Archive for the ‘activision’ Category
Call of Duty: Black Ops First Strike DLC Coming to PS3 March 3rd
Posted by Josh Olin in activision, call of duty: black ops, PlayStation Games, PS3 on February 9th, 2011
The wait is nearly over! Treyarch and Activision are happy to announce that the Call of Duty: Black Ops First Strike Content Pack launches worldwide for the PS3 on March 3rd, 2011. Battle it out in four all-new multiplayer maps including Berlin Wall, Discovery, Stadium, and Kowloon. Expand the cooperative fight for survival in Ascension, the latest chapter within the terrifying Zombies saga.
Berlin Wall features combat on both sides of the imposing wall
Discovery is a desolate, frozen German outpost in Antarctica
In Kowloon, battle in the rain along the rooftops of a towering Chinese sprawl
Stadium is an intense locale with Zombies Ascension
The battle for Democracy expands to new territories in less than one month!
Register for Call of Duty: Black Ops $25,000 Online Ladder, Starts 11/22
Posted by Brian Gauld in activision, call of duty: black ops, PlayStation Games, PS3 on November 19th, 2010
Good News! Black Ops is out, and I’m sure many of you are busy scoring TKs and heaping up the bodies of the n00bs. PlayStation and MLG will make your hours of dedication more lucrative with $25,000 in total cash prizes in the Call of Duty: Black Ops Online Ladder, presented by PlayStation. This is a 4v4 competition — grab a few of your best buds and sign up (it’s free to register).
This is an online tournament ladder, so you don’t even need to leave your house to enter and compete for a shot at your share of the $25,000 prize pool. Round up your posse, join the ladder, and start whatever regiment you need to get into shape for ladder play starting on November 22nd. The top 128 teams move on to a double-elimination tournament on January 24th. The best team will claim ultimate Black Ops supremacy and the $10,000 first place prize.
Join the Call of Duty: Black Ops Online Tournament presented by PlayStation Ladder
Blood Drive Hits PS3 Tuesday, Car Combat with Zombies
Posted by Deborah Haight in activision, blood drive, PlayStation Games, PS3 on November 1st, 2010
Tomorrow, Blood Drive will be hitting shelves and players worldwide will be able to take part in the zombie maiming mayhem that is the Blood Drive tournament. At its core, Blood Drive is a combat driving game. It’s all about driving fast, splattering zombies and wrecking as many enemy drivers as possible. Ultimately though, the question must be asked … How did people go from a worldwide zombie apocalypse to the most ruthless, exciting, and action-packed form of sports entertainment ever?
The Blood Drive Tournament is the natural evolution for the gambling paradise in the desert city of Las Ruletas. From its early beginnings during the civil war as a center for illicit arms trading to both sides, the city has fostered a hands-on, do-it-yourself, self-empowering environment. When the zombie apocalypse broke out, the criminal cartels in the city used their resources to preserve their little empire by cutting deals with top secret government bases in the desert. Working together towards a common goal for once, they managed to not only survive the zombie hordes, but to thrive.
As the gambling trade was dying, another attraction in the city was growing. Led by one of the first “Blood Drivers,” Bastian “B.D.“ Dice, the drivers who patrolled the routes to the sanctuary in the desert built upon his philosophies of violence and showmanship. Before long it wasn’t about just keeping the zombie population to a minimum, it was about doing it in style and in the most violent and messy way possible.
The sport grew and new drivers replaced the ones who couldn’t cut it. Soon TV networks and internet sponsors wanted a piece of the action. The battles were structured and codified and the Blood Drive Tournament was born, with B.D. as the ringleader and announcer.
You’ll take the role of one of the eight finalists in the Blood Drive Tournament. Over the course of the game, you will compete in a number of different event types. As you progress, the goals will change and you’ll have to adapt to keep up. From zombie killing to traditional race events, to the crowd favorite King of the Skull, it will take a combination of skill, guts and sheer firepower to claw you way to the top.
There are six different events in the Blood Drive Tournament, each with a unique goal, and thus a unique strategy to win. For the most part, the events center on killing stuff, pure and simple – zombies, cars, cars and zombies … On top of these there are several more traditional race type events that follow the simple principle of crossing the finish line first = winning. The difference between a Blood Drive race and a regular race is that your opponents don’t have any reservations about ramming you, crushing you, shooting you, or doing any number of other things to ensure they come out on top. Oh, and did we mention the zombies? They haven’t quite figured out that they should stay off the course; in fact, they’re everywhere!!
Learning the event styles, the race courses, the zones and the world of Las Ruletas will all play a part in the driver’s success to climb the ladder of the Blood Drive Tournament. Drivers will be able to choose from unique weapon loadouts between events, as well as collect weapon pickups, health, speed boost and other powerups during gameplay. In addition to this, each vehicle has a unique Rage Power that can be used during the events. Killing the walking dead in as many ways as you can think of fuels the Rage Powers. Missiles, bullets, landmines, the side of your car, the front of your car, walls, trash cans, baggage carts – anything available. Regardless of the event, it’s never a bad idea to splatter a zombie or wreck an opponent. At the end of the day only one Blood Driver can come out on top!
I hope this sheds a little light about Blood Drive to you. Please check it out tomorrow if you like what you see!
Little-Known Facts: Call of Duty: Black Ops Multiplayer
Posted by Josh Olin in activision, call of duty: black ops, PlayStation Games, PS3 on October 27th, 2010
Hello! I’m Josh Olin (aka JD_2020), and thank you for the opportunity to highlight some of the features that Call of Duty: Black Ops will deliver to PS3 fans when it launches on November 9th. A number of these features are ones that I think the community has been wanting for a long time, which is why we’ve worked really hard to deliver. So let’s get started!
Multiplayer Online Split-Screen Support
Let’s get started with what I believe is the most unknown, yet confirmed, aspect to Call of Duty: Black Ops multiplayer – the online split-screen support we’ve re-introduced to the franchise!
The Facts:
- You can connect a second controller and bring a guest online (i.e. “JD_2020” & “JD_2020(1)”).
- Guests can rank up, earn unlocks, etc – all guest progress goes away once signed out.
Custom Games Editor
Allow me to introduce the Black Ops Custom Games Editor! Private matches have never been this customizable. Players will have the ability to structure their games at all new levels of granularity. From variables as simple as Time Limit and Score Limit, or as deep as which weapons, Perks, and gear are available. You want a Pistols Only match? Make one! No longer do custom game modes rely on the “honor system.”
Furthermore, any Custom Game you create and configure can be placed in your File Share, for friends and the community to browse, download, and enjoy. You just might create the most addictive new game mode of all time from the comfort of your own living room!
In-Game Friends List
We’ve integrated a built-in Friends List into the in game user interface. You’ll be able to browse Recent Players, Friends, navigate their File Shares, Recent Games, Combat Records – all within this in-game menu system designed to streamline the social process within the game. Sending game invites and joining Friends’ games has never been simpler than in Call of Duty: Black Ops.
Regional Matchmaking & Party Privacy
Call of Duty: Black Ops will support regional matchmaking filters on a global scale. So, no matter where you’re at in the world, you will have the ability to specify whether you want to match with players from other geographical regions, or only those local to you. This will make communication and lag a much less intrusive variable on your gameplay experience.
Additionally, given Black Ops will support joining games in progress via an even simpler built-in in-game Friends List interface, we’ll allow a Party leader to lock down his lobby to Invite Only, Friends Only, or even Close it altogether if he wants to be in complete control over who enters and exits the Party Lobby.
Emblems Do NOT Reset with Prestige
This one is pretty cut-and-dried. A frequently asked question is, “Will my kickass emblem I spent hours perfecting be lost when I prestige?” The answer is “NO!” Emblems are one of the only aspects of Black Ops MP that do not get a full reset upon entering Prestige. Things that will reset when you Prestige are: XP, COD Points, Challenge progressions, Loadouts, and so forth.
So that’s just a few of the lesser-known components to Call of Duty: Black Ops multiplayer, confirmed for the first time here on the official PlayStation.Blog! For more information regarding Black Ops, and all the new features included in multiplayer, head over to our official YouTube channel and watch all the different trailers we have highlighted from the game. Additionally, you can follow me on Twitter (@JD_2020) for more news and updates.
Euro Event Report – James Bond: Blood Stone for PS3
Posted by Jeff Rubenstein in activision, bizarre creations, Events, james bond: blood stone, PlayStation Games, PS3 on August 5th, 2010
Activision and Bizarre Creations unveiled their latest Bond game at an event in London (of course!) recently. Luckily, we had our own debonair English secret agent covertly in attendance. Here’s what SCEE’s Keating – Barry Keating – observed at the reveal James Bond: Blood Stone for PS3.
While we may have to wait a little longer for the next installment in the James Bond series, gamers and Bond fans can take a quantity of solace in the fact that the suave super agent is getting the videogame treatment from blur developer, Bizarre Creations with James Bond: Blood Stone, a wholly original 007 epic penciled in for release later in 2010.
While much of the plot – from a script by Bruce Feirstein, the writer behind GoldenEye, Tomorrow Never Dies and The World is Not Enough – is being kept under wraps for now, we do know that Blood Stone’s globe trotting thrills and spills are set against a backdrop that involves the diamond trade, a missing scientist and a new Bond Girl: Joss Stone. Yes, Joss Stone. The lovely Miss Stone, who was in attendance at the announcement, has also co-written and performed the games’ theme song ‘I’ll Take It All’ with former Eurythmics man, Dave Stewart; it’s a catchy one!
At the swanky event, Activision and developer Bizarre Creations showcased the game’s opening mission, a self-contained pre-credit sequence that owes much to the way the movies are structured. Consider it a whopping great teaser for the level of wanton destruction that’s about to ensue as you hunt the bad guys across a slew of gorgeously designed locations in true Bond style.
Set in Athens, this sequence sees the fledgling agent with a license to kill hot on the heels of a bad guy holed up on a yacht. Parachuting from the back of passing plane, Bond quickly descends to the yacht taking out a few henchmen in quick succession with a combination of hand-to-hand combat and pistol action. As the action ramps up the pursuit turns into a speedboat duel as Bond guns it towards his goal, shooting bad guys in slo-mo and dodging collapsing buildings, before switching once again into a high speed car chase through the streets of Athens.
Then BAM! It ends as Bond rams his target off the road and the theme song kicks in. Although it was only a ten minute demo, the intent of which was to highlight the varying gameplay elements, I was hugely impressed – it’s just a shame that I didn’t get to play it; strictly hands-off at the moment.
What I did glean from the event was this: it’s a 70/30 split between on-foot and driving missions (there are six according to the developer). By performing melee attacks through a simple button tap you can earn up to three Focus Kills, which allow you to mark and execute villains in quick succession – ideal for sticky situations, then!
There was no mention of multiplayer, but being that this is a Bond game, and Bizarre Creations are known for weaving superb multiplayer components (check out Blur and The Club and you’ll see what I mean) into their titles, I’m assuming it’s a given. I’m definitely excited to see where this one goes, and what kind of missions Bizarre and Activision will reveal before the game arrives later in the year.