(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Hey guys
Just thought id update all you CoD fans (like myself) that there WILL in fact be a CoD on Facebook =D
[multipage=Info]
Source: You must login or register to view this content.

A First-Person Shooter Facebook? Activision Teases Call of Duty Social Network :2k7:

You must login or register to view this content.

Activision on Tuesday lifted the curtain on Call of Duty Elite, an online social network for fans of the hugely popular Call of Duty video game franchise that will launch alongside Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 on Nov. 8.

"The average Call of Duty player spends 58 minutes per day playing multiplayer. That is more than the average Facebook user spends per day on Facebook. And yet, right now, there are very few tools to unite and super charge that social community," said Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg in a statement.

Activision will hold a public beta for Call of Duty Elite this summer, testing the social network's features through gameplay on the already released Call of Duty: Black Ops.
More than 7 million gamers play Call of Duty online every day, according to the company. Players of Call of Duty titles log "hundreds of hours" of online multiplayer gaming every year.
"Call of Duty Elite has been tailored for Call of Duty's diverse base of players—hardcore gamers, casual weekend warriors and even beginners—and additional features will be revealed when we premiere Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer later this summer," Hirshberg said.
"Of course, the out of the box Call of Duty multiplayer experience that gamers have come to love and expect will continue as is. However, for those players looking for more, Call of Duty Elite will supercharge their experience."

The Call of Duty experience will be "supercharged" in a number of specific ways by Call of Duty Elite. There will be two-way communication between the social network and gameplay, "so that the choices and decisions that players make in Elite through the mobile and Web interfaces will affect their in-game experience."

Players will be better able to manage their multiplayer gaming by managing competition against friends and players with similar skill levels or common interests, joining groups and clans, and organizing tournaments, Activision said.

There will be metrics to track how one stacks up against the elite players in the Call of Duty Elite network, prizes both in-game and in-real-life will be available for achievements, and the whole network serves as "a personal online coach" for gamers, with deep-drilling player stats to review and learning tools available.

Call of Duty Elite is being developed by Activision's new Beachhead studio, the company said. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 will be available on the Xbox 360, Sony PS3 and Nintendo Wii consoles, and as a PC game on Microsoft Windows.


[multipage=More Info]More Info
What happens when one of the biggest publishers of standalone AAA video games merges with the company responsible for global phenomenon World of Warcraft? You get Activision Blizzard, currently the top dog in the video game market. But, for a while now, that's all we've gotten. Industry watchers have been left to wonder when a true fusion of the merged companies' sensibilities would surface, and now it finally looks like the other combat boot's about to drop.

Launching in beta this summer, Call of Duty Elite represents Activision's most significant entry yet into creating an online connected platform around a gaming experience. The Blizzard half of the mega-corporation has no involvement in Elite, though. Rather, it's the work of the newly formed Beachhead development studio, which was announced on an investor call in February. The goals of Elite are to give COD players–one of the most rabid fanbases in all of gaming–a way to interact with each other outside of the game and deepen the experience they get from the game.

Think of it as Facebook with crossbows, shotguns and hand grenades.

I got to try out Elite at a recent hands-on event. Myself and other members of the press went at it in Call of Duty: Black Ops multiplayer, running around and slaying each other in the usual frantic fashion for about half an hour. After that play session, we loaded up the beta version of the Elite website and could see a wealth of information about our movements, where we died and where we scored kills. Right away, we could see how many melee kills, say, a player notched in a round. While this info is already available to players in Call of Duty: Black Ops, navigating to it through the current interface is a pain and something you may not want to do during an all-nighter.

Elite also parses the data in different ways and will give each user one single profile that will link into all future COD games. The beta for Elite will use Black Ops play sessions to test out server load and core functionality. But Activision says that players won't get a full sense of how Elite really feels until after Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 launches in November. MW3 and Elite have been built to interlock with each other and every COD game that follows this year's release will support the Elite platform.

ost modern games mine data from their users, ostensibly to give developers feedback as to how people play and what to tweak in the design stages. Elite opens up the back-end to consumers, letting them see what loadout a particular player uses, how he or she fared in recent matches and their membership in various groups.

You'll be able to join multiple interest groups but can only have membership in one clan. Members will also be able to participate in scheduled events like double XP weekends and watch user-generated videos via the Elite platform. Activision is positioning Elite as an online coaching system of sorts, letting players review their sessions and tune their approaches with the available data.

With Elite, you'll be able to look at a heat map–a blueprint of a level that shows where you killed and died–with a timeline function charting the duration of the map. It's a bit like a pro athlete reviewing recordings of his own play and that of his opponents before and after a match-up. Users will be able to log into COD Elite on Apple's portable devices and Activision says that an Android app is on the way, too.

[multipage=Call of Duty Elite FAQs]
FAQs
Will I have to subscribe to Elite in order to play Call of Duty online?
No. "It's worth repeating," said Berger during the reveal event, "Call of Duty does not and will not charge for multiplayer – that is our continued commitment to our players." Berger also reiterated the fact that some elements of Elite will be free to Modern Warfare 3 buyers, including the career stats and groups elements.

How can Activision justify charging for a social networking service?
Well, Elite will have already cost millions of dollars to set up. Activision has formed a new development studio, Beachhead, to create the system. Berger also stated that the publisher is employing "a standalone service team to provide worldwide 24/7 customer service for Elite members". That all costs money.

If map packs are included in the Elite subscription, does that mean I'll have to subscribe in order to get DLC from now on?
No, you'll be able to buy Modern Warfare 3 map packs without subscribing.

Will the service begin with MW3?
Yes, but it's also backwards compatible, to some extent, with Black Ops and Modern Warfare 2. These titles will feature a more limited version of Elite.

Is Elite multi-platform?
Yes, the service will work with PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of the Call of Duty titles.

Will I be able to access my Elite account from different devices?
Yes, according to Berger: "The Beachhead team has adopted a philosophy that we call 'the four screens'. The idea is, when we launch Elite, it will be customised for mobile applications, on the television itself and within the game interface." An iPhone app is apparently launching later in the year.

If this is a success, will other publishers follow suit?
If there's the possibility of a new revenue stream, other publishers are bound to develop similar models. Electronic Arts, for example, is already experimenting with monitised multiplayer gaming, via its Online Pass system, which charges a one-off fee to buyers of pre-owned games who want to play online. The thing is, Call of Duty is one of the biggest entertainment brands in the world, and it has a vast, loyal user-base. As Activision pointed out during its London preview event, all four of the Call of Duty titles released between 2007 and 2010 are in the top ten most played Xbox Live titles. It's doubtful whether there are many other franchises that have the brand loyalty and mass appeal to support a similar proposition. But this time next year, if Activision is raking in millions of extra dollars from its Elite community, don't rule out a surge of similar announcements…

Looks like a lot of copy pasta. Especially the More info.

Yay now all my friends can see that I have no life

same here

what do you think news team does?
im just letting you guys now

But they usually edit it. Or give credits. :\

That would be soo sick!