Call of Duty:Black Ops (also it's advertising)

[Oregonaut]

Some folks are getting their knickers in a knot saying that Kobe Bryant appearing in this ad is demeaning US Armed Forces personnel world-wide.

To this, I say: Fuck off.

I have yet to speak to one of my "kids" who are still in the service and are offended by this commercial. Why do people continue to have problems with stuff like this?

[Menacing Spike]

Some folks are getting their knickers in a knot saying that Kobe Bryant appearing in this ad is demeaning US Armed Forces personnel world-wide.

To this, I say: Fuck off.

I have yet to speak to one of my "kids" who are still in the service and are offended by this commercial. Why do people continue to have problems with stuff like this?

See, if you think like this, it means the terrorists are winning.

edit: That was sarcasm.

[Oregonaut]

If I think that people are idiots for jumping on a player from a team I hate for doing an ad about a game that involves combat? The terrorists win?

[Rackum]

How exactly is his presence in the commercial demeaning to me? I'm not sure I follow their logic. But I am highly amused at the things people often "tell me" that demean or disparage me.

[Oregonaut]

See, that's what I can't figure out. Nobody bothers to actually *ask* the military folks if we're offended. I served 10 years, got injured, got discharged due to being injured, and now I'm supposedly being "disrespected" by Kobe goofing off on a commercial.

I dun' getit.

[SecondTalon]

I can only assume the ad in question which is, quite possibly, one of the most bad-ass ads I've ever seen and pretty much goddamn accurate* to what actually goes on in the game - namely, random people (some of whom are possibly famous, some of whom are possibly supposed to be working, some of whom are underage, and so on) blowing the fuck out of one another with abandon.

...

This is controversial........ how, exactly?

I mean, is Jimmy Kimmel getting the same flak? How about the rest of the unnamed actors?

I mean, fuck.. if people are going to get pissy about this, where the fuck were they when Red was being advertised?


*Alright, more accurately 99% of them would be 12 year old boys calling each other "muthafuckas" and bragging about how they have real world skillz or whatever, so this is obviously a representation of the remaining 1%, but you get my point.

[SummerGlauFan]

I just watched the ad SexyTalon posted, and I must say, they must make a movie like this.

That is all.

[Vapour]

That is one awesome advert

[el_loco_avs]

If Kobe is demeaning them, what about everyone playing the game? >_<

[Oregonaut]

You see, that's the thing that bothers me. Everyone tries to speak FOR the military. No one bothers to speak TO the military. This isn't demeaning, it's freaking awesome. The deli-guy at the end with the akimbo pistols is just hilarious.

[Izawwlgood]

I really applauded that ad actually for what it's doing; it's showing people from all walks of life coming together having a blast (heh), on more or less equal footing. It shows business men/women dueling against construction workers, line cooks, and bored professors. I dig that.

[ProZac]

It reminds me of one of the 360 launch ads, where 2 guys stopped and pulled imaginary guns on each other in the middle of a mall. More people joined in until the entire mall was pointing imaginary guns at each other in a standoff. One person yelled bang, and everyone erupts into a fake war with their imaginary guns. Ads like these are awesome.

[Oregonaut]

That means ads like this understand their audience. The more rational portion of my mind understands that the people blowing this out of proportion are the same kind of people that were against Elvis' hips and that "Rock and Roll" noise.

Seriously though, there isn't any gore. There isn't any actual violence. Nobody dies. They are all posing with guns, that's it.

[Izawwlgood]

I especially like the youngish girl who shotguns the hinges of a door, then braces against a wall and sort of smiles to herself, while the berkinstock wearing hippy chick kicks the door down.

Heh... Yeah, it's a funny commercial. I kind of want to get the game now.

[SummerGlauFan]

One of my favorite parts is the guy who has the RPG with "proud n00b" painted on the side, who knocks himself on his butt when he fires it.

[Izawwlgood]

Incidentally, I think that was Jimmy Kimmel
It is! - ST

[Rackum]

You see, that's the thing that bothers me. Everyone tries to speak FOR the military. No one bothers to speak TO the military. This isn't demeaning, it's freaking awesome. The deli-guy at the end with the akimbo pistols is just hilarious.

This is my favorite part of that commercial. The complete nonchalance in his walk, dual ARs across his back, as he's blasting in each direction without concern to who's over there -- staring straight through the camera -- is absolutely incredible. This commercial almost makes me want to buy a 360 just for this game, hehe.

[SecondTalon]

For the record, it's on a variety of gaming platforms. The computer you're on right now, for example, is one possible example. A PS3 is another. Apparently it's also on the Wii. The DS has a bastardized version.

Okay, five platforms. That still constitutes a variety.

[Rackum]

For the record, it's on a variety of gaming platforms. The computer you're on right now, for example, is one possible example. A PS3 is another. Apparently it's also on the Wii. The DS has a bastardized version.

Okay, five platforms. That still constitutes a variety.

Not sure why I was thinking it was 360 exclusive. But I can't see the Wii version being as playable as the PS3, 360, or PC release. Wii controls just don't seem set up properly for a game like that. Can anybody speak to the playability and other details of the game for each platform?

[Babam]

For the record, it's on a variety of gaming platforms. The computer you're on right now, for example, is one possible example. A PS3 is another. Apparently it's also on the Wii. The DS has a bastardized version.

Okay, five platforms. That still constitutes a variety.

Not sure why I was thinking it was 360 exclusive. But I can't see the Wii version being as playable as the PS3, 360, or PC release. Wii controls just don't seem set up properly for a game like that. Can anybody speak to the playability and other details of the game for each platform?

PS3: PS3 has no games OH god the lag, and the tinny voice chat will break your ears.
360: Decent, but the community sucks with the occasional exception. Quick muting is a required skill. Also larger online population.
PC:HEY, I DON'T LIKE YOU USING THAT GUN *BANNED* HEY, NO MOVING UNLESS CROUCHED *BANNED* It's really hard to find a vanilla server where you can just play the game as the devs intended.

If you have a 360, and are currently paying for live I'd say pick it up there, if you don't and have a PC get it for PC.

[ProZac]

You say those things like it's a bad thing about PC. That's the best part, you can always find a way to fit your playstyle. Some people like Tactical servers. Not my style, so I don't bother. 24/7 Nuketown and tactical are the only ones I see often, and I just avoid them. It's still a minimal amount of servers. I'm actually surprised I've yet to find a server with the 'noobtube' banned. I did find one with claymores and flamethrowers banned, but only on the search and destroy gametype. I thought the flamethrower was a little odd.

[MisterCheif]

360: Decent, but the community sucks with the occasional exception. Quick muting is a required skill. Also larger online population.

The mute problem is solved by sticking with friends in a XBL party.
Yeah, I can't talk with my teammates, but from my experience in really any game before the introduction of party chat, 50% of people had no mic, 25% screamed and cursed into their mic (about half of which were doing that in a far too high-pitched voice) , 15% played rap music into their mic, and 10% were fun people to play with.

Oh, and 96.72543% of any statistics I say are at least 50% made up on the spot.

[BlackSails]

The campaign is incredibly frustrating. Half the time they give you no instruction. In the 2nd mission, you have to shoot down a helicopter with a grappling hook. The first dozen times I tried it, I just exploded. Was I waiting too long? Not long enough? Shooting at the wrong part? I have no god damn idea.

[SummerGlauFan]

You say those things like it's a bad thing about PC. That's the best part, you can always find a way to fit your playstyle. Some people like Tactical servers. Not my style, so I don't bother. 24/7 Nuketown and tactical are the only ones I see often, and I just avoid them. It's still a minimal amount of servers. I'm actually surprised I've yet to find a server with the 'noobtube' banned. I did find one with claymores and flamethrowers banned, but only on the search and destroy gametype. I thought the flamethrower was a little odd.

The thing about the flamethrower is, everyone shoots at you if you have it.

Not a reason for it to be banned, I am in fact agreeing with you.

So, how is this game? I am considering adding it to my Christmas list, since my parents are suddenly wanting me to add stuff to it.

[BlackSails]

The campaign is completely disappointing in every way. The multiplayer is an incremental improvement over MW2 in some ways, worse than in others. Just like world at war, its more twitchy than the modern warfares. Its also pretty annoying that there are weapons that are strictly inferior in every way to other weapons (im looking at you, m14)

[psion]

The campaign is completely disappointing in every way.

After musing over that for a bit, I have to agree. Not to say that it makes it unfun, but every single aspect was less compelling than the MW games. Though they actually tried to use their brains on the plot this time, it hardly matters because it doesn't really go anywhere and there's practically no climax. There's no reason to play Black Ops unless you've already played the two MW games, and if you have, just expect a little less across the board and you should be able to avoid said disappointment.

[BlackSails]

My problem with the plot is mainly

Spoiler:

You dont get attached to any of the characters. The only character whose death I felt sad about was Sergei from the break out from Vorkuta.

Also, they have a gazillion military advisors on this, and they couldnt come up with something more militarily believable. I mean, a transmitter on an underwater station built into a ship in cuba, which the evil bad guy tells everyone who works for him about? There are a ton of ways to have had the same exact mission, but not in a stupid way.

Also, numbers stations? Really? With people being brainwashed into being able to decode them? Thats the best a team of writers could come up with?
.

Gameplay wise, the campaign alternates between super easy (shoot people as they come out from the door) to frustratingly difficult (the objectives suddenly change with no warning and no instructions as to what you should do.) And the gameplay is interrupted way, way, way too often by cutscenes. There is one "mission" which is 100% cutscene. Some of them you can skip, some of them you cant skip

[KrazyerKate]

The multiplayer is an incremental improvement over MW2 in some ways, worse than in others. Just like world at war, its more twitchy than the modern warfares. Its also pretty annoying that there are weapons that are strictly inferior in every way to other weapons (im looking at you, m14)

People complained that MW2 was too campy, but I liked that pace. I wonder if the speed of Black Ops is just due to the game being new. Right now, sniping is really hard because you have to know the maps well enough to know when to lock down a chokepoint, when to move up, and when to back off, and a lot of people just don't have that knowledge yet. I hope that as the game ages, sniper rifles will be more punishing to the more fast-moving run-and-gun players.

I'm glad that they fixed Scrambler to be an equipment, not a perk. Now it's actually kinda handy. At the moment I can't use it very effectively though because of the pace of the game. I never have the five seconds it takes to take out the radar-jammer and plant it because I have to be watching out for baddies.

And the gameplay is interrupted way, way, way too often by cutscenes.

seriously, It's a first-person SHOOTER. Any time I spend with a controller in my hand that isn't spent shooting something, deciding what needs to be shot at, or being told how/where/what to shoot, that's a failure of the designers. I'd give a few examples here, but I usually just walked out of the room and grab a snack if I couldn't skip something. I really like the addition of civilians in this sort of game though.

The campaign is incredibly frustrating. Half the time they give you no instruction. In the 2nd mission, you have to shoot down a helicopter with a grappling hook. The first dozen times I tried it, I just exploded. Was I waiting too long? Not long enough? Shooting at the wrong part? I have no god damn idea.

I've beaten that part and I still don't know what I did right the sixth time that I didn't do the other five.

[ProZac]

Granted, I haven't played much of blops campaign yet (just the first 2 stages) as I largely didn't buy the game for the campaign, but from what I did play (and I've heard others say the same), it's an improvement over MW2. I found MW2 to be quite forgettable in the campaign. It tried too hard to be exciting and was just full of scripted events instead.

As for multiplayer, I've always found snipers to be worthless in CoD. Anytime one would be useful, I find I'd rather just have a single shot/burst fire rifle. Also, I have to assume you're not playing HC if you're finding run and gunners. Maybe you should try it. I played HC in MW, hated HC in MW2, and went back to HC in Blops. For whatever reason, it seemed like health was more reasonable in MW2 without being HC. However, it's back to what feels like shooting bricks. I constantly have the problem where I can always get the upper hand and put a few bullets into a person, but never quite finish them off before they turn and mow me down. In HC, people are made of paper, so I don't have this issue. It's the difference between going 5-15 and 15-5 for me.

seriously, It's a first-person SHOOTER. Any time I spend with a controller in my hand that isn't spent shooting something, deciding what needs to be shot at, or being told how/where/what to shoot, that's a failure of the designers.

As much as I enjoy it, I'd rather not have every FPS be Serious Sam.

As for the helicopter, I didn't have any trouble besides of "wtf" the first time I got there. I ran out, grabbed hook, thought "now what?", saw heli, heard "Shoot the plane with the hook" *dead*. Had no time between being told and death to actually do what I needed. As "Take down helicopter with harpoon" is not the first thing that came to mind. Second time I just ran out, grabbed gun, turned and fired with no issue.

[BlackSails]

I had to try it like 6-7 times before I stopped exploding.

[F117Landers]

As for the helicopter, I didn't have any trouble besides of "wtf" the first time I got there. I ran out, grabbed hook, thought "now what?", saw heli, heard "Shoot the plane with the hook" *dead*. Had no time between being told and death to actually do what I needed. As "Take down helicopter with harpoon" is not the first thing that came to mind. Second time I just ran out, grabbed gun, turned and fired with no issue.

First time, I didn't even make it to the Hook before the *Dead* screen. Found it the second time.

I also found the campaign to be too much scripting and too little instructions. Plus the Tunnel scene gave away the plot twist... Who the hell did they hire, M. Night Shyamalan?

[psion]

Plus the Tunnel scene gave away the plot twist... Who the hell did they hire, M. Night Shyamalan?

Either the plot twist wasn't meant to shock anyone when it was finally revealed to the characters, or they thought the playerbase would be too dense to understand the plot and they provided far, far too much foreshadowing to the twist. Or, third option: they didn't give a damn and that's just how things turned out. I can't say which would be more likely as they all seem equally probable.

Have you finished the campaign ProZac? Do you still think it's an improvement over MW2?

[ProZac]

Not finished, though I have played further. The Vietnam stage with infinite enemies is the last I remember, but I feel like I completed whatever stage was after that as well... Either way, I'd say I still prefer this to MW2. To look at it this way, MW2 had a campaign that I played knowing I would never go back to again. I hated it by the time I was done. On the other hand, Black Ops just has me mostly uninterested. I'm playing, I'll finish it, but I'll likely never play it again just because I don't find it that interesting. CoD4:MW though I did play through multiple times, and enjoyed immensely.

[psion]

I should probably also mention this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RULv6HbgEjY
It's a video of a player who completes the first stage of the game without killing anyone or doing much of anything besides satisfying the scripted triggers. If it doesn't spark a discussion it's at least an interesting deconstruction of the campaign.

[Oregonaut]

That's a problem with using "Black Ops" as a device to drive the game. The best Black Ops are the ones where you don't kill anyone, or at least no one other than your target.

[mind404]

well, i'm late to this party, but its still my game of choice right now so screw it, here we go.

I am offended by Kobe, way to be a noob tuber, prick.

Also, early comment about M14 being an inferior weapon, try it with a grip and silencer (warlord obviously) on Hardcore, its deadly with pretty good iron scopes and quick trigger fire, barely bounces.

I had put down Black Ops for a while but then one of my friends got me into Hardcore, mainly Hardcore Bombs and Flags. These have objective points to orientate yourself so you feel like you have a sense of which direction to look for the bogies. Discovering Hardcore has made the game like 20x funner (and i've been playing since CoD4, took me a while to figure out) so I would advise it to anyone who hasn't played it in a while.

[EvanED]

It reminds me of one of the 360 launch ads, where 2 guys stopped and pulled imaginary guns on each other in the middle of a mall. ... Ads like these are awesome.

This is said ad, BTW, which is awesome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXebJR_G0k4

[Beardhammer]

For the record, it's on a variety of gaming platforms. The computer you're on right now, for example, is one possible example. A PS3 is another. Apparently it's also on the Wii. The DS has a bastardized version.

Okay, five platforms. That still constitutes a variety.

Not sure why I was thinking it was 360 exclusive. But I can't see the Wii version being as playable as the PS3, 360, or PC release. Wii controls just don't seem set up properly for a game like that. Can anybody speak to the playability and other details of the game for each platform?

PS3: PS3 has no games OH god the lag, and the tinny voice chat will break your ears.
360: Decent, but the community sucks with the occasional exception. Quick muting is a required skill. Also larger online population.
PC:HEY, I DON'T LIKE YOU USING THAT GUN *BANNED* HEY, NO MOVING UNLESS CROUCHED *BANNED* It's really hard to find a vanilla server where you can just play the game as the devs intended.

If you have a 360, and are currently paying for live I'd say pick it up there, if you don't and have a PC get it for PC.

Or avoid it like plague because the last thing we need to do is encourage more Modern Warfare copy-paste games. Call of Duty is turning into Madden football - a slightly different version of the same game released year after year for the same price.

But the ad was fuckin sweet.

[The Scyphozoa]

I read somewhere that this ad cost more to make than the game itself. It looked like a pretty big set, it had two famous people in it, lots of explosioning, plus the rights to "Gimme Shelter", all that has to add up a lot of money.

[Beardhammer]

I read somewhere that this ad cost more to make than the game itself. It looked like a pretty big set, it had two famous people in it, lots of explosioning, plus the rights to "Gimme Shelter", all that has to add up a lot of money.

And it kinda seems unnecessary. People already know about Modern Warfare, just like they know about Gears of War, Halo, and all the other titles that are really popular because consoles don't have anything better. People that like Modern Warfare would already buy Modern Warfare, and people that don't like Modern Warfare because they're essentially all the same won't buy it, no matter how awesome the ad for it is.