duty

Links from Thursday's episode of Loaded:

The white iPhone 4 launches at long last

Yahoo sells off Delicious to the founders of YouTube

Microsoft admits a security breach on the Xbox

Google adds new voice features to the Chrome browser

State Farm Insurance launches an app that will tell you if you drive like a jerk

What a week for video game news! As PSN outages continue to plague PlayStation 3s, Sony has finally declared the incident a "compromise of personal information" and a "malicious act." Does this mean our credit card info has been tossed into the Internet void? Nevermind that, we just want to be able to play Mortal Kombat online again.

Last night's Tribeca Film Festival screening of L.A. Noire marked the first time a video game was spotlighted at the big event. Jeff was there for the screening and Q&A that preceded; plus he'll give us some thoughts on an entire case he played a few weeks ago.

Since Nintendo has confirmed that the successor to the Wii will debut at E3 2011 and go on sale next year, we'll play an interesting voicemail that speculates on how players will interact with the new console.… Read more

Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock is the bestselling game released in the U.S. since 1995, a new report from NPD claims.

The music title has grossed sales of nearly $831 million since its launch in 2007, the research firm reported. It bested Call of Duty: Black Ops and Wii Fit, which took the second and third spots with $787 million and $736 million in total sales, respectively. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Rock Band rounded out the top five. NPD's sales figures were not adjusted to inflation.

Guitar Hero III's success in the U.… Read more

opinion For years now, Infinity Ward and Treyarch's Call of Duty franchise has been the big bully on the playground, commanding millions of day-one sales with each new installment. Even piracy can't slow down the speed at which Call of Duty is swallowing the market, pushing every other worthwhile competitor in the most popular video game genre down to steerage class.

After knocking the Halo franchise to its knees in 2007 with Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, 2011 may be the year COD needs to shape up. Will gamers choose the eye-catching Battlefield 3 over their current FPS fare of choice? The heart-stopping Battlefield 3 trailer that debuted at last week's Game Developers Conference suggests that could well be, but will its prioritization of the PC version kill its chances?

Gamers can expect an intensified version of the current Iraq conflict with this game, which is set in 2014 in the parched cities and barren wastelands of the Middle East. Focused on the chaos caused by the PLR terrorist group, it's your mission to stabilize the region from a recent rise in terrorist attacks.

The waiting game is a dangerous one in game development, particularly when catering to the hard-core class that chews through first-person shooter games like they were candy. Tantamount to a first-person shooter's bankroll is the quality of the graphics engine, and developer DICE has wisely bided its time in fine-tuning its Frostbite 2.0 engine for the past three years. When the preview for Battlefield 3 faded to black at GDC and on millions of computer monitors worldwide, the impression was virtually unanimous: expectations for this game went through the roof. … Read more

Activision's Call of Duty franchise rules first-person shooters, but Electronic Arts isn't ready to give up on that market quite yet.

Frank Gibeau, president of EA Games Label, says his company's upcoming first-person shooter Battlefield 3 will help the studio regain some of its lost appeal and get it closer to matching the Call of Duty juggernaut.

"It's what we've been trying to do in the EA Games Label over the last couple years--get our mojo back in terms of quality and great IPs," Gibeau said, referencing intellectual property in an article posted … Read more

Among the sea of trite and unimaginative first-person-shooters is Bulletstorm, the latest offering from developers Epic Games and People Can Fly, some of the fine folks who brought us the Gears of War franchise.

Bulletstorm has been touted as a departure from the typical cookie cutter first-person-shooter. Does it achieve that distinction or sink to the bottom?

Jeff: In the weeks leading up to its release, the marketing minds behind Bulletstorm sent shockwaves through the gaming world by attempting to attract gamers who were sick of the same old shooter experience. To reinforce the campaign further, a parody game called "Duty Calls: The Calm Before the Storm" was developed to poke fun at modern shooters and their redundancies, clearly singling out the Call of Duty franchise as major culprits.

Now that we've actually had some time with the game, we're pleased to report that Bulletstorm does in fact separate itself from the monotony of the average shooter. In playing and reviewing Bulletstorm, a new genre popped into mind; we're calling the game a pinball shooter.… Read more

Activision Blizzard's two strongest franchises helped the company have a stronger financial showing in 2010.

The video game publisher announced yesterday that it generated over $4.4 billion in revenue last year, up from the nearly $4.3 billion it tallied in 2009. It was able to nab a profit of $418 million last year, nearly quadrupling the $113 million profit it posted in 2009.

Even with help from the recently released Call of Duty: Black Ops and World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, the company reported that its revenue slid in the fourth quarter to $1.4 billion, compared with … Read more

Players hoping for games that have no glitches will continue to be disappointed.

Speaking with Videogamer, Josh Olin, community manager over at Treyarch, a wholly owned studio of Activision and the developer of Call of Duty: Black Ops, said that no matter the game or developer, video games are prone to bugs. And there simply isn't a way right now for studios to effectively eliminate all those glitches from their titles.

"It is unfortunate that those [bugs] have to exist at all," Olin told the gaming publication. "In an ideal world, we would love to ship … Read more

Call of Duty: Black Ops has broken sales records and been lauded by reviewers since debuting in November. Now, Microsoft has named it Xbox Live's top title of 2010.

According to data compiled by Xbox Live's director of programming, Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb, Black Ops beat out the likes of Halo: Reach, Red Dead: Redemption, and Battlefield: Bad Company 2 to secure the top spot.

Nelson formed the list by compiling the number of unique users logged in each game's first seven days. This strays from the lists posted in 2008 and 2009, which displayed … Read more