drop me a Friend Request on my new PSN account:
PSN Account: fourzerotwoIW
(Update: Thanks to Matthew Granda for the awesome PSN gamercard!)
Fourzerotwo was taken by imposters, so if you play with anyone on the PSN claiming to be me and isn’t the above tag then tell them to go to hell. That only applies to PSN, I’m still the same on Xbox Live of course.
I’m happy to have PS3 to the collection as it will fully allow me to keep tabs on the PS3 version of the game and community whether I’m at the office or at home, helping me to improve another of my New Years Resolutions of ‘becoming more accessible’!! Woot!
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in Playstation 3, call of duty 4 modern warfare | Comments
Saturday, January 5th, 2008
Back in Los Angeles
As of around 7 pm last night I’m finally back in Los Angeles from a stint back in the old country (i.e. Kentucky) visiting family and friends for the Holidays. I had originally planned to be back on Sunday but decided to come back early on Wednesday. After driving 2 hours in a zero visibility snow storm on I-71 N to Columbus Ohio for a 6 am flight, it ended up being canceled, sending me back 2 hours through the snow to Kentucky to re-evaluate (Note: Never fly Skybus). Luckily I was able to get a flight out the next day around 3 pm (EST) with a short stop off in Denver, Colorado and eventually ending in Burbank, California.
Yesterday was a blur with 90% of the day taken up by Travel, once I landed in Los Angeles I shuffled through a pile of mail waiting at my place, picked up my dog, went to Best Buy in Sherman Oaks for an impulse shopping spree just before they closed:
(begin splurge)
120 GB Hard Drive for Xbox 360
Medal of Honors Heroes 2 for Wii
Beowolf for Xbox 360
iHome for iPod
(end splurge)
Then headed to the studio at Infinity Ward, checked some email, opened some packages that arrived after I left, and try to lessen the impact of Monday when everyone returns to the Studio from holiday.
Got a cool package from a mature Call of Duty 4 clan called 2old4duty from the website http://www.2old2play.com/; who brewed up some “Lobby Fuel” Holiday Ale specially branded for Call of Duty 4 and IW. When my new camera comes in I’ll be sure to take some photos of the COD4 branded booze for you guys to check out. So THANK YOU 2OLD4DUTY! It’s much appreciated gift!
New Years Resolutions
My previous post outlined my new years resolutions, which I’m happy to say I’ve been doing a pretty good job of keeping / preparing for. I fully plan to take more pictures, and have already ordered a new digital camera (check it out) to get the job done, and will be picking up a new video camera for some videos. I’ve been focused on returning every email that comes in (to my hotmail at the moment) and will carry that over to my work emails when we get back to the studio officially on Monday.
In addition, I’m hoping writing up these Weekly, and eventually Daily Update blog posts will help me achieve my “Blog More” resolution and force myself to update more frequently. Hopefully giving you guys a bit more insight not only on the facts but some “how to” and “how come” information about those facts, giving you a inside look at how things play out behind the scenes hopefully.
80GB PS3 Joining the Collection
As you may have noticed in my gaming collection listed along the side of this blog; there is a severe lack of Sony representation happening, with just about every other major console being represented. Well, of course I have a PS3 at work that I use and stay updated on with all the Sony happenings, but I’ll finally be adding an 80GB PS3 to my gaming collection at home.
I plan on picking up tomorrow, and hope this will help me stay more in touch with our PS3 community and the status of the PS3 Network even when I’m not at the office. It couldn’t be too soon either, with the recent announcement that Warner Bros. will be going Blu-ray exclusive as of May 2008 despite the fact I already own and fully supported HD-DVDs. The new was disheartening to say the least, as I personally prefer HD-DVD’s capabilities and performance over that of Blu-Ray, but with some of my favorite titles being Blu-ray exclusive (i.e. 28 Weeks Later, 28 Days Later, Die Hard Collection, Resident Evil) it was becoming apparent I had to at least get a Blu-ray player at one point or another.
So as soon as I have my personal PSN account set up, I’ll be sure to let you all know my PSN Username.
On the Note of High Definition Movies
I’ve recently become addicted to Amazon.com, mainly due to being bored out of my mind in Kentucky after a week and turning to online window shopping to appease me. However that’s not the point, the point is for you High Def junkies, Amazon.com is having a Buy One Get One Free deal on all their High Def movies, that’s right format warriors, BOTH HD-DVD (link) and Blu-ray (link) movies are included.
With the new Blu-ray player entering my collection I decided to preemptively stock up with some of my favorites thanks to the sale; adding the following to my collection:
- X-Men - The Last Stand (Blu-ray)
- Live Free or Die Hard (Blu-ray)
- 28 Days Later (Blu-ray)
- 28 Weeks Later (Blu-ray)
- Die Hard with a Vengeance (Blu-ray)
- Die Hard 2 (Blu-ray)
- Die Hard (Blu-ray)
- Hot Fuzz (HD DVD)
- Children of Men (HD DVD)
- Waterworld (HD DVD)
- Dante’s Peak (HD DVD)
- Mercury Rising (HD DVD)
- Backdraft (HD DVD)
The Blu-ray deal was sporting a much larger (and better imo) selection with 5 pages to choose from vs. the HD-DVD’s 2 pages of mostly older titles. I was able to score the entire Die Hard trilogy on Blu-ray plus some zombie flicks for good measure.
Despite the recent announcement and finally folding and buying Blu-ray myself, I’m still an avid HD-DVD supporter, and I reluctantly buy Blu-ray as in the long run I’m hoping some major announcement will be made at CES this week that will change the tide a bit and bring more production studios over to HD-DVD as I feel its a much more reliable format.
PS3 Servers
On a game related note, the PS3 Matchmaking / Database servers for the PS3 version of the game have been producing a lot of headaches over the Holiday break due to the increased traffic and players online in record numbers. An issue we’ve been making sure the server providers are addressing and are working on at this moment.
A little background info: Infinity Ward doesn’t host or maintain any servers itself at the studio, which is a common misconception among gamers. We develop the game, but multiplayer servers are handled by outside parties for each platform. For example Xbox 360 version uses Xbox Live servers at Microsoft, PC uses dedicated servers by server admins, and PS3 users servers provided by DemonWare (a company we pay to host and maintain them).
So whenever there’s an issue I make sure I’m contacting the appropriate parties and making them aware of it and passing along any updates, feedback, or information between them and the community whenever applicable. So understand that updates from them typically take longer than updates you’d receive if it was an Infinity Ward issue that we could personally address.
Regardless, I appreciate all the feedback and emails I’ve gotten over the break that has helped me stay on top of the issues while out of town and out of the studio. There’s a few dedicated tipsters who are great at dropping me a line whenever there’s issues so I can immediately address, thank YOU!
In Conclusion
It’s been a hectic week, due mainly to canceled flights and cross country travel. I’m stoked to pick up a PS3 tomorrow and dive into some of it’s exclusives I’ve been missing out on (i.e. Drake’s Fortune / Ratchet and Clank), and finally playing more heavily online with Call of Duty 4 and our PS3 community!
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in game collection, life | Comments
Saturday, December 29th, 2007
2007
Year in Review
Call of Duty 4: Modern WarfareBy far the biggest accomplishment and largest contributor to everything awesome and insane that happened in my life in 2007 is the development and most importantly the release of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare for the Xbox 360, Ps3, and PC.
I started to write out lengthy paragraphs regarding the roller coaster ride that was video game development in 2007, but I’ve decided for the sake of my ADHD and the ADHD of my readers, I’ll sum it up in a quick bullet list w/ pictures:
All in all…. it was one crazy year full of amazingly long nights and lessons you can only learn by falling flat on your face, but in the end we pulled out a game I couldn’t be more proud of.
The Consoler (available for your viewing pleasure here)
A site I decided to create in Early 2007 (the background story here) as a hobby to satisfy my google / wiki tangents of wanting to know everything about anything in video games and wanting to document my ever growing video game collection. I got hooked and eventually ended up scanning in every cover of Nintendo power from the first issue in 1988 to today, as well as breaking down the contents page of every issue and making an article for each, complete with the included fold out poster, cover art, and editors note. (compulsive anyone?). Sadly, I took the site public around the same time all my free time was sucked away by Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. One day little Consoler, one day I will give you the attention you deserve… (see new year resolutions)
For some reason I thought this list would be longer, but it seems the majority of all things in 2007 for me revolved solely around the game. Regardless, I can say this has by far been my most successful, busiest, most amazing year to date. I have grown and learn so much over the past 365 days (as of new years) and I’m anxious to see how 2008 plans on even coming close to this year…. good luck 08, 2007 is a hard act to follow.
Now for the RESOLUTIONS (Many will be made, few will be followed through), as with every new accomplishment, comes many new vices:
2008
New Years Resolutions
- Blog More - I apologize, you deserve better. I’ve gotten in a bad habit of only blogging when there’s a major announcement, forget why I started blogging about work so much in the first place. I’m going to start blogging more often, with more personal insider updates, and not just the major Press worthy tid bits.
- Answer EVERY Email - This has always been my motto, ever since I started working professionally I made it my first priority to answer every email or message I ever received because I’ve always felt that anyone that takes the time to write you deserves the same attention in return. With the success of Call of Duty 4 my inbox and private messengers exploded, before I knew it I was receiving thousands of emails a day to all my accounts. Over 1.5 million in my work accounts (thanks beta), and thousands a day to my hotmail (personal), blackberry, and other accounts. Not that I’m complaining nor mind, I love getting email, but I hate when I can’t reply to everyone. I try to get to as many as I can, and I honestly read everything I receive and make sure it’s used as intended. However, I admit there we’re moments when I simply couldn’t get to them all, but NO MORE. With things winding down a bit, it is my goal to get back to answering EVERY message I receive, whether it be email, IM, comments or other.
- Create a more functional blog design - I’m never happy with the blog, I mean the basics are all there, but I think I really need to do some redesigning and add some functionality. I may move over to some paid professional blogging software to get what I need (community server perhaps), which I think will help a lot in the organization and communication of my first two resolutions.
- Take more Photos + Videos - One thing I’ve never been is a picture person, don’t know why, but I rarely take photos of anything, which I regret. So I’ve decided to make it a priority to document more through photo and video, I’m gonna be picking up a mini-cam in JAN to help with this and will hopefully be providing a more visual look behind the scenes of what it’s like to work in video games, go to the events, meet the people, and just live daily live in the city of Los Angeles and at Infinity Ward (the greatest company around). What do you guys think? Is that something you’re even interested in seeing? (comment if so)
- Become even more accessible - I’m always looking for new ways to interact with you guys, the public as a whole. I mean I consider myself pretty accessible already as I heavily make my contact information available, and for good reason as you can’t make a good game without the influence and input directly from your community. I strongly believe that, and in the ingenious words of Kimya Dawson “I’ll ask you what you think, because your thoughts and words are powerful”. I couldn’t name any other developer whose AIM, MSN, Hotmail, Phone Number, Blog, Myspace, LinkedIn, Twitter, and just about any other means of communication is ready available for anyone with the fancy to use it may, but I’ll find even more ways to keep you guys updated more detailed, more personal and more frequent.
Well… as my iPod starts to die and demand to be recharged and my thoughts start to become less and less coherent as the time rounds 1:30 AM I’ll call it a night. Just a few more days left in 2007 and I plan on spending them working towards the aforementioned goals and aspirations… I return to California on Jan 6th and I’ll see you all in 2008!!
Words of Wisdom:
Never blog without music
Always go with your first draft
Always publish without proof reading
Its more honest…
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, life, press | Comments
Friday, December 28th, 2007
From Majornelson.com:There are only a few days left in voting for the Xbox 2007 Community Choice Awards over at Xbox.com. This is your chance let the editors at Xbox.com know what your top gaming choices are for 2007.
Looks like Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is in the running for a few of them, if you think it’s deserving then click on the category below to cast your vote!
Best Game
Best Sequel
The voting is done directly in the Xbox forums and open to anyone with a Gamertag.
A few more categories I threw votes towards were:
Best Weapon - Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device (Portal)
Best Family Game - Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga
You can check out all the categories and chime in on the forum chatter regarding them right here.
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Posted in call of duty 4 modern warfare, community, xbox 360 | Comments
Tuesday, December 18th, 2007
Hey Everyone –
Just to clarify on my last post, those Playlist changes mentioned apply to PS3 and 360 and should be hitting here soon (in December), but I wanted to make it clear that the patch itself with the other changes (i.e. Host Migration, Kill Cams) that are only for the Xbox 360 will probably hit after December, as that requires going through certification, while the Playlist changes we can change dynamically. I noticed it getting reported as the patch getting released in December, and wanted to stop it before too many hopes got up.
Now for the PS3: The PS3 Connectivity patch will be hitting in the very near future and is separate from the Xbox 360 patch. The PS3 (exclusive) Connectivity patch will include:
US Data Center For NAT Server
Will make all US players connect to US data center and EU users connect to EU data center. This will optimize performance for all users in those areas.
Fixed ‘Downloading Game Settings’ Error
Fixed error with conflicting packet interaction.
Port 3095 Issue Corrected
Players were required to have port 3095 open in order to host. Now players who have port 3095 blocked can still host matches.
Matchmaking Optimization
Server search will end upon acquiring a certain number of good servers. Added “prefer” servers with best ping, this will optimize and expedite players finding and joining good matches.
In short, the playlist changes for both consoles will be hitting very soon, however the Xbox 360 patch will probably hit after December once it goes through certification. The PS3 connectivity patch will be hitting very soon and is separate from the 360 patch.
Let me know if you guys have any additional questions, the PS3 will be getting another patch in the new year which will contain some of the same additions as the 360 one but not all.
Tags: Uncategorized
Posted in Playstation 3, call of duty 4 modern warfare, patch, xbox 360 | Comments
Friday, December 14th, 2007
Hey Everyone –
I wanted to give you the heads up on a lot of cool changes coming to Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare multiplayer for the Xbox 360. Before you ask, there is no ETA on these changes, most are included in the upcoming patch, with all the playlists stuff happening independently at some point in the near future. (AKA: Playlist changes will be in December, Patch most likely past December)
All of these changes are thanks to YOUR direct feedback and suggestions through Xbox.com forums, emails, IMing me personally, and any other way you managed to get your feedback to us. So what can you expect?
Multiplayer Playlist Changes:
The multiplayer playlists in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare are always evolving based on community feedback and stats we track behind the scenes. We’re focused on constantly keeping the game fresh and tweaking it based on your feedback, so expect the following Playlist changes to be hitting soon:
Team Deathmatch
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
Mercenary Team Deathmatch
* Brand New Playlists: No Clans / Parties allowed.
* Players who don’t want to be matchmade with clans (or people in parties) can team up with fellow lone wolves and play some TDM.
Free-for-All
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
* Score Limit Change: 100 Points
Domination
* Map Added to Rotation: Ambush - now available in map rotation.
* Map Added to Rotation: Bloc- now available in map rotation.
* Map Added to Rotation: Pipeline - now availalbe in map rotation.
Ground War
* No changes.
Sabatoge
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
Headquarters
* Map Added to Rotation: Ambush - now available in map rotation.
* Map Added to Rotation: Bloc- now available in map rotation.
* Map Added to Rotation: Pipeline - now availalbe in map rotation.
Search and Destroy
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
Team Tactical
* Map Added to Rotation: Ambush - now available in map rotation.
* Map Added to Rotation: Bloc- now available in map rotation.
* Map Added to Rotation: Pipeline - now availalbe in map rotation.
Hardcore Team Deathmatch
* Brand New Playlist: 100% Hardcore Team Deathmatch Only
* No longer switched between Hardcore Search and Destroy and Hardcore Team Deathmatch
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
Hardcore Search and Destroy
* Brand New Playlist: 100% Hardcore Search and Destroy Only
* No longer switched between Hardcore Search and Destroy and Hardcore Team Deathmatch
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
Old School
* Rule Set Change: Free-for-All Only w/ Old School Rules
* Increased Health (slightly)
* No Health Re-gen
* Score Limit Change: 100 points
* Map Added to Rotation: Showdown - now available in map rotation.
Cage Match
* Rule Set Change: No Longer Old School Mode
* 1 v 1: Normal Rules
* Map Added to Rotation: Countdown - now availalbe in map rotation
* Map Added to Rotation: District - now available in map rotation
Oldcore
* Playlist Removed
Team Objective
* Playlist Removed
* All gametypes included now available individually.
Upcoming Patch Updates (Seperate from above Playlist changes):
Addition of Host Migration
* If Host of lobby leaves, all players will be deposited back to the lobby where next best host will be selected before new game restarts. Players will no longer be kicked out of game entirely.
Improved Network Performance For Larger Games
* 18 player games now require more bandwidth to host, resulting in smoother performance for players.
Optimized Server Selection for First Match
* Server selection is now optimized to select best bandwidth servers associated by LSP.
Updated Spectator “Chase Cam”
* Change Spectator Mode: Switch between First Person and Third Person.
* 360 Degree rotation around character you’re spectating.
Fixed “Playlist Older Than Host” Error
* Player will no longer get error when entering games.
Optimized Corrupt Create-a-Class Handling
* Players will no longer be kicked from game when their create-a-class data is corrupted.
Added Kill Cam To Everything
* Kill Cam view Added: Air Strike Bombs (Follows bomb from plane to target)
* Kill Cam view Added: Grenades (Follows frag from hand to ground, then rotates to view target)
* Kill Cam view Added: RPGs (Follows RPG from launch to target)
* Kill Cam view Added: M203 Rounds (Follows round from launcher to target)
* Kill Cam view Added: Claymores (Views from behind claymore until explosion)
* Kill Cam view Added: C4 Packs (View from pack rotating to watch target)
* Kill Cam view Added: Martrdom (View from grenade rotating to watch target)
Optimized Old School Experience
* Added Unlimited Sprint
* Doubled Magazine Size
* Added Ragdoll Cam
Additional Start Spawn Locations in All Maps
* Added a minimum of 9 extra start spawns on each side of all maps.
Optimized Sniper Rifle / ACOG Scope Accuracy
* Sniper Rifles and ACOG scope accuracy improved due to fix.
Fixed Weapon Sprint Bug
* Bug which gave players more sprint when using particular weapons.
Thanks again for your constant feedback and support of the game, keep in mind that playlists are constantly evolving, so everything is subject to change based on feedback and results. If we feel something isn’t fun or based on your feedback we’ll continue to change it up and I’ll continue to keep you in the loop.
Thanks everyone.
(The Playlist changes apply to both the 360 and the PS3 versions, but the PS3 will have different patch changes)
Join in on the discussion here: Xbox.com - Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
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Posted in Playstation 3, call of duty 4 modern warfare, patch, xbox 360 | Comments
The official Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare mod tools are out and we’re already seeing a huge creative outpour of custom maps and mods from the community.
