MW2 Stuff...

Look! They're bailing almost as fast as IW bailed on PC players!

I played multiplayer for a while tonight. I played some Special Ops missions on my own and with with my über-player brother, Reibochief. My one brief moment of glory was on my own, running the pit and getting the frackin' 3 Stars at 34.5 secs after like 10 tries. And, no, I'm never going to try and beat that time, thanks. We played Sniper Fi, O Cristo Redemptor, Bodycount, Big Brother, Suspension, Overwatch on Regular. The latter was over in 1 minute and 30 secs; one squad of enemy came out, which I pulverized with the 25mm. Then, an enemy helicopter hovered for a second, and I blew that up with the 25mm; Reibo just sprinted to the destination, and it was all over. After he switched over the W@W Zombie action, Matt64 and I played MW2 TDM for a while. He's really loving his M4A1; meanwhile, I'm switching back and forth a lot between weapons. On the assault rifles, I'm spreading the love between the FAMAS, the SCAR, and the M4A1. I've unlocked the RDS for the most of them, and the silencer on a couple. But, for now, since it's not hardcore, I'm leaving the grenade launcher on all three. On regular TDM, with the aiming reticle, I can do OK with the grenade launcher.

I've noticed that even tho my client-side view has me getting off the first shot, on the killcam it shows me getting shot first a lot. On occasion, it shows me not even getting off a shot. That makes me wonder how good the netcode is on this game. The client-side advantage must be considerable... Aircraft appear a bit overpowered at times. I put an AT4 into the C-130, seemingly without any effect. No one else on the team had a rocket launcher as secondary equipment, unfortunately.

Overall, I'm having a good time with multiplayer -- when I'm playing well. When I'm sucking, not so much. I've noticed that I have my best games on the tighter, urban maps; I had really good games tonight on Afghan (not technically urban, but not a wide open map), Invasion, and Quarry. There's more cover, giving more advantage to holding choke points. On open maps, like Wasteland, I'm everybody's bitch. As soon as I fire my weapon, it seems the entire enemy team trains their guns on me. On to the links:

• The Modern Warfare 2 PC Dedicated server petition has exceeded 200,000 sigs.
• More reviews of MW2: BASHandSlash has an Aussie PC player's review. IGN has a 3-page review. Others, courtesy of Blue's News: Joystiq, Kotaku, MTV Multiplayer, and Strategy Informer.
  
• GameDaily has Spec Ops strategies & tips.
  
• MW2 Spec Ops DLC buzz: BlendGames; Strategy Informer says "there's a chance" for Spec Ops DLC.
  
• The IW forums are apparently melting down worse than ever with connection problems.
  
• MW2 Term of the Day: Fail package: an air-dropped care package that lands on an inaccessible location, like a rooftop, or onto a fellow player. Props to IW forumer xFeerlyssx for the term.