May 21st was a long time ago

MW3 will whore "premium" content

You knew it was coming.

MCV reports that MW3 will indeed feature purchasable content beyond the usual map packs we've all come to loathe:

CEO Eric Hirshberg described [the new "Project Beach Head" tech] as as "online platform" that "will be an integral part to the innovation signature of the Call of Duty game that we're releasing this year". 

The biggest news, however, is confirmation that for the first time Call of Duty will offer players additional online features at a premium. Whether or not this will turn out to be the long-rumoured subscription service remains to be seen.

And later:

Boss Kotick, however, was keen to emphasise that players will never have to pay extra to receive they services that they do today... 

"While we are attempting to deliver new incremental experiences that have yet heretofore been unseen by our players, we are not attempting to monetize or take any experience away that currently comes as part of the value proposition of buying the game."

It might have just been a poor choice of words on Kotick's part, but "incremental experiences" doesn't sound like "cosmetic upgrades" to me. Since I'm in the minority that finds that the ability to purchase tattered hats and beard dirt does nothing to enhance my experience in any given game, however, I may be reading too much into it.

MW3 trailer - "Our buildings also fall over."

Com3 to Franc3! 3njoy cr3p3s, bagu3tt3s, fin3 win3, and th3 3iff3l Tow3r!

I promise you all, this game will be shit.

Promise.

It can only happen in TF2

(Yes, it was obviously staged.)

OT: Civil War Reenactment

For those of you interested in real wars, I grabbed several shots of the Civil War reenactment of the "Battle of Lewisburg" today and posted them to Flickr: