We've got several developers complaining about how hard it is to develop games for the PS3 hardware (Valve's Gabe Newell comes into mind). But on the other hand, there are those developers who now say that they have little to no problems in creating games for the PS3, like Infinity Ward and now Ubisoft's Yves Guillemot.

Check out why in the full article!

We get all these news about games getting delayed, but we're just glad that the much-awaited Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and the PC) managed to pull off top-notch content with nary a setback, even scoring a a 10/10 score from Official Xbox Magazine. So what's Infinity Ward's secret? Infinity Ward's studio head and president Grant Collier tells about their secret: platform-agnostic development philosophy.

Read more about platform-agnostic development in the full article!


Buy: [ Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PS3) ]
Buy: [ Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PC) ]
Buy: [ Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360) ]

Will Infinity Ward be taking another break from the Call of Duty franchise? That's one of the questions floating around in fans' heads as Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360, PS3, PC) gears up for its release later this year.

Australian video game news website Gameplayer recently had the chance to talk to Infinity Ward's Grant Collier at this week's Activate Asia 2007 conference. According to Gameplayer, Collier was nonchalant when asked about Call of Duty 5 as he didn't think Infinity Ward would be making it.

If so, development tasks for Call of Duty 5 would probably fall once again to Treyarch, the studio that stood in for Infinity Ward for Call of Duty 3 (PS3, Xbox 360). Activision's drive to have a Call of Duty title on shelves every Christmas prompted the need to bring in a different developer for Call of Duty 3.

While the Treyarch entry has been generally labelled as inferior compared to the ones by Infinity Ward, Collier noted that he had high respect for the studio, who managed to churn out what he sees is a good game in only eight months.

 

We all know how good the feedback coming from Activision's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare beta is, but it just might get better if there's any truth behind a rumor that's been going around. According to Spong, Infinity Ward studio head and producer Grant Collier was quoted in the Activate Asia Conference with what seemed to be a slip about CoD 4's co-op mode.

Collier was asked whether there would be a split-screen multiplayer co-op for local games or not to which he replied, "Uh, no, I’m not really supposed to say anything about that… but I’m a big fan of Xbox Live and downloadable content."

Whether that was indicative of things to come or simply a weird answer, we'll know when Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare hits store shelves. The game goes out for the Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3, and the PC.

Buy: [Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PS3)]
Buy: [Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PC)]
Buy: [Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360)]

Not only is Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360, PS3, PC) shaping up to be the biggest yet in the series, but it also seems like the folks at Infinity Ward aren't far from their goal. We're not talking about merely completing another entry to CoD, but studio head Grant Collier said it himself that their goal for CoD4 is to be the best multiplatform FPS there is.

Based on what we've seen of the game so far, that isn't too farfetched. Collier is confident that no other multiplatform title can even come close. Among the competition, he sees Halo 3 as a threat on the 360. He had a hard time naming a game for the PS3, but picked Grand Theft Auto 4. "Killzone 2 is not happening," he added.

Find the man talk about the upcoming beta, how amazing CoD4 will be, and how it'll blow everything out of the water by watching the video below:

For sure. When Microsoft seemed bent to advocate Live Anywhere to game developers in order to connect console thumb-flippers to PC twitchers on what might have been the modern gamer's World War I, they probably didn't expect to be stopped dead cold by Infinity Ward's two-lettered dumb-founder: "No." Activision's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare ain't going Live, says Infinity, and that's that.

 

But Infinity Ward's Grant Collier did reveal in an interview with IGN that CoD4 (for the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3) was not going to be a sandbox destructive game. Instead, they've put more focus on producing better frame rates on the game than creating a world that's "totally destructible."

And according to Collier, full destructibility is just another fad in the shooting genre that could end sooner than later. While everyone is else is requesting for such a feature, Infinity Ward doesn't feel that it delivers fun in any of the games that are being designed with that concept in mind, like EA's Battlefield Bad Company. He added:

I think it's a buzzword, it's a badge, it's a bullet-point option, but a lot of games they get in there and they try to do that and then they're like 'okay we have the sandbox, now why don't we try to make the game fun'. And total destructibility, you can really ruin the gameplay. ... So I think right now it's a fad, and the fad will pass, we're not going to be bite on in it - we want the game to be fun first, and destructibility comes second.

Oh and Price is coming back. Again. Revived for the modern era, the lovable Brit is going to get new shoes to fill, with arch-nemesis Zakhaev. Collier said that a foiled assassination attempt has your paths cross with Zakhaev and Price and much of their history gets revealed through flashbacks set in Ukraine.

And even though facts have been tossed around that Call of Duty 4 was set in present-day Iraq, it actually revolves around conflict touching the four corners of the modern world. And enemies aren't under-equipped, cowardly Guerrilla types; they've got the technology and the tactics to take you and your band of brothers (circa 2007) out.

While the 3D portrait recently released by Infinity Ward for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PS3, 360, PC) was interesting enough, we know you are getting more curious and excited about developments for the video game itself. The latest issue of PC Gamer Magazine just happens to have exactly what you want.

In a recent interview with PC Gamer, Infinity Ward President Grant Collier dished out the difference between the multiplayer and single player modes of Modern Warfare. Collier noted that there's one mission in the latter that will require players to be a gunner in a Cobra assault helicopter and inflict some serious damage on the enemy below them, but vehicles will not appear in multiplayer mode.

Collier mentioned that it was Infinity Ward's intention to focus on infantry combat during multiplayer battles so no vehicles will be available for that mode. He explained, "We want to keep the maps small, so there will be always intense action. If we made maps bigger so they could include vehicles, they'd become less interesting for infantry combat, and that's what we want to focus on."

Well, we have to say that the reasoning behind that is quite logical and it wouldn't be as much fun if multiplayer battles can be concluded by weapon-laden vehicles. The same interview also included a look at some of the game's features. The following are quoted from the aforementioned magazine:

• In multiplayer, you get experience points for your persistent character stats. A kill gets you 2 points, a head shot gets you 3 and an assist (wound them but someone else kills them) 1. You'll unlock new ranks, skins for your character and new weapons. The system is implemented so they can add additional unlocks that come with patches.
• In both single and multiplayer, there are hard points. Points on the map that give you a specific advantage over the enemy. An example that was given: A radio that calls in an air strike, capture it and a helicopter will appear and attack the enemy with its rockets and machine guns. After the attack the hard point goes neutral again.
• A new game type, Realism-Mode. Grant Collier says the mod community had implemented this into the previous titles and now they'll add one themselves. In this realism mode you die from one shot.