PS3 Fanboy

We hope you're not done playing GTA IV yet, because otherwise you could have a boring week ahead of you. The only release to be found worldwide is Call of Duty 4: GOTY Edition. We highly suspect you already have COD4, but if you don't you may as well take this opportunity to pick it up. We did name it Game Of The Year, after all. Here's the "full release list":

US Games

• Call of Duty 4: GOTY Edition [$10 gift card at Circuit City]
  

EU Games

No new releases

Asian Games

No new releases

Here's some good news for Europe for a change. The Variety Map Pack for Call of Duty 4 has been pulled forward to give it a simultaneous release worldwide. COD4 fans will be able to get their hands on it this Thursday, April 24th. As a result, the double XP weekend has also been brought forward and will commence at 12:01am GMT on Friday and finishing at 11:59pm PDT on Sunday. Because of the time difference, this means an extra 8 hours of double experience.

"Play with Infinity Ward" day is now Friday April 25th and members of the team will be playing between the hours of 11am and 2pm PDT as well as between 5pm and 8pm PDT. Sounds like fun to us, we'll almost certainly be playing. Our only question is, if Konami finally gets their act together and begins the MGO beta on Friday, how do we choose between them? It's going to be a busy weekend.

[Thanks Marc and Wilboss]

Critics really love Call of Duty 4. PS3 Fanboy's choice for GOTY took home the gold as the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences awarded Infinity Ward's shooter its most coveted award.

PS3 fans that don't believe in multiplatform titles may be disappointed to hear that PS3 exclusives did not fare so well with the industry's equivalent of the Academy Awards. Motorstorm is the only game to take home an award, for Best Racing Game.

See a list of PS3-relevant winners, after the cut.

[Via Joystiq]

It's been months since Yahtzee riffed on a PS3 game but today he's given his special attention to PS3 Fanboy's GOTY 2007, Call of Duty 4. Fittingly he seems to quite like it, though he doesn't quite place it among the high echelons of the likes of Portal - and rightly so. As usual his review is dead on.

If you're new to the world of Zero Punctuation and enjoy the above video, then make sure you check out all of his other reviews. We've been watching since he first criticised the Heavenly Sword(s) demo way back in the mists of 2007. Please Yahtzee, if you're reading this, review more PS3 games!

What do you do when you make a Game of the Year-winning title? You make more of it. Call of Duty 4 is getting DLC later this Spring, adding brand new maps for the popular online shooter.

According to the press release, "We've demonstrated our commitment to delivering the best multiplayer experience in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and that continues with our plans for new downloadable content," explains Infinity Ward's Community Manager, Robert Bowling. "We're excited about the new maps, and the added gameplay variety, and we can't wait to wrap things up and get online with everyone."

Considering CoD4 is the best selling game of last year, we're pretty sure the fine folks at Activision are going to have to build another pool of money to swim in once the DLC gets released.

Many have experienced issues playing Call of Duty 4 on PS3. Why? Infinity Ward is reporting that the PS3 online multiplayer is being "slammed" by the incredible demand for the game. In a statement to CVG: "The only real issue is that the servers we're getting hit really hard, especially with the launch in Europe doubling that traffic, just something that requires optimising on the server side and we've been working with the PSN COD4 Server team from the moment it started having issues assisting any way we can to help them get them up to speed faster."

The issue is with the servers, and won't require a patch to the game. The game, which has completely destroyed this blogger's weekend, is an absolute thrill ride that any PS3 owner should experience.

Next Generation got ahold of Infinity Ward president Grant Collier to talk about their upcoming release, Call of Duty 4. Some topics of discussion include an emphasis on fully fleshing out the multiplayer experience, the change of scenery from WWII to modern times, and the reworking of the flow of the game. But loyal CoD fans need not worry that the changes to the franchise have left the hardcore behind. Collier reassures that "for us it's all about opening doors and we're not taking anything away, we're just adding".

However, the Infinity Ward president does admit that opening doors to the Sony's inner workings has been a bit tougher. While Collier can claim a close relationship with the people at Microsoft, he cannot say the same about Sony. "I would really like to have that level of relationship with Sony. We're really pushing for that and it's a personal goal of mine to get there but I think there's very few companies that have that level of relationship with Sony. After we come out with CoD4 I hope that we'll be one of them"

Finally, when asked whether he was worried about competition from other first-person shooters, Collier welcomes the challenge. He also notes that because of the November 5th release date, "on PS3 we're number one"

According to Joystiq, Activision has announced a simultaneous worldwide release for Call of Duty 4 on all platforms (PS3, 360, PC). The highly anticipated shooter from Infinity Ward will be released into the wild on November 5th, just before the start of the insane holiday release rush.

The developers of CoD4 recently confirmed that the PlayStation 3 version runs just as nicely as the other versions, at 60FPS with full anti-aliasing -- something sure to appease fans who have been burnt by certain half-assed ports. Unfortunately, we don't get to participate in the multiplayer beta, but at least we know we're getting a solid version of the game.

Now if they would just teach EA a thing or two about programming on the PS3 ...

On the official Call of Duty 4 message boards, one of the developers behind the sexy looking FPS has recently shot-down the rumor that COD4 on the PS3 would run at a sad Madden-like 30FPS with little to no anti-aliasing, versus the 360 version which has already been confirmed to run at 60FPS with AA.

According to the dev, "Same level of AA between 360/PS3, both @ 60fps. Hate on the PS3 all you want guys, but we've done did it up right for the Sony lovers. Nothing has been 360 footage yet touted as PS3, you crack-heads! I'm not sure whats up with what you guys might have seen at E3, but we do have AA on the PS3."

It's awesome to see Infinity Ward pulling out all the stops and not picking the lazy way out like EA did with their sports games. Plus, they mention that the PS3 will be getting some special COD4 flavored love and that we'll hear about it soon. Hopefully it's something more than lame Sixaxis support, but at this point PS3 fans would be happy just to get a freaking demo or something ...

[Via N4G]