First Strike DLC Coming to PC, PlayStation 3

[Andy Chalk]

First Strike DLC Coming to PC, PlayStation 3

The First Strike DLC pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops [http://www.amazon.com/Call-Duty-Black-Ops-Xbox-360/dp/B003JVKHEQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297444173&sr=8-1] that went live for the XBox 360 earlier this month will soon be coming to the PC and PlayStation 3.

First Strike was announced as a "timed exclusive [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/106265-Call-of-Duty-Black-Ops-DLC-Map-Pack-Strikes-First]" for the Xbox 360 back in December, meaning that 360 owners would be able to tear into the map pack on February 1 while those of us with PCs and PS3s would have to wait. How long? Nobody knew!

But now we know. As part of its Calendar Year 2010 Financial Report [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/106265-Call-of-Duty-Black-Ops-DLC-Map-Pack-Strikes-First], Activision revealed that the First Strike DLC would be released for the PlayStation 3 on March 3 and come to the PC "later in the quarter." It also said that First Strike had done remarkably well on Xbox Live, setting a new record with 1.4 million downloads in its first 24 hours of release despite costing a whopping 1200 Microsoft Points, which translates into $15. The mark is more than 25 percent higher than that set by last year's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Stimulus Package.

With that question settled, only one remains: will PC and PS3 owners be willing to fork over 15 bucks for five maps? It seems like an awfully stiff price tag to me, but 1.4 million 360 owners can't be wrong. Right?


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[vrbtny]

Yes they can be.

OT: i Ain't getting it. Blops has already been traded back in for New-Vegas.

 

[Kevlar Eater]

Oh my freaking god, why do people keep shelling out money for this tripe? Are FPS fans nowadays so braindead that they can't see they're being unreasonably charged for this?

Eh, screw it. This would be like trying to talk to a brick wall.

 

[Legion]

I still can't fathom platform exclusive DLC for games that are multi-platform, it just doesn't seem beneficial in any way.

 

[uppitycracker]

They still haven't announced a price structure for the PC, meaning there is still some glimmer of hope that it'll be free. Hopefully Treyarch can get nvidia or someone else to sponsor the PC release again. I'm really hoping that MW2 didn't start a trend with charging the PC for the map packs, and without something like IWNet holding it back, I'd wonder how they would enforce it anyway.

 

[-Samurai-]

Not touching it. Black Ops is a horrible game that I only keep around for Combat Training split-screen with a friend.

Why the hell would I pay $15 for the same old maps we've already played thousands of times? I guarantee you the maps will be square shaped, with the only way to get to the other side of the map being a left path, right path, or center path. Boring.

I can get 2 used games for $15.

 

[Armored Prayer]

I always did disliked how for a multiplatfom game the 360 players get it first and the other have to wait a long time. Seems kind of dickish to me. As for the DLC my friend is having a blast with it. I'm not getting it, but with sales like that I can't deny that its doing something right.

Now I'm leaving this thread before the hate storm comes.

 

[WarpCode]

I have my $15 waiting for the PC release. I for one have no issues with paying $15 for a 5 map pack DLC. Its the same price as a movie ticket and I know it will bring me a lot more enjoyment then any 2 hour movie would.

 

[suitepee7]

well i'm all for DLC, as a sizeable expansion. this doesn't seem huge, and its adding nothing new to the game other than scenery.

personally, i 100% regret buying black ops, but as it was on steam i can't exactly trade it in. i will be passing.

 

[archvile93]

I still can't fathom platform exclusive DLC for games that are multi-platform, it just doesn't seem beneficial in any way.

Sure it does, MS pays these companies huge sums of money to screw over their own customers.

 

[jrubal1462]

I have no intention of buying it, but I can't wait for this to come out on PS3. I still play Blops casually with friends, but the community's evolving to the hardcore camper-sniper happy gameplay that usually settles in when normal people lose their taste for the game. This map pack was created largely based on feedback from this hardcore crowd, and, surprise surprise, it looks like a tailor-made snipe fest. I'm fully expecting all the people who put in 6 hrs/day to easily shell out the $15, and they can have their own little thing over there while me and my friends run around like the amateurs we are, without being the victim of 2 sets of dogs and 4 chopper gunners in one game.

 

[GonzoGamer]

I'm fully expecting all the people who put in 6 hrs/day to easily shell out the $15, and they can have their own little thing over there while me and my friends run around like the amateurs we are, without being the victim of 2 sets of dogs and 4 chopper gunners in one game.

Good point.
I can put in this game again without getting spawn-fragged by a chopper. All those guys will probably be on the new maps.

As for the price, we only have ourselves to blame. Gamers have proven themselves to be total suckers and Activision knows they can charge that much. Look at how much R* charged for GTA dlc and that didn't even have any new maps/large areas. They know the franchise has hardcore fanboys who will pay anything.

 

[Calico93]

Who cares, games utter shite anyway.

Sorry mega troll in me *clears throat*

Seriously though its not a bad game, just boring and quite laughable that people are paying £10 or $15 for a few more maps.

 

[Low Key]

I love how the only people who have commented so far are those who hate the franchise, while the most popular game amongst Escapist users [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/profiles/top_games] as a whole right now is Black Ops. In fact, I just bought the game last night.

Anyways, it'll be interesting how the PC crowd will take to the $15 fee. Me thinks it won't go over so well.

 

[jrubal1462]

I love how the only people who have commented so far are those who hate the franchise, while the most popular game amongst Escapist users [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/profiles/top_games] as a whole right now is Black Ops. In fact, I just bought the game last night.

Anyways, it'll be interesting how the PC crowd will take to the $15 fee. Me thinks it won't go over so well.

I guess it's pretty natural that extremely popular things tend to bring out a vocal counter culture. I hope what I said didn't come across as hateful though. I play, and thoroughly enjoy black ops from time to time. It's fun, my friends/family have it, and I feel like it makes other shooters feel clunky by comparison.

It's far from perfect though, and I'm hoping that NOT buying this map pack will go a long way towards fixing what I consider the biggest fun-sucking problem with black ops: being thrown into a room with a bunch of sergeants and majors on my side, and facing a team that has 80% of their players on their 8th prestige already. I would be just as excited if they announced that all rooms will employ some sort of algorithm that considers total experience and k/d ratio to balance teams, or that treyarch is somehow incentivising the prestige only playlists (like, by tripling the exp needed to multiple prestige, and also tripling the exp you get in prestige only playlists)

 

[-Samurai-]

It's far from perfect though, and I'm hoping that NOT buying this map pack will go a long way towards fixing what I consider the biggest fun-sucking problem with black ops: being thrown into a room with a bunch of sergeants and majors on my side, and facing a team that has 80% of their players on their 8th prestige already. I would be just as excited if they announced that all rooms will employ some sort of algorithm that considers total experience and k/d ratio to balance teams, or that treyarch is somehow incentivising the prestige only playlists (like, by tripling the exp needed to multiple prestige, and also tripling the exp you get in prestige only playlists)

Being high prestige doesn't mean you're good, though. It just means that you've spent more time in the game. A friend of mine is almost in the last prestige and has a K/D of less than 1, but has more than 20 days in the game. You can rank up without ever getting a kill and just running off of assists and match bonuses alone.

 

[Pandaman1911]

Oh my freaking god, why do people keep shelling out money for this tripe? Are FPS fans nowadays so braindead that they can't see they're being unreasonably charged for this?

Eh, screw it. This would be like trying to talk to a brick wall.

Holy fucking shit, your brain works too? Amazing! It's nice to finally find somebody who sees that they're being charged insane amounts of money for virtual space to play in.

 

[DanielPowell33]

While I really do want the zombie map, I don't think I'll be getting this map pack. There's plenty of other games coming out soon that will occupy my time.

I wish they would just release the zombie map by itself.

 

[jrubal1462]

It's far from perfect though, and I'm hoping that NOT buying this map pack will go a long way towards fixing what I consider the biggest fun-sucking problem with black ops: being thrown into a room with a bunch of sergeants and majors on my side, and facing a team that has 80% of their players on their 8th prestige already. I would be just as excited if they announced that all rooms will employ some sort of algorithm that considers total experience and k/d ratio to balance teams, or that treyarch is somehow incentivising the prestige only playlists (like, by tripling the exp needed to multiple prestige, and also tripling the exp you get in prestige only playlists)

Being high prestige doesn't mean you're good, though. It just means that you've spent more time in the game. A friend of mine is almost in the last prestige and has a K/D of less than 1, but has more than 20 days in the game. You can rank up without ever getting a kill and just running off of assists and match bonuses alone.

That makes sense, and works right into my plan. If you were talking about team balancing, I imagine the system could take into account expreience AND k/d, even w/l..., or even (k/d)/(w/l)..... kl/dw, which would measure how much you kill whore without helping your team at all in domination.

If you meant that your "FRIEND" isn't good enough to play in the prestige only rooms, that works out too. He's still welcome in the layman rooms, he just won't get multiple prestiges as quickly (which makes sense, because like in any RPG, you get more experience fighting hard enemies than you do kicking squirrels that come out of the grass). OH! How about big match bonuses in the prestige rooms...or match bonuses based on the relative rank of other people in the room?

In the interest of full disclosure, I'm fully ranked up and ready to prestige myself. I just don't want to because:
1. I'm not good.
EDIT: I'm not BAD. I think my k/d is slightly over 1. At one point rather late in the game I had a +/- of 13. You have to almost admire that mediocrity. In my opinion, my true team value lies in my dedication to always carrying a strela launcher and shooting down choppers, UAV's, and counter-UAV's as soon as they enter the map if I'm not under direct fire when the announcement comes in.
2. It took a lot of focussed work, and a good deal of luck to complete the challenges to unlock hacker pro...and I REALLY enjoy hacking sentry guns, SAM launchers and especially stealing/booby trapping enemy crates. Things I do not enjoy are laying c4 on flags in domination, and camping around my jammer/motion detector in order to unlock hacker pro.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

$15 for 5 maps isn't that bad. $15 for ONE map is bad, but I'm still going to do it. Multiplayer has never interested, but I MUST HAVE ZOMBIES! Also, can't have the trophy collection fall below 100% for too long. Unacceptable.