Why do I love history?  People change.  Human nature does not.

Activision was founded in 1979 when Atari programmers split from Atari, a company whose then-monopoly on Atari 2600 development was used to marginalize employees and promote the brand.  In 2002, twenty-two employees broke from 2015 Inc. (rumored the end-result of disagreements with publisher Electronic Arts) to form Infinity Ward.  Five years later, now-mega-corporate publisher Activision rejected Harmonix’s request to follow Guitar Hero with a band-oriented rhythm game. It culminated in a takeover that placed development under Neversoft.  And under Activision’s orders, the company behind the sequel-scarred Tony Hawk series proceeded to saturate and destroy the rhythm game market.

And after the public receives two contractually-obligated map packs for Modern Warfare 2, you can lay the roses on Infinity Ward’s relationship with Activision.  Kaputt.  Done.

We may not have all the information behind the tense situation between Activision and Infinity Ward, but we do have a conclusion: Activision has announced that the series will now be in the hands of Sledgehammer Games, a studio founded last year by veterans from Electronic Arts. Specifically, Sledgehammer is the brainchild of Glen A. Schofield and Michael Condrey, the head honchos on Dead Space.

It’s as fascinating as it is surreal: A developer founded by those who severed ties with Electronic Arts’ corporate culture has been detached from their child by a corporate culture founded by people attempting to escape a corporate culture.

This course of clusterfucks is currently sketchy, featuring the understatement of the year in “creative differences“, a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that’s probably foreshadowing a trip to Lawsuitville, and a physical response typically reserved for coming down on enemies of the state.  What we do know is that Call of Duty now falls on Treyarch and newly-founded Sledgehammer games, the latter slated to go action-adventure on the franchise in 2011 (presumably to fill Modern Warfare 3’s void).

In November, I said IWNet could be a turning point in game development history, a step in consolidating control over the product.  That assumed Infinity Ward’s talents would be leveraged against consumers looking to fight the power.  After Modern Warfare 2’s release, I stated Activision was prime to burn, a company totally behest to billion-dollar name power.  And even that assumed Infinity Ward would continue as the class of American game development, a company talented enough to stave off outside influence.

Almost fittingly, Activision-Blizzard released their annual fiscal report yesterday.  Three games accounted for sixty-eight percent of their 2009 revenues: The now-irrelevant Guitar Hero, the World of Warcraft whose user base has peaked, and the Call of Duty now separated from the developer responsible for the success.

So now, there’s only question left to ask: Does Blizzard have an opt-out on the ticking time bomb they’ve partnered with?  Bobby Kotick and Activision officially fail to recognize how video games work.  Guitar Hero III was the best selling game in the series because Neversoft was living on the moxy of Harmonix’s accomplishments.  Medal of Honor: Frontline blew up the sales charts because 2015 Inc. convinced people Medal of Honor was worth their time.  Chinese workshops molding established franchises do not win championships.  Talented development teams do.

UPDATE: As rumored, it’s about unpaid royalties.  Infinity Ward’s looking for their cash and the rights to the Modern Warfare property.  In other words, Kobe Bryant just got cut from the Lakers and is now dedicating the rest of his career to making sure that Los Angeles doesn’t win another title on his watch.

I’m opposed to outright predictions.  The last time I made one, I reneged on my promise to eat a hat-shaped object.  Who knew Blizzard would significantly delay one of their products, anyway!?  So uh, let’s try this again.

Activision’s standing as gaming’s biggest publisher is prime to burn.

I’m not arguing the quality of their products; I’m arguing we’ll wake up the morning of an Activision-Blizzard earnings report and discover Bobby Kotick isn’t the genius the mainstream claims.  You know, where Forbes incredulously wonders how “a chief executive blind to the beauty of videogames developed an unmatched eye for spotting hits”, and his company “owns a peerless collection of widely beloved and extremely profitable games.”

It’s a delicious setup.  Activision was founded by game developers disgruntled with Atari’s corporate culture.  Thirty years later, they’re synonymous with paper-pushing.  They recently merged with Blizzard, a company notorious for delaying franchises in the name of quality control.  Their alliance is hogtied to a shareholder market and corporate culture that demands immediate returns on their investment.  In the name of meeting those quarterly expectations, six bad months can destroy the company.

Their safety net?  Acquire “the next big thing”.  The problem?  When Activision and Blizzard merged, Kotick dumped properties that lacked the now-infamous “potential to be exploited across every platform every year”. The man has created a dangerous situation where they have bet the farm on Call of Duty and Guitar Hero.  Find me an empire that went beyond their means and lived to place their eggs in a single basket.

Are we forgetting that in April of 2007, THQ’s stock price peaked above thirty-six dollars? Thirty-one months later, they’re sporting a stock price below five dollars and a catalog of Nickelodeon stowaways.  Their lone hope is that a larger company acquires their mountain of trash in order to obtain the Ultimate Fighting Championship license.  Place Blizzard’s financial capita aside, and what’s to assume that Activision may not suffer the same calamity?

They’re like locusts. They’re moving from game to game…their whole business. After they’ve consumed every natural resource they move on…and something else is next.

Even Activision’s own history suggests it.  In 1999, the Tony Hawk franchise was an affirmation that extreme sports weren’t a fad.  If Tony Hawk Ride is as dreadful as reviews paint it, the series is dead.  In 2007, Guitar Hero outstold Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 on way to becoming the best-selling core title of the year.  Guitar Hero is now the head of a genre whose sales are down sixty percent from 2008 to 2009.  And here we are, heralding “teh awesome salze!!” of Modern Warfare 2, the awesomest fuck-awesome to ever balls in your ass.  Did you see how the stock market reacted to “the biggest entertainment launch of all-time”?

They didn’t give two shits.  Call of Duty is undergoing the Michael Jordan treatment, where the product is so exceptional we’ve become numb to it. And if Activision’s only sure thing is keeping the seas neutral, your company’s long-term future is no guarantee.

Note: I chose not to consider the Blizzard side of things because I cannot find current World of Warcraft subscription data.  Should I find it, I’ll supply an update.

To nobody’s surprise, Modern Warfare sold many copies.  When I read the sales tally, it reminded me of a certain game published in 2007.  You couldn’t escape it.  It was a follow-up to one of the prior year’s top games, a genre-defining experience.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare?  Nope.  In a world where Call of Duty 2’s legacy was confined to personal computers, it was a surprise hit on the consoles.

The game in question was Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. It didn’t witness a ridiculous first-day launch like Grand Theft Auto or Modern Warfare 2, but it would move nearly fifteen million units across five platforms.

And what does Guitar Hero offer us two years later?  Not a single nice thing can be said about it.  And here we are in 2009, Activision is once again publishing the biggest game of the year, a phenomenon that cannot be stopped.

Yes, in terms of finished product, Guitar Hero III isn’t in the same league as Modern Warfare 2.  But no matter how good the follow-ups are, the public will perceive this as the high point in the Call of Duty franchise.  Remember the runaway success of Super Mario Galaxy?  On principle, it had zero chance to dethrone Super Mario World or its brethren.  Why?  There’s a Simpsons quote for every situation:

“The thing is, there’s not really anything wrong with [Call of Duty], it’s as good as ever. But after so many years, the characters just can’t have the same impact they once had.”

Just remember: Two years is a long time.  And in the upcoming two years, we know of one certainty: “The incredible follow-up to the most successful entertainment launch of all-time” will fall in the hands of Treyarch.  Good luck selling that to the red states.

Know when you were a kid and your cat died?  And mom explained it went to kitty heaven, where the biggest, most awesomest scratching post awaits?  That’s the game industry.  In a world where The Dark Knight wins fans with anti-heroes and morality redefined, Starcraft II won’t have LAN functionality because Battle.net is so amazing, you wouldn’t want to play the game offline!!1

In a world where the average gamer is 29, your overlords treat you like children.  That’s why I waited to judge the Modern Warfare 2 clusterfuck.  Now I can judge.

On November 3rd, Best Buy hosted a question-and-answer developer chat.  It only took a few thousand keystrokes for Infinity Ward to bury a platform and the consumers that made Call of Duty the biggest gaming event of the year.

Modern Warfare 2 would be capped to nine-versus-nine matches, a pleasant surprise for 100-plus-player clans that rely on sixty-four-player dedicated servers.  The InfinityWard.net matchmaking model uses player hosting, presumably granting hosts a significant latency advantage.  The game will not feature a console (programming prompt) because the company “would like you to play the game the way [they] designed and balanced it.”  The ability to lean, once a critical gameplay tactic, won’t be included because “the game is not balanced for lean.”  There will be no ability to record replays, likely cut in favor of the console development cycle.

And that 196,000-signature petition?  According to an Infinity Ward rep, Robert Bowling (the company’s community manager) signed it four times, so who gives a shit what you think?

The people who work for Infinity Ward (or those who tell them what to say) bought their own Kool-Aid.  Modern Warfare was the epic, fuckstaining, Halo-killing, babypunching opus for video game gun fetishists.  They thought PC gamers would throw up their arms and play it anyway.  No lean?  You’ll get used to it.  No server model?  Look at the pretty matchmaking system!  No console?  It’ll be fine.

And then you look at X-Fire’s daily stats, where 2005’s Call of Duty 2 fights it out with 2007’s Modern Warfare while 2008’s World at War barely registers.  (Yes, I am aware Treyarch developed World at War.)  But I guess if Infinity Ward is to abandon the platform that made them famous, we can at least thank you for the previous installments.  Your once-benevolent fan base will play those instead.

Note: Edited for general flow.  Thanks, Littlesaltz.

I rarely wish epic failure upon a video game project.  No matter how awful the worst games may be, the people behind them have families of future bad programmers to feed.

With that disclaimer aside, Band Hero is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous communist plot we have ever had to face.

I never showed an ounce of support for Lego Rock Band.  Two weeks after that was announced, Activision countered with Band Hero.  Both games will be released today.  Care to guess my opinion on a game solely designed to cut into another’s market share?  The seventh of eight Activision rhythm games to be released on a major gaming platform in 2009?

People watch Detroit Lions football when they need high comedy.  This month, I’ll follow Band Hero’s sales.  The casual market will view Band Hero as a Guitar Hero knockoff.  The hardcore market will dismiss the game as “same old shit”. Unless you’re a twelve-year-old Taylor Swift fan with mommy’s credit card, this game does not feature a single selling point.  Know how Guitar Hero III sold nearly fifteen million units?  Two years later, you’re looking at the possibility an Activision rhythm game won’t sell 100,000 copies.

Bobby Kotick doesn’t have to choose between video games and food like you do, but at least you didn’t greenlight a doomed-to-fail rhythm game.

The PC iteration of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 will not feature support for dedicated servers.

In a webcast [Saturday], Robert Bowling revealed the existence of IWNet, a matchmaking service Infinity Ward will operate beginning with Modern Warfare 2. But it ends dedicated servers, and fundamentally changes the culture of the game’s PC community.

Bowling, the Infinity Ward community manager, said IWNet makes multiplayer more accessible to the PC community on Modern Warfare 2, replacing the need for dedicated servers that are hosted and managed by players. But the hardcore PC crowd to whom he was talking, on BASHandSlash.com’s webcast, did not take the news in a completely positive light.

…

Here’s the score: by building up its own matchmaking service riding shotgun with Steam, “you can get in and play with players your same rank,” Bowling said. However, “You’re completely reliant on IWNet and there is no dedicated server or server list. You rely on IW Net for matchmaking and your games, but you still have your private matches.”

I dismissed Starcraft II’s lack of a true LAN component.  Long ago, CD-Keys established a doctrine of “one copy per computer” (hence why I’m opposed to the decision of “one username per account”).  I scoffed at the Left 4 Dead 2 Boycott, a community rejecting the sequel to a game they thoroughly enjoyed.  This is not one of those situations.

Game developers want to kill retailers.  They want a society that accepts digital distribution as the standard.  Following this, they will attempt to kill the video game console.  OnLive represents the endgame for this industry.  They do not want video games to be a manufactured good.  They want them to be a service.

Beyond the latency issues that plague first-person shooter matchmaking, beyond the fatal blow to the competitive gaming community, beyond the restrictions on modmaking that creates an artificial market for “premium content” and its developer-held monopoly, the elimination of dedicated servers is a step towards “service”.

Similar situations have proven roadblocks, torn asunder by protest piracy.  The reality is that Infinity Ward is backed by Activision.  They undoubtedly had a say in this decision.  That is, a company powerful enough, headed by a big enough asshole, to risk setting precedent that would create their vision for video gaming.

Why not?  As vocal as computer games have proven, their money is competing against the console gaming juggernaut.  And in the eyes of that console gaming community, computer gamers are the boy that cried wolf.  They cried about SecuROM.  They cried about StarForce.  They cried about Spore.  They cried about Left 4 Dead.  They cried about Starcraft II.  In the eyes of the console gaming community, we’re just a bunch of nerds and we need to stop whining.

In the meantime, make some popcorn. Three weeks until the release of Modern Warfare 2, and this is only the beginning of a battle that may prove one of the most important moments in video game history.

For thirty years, Activision and the term “gaming clusterfuck” have been best friends.  Defecting Atari programmers formed the original Activision, gaming’s first third-party developers.  Their success led to a lawsuit from their former business partners, and ended in a settlement that justified third-party development and led to the saturation that caused the crash of ’83.

That Activision is long dead.  Today’s Activision may cause the same fate for rhythm games.  Rumor is that Activision plans to release eight separate rhythm games this year.  Eight.

Eurogamer has been told that Hard Rock Van Halen (August), Guitar Hero 5 (presumably a working title – September), DJ Hero (October), and Band Hero (November) are among games planned for release on PS3, Xbox 360, Wii and PS2 in 2009.

Following the release of Guitar Hero: Modern Hits, Activision also plans to release at least one more DS Guitar Hero title in 2009, the same source said.

Several of the above games are already in varying states of public undress. Activision Blizzard boss Bobby Kotick has spoken publicly about DJ Hero already, and mentioned Van Halen rather notably at an investor conference in early 2008.

Guitar Hero 5 and Band Hero (a trademark registered at around the same time as “Drum Hero”) are supposedly separate titles due for the same spread of home consoles within the space of a few months, although our source was quiet on any specifics.

Activision: Game companies are hemorrhaging money because their product sucks.  Your response is “whore your premiere franchise”?  That’s the business plan running THQ out of business and putting Electronic Arts on the edge.  If the rumor is true, you will end up releasing seven Guitar Hero games in eighteen months…not including the arcade version.

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