In this BASH, we are devoting the cast to talk about this week’s
decapitation of Infinity Ward’s leadership by their owners, Activision.
Monday evening, we all sat stunned in front of our computer screens
as G4TV’s Patrick Klepek broke the story of the firing of IW’s
President/Game Director Jason West and the CEO Vince Zampella. Shocking
news made even more surreal given that IW’s game sales of MW2 have
nearly approached one billion dollars.
What gives? Why were these two men fired? What does it mean for gamers and is this good news or bad news for PC gamers?
My special guest on the program, providing his deep insight into this event, is Game Editor for ArsTechnica.com, Ben Kuchera.
Here's a sampling of some of Ben's articles on ArsTechnica's Opposable Thumbs blog:
We explore some of the plausible reasons for Zampella and West's dismissal and discuss the probablity of success of their recently filed lawsuit against Activision.
Should PC gamers celebrate the firing or does Activision have even worse in store for us (you can guess the news won't be good on that score).
Does the appointment of a CoD czar to oversee all Call of Duty business units mean more higher quality and more consistent products for the end user or does spell the end of the franchise?
It's a lively discussion and you are free to comment on it, through the BASH forums, click here.
Read the court documents filed by West and Zampella against IW here.
BASH 140: CoD4 Renaissance
Written by jockyitch
Saturday, 27 February 2010
I thought CoD4 was yesterday’s game.
The eSports community just seemed to lose interest in it last year,
about the time when CoD:WW came out. There seemed to be a lot of
confusion back then. Some people were calling to stay with CoD4, some
said to move to CoD2 and a small group even wanted CoD:WW
In competitive circles, CoD4 stayed on low burner for a year, but
with the failure of MW2 it is going through what can only be termed
renaissance.
What has changed? Why are people re-embracing CoD4?
On the program to discuss the rebirth are:
Keith Hullenaar (Keithsu/Kzu) from Team Loaded (goloaded.com), fresh from his team’s win at NERV 3.
Joe Amorosa (Nabore) from Team Legends, who just un-retired himself to take advantage of the new found interest in the game.
Sam from omnilinkit.com and John from efragtv.com (whose company shoutcasted NERV).
I have not been able to find confirmation on this, but sources have told me that Spectator view in BFBC2 is coming and that it will most likely be available around the first or second patch of the game.
For competitive gamers, this would be a godsend, given that it would allow matches to be properly streamed. Gamers are not the only ones that have been clamoring for it. Many casting companies and online tournament groups have been requesting such a feature from DICE. It appears that they may have heard the gripes and are currently trying to provide this capability.
As it is now, games can be shoutcasted but only just.
Gamestah, the shoutcast company that covers the AusCoD/SE-Asia scene, has attempted to do justice to BFBC2 competition and in fact they shoutcasted a few BETA matches. Gamestah's matches were about thirty minutes long (they played RUSH) and they were very well received.
Due to the absence of Spectator view, Gamestah actually got their shoutcasters to "play" for one of the competing teams in the online game. Both casters chose the Defense side. In that way, even if they were accidentally shot, the unlimited number of Defense tickets would not alter the outcome of the match.
Of course, they didn't actually participate in the action and video capture cards were used to relay what the shoutcasters were seeing. Here is the outcome:
As usual, Gamestah's ingenuity and courage to experiment produced a great shoutcast for the hardcore gamers out there wanting to watch a competitive BFBC2 match. Most casting companies have stayed away from the game because of the lack of basic cast-friendly features.
For this reason, the news that BFBC2 might be providing us with a spectate mode is great news.
On another point, Gamestah has some really great products. Given that the Beta has terminated...as we wait for the game to drop next week, I needed a BC2 fix, so I thought you might as well. So, here's Gamestah's wrap on the BFBC2 Beta Cup in their weekly DEEP INSIDE cast:
The opening jump sequence will go down as a casting classic. Well done boyz.
