How often in life do you get a second chance? If you’re an online Call of Duty player, well, that’s pretty simple – you get one every time you press Square to respawn. But the concepts of return, reinvigoration, and redemption all play into Uprising, the second map pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops II, which is available today on PlayStation Network.

To start, Uprising features four new maps for Black Ops II multiplayer matches:
Vertigo, the top of a Tacitus mega-structure that’s so tall, it breaks the cloud layer; Magma, a small Japanese village that has been engulfed by the lava of a nearby erupting volcano; Encore, the performance stage and surrounding grounds following a London music festival; and Studio, a re-imagining of the Call of Duty: Black Ops Firing Range, offering chaotic combat over several movie sets on a Hollywood backlot.

Studio is a particular point of pride here, as it’s a re-imagining of Firing Range, which fans of the original Black Ops still eagerly choose in multiplayer lobbies. Its compact design and varied lines of sight – sniper perches, blind corners, tight alleyways – make it popular, but thematically, the original level is a bunch of plywood targets, purpose-built for training soldiers. Not only does the level look a lot more colorful now with the addition of crashed spaceships, animatronic dinosaurs, a pirate harbor, and a miniature monster-movie set, but these visual landmarks make it even easier to communicate. When a teammate calls out “there’s two in the pirate cove” or “I’m heading to the saloon,” there’s no confusion in the sitreps. And when you work together as team, you’ll find you don’t need second chances quite so often.

For Mob of the Dead, the question isn’t so much “how often in life do you get a second chance” but “how often in death?” Alcatraz is the setting for this star-studded adventure, as four gangsters – played by Ray Liotta, Michael Madsen, Chazz Palminteri, and Joe Pantoliano – seek to escape one of the world’s most infamous prisons. But as you might expect, the bars and cells aren’t the only things standing in their way. Zombies – the ultimate benefactors of a second chance! — have taken over the island prison, so these wiseguys will have to battle the undead if they’re going to make it out. New perks like the wittily named Electric Cherry offer players some shocking new gameplay mechanics, as does the new Afterlife Mode, which lets interact with your environment and solve puzzles despite having just had your existence expire. But like I said…a second chance is something you should never take for granted.

Uprising is available now on PSN for $14.99, but if you are the owner of a Black Ops II Season Pass, you already own it – just download it from the in-game Store menu.

As the old saying goes, “the revolution will not be televised.” Nonsense – it’s not only on your TV screen, but it will be interactive, too. Revolution, the first DLC pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops II, arrives on PlayStation Network on February 28 – and there’s more inside this collection than you may be expecting.

Revolution offers a heck of a lot of content for both multiplayer and Zombies fans. First up are the four multiplayer maps:

• Hydro: Located in Pakistan, this hydro-electric plant comes complete with a lethal spillway that floods with very little warning.
• Grind: Set in a skate park in Venice Beach (the birthplace of skateboarding!), quarter-pipes and curved surfaces drive players away from easy cover and into intense firefights.
• Downhill: A ski resort in the French Alps, this snowy map is complete with a moving gondola system that can both offer cover and crush you to death.
• Mirage: Located in China’s Gobi Desert, this luxury resort has been ravaged by a sandstorm.

It’s worth noting that Mirage is also the first Black Ops II map where Domination takes place in a triangular flag pattern instead of a linear one – that is, you can run laps around the main hotel (or cut through it) as you try to capture the three flags at three different corners of the map. You may find this changes up your Domination strategies a bit.

As a bonus, Revolution also contains the first downloadable weapon in Call of Duty history. The Peacekeeper SMG has the small form factor of a compact submachine gun, but the range of an assault rifle. It’s actually rated two points higher in range than the longest-range SMG in the game, the MSMC. It’s not the overpowered monster that I think some gamers were afraid it might be, but it will likely become a very popular choice for the short-to-medium range specialists out there. And once you level it up along with the rest of your SMGs, it too can sport gold and diamond camos.

If you are a Zombies fan, Treyarch has some secrets and surprises in store for you, too. Die Rise is an all-new Zombies level that takes place in a shattered skyscraper; one false move might send you right over the edge in a very literal and non-metaphorical sense. The verticality of this level makes it feel unlike other Zombies experiences; you’re constantly finding new places above and below, exploring the rubble, locating parts for buildables, and even finding surprises in the very unsafe elevators. Some of those surprises are good, and some of them…well, just be prepared for anything, okay?

Last but definitely not least, Revolution offers a new way to play Zombies altogether, in the form of a new mode called Turned. Throw out your expectations for a strategic and calculating Zombies experience – this one’s all about adrenaline. Up to four players can join in; one is human, the other three are zombies. The winner of the match is the person who can survive as the human the longest. A Reverse Gun Game weapon loadout means that the human switches from powerful to weaker weapons as their turn continues; whichever zombie player can take out the human becomes the human themselves. It’s very fast, very frantic, and makes a great short experience for those times you want to play but can’t commit to a long gameplay session.

Prepare to have your high expectations met when Revolution arrives on PSN February 28. And look for me in the online lobbies — my PSN ID is OneOfSwords, and I’m the easy target!

If you want to watch it again, I’ll wait. There was a lot to see in there.

Developed by the team at Nihilistic Software, Call of Duty: Black Ops Declassified is what Call of Duty fans have been waiting for: the game they know and love, authentically translated to handheld. “One of Call of Duty: Black Ops Declassified’s compelling features is the fact that you can take the established gameplay everyone knows and loves and bring it to the PS Vita,” says the game’s producer at Activision, Neven Dravinski. That means you can look forward to familiar elements like Create-a-Class, Perks, Prestige Levels, and of course, dual analog stick controls.

Black Ops Declassified’s single-player campaign offers covert missions that help bridge the story gap between the original Call of Duty: Black Ops and the soon to be released Call of Duty: Black Ops II, while the multiplayer offers mayhem for up to eight players over Wi-Fi connections. “We’ll have a variety of game modes and maps, including some that are custom made for PS Vita and others that leverage fan favorites from the Black Ops series, but tailor made for PS Vita,” explains Dravinski. Multiplayer game modes include 4v4 Team Deathmatch, Kill Confirmed, and Drop Zone, but Dravinski says there will be other modes as well.

The dev team is making sure that Declassified takes advantage of key PS Vita features, too. The game will use the touchscreen for melee attacks, and for chucking grenades at your foes, and will even let you share loadouts with your friends via Near technology.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Declassified is due out this November, so you don’t have too long to wait to try it yourself. We’re working on a limited-edition PS Vita hardware bundle that comes with the game as well — keep an eye out for details on that! In the meantime, watch the PlayStation.Blog for more info – a deeper look at the game is coming soon.

Check out all the news coming out of Gamescom 2012 on PlayStation.Blog

Media Molecule’s New Project Revealed: Tearaway for PS Vita

PlayStation All-Stars Gamescom Reveal: Dante, Sackboy, Spike, Ratchet and Clank

Gamescom: New The Last of Us Trailer

Watch the GamesCom Trailer for Killzone: Mercenary

PSone Classics Coming to PS Vita via the latest System Software Update (v1.80)

Until Dawn — New PS Move Horror Game — Announced for PS3

The Curtain is Raised on Puppeteer, a New PS3 Adventure

PlayStation Plus Coming to PS Vita, Online Game Save Storage Getting Upgraded

Are You Ready for the God of War: Ascension Multiplayer Beta?

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Content Collection 1 arrives in the PlayStation Store today, and it brings with it a whole weekend of double XP. This is the biggest DLC collection in franchise history, offering four multiplayer/Survival mode maps – Piazza, Liberation, Overwatch, and Black Box – as well as two all-new Special Ops missions, Black Ice and Negotiator. That kind of content doesn’t just make itself, so I asked Mark Rubin, Executive Producer at Infinity Ward, for some insight into how the studio approaches making add-on content for MW3.

Dan Amrich: Everybody has different tastes in maps. When you put together a collection, are you trying to please different groups of fans with specific maps, or do you try to make every map have something for everyone in it?

Mark Rubin: Any map can come up at any time in any game mode, so we never want to make a map that leaves players thinking “this isn’t for me.” Even when we design a map like Liberation, which snipers enjoy with its long sight-lines, we still create areas for players who enjoy, say, close-quarter combat. The central bridge and underground bunker in Liberation are a great example of this. It’s something for everyone, but we try to really offer something of value to each subset of players.

The locales represented in Collection 1 are literally all over the map – a seaside village in Italy, a swanky neighborhood in California, and the heart of Manhattan. How do you choose where a map will be located, and does that location determine what kind of gameplay works best there?

It’s a brainstorming process. Sometimes we think about the single-player campaign and ask “What’s going on a few blocks over? What’s happening that we aren’t currently seeing?” Other times, it’s dreaming up environments that offer the most tension and danger; it’s hard to beat Overwatch for that in Collection 1 – gun battles on a skyscraper are definitely dangerous. Other times we go for locales we’ve never seen before, or something that the art team wants to try out. I’m really proud of them on this collection; it’s worth stopping and looking around a map like Piazza to appreciate just what a good job all the art teams have been doing. And every now and then, someone will go to a great vacation spot somewhere around the globe and think, “This is gorgeous – and it would be a great CTF arena!”

I know each map goes through a revision process. How long does it take to make a map, generally? And with constant iterations, how do you know when you’re done?

We start a level by prototyping the map geometry. Before we decide on a final theme or setting, it’s more important that we get the level layout locked down – it needs to flow correctly, it needs to offer a lot of interesting engagement points. And that can take several months, with playtesting and polishing. As for how to know when it’s done…it just feels right. When the team agrees, from playing it, that things feel balanced, we know it’s ready.

What makes a map fun?

Player interaction and variety. When you spawn on the map, you want to run into other people – that’s the interaction. Maps with interesting choke points and clear pathways feel very satisfying to most players, because they know they’re going to get into battles in those areas. The tight corridors of Air Force One in Black Box are a good example. Yet elsewhere in Black Box, you have completely different environments – inside fancy mansions, a few construction areas. They look and feel different from the airplane sections, and that’s where variety comes in.

Which map in Collection 1 is your favorite to play, and why?

This is like asking someone to choose between their children, and I won’t fall into that trap. I hope everybody enjoys all four of the multiplayer maps. That’s why we made them.

Infinity Ward, Sledgehammer, and Raven Software all square off in a MW3 lobby. Which studio wins?

Do you even have to ask?

Somehow I knew the answer to that last one. Content Collection 1 is available now in the PlayStation Store for $14.99, and double XP kicks in on Friday – all players, all modes. Enjoy it!

Then you hear the WHUPWHUPWHUP of rotors overhead, and your exquisite view is obscured by smoke from a nearby grenade. Sorry, pal, you’re not on vacation – you’re in the thick of the conflict, because you’re in Piazza, one of the two new Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer maps that are reaching Call of Duty Elite premium members today via the PlayStation Network. Now it’s a little slice of paramilitary paradise.

Piazza is actually going to be a big hit with fans of close-quarters combat; the tiny town features several sharp corners, tight corridors, and dangerous staircases that just beg to be explored with a Striker or P90 in hand.

Is the European coast not your style? Maybe the cold doesn’t bother you – maybe you prefer a brisk walk through New York, taking strength from the bracing temperatures while you enjoy the famous foliage of midtown Manhattan’s Central Park. But again, don’t just look at the skyscrapers – look out for the soldiers who have their MSRs trained on the map’s objectives. You’re in Liberation now, complete with winding paths, underground tunnels, and exposed Domination points. The large scale of the map makes it a playground for assault rifle experts and snipers, especially.

Piazza and Liberation are both available now for Elite premium members. If you’re one of them, all you need to do is select Store from the MW3 multiplayer menu and you’ll be invited to download the new maps for no additional cost – your Elite premium membership includes access to all the maps, modes, and surprises that are coming for the next nine months. If you’re not an Elite premium member, you’ll be able to get these two maps a little later on in the year, but an Elite subscription brings you everything as soon as it’s released on PS3. You can find more info on Call of Duty Elite here.

I need to practice a bit, but then I’ll be giving these two new maps a workout this Friday. Hope you see you online!

While the content season will contain more than 20 items overall – some multiplayer maps, some game modes, and some Spec Ops missions – the first two pieces of content in the season are a Call of Duty player’s bread and butter: multiplayer maps. The seaside village of Piazza is a perfect battleground for fans of close-quarters combat; the sharp corners, tight corridors, and stone staircases all offer compelling examples of why the word “paranoia” is the same in English and Italian.

Liberation offers more room to run, but it’s no less deadly. Enjoy the beautiful foliage, romantic footbridges, and brutal explosions as you attack the enemy centrally located park in Manhattan. Snipers will find their perches, but sneaky players will enjoy the underground passage and ample ambush cover options.

The first two maps will arrive for Call of Duty Elite premium members first on February 28th, with more content to come over the nine months that follow. If you’re an Elite premium member, you’ll get a message at the MW3 multiplayer menu as soon as the content is available to download; from there, just select Store from the multiplayer menu and the downloads will be yours at no additional charge. It’s part of the whole Elite premium package. If you want in, the details are here.

It won’t be long now before we see each other in Italy and New York. Ciao, buddy.

That said, the gap between the masters and the students is not that wide. We’re all playing for the same reason – Call of Duty games are fun, that’s all. I’ll always take an opportunity to learn and improve, but even when I get my ass handed to me online, as long as I enjoy the company of the people I’m playing with, I’m more likely to leave a session laughing, regardless of KDR.

This is where Call of Duty Elite comes in. Not many games have 30 million people playing them, so the idea behind Elite was to give all those players a common ground – a service that would help them connect, compete, and improve. We’re all playing together as it is; let’s play together better.

This summer, some of you may have had a chance to check out the Elite beta, which gave PlayStation 3 players an early taste of the service. The beta only incorporated data from Black Ops, but Elite’s launch date of November 8 – same as Modern Warfare 3 – is no coincidence. The beta was truly just the beginning. Well, before the beginning, if you think about it.

Check your stats. Tweak your loadouts. Analyze heat maps from all the matches you’ve played in the last month and learn what you did right and wrong. See your stats using each weapon in the game and get detailed advice on how to use it better. Track your performance and compare it instantly to that of your friends on custom leaderboards. Create a clan and Join social groups of players with similar interests. I found groups for guitars, juggling, and Ghostbusters; if you don’t see what you’re looking for, you can create your own. (You are hereby invited to join the OneOfSwords group – that one’s mine.)

All that stuff is free. No charge. Thank you for being a Call of Duty player, says Activision. Enjoy this extra stuff.

What’s more, in MW3, Elite is fully integrated into the game. Wanna change your loadout during the day for your big match that night? Just visit the website, change your settings, and it will automatically push to the game, waiting for your next login. Don’t want to use the web? Use your iOS or Android device. Just want to do it all on your console? No problem – there’s a PlayStation 3 downloadable program that you can download and use from directly within MW3. That Elite PS3 application is free. The mobile app is free. The website is free, too.

If you are a dedicated player and you want more from Elite, you can sign up for a premium membership (using the funds in your PlayStation Wallet, of course) to access a ton of extra features – most notably, you’ll get ALL of the MW3 DLC content as soon as it is released on PS3, ready and waiting for you the day it comes out. You’ll also have access to exclusive Elite TV programming to high-stakes competitions for real-world prizes (like iPads, Jeeps, and trips to Paris) to more video storage space to all the MW3 DLC that will be released, ready and waiting for you on the day it’s released. There’s a big chart that goes into all the relevant details here. And if you like what you see, anybody who activates a premium membership before November 13 will receive Founder status, which comes with its own benefits. Plus, you get to say “I was there from the beginning.”

Regardless of how you wind up using Call of Duty Elite, just remember why it’s there: to serve and unite the community of CoD players. Maybe you’re wonderful sniper, maybe you’re terrible flag runner, or maybe you’re simply a work in progress as a player. Call of Duty Elite is here to make your triumphs into celebrations, your losses into educational tools, your performance into prizes, and your opponents into your friends. After all, we all have one big thing in common.

You know, zombies have to take a lot of heat from the living. I mean, is it their fault that they are doomed to roam the earth, lurching from brain to brain in a murderous rampage? They’re doing the best they can with the hand they’ve been dealt.

That’s why I’m asking you, the PS3 community, to welcome some zombies into your home this weekend. The Rezurrection DLC pack comes out today for Call of Duty: Black Ops, and it contains five maps that many will approach as a thrilling first-person horror experience – or maybe, just maybe, it could be a very special chance to connect with the dearly departed.

Four of the maps are a joyous reunion anyway; they’re upgraded and remastered versions of levels first seen in Call of Duty: World at War. There’s Nacht der Untoten, which some see as a desperate standoff in a dilapidated building, but could just be the perfect place for zombie peace talks. In Verruckt, how do you know the asylum isn’t just a nice, padded place for a zombie nap? Shi No Numa takes place in a swamp – a relaxing vacation spot for you to get to know your new friends. And Der Reise is a huge factory – basically, you’re inviting yourself into the zombies’ home. Be a polite guest by not blasting their faces off with a shotgun, huh?

The fifth map is all-new – a trip to the Moon, where you will be forced to interact with your zombie friends in a whole new way. Zero gravity looks like fun, plus you get to play with new toys like the Wave Gun and the Quantum Entanglement Device. Don’t you think your putrefying pals would like to have a turn, too?

My point is, this new batch of content represents a fantastic opportunity for greater understanding. The zombies are making the effort to be your friend – that’s why they’re stumbling directly toward you. They come bearing gifts! Who do you think suggested that Rezurrection include a free Zombies soundtrack and a Moon theme on PS3? And who said “Hey, if you already have the first four maps from the Hardened or Prestige Editions of Black Ops, you can download Moon, the soundtrack, and the theme for free?” That’s right. And think about how you’ve been repaying them for that kindness – with headshots. Splattery, splattery headshots!

Trying to eat your brain is just a zombie’s way of seeking knowledge, direct from the source. Tonight, grab the Rezurrection DLC pack and learn more about zombies — and give the zombies a chance to learn more about you. I think you’ll find that the screeching, lumbering undead are just like you and me; it’s what’s inside that counts. And since they’re zombies, you can easily see their insides.

Annihilation — the third pack of DLC maps for Call of Duty: Black Ops – comes to the PlayStation 3 late tonight after 2am Pacific Time. The DLC offers four new multiplayer arenas and a new jungle-based Zombies survival experience in Shangri-Li. In celebration of the big release, developer Treyarch has deemed that the double XP will flow all weekend long. I’ll be hosting a gameplay session this Friday night to soak some of that up myself, and my favorite game type is Domination. Truth be told, I’m not that good a shot, so objective-based modes like this one let me help the team and keep leveing up even if I’m nowhere near the top of the K/D ratios.

In that spirit, I wanted to offer some tips for the four new maps. I don’t know if we’ll meet up on the same team or on opposite sides of a red dot sight, but I’m willing to take that risk in the name of having fun…

Drive In

I like this map a lot. Snipers perched in the projection room and in the screen will no doubt trade fire over the B flag in the middle of the map, but that also makes them susceptible to backstabs and grenades while they’re preoccupied. If you sneak up behind them, beware their defensive claymores. If you prefer to play defensively yourself, the box office near A is often underutilized as a hiding spot; you’ve got a good view of the flag and the most popular paths for advancing troops, so don’t be afraid to crouch in the ticket booth and guard your flag. Since all three flags fall in a line (more or less), consider Napalm Strike as a killstreak reward; if you drop a bit of linear fire, you can often shut down A & B or B & C and force the opponents to the edges of the map. Oh, and while you’re off to the left side, stop in the arcade and check out the pinball machines for a nice in-joke.

Hazard

This golf course is a sniper’s dream – the gazebo over A and the bridge near C give you clear lines of sight all the way down the fairway. As a result, expect B to be a nightmare to capture, especially since it’s easily attacked from the left or the right side as well. Gas grenades are great defensively at B, so consider a loadout with Tactical Mask to counteract that if you’re trying to capture. Personally, I prefer to try to control A and C and wait it out; sneak a claymore in near the chess table at C to help conceal it, and use the shadows at A to your advantage on defense.

Hangar 18

This level’s flags are spread out in a wide triangle pattern, with the B flag directly under the nose of the SR-71 Blackbird. B is particularly hard to capture because it’s so exposed and can be protected by long-range fire – there’s a building directly above on the A side that’s perfect for someone with a sniper or assault rifle, not to mention the tarped shipping crates that provide both height and cover for guards. But while everybody’s paying attention to the nose of the plane, don’t neglect its engines – flanking from the hangar itself (especially if you lead with a flashbang or concussion) is usually quite effective.

Silo

Silo can be overwhelming, as there are many blind corners and unusual pieces of cover – those cement cylinders, for instance. There’s a fair amount of verticality to the map; it doesn’t immediately look like Kowloon, but with several ladders, staircases, and scaffoldings to climb, it kind of plays like its Russian cousin. Plus, its highs are very high, giving snipers excellent views of B. However, A and C are less open from the most popular sniper perches – each has a tall wall between it and the middle of the map – so load up with shotguns and SMGs and storm them. The best team balance I’ve seen for Domination is two dedicated snipers and four roamers/cappers, working together. You really need teamwork on this one to be effective.

Above all, regardless of what map you play, use your voice! Most Domination games can be aided by simple status reports – every player can act as a scout. If three people took you out at A, say “Three at A” to prepare anybody else on your team. Simple, direct intel like that is always appreciated by teammates who want to work together.

Enjoy the new maps, enjoy this weekend’s double XP, and jump in for my Friday night session if you can; my PSN ID is OneOfSwords.

First Strike was fun. Escalation rocked. But Call of Duty: Black Ops fans want more – they crave new battlegrounds and new experiences. Black Ops developer Treyarch knows this, so they’ve been busy creating another fresh batch of DLC maps: Annihilation. The newest add-on content will be ready for download from the PlayStation Store starting Thursday, July 28th.

Annihilation features four new standard multiplayer arenas – Silo, Hangar 18, Drive-In and Hazard – and the deadly jungle Zombies experience, Shangri-La. “The goals we set were about quality and variety,” says Treyarch’s Online Director, Dan Bunting. “We wanted to make everything feel unique and distinct.”

Annihilation delivers on those goals with five all-new environments:

Drive-In: This one-time American movie paradise once showed war movies; now it’s the location for one. The holes in the screen have been filled with snipers. The popcorn is stale, but they’re still serving up hot lead in the concession stand. “Drive-In is a small map, very fast paced,” says Treyarch’s Online Director, Dan Bunting (the nice bearded man from all those behind-the-scenes videos). “It’s similar to Nuketown in that it’s a fast, close-quarters map.”

Hazard: Ah, the Cuban good life! This swanky golf course features lush greens, oceanic driving ranges, and long-range sniping opportunities straight down its deadly fairway. Never mind getting a hole in one — try not to get lots of holes in you. Those skilled with assault rifles and sniper rifles will enjoy this one.

Silo: If you’ve ever said to yourself, “This is a great map, but what it really needs are missiles launching right next to my ear, so every time I line up to snipe someone, I pee myself instead” – and really, who hasn’t? – this is the map for you. Muddy sloped terrain, a smattering of construction equipment, and a few carefully placed sniper towers make this military outpost a tactical challenge regardless of game type.

Hangar 18: This one’s a tribute to the Groom Lake military base where the government developed the SR-71 Blackbird – or, depending on the conspiracy theories you choose to believe, where they stored a recovered alien spacecraft. Either way, you’ll be in an out of buildings frequently here, not to mention using a multi-million-dollar piece of reconnaissance aircraft for cover. But that’s not the only secret project it’s hiding. “Hangar 18 has a couple of fun easter eggs,” hints Bunting. “I can’t talk about them because it would ruin them.”

Shangri-La: Welcome to the jungle, where the Zombies have taken over an ancient shrine. But be extra careful – the environment’s many hidden tricks and deadly traps can be used against you as easily as your undead enemies. “It’s one of the more creative and clever map designs we’ve got so far,” says Bunting with pride. “The diehard fans are really going to appreciate the story hooks in this one as well.”

Annihilation will be available in the PlayStation Store July 28th — less than two weeks away. And as is the custom, the weekend that follows will offer all players double XP in celebration. See you at the drive-in!