Modern Warfare 3 vs Battlefield 3: This War is Dumb

Can we all just come to terms on this? This is a war on the level of dumb only matched by dumb wars like Donald Trump vs Rosie O’ Donnell, Pokemon vs Digimon, Axel Rose vs his fans, Call of Duty vs the “cool kids,” and 360 vs PS3. In all cases, each had something to bring to the table and really the war was simply a tie up of preferences and poor choices with no real winner, but a bunch of losers. Donald Trump and Rosie are insane, Pokemon was kid friendly while Digimon tended to go in a darker direction, Axel Rose is… well, insane and the fans wanted him to not be, Xbox and PS3 are both gaming systems with their equal claims to success, and Call of Duty was being shoved down the general populaces throats by Activision and we were loving it like the whores we are. There may be a few detractors from the ranks who spam Meta Critic and every forum they can, clambering to speak out against the biggest giant in all of videogamedom. Yet with the release of MW3 and its record setting $775 million in sales during the first five days, the point of the few vocal has been beaten down by the wallets of the general market.

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Battlefield 3 Goes Back To Karkand Tomorrow on PS3

Dice is not playing around with its first DLC for its big hit Battlefield 3. The promised free expansion that was given to consumers who bought the Special Edition of the game is more than just a map pack. It will give fans of the game 4 new maps, three new vehicles, ten new weapons, five new dog tags, five new achievements/trophies, and lastly a whole new game mode. The game mode while not exactly new, is the return of Conquest Assault which for those not familiar is a hectic version of Conquest. Conquest Assault starts with one team fully in control of every spot immediately putting one team on offensive and the other tasked to defend their territory.

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Facebook and EA Sign 5-year Exclusive Rights Deal

Facebook announced today that they have inked a 5-year deal with Electronic Arts to make Facebook Credits the exclusive method of payment for EA’s games on the popular social networking site. This news comes as a boon for both companies, as EA will rake in 70% of the revenue to Facebook’s 30%.

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The Sims 3 Late Night Is a Douchebag’s Dream Come True

Today, EA announced that their newest expansion pack for the insanely popular Sims franchise, “The Sims 3 Late Night“, is now available for purchase in Europe and North America for PC/Mac. In this game, players will be able to take their Sims out on the town for a boatload of nocturnal adventures (and yes, they can do those nocturnal adventures as well), such as hitting up nightclubs, playing in a rock band, and even transforming into vampires. A few new career opportunities are now available, like celebrity, in which you can go the rock star or actor route, and master mixologist (seriously, who would pick this?). As a celebrity, your Sim is hounded by paparazzi, lives in the best part of town, and is practically drowning in simoleans. No word yet on whether an upscale drug dealer is included.

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EA is Making a Mistake with Mass Effect on PS3

So it was  announced this week that Mass Effect 2 will finally be coming to the PS3 in January 2011.  EA also clarified that they have no plans to bring the original Mass Effect to the PS3.  It is great that PS3 owners will finally get to play Mass Effect, but EA is making a huge mistake by not releasing the first title in the series.

EA has the opportunity to deliver the entire Mass Effect experience to PS3 owners, but they are squandering it by skipping the entire opening chapter.  Mass Effect 2 is a great game on its own, but the first game adds much more depth to the characters and overall story.  Skipping straight to Mass Effect 2 would be like watching The Empire Strikes Back without having seen A New Hope. Continue reading…

Infinity Ward is Falling Apart – Respawn Entertainment Will Rise

UPDATE: Two more people have announced their departure from Infinity Ward today.  They have both been added to the list below.  Messerly is actually somebody who have been with IW since day 1.  I should also note that Grisby was the inspiration and voice actor for the CoD 4 character, Staff Sergeant Griggs.  This brings the body count to 13 as of today.  I think it is fair to see we will see more over the few months.

Ever since the Infinity Ward fiasco where two studio heads, Vince Zampella and Jaxon West, were fired by Activision, people have been talking.  Most of that talk has revolved around what the two of them would be doing next and about the suing and counter-suing between the duo and Activision.  That conversation has changed over the past week and some of the speculation has been answered.  Word has spread that several employees of Infinity Ward are resigning from their current positions.  On top of that, West and Zampella announced the formation of their new company, Respawn Entertainment.

It is important to note that the people leaving Infinity Ward aren’t just a handful of their talented staff, but most of them are company leads and have worked there for many years.  With Zampella and West included, it is confirmed that Infinity Ward is now 11 employees fewer than they were just a couple months ago.  Let us take a look at the full list, along with their roles at Infinity Ward: Continue reading…

UFC President Solidifies His Stance Against EA

Last week on the podcast Josh brought up some news about Dana White and his position towards EA during our podcast. Basically, White had stated that anybody who appears in EA’s MMA game will be banned from fighting in the UFC. This seemed a little extreme and the best reason that I could think of was that it might conflict with some sort of contract that the UFC had with THQ. As it turns out, Dana White just hates EA. Continue reading…