Bad News, Call Of Duty: Vanguard's August Alpha Won't Be On Xbox

This is not what I call a "bad news."

Why is this a bad news again?

@The_New_Butler
It’s no big deal to me, don’t care.
But what it does from also an advertising perspective on tv etc and along with FIFA creates a clever illusion that COD and FIFA are PS4/5 only.
This has worked wonders for Sony in Europe since Xbox lost the advertising rights for both.
That’s one of reasons Sony walks the walk in Europe. And I thought one of the smartest moves Sony made back in the day as they it nicked right from under Microsoft nose.

@Senua
Who cares it’s good news.

One week early is anyone actually bothered by that.

I don't bother playing any early access games nevermind one in which we all know will play exactly the same just on new maps(might not even be new maps lol)

P.s I don't mind cod but we all know it's been pretty much identical for soo long

@The_New_Butler
I think it does a bit.
In the 360 days in the UK, lots were playing COD and FIFA on 360.
Now it’s seems to be playstation. Some just buy PlayStation to play fifa and cod and that’s all mainly, seems crazy to me.
Anyway Xbox showcase tomorrow 6pm UK.

Not fussed. The only time I ever play game demos or betas is when I'm unsure whether or not to buy the game (and I actually realise there is a demo!), or when there is to be a reward for playing the demo that carries over to the full game.

With regards to CoD, I always pre-order the game, but as the only mode that actually interests me is the campaign, and as there is never a demo or beta of that, I have no interest in who gets first dibs.

Let the Playstation have their chav exclusivity for a week.

Doesn’t bother me at all, I’ll only rent it for the campaign anyway. Battlefield 2042 now that’s a game I’m looking more forward to, future setting with modern weapons and vehicles, 128 players on one map. CoD seems to be taking a step back going back to WW2 and offering nothing over BF 2042 aside from campaign and zombies but as we all know it’s the MP that really matters.

@Widey85 completely agree with your statement. I’ve finally convinced a few friends after 7 months of badgering and gloating about game pass. Most only have 1-2 PS5 exclusives and we were cross playing are favorite last generation games. Harder to get my die hard nintendo family out of that though then Sony fans.

I remember when Playstation was the console of weebs, otakus, and D&D basement nerds everywhere. I liked that Playstation. How did it become the XStation 180? Duuude, get a PS5 bruh!

@Fiendish-Beaver Is there even a campaign? I thought they stopped doing campaigns last time.

@Widey85 It's not almost, they do actively stoke the console wars. TBF so does MS at times, but more the social media accounts, and at least one of them got called out for doing so. But that's exactly what "we believe in generations" was all about. It set the fans alight to build their own narrative of what that all actually means, and Sony let that run amuck for months before having to finally reveal that they're really doing cross gen after all, after forcing MS to back down from their own already announced plans to do so. It's just a very classless management team there right now. Between Ryan and Herman "Fiercely Daring" Hulst (because nothing says daring more than a Disney license and not using numbers in sequel titles) PS feels like the real legacy of X360's dudebro era right now. Heck, the whole 3rd party timed exclusive thing was a Matrick trademark.

Though their trouble is they're now facing tons of competition and winning the marketing war is really their only choice because they don't have anything else to compete on. Yeah, people will say their games, but by the sales numbers, less than 16% of their console owners buy even their biggest games. So the people that want the exclusives don't really make up the bulk of PS owners. CoD, GTA, FIFA, Fortnite, etc, do. So the heavy handed marketing to create a narrative that it's the "BEST" console is essential for them.

(LOL, after I wrote that I saw your latest post where you describe your brother that's literally one of the 360 CoD/FIFA dudebros that migrated to PS4..... )

Life is easier when only one console is the toxic one, though. 2 gens ago that was 360. Now it's PS4. Well, and Nintendo, but Nintendo has always had that toxicity baggage with it...

@SplooshDmg LOL, the classic "Game Pass will destroy gaming". I mean yeah, there's some legit concern over the directions it may take, but there's a difference between trepidation about its future effects and this crusader obsession with it.

@Dezzy70 "One week early is anyone actually bothered by that." There's those people who buy the super gold or whatever edition of Assassin's Creed just to play it 2 days early..... Some people are like that. I equate it with the people who yell "FIRST!" on a forum post when they're the first

Correct me if I'm wrong but a few months ago Microsoft paid for scarlet nexus demo to be a week early on xbox systems......

Let's not all act like sony is the only one doing this.

On the subject on beta's, isn't the riders Republic one starting today?

@NEStalgia Yes, Vanguard does have a campaign. It is shown in the trailer, and appears that you will be fighting on 4 fronts. I think the only reason the campaign was dropped last time round was because of Covid. I think it was a one off. Same applies to Battlefield this time round. If they did start work on a campaign, I would imagine that it will resurface at a later date.

@Widey85 I think the angst with 343i isn't so much about them getting the Infinite launch (very badly) wrong. It's that that's not new for them. In fact, I don't believe to date they've had a launch that went right. Reach was the last solid Halo launch, and that was still Bungie. Even MCC that was just a collection of Bungie games launched horribly wrong and they spent, literally, years fixing it.

@SplooshDmg "We respect the competition. We feel there's a place in the market for a console that caters to the kind of player that accepts off-brand mayonnaise. But we want to do something different and keep focusing on world-class experiences for the kind of consumer who buys quality, brand-name mayonnaise with a proven track record of industry leading success."

-Jim "Patrick" Ryan.

"Fiercely daring mayonnaise he means. And in many ways mayonnaise in Japan still matters to us a little. Fierce mayonnaise. Daringly eaten. Sometimes in Japan, too.

-Herman "-san" Hulst

@SplooshDmg Maybe Sakurai eats only that pizza while drinkning only Coca-Cola Zero.

This may be Phil's first Halo, but he was also clearly entirely detached from development until things blew up literally at launch. Maybe he's involved how but it's clearly had years coasting on post-Matrick inertia.

@SplooshDmg What makes Halo Halo is that it's really on tight rails, with occasional "wide linear" arenas as set-pieces, and for the gunplay....well it's basically Destiny 2, because Destiny do is basically just Halo.

The real problem is "true halo" is based on very archaic design that remains fun but doesn't work in a new game. Well, except Sony, they can make wide-linear on rails games and walk away with a lineup of Oscars, Emmy's and Grammys, despite not being films, TV shows, or records....

@SplooshDmg [sounds of Quake running in the background]

@SplooshDmg I commented on the NL 10/10 review that it's funny that with all the modern games, Quake 1 is still the highest rated release of 2021 on all platforms. We could have just stopped the game industry at Quake and we'd still be alright.

@NEStalgia hahahah you've lived too long that actually cracked me up. At what point in time was the playstation console associated with weebs and all that? Ps1, ps2? I do wonder if I may be so frank, through your life which consoles have you owned and mainly used each gen (if you'd be so kind to start at the first ps else I'd feel your reply might be a tad long and I'm not familiar with consoles before then either). And to be clear I'm not asking you about whether you were a fanboy or anything. Also if you feel the answer might be too long don't bother replying. (Or we could have a talk over voice chat if you don't mind because I'm interested in learning more of console gaming's history through a gamers eye, especially one that I feel is quite openminded).

@Cherip-the-Ripper Technically speaking the PS4's first half of it's life was still echoing some of it's weeb-ish history, but I think mid-PS3, and the dawn of Uncharted's success is when the weeb identity of PS started to crumble, through TLoU, and finally the launch of PS4 when the X360 dudebros ran screaming to the console you can share games on.

Haha yeah, my first console goes back to Atari 2600 followed by NES (as my username implies ) I played DK and Metroid on the freaking arcade cabinet first!

I was still on SNES&Genesis/Megadrive when the PS1 launched (and had just been burned by Virtual Boy so I skipped N64.) Then around that time I migrated to PC entirely (thus the Quake, Myst, Doom revivals being such a huge deal to me) But I built up a decent legit PS1 library via emulator (you could read the discs right in a PC - they weren't encrypted.) Plus a real PS2 because PC just couldn't outpower it for any real budget. Eventually I got tired of the PC upgrade cycle and the shift to digital, and bought a PS3 to "replace" my PC. And Wii because it was intriguing and a bit nostalgic to go to Nintendo again. And finally, a 360 despite resisting it at first, because anything third party ran like pure trash on a PS3. Since then I've had mostly everything. X1 was terrible at launch but got it after X1X came out. PS4, Pro, 3DS, WiiU, Switch, Vita, PS5, XSX..... Too much to keep up with really!

@NEStalgia thanks for the detailed response!!!
I just looked up virtual boy and that's wild, the automated google question as well (can it make me blind? Lol), never heard of it but that makes sense.
I also never actually knew consoles back in the day were better hardware wise than pc either.
So you haven't been playing on pc at all since the ps3 days? Don't you feel like you're missing out in that case?

I will be testing this on my PS5 this weekend. But make no mistake, I'll be buying it for my PC, and then possibly Xbox. My PS5 is the red headed step child of my gaming platform trio. The only love it gets are the 5 PS exclusives I enjoy.

I really enjoy COD WWII and so do my friends. We still play it. I'm hoping this will be more of the same, with a great story campaign and some new WWII era maps. Wasn't there a rumor a while back that there may be online co op for the campaign? That would be great.

I'm guessing this isn't a big deal as most people on Xbox sites don't seem to play much COD - perhaps this is a PS franchise mainly as its one of the biggest selling games in history but no one here seems to like it.
Anyway Halo is just around the corner. To be honest the FPS battle these coming months are going to be very interesting. A free Halo vs COD vs Deathloop vs Far Cry 6 vs Battlefield vs Back for Blood (did I miss any?)
Surely only 1 winner?

Good news, kids: you can recreate the Call of Duty alpha experience in your own neighbourhood!

Get yourself an old nerf gun and then walk 50 paces in one direction. Now imagine yourself shooting endlessly recycling badguys for 5 minutes. Turn 90 degrees in one direction and walk another 50 paces. Turn 90 degrees again and walk 25 paces. Imagine yourself shooting some more endless goons for 5 minutes.

Repeat until bored.