Call of Duty: Black Ops

[GamerMan316]

First COD: Black Ops map pack announced

Microsoft mouthpiece Major Nelson has announced the first map pack for mammoth FPS Call of Duty: Black Ops.

As expected, the map pack will appear on Xbox 360 first. The First Strike will hit Xbox Live on 1st February and set you back 1200 MS Points (£10).

Four competitive maps are included. Discovery is set in the Antarctic research station from the campaign. Kowloon is set on the rooftops of Hong Kong, again, from the campaign. Berlin Wall has you fragging at Checkpoint Charlie. And Stadium is set in an American hockey rink. There's a zombie map, too, called Ascension.

The map pack is yet to be dated for PC and PlayStation 3, but we expect a month of exclusivity on Xbox Live.

[Failed]

Stadium sounds good, be funny if you slipped on the ice too

Still 1200 is a lot for 4 maps. I'd want 6 and 2 Zombies

[sambo]

I'm not going to be burnt by buying CoD maps again. I'll stick to the ones they gave me with the game.

[Jaynestown]

I'm not going to be burnt by buying CoD maps again. I'll stick to the ones they gave me with the game.

Look, loook, a rare sighting of the lesser spotted Sambo!

Edit: I posted this before I saw Sambo's glorious return thread!

[GamerMan316]

Call of Duty: Black Ops tops $1 billion in sales
600 million hours of playtime logged since November 9 launch

Call of Duty: Black Ops has grossed over $1 billion in worldwide sales since its launch on November 9, according to internal Activision estimates.

In its first five days alone, the game generated more than $650 million worldwide, beating the five-day sell through record of $550 million set by last year's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

Activision says more than 600 million hours of playtime have been logged since Black Ops' release last month.

According to Microsoft, the average Xbox 360 player logs on more than once a day and plays for more than one hour each time, spending over half of their time online.

Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick said: "In all of entertainment, only Call of Duty and Avatar have ever achieved the billion dollar revenue milestone this quickly.

"This is a tribute to the global appeal of the Call of Duty franchise, the exceptional talent at Treyarch and the hundreds of extraordinary people across our many Call of Duty studios including Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer that work tirelessly on the franchise.

"Our ability to provide the most compelling, immersive entertainment experience, and enhance it with regular, recurring content that delivers hundreds of hours of audience value, has allowed Call of Duty to continue to set sales and usage records."

Kotick added: "This extraordinary milestone was achieved because of the tens of millions of passionate Call of Duty players around the world... This unique level of community engagement has enabled Call of Duty to become one of the world's most engaged online communities."

[GamerMan316]

Free Black Ops Xbox Live multiplayer weekend coming in January

We recognize that the odds of you being a consummate Call of Duty: Black Ops player that hasn't dipped into the game's online multiplayer offerings are slim indeed, but we still thought we'd share -- Activision will host a free Xbox Live multiplayer weekend for the game early next year. Any Silver subscribers who pop into the game from January 28 - 30 will be able to play against other worldwide soldiers at no cost.

Of course, this promotion is only set up to reel in as many suckers as humanly possible before Activision fires off the game's "First Strike" add-on pack February 1. Or, in military terms, Activision's creating a choke point, and drawing all the outsiders into it with jelly beans. Military-grade jelly beans.

[GamerMan316]

Black Ops the most pirated game of 2010
Over five million illegal downloads of Activision's shooter

Call of Duty: Black Ops has set plenty of sales records since its release last November, but one award Activision won't be happy about is the game's status as the most pirated title of 2010.

According to Torrent Freak (via PC Gamer), the PC version of Black Ops was torrented more than four million times, while the Xbox 360 edition was torrented 930,000 times.

The most pirated Xbox 360 and Wii games were Dante's Inferno (1,280,000) and Super Mario Galaxy 2 (1,470,000) respectively.

The top five most pirated PC games of the year:
01. Call of Duty: Black Ops - 4,270,000
02. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 - 3,960,000
03. Mafia 2 - 3,555,000
04. Mass Effect 2 - 3,240,000
05. Starcraft 2 - 3,120,000

A report last month claimed Wii was the most popular gaming platform for pirated games last year.

[nCogNeato]

I picked up Black Ops for $25 online at gamestop.com.

Buy 1 "new" game, get 1 "used" game 50% off.  I bought some crap PC game for $3 (new) and then got BlOps (used) 50% off.  

I'll probably just trade it on cheapassgamer.com though for a ton of old cheap games.    

[Failed]

random, they should make the cheapest game half-price, not just ANY!! good catch cogzy!

[nCogNeato]

random, they should make the cheapest game half-price, not just ANY!! good catch cogzy!

That's what I thought.  It would have made a lot more sense.  They often have the a similar deal with their used games, and it's always the lowest valued game gets the discount.

I didn't see any restrictions in the offer, so I decided to give it a try.  The offer is still going on.  I'll post it in the bargain topic.

[GamerMan316]

Black Ops First Strike DLC screenshots show Stadium
Treyarch gives tactical advice with new shots

Treyarch has released the first few Call of Duty: Black Ops First Strike screenshots showing the Stadium map from the upcoming DLC.

As you can see the map is based in a disused hockey stadium, which Treyarch describes as "A mid-sized map designed for close-quarters mayhem, teams must fight tooth and nail in a maze of tight corners and deadly vantage points."

The developers have even been good enough to offer a few survival tips such as entering from the western turnstiles and using a nearby souvenir shop for cover. We hope you're jotting this down.

Treyarch posted a solitary shot from First Strike's Berlin map last week, which is a haven for snipers.

The pack will cost you 1200 Microsoft Points on Xbox 360 and PS3 and PC versions are expected a month later.

[GamerMan316]

[BigDaddyDaveedo]

I hate the fact that they charging 1200 for the amount of maps your getting but i understand that a hell of a lot of work has gone in to making them, but i'll defo be buying them, love black ops.

[GamerMan316]

Call of Duty: Black Ops First Strike Achievements Unveiled

With the Call of Duty: Black Ops First Strike DLC map pack now just mere days away, Treyarch has revealed four new achievements for the pack's Ascension zombie map on the official CoD website, offering 150 Gamerscore to earn as you fight your way through the undead horde.

The new achievements are as follows:

    * The Eagle has Landers (35G) – In Ascension, escape on all three lunar landers.

    * They are going THROUGH! (35G) – In Ascension, kill at least 5 zombies with 1 Gersch device.

    * Space Race (45G) – In Ascension, Pack-a-Punch a weapon before round 8.

    * Chimp on the Barbie (35G) – In Ascension, kill a space monkey with a fire trap.

So, sharpen those zombie-slaying skills in time for the Call of Duty: Black Ops First Strike add-on, which bundles five maps - Stadium (pictured), Kowloon, Discovery, Berlin Wall and Ascension - and is set to hit the Xbox Live Marketplace on February 1st for 1200 Microsoft Points.

[Legion]

One of the reasons I couldn't get into CoD multiplayer (aside from me being awful at it) was the small amount of default maps and the ridiculously overpriced map packs that I refuse to buy for that extra bit of variety. Nothing changes I see.
Still though, a zombie killing mode with CoD controls and everything does sound pretty damn awesome.