Spitznock

I don't understand the matchmaking, either. Is it Call of Duty style where the game'll just belch you into any old group of players? Because it most certainly seems as though that's the case.
Out of the 16ish hours I've played so far, I've only rarely encountered a close match. They're usually landslides one way or the other, which is a mark of iffy player matching.
Also, if I queue solo, this VVVV should never happen.

I too, don't quite understand the unending praise for the campaign. There are neat set piece moments, notably near the end, but the rest is mowing through a bunch of brain-dead AI in a bunch of less than interesting environments.

The idea of having named Pilots you encounter as boss fights is wonderful conceptually, but those encounters don't play out all that differently than the other Titan encounters in the game. It feels like a campaign held back by its production budget.

Personally I liked TF1's multiplayer campaign way more. The increased NPC chatter made the matches feel huge and important, whereas now the multiplayer matches just feel like multiplayer matches.

A buddy of mine and I have been playing CoD4 a bit recently on PS3 and it's been just as terrific as I remember. The mod nonsense doesn't seem like as much of a problem if you stick to the Mercenary playlist, though a small playerbase means you get some laggy hosts here or there. There's also a weird sense of community on there, as you see the same people in matches often.
MW2 on the other hand, from my experience, is a living nightmare of level boosters, aimbots, etc, regardless of which hopper you choose.
I'm going to be all over the remaster once it hits. Hopefully classic Headquarters (none of that headquarters pro or hardpoint nonsense) makes it in.

Hey folks. CoD4 and MW2 are a cesspit of modding nonsense these days, making them nigh unplayable. I would happily grab a copy of MW3 to play if it hasn't suffered the same fate.
If anyone out there still has a copy, would you do me a solid and poke your head into multiplayer to see if it's still functional? It would be much appreciated.

Is there a way to make the aiming not abject garbage? Shooters are pretty much my thing, but I cannot stand to play this one because it feels as though the game is actively working against allowing you to put the reticle over dudes.
I got all excited a couple patches ago when they said they tuned the look acceleration and put in a slider for autoaim, but try as I might, I just cannot get it to where I feel confident that I can put the cursor where I want it to be, and like I said, I play a ton of shooters, so I'm generally well versed in shooting dudes with a gamepad.

The story mode reminded me of when I was a kid and would gin up pointless scenarios for my action figures to "fight" one another.
I'm fine with the dumb gags and the way the characters cross the globe like some of us cross the street, but there is a supreme lack of focus in the narrative, and the loop of: watch pointless 20 second cutscene, beat up on brain-dead CPU for 1 round, repeat, got very boring after a short amount of time.

It's the length of mode that I could see myself easily tearing through in one sitting, though in reality it took several. Not because I was busy or because it was too much to handle, but because it was so boring that I felt guilty for spending my time on it. Mortal Kombat this is not.

I'll take the 30,000 Fight Money or whatever it was, but I don't feel like it was worth my time, or the wait.

You keep saying things were released early. Ibuki was originally planned for May (and was late), and the story update was planned for June. Balrog was originally planned for July. He released on July 1st, which makes his release "on time", where the other two mentioned were late.
Nothing has been early thus far.

As someone who grew up more with Tekken and Soul Calibur (as well as those other fighting games that people refuse to accept as fighting games, such as Smash Bros), I was used to unlocks being the single player content.

I spent hours upon hours grinding out cash in Tekken Tag 2 when it was released on consoles just to create zany get ups (I had a Henrietta/Triela set from Gunslinger Girl for my Alisa/Lili team. Because I'm a cool dude), and that was hours upon hours spent playing through arcade and survival mode over and over again by myself. The fighting system was fun and the AI weren't entirely brain-dead, so it was a relaxing way to spend a evening.

Street Fighter V needs this. It needs some sort of endless mode with Fight Money payouts increasing for how far you get. An arcade mode with payouts at the end increasing for difficulty played. Hell, if they were being nice about it, they'd let you fight the CPU in versus and grind out currency that way. Naw.

The cosmetics in Street Fighter V and the cosmetics in Tekken serve different purposes. Tekken uses the cosmetic items as a carrot to lead you back to play the game more, whereas Street Fighter V uses these items as a way of persuading you to give them more money. The addition of "premium" costumes that are only obtainable through coughing up real life dough are proof.

I don't intend this reply as any sort of "Grr Tekken is better than Street Fighter!" debate by the way, because that's silly. Both are fun fighting series.