Gallery: New screens of Activision's Call of Duty Elite service, plus US pricing more details on what's free, and what's premium.
We're pretty much over the Call of Duty franchise, but ironically, we really like the look of the upcoming Call of Duty Elite service. We were initially pretty dirty on it, but to be honest, that was an unfair knee-jerk. After seeing it in action at E3 recently, we actually wish more games would offer this kind of in-depth stat-tracking and match-making.
Activision's now released a mess of media on the service, including screens and a behind the scenes trailer, as well as some new info. Probably the most interesting thing is that pricing - at least US pricing - info has also been released. While the base service is and always has been free, the Premium service will require an annual $49.95 subscription.
Here's the Free feature-set:
Performance tracking, custom leaderboards, support for Clans and the ability to create custom Groups within the service, enabling users to identify and play with like-minded players. All Elite users may also browse the Call of Duty Theater for high-definition programming, or upload their own media to Elite. Players can also access detailed strategy guides to help shape their game. In addition, the free component allows for custom class creation via a range of mobile apps for smartphones and tablet, and the opportunity to meet and invite Facebook and Elite friends to battle in-game.
And here's the Premium details:
Modern Warfare 3 DLC, including all the MW3 map packs, with twenty pieces of new content that will be made available to Elite premium members on a monthly basis during the 9-month DLC season (Map Packs still remain available a la carte). With the premium membership, you will get tons of new content, and get MW3 DLC first and it’s yours to keep. New features include the ability to level up a Clan with competitions and Clan Operations available exclusively to premium members. In addition, premium members can also compete for real-world prizing daily (including iPads, LCD TVs, Jeeps, etc.) via an expanded list of Operations, official leagues and events, only available to premium users. The highly-anticipated Call of Duty Elite TV will deliver premium episodic video content and exclusive entertainment crafted by top Hollywood talent (Will Arnett, Jason Bateman and Executive producers Ridley and Tony Scott) for premium users, while members can also upload more and have 8x HD video capacity than free users.
This is all straight from the release. Have a click through the gallery to see more details, and see what Elite will look like on mobile devices. All these shots are on from the console version of the service, by the way. It's coming to PC too, but we've not heard anything specific about that. Yet...
Issue: 137 | June, 2012