rootninja

Check out CNN’s take on the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops. The editor is on crack if he doesn’t think Black Ops will be a huge success.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/gaming.gadgets/11/08/call.of.duty.black.ops/

Does Treyarch just lack what’s required to do justice to the Call of Duty title. Treyarch has a knack for riding the coattails of Infinity Ward, screwing everything else up. World at War was a step backward from Modern Warfare, and Call of Duty 3 was just a complete bomb. After the massive blunders in the PC version of Modern Warfare 2 of an otherwise stellar release, perhaps the door is wide open for true fps perfection.

Critics are wondering if Treyarch can match the creative heights of Infinity Ward’s earlier efforts. The departure of several key Infinity Ward team members and subsequent legal battles with game publisher Activision have also bred skepticism among fans.

I think real skepticism revolves around the publishers perceived need to strangle the PC players with console limitations and snub the modding community in general. This, and the dumbing down of gaming to the lowest common denominator (consoles, yeah I’m looking at you) appear to be the biggest failures of modern game publishing.

There are two things Treyarch has definitely gotten right over the last few years: Zombie survival mode and copying Infinity Ward. Hopefully they won’t screw up the game play this time.

If Black Ops flops, perhaps the Battlefield teams could lend a hand and release a Modern Warfare 3 done right. But the day that happens is probably the same day the Call of Duty guys fix Battlefield’s buggy, crash-prone interface.