Modern Warfare 3 No Longer Part of Popular Culture?

As stated in the textbook MediaMaking popular culture is something (person, place, or thing) that is in mainstream media. A highly anticipated video game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, was released this past November. The video game is a first person shooter that takes the United States Military along with several other militaries worldwide and unleashes world war three in the process. Within 24 hours of release of this game it sold 6.5 million copies in the U.S. and in the UK. It grossed in $400 million in that amount of time. With it surpassing $1billion dollars in 16 days of the initial release date. The previous game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, sold 4.7 million in 24 hours with a confirmed copy of 22 million since its release and the first game, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, in the series sold over 13 million by May of 2009 (Wikipedia).

Before the second game was released a television commercial was made with celebrities to help promote the game. The television commercial included basketball star Kobe Bryant along with late night comedian and talk show host Jimmy Kimmel. Before the third installment of this game that recently came out there was another television commercial involving celebrities. In this commercial it starred actor Sam Worthington and actor/comedian Jonah Hill. What does this show? Well, it uses the revised social learning theory/observational modeling theory, which is actors in mass media are so attractive that audience members want to be like them, therefore actors can influence behavior simply by existing to their attractiveness (Grossberg). Since the game is rated mature, which means you must be 18 or older to purchase the game, so the demographics are from 18 to 35 but parents purchase the video game for children under the age of 17.

This being the third installment the “hype” or expectation of the video game was through the roof. Many consumers were expecting groundbreaking technology, more features, and innovative gameplay. Big companies (magazines and websites) were able to play the game before its release, rate it, and score it on their respective scale. Every company gave it positive reviews and a must buy. When consumers purchased the product, had actually face time with the game they went on a website, and gave their reviews of it. The website is metacritic.com. On that particular website it is broken down into two categories when reviewing a product. Modern Warfare 3 in particular got an 89 out of 100 from the critic side while from the consumer (User) side it got a 3.2 out of 10. What does this mean for the video game? It has to do with the economy and popular culture; where audience are bought and sold, and this relates to both economy and popular culture – the power of the consumer. Audiences have the power and may resist the powerful (Grossberg). The audience of Modern Warfare 3 wants to show the critics and the game company that produced this video game that the same concept, a copy and paste of the old video game, cannot be sold back to the audience. There needs to be more of a change in the product or it will fail and no longer be a part of popular culture.

Though, there never seems to be enough multiplayer videos from the millions of people that have bought this game.  Just take a look at this video from one of the players.  Ending with that, what do you all think?  Should Call of Duty remain as popular culture or should we (the users) make a difference and try to have it erased from popular culture?

References

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. 2011. In Wikipedia. Retrieved December 5, 2011, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty_4:_Modern_Warfare

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. 2011. In Wikipedia. Retrieved December 5, 2011, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty:_Modern_Warfare_2

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 3. 2011. In Wikipedia. Retrieved December 5, 2011, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty:_Modern_Warfare_3

Grossberg, L., Wartella, E., Whitney, D. C. (2006). MediaMaking: Mass media in a popular culture (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, California.

Halloween Costume Contest 2011

Happy Halloween everyone! As this joyous day of candy eating comes to a close and the parties are wrapping up we are going to do our Halloween Costume Contest. So lets get right down to it.

The rules:
1. Like our Facebook page or be a fan already.
2. Submit a photo of yourself wearing a costume from any video game you want.
3. ?????
4. Profit

The Prize:
The winning costume will be announced at the end of the week. The winner will win A $20 Xbox Live game points. Good luck to everyone and we cannot wait to see your submissions.

The History Of Donkey Kong

We’ve always been fascinated with the origins of our most beloved video game characters. However, their history isn’t always a Google search away.

So without further a due we present to you Gil is Munny Origins, a new series that will dive into the past of gaming’s brightest stars and deliver you the hard factual evidence. It may shock you.

Professor Layton’s Long Lost Brother Is A Doctor

I’m a pretty neurotic guy. I’ve got a compulsive and addictive personality which entices me to make mountains out of molehills, dig deeper than I should, and become obsessed rather easily. If I’m drawn into a particular story or brainteaser, you’re not going to get me out of it anytime soon.

That said, Professor Layton I was told would be right up my alley. It’s a simple enough mystery blockaded by numerous puzzles and brainteasers that has a sporadic amount of difficulty. Before I could even begin the game though, an image kept burrowing through my skull.

Remember, I’m neurotic. With neuroticism comes paranoia and with paranoia comes Doctors.

Now I ask you to go to ZocDoc.com. I made it fairly easy for you. Click this sentence.

It’s possible you already found what I’m talking about, but just incase you haven’t…

Questions?

New York Comic Con 2011 – Max Payne 3 First Impressions

Amidst the Chaos that is New York Comic Con, Rockstar Games prepared a very urban, yet chic display for promoting Max Payne 3. Scuttled off into a dark room behind their booth (I’m serious – there were 12 of us total and we were instructed not to videotape or take pictures) we witnessed the first elements of the tech demo.

 I’m not too familiar with Max Payne 3 but it seemed interesting enough as the title screen was just the back of his bald head. Rockstar went through the series for people just like me who really didn’t care about it that much, but it ended up being a good pat-on-the-shoulder talk about bullet time, physics, and other crap.

I do like how they left out the Mark Wahlberg film. Not much to say about that really.

First off, I never expected this much in-depth storytelling from Rockstar. That said, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll be good.

My favorite part about the tech demo? The Rockstar Rep made a point of saying that he was from Hoboken, NJ.

That’s right – He’s a Jersey Boy. I could’ve just left the demo then and been satisfied.

Then it got better .. Much better. The story just blew me away. Max ran out of his apartment with another man being gunned down from the street and a homeless man with a bomb strapped on him randomly came out with a shotgun, and then blew the hell out of everyone in the hallway.

With all the push on the narrative to show that within the demo I was just confused. It seemed fun. We all laughed. Then what is the point of all the in-depth story?

For Gameplay they’ve modernized the game with a cover system straight out of Gears Of War and bullet-time with the added bonus of HD resolution. It looks beautiful, but it feels like nothing new.

Who knows? I’ll pick it up because it isn’t Grand Theft Auto.

Bubble Bobble On Planet Hoth: Snow Bros Thrown Into Obscurity

When Capcom was making glory titles for the Nintendo back in the early 90′s, two princes named Rick and Tom came into the spotlight and quickly disappeared just as fast as they came. Nobody seemed to have the patience for them and it didn’t help that their adventure was also out on a much newer, flashier system (Super Nintendo).

It quickly became forgotten, but in true Nintendo fashion, forgotten fun games become cult classics that people are willing to drop some serious cash on. With limited printings giving it another push, Snow Bros can be seen selling for anywhere upwards to $110. In more of an investigative manner, I wanted to find out why something that appeared so simple could sell for so much hard cash (other than the fact that there were simply not a lot of them).

And after a few seconds it became incredibly clear – it’s Bubble Bobble with snowmen.

There are over 100 floors with bosses splitting up the monotony every 10th floor. The stages themselves are simple enough; gain some power-ups, throw snow at enemies and push them into balls rolling them down the stage, and clear the stage. I have to assume they’re getting the snow from their ever-replenishing bodies, which is actually kind of disgusting if you think about it.

The bosses are impossible though supply that welcoming satisfied feeling once mastering the patterns they throw at you. Playing with two players is a must.

So why would a Bubble Bobble clone be worthy of such praise? Dare I say it – it’s better than Bubble Bobble. It’s Bubble Bobble perfection. Hell – if you like Bubble Bobble, sell it and pick up Snow Bros. The length of the game shouldn’t deter Bubble Bobble fans as they’ve accepted not finishing the game unless they have countless hours of time on their hands.

It’s a gem that is worthy of praise and a must for any Nintendo fan boy lurking amongst us.

-Shaun

Mortal Kombat Reboot In The Works

Hey remember that web series called Mortal Kombat Legacy?  Mortal Kombat is actually getting a reboot from the director, Kevin Tancharoen, of said webisodes.   Nothing yet has been written nor planned except for the fact that it will be made into a feature film.

Kevin Tancharoen had this to say in the LA Times about his reboot of Mortal Kombat.

“my sensibilities lean more toward realism as opposed to the more mythological stuff that Mortal Kombat automatically has. You can expect more of that instinct in the feature version. It will be more realistic and gritty than the last two movies, but also a very big story.”

While the tone will drop the mystical, it will also ramp up the blood – “What took most people by surprise with my shorts, I think, is that you never would think of putting Mortal Kombat in a realistic setting. But I believe it’s a fighting game and it’s meant for that purpose… I want to do it rated R and all the discussions have been for it to be rated R. I want it to be bloody, but in a natural sense and not gratuitous, crazy spurting pools of blood. That takes it to a different level of camp.”

The story will be kept straightforward – It’s like a rule in video games that fighting games have to have extremely convoluted stories. It’s strange, because no one really cares. They just want good fighting mechanics… We’re very adamant that you don’t have to be a fan of the games to understand what’s happening in the movie. It will be an origin story that you can understand completely from the film. Over nine games, the mythology has gotten quite complicated.”