Topic: Call of Duty: Black Ops

[Aftrthought051]

No online pass for COD:BO

While various publishers (including EA, Ubisoft, THQ, and maybe even Sony) have embraced the "online pass" model to combat used games -- that is, charging used game buyers $10 to access multiplayer content -- Treyarch studio head Mark Lamia says they're going to try a different tactic: keep Call of Duty: Black Ops' multiplayer perpetually free, but make it addicting enough that no one will want to trade in the game in the first place.
"You won't see that for Black Ops," said Lamia to MCV, regarding the online pass model. "The multiplayer comes with the game you buy -- you don't have to do anything else for that.

"I want to take that in the other direction and bring consumers really great reasons to keep their games, rather than trade them in," Lamia said. "Multiplayer is critical to the success of this series. It has such tremendous staying power -- there are millions of people playing Call of Duty every day. It's entertaining people on a magnitude that's mind-blowing and we work really hard to make sure it's supported for a long time."

To that end, Lamia said improving and supporting Black Ops' multiplayer will be Treyarch's major focus once the game ships. "We're going to support the hell out of Black Ops. That will be our focus post-release: making sure we keep our fans engaged, and hopefully as a result, they'll want to keep playing our game and won't want to trade it in."

Call of Duty: Black Ops hits shelves on November 9.

1up article

[JacksDaddy]

So what's everyone going to be playing?  This, or Medal of Honor?

How about BFBC2: Vietnam.    

Oh Damian...  You and Joey can have your Battlefield and spawn all over each other every chance you get while everyone else is either playing Black Ops or jumping off bridges.  I'm not sure which, we'll all decide later...   

I will be playing Black Ops and the occasional BFBC2.  I gotta have 1 game to keep my sanity when Black Ops starts pissing me off.

[Aftrthought051]

So what's everyone going to be playing?  This, or Medal of Honor?

How about BFBC2: Vietnam.    

[Crucial Chase]

ya know. never thought i'de say it buuuut... the theatre mode i think sold it for me...i always wanted more games to do that. that was my absolute favorite part about halo 3/odst. hopfully it pans out like halos did but with cod gameplay. i'm just worried about all the ks awards. i may get it after all.

[croc01]

I am going to be getting this. I was not impressed with the MoH beta at all.

[Leukoi]

So what's everyone going to be playing?  This, or Medal of Honor?

[Chef Dad]

that's pretty fn cool

[JacksDaddy]

I am looking forward to this game.  Still regretting selling MW2 cause I am getting sick of BFBC2 at this point and want to change back.  I'll just be patient and count the days until this comes out.

[Brisk 69]

More Eye Candy, if you can stomach it! 


Call of Duty: Black Ops - Multiplayer Overview (Also available in Inside Xbox on the Dashboard)
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[jlfarris]

The latest info for this game has put it back on my radar, especially considering I've heard Medal of Honor is a bit rough.

[davebrubek]

 

[keetedw]

I was going to pick this up just because I enjoy the single player in these games.

I like these game modes and changes, though.

[Brisk 69]

To add to Aftrthought051's post...

Call of Duty: Black Ops - Wager Match Trailer
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This game is a pre-order must have for me.

[Acidophie]

I am really excited for this game. I loved playing World at War, especially with the addition of Nazi Zombies. This game looks like a natural progression of the first. Better graphics, better content, addictive play elements.

[Aftrthought051]

Bit of a long read, but kinda details the way COD: BO is changing up things.  The wagering on matches at the end of the article does sound very interesting and is getting good reviews from those that have played it.

The Five Ways That Black Ops Changes Call of Duty Multiplayer
(PS3, XBOX 360, PC, Wii)
Money, gambling, movies, and happy face reticules are just some of the ways that Black Ops changes up COD multiplayer.
 
By Thierry Nguyen
Posted: 09/01/2010 Earlier today, we had a brisk and information-dense presentation followed by some quick play sessions of the multiplayer features for Call of Duty: Black Ops. The easy assumption to make with Black Ops would be that it simply features "more stuff." Take the current number of quantifiable items like killstreaks, perks, weapons, and levels, and crank out a bunch more. And that is indeed one aspect of Black Ops' multiplayer.
Examples of the above include stuff like an expanded Killstreak list that includes Cold War-ized versions of popular Modern Warfare multiplayer tropes; the UAV has given way to the Spy Plane. The Napalm Strike replaces your typical airstrike. The gunship is an appropriately Cold War era helicopter rather than a modern behemoth. And there're new Killstreak rewards, like the exploding RC buggy (affectionately referred as the "bomber buggy") or the minigun called "Death Machine." But once you get past the traditional, "here's more stuff," you can see that Treyarch is actually adding five major changes or additions to what we would traditionally associate as Call of Duty multiplayer.


 
Click the image above to check out all Call of Duty: Black Ops screens.

No. 1) Combat Training
So Treyarch has come to the same conclusion as Epic: not enough players actually go online. Despite the fact that COD hosts a thriving multiplayer community, the developers found out that a huge percentage of COD players simply never go online for multiplayer. The first major method the team wants to fix this with is through Combat Training, a sort of bot-match mode. For players who indeed are too intimidated to go online and test their mettle against other players, Combat Training will let them play against the A.I. and get used to the multiplayer experience. Online director Dan Bunting comments that the mode grew from the team's internal use of an A.I. bot (named "Larry") for balancing purposes, and they decided to let players go against Larry before jumping into the real world.


No. 2) Customization
Modern Warfare might have introduced character classes with Perks and whatnot, and while Black Ops retains that same basic formula, the team has made some distinct changes to the character system. The key thought behind customization is the idea that the player should truly feel distinct and individualized, and the degree to what can be changed has increased significantly.

For one thing, there're the obvious visual changes that come from selecting a base class. Choosing a flak jacket fellow gives you a different character model than choosing a stealthy ghost guy. After that, the team has further changed the way your armament works; gear is now divided into "lethal" (anything that can kill, like grenades), "tactical" (things that don't kill, but give you options during gameplay, like flashbangs), and "equipment" (items that can be deployed, or picked up, such as gun turrets or motion sensors).

Further than that though, you can also customize your emblems and weapons. The emblem editor lets you muck around with three layers (the emblem itself, any sort of tag or text, and the background), and it somewhat resembles the livery editor from something like a Forza game. The main example is when Bunting created a horse emblem that featured pistols instead of hooves adorned against the American flag. Then you can take said emblem, and apply it to your weapon -- in addition to changing the weapon's basic camouflage patterns or even the actual red dot sight (my favorite example is a rifle that changed the red dot sight into a blue happy face). The actual player classes, plus their gear, is part of the overall theme of player choice that Bunting cites frequently.


No. 3) Theater
Likely inspired by Halo 3, Black Ops now supports a full theater mode for sharing your exploits online. Each player gets a file share space where he or she can place films, screenshots, or even custom game settings, and these items are all searchable and viewable. Your recent matches are available for searching, clipping, machinima-ing, and everything. Bunting wouldn't elaborate on what exactly "custom games" actually entails, but it's still interesting to see that every Black Ops player will have a central hub to post bragging rights (besides a Youtube channel).


No. 4) Money
Perhaps the biggest change to COD is the concept of money which complements the leveling system. Lead multiplayer designer David Vonderhaar jokes that money came about from the simple fact that he's a greedy fellow who loves money and gambling said money. Bunting elaborates the system: in addition to earning experience points for levels, players will earn Call of Duty Points (CP). Every time they reach a level, they don't simply unlock one new gun. They unlock whole categories of firearms and attachments, and you then spend CP to buy gear for yourself. As Bunting reiterates, the core of multiplayer is about player choice, and now in addition to designing their own looks and color schemes, players will be defining their own loadouts via money.


No. 5) Wager Matching
So with the addition of money comes the other item that Vonderaar loves so much: gambling. Wager Match is a separate multiplayer mode where you simply gamble your CP in a series of specific matches. The four "wagers" you can partake (so far) are: one in a chamber, sticks and stones, gun game, and sharpshooter. As noted, each Wager Match mode has specific rules, and does different things to your gambled CP.



One in a chamber starts simply: you have a knife and a single gun with a single bullet. Taking down foes will earn you more bullets to use, but once you run out of bullets, you have just the knife to stab fools with. Sharpshooter also has a pretty easy to grasp concept: everyone gets a random weapon that they are stuck with, and the emphasis is on pure, well, sharpshooting skill with whatever you have. Sticks and stones gives you ballistic knives, the crossbow, and tomahawks to take on players with. While the ballistic knives and the crossbow present standard "these are neat ways to kill opponents," the tomahawk presents the most interesting effect: it fully bankrupts its victim. The moment someone succumbs to a tomahawk, they instantly lose all of the CP they wagered for the match.

For me, the most interesting mode is easily Gun Game -- which itself seems reminiscent of a PC mod for Modern Warfare. This one has players working their way through a series of specific guns during a session. At any one time, you're locked to using one specific weapon, but a kill will automatically equip the next highest gun in the list -- meaning you start out with a lowly pistol but as you kill foes, you work up to better pistols then to submachineguns to shotguns to assault rifles and the like. The inverse happens as well -- every death means you get knocked down to using the previous (and weaker) gun. The first player to have used every gun becomes the winner of the wager. From my experience, it's just pretty neat to be on a solid kill run and just watch your arsenal get more and more lethal as you score -- only to be knocked down a peg or two from someone else interrupting your streak.

There honestly is quite a lot going on with Black Ops -- more than I expected. I had walked in thinking, "this is just going to be Modern Warfare 2 with bigger numbers," but with the five things outlined earlier, Black Ops already feels like a distinct (and large-scale) Treyarch title rather than a me-too addition to the franchise.

Article w/ a video

[t0etags]

I have to say that I have been a fan since CoD2, but Cod:MW2 really disappointed me. I look at XBOX FPS like this, Run and Gun you play COD, Real Strategy Based FPS you BFBC2. Do not plan on purchasing Black Ops until I know about all the glitches and patches that they are shooting out  of the console. lol.

[Brisk 69]

I plan on buying this game on release day. I had more fun playing the Multi-player of W@W than the single-player. Also, I liked how Treyarch continuously patched the game and modified the gametypes and maps so that the game would have a continuous even playing field.

[JacksDaddy]

So they are just releasing the W@W zombie maps?  Aren't they already out?  If I wanted to play those zombie maps I'll just go buy W@W again for significantly less...

[Aftrthought051]

Reported late yesterday, In what can only be described as a routine marketing blunder, Gamestop may very well have revealed Treyarch's plans to bring Zombies back to this latest Call of Duty title significantly ahead of schedule. However, ever taking things in stride, Treyarch quickly stepped up to the unearthed secret and did indeed confirm the pending arrival of maps in Black Ops that will be littered with hordes of the trendy, familiar undead.

Josh Olin, Community Manager at Treyarch, briefly confirmed that gamers can expect four-player cooperative maps pitting them in a fight to survive against waves of zombies will be included in both the Prestige and Hardened editions of Black Ops, "All 4 existing CoDWaW Zombies maps will be included in Hardened & Prestige editions of CODBlackOps as callback co-op levels!"

While this does seem as a bit of rehashing on the part of Treyarch, one can only hope that the perennial Call of Duty developer tosses a few new Zombie maps in the game as well instead of waiting until post release to milk the DLC profits. Either way, if you can't get into the single or multiplayer elements of Black Ops, I suppose there is always killing Zombies.

Call of Duty: Black Ops hits shelves the world over on November 9th, 2010 in Standard, Hardened and Prestige edition flavors.

PlanetXB360 article w/ pics of included items in Hardened/Prestige edition of COD: Black Ops

I guess it has the different wpns you use in Black Ops, but still, no new zombie maps.  That is really lame.  I guess you can be hopeful that the hardened edition just has more zombie maps w/ the Black Ops zombie maps AND the W@W maps, but time will tell for sure.

[Villid]

yeah, what aftr said lol.


was talking to the dude at gamestop today while preordering gears 3(yes i know its still 11 months out).  he said  black ops will definitely have a zombie mode.    so it looks like i am buying another cod game.

[Aftrthought051]

There are 2 conditions to be buying this game.  Terrorist(?) Zombies, but more importantly, that it doesnt freakin rain grenades during the single player.  spent more time runnin from 'nades than killin ppl in W@W

It's about time you registered with the site.  Been gaming with you for weeks and you FINALLY join!

   Villid's been w/ the site before you, he just never logs on and puts in his .02 or let's us know how he is doing.   

[Aaron]

I got sick of MP due to the rain of grenades and noob tubes. So annoying.

[keetedw]

There are 2 conditions to be buying this game.  Terrorist(?) Zombies, but more importantly, that it doesnt freakin rain grenades during the single player.  spent more time runnin from 'nades than killin ppl in W@W

It's about time you registered with the site.  Been gaming with you for weeks and you FINALLY join!

[Villid]

There are 2 conditions to be buying this game.  Terrorist(?) Zombies, but more importantly, that it doesnt freakin rain grenades during the single player.  spent more time runnin from 'nades than killin ppl in W@W

[keetedw]

LOL, yeah, I saw the Bruce Willis guy also.

I have a feeling I'll end up getting this.  I enjoy FPS enough to get it.  But if it sucks or looks like the MP will just be another MW2, I'll sell it when I'm through the single player a couple times.

I want dog tags if I cut a b*tch!