I want to get into that Wed night action ;) I'm always looking to play with someone who's not 10 years old.

I was thinking the same think CleBrowns. I'm wondering if we could get a steady game going on here.

I'm BVest1121 on 360 if anyone is ever looking for a game.

Only died one time on that one. As it turns out the guy on the train gave me MUCH more trouble. It wasn't quick but stay away from him enough and it's not frustration inducing like the train guy was.

I'd be in, I'm on the fence on which system to get this for. A couple of my buddies from back home are going to get it on PS3 but I enjoy gaming on the 360 far better for some reason.

I've never played the single player mode of a CoD game for more than 10 minutes total. I'm not even certain I'll bother doing that much this time. CoD is all about the multiplayer.

I am buying it for MP, otherwise I would just rent the game. I still play MP on COD:World at War, almost every night lately. I took about 3-4 months off and fell back into it big time a couple months ago. I will still play it a little after MW2 comes out even, because I want to get to the 10th prestige level, which I am just short of right now.

The first one had pretty short single player, as does every CoD. I buy them because I will generally play through them at least twice. And with the previous Modern Warfare, I played some of the missions many times. I can't count how many times I played the mission where you are in the plane and shooting down to the ground.

So even if the SP mode is 6 hours, I'll still get at least 20 out of it. More if they have missions that are as fun as the one I mentioned.

Completely serious. For any action game I prefer a controller.


I'm sure a game like Civ is better with a mouse and keyboard. But those aren't really my kind of games.

Is this standard operating procedure? I finally decided to pick up Fight Night Round 4 (for PS3), and it was only $40. Whenever I buy a game, I buy it pretty much when it first comes out, so I'm used to paying the $60. I had no idea the price of games dropped the longer they were out.

Yeah, there are entire sites/forums (cheapassgamer.com for example) dedicated to people saving money on games. If you can wait a few months you can find most games for $10-20 bucks off somewhere (unless Nintendo publishes it, their games hardly ever drop in price which is frustrating).

edit: Only one more week until the new Mario game comes out, it should be awesome. It's probably the last game I get this year, between that, FM 2010, and FIFA 10 I'll be all set for a few months.

I have it. Got to the closest Walmart at about 11:45 and there were twelve guys in line, twenty-four by the time they started selling them. Got the basic game, see you guys when I crawl out of my hole.

Out of my hole for a second. As expected, loving this game. Solo play is good, done 4 or 5 missions. MP is fricking great and judging by the 73000 guys on at 3:40 AM central time playing this game I would say its a bit of a big seller so far. Highest number I can remember seeing on WaW was 30-35000 (PS3 by the way, 360 is probably has even more on right now).

Good first 7 hour round of playing. Off for some sleep so I can dedicate some more time to this game. SpecOps missions seem to be pretty cool as well as the solo and MP play. They made a damn good game.

I wonder how many man-hours of labor are being lost today due to people being *cough* sick *cough*.

"I feel like somebody dropped a bomb on me, boss."

Am I the only person who gets excited reading gaming stuff that mentions MW2 because they immediately translate that to Mechwarrior 2?

Then I'm disappointed when I realize it is Call of Duty. I've somehow managed to never get into these games, just not my style I guess.

My brain does the automatic MW = MechWarrior translation as well, but then I quickly bring myself back to reality.

Ran into about three hours of "one more thing to do" playing Torchlight last night. I'm up to about Level 19 with my character, and so far think that I'm getting good value out of the game for $20.

I'm interested to see how much replay value this one has a just a single-player game that has considerably fewer character decisions (at face value, anyway) than Titan Quest.

I think this one will really live or die by the mod community. The tools should be out any day now and supposedly you can mod just about anything, going so far as to create new spells, skills, and therefor classes. All the obvious stuff as well like levels, items, and mobs.

If some people get together and put some class packs together I can see this one sticking around a long time.

Depends on how much of a pain the mod tools are, but the little I've read has impressed me.

Outstanding game for 20 bucks either way though.

Isn't there a new Mechwarrior game in the works? I thought I read something about it and even watched a trailer for it.

MechWarrior (reboot) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read the "Legal troubles" section. It looks like the old conflict between BattleTech and RoboTech is rearing it's ugly head once again. :banghead:

Tonight I will crawl into my MW2 hole. :)

+1. Picked it up last night but it is sitting there, unopened, waiting for me to get home.

My gamertag on 360 is LicensedDwarf. Looking for some good dudes to play with :)

Yeah, what kind of parents are these.

I think it's worse that everyone is going to spend Remembrance Day/Veteran's Day shooting the shit out of each other online. Last year was worse when they released WaW right on 11/11, but a day early isn't much better.

We all know how involved and caring many parents are these days!

Eh, it's only a day early because it's a Tuesday release and the rotation of the calendar pushes any specific day of the month a day later in the week from year to year - two days on a leap year.

And, yeah, they probably could've just released it on 11/11 this year, but it seems like the gaming industry is shifting to line their releases up with movies/music. It seems like more and more new gaming releases are coming in to work with Tuesday street dates, rather than the more traditional "sell 'em if you got 'em unless we've specified a hard street date."

I think he means that it's kind of weird/disrespectful to honour those that fought for us by releasing a war game for others to kill each other in.

Any of these very popular video games should street date on a Saturday. No real reason to create a scenerio for a kid to miss school the next day. Nike/Jordan Brand realized this a long time ago.

You can argue it either way, I guess.

"Disrespectful to release a war game on Veterans' Day," versus what I'm sure is Activision's line of "Release a game that shows people what our servicemen and women do for this country every day, to make them more aware of why we ought to remember them."

I guess I fall into the line of thought that, well, this is Activision's biggest release of the year, so of course it's going to fall into the two-month window leading up to Christmas. The nature of our country's history is such that there are all kinds of militarily important dates during those two months. 11/10 - the birthday of the United States Marine Corps. 11/11 - Veterans' Day. 12/7 - Pearl Harbor day. 12/25 - Washington crosses the Delaware River.

I guess it boils down to whether one specific day is less appropriate for a game's release than another.

Just playing devil's advocate here but is it really the video game company's job to worry that kids are going to miss school to play their game?

Sorry, I'm not going to put that one on the publishers.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is an M-rated title. It is not meant for consumption by schoolchildren. That some parents/relatives/complete strangers are willing to buy the game for those children does not mean that it is Activision's duty to, on the one hand, release a game not intended for that audience, but on the other, schedule that release in such a way that it winks and nods at the fact that said audience will be playing it.

Not to mention:

Activision Donates $1M on Game's Launch Day To Help Vets - Call of duty: modern warfare - Kotaku

I also think that this game does more to make you stop and think about why you're home from school on veteran's day than anything I saw growing up.

Or you could differentiate the 2 and just not worry about the GAME.

It doesn't matter what they play tomorrow. They're still not going to give a fuck why they have the day off. They just know it's a day off of school.

I checked out at noon to watch the ACC basketball tournament on TV every year I was in HS.

edit to add: Meanwhile, I don't think I've ever known of anyone being out of school on Veteran's Day. We never were at least & my son has never been.

I went to school twice on ACC Quarterfinal Friday from 3rd grade to 12th. I remember both days vividly, not because I learned a damn thing in them. In 1989 I was in the 6th grade, I remember sneaking out my Walkman to listen to Maryland upset NC State, the first time an 8 seed ever beat a 1 seed in the tournament IIRC. My junior year of high school all three classes I had after lunchtime just turned on the TV's that were installed in every classroom and allowed the students to read or work on homework or watch the game.

Every other year I was "sick" that day.

Really? Glorified violence and getting points and levels for shooting other people in death matches makes you think more than, oh, I don't know, seeing 85 year-old men crying over wreathes respecting their fallen brother's, son's, etc? Really? That's sad.

Weird that people don't go to school on Veterans' Day. At my school, it is one of the most important days of the year. We invite all veterans to the school and put on a huge production in their honor. It is always a very big deal. I'm all for vacation days, but I'm glad we do this instead of just get a day off.

I think you should explain to your school board that you'd learn far more about war by staying home and playing Call of Duty. Then maybe kick a vet in the shin on your way out.

The NV goggles in the WM2 bundle actually aren't too bad. I was able to walk around my backyard with them and they worked pretty well. But then I remembered that I had an infrared spotlight. Got that bad boy out, and I could see stuff a couple of hundred feet away. There is no depth perception though, so it is a bit tricky at first to walk around with them.

I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure as a kid I had Veteran's Day off of school every year.

Please tell me you're going to go snooping on Tom Cochoran. :)

I'm a disabled vet. My wife has done a tour in Iraq on top of that and very well could be going for a 2nd time in April.

Anyone who has a problem with people playing Modern Warfare 2 on veteran's day is completely out of touch with today's society. If you think that somehow equates to disrespecting anyone then I can only assume you're the type of person that goes out looking for things to offend you.

I've lived in school districts with military families for the past 11-12 years. Typically the district finds a way to give the kids memorial day off whether it's just a day off for teacher training or conference or whatever.

If anyone wants to watch me die over and over I'm on XBL as Reign78 from time to time.

COD MW 2 is quite a thrill ride!!!

MW2 spoiler discussion ("No Russian"):

No way, I don't want to be put in the Lunatic Fringe. :D

So I finished the single player phase of MF2 last night, and I noticed on the screen it only said 50% completed. Do I have to go back and play at a higher difficulty level or something?

Microsoft blacklisting 600K-1M users off Live. That's 3-5% of their total online users. Surprised that piracy is so frequent on that console.

Microsoft bans up to 1 million Xbox Live users - Games - msnbc.com

Why are you surprised?

You're probably right. I shouldn't be. I've honestly never considered any piracy on any consoles I've owned. I suppose the temptation is too much for some people. I used to copy old 5 1/4" disk games on my old Apple, but I was a dumb 7-8 year old kid then and didn't realize that what I was doing was illegal. I'm guessing that most of the people who pirate games on the 360 know it's illegal but do it anyway.

Well, if you read the article their scope is relatively broad as well. If you modified your XBOX to have a bigger HD, it is caught in this net.

I'm not sure they can really do anything besides an "all or nothing" approach, but it certainly catches some people with less nefarious intentions.

about the same.. I even let a few of the wounded live.. ;)

Why can't i find a demo for modern warfare 2 on PSN? I thought it would be out by now.

I don't think they released a demo.

No sympathy on this end from me.


(CNET) -- It's oh-so enticing: you find a copy of a brand new game like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 on a pirate site and the temptation to download it is too strong.

Well, that temptation may have cost up to 1 million users of Microsoft's Xbox Live the ability to use that service. According to a report in InformationWeek, Microsoft has banned as many as a million players from Xbox Live for altering their consoles in order to play pirated versions of games.

This week, Activision's new Call of Duty was released, and InformationWeek speculated that because pirated versions of the game appeared on various sharing sites in advance of the release, the game's developer may have exhorted Microsoft to enact the bans.

"Xbox 360 consoles are equipped with digital rights management technologies designed to detect pirated software," InformationWeek wrote, "but some players have successfully 'modded,' or modified, their machines to circumvent DRM protections."

Even if someone has been banned, their Xbox will still play offline games, InformationWeek said. But it's not at all clear if the bans are permanent or if Microsoft will allow those who have been booted from Xbox Live to return at some point down the line.

In a statement Microsoft said: its "commitment to combat piracy and support safer and more secure gameplay for the more than 20 million members of the Xbox Live community remains a top priority. All consumers should know that piracy is illegal and modifying their Xbox 360 console violates the Xbox Live terms of use, will void their warranty and result in a ban from Xbox Live. We can assure you that if an Xbox Live member follows the Xbox Live terms of use, purchased a retail copy of Modern Warfare 2 and played the game on an unmodified Xbox 360, no action will be taken."

And on the Xbox support page, Xbox Live Director of Programming Larry Hryb, aka Major Nelson, has addressed some of the circumstances that could lead to a player's being banned.

"Players who find their Gamertags banned from Xbox Live have wound up in that situation due to violations of the Xbox Live Terms of Use," Major Nelson wrote.

"The Xbox Live team monitors players for not just cheating, but also for things like threats, racism, profanity, and just being an all around poor sport and ruining the game for others.

"When a Gamertag comes up as violating our policies for online behavior, the person who owns that Gamertag is punished by being banned from the service. Keep in mind, this isn't just a ban on a particular game. This is a ban on the Xbox Live service as a whole, so you won't be able to go online at all during your ban. Initially, you may be banned for a day, a week, or depending on severity, permanently! Kiss that $50 goodbye."

My take:

Umm i'm not sure if to pick MW2 for PC or PS3, i wonder which one will have more online players, PS3 probably (behind 360 that is no an option for me).

Last time I looked at the number of people on line playing MW2 on the PS3 last night it was above 200,000 at that moment. I would be surprised if it is not a record number of people playing MP on the PS3.

Amazon has $20 credit too your account when you purchase MW2... fyi

Two things about the post quoted below. First, I never even knew you could pirate console games through a digital download. Not sure why i never considered it possible but I hadn't. Second, they just ban the username so you can turn around and sign up again? Sure you pay some money, but it doesn't sound like the worlds worst punishment.

The console gets banned. Kotaku actually put a warning out for those buying used consoles to check and make sure it worked on XBox Live before the return on it is up.

Giant Bomb Quick Look: New Super Mario Bros. Wii

Four player co-op/competitive looks chaotic and awesome, I'll be getting this on Sunday for sure. Single-player meets the standard set by the rest of the series from what I've read too.

I have to agree with your take especially with regard to that being a pretty out of touch reaction if for no reason so much as knowing that troops in the Middle East today play the COD series while in country, going to some lengths to set up LAN play so they can do multiplayer. Literally on patrol in the morning & playing COD by nightfall.

I'm not really sure how playing the games is that much different than watching any of the gung-ho war movies that tend to air on/around the holiday. It's entertainment that happens to have a combat setting.

I've been looking forward to this a bunch since I heard about it a few weeks ago. Can't wait to try it out.

I'm all over it, but I don't know if I'll snag it on Sunday or a few days later.

I don't have a problem with the games (I've owned the last 3 and bought MW2 this week), and I do know that soldiers play them. I just think it's kind of tasteless to release on Remembrance Day, like they did last year (and so close to it as they did this year). It seems to me that a bunch of kids will be home playing war instead of going to services or actually taking time to remember those that have fallen. I don't think that's an 'out of touch' statement, it's just a point of view. I'm not saying "jeez, kids these days with their video games... hey, get off my lawn!". I just think that the makers of CoD could stand to class it up a little and release the thing a week earlier or a week later so that they aren't essentially turning the holiday into "Call of Duty Day" instead of "Remembrance Day".

The thing is, they would be home playing another game if MW2 wasn't out.

These kids don't give a shit about Veteran's Day.

Ok, that is much better then and a real punishment I guess.


As for Modern Warfare 2, finished the story last night. 10 of game play for me, all of it very cool. Spec Ops will keep me busy for a while when I want solo play from here on out, that crap can get hard.

North American release date set for FFXIII. March 10, 2010.......

FINAL FANTASY XIII – The Time Has Come – PlayStation.Blog.Europe

February and March are absolutely stacked with releases at this point. God of War 3, Heavy Rain and Gran Turismo 5 are also scheduled in the same timeframe. Save those X-mas gift cards.

Awesome! It's chocobo racin' time!

Forgot about White Knight Chronicles also being released in that timeframe. Geez.

BioShock 2 on February 9th.

I think the Feb/Mar timeframe has become the defacto holiday season this year. There's been so many huge titles that weren't quite ready for the holiday season, so the next best time was to put those games at the start of 2010. Most gaming and electronic companies have a fiscal year that starts on April 1st, so they put their big games in the month or two before that to boost profits. It used to be that gamers didn't have enough $$$ to buy all of the blockbuster holiday season games. Now that has moved back three months beyond the holiday season.

Did anyone pick up New Super Mario Bros. today? If so, how is it? I know reviews are great but I tend to trust you guys more than the in-the-pocket reviewer that plays for about 3 hours.

I've beaten the first two worlds (just beating all the levels, going back and getting all the big coins will be a lot harder) and I'm enjoying it so far. I like the new powerups, the levels have had a lot of variety already, and it's pretty difficult by the second world. One of the few things I didn't like about Super Mario Galaxy was that it was too easy for the opening third of the game or so, this one doesn't ease you in as much. On the first stage of World 2 I triggered the Super Guide option (The eighth death on a level will activate a green block you can hit, after which Luigi will start going through the level and you can take over from the CPU at anytime. It's meant to help people get past difficult sections. I haven't activated it yet though.) which was pretty embarrassing. The handful of levels I played two-player were hilarious since the other person was not good at all but with enough advice and cooperation I was able to get them through most of the levels, I can't wait to play with a few people who know what they're doing.

The main annoyance for me so far is that I sometimes trigger the spin (done by waggling) when I don't mean to, it's hard to keep my hands still enough all of the time. The tilt control aspects work well but they are not very frequent, I'd prefer being able to use a classic controller (I also like that D-pad better than the smaller Wiimote D-pad) and tilt those platforms with L and R to avoid spinning when I don't want to but no such option exists.

Compared to recent Mario games I'd place it above NSMB on DS (which was still pretty good imo) and below Mario Galaxy so far but like I said I'm less than a quarter of the way through single-player and yet to experience multiplayer with a halfway competent gamer.

I'm a big fan so far, and I'm about halfway through world 2. I was playing two-player co-op the whole time with my girlfriend - a self-professed video game hater - and she was having a blast the whole time. She's pretty terrible, but managed to do some pretty impressive (read: lucky as hell) things. The co-op mode is a little difficult at first - it's odd to get used to bumping into someone, and that led to quite a few deaths on both of our parts when navigating some of the smaller platforms. I'd imagine with 4 players simultaneously the world feels incredibly crowded, but I'd also imagine it'd be fun as all hell. I'll also echo Big Fo - the difficulty ramps up CONSIDERABLY in the second world. It's still not "hard," I'd say, but it's definitely not mind-numbingly easy.

The game feels like they took Super Mario Brothers 3 (NES) and Super Mario World (SNES), combined them into one game, and then polished it up for the new system.

My wife was an a-hole and "forgot" to go pick up my copy today. I guess I'll go get it tomorrow.

I'm finding the game incredibly tough. Used the super guide on the water level in the first world. I'm so crap haha. Although just cracked the second world now, so lets see how I fair this time.

Started out earlier with the plan of going down and trading in Skate 2 and inFamous and grabbing one of the newer games out. Was thinking Dragon Age, Uncharted, or FIFA. After a couple stops for work I just came home. Can't decide what to get, none really stand out as THE ONE to get from those. I will give it a few weeks I guess.

Dragon Age is game of the year by a wide margin, IMHO.

You obviously haven't played Uncharted 2. Dragon Age may be GOTY, but the wide margin part is silly talk given the number of great games.

I have played it. It's an excellent game, but in my opinion, Dragon Age is much better. Dragon Age is a game of the decade type of game.

Wow. I'll disagree even more with the decade comment, but that's what opinions are for. Dragon Age would be 3rd best IMO for this year.

Edit: I should also note that I haven't played any 360 exclusives, so I may be missing out on a great game amongst that lineup.

I haven't played it yet but I cannot see how it maks it by a wide margin, if at all. Uncharted 2 gave me one of the best gaming experiences ever in a game.

FIFA - fun but not much more than a little extra pollish from last year

Uncharted 2 - A GREAT game which had a nice mix of platforming, fighting and puzzle solving. This is a rare game that makes you feel like you are playing through a great action movie. The cut scenes are well done and the interaction between the characters is very believable and I didn't see anything that seemed like forced dialogue.

Dragon Age - haven't played

I'm going to have to play Uncharted 2. I'm only three or four hours into Dragon Age, and I'm with Eaglesfan27 in that I think it's easily a game of the decade competitor. It's already one of the best games I've ever played.

So, uh, just to be clear.

When you rescue a Toad in NSMB Wii, you aren't supposed to throw him down the nearest gap. Right?

Kotaku just posted a very glowing review for Assassin's Creed II. It sounds like the solved a lot of the problems that plagued the first one.

Yeah, it's another big week for releases. Left 4 Dead 2, Assassin's Creed 2, new Tony Hawk game, God of War Collection, and Little Big Planet (PSP) just to name a few.

IGN gave L4D2 a 9.0, FWIW. Said it is better in every way over the original.

I haven't done the research on AC II, but If they haven't solved the repetitive game play then they haven't solved anything.

IGN says it's fixed. They actually said that if the series continues to improve the next will be on par with the GTA games.

According to the review I read, that's exactly what they solved.

It was clear to anyone who played the game for more than a few hours that the repetive game play was by far the worst issue with that game. I played it one night, saw the issue and became immediately bored by the entire thing.

Cool. Guess I'll have to pay attention to this one again. Loved the universe, fighting and general basics of the game, but that repetition.. ugh...