Various sites were running articles yesterday about leaked Mortal Kombat DLC characters. Yes, these are characters that will not be available for the game that is still a month away but will be available sometime at a later date for a small price. We all know how companies are looking at DLC as a way to keep making money once gamers have initially paid the $60 price but it’s still irritating to know of these instances.

Yes, this is something that leaked early and probably shouldn’t have been talked about until after the release of the game, but it’s still wrong. They are witholding characters from the game only to nickel and dime us at a later date. I have really been looking forward to this game, and still am, but this is just a bummer to see shit like this. I guess we should just look at Mortal Kombat as the game itself and judge on if its worth the full price or not. It always seems like fighting games are the worst with DLC and how they handle distributing it. I feel like costume packs for various Capcom fighting games is just as bad as horse armor for Oblivion.

So am I wrong for this? Looking at it from a business perspective, I can understand completely why you would do it. You are letting gamers know not to trade in your game early because we will be updating the game with new stuff. It sucks they are forced to go down this route with so many retailers having great incentives on trading in their games. It’s a direction I hate seeing the industry travel toward, but understand if things don’t get any better than even more drastic measures will be taken. In the meantime, I’ll just neglect to purchase stuff like this and only enjoy the product they release on store shelves.

What do you all think of DLC and do you find yourself getting DLC for many different games?

Monster Tale (Nintendo DS)
I’ve been excited to get my hands on this game for quite a while once I learned it was like a Metroid style game from the creators of Henry Hatsworth. Hell, I really liked Henry Hatsworth for a while until the difficulty got a bit too much for me then decided to put it down. I feel like Monster Tale will be the same way but for a completely different reason. The game just has a bit too much backtracking for my taste.

Before I get ahead of myself, I’ll clarify a little about Monster Tale. The game is about a young girl who stumbles upon a bracelet that lets her shoot shit. Then, along with the badass bracelet, she finds an egg which miraculously hatches at that moment and becomes her little creature named Chomp. Chomp can fight alongside you and level up abilities, and even morph into other crazy creatures which helps bring variety to combat. Exploring is fun, you can approach combat in a number of different ways, and the game world is varied and interesting. Also the game feels like it is constantly rewarding you with new upgrades to Chomp and new abilities to play around with. But sadly, the backtracking is a bit much and I really hate the characters.

This is essentially a kids game, I understand that. But the main villain is some whiny princess bitch that finds it okay to torture animals; her motives are quite unclear though so I’ll skew toward the more adult theme and believe she is hoarding these creatures for some crazy sexual pleasure. Anyway, the boss battles are about as fun as you can make a boss battle but are mainly a pattern recognition instance that you must cross. Like I stated above, the game is really fun but it is forcing me to backtrack quite a bit more than I really want to. The game has no sort of fast travel system that makes it any quicker either. It forces me to travel out of my way about ten minutes to pick up a key to open the door I’m standing in front of. I’m around the 35% mark (it tells you) and I’m hoping it can keep me in until the credits.

Warhammer 40,000 Dawn of War II (PC)
I started this game a while back, late last year, and thought it was awesome. Played through the first level then got caught up with holiday titles like Fallout: New Vegas and completely forgot about I even bought it. An internet blackout one night had me scrolling through my Steam list of games and I decided to boot this game back up. I’ve played around five hours of Dawn of War II and am really enjoying it so far. It’s a challenging RTS that I think could be one of my favorite RTS games I’ve played. It’s getting fairly challenging and forcing me to approach large battles with tactics which is great. Won’t talk about this one much since it’s older but I see myself playing through the expansions once I complete the main quest.

I’m playing it by myself right now but would love to co-op up with someone if your interested. I have the main game and Chaos Rising; gotta love Steam sales.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light (Xbox 360)
Me and Rich are still playing this game but I’m not too sure for how much longer. It’s been great so far but doing a quick scan on an internet walkthrough shows we still have seven levels left. We are already getting kind of bored of this game and am ready to move onto Dead Nation but still want to completeLara Croft first. Still a great game but maybe a little long or not enough variety.

Lead and Gold (PC)
Played several matches of this over the weekend due to Steam hosting a free to play weekend. This game is great but with all multiplayer games gets old after a bit if you aren’t playing with friends. Also Lead and Gold seems to be more on objective based modes in which nobody was paying attention to; we were all just running and gunning then bitching at why we lost when we had more kills. The game was only $2.50 but neglected to buy it because I’m not really that much into online games if I don’t have people to play with. I say this but am still pumped for Battlefield 3.

Angry Birds Rio (iPhone)
Bought this game then forgot it was just more Angry Birds. There was a time that I was really into Angry Birds but fell out after I got my fix from it. They are great games but you can only fling so many birds before the novelty wears thin. This new game sports updated graphics and a new story about monkeys and caged birds but just know going into it that its just more Angry Birds. I’m sure that’s enough for many people though.

My plans for the week include playing more of what I played last week but also maybe hopping on theCrysis 2 train. Reviews have been pretty stellar so far but I’ve played multiple shooters already that I kind of want a break for a bit. Need to finish Pokemon White, and also my second playthrough of Mass Effect 2.

Have a good week of gaming!

-Mau

Before I begin, I must state my experience with the MMO genre. I’ve seen older titles like Everquestplayed for several hours. I’ve logged a couple hours into WoW, but the style of play just wasn’t for me. I spent a day updating Final Fantasy XIV, but was never able to join a server. I’ve never deeply invested myself into an MMO, but I do have an idea of what they exactly are. Being an old school gamer at heart, I was instantly turned on to the idea of an MMO based around an 8-bit RPG like Dragon Warrior or Final Fantasy. It was an easy decision to try NEStalgia for the fact that it’s completely free to play, and was created to mimic the look and feel of an old school RPG.

NEStalgia is the perfect name for this game; it’s nostalgic and modeled around the NES RPG titles. It is also completely free and takes ten minutes to download BYOND, create an account and hop in a server. I was actually impressed with the quickness of this and was already off to a good start. Once you are set up, you can create a character choosing his outfit and hairstyle — which is quite funny since these characters are so limited with how they look. You then pick a class and are thrown into your starting town.

At first you might feel lost but talking with town folks will begin your quest log and some direction as to what is going on. The quests are typical: go collect this, head in this dungeon, and bring back a number of items — quests that don’t break from the mold but don’t need to; this game was made for fans of NES RPGs anyway. You can see other players in the server running around town; partying up with others is as simple as clicking an icon and clicking on their character. You can also see other player levels by clicking on their character, which then displays their name and level in the chat window to the right, which is always running.

I accepted plenty of quests and decided to start wondering the rest of the town and explore the overworld. One quest had me shrinking down where a common mouse was a ferocious enemy and taking it out. Fighting in this game shows the enemy and a menu where you can choose attack, escape, magic, etc. You also get quests like collect five of some item and bring it back for gold and experience. One had me collecting ten bandit masks or headbands that brought me to the main cave of the starter zone and to the first boss, Reghor. Exploring the overworld is exactly like the original Final Fantasy or Dragon Warrioroverworlds are handled. Do I need to make this point anymore of it being similar to old school RPGs? You can see other characters exploring and disappear once they get into a random battle. It’s funny to see a group of people heading to town, probably trying to heal before they die, only to see them disappear into another fight.

My character at the time was a level six Cleric. Going through the cave collecting masks, you realize this game is made to play with friends. They actually say it’s a frustrating experience taking on bosses and some quests if you try it alone. But who wants to play an MMO by themselves anyway, right? I barely made it in the cave before dying and couldn’t make it back in time to heal. Dying in the game teleports you back to the last town you were in, or the last Inn you visited. I then talked a friend to start up an account, and we joined with another and were able to take out Reghor. Even with all three of us, which is the max a party can be, we still had to be strategic during the fight.

When Reghor was defeated, we all got our loot; entire party gets the benefits, and was able to venture into the next area. Before that, though, I made sure to go back into town and sell off items that I no longer needed, since you are limited with how much you can carry. Loot is another hook in this game as it is with all RPGs. I also finished up a couple more quests then headed East to the next area filled with more quests. I’ve played a couple hours past this point but is all I’ve experienced so far. The next zone had all new types of quests including navigating through a Zelda-like forest.

The big appeal of this game is the fact that it’s an MMO. How has this concept not been done before? Gamers love these old school games and being able to play with friends makes it infinitely better. The only problem I can muster is being in the party and not being the party leader. These games, although incredible deep, are also simplistic when control is taken from you — to the point where you just watch your party leader take charge. You lose control of your character and follow the leader in a line. It can get boring since grinding is pretty important for boss battles and you are doing nothing but clicking “attack.” I would say the best way to play is participate in the chat menu or hop on Skype with your party.

Even though this retro style game looks simple and “outdated,” it has many things that brings it up to date including a quest log (which I mentioned earlier), a guild system, PvP combat, and an auction house for trading items. It’s surprisingly deep with how varied the game is including the many different stats your characters have attached to them.

I said the game was completely free to play from beginning to end but they do offer a paid service that has its perks. You can do either a $9 a year plan, or a lifetime subscription of $20. With how much they plan on updating this game, I would go ahead with the lifetime plan if you end up liking the game. What the paid content gets you is extra character classes, ability to create a guild, fast travel routes, and other extras that seem worth the small amount they are asking.

I have to thank Phil Kollar from GameInformer who introduced me to this game through a news post he wrote. It was the basic idea of what this game is that sounded so inviting to me. I’ve always wanted to play an MMO, but didn’t want to invest the money or the time it takes before they become “fun.” It was the ease of this experience, and creating an account and hopping on a server, that makes me say this is a game everyone should try if you were ever a fan of old school RPG’s.

Homefront (Xbox 360)
This was the main game of focus this week in which I plan on writing up a review of it soon so I’ll keep this short. The campaign was fine but only around five hours and I didn’t care much for the characters. The multiplayer seems fun but i didnt get much into it due to server issues and it being a hassle to deal with. I’ll give a more thorough explanation in my writeup later this week.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light

Story wise I have no idea what is going on except dinosaurs play a part, and I love dinosaurs. The game is worth a buy for people looking for a great co-op game to play. Even people that don’t play games much they could easily get into Lara Croft; you spawn on your partner if you die which makes it easy to get into. You also get the opportunity to stare at her sweet pixel tits.

Hard Corps Uprising (Xbox 360)
Thanks to Keadin for giving me a code to try this game out. I’ve been a fan of Contra games in the past but wasn’t really planning on checking this game out. I’m pretty happy I did because it reassured me that I’m not into these games anymore. I’ve played through the first level a couple times in Rising Mode and always die during the motorcycle part.

Rising Mode is pretty cool for gamers like myself who flat out suck at these games. You gain experience that can be spent on upgrading your life bar, guns, or anything to help make it further into the game. This mode might anger those who think this makes the game too easy but it still has a classic mode that strips all these features and provides only three lives.

I’m not really digging the art style or the noise the enemies make when you kill them; I compared it to audio being recorded on a Yak Back. It really detracts from the overall polish of the game and is distracting. I haven’t made it past the first level and not sure I will try anymore. Not even the co-op has me excited.

Tiny Wings

Dungeon Raid (iPhone)
This game just seems to do nothing but piss me off. It’s a Bejeweled type game that draws heavily fromPuzzle Quest. The enemies are actually pieces in your playing field that you connect with sword pieces to attack. You can zig-zag the line and add however many are on the field so if ten swords are by eachother then connect them all with enemies to do massive damage. It’s really deep with how much customization there is to Dungeon Raid and is definitely worth the small price of $2.99.

The reason of my aggravation is the fact that once you die in the game you start completely over. You can pick the difficulty at the beginning but even easy mode gets hard at one point. Enemies become more frequent and have higher hit points and attack damage and can wipe you out easily if you don’t play strategically. I’m still learning how exactly to attack this game and don’t plan on putting it down quite yet.

I’m hoping this coming week to finish Lara Croft and start Dead Nation, which is $7.50 right now for PlayStation Plus subscribers. Also want to get back into NEStalgia and return to my Pokemon White journey. It’s looking like a slow week with new releases so I should be able to catch up a bit with my backlog.

I figured I would ask a larger community this question. I see their are many community podcasts but was interested if anybody else would be interested in doing a podcast. If so send me a message or reply to this blog post and ill send you details. This is not me trying to promote an external site (although it will be hosted externally) but just more of a way to see if people would be interested in podcasting. In our podcast, we do talk about being community members on here so please don't think I'm trolling for hits. Looking forward to hearing back from everyone. We record thursday evenings around 6-7 EST and talk about gaming news and other forms of entertainment.
 
if you would rather email me just email me at maup64@gmail.com

 
2010 has been a hell of a year, but although we have had a slew of great content, there are still though things that come up a bit short. Here are my top five disappointments of 2010.

5) Medal of Honor
Hey everybody, let’s make a game that will put Call of Duty to shame and force them to innovate their game and help drive the industry forward. How are we going to do that? First, let’s make a single player story realistic but broken and copy all the gameplay elements of games that shooter fans are already accustomed to. Next, let’s put it in a realistic setting but shy away from using actual enemies (in multiplayer) once the media gets a hold of our game and poo-poos on it. Then, let’s hire industry professionals like Dice to make our multiplayer although they have their own games to worry about that comes down to competing with a game they helped on (Battlefield vs. MOH.) How could this possibly go wrong?

Well it did, and for all the right reasons. Sure, the game sold well, but it’s a freaking Medal of Honor game which has merits in its name alone and didn’t need to persuade any gamers out there. What we thought would be something new or fresh just ended becoming a clone of a genre we are used to playing. Oh and this game is already forgotten about since Black Ops came out and Dice’s franchise game Battlefield 3 is coming soon. Fingers crossed that game turns out good.

4) Fable 3
Every time I play this game I feel like I’m always one step away from the game breaking. Watching the frame rate chug at single digits when I get into fights is something you put up with on a regular basis. The decisions they made with this game are all a jumbled mix of wrong and more wrong. They still held onto a broken map but having your pause menu take you to another room that you have to navigate through boggles me. Seriously, why do that? Also having an economy system that is this hard to keep in check is dumb as well.

They did improve on multiplayer which is fun but that’s about the only good change they’ve made. I’ve done expressions maybe once just to see how it is versus in Fable 2 where I was farting and dancing with a large crowd of people multiple times. Combat is still fun but it breaks immersion when all enemies move like robots. Yes they are fixing it, but I can’t understand what they were thinking when they took out what made Fable 2 so good and replaced it with nothing innovating at all. Fable 3 is the third game that has failed to live up to it’s hype and reminds us yet again that we shouldn’t always believe developers when they talk about how revolutionary their game will become.

3) PlayStation 3
This year has been a rough year between me and my PS3. I maybe played five games on it in including God of War 3, MAG, Modnation Racers, Final Fantasy XIII and maybe something else. Sadly, all of those games besides God of War was nothing but disappointment to me and is why I’ve handed my PS3 over to my parents for a Netflix streaming box.

Trophies came at me too late, I was already heavily invested in achievements and don’t plan on switching anytime soon so I always play my multiplatform games on my 360. That is also where the majority of my friends are which keeps me there as well. I’m not saying it’s technically a bad system, but it’s just one I don’t see myself needing anytime soon. Exclusives this year have been disappointing in my opinion and the constant system updates really do kill it for me. I understand they are only doing it to make more options available to users, but take a page from Microsoft’s book and lump them all together for one major download either on a bi-monthly basis or something else just to help spread them out some. I also picked up a PSP this year only to sell it a couple months later. Again, I understand both these systems have their positives, but they aren’t enough for me to take the little time I have to game and play them. My 360 and PC wins every time.

2) Motion Gaming
Seeing Kevin Butler announce that motion gaming isn’t just for the casual anymore, only to pan to a family playing a volleyball game together cracks me up every time. Not because Kevin Butler is funny, he is played out by now and should not be used as much, but their marketing is so contradicting of itself. Okay, maybe there is a hardcore gamer there just watching his family help him get trophies, but motion gaming as a whole is not what all hardcore gamers out there want.

I was actually a little excited for Kinect at one point but then realized that I was giving myself false hope. Why do I want to do what Kinect’s limitations let me do? Why would I want to navigate the dashboard with me swiping my hands in front of me? Tell me one instance why you would want to do this over using a controller. It’s faster, more reliable (except for that dreaded d-pad on the 360 controller) and just works. I also game in a small space so trying to pretend I’m rafting down a river isn’t something I don’t have the space for, and just don’t want to do period. There is an audience out for these products, but they do not tailor to anything I want to play which makes motion gaming a big disappointment to me. It’s disappointing only because I have high hopes with amazing controls that the industry hasn’t quite reached yet, but when they do I’ll be ready.

1) Final Fantasy XIII
We were all there, eager to get back home, rip open the plastic, and ignore our entire life for FFXIII. I was one of them. Playing through the first ten hours, I convinced myself that I was having fun and the game would only get better. Hours 11-20 were much harder to get through yet I prevailed with a smile on my face. Then I finally get to the chapter, THE chapter that opens up and begs for exploration. I ejected the disc, took it back to GameStop, and tried to forget what has become my most disappointing moment of 2010.

Everything about this pitiful excuse of a JRPG was such a letdown besides having great graphics. Visuals do not help a world I could care less about, characters who are so contrived of any personality and want them all to become L’CIE (if that’s the bad virus) and a story so in-comprehensible that it puts the name Final Fantasy to shame. I have been a big fan of Square Enix and am not afraid of innovation, but this throws all the great elements of a JRPG away and tacks on some rather questionable gameplay.

Square Enix really has had a rather terrible year. What once was an amazing company that encapsulated millions of gamers is now forcing out two of their most cherished franchises out the door where one was a bad game and the other was and still is a broken game. They did everything they could to disappoint gamers with FFXIV making it nearly impossible to participate in the beta and releasing with so many flaws that nobody should spend money on and play through. Sure, they are fixing these issues, but how can a company justify putting a price tag on a product that is broken. Imagine buying a DVD player that only plays romantic comedies but they promise to one day patch in action movie support. Why would anybody play this?

Getting back on XIII hate, I’m not boycotting the company just yet. I’ll allow them to release terrible games here and there, but fans have shown an overwhelming negative response to this game that they are hopefully forced to listen to their fans and deliver. Also, not sure why they claim making a FFVII remake would be too expensive. I’m sorry but if I had a million people yelling at me to make it, I would go for something that is guaranteed to make money and not try to innovate in areas that do not need fixed. Isn’t this an industry that follows that philosophy anyway?
 
originally written for my blog 64bitbastard

My week of gaming will be more scattered than most weeks where I have a consistancy to what I’m playing. Despite my thoughts on Splatterhouse, I really need to power through the game and get my opinions up of my thoughts. Sadly though, the load times after death plus how brutal the game can be in spots makes for a rather uneventful experience. Couple that with a protagonist that I care nothing for and you get a game that is sitting on my pile to play but yet I find myself always skipping it. I’m thinking holiday break is when I’ll get to the bottom of Splatterhouse with a review to entail afterward, but hopefully sooner than that.

I also got Epic Mickey in from Gamefly so that will definitely be a game that me and my wife will be playing together. We really enjoyed playing Kingdom Hearts and she loves Disney so this is perfect for her. It just sucks to see so many people talking bad about the game with an imprecise camera and ugly visual style. I’m still really intrigued by the whole dark tale surrounding Mickey so hopefully it’s enough to pull me through the majority of the game.

Fable 3 is still gathering many hours from me partly with doing random quests but mainly staring at walls and watching my money go up every so many minutes. I normally just leave my Xbox on while I work on studying for my A+ certification. I’m getting about $50,000 every so many minutes but I hear people can get so much more. Is it worth it to try and reach the 6.5 million or should I just finish the game already? I have already played through the DLC mission, which was not worth the five bucks and am at the point where I just want some closure to be done with the game. I’d say by the weekend I’ll have this one beat since I hear I’m about an hour away anyway.

Infinity Blade will be bought this week in which I’ll slowly play through. I finished all my Angry Birds levels (not 3 stars, just finished) and wanted another game to play. I’ll probably do a write up of Infinity Blade since it seems to be very impressive looking at other blogs about the game. Also hopefully get in some more Black Ops and maybe finish Shatter hopefully.

What is everyone else playing this week? add me if you want to play some Black Ops. I play for fun which is code that I’m not very good at all.

The Spike VGAs were last night which if you are not in the loop of things is an attempt to mainstream video games by making an award show. While this sounds like a great idea to help bring more people aware of the culture behind the largest entertainment market around, its execution is so horrible and makes me cringe every year. The only good thing to come out of these events are the exclusive reveals that are held for this evening.

First off, all award shows like what was displayed last night are always poorly ran and full of awkward silences and missteps. Neal Patrick Harris as the host did about as good a job as he could do with the lines written for him. Other comedians came out with poor jokes as well including Dane Cook and Nick Swardson which can be funny at times but were doomed the moment they agreed to be a part of this. The celebrity appearances are nothing more but a way to get more people to watch this abomination. Yes, I think these events are awful. Gamers only want respect from the general audience and these are always looked upon as disasters that have no bearing on the industry as a whole. Some have fun with them, while others look at them with a certain disbelief of “I can’t believe I’m actually seeing this.”

I feel like the VGA show should focus more on the developers that make these amazing games, I mean it is what it all comes down to right? The awards are even handled wrong. They have comedians come out with terrible bits that take up valuable time then group together around five to six different categories of winners, in which the developers do not receive any stage time or anything. Also, how in the fuck did Neal Patrick Harris’s Spiderman performance beat out every other video game VO? Who in their right mind would vote him over Shepard, John Marston, or even ol’ pissed off Kratos. I’m not sure if they categories are rigged or whatever, but I would throw money down on that one.

easily the best part of the show

Yes, I’m harping on the show as a whole, yet I still continue to watch them only for the fact that I want to be wowed with new game announcements. I was impressed once I seen Skyrim announced with a release date (fingers crossed they hit it.) Joystiq has a great breakdown of what all won awards so make sure you check that out along with all the new trailers. 2011 is appearing to be quite a year; I’ve seen it already quoted as what could be the best year in gaming, but that gets thrown around every year. Just next year VGAs please give me more game stuff and not so much filler bullshit.

What i'm currently working on

With the end of the year coming up, I’ve decided to get my ass back into school. I’ll be attending IUS for a computer science degree in which I haven’t worked toward in over a year; no studying up on Java, assembly language, or anything else I might need. This puts me in a bind especially since my next class will need me to know Java or C++ in and out as well as work on other aspects of computer science like getting A+ certified. I’ve bought a bunch of Dummies books to help guide me through this process which I enjoy even though they do rely heavily on meaningless storytelling. I understand its just to ease you into it all but it does get a bit tiresome (I normally just skip past a lot of this.)

I hope by January 10th (first day of class) I’ll have a better understanding of Java and be deeply invested in my A+ studies. I also have a book on CSS and HTML and all kinds of web programming but it will have to wait. I’m enjoying Java currently but can’t quite wrap my mind around some of the concepts that goes into building programs. I keep trying to memorize everything where what i should do is just keep the general idea in my head, mainly the different codes of API.

My main goal one day is to actually make a video game. The University I attend strictly uses Java and doing some google searching appears that games code a lot in C/C++ so I’ll also be learning that on the side once I feel more comfortable with what I’m currently learning. Expect to see me update a lot on how I’m doing in school, as well as general game stuff and other shenanigans.Are their any other programmers currently on GiantBomb? I would love to talk with you on how you learned and maybe some pointers to help speed things up.

 

Call of Duty Black Ops is upon us, most of us, and we are already trying to decipher where the next entry is heading and who will be holding up the project. Will it be headed up by Infinity Ward and be Modern Warfare 3? Will it be handed off to Sledgehammer and be put during another war that has yet to be captured? Or will we end up with space fighting alongside Master Chief and Marcus Fenix hunting aliens?

We can already lay money down that this will continue to be an annualized series. Activision likes making money, and since the past several years COD has been only gaining sales numbers, it will continue this yearly tradition. It has became one of the only titles besides sports games that can get away with this, and I know its hard to cope with but the 5.6 million people on day one is enough to say that this is something we will be getting every year until it starts to lose steam. I'm a naysayer myself always saying that they should skip a year on the Call of Duty series, but yet again I preorder the game and enjoy both the single and multiplayer modes of the games. I'm not a hardcore player, but these games have such a polish to them that it's almost a little hard to stay away from if you have played any in the past.  

Call of Duty Black Ops, or BLOPS as what the internet has started calling it which I quite enjoy, has finally proven that Treyarch has the power to create a good COD game. Sure World at War and others were good games but was always ridiculed because they were always compared as the ugly step child to Infinity Ward. Now we are clueless as to what is going on with all the studios are going to be doing with this series. Since Treyarch is on track to bringing the most revenue with BLOPS, then we can almost guarantee we will be playing a Treyarch COD in 2012. Which brings us to Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer.

It has already been announced that Sledgehammer is making a COD game. Visiting their official website, which I might add has those awful flash animations as its loading up, you will see plain as day that they are currently working on it but it's still a studio that is trying to get their staff together. Unless they are contracting some of their work out, I'm not quite sure a brand new studio can get out a title of this caliber in under two years, which rules them out in my opinion and could push back Treyarch another year or move them up or who the hell knows.

Visiting the IW site is a little weird; it seems to be really quiet on their side. Also their forums seem to be thinning out as well, but I couldn't really poke around too much since I'm not a member of the site, and don't plan on ever being one. Still though, I'd say this company is working on another COD game but which one?

Here is what I'm thinking of the whole thing: Infinity Ward is working on Modern Warfare 3 that will be released in holiday 2011. This game will close the story on all the characters introduced in the MW series and Price will become a dictator of America. Sledgehammer is working on a future title in the series that may or may not be space marines. Maybe they are space black ops or space navy soldiers. Maybe they are working with some Bungie folks as they are pitching their new IP to Activision; Bungie has delved into space a time or two. Then Treyarch is continuing its story with WOW and BLOPS and developing another title using the same characters, or at least bringing it full circle with those characters. Maybe Woods is Price's dad and then bring COD as a whole together. Not sure any of that is possible but I'm sure they could craft something like that together.

Do we want COD in space? I feel like people that are asking for a radical change would be happy with a completely different setting besides Earth. Honestly though, it's going to be hard to convince Activision to make drastic changes to a game that has made them so much money. Just do me a favor and keep Kinect out of the equation.