Modern Warfare 2 PC Sucks
The biggest video game launch ever, selling 5 million units within 24 hours of release, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 isn’t as good as the hype. As a big fan of COD4: Modern Warfare on the PC, I was biased towards the game before I ever unwrapped it. However, I have big problems with the short, unsatisfying single-player campaign and the lousy multiplayer support on the PC. The $10 increase in price from $50 to $60 for the PC version also does little to assuage my dissatisfaction.
There’s a large section of the MW2 Wikipedia entry which details criticism of the PC version, which I would rather cite than rewrite:
Criticism has arisen of changes made to the PC version of Modern Warfare 2 including the lack of dedicated servers, latency issues of the listen server-only IWNET, lack of console commands, lack of support for matches larger than 18 players, and inability to vote towards kicking or banning cheating players immediately. Ars Techinca writer Ben Kuchera wrote, “At launch, this will be one of the most locked-down, inflexible, and gamer-unfriendly [games] ever created.”
This is immediately evident in the Amazon reviews for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which are hovering just above 1-star. Reviewers complain about the tiny multiplayer matches (9v9 tops), the fact that Steam is required (no resale value), horrible multiplayer latency, and poorly planned out single-player campaign. The official steam forums are ablaze with outrage over the bad multiplayer, especially. Still, the game has peaked at over 95,000 concurrent players multiplayer (according to steam stats).
MetaCritic gives the game a 89% rating, but actual humans have knocked that down to a miserable 16%. On other platforms the spread is narrower–after all, this is a console game, ported for the PC. Infinityward, perhaps trying to emulate the design decisions between multiplayer in Left4Dead, screwed up on their tried-and-true FPS multiplayer scheme. On the console your bad lag, join-in-the-middle, and 9v9 matches might be OK, but on the PC we like big maps, lots of players, and dedicated servers with low latency.
We’re PC gamers. We want a long, immersive single-player campaign. We want a good storyline. We don’t want to be babied with chicken-screens for the “good parts” of the game. We don’t want to be pandered to with juvenile “shock screens.” And, we get tired of being shot in the head and dumped to die in every mission.
RAGE Screenshots
Counterstrike CS:S GunGame (GG) Maps Download
We’ve put together a gigantic free download of maps for the popular HL2 Counterstrike Source mod Gun Game that we’re sure you’ll enjoy. At 194MB of raw maps, 676 killer files, get your mod game on! A tag in the .rar file identifies this as “SICFORUM CSS GunGame MapPack.”
Download now: CSS Gun Game GG Maps.rar!
Here is a listing of the files in this download; warning, it’s long, so I’m hiding it behind a cut. You’ll have to view the full post to see: (more…)
Brazil Bans Counterstrike + Everquest
Joining previous bans of pc games Carmagedon, Grand Theft Auto and Postal which all garnered 18+ “adults only” ratings in Brazil, now first-person shooter Counterstrike and MMORPG Everquest join the ban list. Since 01/17/2008 a federal judge in Goiás has begun confiscating copies of the games, enforcing a ban that was legislated last fall. Other provinces are not seizing the games.
Kotaku also reports that Counterstrike “in the vision of specialists, teaches war techniques” and that Everquest “takes the player to total nonsense and heavy psychological conflicts, because the quests he receives may be good or bad.”
More amusingly, Everquest is not even officially sold in Brazil, and the offensive Counterstrike content where “Rio de Janeiro drug dealers kidnap and take to a slum three UN representative s” and “the police invade the place and are welcomed with bullets” refers to a user created map, CS_rio. Lol, it’s ok Brazil, we have politicians like that too in America; they’re called Hillary Clinton.
Phosphor: Free Game of the Week
Phosphor, a beautifully rendered, 3d multi-player browser-based first-person shooter, is not only an impressive game, but it’s also 100% free. The game, developed by Rasterwerks, is in beta so it’s not without its problems. Apparently the mouse locks up in Firefox when playing, but despite the minor issues, the game is a stunning feat. It’s well worth your time, so check it out!
Note: this bad-boy takes plenty of load-time AND you’ll need to have Shockwave 10.1 to run it (which should auto-prompt if you don’t have it).
