Medal of Honor was at the root of the latest FPS controversy when it was confirmed that Taliban soldiers will be playable in the game. But some military personnel believe that the real issue is the way war games make money from real-life conflicts.
"People freaking out about the inclusion of the Taliban as playable characters in the multiplayer mode of the new game is ridiculous. In every FPS-type game, there is a bad guy," Justin Polaski of the US Army told GamerFeed.
"More importantly, the creation of games like these is war profiteering; the same profiteering that Blackwater, civilian contractors, and companies that produce ACU backpacks for school children participate in."
"War profiteering of any form is unjust and constitutes a true insult to those who have served overseas."
When asked how he felt about being able to play as the Taliban in Medal of Honor, Jason Clark from the US Navy added:
"I thoroughly enjoy these games but in respect to my fallen brothers I find it very hard and disturbing to play as the actual group whom I have seen kill so many of my friends and brothers in arms."
A different US Navy member going only by the name of Jason (not Jason Clark we should stress) offered the the other side of the argument:
"I can honestly state as a gamer and a military man that games have less of an impact that people might think."
"I just push the buttons and kinda giggle at the rag-doll physics engine."
Caitlin Stier from the US Army Reserves concurred:
"Honestly, I don't really see what the whole fuss is about. It's a game, and just like in Call of Duty, you don't really care about what side you're taking, just as long as you win. I don't think anyone cares if you're part of the Rangers or Spetznaz, as long as you win."
As reported from the CodBlackOpsBlog, GameStop has revealed some of the special editions that gamers will be able to pick up, which include the Prestige Edition and Hardened Edition for the game.
Customers have noticed that an added bonus for the Hardened Edition of the game, is four Nazi Zombie maps from the last World of War game, which have been revamped for use on the Black Ops game engine.
On another website, GameStop has confirmed this as accurate, so it looks like zombies are definitely on the way. Here is the portion of text which accompanies the Hardened Edition:
“Four exclusive zombie maps from World at War updated for the Black Ops engine ($15 value)”.
Other rumours are that the ultimate edition of the game will include the remote control car recently shown in the multiplayer video.
I have to admit, I'm not a fan of Zombies or exploding cars and like my COD a bit more serious. But saying that, I hope that they add some new zombie content to Black Ops, not just remake the old maps for Black Ops. Otherwise that would be a big let down in my opinion, and a lazy job by Treyarch.
Don’t forget that this is still unofficial until it’s confirmed by Treyarch
TDS is happy to announce the addition of a new recruit to its membership this week.
Sora, a by now familiar face and a friend of Pitbulls (not that we should hold that against him) officially joins as a recruit and as such will be subject to ritual stabbing every night this week......wait, what? We dont do that anymore?? When I joined I had to kneel down and su......we dont really need to go into that do we?
Anyway *cough* Welcome Sora! Latest in, still Last Out.
Online retailer Buy.com has revealed that Call of Duty: Black Ops will be available in a Hardened and Prestige special edition. At least, it will in the US.
While the contents of the two premium versions haven't been detailed, the Hardened Edition is listed for $79.99 while the Prestige Edition will set you back $149.99.
Modern Warfare 2 received similar treatment when it was released last year. The Hardened Edition of MW2 featured a steelbook case, art-book and a code for Call of Duty Classic.
The Prestige Edition had a working pair of night-vision goggles. You can probably guess these will have similarly outlandish gifts thrown in.
According to analysts Treyarch's Call of Duty: Black Ops pre-orders have surpassed those of Infinity Ward's blockbuster, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
Comments from Treyarch suggest that the studio is very confident in their follow up to Modern Warfare 2, they recently stated that it 'raises the bar' over Modern Warfare 2 and will exceed expectations.
Over the last few days various rumours have come out about playing Call of Duty in the future and a possible move toward a pay per month subscription model. Scary news admittedly, and probably a change that would mean many, if not all of the squad being forced to make a massive decision and most likely avoid that release of COD like the plague.
However, Activision, Treyarch and Infinity Ward have all rubbished rumours of a subscription to play Modern Warfare 2's multiplayer, reports CVG on their site today.
Activision's Dam Amrich was the first one to sound off on the rumours, which were sparked by the emergence of a video on CVG's site. Video can be found here - http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=256187.
"MW2 subscriptions? Nope," he says. "There's a video that made the rounds today of a 360 player getting a glitchy, incomplete message that uses the phrase "Modern Warfare 2" and half of the word membership."
"This video shows just a glitch - since you can access a Live subscription renewal from within the MW2 game interface, it appears some data got jammed between two parts of Live. It's not a secret portal to some nefarious plot to charge people for COD multiplayer - and there are no plans to do that" explained Amrich.
Infinity Ward's Robert Bowling also said "nobody has to pay to play COD or MW2 multiplayer, nor will they" in a tweet while Treyarch's community manager joined in with a tweet of his own, saying "No, you will not have to 'Pay to Play'".
In fairness, it's Bobby Kotick's desire for a pay-to-play model that gave the rumours weight in the first place but it seems that we're safe. For now........
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