Modern Warfare 3 has been out now for four days and Activision is claiming that 6.5 Million copies of the game were sold in the US and UK alone in the first 24 hours – making it the biggest launch of anything entertainment-related, ever [IGN]. Coinciding with those ridiculous sales numbers came loads of critical praise for the title from many of the video game-reviewing outlets giving the game a current score of “89 out of 100” (on Xbox 360) based on 49 critic’s reviews. But the news isn’t all good…

Modern Warfare 3 for Xbox 360 currently holds a User score on Metacritic of “3.1 out of 10” based on nearly 4600 user-submitted reviews to the site.

It’s very sad, that people give a developer credit for lazy work. Half of the sounds, equipment, perks, guns, and only one new attachment are in the game. 80% of the killstreaks are the same. And you always the get the felling “I have done this before”. – “WhitefireWF” 0/10

Welcome to the Madden of fps! Every year they release essentially the same game with a few tweaks and a bit more graphics and tell you that you gotta have it. And just like the Madden series, no matter how few new features there are people will still snap it up. Rent before you buy, make sure you actually want this game! – “The14th” 0/10

The much anticipated Modern Warfare 3 game can only be described as an epic fail to provide its gaming community with anything new. The graphics are brilliant but the mechanics are terrible. The game plays to the gamer who just wants to log on and die 40 times and kill someone 40 times. After the release of BF3 this year you would have thought CoD MW3 would have been inventive… Save your money or buy BF3.… – “Muird418” 3/10

These are just a taste of the type of user reviews being left for MW3 on Metacritic. So what’s the deal? Is the game really that bad? Are these Battlefield 3 fanboys trying to squash the CoD franshise? Or are people finally realizing that Activision has been pushing out essentially the same game for years now?

I’m a fan of the Call of Duty franshise, just jumping into it with the first Modern Warfare and then each subsequent game following it. While I have enjoyed each title and that handfull of new features they bring it hasn’t been hard to see that the game has been running on the same engine for years and with each title you are essentially getting the same multiplayer experience. Sure, they might change up how the leveling-up system works, throw in some new weapons and killstreak perks, and of course new maps, but it’s essentially the same game repackaged and perhaps the CoD fanbase are finally realizing this and refusing to just be happy with the same game sold to them year after year at $60 a pop.

I do believe the release of Battlefield 3 has hurt Call of Duty as well. While both games have their pros and cons I can say personally it’s nice to play a game where the entire point isn’t to rack up a 36-2 kill/death ratio and where spawn camping and camping in general aren’t encouraged just by sheer game play mechanics. Battlefield asks you play a role to support your team and you can earn just as many points distributing ammo, healing teammates, and repairing and piloting vehicles as you can racking up a bunch of kills. You actually feel like part of a team as opposed to just playing a supporting role to the one guy on your team running around like a mad man racking up ridiculous amounts of kills. To put it simply, it’s a nice change of pace to the “run around and shoot everyone” gametype.

Now I’m not saying that Battlefield 3 is the sole reason for MW3’s user review woes, nor that that it should be everyone’s preferred game of the two. Everyone has different tastes and they should play the game that they get the most enjoyment out of, because remember: Video games are supposed to be fun! But perhaps with some pressure from the fan base, Activision will take a hard look at how they rush a CoD title out every single year just because they can know a certain degree they will make bucket-loads of money off it and maybe pump the breaks a little and take some time to inject some innovation and change into a strong franchise that could possibly be seeing their first signs of slipping. Possibly.

Obviously Modern Warfare 3 has sold a ridiculous amount of copies and I’m sure there are plenty of people out there perfectly pleased with the title as this Metacritic score is based off a very small population of people in comparison to how many copies of the game were sold. What do you think the reasons for the low score could be? Are these folks just the vocal minority nit-picking a great game? Or perhaps has the tide turned on Activision and they may no longer be able to get away with releasing “cookie-cutter” titles year after year? Sound off in the comments below!

I’m very excited about this movie. I’ve made no secret of that. This last trailer only proves that, if nothing else, it will be incredible to look at.

It really did give me the chills, though.

I can’t wait.

Red Tails tells the story of the Tuskegee Airmen and comes out January 20th. You can watch the trailer in full-res on Apple’s website.

One thing that Archie comics has never shied away from is tying into current pop culture. Recent happenings like the Obama/Plain meet-up and the ‘Twilite’ parody exemplify this, but never was Archie Comics finger on the pulse of pop culture like it was in the 60’s. You got “The Man From R.I.V.E.R.D.A.L.E.” & The gang forming “The Archies” as a Beatles stand-in among many others. The 60’s pop-parody that has always and will ever be my favorite though is what is now collectively known as Archie’s SuperTeens.

While Archie as Pureheart the Powerful always seems to get the most attention, I’m a Jughead guy myself. So where the be-beanied one makes the super-heroic scene as Captain Hero, I’m always going to be first in the comic shop to pick up a copy. I got my wish in this week’s Jughead Double Digest #175. Does it hold up to my scrutiny or does Captain Hero’s magic fizzle out? Read on my friends!

If you’re going to do a classic superhero parody, you may as well get a creative team who can play it to the hilt, and with Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz, that’s exactly what you get. These guys have worked together on Marvel comics for years and it shows (in a good way). The artwork is dynamic, the dialog is classic, and the bottom line is that the story is just plain fun to read. Above all else, when I read an Archie comic, I want to finish it feeling like I had a good time. “Captain Hero vs. The Rampaging Rebound” delivers on this promise admirably.

The story itself is one of those time honored tales where there are a bunch of disparate yet related threads that tie up nicely into a bow at the end. I don’t want to give away too much, but we’re introduced to the titular Rebound as well as a new heroine to help Captain Hero on his latest adventure. The Big “e” is a familiar face, but a welcome one, and her adventure is just as satisfying as Captain Hero’s own.

The story’s humor is a bit knowing, playing on familiar superhero tropes, but never in such a way that you feel like you need to be a guru of comic knowledge to “get”. The only thing I had a (very) slight issue with is the depiction of Captain Hero’s powers. He seems to be able to transform every part of his body as the situation requires. It’s a little inconsistent from previous “Hero” stories I’ve read, though I’ll admit I haven’t read them all. I just chalked it up to artistic license, and the fact that the SuperTeens have never been wildly consistent to begin with. I would have liked to see a re-use of the beanie dart gun, though.

So the main story is all well and good, but what about the rest of the book? A nice side-dish of Jughead reprints from all over the character’s publishing history like always. In fact, I would love it if the folks at Archie would include a little footnote indicating where the reprints first appeared so I could place them in time a bit better. At any rate, I must reiterate my belief that the Archie series digests are absolutely the most bang for your buck you can get in comics these days. To someone like me who has a limited budget, and I have a choice between 160 pages of Jughead antics and 20-odd pages of the latest Spider-Man? Well, I love ya Spidey, but Jug wins this round!

Jughead Double Digest #175 is available at any retailer worth it’s salt right now, what are you waiting for, go buy it!

Lucasfilm has been kind enough to provide us with another clip of the upcoming episode of The Clone Wars.

This is from the third and penultimate episode in the Umbara arc.

From the press release:

The battle for Umbara continues in “Plan of Dissent,” a new episode of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, airing at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT Friday, November 11th on Cartoon Network.

After the Republic conquers an Umbaran airbase, General Krell orders Rex and his men on towards the heavily fortified capital. Realizing there’s a better plan, several clone troopers disobey orders to carry out a rogue, covert operation.

Takashi Miike, director of Ichi the Killer, Audition, and Visitor Q, is now working on a film adaptation of the popular game series, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. The film, set to release this February in Japan, now has a trailer that surfaced recently and gives us a brief glimpse into Gyakuten Saiban (Ace Attorney). Luckily, Miike seemed to have left incest and torture out of this one….

I am a huge fan of the games, having played and beaten every single one of them and for a while, I have been secretly wishing for something like this to happen. I’m glad Phoenix got representation in Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 and now I’m ecstatic there is a movie chronicling his adventures. Most of the characters seem to be faithfully represented here, everyone from The Judge and Larry Butz to Manfred Von Karma looking a lot like their video game counterparts. Briefly, you can even see an appearance by the police station mascot. (1:01) Awesome. My only little gripes so far is that Maya looks a little older than I remember and where the hell is Detective Gumshoe?! There must be at least a couple Japanese gentlemen of larger stature out there that could fit the role, right? Regardless, I can’t wait to see this movie…

It was an easy choice to pick this week’s Blu-ray when I discovered that Amazon was having a fantastic sale on The Incredible Hulk.

For $10, you can snag the Blu-ray of this underrated Marvel Studios picture and add it into your queue of movies to watch as you gear up for The Avengers next year.

Marvel has done a pretty incredible thing by stringing these movies together and this movie was no less fine than the others, but seemed to receive the least amount of attention.

It also had one of the best Stan Lee cameos in recent memory.

As Bruce Banner, I think Edward Norton worked really well in the part and I’m still confused about exactly why he wasn’t asked to come back for the Avengers. There were rumours that he was in the editing room on this film, working on it until the end. Some might find that annoying, but I think it’s a dedication to craft. The man is a wonderful actor. I’m not upset they replaced him with Mark Ruffalo, though. He is equally fantastic and I can’t wait to see what he does in the Avengers movie.

If you’re going to pick this film up, I would recommend revisiting Ang Lee’s Hulk as well. On Blu-ray it’s even cheaper, coming in at $7.99. I think this film is twice as underrated. It’s a long, slow burn to the action, but it’s such a compelling drama that I can’t help but just love it. It’s also one of the most comic-booky of the comic-book movies, both in editing, visuals and tone. I think with the proper distance people can do a better job of appreciating it. Between the fight sequence with the hulked out dogs and the desert fight, there should be more than enough action, too.

And to anyone who found the story stupid, I think if you’d read the EXACT same story in a comic book, you’d have been on board. For some reason it just didn’t seem palatable to a movie-going audience and I don’t get it.

In what seems a clear response to DC Comics going with Amazon Fire as the exclusive digital distributor for a hundred of their flagship graphic novels, Marvel and Barnes and Noble announced today an arrangement that will bring digital graphic novels to the Nook as soon as next week.

I think the brinksmanship between Marvel and DC on the digital front in the last year or two has been one of the best things for the business in a long, long time.

This is good news for those of us who make a part of our living on eReaders though. More options on eReaders means more people buying eReaders.

From the official press release:

Marvel Digital Graphic Novels Available on NOOK Tablet™
World’s Leading Comic Publisher Teams With Barnes & Noble To Offer
Digital Library of Acclaimed Graphic Novels

New York, NY—November 7, 2011—Marvel Entertainment announced today that the hotly-anticipated NOOK Tablet from Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS) will offer readers access to the greatest graphic novels of all time. Featuring the Avengers, Spider-Man, Wolverine and more of the world’s most popular super heroes, NOOK Tablet launches with a digital library of your favorite Marvel graphic novels—and more of your favorite stories are on the way! NOOK Tablet utilizes the world’s most advanced VividView™ Touchscreen, offering readers a chance to experience the action-packed epics of Marvel graphic novels in Barnes & Noble’s fastest, lightest tablet with the best in HD entertainment.

“This is a huge opportunity for Marvel—and the entire comics medium—to reach a wider audience than ever before thanks to Barnes & Noble’s exciting new NOOK Tablet,” said Peter Phillips, Senior Vice President & General Manager, Marvel Digital Media Group. “Barnes & Noble is committed to offering customers a broad array of Marvel graphic novels, both digitally and through their massive in-store selection, which can only help bring fans into our exciting world of Super Heroes and unparalleled storytelling.”

Users can purchase digital copies of their favorite Marvel graphic novels through NOOK Bookstore™, with a selection including such hits as Civil War, Invincible Iron Man, Captain America, Thor by JMS, Astonishing X-Men, New Avengers, Marvels and more! These graphic novels will also be available on the highly-acclaimed NOOK Color™.

“We’re excited to bring NOOK customers the largest available digital collection of graphic novels from Marvel Entertainment,” said Theresa Horner, Barnes & Noble’s Vice President of Digital Content. “The high resolution of our VividView color touchscreen makes the action virtually jump off the page, and takes graphic novels to a whole new level of entertainment.”

Starting next week, the world’s greatest super heroes, their most acclaimed stories and most powerful graphic novels arrive on NOOK Tablet! Experience NOOK Tablet at any Barnes & Noble bookstore or at www.nook.com

I felt compelled to write a review of this episode of The Walking Dead because I felt like, so far this season, it’s been my favorite and the one that’s come closest to replicating the experience of the comic book. I’m not saying that I want them to just faithfully, mindlessly adapt the comic book, that’s not what I’m saying at all.

Over the years of reading the comic, things happen or are alluded to or are foreshadowed to happen and you just raise your fist in the air and shout, “No!”

That’s what this entire episode was like. Sure, I loved that they’re setting up a whole bunch of stuff from the comic, too, stuff that I love, but this is about an overall feeling of frustrated uneasiness that the comic provided in spades. That entire scene with the zombie in the well (and what happens to half of him) was so terrifyingly creepy and excellent I couldn’t even stand it.

I can’t even stand how much I love that they’re setting so much stuff up, finally, that it feels like for the first time this season things are moving forward in a way they can’t be turned back from. Lori is pregnant. Maggie and Glen are getting together. Is Hershel REALLY storing walkers in the barn?

Jeez, it was so good.

But I also love the X-factors in the episode, also. Will they find the girl? How much of a badass is Daryl? Is Hershel hiding even more than we expect?

I can’t even begin to explain how nerve-wracking this show is to watch if you’re not watching it.

And you really don’t have any excuse to not be watching it, especially since we’re presenting it for FREE with Brewvies and Salt Lake City Weekly every week on the big screen. Seeing this show with a hundred and fifty other drunken fans on the big screen is about the most fun you can have watching the show.

And really, who else choked when they saw Merle in the preview for next week? I think that confirms pretty conclusively that he isn’t The Governor.

Which means that if and when we get the real Governor, he’s going to be a clean slate.

Welcome to the thirty-first Convention Sketch!

We feature a convention sketch here every week. We’ve got a whole pile of our own, but we want to see yours, too. Email us convention sketches you want to show off and let us know what website you’d like credited for it. (bigshinyrobot(at)gmail.com)

Today’s sketch is from my own collection.  Richard Harrison Green once worked for Disney, producing art of Lumiere for Beauty and the Beast and Bernard and Bianca from The Rescuers Down Under.

He drew this gorgeous Belle for me. 

Dragon Ball Z: Level 1.1 hits stores this Tuesday, November 8th. Since this is the first time the original Dragon Ball Z is launching on Blu-ray, Funimation painstakingly restored the series frame by frame (and the results are stunning). Check out my review of Level 1.1 here.

Episodes: Level 1.1 contains episodes 1 – 17 of the original edit of the series (please note that this includes the original edit only, not the Kai version that has already been released on Blu-ray). Given all the audio options you can watch through the episodes at least three different ways. This release does not include the Next Episode previews, but honestly I prefer my anime without these previews so this choice was fine with me.

Audio: You can opt to watch in English or Japanese. If you watched the series on Cartoon Network, then I highly suggest going back and watching it in English again (Let’s face it, Dragon Ball Z’s awesome voice actors are the ones that took dubbing in North America to the next level!). Your options are:

DOLBY TRUE HD: English Dialogue with Japanese Music 5.1

DOLBY TRUE HD: U.S. English Broadcast Version 2.0

Original Japanese Mono: (With or without English subtitles.)

If you want, you can change the audio and subtitles at any time during the episode and check out the differences between the Japanese and English versions. It’s really neat for fans like me who enjoy both the Japanese and English versions of the series! My recommendation: put the English Dialogue with Japanese Music 5.1 on your surround sound system and blast it so your neighbors can hear every epic “Kamehameha!” as if you were with our heroes on the battlefield (they’ll love you for it, I promise.).

Picture: Clear, crisp, and beautifully restored. You can see the grain detail in the color and that’s exactly how it’s supposed to look (if you don’t believe me, try pulling out any anime VHS you’ve got sitting in your closet, this remastered version is so much sharper!). The transfer of 16mm film to 1080p HD has not only preserved the original, director-approved color and classic 4:3 aspect ratio – it has also created a picture that looks much better than when we first saw the series on television in the 1990’s (for anyone who’s curious, Dragon Ball Z first aired in Japan on April 26th, 1989).

For me, it was great to watch this in the classic 4:3 aspect ratio – and it looks fine on today’s HD Televisions (I still have my tube TV for classic console gaming, so I actually tested this theory by playing the disks on both units with my PS3). Your HD TV will automatically letterbox to the proper size and it looks great.

The Bonus/Disk Features include:

The Marathon Feature: Watch all the episodes on each disk seamlessly with just one click! This connects all the episodes together so you can power through each of the two disks. Personally, I recommend this feature be viewed with a group of friends and your favorite beverages and snacks. I had a blast watching disk one in Marathon Mode – I hadn’t sat down and watched the original series from the beginning since it was on Cartoon Network, so this was a pretty epic occasion for me! You still might want to click through each intro/ outro sequence – but this is easily done on a PS3 (or your Blu-Ray player of choice). During Marathon Playback, you can summon up a small menu bar in the left corner of the screen and switch between episodes, audio, and subtitles at any time without having to return to the main menu.

Textless Openings and Closings – a great way to enjoy the art and editing in the intro and outro.

The Remastering Featurette is a neat way to see the painstaking process that these episodes had to undergo in order to be restored to HD quality. The side-by-side comparison of un-restored and re-mastered footage is pretty amazing! Check out this short clip from the Featurette:

Given the to-be-continued style that the Featurette ends in on the blu-ray, it looks like we’ll get a peek at more behind the scenes goodies with each upcoming Level.

Character Profile Card: Each release comes with a collectible character profile card. Level 1.1 comes packaged with Vegeta, and it’s printed with Chris Sabat’s signature and profile as well. It’s a very cool collector’s bonus!

All in all, this set is going to be a must-have for anime collectors out there who will enjoy seeing the series beautifully remastered to HD. I definitely recommend it to fans of the series and to those who need to watch it for the first time – set the disk to Marathon Mode and enjoy!

For more Dragon Ball Z goodness, check out Big Shiny Robot’s recent NYCC 2011 Interview with Chris Sabat, Justin Cook and Sean Schemmel about the Blu-ray, Kai, and more! You can also check out the trailer for the upcoming 1.1 Blu-Ray release on Funimation’s website.