Activision Brings In Hollywood Talent For Black Ops

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Activision and Treyarch have announced that Gary Oldman (The Professional, Dracula, Batman: The Dark Knight) and Ed Harris (The Abyss, A History of Violence, Pollock, Apollo 13 and The Right Stuff) will play veteran Soviet soldier Viktor Reznov and CIA operative Jason Hudson, respectively. Filmmaker David S. Goyer (Batman: Dark Knight, Batman Begins, Blade and the upcoming Superman: Man of Steel) will provide provide script consultation and story development support.

Oldman, Harris and Goyer are considered some of Hollywood s finest talents and they perfectly complement Call of Duty: Black Ops ambitious and immersive single player experience, says Mark Lamia, Studio Head of Treyarch. Their contributions have helped us to push the boundaries of our story telling and character development far beyond anything we have ever attempted before in the franchise.

Ping Draws In A Million Users, Mixed Reviews

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According to a statement by Apple, their Ping service has attracted over one million users within a couple days of launching. This number represents over a third of those that have downloaded iTunes 10.

Of course, that hasn’t stopped various bloggers from teeing off on the service. “It is fundamentally flawed because it doesn’t interact with your iTunes music collection,” writes Business Insider’s Jay Yarrow. “Without the ability to actually to actually tell our friends what we’re listening to, Ping is a pretty useless service. Without the ability to listen to all our music through Ping, like we once did with Lala, the service is decidedly weak.”

TechCrunch’s Erick Schonfeld also notes that the service is entirely iTunes-dependent. “And Ping doesn’t communicate with any other social networks,” writes Schonfeld. “I can’t see people’s iTunes Pings in Twitter, Facebook, or anywhere else. While Ping does make iTunes itself more social, the problem is that I don’t live in iTunes. It is a store. I go in to buy stuff and get out as fast as I can.”

Facebook integration was initially in the cards, but it was canceled after Facebook denied Apple the right to use its APIs.

Source: PC Mag

Portal Into Books

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 Portal has one of the most energized fanbases on the planet. Their passion is such that Valve should probably take a note or two from how to create merchandise, like for these book holders.

Aperture Science Reading Material Organizers

 

Source: Bob’s House of Videogames

Dead Rising 2 Has The Hardware

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 Capcom announced a recent media event for Dead Rising 2 in an unusual way. Instead of sending out a regular invitation, they indicated a sale on a variety of items at Greene’s Hardware in Seattle in a fake circular, highlighting the myriad of items with which you can destroy zombies in Dead Rising 2

 

Source: Kotaku

Hudson Promotes Child’s Play With Lost In Shadow

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Hudson Entertainment recently launched a special campaign to promote Lost In Shadow. For everyone who ‘likes’ the game’s official Facebook page, they will donate 10 cents to the Child’s Play charity.

They also offered to donate $1 for anyone who changes their profile picture to a shadow. The number of page likes and shadow profiles will be counted at the end of Sept 7, 2010.

To find out more, visit www.facebook.com/lostinshadow.

Goldeneye Creator Disses Activision

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The original Goldeneye 007 was a work of passion by Rare, releasing long after the movie but still having a huge impact on gaming and selling well. Martin Hollis, the designer of the original GoldenEye, knows full well about what effort went into the game, but he doesn’t think the new title from Activision is motivated the same way.

“I imagine it is a business decision isn’t it? This name is valuable, let’s use it, said Hollis. I find it hard to picture Activision’s top management being excited about the original and wanting to do it justice. In fact, I find it hard to imagine them being excited about any game. It’s my perception that they are trying to be EA, only more so. I think they are doing a fine job at that.”

However, Hollis had kinder words about the developer of the new Goldeneye. “I know and like Eurocom,” he said. “I think they are a good company. I’m confident they have done their very best.”

Source: ONM

All Roads Lead To Fallout: New Vegas

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 A 12-page preview of Fallout: New Vegas All Roads has gone up on iTunes. The graphic novel is published by Dark Horse Comics and written by the game’s senior designer, Chris Avellone introducing the world of Fallout: New Vegas exclusively in the Fallout: New Vegas Collector’s Edition.