Blur Xbox 360 Multiplayer Beta Impressions

On 03.09.10, In Video Games, By AC Slater

Yesterday I received a code which gave me access to the multiplayer beta of Bizarre’s new racing game Blur. I’m going to be honest and say that I really don’t know a whole lot about the game, but I’m a fan of arcade racing games (don’t really care for the sim ones) so it looked interesting and hey, free beta so why not. The downloaded clocked in at a little over 1 gig and seems to include 4-5 tracks (?) and a handful of cars. I haven’t had time to mess around with all of the customization or anything like that, but I did get a solid hour and a half of playing time in so that’s basically what I’m going to be telling you about.

So seeing as how I knew nothing about the game going in I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but right off the bat I figured out that it’s kind of like Mario Kart, but with real cars. Essentially you are racing through a city, shipping yard, whatever, against other players trying to finish first, but along the way you can pick up different power ups to use against enemies or to help yourself. Just like in Mario Kart you can fire these power ups forwards or backwards, you can cycle between the different things you are carrying and the power ups themselves are similar to what you would find in Mario Kart. There’s a gun of sorts that gives you 3 bullets to fire off at people, there’s a red bomb type weapon that seeks out the person in front of you and hits them, there’s another red bomb thing that goes backwards and sits on the track waiting for someone to run into it, there’s a shockwave weapon that emits a pulse that damages any vehicle around you, there’s speed boosts, there’s shields, etc… you get the point.

So the muliplayer beta is basically just a handful of courses where you race around trying to finish first. You get different amounts of points depending on what place you finish and these help you level up which I’m assuming nets you different cars and mods and stuff. The menu interface is very clean and easily navigated, the game lobbies don’t seem to have any problems, there’s a nice voting system to choose which track will be next, overall the menus seem pretty thought out. The gameplay itself is actually pretty good, I didn’t have any problems with it although a lot of people in the game were complaining about the drifting, which I felt was alright, just took a little getting used to. It also took a few races to figure out what each of the power ups does as they are just colored icons without any description of what they are, but it’s easy enough to pick up on. The cars handled like I was expecting them to handle in an arcade racing game and I actually had a lot of fun playing online. So overall the beta seems pretty promising, but I’m not sure whether I’ll be picking this one up or not. I have quite a few games to play at the moment and am still having a hard time pulling myself away from Modern Warfare 2, so we’ll see. I’m always up for a good racing game and I’ll probably pick this up eventually, but I won’t be running out on release day to get a copy.

Is anyone else in on the beta? What do you guys think of the game so far? Does the drifting seem off to you or do these other people just need to get used to it?

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What Problems Do You Have With Modern Warfare 2?

On 03.02.10, In Video Games, By AC Slater

It seems that this blog attracts quite a few Modern Warfare 2 players (probably because I write about it so much), so since that seems to be the core audience here I wanted to post this and get your ideas of what some of the problems with Modern Warfare 2 are. Over the past few weeks all I seem to be reading on Twitter (#mw2), Buzz and other blogs, is how Infinity Ward should fix the game before even thinking about releasing DLC or expansion packs, and my question is, what problems are you people referring to?

Sure, when the game was first released there was the big issue with the lack of dedicated servers on the PC version and the smaller game sizes. Whatever, the servers is not a game play issue, get over it. You knew that there was not going to be dedicated servers before buying it, it made major news outlets (which seems weird to me) so it’s not like Infinity Ward straight up lied and said there would be dedicated servers and then changed their minds at release time. There may have been rumblings early on in production about dedicated servers being there, but it was a well known fact long before the release that they would not make it to the final product.

Now for the in game glitches, mainly multiplayer. I see a lot of people upset that there are so many glitches and they are blaming it on the fact that there was no public beta for the game. They say that if there was a public beta, many of these things would have been discovered before the game was released. I’m sure some of the stuff would have been figured out, but majority of it would not have. IW has a slew of in house testers that are paid to sit around and try to break the game, but when I say a “slew’ I mean it’s maybe 30 people (I really have no idea how many testers they have), but when the game is released, how many people bought it? Millions! So therefore, obviously millions of people are going to be able to find things that the 30 or so in house testers happened to miss. And to be honest, I think Infinity Ward has been doing a pretty good job of getting patches out there to the consumer.

The first major glitch that was discovered was the javelin glitch that allowed you to become a walking bomb. When you would die your body would explode with the radius of a javelin missile, destroying anything around you, it was quite annoying and eventually Microsoft stepped in and started banning people from xbox live, which they have every right to do since it’s part of the ULA you accepted when you signed up for Xbox Live. The next big glitch was the unlimited care package glitch which was a bit more of a problem. There were a couple methods for pulling off this glitch, 1 that was pretty easy and another that was more difficult. IW went ahead and patched the easy method, but the harder method still existed causing them to pull back the initial patch from MS approval and fixing it once and for all (it took a little longer to push out the PS3 version, PC was pretty instant I believe). But in the end it was fixed and as far as I’m aware there is no method that still works (until someone finds one). The other glitches were fairly minor like being able to place a sentry gun inside walls so that it could shoot out, but you couldn’t shoot in and same with player collisions and objects. I’m sure some of these still exist, but they have always existed in games for those willing to seek them out. There are also some elevators that they patched, but there  are still a few of them that are accessible in the game. For those that don’t know, elevators are glitches that allow your player to basically float way up into the sky and shoot down or access places they shouldn’t be able to.

So in my eyes the major GLITCHES were fixed. There were some other issues that people had with gun balance that were also changed around, in particular the range of the Model 1887 shotguns, but I don’t consider those glitches or an issue really. I never had a problem killing people that were running up on me with the Model’s. Sure I’ve been killed up close by them many times, but they are an up close weapon. I understand the issue here was the range and power, but I never found it to be an issue. Same goes for the complaints people have with Marathon, Lightweight and Commando. Sure it’s annoying to be killed by one of these guys, but it’s also not that hard to kill them. In my eyes the problem here is skill, there are some good players online in Modern Warfare 2 and if you can’t kill the guys running around like this, you obviously aren’t as good as them. Personally my only issue with the game is those damn thermal scopes… but it’s not a problem with the game itself, it’s just the fact that I still get killed by them… oh and noob tubes also… haha.

I know there are also complaints about the lobby times and getting booted out of games and I’ll agree that sometimes it takes a couple minutes to get into a game, but it’s not a ridiculous amount of time… And at least when the host of a game leaves it usually tries to find a new one, I know it doesn’t always work, but at least it tries which is more than I can say for CoD 4. And I know there are also some hacked lobbies with super fast movement and stuff like that, but I have yet to run into one of these lobbies and, as sad as it is, I usually play for a couple hours every day (Xbox 360), so I don’t know if it’s just a PC issue, but I have yet to run into one of these “hacked lobbies”.

So I’m curious as to what everyone’s problems are with the Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer? Why all the hate towards Infinity Ward? I know it comes off as if I’m trying to defend the game as a whole, but I’m actually just curious as to what problems other people have with the game since I don’t seem to have any… I really just want some new maps!

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Modern Warfare 2 Expansion Pack aka DLC aka Map Pack Rumors

On 02.19.10, In Video Games, By AC Slater

There’s no doubt that Modern Warfare 2 will be coming out with some sort of Downloadable Content in the future, but what exactly are we going to get. The obvious thing would be more multiplayer maps. In the past, for the Call of Duty games, we have gotten map packs containing 3-4 new maps to play, at a price of around $10. Some information leaked almost as soon as the game did, that MONSTER Energy Drink was sponsoring a promotion to win a new map pack in the spring of 2010 which lead to a rumored release date for said DLC. Since then Microsoft has had a few keynote presentations and has been doing away with the DLC, or Downloadable Content, word and has been touting it as an ‘expansion’. Now take that as you may, it could just be Microsoft trying to get away from the term DLC for some reason or it could mean that it’s going to have a little more than we’re used to in just a map pack, and there are actually rumors to support this… kind of.

Since the game was released people have been digging through hidden files and text files that are stored on the games disc and have found some pretty interesting things, someone even managed to rewrite a file and was able to play a possible new game mode called “Global Thermalnuclear War”. You can actually play the game mode right now if you’re lucky enough to have a friend that’s reworked whatever file you need to in order to make it active and of course it can only be played in a private match. Personally I have no clue how to even go about unlocking this mode or gaining access to it so if you know how please post a link in the comments. Anyways, there are tons of videos on YouTube with people playing this mode so you can check it out if you want. The way it’s played is kind of like Headquarters, but with a nuke. The nuke is in a crate in the middle of the map and each team must stand next to it for about 1 and a half minutes before the nuke activates and destroys everything. It sounds like a cool game mode and I’m not sure if it will be part of the spring DLC or if maybe Infinity Ward can just activate it via a playlist update which requires nothing at all on the users end. I only say that because it seems like all of the files, voices, etc are already on the game disc itself, so it’s just a matter of allowing us to play it, but we’ll see.

Similar to the above, someone also found some audio files with other game modes mentioned like Defcon, Die Hard, Arms Race, Team Deathmatch Pro, Free For All Pro, Search and Destroy Pro, and Sabotage Pro as well as Team Tactical (not 3rd person). Those seem like they could be easily implemented via a playlist update rather than any sort of DLC, but again this was all just rumors and actually Robert Bowling at Infinity Ward commented on the files and did say that they were just leftover stuff that was scraped from the game before launch. So while he could be lying and these could be introduced later, I’m going to go ahead and say that we will not be seeing all this stuff made playable in Modern Warfare 2.

Along with the different game modes there were also some weapons found hidden away in folders; G3, G36, R700, M40, M240, SA80, AW50, a power drill, Mp5, MP9 and the MP44. So take this with a grain of salt, it could just be stuff they left in the game folders when testing out which guns worked the best for balance etc, but who knows.

Now let’s talk about what everyone, including myself, are more interested in… maps. Again, from digging through files that shipped with the game, some people were able to find some map names that are currently not playable in the game. Now whether this means they will be available for DLC or they are just unfinished or unused maps that were scraped is anyone’s guess at this point. A couple of them are actually maps from the original Modern Warfare which would be really cool. As much as I don’t really care for the Wasteland map, I do like it cause it’s a clone of a map from Call of Duty 2. So to see some of our old favorites from Modern Warfare pop up in MW2 would be pretty cool. But for those interested in the map names here you go:

mp_abandon
mp_compact
mp_complex
mp_dcwh (D.C. White House?)
mp_revolt
mp_storm
mp_shipment (Shipment from MW)
mp_crash (Crash from MW)

So that’s what I’ve got in terms of rumors for DLC although I really don’t believe we’re going to see any of this as part of an ‘expansion pack’, as Microsoft dubs it, but instead we’ll get stuff that isn’t hidden on the disc. I really believe that all of this stuff is just left over stuff from testing, but who knows, we’ll just have to wait and see.

Is there anything else that’s leaked in regards to new modes, guns, maps, etc? These are just the main ones I was able to find, but there’s gotta be more info out there that I missed…

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Modern Warfare 2 Care Package “Glitch”

On 01.08.10, In Video Games, By AC Slater

I see a lot of people ending up at other articles on this site from searches for the care package glitch and the post they are ending up at claims that the care package glitch was fixed in the last update, which it was. The care package GLITCH that was referred to in the last update was the glitch where people could get unlimited care packages. I don’t believe there is any other care package glitch, but apparently a lot of people feel that the fact that you run a little faster while hold a care package smoke canister is a glitch. Personally I don’t think it’s a glitch in the same way that the javelin glitch was a glitch or the unlimited care package glitch was a glitch. I don’t really see anything that would indicate that this was a “glitch”.

If anything this care package “glitch” is more comparable to the Akimbo Model 1887’s being able to shoot and be much more deadly than they should be at such a long range, so more of a balance issue. Despite what you think, the people running around with the care package smoke grenade in hand can’t knife you from any further than a normal person running around can, it only seems that way because they are running faster than most people. So combine that with the commando perk and you have what appears to be someone knifing you from much further than they should be able to.

Now I’m not saying that I don’t think this should be rebalanced, because I do, but it’s not a glitch! If there is any glitch at all it’s only in the way the person running, with said canister, appears. He’s all hunched over like he’s trying to speed walk and take a shit at the same time, which makes it a little more difficult to shoot at them. So I don’t mind that they run a little faster (although it should be pretty comparable to holding a pistol and running), but the way they run is a little annoying and may need to be rethought.

What do you guys think? A lot of you have ended up here searching for answers to this one. Do you really think it’s a glitch and needs to be patched?

Update 2/2/10: So it appears that this latest patch was supposed to fix the unlimited care package glitch, and while it did fix 1 way of doing it, there is still another method for getting unlimited care packages. Infinity Ward is aware of the issue as noted in a Twitter post by Robert Bowling, but my question is why can’t they eliminate this thing once and for all? Why is it so hard to patch this… I was getting extremely annoyed with people doing this in a game I was in over the weekend that I eventually just started knifing the people on my own team that were doing it (Hardcore TDM). It’s ruining the game and IW needs to squash it once and for all… it’s almost as bad as the javelin glitch.

Update 2/4/10: I’m not sure if this is correct, but from what I’ve gathered after reading some sites and Tweets, Infinity Ward pulled the Xbox 360 patch back (the one that was already in place on PC and PS3) in order to fix the other care package glitches that still plague the system. So hopefully when it finally does roll out it will fix everything once and for all because it is getting quite annoying now. And I will continue to file complaints about every single person that I see doing it, even if they only do it once.

Update 2/12/10: Looks like the latest update has been approved by MS and is being rolled out to Xbox 360’s and hopefully will rid the world of the care package glitch once and for all. Find out everything the recent patch fixed here.

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MAG Beta Impressions

On 01.05.10, In Video Games, By AC Slater

The 256 player FPS MAG went into public beta yesterday and I had a chance to sit down and play for a few hours so I thought I’d give you a quick rundown of my experience. Normally I would wait until I’ve had a little more time to experience all that a game has to offer, but I wasn’t that impressed so I don’t know how much more of the game I will be playing.

First of all let me start this by saying that my PS3 was purchased mainly as a Blu-Ray player and I currently only own 1 game for the system (Little Big Planet), which has not gotten much playing time. My main reason for not playing games on the PS3 is the controller. I’ve never liked the way the analog thumb sticks felt in my hands. It just seems like they are too loose which causes my movements to be a lot more erratic than with the Xbox 360 controller. So with that in mind I already knew that I was probably going to suck at MAG and get very frustrated.

If you haven’t downloaded the beta yet from the Playstation Network you may want to set aside some time to do that before you get the urge to play. The demo itself only takes a few minutes to download and install, but once you launch it there is a 2gb “update” that begins to download and can take quite a bit of time. Once you get past that it’s time to make a character. There are 3 different groups  you can choose from and this group will determine which team you fight with, RAVEN, VALOR or SVER. I don’t know if there’s a difference between each group as when I made a character in VALOR (the US group I believe) I could not get into a single match, it kept erroring out. So after reading a bit on the internets I determined that if I chose SVER I would be able to get into a match right away, and I was right.

So once I got into the main screen there were a bunch of options that I didn’t have any clue what they meant so I just chose Deploy as I wanted to get into a game quickly. I tried to play the tutorial so I could get a feel for the controls and adjust my sensitivity, but for the life of me I could not figure out how to get into it. So despite the fact that I had no clue what I was doing, the only other option was to play Sabotage ( I think that’s what it was called), as all the other game modes are locked until you hit higher levels. So Sabotage consists of one team guarding 2 bases and the other team trying to capture them, once the capturing team as done so to both bases a 3rd base appears on the map and they must plant explosives there while the other team defends.

The game mode itself isn’t bad, it’s only 24 players or something like that, not the full 256 like advertised (I guess that’s only for certain game modes), but I still found myself dying almost as soon as I got to any of the bases. And the gun selection didn’t help me either. You start off with 3 guns, an assault rifle, a sniper rifle and a machine gun and in order to get new guns you need to level up and then spend those skill points (1 per level) on different upgrades and/or weapons. It’s a decent system, but I definitely think there should be more than 3 guns to choose from at the start of the game.

The maps and graphics looked pretty good. I’ve read some other people saying that they didn’t think the graphics were up to par with games like Modern Warfare 2, but I think they are still pretty good, especially considering how massive some of the maps are. I still feel as though the Playstation 3 controller is a huge crutch when playing FPS’ on the system, but again it’s probably just because I’m used to the Xbox 360, so those of you that are used to the PS3 controller and it’s response time and movement will probably be just fine. Other than that, I can’t really comment on the lag issue in a 256 player game because I have yet to get into a game with that many people, but there was no lag that I noticed in the Sabotage games that I was playing in. I may have to play some more just to unlock the other game modes to see what a huge game like that plays like.

So overall I’m not terribly impressed with the game, I’d much rather play Modern Warfare 2 to get my FPS fix. I had considered purchasing this game as a blind-buy when it comes out later this month, but I think I’m going to hold off now and just wait for God of War III which will probably be my first and only PS3 game considering the new Final Fantasy is coming to the 360 this year as well.

Has anyone else given the beta a run through, what do you think so far? What did I miss? And are the other game modes more fun than the Sabotage one?

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