Activision, Modern Warfare execs trade barbs, lawsuits!

darkwarrior3007

darkwarrior3007

Fans of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 are used to dramatic battles, but a war of words emerging this week could determine the future of one of modern videogaming's most successful franchise.

Modern Warfare 2 co-creators Jason West and Vince Zampella, fired for alleged insubordination on Tuesday in a surprise move that shocked the entire industry, filed a strongly worded lawsuit with a California court today.
http://videogames.yahoo.com/events/...rn-warfare-execs-trade-barbs-lawsuits/1392011
 
darkwarrior3007

darkwarrior3007

Everything We Know About Call of Dutygate
Catch up on the ongoing legal war between Infinity Ward and Activision.
by Ryan Geddes

March 5, 2010 - This week, the gaming world watched with morbid fascination as Infinity Ward, the development studio that created the enormously popular Call of Duty series, imploded. In a flurry of press releases, legal filings, rumors and social networking status changes, Infinity Ward developers and publisher/owner Activision took their private war public.

The extent of the damage is still unknown, but we have solid intel in a few key areas. First, we know key Infinity Ward developers Jason West and Vince Zampella have been forced out in the wake of a bitter dispute with their corporate masters. It's trouble, we're told, that had been brewing for a long time. We also know Activision is already moving on with the Call of Duty franchise, giving new installments to internal studios Sledgehammer Games and Treyarch.
http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/107/1074869p1.html
 
lachemo

lachemo

Well, if something like this had to happen, at least its happening to a franchise that already did 6 games and is a 1st person shooter. That said, it wouldnt be too hard to kiss the franchise goodbye.

If this was going on with the devs behind Uncharted, Mass effect, Infamous, Gears of war, God of WaR etc it would really be a loss to the fans,gamers and gaming industry.
 
shayd

shayd

I think Activision really made a big mistake getting this whole fiasco started. Infinity Ward has consistently been one of the biggest innovators in the gaming world since the early days of the X-Box, and it's sad to see that even after all they've done, they're not getting the respect they deserve.
 
Embryoyo

Embryoyo

FUCK TREYARCH... Looks like this series could potentially be DEAD.
 
PornKhaos

PornKhaos

lachemo said:
Well, if something like this had to happen, at least its happening to a franchise that already did 6 games and is a 1st person shooter. That said, it wouldnt be too hard to kiss the franchise goodbye.

If this was going on with the devs behind Uncharted, Mass effect, Infamous, Gears of war, God of WaR etc it would really be a loss to the fans,gamers and gaming industry.
Click to expand...

If the Call of Duty franchise was stopped it would be a huge loss to the gaming industry you can't say it won't be. If Gears of War, Uncharted or Infamous were to go i wouldn't bat an eyelid. Not because im such a COD fanboy, but because compared to Call of Duty, they havent got as much influence.
 
darkwarrior3007

darkwarrior3007

PornKhaos said:
If the Call of Duty franchise was stopped it would be a huge loss to the gaming industry you can't say it won't be. If Gears of War, Uncharted or Infamous were to go i wouldn't bat an eyelid. Not because im such a COD fanboy, but because compared to Call of Duty, they havent got as much influence.
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Well to be fair the Call of Duty franchise wouldn't stop. Just the games being made by Infinity Ward and that would be a huge loss for the industry. Infinity Ward is the developer that was making the "good" Call of Duty games. If Infinity Ward does go to another game company and has to make a different FPS franchise I'm pretty sure a lot of people are going to drop Call of Duty and follow Infinity Ward.
 
lachemo

lachemo

PornKhaos said:
If the Call of Duty franchise was stopped it would be a huge loss to the gaming industry you can't say it won't be. If Gears of War, Uncharted or Infamous were to go i wouldn't bat an eyelid. Not because im such a COD fanboy, but because compared to Call of Duty, they havent got as much influence.
Click to expand...

thats the key word there, you say that "you" wouldnt bat an eyelid.....you think the rest of the gaming world wouldnt care if those games were terminated in a way???? lol.... theres folks out there that are die hard racing fans that would throw call of duty into the fire to save gran turismo or Forza.To you and me that sounds rediculous yes, but you gotta remember that theres a billion gamers out there with a billion different tastes in games.

As far as it being a huge loss to the gaming industry, yes it would be. But it would be a loss to the ones making the big $$$ off of it. Us as the gamers would learn to live without it in time.

It happens countless times to "us the gamers" in this industry in the form of there not being a sequel to a game we adore. You accept it and move on to other great games, call of duty would be no different...

Let me ask you guys a question, if you had a choice would you take a 7th call of duty game dev'd by almighty Infinity Ward or would you take a sequel to one of your fave games of all time that will probably never see a 2nd game?
 
Legzman

Legzman

what the fuck you lookin at?
I prefer MW2 :dunno:

Fuck it, I like what I like. Shame all this shit went down. Treyarch and infinity ward swap the series back and forth every other year. The treyarch years the game is pretty much a carbon copy of the previous years infinity ward game. I didn't read the article, but sounds like the end of the line for the CoD series.
 
mr. jizz

mr. jizz

lachemo said:
thats the key word there, you say that "you" wouldnt bat an eyelid.....you think the rest of the gaming world wouldnt care if those games were terminated in a way???? lol.... theres folks out there that are die hard racing fans that would throw call of duty into the fire to save gran turismo or Forza.To you and me that sounds rediculous yes, but you gotta remember that theres a billion gamers out there with a billion different tastes in games.

As far as it being a huge loss to the gaming industry, yes it would be. But it would be a loss to the ones making the big $$$ off of it. Us as the gamers would learn to live without it in time.

It happens countless times to "us the gamers" in this industry in the form of there not being a sequel to a game we adore. You accept it and move on to other great games, call of duty would be no different...

Let me ask you guys a question, if you had a choice would you take a 7th call of duty game dev'd by almighty Infinity Ward or would you take a sequel to one of your fave games of all time that will probably never see a 2nd game?
Click to expand...

Thats not a very good hypothetical question of course EVERYONe is gonna pick their favorite because of course, IT'S THEIR FAVORITE GAME! And saying "us gamers" would learn to live without it isnt fair, just cause you dont like it doesnt mean that no one else does.

IMO it would be a huge loss for gaming, theres always room for improvement in a franchise and the first few games in a series arent always necessarily the best i.e Need for Speed, Tomb Raider, Midnight Club, GTA (imagine if they had cut off GTA before GTA 3 came out!!??) I dont know man you just seem like a COD hater, no offense.
 
shayd

shayd

lachemo said:
Or trade the game in and get Battlefield Bad company 2 cause its an all around better game......oh, people are already doing that.
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I wouldn't be too sure of that. Bad Company 2 did outsell Modern Warfare 2 last week, but you've got to figure that's probably just because Bad Company was just released. Looks like most of the estimates have Bad Company at about 1.2 million sold, and Modern Warfare 2 at about 900,000. One of the amazing things about Modern Warfare 2 is that the number of people playing online has hardly dropped since mid-December.

And for my money, I'd take Modern Warfare 2 over Bad Company 2 at this point, and it looks like the reviews seem to agree, mostly based off of a lackluster single-player mode, (where I have to be honest, it seems pretty tough to beat Modern Warfare 2 in that regard). Multi-player seems to be a wash, as both feature excellent online functionality, so my vote goes to Modern Warfare 2.

PornKhaos said:
If the Call of Duty franchise was stopped it would be a huge loss to the gaming industry you can't say it won't be. If Gears of War, Uncharted or Infamous were to go i wouldn't bat an eyelid. Not because im such a COD fanboy, but because compared to Call of Duty, they havent got as much influence.
Click to expand...

I couldn't agree more with regard to Infinity Ward. I don't think people really understand how much of the current FPS genre has been shaped by Infinity Ward starting all the way back with Call of Duty 2.
 
lachemo

lachemo

mr. jizz said:
Thats not a very good hypothetical question of course EVERYONe is gonna pick their favorite because of course, IT'S THEIR FAVORITE GAME! And saying "us gamers" would learn to live without it isnt fair, just cause you dont like it doesnt mean that no one else does.

IMO it would be a huge loss for gaming, theres always room for improvement in a franchise and the first few games in a series arent always necessarily the best i.e Need for Speed, Tomb Raider, Midnight Club, GTA (imagine if they had cut off GTA before GTA 3 came out!!??) I dont know man you just seem like a COD hater, no offense.
Click to expand...

COD hater??? LMAO just for the record, I never said I dont like it......I probably put more hours into Call of dookie Modern 2 than all the people in this topic put together. Me and peeps hammered that thing every night for months since the day it came out and we loved every minute of it. My opinion is being voiced towards the future of the franchise not the past and present.

Theres no doubt its a great franchise, great games, however if it were to go away than we'd all get over it. Theres so many quality games to choose from these days, especially in the 1st person shooter dept. As a matter of fact, that genre is getting water down big time and that plays into being able to get over it fast. Its always good to have a diverse taste in game genre cause if you do, you'd get over a loss like that quicker.
 
darkwarrior3007

darkwarrior3007

Infinity Ward Bloodletting Continues
by Matt Bertz on April 15, 2010 at 02:10 PM

We can see the business class case study on Activision now: "In retrospect, threatening your employees and withholding their rightfully earned bonuses may not be the best course of action when dealing with your most talented studio." The list of veteran developers resigning from prized studio Infinity Ward continues to expand in the wake of Activision's strong-armed negotiation tactics, with a few more defections being reported by Kotaku.
http://gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2010/04/15/infinity-ward-bloodletting-continues.aspx

[Update] West, Zampella Form Studio, Sign With EA
by Meagan VanBurkleo on April 12, 2010 at 02:10 PM

[Update] Activision has broken the silence in regards to the formation of Respawn Entertainment.

“This agreement comes as no surprise to Activision given the myriad of improper activities detailed in the cross-complaint filed on Friday against Jason West and Vince Zampella," An Activision representative told Destructoid. "We look forward to continuing to work with Infinity Ward’s deep bench of proven talent on exciting new projects.”

It seems that both sides are sticking to their respective story. Let us know your thoughts via our front page poll.
http://gameinformer.com/b/news/arch...-Zampella-Form-Studio_2C00_-Sign-With-EA.aspx
 
L3ggy

L3ggy

Special Operations FOX-HOUND
Never actually been a fan of CoD, or FPS for that matter, but I must admit that CoD sure was a fine franchise, not anymore I'll bet, oh well, franchise's comes and goes.
 
Legzman

Legzman

what the fuck you lookin at?
I heard they were fired because activision didn't want to pay them. Regardless I hope these 2 start their own company that eventually puts activision out of business! Hows that for pay back?
 
darkwarrior3007

darkwarrior3007

Legzman said:
I heard they were fired because activision didn't want to pay them. Regardless I hope these 2 start their own company that eventually puts activision out of business! Hows that for pay back?
Click to expand...
They've already formed a new company.

darkwarrior3007 said:
[Update] West, Zampella Form Studio, Sign With EA
by Meagan VanBurkleo on April 12, 2010 at 02:10 PM

[Update] Activision has broken the silence in regards to the formation of Respawn Entertainment.

“This agreement comes as no surprise to Activision given the myriad of improper activities detailed in the cross-complaint filed on Friday against Jason West and Vince Zampella," An Activision representative told Destructoid. "We look forward to continuing to work with Infinity Ward’s deep bench of proven talent on exciting new projects.”

It seems that both sides are sticking to their respective story. Let us know your thoughts via our front page poll.
http://gameinformer.com/b/news/arch...-Zampella-Form-Studio_2C00_-Sign-With-EA.aspx
Click to expand...
 
cartman24

cartman24

Hopefully they keep making first person shooters at the new company. I'd like to think that MW2 is so fucked up because of Activision pushing so hard, so this could be a breath of fresh air. Anyway, goodbye Infinity Ward, your glory days are gone.
 
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