Call of Duty Elite (abbonamento "premium" + more) [UPDATED]

[Turrican3]

Call of Duty® Elite Will Unite and Ignite Gaming's Largest Online Community
Activision's New Service Will Offer 30 Million Call of Duty Players Innovative Ways to Connect, Compete and Improve
Will Launch With This Year's Most Anticipated Release Call of Duty®: Modern Warfare® 3 on November 8, 2011

SANTA MONICA, Calif., May 31, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The world's most passionate online gaming community can now connect, compete and improve their Call of Duty® multiplayer experience through Activision's (Nasdaq: ATVI) innovative new online service, Call of Duty Elite.  

Developed from the ground up by Activision's new Beachhead studio, Call of Duty Elite offers cutting-edge features that significantly enhance the franchises' multiplayer experience and deliver a new level of social engagement that will unite more than 30 million players worldwide.  Additionally, the service will offer exclusive, high-production value, original entertainment programming designed exclusively for the Call of Duty community.

"The average Call of Duty player spends 58 minutes per day playing multiplayer. That is more than the average Facebook user spends per day on Facebook. And yet, right now, there are very few tools to unite and super charge that social community," said Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision Publishing. "Whether it's allowing you to connect with your friends, or people of a similar skill level, people who live in your city, people who share your favorite passions, join competitive clans or social groups, or upload, view and comment on the incredible mass of player-generated content, or watch and comment on exclusive created content, Call of Duty Elite will give people more ways to connect with fellow players than ever before. Elite will also allow players of every level to improve their game with an intuitive suite of tools, and compete in tournaments for both real and virtual prizes."

Call of Duty Elite will include several industry-first innovations, and is designed to reset the bar for what players can expect from a multiplayer experience for this year's most anticipated game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.  Elite will offer two-way communication between the service and the game, so that the choices and decisions that players make in Elite through the mobile and web interfaces will affect their in-game experience.  The service will be fully integrated into Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and will launch alongside the game on November 8, 2011.

Call of Duty Elite's features and services engage the community in three key ways:  

   * Connect: Call of Duty Elite gives players unprecedented control over their multiplayer experience, transforming it into a true social network. Players can compete against friends, players of similar skill levels and players with similar interests, join groups, join clans, and play in organized tournaments. They can also track the performance, progress and activity of their entire network, both in the game itself, as well as through mobile and web interfaces.  Elite will be an "always on" way for players to connect with the Call of Duty community.
   * Compete: Call of Duty Elite establishes the most exciting, competitive environment in a multiplayer game.  Players will have available a constant stream of events and competitions, tiered to group them with those with similar abilities.  Both in-game and real-world prizes will be rewarded to all skill levels.
   * Improve:  Call of Duty Elite is like having a personal online coach. It provides players with a dynamic strategy guide that tracks their statistics and performances down to the most minute details.  It can show gamers how they stack up against their friends or others in the community. Tools and information are provided so players can learn and up their game.


Carrying forward to future Call of Duty games, Elite will chronicle a player's gameplay history in a cohesive career record, keeping track of every kill, every game and progress.

"Call of Duty Elite has been tailored for Call of Duty's diverse base of players — hardcore gamers, casual weekend warriors and even beginners — and additional features will be revealed when we premiere Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer later this summer," added Hirshberg.  "Over 7 million gamers play Call of Duty online each day logging hundreds of hours of multiplayer per player per year.  Of course, the out of the box Call of Duty multiplayer experience that gamers have come to love and expect will continue as is.  However, for those players looking for more, Call of Duty Elite will supercharge their experience."

Many key features of Call of Duty Elite will be available to Call of Duty players free of charge.  Additionally, for players who want to up their game, Call of Duty Elite will offer a premium membership with a wide range of state-of-the-art services, exclusive entertainment programming and all-inclusive game content for less than the cost of any comparable online entertainment service currently in the market.  

The service will be accessible on a number of platforms -- via web browsers, mobile devices, through game consoles and within the game interface itself -- so that players can connect with Call of Duty Elite whenever and wherever they want.

Call of Duty Elite will launch this fall with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. However, to test the scale of the service, Activision will hold a public beta this summer for Elite with Call of Duty®: Black Ops.  For more information, go to www.callofduty.com.
[...]

Press release ufficiale:
http://investor.activision.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=581875

Sito ufficiale per richiesta inviti alla beta chiusa:
http://www.callofduty.com/elite

===========================

ORIGINAL POST

Activision Blizzard Inc. plans to launch an online service called Call of Duty Elite this fall that will work with the next major edition of the game, "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3," and future installments of the hyper-realistic combat-simulation game. In a move industry executives describe as a first, Activision plans to charge a monthly subscription fee for the service, which will provide extra content that isn't offered on game discs sold in stores, including downloadable map packs that give players new "Call of Duty" levels to play.

Activision executives said they haven't yet figured out how much to charge for the service, but they expect the cost to be less than fees for comparable online-entertainment services, such as a $7.99-a-month Netflix Inc. movie subscription. Portions of the service will be free, including features inspired by Facebook Inc. that will let "Call of Duty" players meet for online gun battles with others who share various affiliations and interests.

Another feature of the service will give "Call of Duty" players tools, modeled on those from stock-trading websites, to analyze their performance within the game, gauging factors such as which weapons have been most successful for them in killing enemies.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304563104576355310423496054.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories

Activision dovrebbe lanciare un servizio "premium" per gli utenti di Call of Duty: in cambio di un canone mensile (pare al di sotto degli 8 dollari) gli abbonati avrebbero accesso a materiale esclusivo non presente sul gioco venduto nei negozi, inclusi dei pacchetti mappe.

[Turrican3]

Da quel che si legge (sempre che venga confermato EDIT: la notizia pare confermata) si direbbe che stiano optando per la strada relativamente più "soft".

Considerato che si potrà continuare tranquillamente a giocare online anche senza pagare il canone, la presenza di mappe nel pacchetto (che per logica immagino disponibili in esclusiva per gli abbonati) mi fa presumere che l'idea sia di attirare almeno all'inizio l'utenza ultra-appassionata, ovvero quelli che oggi non si lasciano scappare nessun map-pack supplementare. Se la formula dovesse risultare di successo si potrà pensare al passo successivo, ovvero un vero e proprio abbonamento in stile MMORPG obbligatorio per il multiplayer online.

Manco a dirlo, è un trend che non mi piace per nulla ma l'industria del videogioco sembra puntare con decisione verso queste (e altre) strade. Staremo a vedere.

[Turrican3]

Activision ha rilasciato la press release ufficiale:
http://investor.activision.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=581875

Sito ufficiale per richiesta inviti alla beta chiusa:
http://www.callofduty.com/elite


Non si parla con precisione dei prezzi ma è confermato che i servizi "premium" saranno a pagamento (ad un prezzo più basso di qualunque altro servizio di intrattenimento online paragonabile attualmente sul mercato recita testualmente la press release), mentre altre funzionalità chiave verranno offerte gratuitamente.

[Turrican3]

Hands-on:

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2011/05/31/hands-on-with-activision-s-elite-call-of-duty-social-network.aspx

[maxam]

Sono contento per loro, se lo meritano, dopo il lavorone che hanno fatto con Black Ops....
Sicuramente correrò subito a fare l'abbonamento.

:ohno:

[Turrican3]

There are three guiding principles that we thought about in building the service.

    GIVING YOU MORE THAN EVER BEFORE (AND TAKING NOTHING AWAY) - With over 30 million online players around the world, the Call of Duty community is too large and diverse to create a one size fits all approach, and Call of Duty Elite must be purely additive to the experience. The Call of Duty "out of the box" experience that our players expect: a great single player campaign, co-op missions, and the deepest and most accessible multiplayer anywhere -- at no additional cost -- remains the same as ever. Our promise to you is this: Elite only adds to the Call of Duty experience. Nothing will be taken away from the experience you know and love. If you want to continue to play Call of Duty as you always have, you will still be able to do just that, including the ability to buy Map Packs ala carte. With Call of Duty Elite, we're adding a new choice for those who want to get even more out of the game. Even haters can play for free.

    THE BEST FREE SERVICE ON THE MARKET - How can we say that this is the best? We believe that the free elements of Call of Duty Elite will be superior to any free service currently on the market because we are offering more features than any other service out there. Additionally, many of Elite's free features which will debut with Modern Warfare 3 are industry firsts and offer a new level of innovation.

    A selection of Elite's free features will let you:

        * Access Elite through the web as well as Elite's free custom iOS and Android applications for smartphones and tablets
        * Communicate any way you want across mobile, console and the web with your friends
        * Track and share thousands of stats with friends - k/d ratios, score-per-minute, win % and loads more, all represented in easy to understand charts and infographics
        * Create your own custom leaderboards to track friendly rivalries - who is moving up and down in your group of friends?
        * Analyze advanced heat maps detailing your match-by-match performance - where you killed or got killed, when it happened, and more
        * Analyze your weapons performance - which weapons you are best with in which situations
        * Upload and share videos of your greatest moments through our exclusive theater mode with the touch of a button
        * After you analyze your performance to your heart's content - Customize your loadout - search through all the weapons, attachments and perks, and push them directly into the game menu from the web or your mobile device with the touch of a button
        * Join dozens of groups and find other players with common interests to play with and compete against - find people who make the game the most fun for you - TDM, Lakers' fans, Weekend Warriors
        * Create a Clan with players who share your interests and taste for competition
        * Bring your Facebook friends right into the game, easily taking your existing network into the Call of Duty experience.
        * Seamlessly be placed into Groups with those who share your affinities and interests based on your Facebook profile.
        * Start tracking your Call of Duty career — everything you wanted to know about your performance across the franchise starting with Black Ops

    And that's just the beginning. The service will continue to evolve and we will continue to add new features.

    A PREMIUM MEMBERSHIP THAT RESETS THE BAR - The premium membership of Call of Duty Elite (which is completely optional) will set a new gold standard for what the multiplayer and community experience for a console game can be. Why are we not revealing all of the features that are part of the premium service today? Simple. Because the service was designed to be deeply integrated with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, and will not be demonstrable until we are closer to the launch of the game. We know seeing is believing, and over the next few months we will be revealing and demonstrating more of the premium features and by the end of the summer, we will reveal the entire service in full.

    The reason we announced the service today was so we could begin recruiting for a free beta with the multiplayer community of Call of Duty: Black Ops, which will allow us to test the service at scale. This is a critical step to us launching the service successfully this fall. So we appreciate your patience.

( estratto della FAQ con alcune delle funzionalità gratuite --> http://www.callofduty.com/elite/features )


Le beta (a numero chiuso, solo per invito) di COD Elite parte il 14 luglio:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-06-06-call-of-duty-elite-public-beta-date

[Turrican3]

Ecco tutti i dettagli del piano di abbonamento Call of Duty Elite, con le differenze tra l'utenza pagante e non:

http://www.callofduty.com/elite/whats-included.html

(tra le cose importanti da segnalare: il canone di abbonamento - 50$ - è annuale, non mensile, e i DLC rimangono comunque in licenza all'acquirente anche dopo la scadenza)

[maxam]

Ero già molto lontano da Call of Duty, con questa notizia hanno definitivamente perso un cliente. Sicuramente.

[Turrican3]

Per me (e non lo penso certo da oggi) stanno tirando troppo la corda.
Il rischio che si spezzi IMHO è più che concreto, ma finchè la gente paga han ragione loro...

[Joe]

Sono folli, davvero. 

[Turrican3]

Venerdì 28 chiude il servizio Call of Duty Elite, verrà rimpiazzato da un'app dedicata.

Qui tutte le FAQ:

http://support.activision.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/Call-of-Duty-Elite-Shutdown-FAQ