If other devs and publishers go the route of Activision and IW I think we could be seeing the start of the consolizing of PC games. Taking out dedicated servers, P2P matchmaking and the eventual charging us $10 for 3 maps or whatever. I just see it snowballing away. Console people dont understand because they bit it long ago by accepting $5-10-20 add ons for what may very well be on the disc they purchased day 1. They have been taking it in the pooper for years, and frankly as a Consoler myself, (dont play enough to purch anything other than Beatle Rock Band tracks). I just see this as bad, not because we are loosing out on a killer version of COD4, that too, but the eventual spreading of the game its introducing.
ANYWAY, Im going to post this post from Joystiq that someone ELSE wrote, cant find his name cause Joystiqs forum comment thing is for the f'ing birds. Here it is, and I havent seen anyone else post anything as effective on any of the 8 forums I view.
His name is Jackel on there found the name.
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While that might very be the case if the game flops on our platform, it would also send a clear message to both the publisher and developer that we won't put up with this kind of crap. If we pay substantially more for hardware, if patching a game is absolutely required to make it stable post-launch, if our games implement DRM schemes that prevent resale, and if we get content far later than our console counterparts do, the absolute least a developer can do is to ensure the features they just cut from the game are in place.
Privately owned servers ensure that, when IW's gets yanked offline for maintenance or goes down because they can't handle the player load they've been given, people can still play the game online. This is why some of the most touted exclusives for the Xbox 360 and PS3 were unplayable online for days (or even weeks) after they were launched. IW and Activision both know this, so their decision to remove a feature just to "streamline" online connectivity in a market that had online multiplayer years before any console did (and did just fine) is simply an anti-consumer act that is nigh retarded.
Completely removing mod support from a PC title is, also, an act of unfathomable stupidity. PC games are often bought because they provide the consumer with an opportunity to create their own content in an environment where they don't have the money or technical expertise to do otherwise. Counter Strike started off as a Half-life mod; it is still one the most played games online for any platform despite having been released a decade ago. Team Fortess? It's Quake mod that's had infinity longer legs (and arguable more success) than the very game it was spawned from. The PC port of RE4 looked worse than the PS2 version did when it was released; because of the community, updates were made to the game that not only allow it to easily compete with most current gen titles, but fixed the well documented control issues and even provided others (I'm sure you can now use a Wiimote for the PC version). We could delve into the countless weapons, characters, custom maps, custom levels, and total conversions that the modding community have made. These are all things the console ecosystem often does not provide (sometimes for copyright issues, sometimes to wring money out of wallets in order to sell you things the community could've created in a day) and it's always been a major factor in purchasing a game for one platform over another. Which, I'm sure, is why they killed MW2's modding community before it had a chance to begin; they now have the opportunity to sell us 3 maps at the low price of $10 and there's no way for us to compete with them. With IW pulling the feature from one of the year's most advertised and anticipated games in order to hock **** to us we would've made on our own, they risk giving other developer a precedent to do the same for future titles. ::claps:: Way to piss on the fans that made you a top developer, Infinity Ward.
To do all of that while charging us $60 for a game that offers substantially less than its $50 predecessor did while forcing us to use Steam so our games can't be resold after they're played and then to completely hack out any feature that would've made the game desirable to a PC gamer in the first g*ddamn place...well...there's just no point in playing or owning the PC version even if it does look and perform better.
To all Infinity Ward and Activision employees (which I'm sure is none) who read this site, I have the following kind words for your consideration. Go **** yourselves, your games, and I hope to see all of your future endeavors flop horrifically. We made you (Infinity Ward) what you are today and you ****wits can't even make a clean stab to our backs as a token of appreciation; no, you've got to twist the blade slightly so we actually feel the pain. Your FPS is one of many available to a platform that spawned and still dominates the genre; no matter how anticipated, no matter how advertised, you're just one fish in a sea of many. I hope Activision runs you and your franchise into the ground just like they have to every one of their pet developers; at this point in time, you don't deserve anything else.
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