The announcement that developer Infinity Ward’s “Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2” for the PC would not be delayed seemed to coincide with (in hopes of easing the blow) the fact that it would not include private dedicated servers. As if to pat the consumer base on the back, they told us it was because it was reliant on proprietary matchmaking technology. If I wanted to be locked into a matchmaking service, I could easily do that with Xbox Live.
The PC gaming market has been in some sort of weird limbo for most of this decade.
As consoles continue to be evermore profitable, companies pandering to the PC market are forced to combat software pirates and hackers while providing tools for modders — who create custom maps or gameplay modes that can easily add replay value to a game — while constantly trying to reinvent the wheel as evidenced by the first Modern Warfare’s “ranking” system, in which players gain access to better weapons the more successfully they play the game.
Yes, life is hard, especially for the ever-changing Silicon Valley software studio, but this is no excuse to turn into restrictive heathens. This takes the power to host LAN/WAN (local/internet games) servers away from the end-users who have, since the early days of computer First-Person Shooter games, enjoyed the ability to run games of their choosing, any way they like, including the ability to modify and add to the gameplay experience.
This ability has kept timeless juggernauts that almost everyone has heard of (“Counter-Strike,” “Quake” and “Battlefield 1942,” to name a few) alive and kicking for years after they should have run their course, when their graphics are aging and their gameplay is outdated.
Taking this away will shorten the life of the game. Taking this away will definitely hamper and dampen sales and provide no real reason to buy this game on the PC, when the experience will essentially be identical to its console counterparts: What sets PC gaming apart is being in control of the multiplayer experience and modding.
I have a feeling that gamers will boycott this maneuver in the same manner they boycotted games with the indescribably intrusive Starforce anti-piracy software. At this juncture, Infinity Ward may be better off not creating a PC version at all, or stop this nonsense. It will not be long until someone creates a modified version of the game that runs on private dedicated servers and all of this hullaballoo was for nothing, save the fact that Infinity Ward has lost respect.
I appreciate that developers still support the PC, and in the last year or so a great many developers who left for greener console pastures are now returning or re-expanding into the PC gaming market — this is great. However, we the PC gamers, in order to create a more perfect union, yadda yadda as the freest and most spoiled of all the gamers, will not stand for this mockery.
Give me liberty, or give me a hacked copy.
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Times are tough for PC gamers
Daily Emerald
November 2, 2009
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