Microsoft pushed Sony into lowering their price down to $299. Now Sony has no more room to lower that price for a few years now since they reported a $1 billion dollar lost in the first quarter of 2009 because of the PS3. In November the Xbox 360 sold over 100,000 more units than the PS3 showing that the PS3 price cut boost is starting to fade away and so is the hype around Uncharted 2. Modern Warfare 2 is the hype for some time to come. In 2010 Xbox 360 will drop the price of the Elite to $199 and the Arcade to $149. Natal is coming out next fall for around $79 and will also be bundled with a Xbox Natal system for around $279. Now the two big system seller that Sony has for 2010 are God of War 3 and Grand Turismo 5, but Sony has no room to lower its system price in 2010. Bluray is still a good selling point for the PS3 but gamers buy gaming systems to play games first. I eagerly wait for God of War 3 so that I can play it on my PS3, but I don't expect it to sell as many systems as a Halo 3 ever did. Microsoft is a company that plans its strategy ahead in everything they do, having invested billions of dollars and over 10 years developing their Xbox business. Microsoft is not playing checkers, they are playing chess.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, the sequel to Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is the most anticipated game of 2009. Before its release Modern Warfare 2 broke the record for the most pre-ordered game in history. On November 10th of 2009 Modern Warfare 2 was released for the PC, Playstation 3, and the Xbox 360. It went on to become biggest launch in entertainment history by selling 4.7 million units and generating over $310 million on its first day of release, a title previously held by Grand Theft Auto 4 in 2008 and Halo 3 in 2007.
Now the question everyone is asking, does Modern Warfare 2 live up to the hype? Yes it does, this is the best game of 2009. The Modern Warfare 2 experience is composed of three different game modes consisting of the Campaign, Multi-player, and Spec Ops. For this article I will be mostly reviewing the Xbox 360 version of Modern Warfare 2.
The Campaign: is the single player story mode, which follows after the events of Call of Duty 4. You see and play the story through the eyes of various soldiers and a terrorist. You fight in different events around the world in what seems to be the beginning of World War 3. I will not give any details on the locations or the events that take place in the campaign because it is something that is best experienced unspoiled.
Some hardcore gamers might consider the campaign to be short. I was able to complete the game in 6 hours playing in the regular difficulty setting. I have to say that it was one of the best 6 hours I had playing a video game in recent history. The gameplay is top notch with slight improvements over Call of Duty 4, with new weapons and vehicles available.
Instead on relying on cinematic cut scenes the story is told within the actual gameplay just like in Call of Duty 4, it plays like a high action Hollywood movie that never has a dull moment in the game. Hans Zimmer who is better known for composing the soundtrack for The Dark Knight composed the soundtrack for this campaign. This campaign rivals the best of Hollywood movies in creating an adrenaline rush while making you feel heroic at times.
There is a small short fall in this campaign, that is in between the levels they could have done a better job by adding some cut scenes to provide better storytelling for gamers that have been spoiled by the storytelling in such games as Halo 3 and Metal Gear Solid 4. Instead gamers are left to pick up the story from the events and actions that takes place in the gameplay through the eyes of the different characters that you play. Regardless this is still one of the best single player campaigns of this generation.
The Multiplayer: Infinity Ward has follow up on their great multiplayer experience of Call of Duty 4 which two years after its 2007 release is still one of the most played online multiplayer games out there. In Modern Warfare 2 they have added more maps, weapons, and character customizations to keep players coming back for more.
They have improved their matchmaking in very significant ways. I have experienced jumping from the game title menu into an online multiplayer game in less than 45 seconds here is a video clip. The multiplayer mode in Modern Warfare 2 is one of the best of 2009 and should remain that way for a long time to come.
The Spec Ops: Special Ops allows players to perform standalone missions either on Solo or with a friend via online or split-screen co-op. Different difficulty settings are offered for each Special Ops mission. Gamers playing in harder difficulty will be able to unlock more in-game goodies providing a lot of replay value.
Online multiplayer note: For gamers that own both a PS3 and Xbox 360 with Xbox Live Gold should buy the Xbox 360 version of Modern Warfare 2 since it has been proven to offer better networking and matchmaking capabilities. The day after the release of Modern Warfare 2 Xbox Live reported having over 2 million players online playing simultaneous, which was the same day I recorded the video clip of matchmaking in less than 45 seconds. On that same day PS3 gamers were not able to play Modern Warfare 2 online on the Playstation Network because of servers crashing not been able to handle the high amount of players.
Infinity Ward has release updates for the Playstation 3 to fix some of the problems been experienced on PSN. Also the Xbox 360 version of Modern Warfare 2 has sold more than double the PS3 version, which you should consider if you plan on doing online matchmaking as you want to be playing the version with the most players online.
The Verdict: Regardless if you get the Xbox 360 or PS3 version of Modern Warfare 2, you are still buying one of the best games ever. Infinity Ward has created an outstanding package that significantly improves on their previous masterpiece (COD4) while offering a lot more options to keep gamers coming back to play this game over and over for a very long time. Expect this game to be nominated for game of the year by all major gaming publications and awards. This is the game you do not want to miss, I give it a 5 out of 5 stars!
Starting next month, U.S. PlayStation 3 owners will finally be able to stream high-definition movies and television episodes through Netflix's rental service via PlayStation Network.
This is good news for PS3 owners who don't own an Xbox 360. I own both game systems and I currently stream Netflix on my Xbox 360 and it is great. Watching Lost stream in HD is nice. I decided to order the Netflix disc for my PS3. Both systems are great and is really a matter of choice and opinion. I own a PS3 because of some of their exclusives and Blu-ray. But I do most of my gaming on Xbox 360 because I try to play all multi-platform games on Xbox 360 because they usually run and look slightly better and Xbox live is still a lot better when it comes to multi-player games. PSN is good and games like KZ2 and MGS4 play really well online and all the Sony exclusives.
My Xbox 360 will still be used the most because I do most of my gaming on it and Netflix streaming, I also got the early XBL update so now I got Facebook , Twitter, and Last.FM and the new Zune HD 1080P streaming. Now for all the fanboys PS3 is still running in 3rd place when it comes to overall global numbers and the Wii as much as many Xbox 360 and PS3. Also the fact that the Xbox 360 has an 8.7 games per system attachment rate means that the Xbox 360 will still get more 3rd party support than the PS3 for sometime to come
I bought my Xbox 360 on launch date in 2005 and Microsoft has been able to evolve my Xbox 360 experience over the years. The PS3 is a great piece of hardware which I believe has great potential to be unlock but soon we will be entering the fourth year of this generation and Sony better start adding more features and games to keep their sales up.
At E3 Bungie revealed Halo: Reach but did not give any other detail about the game except that is coming in 2010 and that there is a multi-player beta coming soon and that keys to that beta will be included in Halo:ODST.
Today rumors around the industry is that Halo: Reach will be based on the science fiction novel Halo: Fall Of Reach written by Eric Nylund in 2001.
