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Customizer Fixes the Biggest Problem With Skylanders Toys
While the plastic characters Toys For Bob created to populate the world of Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure are certainly cute, colorful, and well-made, zero points of articulation makes them less action figure, more tiny statue. Action figure customizer supreme Jin Saotome brings four Skylanders to life in a whole new way. With a steady hand and…
By Mike Fahey Published November 28, 2011 -
Is “Morning Wood” Really a Map Name in Modern Warfare 3‘s First DLC?
Grain-of-salt territory here, but rumors have it that Modern Warfare 3‘s first set of premium downloadable content will feature five maps entitled “Morning Wood,” “Concrete,” “Park,” “Italy,” and “Overwatch.” The title of the first, and the fact “Overwatch” was a map in Modern Warfare 2, calls for some healthy skepticism. Modern Prestige has what it…
By Owen Good Published November 26, 2011 -
Call of Duty Elite Is 95 Percent Operational, Mobile Versions Inbound Next Week
Call of Duty’s online Elite service is just about fully functionally, with the first episode of Friday Night Fights set to hit this week and the mobile version releasing as early as next week, Activision says. “We changed our status to green yesterday,” said Daniel Suarez, vice president of production at Activision. The service had…
By Brian Crecente Published November 23, 2011 -
Activision’s CEO Thinks Call of Duty Deserves Hurt Locker-Level Respect
Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg had some sharp words when asked about the criticism that Call Of Duty games get for their supposed glorification of violence and military aggression. “There’s a sense that games are more exploitive in a way that The Hurt Locker—which also was designed as form of entertainment—isn’t.” Hirshberg’s opinion is that “video…
By Evan Narcisse Published November 22, 2011 -
One Million People Are Paying for Call of Duty Elite
Never mind that the rollout for Call of Duty Elite, Call of Duty‘s stat tracking and social service, hasn’t been smooth, Activision is sending out a press release this morning to proudly announce that it’s sold one million premium accounts. Congrats! GameStop alone sold 600,00 Elite membership. According to Elite‘s status page, “Service Is Intermittent”.…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 22, 2011 -
79.9 Years Is Too Damn Long To Play Call of Duty
In 79 years, I’ll probably be dead. So will the vast majority of our readers, save for the little assholes on Xbox Live. For reader Jeremy (not an asshole!), 79.9 years is apparently how long it will take him to reach “Prestige” in Call of Duty Prestige is, of course, the highest ranking CoD players…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 21, 2011 -
Call of Duty: Elite‘s 404 Page Is Wonderful
Call of Duty: Elite is suffering a rocky rollout. Things haven’t gone as expected, but in good time, Activision will hopefully get things ironed out. Until then, there’s this. The above 404 image appears when you try to enter “status” on the Call of Duty: Elite website. It sums up how many feel about the…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 21, 2011 -
A Children’s Treasury of Insane Throwing-Knife Kills in Modern Warfare 3
Last night we were sent the clip of the insane bank-shot knife kill you see above, courtesy of the unwitting victim felled by it. We have no illusions that this is the first WTF knife kill for a game that’s been out for two weeks, and played by millions online since its release. Another year,…
By Owen Good Published November 20, 2011 -
Observe World of Warcraft‘s Seventh Birthday with Free In-Game Items and a New Ad
World of Warcraft celebrates its seventh birthday on Nov. 23, and in observance, anyone logging in between Sunday and Saturday, Dec. 3 will get a free celebration item that temporarily grants an XP boost. The “Feat of Strength” and the celebration item also grant a special tabard and a reputation bonus, in addition to shooting…
By Owen Good Published November 18, 2011 -
Are These the Best Modern Warfare 3 Players in the World?
There appear to be at least two Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 players in the world who have essentially leveled up 800 times each. Eight hundred times. The Call of Duty games have something called Prestige Mode. It allows a player who has reached the higher online level in the game’s multiplayer to give…
By Brian Crecente Published November 18, 2011 -
GameStop Alone Sold 600,000 Memberships to Call of Duty’s Elite Service
Call of Duty Elite’s launch was rocky, Activision tells us, missteps were made, but we’ve never had any sense of just how many paying customers it might have attracted, until now. During their third-quarter earnings report yesterday, GameStop spilled the beans on just how many people picked up the paid version of the community-building, stat-tracking,…
By Brian Crecente Published November 18, 2011 -
Prototype 2‘s New York City is Slightly More Dangerous Than Ours
Fourteen months after the events of the original Prototype, New York City has become a place filled with danger, disease, and corruption. What took it so long? Having only been in the city twice in my life, my opinion mainly comes from television and movies. So I know that for every sexually based offense handled…
By Mike Fahey Published November 18, 2011 -
It’s Going to Take a “Couple of Weeks” to Make Call of Duty Elite Fully Functional, Says Developer
It wasn’t the numbers that knocked Call of Duty: Elite on its ass the day it went live, it was the questions. Speaking with Kotaku earlier this week Daniel Suarez, vice president of production at Activision, walked us through how one of the most experienced online gaming companies in the world was blindsided by the…
By Brian Crecente Published November 17, 2011 -
Call of Duty Pulls In More than Three-Quarters of a Billion Dollars in Five Days, And Other Insane Numbers
Following in the footsteps of the last three Activision military shooters, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 had a record-breaking, money-printing first five days, pulling in more than $775 million in worldwide sales, Activision reports. “With $775 million of sales of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 in its first five days, Call of Duty…
By Brian Crecente Published November 17, 2011 -
Call of Duty Thief Escapes in Waiting Getaway Car
Is it just me or are Call of Duty thefts starting to sound more and more like missions from the game? The latest snatch and grab of the Activision shooter happened last week when a man swiped ten copies of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 from a display stand at a Tesco in the…
By Brian Crecente Published November 16, 2011 -
Call of Duty Elite Is Coming to PC. One Day.
The stat-tracking, community-driven Call of Duty: Elite is still missing in action. Problems have continued to plague the free and premium versions. It’s still broken Previously, Elite‘s developers stated in a now-erased tweet that it “cannot guarantee if or when a version will be available for the PC.” Now, it looks like there will be…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 16, 2011 -
Elite Update: Blah, Blah, Blah, It’s Still Broken
A week after the tremendously successful release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, a game that more than 6.5 million people picked up on the first day, the massive community-driven, stat-tracking element of the game remains unstable at best. Call of Duty: Elite was meant to herald a new era for the annual Activision…
By Brian Crecente Published November 15, 2011 -
Reviews
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3: The Kotaku Review
Liquid fast, meticulously polished, wickedly consuming: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 doesn’t deliver stories or engender emotion in its players, but rather deals in raw adrenaline. A match of Modern Warfare 3 is punctuated by the rush of a well-placed shot, the anger at a surprise, unjust death. Infinity Ward’s latest iteration on the…
By Brian Crecente Published November 15, 2011 -
Belgium Mom Wraps Up a Profanity-Laced Call of Duty Session With Some Gunfire
This charming foul-mouthed hardcore gaming mom helps to elucidate some of the problems we all stumble across while playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 online. Some weapons, she points out, are a little overpowered. The game allows you to transition to the scope view on a gun a bit too quickly and other players…
By Brian Crecente Published November 14, 2011 -
Is This the Reason People Love Call of Duty?
You can thank/blame marketing and a Michael Bay-on-steroids storyline all you want, but there’s a reason people come back to Call of Duty games year after year, and it has nothing to do with zombies or sideburns. It has to do with how the game feels There’s a quickness to Call of Duty games that…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 14, 2011