I think anyone who likes to bash on COD needs to take the time and read this article.

I'm not trying to start a flame war here, just to backup my opinions about COD. Also, the article is written by a highly respected video game editor, Dan Ryckert. Who coincidentally gave BF3 a higher review score than MW3 for those who were just curious.

I agree that they are fun games, and I'm not trying to flame war here either, I've played both MW3 free weekends. However (for me, i.e. my own personal opinion):

Like It Or Not, It’s Evolving-Yes it is changing, they are introducing new things in each game, but some of it (not all) feels like it could have been changed with patches, albeit fairly substantial patches. If I had the money, I probably would by BO2. But I would not buy each game every year, as I feel the changes are too small, and only after 2 years does it warrant me spending another £40, which is a lot to me, as I don't have a steady source of income.

Misconceiving The Crowd-Who plays the game really doesn't bother me, as long as I enjoy it

Bang For Your Buck-Fair enough, I bought BF Premium, as I spend enough time on it to make that seem like a worthy purchase to me

Why Would Activision Do Anything Differently?-If it aint broke, don't fix it. True. But, as I mentioned earlier, there needs to be more reason for people who have to be very pick and choosy about which games they buy, to buy each title.


I've enjoyed what I have played from MW3, but would I pay £40 for it? No. Same with upcoming Battlefield titles, if they start becoming similar each time then it's not really worth it. It's a well written article though and covers a lot of true points about people who hate COD just because it is COD.

Big doesn't equal bad = true

Evolving = false, the changes between installments can hardly be called "evolving" at best they're NOT stagnant, but its not an "evolution" between games. It's just so minor changes. The graphics engine has never even replaced with a next generation installment its just a rehashed Call of Duty 2 engine.

Misconceiving the Crowd = false, didn't even bother to read. The crowd are overwhelmingly bad people... either in skill, teamwork, and/or communication. Age group is also often low, at least the ones that bother using their mics, then older players don't bother because of the dumb kids.

Bang for your buck = HAHAHAHAHA, DLC and Elite/DLC passes are the biggest money W**** scheme ever under the pretense of giving you a great deal! Is it better than paying for the movies? More affordable than a concert ticket or visit to the theme park? Yeah. Still doesn't justifying making each customer pay $120+ for game plus DLC EVERY YEAR THEY WANT TO PLAY COD. Guess thats the Activision tax.

Why Would Activision Do Anything Differently? Then it comes to this part. Its only about the company line. They want money whether its milking WoW, Guitar Hero, COD, whatever. There isn't an evil plan but its also not innocent business as usual: Activision asks us to pay WAY too much for their published products. Are they keeping their franchises alive and asking people to pay again and again for little change? Yeah. Good for a sound fiscal policy, at the cost of the gamer.

I have to say that article sounds like someone got paid a few bucks to write it. Nobody even has any business writing a review like that unless they want to become to target of controversy themselves. And it doesn't help when everything they write (almost) is bogus.

How does it sound like he got paid to write that? He works for Game Informer, not Treyarch or Activision. This article could have been written years ago when the controversy was even bigger, but it was written now..I just don't see your logic.

He makes solid points, especially about paying for their product. How is Dice any different by making you pay for DLC content? Or any of these "free-2-play" games that say you can keep certain items if you pay for them?

It's a business, plain and simple..that's ANY company's bottom line.

Also, he's right about people misconceiving the crowd. I know plenty of people that own a console but they've got full-time jobs and only play sparingly between taking care of their families, working, errands, etc. Unfortunately it's usually the most vocal that people notice, but they're certainly not the majority.

I can not say I agree with insevin. I am new to console games mostly due to work and other priorities in the past. I know when I play the mute feature is the top thing I do even before I start playing the game. I like CoD cause it is fun and in fact that is all that matters to me. Is it fun and is it worth the money I spend on it. Now I am not trying to insult anyone on this site or others not here but a big issues is with the kids on these games. Parents buy these games and whatever else little Eric and Erica want to just keep them out of there hair so the parents can do what ever. The kids then proceed to act how ever they want. I will not get into why I feel they do this but, I have a good feeling why.

As for the money that is the only reason a company is made. I don't hear people saying lets go spend $1 million to make a company and sell our stuff so we only make $500,000 and then let's do it again. As long as there are people willing to buy what ever comes out with a CoD name on it and they make money they will keep making it. The simple point I got from this article is if you think it is worth it then pay the money and get it. If you do not think it is worth it then don't. There is no reason for anyone to bash on it if they do not like it. I mean I do not bash on people that have Hondas or Toyotas and I don't like those vehicles. So why bash a game. Oh wait see first paragraph again. Kids wanting to be big and bad.

It's true that there are only 2 or 3 people yelling out of the 16 or so players in the lobby, but that still ruins the expierence. Also the guy mentions that the killstreaks have changed a bit over time, from fixed to choosable and now a point system just like in homefront. I'm sure a few killstreaks have been added or removed over the years, and some guns have been added or removed. But I wonder if you CoD players find this satisfactory? I only played MW for about 20 hours, Black Ops 40 hours and mw3 for a measly 2 hours in multiplayer, skipping W@W alltogether, so I possibly couldn't tell if the game has evolved or not.

Ofcourse EA has innovated pretty much the last few years with the battlefield and medal of honor series, but that's pretty much only because they're trying to grab CoD's position as market leader in the FPS market. Perhaps something similiar will happen as did with the soccer games. For a long time FIFA was marketleader, and the games have gotten pretty stagnant, hardly anything new from year to year. Then PES enters the market and steals the show for a year, since then both developers have strived to make the best game each year.

Black Ops 2 is showing promise that things might be headed in the right direction. Attachments only affect your gun, not your character. Perks only affect your character, not your gun. Ranked lobby matches (similar to the Halo series), prestiging won't reset anything you've unlocked for your gun (attachments as well as challenges).

Scorestreaks will be much harder to obtain. Simply slaying won't really affect the game against other players as kills (normally) don't count for nearly as much as defending/capturing flags, planting bombs, capping flags, etc.

It's got promise.

I'm happy you enjoy the changes being made to balance. But how do you feel about the rest? like graphical or engine improvements that the old call of duty games couldn't do.

well here are my two cents, im a pretty big fan of both CoD and Battlefield, but i know enough not to try and compare the two, they ARENT meant to play or feel the same, nor should you treat it as such, CoD usually aims for that "fast paced, in your face" kind of persona while BF3 and such aim for a more "tactical" approach. but because of this, doesn't make one better than the other, honestly, it comes down to personal preference.

as for the new Black Ops. Im honestly somewhat disappointed, not at the game itself, but the work that was put into it. Ive had the game for about 3 hours and in that time, ive played it very little. It's constantly freezing, especially at the loading screens, i can't even count how many times ive had to restart my console. Not to mention, the graphics feel chopped and very stale. on PS3, they seem really low rez and pixelated, even after installing the graphics onto the HDD. it almost looks like when you play a pc game, and you turn the resolution down to something it can't work with, like 800x600. it looks pretty bad.

all in all, BO2 has awesome potential, but there is just too much broken gameplay from poor coding. and that makes the game a little less comfortable to play.