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[JD]

Zomg

[Melodic]

Son of a fucking bitch.

[Spluff]

oh fuck no you are the WORST company ever

[satsugaikaze]

Hey guys it's Modern Warfare 2 and the multiplayer is going to be just as rad as it was for the first one BUT WAIT WE DON'T LIKE PC GAMERS because they mean we need to put more effort into multiplayer servers so we're just going to go and let you do all the hard work for yourselves and while you were gasping for air because you went into shock about the news we decided to fart into the air conditioning! It was a little wet too. We hope you'll enjoy the smell!

Man I used to like those guys

[Trollstormur]

This affects me in no way whatsoever, as I plan on pirating the game to play the single player missions.

[BlahBlah]

ffffffffffffffffffffffffffff

Infinity Ward used to be one of my favourite game developers. This is completely shit news. How is this going to encourage the growth of a community around the game?

[Nodaisho]

Jesus. How far up your ass does you head have to be to miss all of the complaints about matchmaking that Xbox owners had? How did this ever seem like a good idea?

[bicostp]

Jesus. How far up your ass does you head have to be to miss all of the complaints about matchmaking that Xbox owners had?

Far enough to have done a complete lap so it's in there twice.

[JD]

Petition!

[Nodaisho]

Don't know it will do much, but with almost 45,000 signatures in this little time, it might.

[snalin]

I'm only going to play it as singleplayer, but this is a bad deal for you multiplayer folks. The petition gave me a 404, though.

[JD]

They clearly hate norway.

[Nodaisho]

They clearly hate norway.

Who can blame them?

[Johnny C]

"ruined" is a really strong word

[JD]

I think the "may have" balances it out

[Bastardous Bassist]

Hey now, it's the swedes who burn bunnies to stay warm, not us.

The swedes are now awesome.  Norway, you're still on the list!

[JD]

Infinity responds

[Chesire Cat]

Well my extended sense of entitlement atrophied back in Beta 1.4 of Counter Strike. Really they didnt make these moves to hate you, or because they are lazy. And no-one has actually given it a chance since it hasn't been released yet. But provided there arent queues to actually join a game a-la old Gamespy Arcade. This wont be so bad.

And lets face it, there have been a lot of changes to the world of gaming for some time now. And try as they might video game companies are struggling to keep PC gaming outside of an MMO setting profitable. Perhaps measures that prevent piracy will result in people buying more. And like any economy, the more people spend, the more indirect returns they will see.

[Ozymandias]

Perhaps measures that prevent piracy will result in people buying more.

This has been pretty consistently proved false. Convenience and quality result in people buying more. Anti-piracy measures result in shitdicks pirating it just to show they can.

Also, pirated copies will probably end up utilizing dedicated servers to play on which I mean...holy shit does that break the entire concept of this decision.

[Bastardous Bassist]

I've pirated games because the anti-pirate software made the game unplayable for me.  The only way I could get it to run was to find a pirated copy.  As such, I try to avoid games with much anti-piracy software.  I've turned more towards consoles because the games run with no fuss on them.  Anti-piracy schemes have turned an extremely dedicated computer gamer off to computer gaming in general.

[Chesire Cat]

When it comes to music and movies and generally media available with no cross platform issues. Games on the other hand pretty much have to be purchased... except on PC, combined with the relative high cost of maintaining a gaming PC and the trials of making a game compatible with a myriad of hardware spec make it much more unprofitable.

You can deny that. But I would argue statically declining PC gaming market and the fact that cross platform games ALWAYS have console versions outsell PC versions by vast margins (excluding console games retroactively produced from PC games such as Decent, Doom, Starcraft etc)

[Ozymandias]

I'm not sure what I'm supposed to try to deny because I don't understand your point.

[Chesire Cat]

Ok, lets look at it this way. The vast majority of major releases or for consoles, some of them bless us with a PC version as well. Very very few are PC only. And even then, after all the hype generated, how many of them actually make a major splash?

Why should developers continue catering to this shrinking minority? I appreciate the smaller releases for PC games, games like Braid. But the big budget big deal games arent coming as fast as they used to.

[Nodaisho]

except on PC

Which is why you could never find an xbox or PS game on a torrent site, that just never happens.

Also, pirated copies will probably end up utilizing dedicated servers to play on which I mean...holy shit does that break the entire concept of this decision.

...I hadn't thought of that. The only way for over 100,000 people to get the game they want is to pirate it, no matter how much money they have, they can't buy the game that they want. I expect I'll probably just play the singleplayer campaign on a friend's Xbox or PS3, PC if I am really lucky, then I'll go back to CoD4 for the multiplayer. Unless they manage to either make a dedicated-server-free method work well (snowballs and hell come to mind) or people start idling in servers and outputting the server IP once in a while to make impromptu dedicated servers.

[Chesire Cat]

Thing is, to crack a console you have to give up XBox Live forever. Which to me, is not an option, well assuming I had a console.

Unless they manage to either make a dedicated-server-free method work well (snowballs and hell come to mind) or people start idling in servers and outputting the server IP once in a while to make impromptu dedicated servers.

That is the most major concern of mine regarding this decision. Waiting in lobbies for a game to queue means microwaving a Pizza Pop, and you sure as heck cant play CoD while eating a Pizza Pop unless you are Goro or otherwise have 4 arms.

[snalin]

I'd go for cereal; put a bowl in front of your face, and splash your head down every time you wait for respawn. Wear swimming googles if you are on a instant-respawn server, and need to get sight back fast.

[Chesire Cat]

Ahhh back to the dedicated server issue again 

[Bastardous Bassist]

Ok, lets look at it this way. The vast majority of major releases or for consoles, some of them bless us with a PC version as well. Very very few are PC only. And even then, after all the hype generated, how many of them actually make a major splash?

Why should developers continue catering to this shrinking minority? I appreciate the smaller releases for PC games, games like Braid. But the big budget big deal games arent coming as fast as they used to.

Jerry Holkins pretty much agrees with you in his most recent newspost.  I also happen to agree, but he puts it so much better.  The salient quote will be reproduced below.

To read such lamentations, you'd get the impression that PC gamers still think they are the focus of the industry, when that hasn't been true for awhile. Indeed, hardcore gamers in general - and the dedicated PC enthusiast, which is a subset - haven't been the object of their desire for some time. I was under the impression this was well known, but it does require a willingness to perceive factual information, which is not a universal trait among cultists.

The thing is, the gaming industry ends up putting off computer gamers even more with ridiculous shit they're doing to prevent all of this piracy.  Maybe they're just trying to kill computer gaming off entirely so that they won't feel guilty about not making a computer version of a game they're designing (unlikely their motivation, but it does seem to be going in this direction).  Sure, we'll still have the small companies, and that'll be awesome, but RTS as a genre might be kind of on its way out, or at least RTS that has anything approximating a budget.

[Chesire Cat]

I was always excited by the idea of Serious Sam. Middling budget but cheap as hell and wildly entertaining multiplayer type episodic content to be the future.

But I was ever so disappointed.

[JD]

Valve doesn't appear to be abandoning the PC anytime soon.

[LTK]

Speaking of which, Zenimax, parent to Bethesda and recently id, is rumored to buy Valve. See here.

And I also think PC gaming is still far from dying. For one, PC titles have always been a good deal cheaper than those for consoles. That certainly factors in for me. Then there is almost unlimited capability for making mods and indie games for PC users. I mean, look at the cornucopia of mods that Fallout 3 has, and the Indie games section on Steam is still steadily growing. And not just Steam; there's also a multitude of digital download sites for PC games, giving them a high level for competition, as opposed to the monopoly on downloads that Sony and Microsoft have on their consoles.

[Bastardous Bassist]

Indie games certainly aren't dying.  Hell, it seems like a PC will be their natural home.  But the big budget games intended for PC's seem to be rarer and rarer these days.  I definitely think it can be saved, and what needs to happen is that the big developers need to either come up with new ideas for or do away with their crazy copy protection.  What they end up doing with all of that crap is turning people off to computer gaming.  The game still gets pirated with what they have now, and once somebody cracks it, it's easy to circulate it, so it's not like they're reducing it seriously.  All they're doing is punishing the people who legitimately buy the game, like me.

I'm not saying computer gaming is dead, but it's certainly on its way to becoming a thing where only smaller gaming outfits put out games unless the big players in the industry change their way of thinking.  As of now, it just isn't making that much financial sense to put much money into computer games, and I'm sure there are some people out there who aren't seeing that maybe it's the way they're doing business rather than people just not wanting to buy computer games.

[Chesire Cat]

Yes but indie games arent gigantic blockbusters that make fanciful amounts of money. I mean, indie games can be very profitable in that splitting profits between 2 or 3 or 5 people is much less then splitting it between 20 or 30 or 50 people. But its not going to save the industry, it will just change it, and lets face it, XBL Arcade and whatever Sony's equivalent is are doing a good job headroads into that market anyway.

Frankly, the saving grace of the PC market is going to be MMORPGs since they as of yet, dont translate onto consoles very well. Im still unclear as to the future of the RTS market. But even look at wildly successful franchises like Madden. It hasnt made it to a computer since Madden 08. And Halo pretty much taught everyone everyone that shooters can make it on a console very successfully.

Sorry guys, or time in the sun is fading.

[Alex C]

I guess I just don't see what exactly the point of bringing that up is. That it is likely or perhaps even inevitable that PCs either change or become further relegated to the gaming gulags doesn't mean that people shouldn't vote with their dollars* or express what features they'd like to see in a release. It is pretty reasonable for legit end users to be upset about this whole development and to express the idea that they are still willing to pay for product as individuals even if they cannot speak for the gaming community as a whole. Whether it is an effective tactic or not really matters very little given that providing feedback costs you nothing but a bit of time.

If anyone is curious, no, I don't consider pirating to be a form of voting with your dollars. That's basically just undermining the entire process as far as I'm concerned.

[Chesire Cat]

Well if people really want the game they will be able to overlook this dedicated server angle and will buy it anyway. So really is it worth it to write off the time and effort they have already put into the system they plan on implementing, or to put more time and money into something that will probably yield no returns, or worse yet, enable piraters to be able to play multiplayer?

Lets face it, modding is a privilege and not a right. And lets face it, as XBL or, say, MMORPGs proved, non-dedicated servers/multiplayer connection services pretty much prevent piracy altogether. Sure some people have two Xbox's, one modded one not, and sure some people play on private WoW servers. But realistically, they are the minority a mere footnote in the success stories that these platforms are, and most people still shell out sub fees to enjoy these services.

Frankly the fact that multiplayer on the PC is still largely free should be seen as a boon. But alas, a bloated sense of entitlement is probably the most American part of America right now, let alone western society in general. I would re-quote Tycho's post, but that would be a little bit redundant. But bottom line is, developers and publishers have made it pretty clear that all that is needed is an excuse to cut the PC side of their projects.

Sidenote: I really would like to see the sales figures of Morrowind and Oblivion on PC vs Console since they jealously support modding via the PC version but have gone through great lengths to make the games themselves accessible with very console centric control schemes.

[Alex C]

Well, see, the thing is, I don't actually see myself buying the game without dedicated server support. The rest of the shit is immaterial to me. I don't hate these guys or their product. That'd be crazy irrational. It's not some big, emotionally loaded issue to me, which is why I find posts like the one Tycho made uncharacteristically condescending and thus annoying, since I'm not even really what you'd call surprised by the announcement. Yes, the game developers can go sell the game to other people. I realize that they can do this. They're not entitled to my dollar any more than I am entitled to their product. But if they do, by chance, want to sell to me, they should perhaps consider the dedicated server thing a bit. That other people may pirate it is something I do not have control over.

Basically, my position is that this sucks. I understand the situation that led up to the sucking, but I still think it sucks.

[Spluff]

That this was done to prevent piracy is a common fallacy - the matchmaking service has nothing to do with piracy. Using steam will prevent piracy, the IW.net idea is for completely different reasons and will have no effect on piracy in the long run. I can only naturally assume that it was done to crush everything that makes PC gaming worthwhile whilst simultaneously pissing on the grave of the various quality game companies that were destroyed by the monstrosity that is Activision. Why? Because Activision is a devil worshipping cult hell bent on destroying the world.

[Bastardous Bassist]

Well, I guess that's one point of view.

Also, I think the point is that Activision, and most game companies,

But if they do, by chance, want to sell to me, they should perhaps consider the dedicated server thing a bit.

I think the point is that Activision, and indeed most game companies, don't really give a shit about you, because people like you don't give them enough money.  Partly, this is due to piracy, but also partly due to people like me who got turned-off to computer gaming because of the anti-piracy measures the industry has taken (like I said earlier, the only games that I can remember pirating are games that I had actually purchased but couldn't play the legal version of the game).  I think that piracy will be a constant, but the game industry might be able to bring people like me back into the fold by removing their stupid anti-piracy software that primarily effects people who legally own the damned game.  I also think the game industry, in general, doesn't realize this fact and tends to attribute the lost sales to people preferring consoles and piracy, whereas if they changed the way they did business just a little bit, I think their net result would be more profit for them and maybe more sweet computer games for us.

[Chesire Cat]

Can I get some good examples of how antipiracy measures have truly screwed over the PC gaming user base and forced them into the realm of consoles? People seem to throw this complaint around like it is common knowledge but dont really cite any examples where this is the case. From my experiences, it seems like it is a statistically insignificant number of people who truly get affected by issues like "my DVD player wont recognize the disc protected by Securom". And let us avoid Sony's whole rootkit debacle, as that is something I *am* aware of, but its pretty ancillary to what I am speaking of.

My opinion: The argument always seemed to come from the pirates trying to protect their interests under the guise of "rights abuses", or ignorant people trying to keep "Big Brother" out of their life and stick it to "The Man".  It's pretty much a cop out. I am acknowledging myself as a pirate here and now just to make sure your understand my point of view.

And putting things into perspective. IW is simply took away an extra that PC versions had over the XBL users.

[Bastardous Bassist]

You're talking about examples aside from the one of me?  Several of my friends tend to also refrain from buying computer games due to hassles they've had getting the game to work on a PC versus on a console.  When I say that I've had to pirate games so that I could play ones that I already had, I'm not exaggerating the issue at all.  I posted on their forums/e-mailed their technical support team, but all I got was silence.  Eventually, I just got fed up with not being able to enjoy something that I had already paid for, and pirated it.  It's become so that I am fairly certain I will have an issue with the anti-piracy software, and so if the game is available for console, I will choose that one instead.  There are a few notable exceptions to this rule.  Valve was mentioned earlier, and their system has always worked for me, though it always takes a bit of extra time versus the similar console version (much less than the install time, at least).

Note that I don't pirate games, in general and I do not advocate pirating games.  I just buy console games instead, which are more expensive than the computer version and as such I wait much longer until they drop down to a price that I can justify.  Also, I used to be a die-hard computer gamer, so keep that in mind.

Yes, this is anecdotal, but smaller companies have shown that their games are no less profitable (and usually more profitable) upon removing copy protection.

[ackblom12]

I've had multiple games with DRM fuck me. Either in the sense that I lose the CD-Key, SecuROM being SecuROM, or fucking me in the number of installs. You have to consider that I own over 200 PC games and over the last 3 years or so have only bought 2 non PC exclusive PC games on my PC. So I would definitely say that in my case at least, DRM did a very good job of getting me away from a platform that I was a big fan of for 18 years or so.

As Bassist said, it's not like consoles are cheaper than PCs. Even a smart folk building a PC from scratch can do it on the cheap and keep up with the market for a decent price. PC game are cheaper by a large margin, more price cuts occur for PC games and there is more freedom for modders and the like to expand the life of a game, but yet I can't be arsed to give a fuck anymore because legal PC consumers get fucked by a large chunk of the PC gaming world.

Valve and Stardock are about the only developers I buy PC games from anymore. Blizzard is likely to be added to that list for Diablo 3, but it's a rare exception.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

Bump because the game's out, suckas. Who's got it, and what do you think of it?

Went straight into multiplayer last night when I got home and it is pretty great. It's just like the first one but....smoother, slicker, fancier, better, cooler, more action-packed, and, most importantly, more ridiculous. Killstreak rewards are no longer limited to one at a time, which can make some pretty chaotic things happen. For example, last night i was in a game with two harriers hovering overhead, two attack choppers gunning people down, and ammo crates repeatedly falling out of the sky all at the same time. Not to mention the various gunfire and explosions.

The levels are definitely way more vertical than they've ever been; it'll take some getting used to. It's pretty awesome for snipers and...slightly less awesome for everyone else (but still totally awesome 2 tha maxx, bro)

Customizable Killstreaks are rad. Predator missiles are rad. Tactical Insertion is fucking rad. The SCAR-H is super duper rad.
I went 17-0 on the snowy level with the train last night using a silenced Barrett and the PP22000 (?) machine pistol (also silenced). The other team was really sad about it, but that's what they get for repeatedly standing in the same window over and over again for the entire match even though I headshot'd every single person who did (including this one guy, who must've accounted for, like, 9 or 10 of my kills but still didn't get the picture).

I plan on blasting through the campaign this weekend, and just playing MP all week until then.

[Melodic]

If you have the 360 version, that is borderline trolling sir.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

but...both versions are exactly the same.









(now that was trolling)

[clockworkjames]

STEAM WILL NOT LET ME PLAY IT FOR ANOTHER 2 HOURS BUT I PAID FOR IT 2 DAYS AGO IS THIS LEGAL?!?!?!?!??!?!?!

[KvP]

Been visiting the Steam forums I see.

Just goes to show you that if the internet was a barrel, the gunk on the bottom would be game forums.

[Scandanavian War Machine]

wrong

[Felrender]

wrong

Welp, that's it.  Blow it all up, let's start this shit over.

[Melodic]

Usually I'm fairly apathetic towards shitty PC ports, but this'll be the first game I pirate a game on principle alone. I'm really disappointed that the PC multiplayer experience is such total bullocks, because after hearing such glowing reviews from the console versions I really want to be able to play MP on the computer.

[JD]

Really, I liked the first one, but I can't find myself caring abut this one at all.