So NOW it's cool?

[GenericAmerican]

No one at my school plays Black Ops anymore...they all realized how bad it is and switched to BFBC2 upon my recommendation.

I haven't liked a call of duty since the first, with the exception of 4.

 

[Judgement101]

You have to have someone to hate, CoD players hate Halo, PS3 hates Xbox 360, and EVERYONE hates the Wii.

 

[drbarno]

You have to have someone to hate, CoD players hate Halo, PS3 hates Xbox 360, and EVERYONE hates the Wii.

I don't.

 

[Drake_Dercon]

Black ops isn't as fantastical, doesn't have pretty colours and there's a good chance that at least one of these frat boys was actually a nerd in high school and is now suddenly cool. Trick is, he still likes games, so he shows the manlier ones to his friends. Then they realize they've been missing some really amazing shit, only they won't stray outside the familiar until another ex-nerd shows them something.

That's my unfounded hypothesis.

Then again, the hyper-masculine CoD sensation is spreading through high schools as well. Maybe it has something to do with younger kids getting into games or nerdy older siblings.

Call of Duty is to Halo what Fantasy Football is to Dungeon's and Dragons.

Hang on, don't get offended, what I mean is that people would always make fun of kids who played D&D, yet have no problem playing fantasy football, which for all intents and purposes is the same fucking thing.

Don't EVER associate fantasy football with tabletop RPGs. If anything, it's more akin to Warhammer 40k (which is a closer comparison anyway seeing as WH40K is science-fantasy and not just fantasy). Also, I really like WH40k and hold nothing against the original (Warhammer, that is; my experience with games workshop is not limited to Dawn of War) so don't call me on that. But I do see where you're getting at. Somehow it's less masculine when you make stuff up and don't copy pre-existing politics (actually they probably just think it's silly). Maybe it's because people think playing pretend is stupid and childish.

 

[Nieroshai]

Ever heard the phrase "I liked [...] before it was cool"? Most people say it with a hint of annoyance, because while THEY were into it it was a bad thing but now everyone's into it.
Only hipsters say it without sounding annoyed.

 

[ultrachicken]

At my high school, it's common for the kids who play CoD to stalk each others' profiles and tease whoever has been playing the most. It's completely retarded, and makes me glad that I didn't give them my gamertag.

 

[Smagmuck_]

This things kind of irritating to me when I hear about stuff like this. I've played Call of Duty since Finest Hour, and it pains me to see it degenerate to the garbage it is today. And I've also been playing Halo since Combat Evolved so I'm basically one of few people who have played both Franchises from or near the beginning.

So, I get really pissed of when I got grilled yesterday by some douche who had an IQ lower then 40 who all he talks about is Black Ops and how bloody wonderful it is and how everyone should experience the awesomeness, only because I like COD 4 better. He called me an idiot for basically not liking the game that should be worshiped and how I'm "Never going to get laid because I'm a f****t-ass nerd."

But, I did turn around a revenge-grill his ass by stating just about every obvious flaw the game had. Especially the spawning system itself. Hell, I had to stop myself from going on a full on rant because of how crappy the story was. Hell it was worse then MW2...

/rant

 

[burningdragoon]

Since when did these guys look down on Halo? From what I remember of the time period where Halo was on top, it was the one game you couldn't get jocks and frat boys to shut up about, and was if anything more of a "bro" game than the CoD games are now. Is my memory faulty here?

I'd have to agree with this guy here. I remember middle-to-end of high school when the Xbox and Halo was played by pretty much every douchebag (and some non-douchebags) in my class.

And you know what, lemme just quote this guy too:

Umm...Halo was extremely popular with exactly the same crowd. Selective memory for how 'halo frayboy bro' was a stereotype?

Also am I the only person on this website who doesn't live in a feelgood teen film? I never got shit for gaming, you don't tend to unless you're creepily in to it.

Me neither. And when Halo was big I was never "oh so now video games are cool!?" It was more like "wow... those asses are being quite obnoxious about Halo"

 

[DaHero]

You aren't a square are you?

I'm a geometric figure that seems impossible to human comprehension.

 

[disfunkybob]

My meathead roommate played Counter-Strike all the freakin' time.

I was much more hardcore and edgy, so I played Day of Defeat.

 

[Fr]anc[is]

The deal is they're assbags who just happen to be assbaging on your hobby at the moment. What's the name of that show about the sorta mutant kids on adult swim where all the pretty girls look exactly the same? In one episode they all put buckets on their heads and say "If you do it now you're just copying" even though Milo did it first. Assbagery no matter the form. Wish I had that clip, that show's great...

 

[fundayz]

Seems like every middle school boy and frat boy broski think it's cool to play Black Ops for hours at a time.

A few years ago, these same people would make fun of kids who spent a lot of time playing Halo online. What's the difference?

Dont get me wrong, Im not bashing either game, Im just wondering what the deal is.

Gaming is much more mainstream now. Mainstream things are not odd enough to make fun off, although even "cool" people will be made fun off by their friends if they play too much.

 

[Jennacide]

Because Call of Duty and Madden are big enough franchises to be hipster. Which is what you are talking about. The same shit is happening with casual games, people that bash on your average gamer will spend hours and hours playing Bejeweled or Angry Birds on their iPad.

 

[Waaghpowa]

Sci-Fi is often ridiculed. Just a fact of life. You spend your days engrossed in a purely fictional world and people think you're odd. Same people might obsess over daytime soaps, sports, or other real world pursuits/fiction, which isn't the same thing in their mind.

Here's the thing about sci fi and why I love it, since it usually takes place in the future, who are you to say that any of it couldn't happen at all somewhere down the line?
For me when it comes to spots, I don't care till some meat head sport freak tells me my videos games are just "games" when they spend their time obsessing over another game, which by the way, they usually don't actually play.

 

[Squirrelygod]

What does it matter? Both franchises were driven into the ground and just suck now.

 

[migo]

It's cool now. Don't question the cool. Only a square questions the cool. You aren't a square are you?

Nope, I'm an Atlus.

 

[The Lawn]

All my friends play TF2 or MNC, sometimes a little BF:BC2...
I haven't touched black ops in months, MW2 even longer...

Being that I hang out with "gamers", and by "gamers" I mean members of the Glorious PC Gaming Master Race, when we encounter one who calls themselves a "Gamer" and they say they play the "Blops" on the "360" we simply tell them we don't play with childrens toys. And then we laugh at them with their forced framerate caps, lower texture resolutions and lower polygon count models while we bask in the glory that is 1900x1200 with X8 MSAA and x16 Anisotropic Filtering.

And then we retreat to our sanctum to play SF4 or MvC3 on our 360 in secret....

 

[StormShaun]

Copy cats will always be copy cates, I just hate the up-themselfs gamers that arnt really gamers and they JUST plain suck especially when they talk about their 100400390 killstreak...such dicks

 

[Netrigan]

Didn't movie Bob do a segment on something like this with D&D nerds versus Sports fans?

The best reason I can think of is that Halo is in a made up universe so it is dismissed as juvenile while Black Ops is the more "mature and edgy" game that talks about real events and therefore is more of an "adult" game. I personally think its hilarious that a super soldier set in the Cold War is somehow more unrealistic than one set in the far future.

Of course, sci-fi/fantasy fans would never look down upon sports fans for their chosen form of entertainment... like Movie Bob does on a fairly regular basis, like dismissing first-person shooter fans as immature jocks

There's a lot of snobbery going both ways. In comic fandom, it's pretty easy to find comic fans who treat the super-hero stuff with a bit of scorn (they're the ones who are quick to point out that they like stuff like Preacher, Sandman, or Scott Pilgrim)... then head over to certain corners of the Internet and die-hard super-hero fans are ridiculing fans of those books, accusing them of self-loathing.

I was once accused by a woman with a serious soap opera obsession of "living in a fantasy world" because I spent a good portion of my free time reading science fiction and comics (among other things). And she was the one who talked about fictional characters as if they were real people.

Even among sci-fi fans, you'll see it spring up. When Avatar came out, hard core sci-fi fans branded the movie's fans "Avatards" because they're painting themselves blue and taking the whole thing a bit too seriously.... but going to see the new Harry Potter in Wizard robes or a Star Wars movie in Stormtrooper armor were perfectly acceptable.

As Robert Heinlein once said, "man is not a rational animal, he is a rationalizing animal". We are littered with logical contradictions that we absolutely refuse to see.

 

[Netrigan]

What does it matter? Both franchises were driven into the ground and just suck now.

I'm curious to see what the next installments of both franchise bring. Both are going to be handled by a new studio, which traditionally has been the kiss of death for video game franchises.

Wouldn't be surprised to see Halo or Call Of Duty (or both) joining the ranks of Tomb Raider and Sonic in a handful of years.