Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

[Shawn Zipay]

Valve and Activision have announced that Modern Warfare 2 will make extensive use of Valve's Steamworks. This applies to all PC versions of the title, be it purchased through Steam or retail outlets.

All PC versions of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 will be powered by Steamworks, providing gamers with auto-updating, anti-cheat technology, Steam Achievements, and the recently introduced Steam Cloud.

"Steamworks will make it possible for us to have a closer connection to our fans, and enable us to support our community much more than ever before," said Robert Bowling, creative strategist, Infinity Ward. "Steam is the hands down leader in offering a community focused experience on PC and the inclusion of Steamworks has allowed us to deliver the most feature-rich PC version to ever come from Infinity Ward, which at the end of the day will mean the most to our fans."

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 for PC will include 50 Steam Achievements, enticing players to train a local militia and be "Back in the Saddle" or infiltrate the snowy mountain side base and earn the "Cold Shoulder." Fans may access the game from any computer. And through Steam Cloud, multiplayer game progress will be stored persistently and travel with the player.

"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 may be one of the biggest releases in video game history," said Gabe Newell, president and co-founder of Valve. "Having a game as significant as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 using the suite of back-end services in Steamworks is a signal to us that we're making the right kinds of choices for triple-A developers like Infinity Ward."

Modern Warfare 2 can be picked up for $59.99 (USD) through Steam. It will be unlocked on November 13th.

[Rogue Warrior]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

So does this mean SteamWorks is sponsoring the DLC, and it's free for PC?

[Micster]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

Sounds like a step in the right direction.

[RangerXML]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

So does this mean stats will be stored remotely like BF2? I hope so, it was a pain to keep to PCs synced since I played at home and at work.

[ch3ch3n]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

I just hope that you can activate the game whit retail key because i m not going to download 16 gigs. Not only will it take to long but the amount of ppl that are going to download it it may take 1 year to finish the download xD

[Stev0esque]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

Sounds better now. Im pissed off with the lack of dedi servers, but looks like its SP and possibly Coop Spec-ops.

[RangerXML]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

I just hope that you can activate the game whit retail key because i m not going to download 16 gigs. Not only will it take to long but the amount of ppl that are going to download it it may take 1 year to finish the download xD

LOL same here. I'm setting up remote desktop so that when the unlock the game and it arrives I should be able to activate it. Wanna see if I can add the retail to Steam.

I still wanna rebuy COD4 for Steam so I don't have to deal with the hard copy, but not willing to spend $40.

[Keyelite]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

It's still very unfriendly for competition. Promod had little tweaks everywhere, from removing all the graphical junk, to tweaking the bomb plant/diffuse time, to removing weapons, fixing the weapon sway, fixing the sniper rifles, putting limitations on classes, removing the "cook" feature from the nades, etc.

Unless the IW devs make a 'playlist' for that, chances are there will be NO competition except for TWL and MLG... the laughing stock of serious competition leagues.

[[Expletive Deleted]]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

I never really understood why competition couldn't occur with the stock game...
It would be just as fair to everyone, if everyone had the same options and limitations, either way.

Grenade cooking is balanced in its own right. While you cook a grenade, you're essentially helpless.
The "graphical junk" is all up to config options that all players have access to.
"Removing weapons?" Why is that even needed if anyone can choose any weapon?
"Fixing weapon sway," and "fixing the sniper rifles?" If everyone has the same sway and rifles, what really needs fixing?

To me it always seemed like telling basketball players which shoes they were allowed to wear: pointless.

[Mavrik347]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

allowed us to deliver the most feature-rich PC version to ever come from Infinity Ward, which at the end of the day will mean the most to our fans."

Wrong. What matters most at the end of the day is that it plays well and is balanced. You think COD4 is still going because it is feature rich with matchmaking, co-op, spec ops modes and all sorts of other random gizmo's?

We need a new PR guy for PC.

[imported_ATM743]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

i can give a **** less about integration with steam. o boy steam achivments now i feel closer to my xbox 360 pals ........

dont get my wrong i Love me some steam, but i the lack dedicated servers = me not buying the game. they can give me a free game of choose if i bought this game and i still would not buy it.

[Nedzz]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

You people need to get on the right side of this.With out mods there is no competive play .Anyone can walk around with a noobtube and think there a competive player.
If we all stand for what the pc player wants this will not happen again
So pick a side if you buy this game you not a competive player and just like to play a game they make,if you dont you asking for better and demanding people like IW to listin to there base and not the small few

[CptainCrunch]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

You people need to get on the right side of this.With out mods there is no competitive play .Anyone can walk around with a noobtube and think there a competive player.
If we all stand for what the pc player wants this will not happen again
So pick a side if you buy this game you not a competitive player and just like to play a game they make,if you don't you asking for better and demanding people like IW to listin to there base and not the small few

I'm not a competitive player. Its that mentality that turns people away from gaming. I'm a gamer. I play games. I like to also play with friends and/or clans. If someone can only use one specific way to kill me, then I better learn to adapt, or leave the server I am on. PC is the small few. Competitive players are smaller still.

As much as I do not want to see competitive play get hurt, because I believe we should have the choice to be competitive, the fact is that competitive play is a very small percent. Go to any league and look at the numbers yourself and you will see thousands of active people. Thats right, thousands, when there are MILLIONS of gamers.

Actually, if you all want the truth, I am for BOTH ways being implemented. The average person wants to have their own server up to do things with and I think thats a great idea. However, the average person does not have the computer or bandwidth to make the game a large scale and fun experience. Thats where dedicated servers come in.

I don't mind not having punkbuster because I believe it is now an outdated technology that has many flaws and most people do not fully understand it or how it really works. Fewer still do not implement it correctly on their servers. I know this, because I admined my own servers and learned punkbuster and set up streaming and devar/md5 checks and screen shots and auto updates and console messaging and so on...

This is what irritates me. Dedicated servers can just as easily link into IWnet as well as our own copies, yet its a no. There is no good reason for that that anyone can explain to me for not having dedicated server files. None. Try if you like, I will shoot down your reason with logic and rationality.

This is my opinion personally. I don't expect everyone to agree with it. Thats OK, there is nothing wrong with that. I think its a big problem to lose dedicated servers and admins. That does not make a community.

To try to blame this on piracy or someone buying the game anyway is fallacy. This is a corporate decision by Activision for whatever reason they have. Maybe charging DLC, maybe to make producing the game easier, maybe because of the purchase of Blizzard and how they manage on their games via Xnet setups.

I think the game is doomed the way it is, but I am going to try it out and report back and we will see what happens. Every game that did not have good community support did not last and that will be the end of it for this one as well and IW will know it when the PC sales are down and DLC sales for PC are nothing and MW3 has no one buying it.

Crunch

[iQue]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

I never really understood why competition couldn't occur with the stock game...
It would be just as fair to everyone, if everyone had the same options and limitations, either way.

Grenade cooking is balanced in its own right. While you cook a grenade, you're essentially helpless.
The "graphical junk" is all up to config options that all players have access to.
"Removing weapons?" Why is that even needed if anyone can choose any weapon?
"Fixing weapon sway," and "fixing the sniper rifles?" If everyone has the same sway and rifles, what really needs fixing?

To me it always seemed like telling basketball players which shoes they were allowed to wear: pointless.

All the popular competition mods for CoD4 (early on PAM4, later Promod) didn't only balance the game, they included vital competition features like warmup time and advanced spectator options for shoutcasters.

And really, the community tried playing with the vanilla game in the beginning with all perks and weapons but it really influenced the game in a bad way. LMGs are way too powerful for spamming through walls, RPG's have a huge splash damage radius and 3x nades promotes spam instead of actually using your weapons. Dead silence is very cheap for a game mode that relies on stealth, juggernaut yet breaks the balance. You want a teams skill make them win, not their perk layout.

Pretty much all games played competitively has promods. Even games that are very competitive in nature like Quake has promods (cpma, osp and q4max). MW2 especially needs one.

[*FMJ*Power]

Re: Steamworks Integration with Modern Warfare 2 Announced

What a great way to absolutely destroy the resale community......you wont ever see a used copy of MW2 for sale because once you tie the serial number to your steam account there's no way to undo it............these guys are just slapping the PC community in the face over and over........