Activision’s Hyped Call of Duty Elite Continues to Stumble [UPDATED]

@sbarre said:

The answer is probably more obvious than everyone thinks: Large web teams invariably have weak links (i.e. crappy developers) and a company the size of Activision probably doesn't implement best practices in these add-on products (like unit testing, proper stress testing etc) because the budgets aren't there.

I think the second is way more likely to be the cause then the first. Every company has "bad" developers. Or more likely just junior very inexperianced cheap developers. Which is not a problem if allocated correctly and the budgets are there. This way more smells like to little or wrong allocation of budgets combined with very bad project management. I would not quickly jump on the 'blame the programmer' bandwagon here. I've seen to many instances where good programmers had to make shit and warned their superiors about it, but due to to lack of time and budger where forced to anyway. Unless they want to work in their free time.

Has anyone been able to sign up even? I can't do that since launch, no matter what browser I use.

Multiplayer works fine, which seems strange as you'd think the strain on Elite would be lower - it's a website rather than a game, and it has presumably fewer users than the number of players who actually play online.

Pretty amazing how a company like Activision could mess this up so bad, for its biggest franchise! I figured after the Beta they would´ve worked out the kinks, apparently it wasn´t that easy...

I bought the Hardened Edition thinking I'm probably gonna pay for the DLC so I can keep playing with my firends, and I'll might learn a thing or two from Elite to get better at the game. (Seeing how I don't just play COD so I tend to get rolled after the game has been out for a couple months.) But with how broken Elite is I really can't help but feel ripped off. It's getting better but it almost seems unacceptable for such a large company to do this. I think it was Jeff that said he remember's when games would ship finished not like now where we all buy broken products and have to wait to get the patch that "finishes" the game. I know Elite isn't a game per say but I feel it's still in the same boat.

@Jayzilla said:

$60 still in my pocket for a multi-player that i loved but feels old hat now. So glad I didn't buy this game.

Agree entirely. The bell cruve of my "enjoyment per title" graph peaked at Modern Warfare 2. I don't miss playing these games.

I just got a MW3 for £25 and was going to buy Elite since I got the game so cheap but after reading all about it, I think it would be wise to just pass on this mess.

@TheKing said:

Seeing how the actual game worked perfectly fine at launch (unlike the other "big" modern military shooter this holiday) and they gave everyone a free month I fail to see why people are bitching. Oh right, it's Activision.

When you have pre-order figures, you know its going to be big etc to use the excuse of not being ready for the numbers is a poor one. Will always be so.

The other things here other the fact they should have had a good idea about numbers already is the implementation. You got other similar (and better) things already existing. You have Blizzard under your wing who has experts on this stuff you could at least get what needs to be done off them...... A list of things that could have been done and moreover should have been done is too long for this to be going live niggles.

They messed up.

Admitting it we could all move on but the spin these companies put on it sometimes, first blaming every one and everything else, the back tracking and side stepping just annoys everyone. Clearly not ready - delay it. People will groan but far less then launching something and causing the mess you can see today.

Just something you expect not to see, IT messed up, Ok that is bad and they could have avoided it on so many levels but the handling is what then drives the rage further.

@vinsanityv22 said:

For shit's sake, go play something else people. There are so many great games out there that you shouldn't STILL be wasting your time with COD. Yeah, it's a great game. So great, they released it EIGHT FUCKING TIMES and you all still eat it up. Shit. Both Infinity Ward's and TreyArch's (and Sledgehammer's, and Raven's...) imaginations are so atrophied at this point that the most creative addition to the COD formula yet is zombies. And you all respond by....throwing your money at over 6 million copies of the game! Why not just pull your pants down and bend over for Bobby Kotick personally?

What's the fucking point of people making creative, colorful, memorable, and fun games when it's apparent that you morons don't seem to care about any of them!?! You all just want to consume the exact same experience over and over. Idiots.

Your argument boils down to, "Why do people who like to play online multiplayer shooters keep playing online multiplayer shooters?" Why do you play creative, colorful, memorable and fun games? You should stop wasting your time with things you enjoy and play something I think is better that you might not enjoy. Point number two, if you have to resort to name calling to get a point across in your arguments then it's you who has become the idiot.

As far as the article goes, of course a free PC version of elite is off the table. Why would they continue supporting something free when they cannot keep up with a service that is so big that they can't take peoples $50 dollars fast enough for membership?

I downloaded the console app but can't find it on the dashboard. Where is it? I'll never pay for it but am intrigued to see how much they provide for free.

They should have known beforehand what to expect.

how hard is it to just make a dam website

My opinion on Elite has gone from "I do not like the sounds of this." to "Eh, this doesn't look so bad." to "Oh man, this is broken!".

Wtf?

So many things about what I've seen make me happy I didn't buy this game

@Korwin said:

Battlelog and Bungie.net keep on humming along...

Battlelog had a rough start, and not all of its features are working right now (like reserved slots and server queues. )

Bungie.net, however, is awesome.

Battlelog and Bungie.net keep on humming along...

@vinsanityv22 said:

For shit's sake, go play something else people. There are so many great games out there that you shouldn't STILL be wasting your time with COD. Yeah, it's a great game. So great, they released it EIGHT FUCKING TIMES and you all still eat it up. Shit. Both Infinity Ward's and TreyArch's (and Sledgehammer's, and Raven's...) imaginations are so atrophied at this point that the most creative addition to the COD formula yet is zombies. And you all respond by....throwing your money at over 6 million copies of the game! Why not just pull your pants down and bend over for Bobby Kotick personally?

What's the fucking point of people making creative, colorful, memorable, and fun games when it's apparent that you morons don't seem to care about any of them!?! You all just want to consume the exact same experience over and over. Idiots.

Soooo... play that, or what? That other military shooter? Or all the other sequels coming out?

As someone who's played pretty much every big release this year - I love GameFly - including Modern Warfare 3, I can tell you that I'm having a blast; definitely one of my favorite games this year. They've made a lot of smart tweaks to the formula, and it's so fun. I keep finding myself playing hours longer than I intended; I was up until 5am the other day even though I had class the next morning to go to.

If you're tired of the formula, don't play it. That's why I'm not tired of the formula yet. I skipped the Treyarch games, so this still totally feels awesome to me.

What are people doing playing CoD anyway? Instead they should be playing one of the greatest games of all time: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim!

@vinsanityv22: The most popular products in any medium are never the best artistically.

This is true for everything, not just games.

I know its fun to get outraged over popular things, but you really should take a look around before mounting up on that high horse.

i have yet to even be able to log in. i just get timed out of queues or told that traffic is too heavy. Iv been trying since day 1 to get on and i got nothing so far :/

For shit's sake, go play something else people. There are so many great games out there that you shouldn't STILL be wasting your time with COD. Yeah, it's a great game. So great, they released it EIGHT FUCKING TIMES and you all still eat it up. Shit. Both Infinity Ward's and TreyArch's (and Sledgehammer's, and Raven's...) imaginations are so atrophied at this point that the most creative addition to the COD formula yet is zombies. And you all respond by....throwing your money at over 6 million copies of the game! Why not just pull your pants down and bend over for Bobby Kotick personally?

What's the fucking point of people making creative, colorful, memorable, and fun games when it's apparent that you morons don't seem to care about any of them!?! You all just want to consume the exact same experience over and over. Idiots.

Funny, Battlelog works pretty damn well.

Bungie and Blizzard both work with Activision, why no get one of them to help out seeing they are the best at this kind of stuff.

The last 2 days It's been working for me just fine. Both the website and in-game.

Give everyone a free year of Elite. Problem solved....

Oh the tears of the fanboys. So delicious. :P

@AnEternalEnigma said:

Bungie.net has always worked perfectly going back to when Halo 2 launched. It worked from day 1 of Halo 2.

They even had a beta for this (which I was a part of), which I guess was worthless now. GG, Activision.

Adding salt to the already gaping wound here is that Battlelog, Elite's most direct competition, has worked near-flawlessly since BF3's launch.

"If I didn’t know any better, I’d have assumed Call of Duty Elite was the launch of a Call of Duty MMO, given how many problems the service has experienced getting off the ground."

LOLOLOLOLOL

@Frostburn said:

Even better is myself and 2 friends joining a game in progress, killing someone and getting -1999998839 EXP. I'm now level 1 and won't be digging myself out of that hole anytime soon.

Wait, that really happened?

Has anyone been able to get on Elite at all? I've checked probably once a day since the game came out and haven't been able to get in a single time.

@aurahack said:

@TheKing said:

Seeing how the actual game worked perfectly fine at launch (unlike the other "big" modern military shooter this holiday) and they gave everyone a free month I fail to see why people are bitching. Oh right, it's Activision.

I don't know what game and service you were using, but Battlefield 3 worked without problems for me out of the box on launch and Battlelog was up and running perfectly the moment I signed-in the same day (and since).

As for MW3, I could barely get into parties and matchmaking was a nightmare of "Could not migrate to host" pop-ups and static screens waiting to find me a game. A complete mess of a launch.

Not just that, but having actually signed into Elite and messed around with it... there's not much to get all that excited about. Battlelog tracks an infinite amount of stats more than Elite does and navigating Elite, for the time being, is a sluggish mess of an experience. :|

Here, here and here.

As for MW3, I played on launch day (360) and it worked perfectly fine.

Does Elite show you your stats for the previous games too? Cause on Bungie.net I can go see how bad I sucked at my first game of Halo 2. I know it's been up and running since then and not retroactively added, but if Bungie could do it that long ago on the regular X-Box, what the hell is Activision's problem?

@TheKing said:

Seeing how the actual game worked perfectly fine at launch (unlike the other "big" modern military shooter this holiday) and they gave everyone a free month I fail to see why people are bitching. Oh right, it's Activision.

I don't know what game and service you were using, but Battlefield 3 worked without problems for me out of the box on launch and Battlelog was up and running perfectly the moment I signed-in the same day (and since).

As for MW3, I could barely get into parties and matchmaking was a nightmare of "Could not migrate to host" pop-ups and static screens waiting to find me a game. A complete mess of a launch.

Not just that, but having actually signed into Elite and messed around with it... there's not much to get all that excited about. Battlelog tracks an infinite amount of stats more than Elite does and navigating Elite, for the time being, is a sluggish mess of an experience. :|

The game itself works fine. Personally, all I want Elite for is my free 2 hours of double XP. Not losing sleep over this.

Way to fail horribly at ripping off Halo Waypoint haha

Even better is myself and 2 friends joining a game in progress, killing someone and getting -1999998839 EXP. I'm now level 1 and won't be digging myself out of that hole anytime soon. Called Activision after waiting on the phone for over an hour and they are supposed to take care of it at some point. Good thing we don't have dedicated servers on PC right? Safer that way...

Seeing how the actual game worked perfectly fine at launch (unlike the other "big" modern military shooter this holiday) and they gave everyone a free month I fail to see why people are bitching. Oh right, it's Activision.

@MrKlorox said:

Know what's awesome? Battlelog.

BattleLog definitely turned out better than I'd expected (though it's got its kinks). I thought CoD Elite was by far the better looking of the two services design and usability-wise. I haven't seen it lately, though. Just watched the demo video that came out over the summer.

@Superfriend said:

Or hire professionals who have done this sort of thing before.

Uh, can you recommend someone who has pulled off the largest game launch in history, without a hitch?
I mean, someone who doesn't already work for Activision...

The game earned a staggering $400 million dollars in the first 24 hours after its release, making it the biggest opening day seller ever. The previous record holders? Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which earned $310 million in its first 24 hours in 2010 and Call of Duty: Black Ops, which earned $360 million in the first 24 hours after its release.
 
Life-to-date sales for the Call of Duty franchise exceed worldwide theatrical box office for 'Star Wars' and 'Lord of the Rings,' two of the most successful entertainment franchises of all time," said Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick in a statement.

Know what's awesome? Battlelog.

once again they fail to deliver

Maybe I'll try logging in again. I've tried a few times at about 8am but it's never worked yet.

I'm so relieved that I sold my shares a while ago...

“We are working towards a universal Elite experience but we cannot guarantee if or when a version will be available for the PC”

Utter Bullshit Activision.

Or hire professionals who have done this sort of thing before.

The game earned a staggering $400 million dollars in the first 24 hours after its release, making it the biggest opening day seller ever. The previous record holders? Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which earned $310 million in its first 24 hours in 2010 and Call of Duty: Black Ops, which earned $360 million in the first 24 hours after its release.
 
Life-to-date sales for the Call of Duty franchise exceed worldwide theatrical box office for 'Star Wars' and 'Lord of the Rings,' two of the most successful entertainment franchises of all time," said Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick in a statement.

I thought people realized this when they didn't announce a harden edition for pc o_O.

Bungie.net has been doing this since Halo 2 and it was free and it never failed this hard.....

You'd think with the numbers that the COD series makes annually they could at least put out a functioning service, especially considering you have to pay for it. 

$60 still in my pocket for a multi-player that i loved but feels old hat now. So glad I didn't buy this game.