Mapathetic

Infinity Ward/Activision’s Stimulus Package is a lot like President Obama’s Stimulus Package.  It hasn’t really created any jobs (in fact, Infinity Ward is dissolving rapidly), and it turned out to be a huge waste of money…

It’s nice that Infinity Ward wanted to bring back some fan favorites from the original Modern Warfare, but are they really worth it?  My reasoning is this:  Call of Duty World at War’s Map Pack seach came with 3 new multiplayer maps, along with a new Nazi Zombie campaign.  I call it a “campaign” because thought actually went into creating a story progression for each new setting, along with new perks and weapons.

So, the established price for Map Packs was $10 for four maps.  Plus, Treyarch provided the excellently reimagined “Makin Day” map for Free.  Yes, I said free!

Given The Stimulus Package’s massive success so far (over 2.5 million units sold on Xbox 360 alone), there may actually be another map pack for Modern Warfare 2 (hopefully a more generous, or at least more affordable one).  With the history of the Modern Warfare franchise, which saw only one Map Pack for Call of Duty 4, things become questionable.  Add to that the continuing dissolution of Infinity Ward, and you must ask how good any subsequent map pack will be.

Now, I will finally get to the point of this whole article, which is what Activision should have done with the stimulus package.  It’s something that’s been done for a couple years now with music/rhythm games.  The import fee.

Pay a small fee, and you can play all the Call of Duty 4 maps (including the Variety Map Pack) in Modern Warfare 2.   Maps could be ripped from the COD4 disc to the HDD, or charge a bit extra for direct download from Xbox LIVE or Playstation Network, etc.  This would drive retail and digital sales of Call of Duty 4, along with sales of the older Variety Map Pack.

Not to mention that this could persuade holdouts still playing COD4 to make the jump to Modern Warfare 2, selling even more copies of their record-breaking title.  With very little effort, Activision and Infinity Ward could almost double the number of maps available in MW2, and garner some much needed public opinion.

Note that I have not purchased or played the Stimulus Package Map Pack, and I don’t currently plan to. My opinion of it’s worth may change if I could evaluate them.  It would be nice to see multi-player  map packs start coming with time limited demos, similar to Age of Booty, which let you play for a set number of hours to get a feel for the maps, and whether you want to buy them.

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