BASH

Though it should have been a runaway romp, the marketing of Modern Warfare 2, the sequel to the iconic CoD4, has been a muddy slog.

Activision, the game’s publisher and Infinity Ward, its developer have seen the game’s release troubled by an ever growing list of issues, many of their own making.

MW2’s ball-handlers have dropped their fair share of pig-skin in the last few months. Here are just the lowlights:

- Activision brass increase the price of MW2 during the deepest recession since the Great One, just because they can. This causes great resentment even amongst the game’s fanboys.

- The PC community forges a 170,000+ petition demanding the restitution of dedicated servers after it pieces together the dev’s plot to have their online experience replaced by a peer-to-peer system.

- PC pre-orders of the game drop, as does Activision stock, soon after the news of the lack of dedi servers hits the internet.

- IW devs single out hardcore CoD PC gamers as bad influences. They are effectively fired. Modders, competitive gamers and tuners go into anaphylactic shock.

- PC Modders revolt after they see that their creativity is harvested and used blatantly in some of MW2’s more appealing features, without so much as any recognition (never mind any monetary compensation).

- Console gamers get a hold of MW2 DVD’s and begin live-streaming SP missions over the internet. Hundred’s of spoiler alerts go unheeded as the game’s closely guarded secrets get spilled.

- Pirated MW2 console torrents are being seeded across the world, two weeks before the game is officially released. This finally dispels the myth that illegal PC downloads were the real problem.

- CNN ireporters call in to say that MW2 lets kids play terrorist characters. The alleged opening scenes of MW2 see the wholesale slaughter of civilians. Acid-tongued CNN readers suggest that the only terrorism is the cancellation of dedicated servers.

To discuss these and many other topics are:

Rudedog from fpsadmin.com

Garetjax from codtv.tv

Bleed from omnilinkit.com

and our guests:

Josh from planetmedalofhonor.com and planetcallofduty.com

console expert Mattks from weplaycod.blogspot.com

competitive player, Andy “The Impaler” Coons from Loaded (goloaded.com)

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BASH 123 detonated over the CoD community like an atomic blast.

It has been a week now and we have all had a chance to recover.

On this week’s BASH, we look forward into the future of Call of Duty. A future that might be missing the elements that brought us into this game in the first place.

Today’s webcast features a status update on Modern Warfare 2, with an emphasis on community reaction.

We also talk about the stinging rebuttal from MW2 developer, Infinity Ward.  Jason West’s reply was particularly strong and no doubt a stiff rebuke to the outcry from PC gamers.

We talk about the success of the online petition against IW and the wisdom of a server strike.

After what has happened, will you buy this game?

SERVER GIVEAWAY!

On to show PC community solidarity is, friend of the show, jimmycorps (jimmycorps.com) who will give away a dedicated 60-slot Linux server to a lucky BASH listener.

Trivia question: Besides PST*Joker, who’s the only other person to win on an episode of BASH’s quiz show “Kill or Be Killed”.

Kill or Be Killed Ep 2

Kill or Be Killed Ep 1

We have on PST*Joker, Bleed, Josh Peckler, Mattks and Ian Tannehill to talk things CoD.

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Rob Bowling, community manager at Infinity Ward was kind enough to join our panel on BASH today. He let us in on the news that IW was taking Modern Warfare in a new direction. The online game on PC has changed. Dedicated servers are out. IW.net is in.

This is a game changer and many of you may not be too happy. I for one will be willing to listen and try it out. It’s all I can do.

For the folks in our community that mod and map, the future does not look as bright as the past.

Thanks to Rob, PST*Joker from mycallofduty.com, Rudedog from fpsadmin.com, Garetjax from codtv.tv, Josh from Planetmedalofhonor.com, MatTks from @weplaycod (Twitter) and weplaycod.com, iBleedv20 at omnilinkit.com and the hordes in our chatroom and ventrilo.

I’m glad the day is over.

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A hectic week for MW2 news junkies. There was a great deal of information released about the game. It started last weekend with the release of the Infamy video and it continued with the GTTV special on MW2.

However, what should have been  a straightforward marketing bonanza for Activision and IW became anything but…in the PC community that is.  Activision/IW lost the marketing highground and their message was hijacked by rumors of a delay in the PC SKU.

That’s our topic for today’s cast and with me to discuss the issue, as well as to talk about other relevant MW2 tidbits are Rudedog from fpsadmin.com and Xiao from Blackmonkeys.de.

And in a historic first for the program, BASH introduces MaTtKs from Twitter’s WePlayCod and weplaycod.net. Matt, a staunch CoD console community member is on to bring his community’s viewpoint into the cast. Welcome Matt!

In addition, we talk about Operation Flashpoint 2: Dragon Rising. How has the release process gone for this new FPS shooter?

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We have tried for some time to get Ian Tannehill, head of game at CEVO, to come on and talk to us but something has always gotten in the way. Whether it was food poisoning (…pork’s not as easy to cook as you might think!), or structural fires (Ian’s a much-in-demand firefighter) something has always kept us from having him come on the show and share his insight.

Well on this week’s BASH, we had Ian get up early to talk to us about the exciting end to season four of the CEVO-P season.

In addition to CEVO’s CoD guru, we have John from efragtv.com.

John and his shoutcasters casted the final game, which saw Loaded go up against Team Pandemic for CoD4 bragging rights in North America. John brings us his thoughts on the championship game and on the season.

Along with Ian and John are my co-hosts.  PST*Joker from mycallofduty.com, Bleed from omnilinkit.com and Rudedog from fpsadmin.com are on to discuss the rest of the news in the CoD world for this week.

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