VentureBeat

Modern Warfare 2 is universally expected to be the biggest video game of 2009. The game debuted tonight at midnight Eastern time as retailers around the country held midnight events.

The game, part of the Call of Duty franchise but set in the context of modern anti-terrorist combat, is going to create a blast radius. Rival games slotted in the same launch period are likely to be overshadowed by Modern Warfare 2.

The last version of the game, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, launched in 2007 and sold more than 14 million units, giving its developer Infinity Ward and Activision Blizzard one of the most powerful game franchises on the planet. At $60 each, the game has generated more than $840 million at retail, and it got an average review score of 96 out 100. The industry is hoping that Modern Warfare 2 will bring back the sizzle in game sales that have been hurt by the recession. Activsion Blizzard chief executive Bobby Kotick said it may be the biggest entertainment opening of all time, with revenues exceeding the $155 million opening weekend of The Dark Knight. About 10,000 stores opened at midnight.

I’m eagerly awaiting playing this game. I played the first one all the way through and went on to play multiplayer combat for weeks at a time. I got a few dozen levels up in the multiplayer rankings, out of a possible 50. Based on the previews I’ve seen so far, this is likely to be one of my picks for the best game of the year, fighting it out with titles such as Sony’s Uncharted 2: Among Thieves.

The original Modern Warfare game was an intense first-person shooter game where you play the role of American or British special forces soldiers fighting terrorists. The combat is bloody and gritty. Infinity Ward has a knack for creating intensely dramatic combat situations; one of my favorite parts of the last time was a firefight inside a broadcast TV station where flying grenades and shattering glass abounded. The new game has the same kind of intense scenes, such as firefights aboard snowmobiles.

It’s not without controversy, however. We wrote about how Activision Blizzard had to fight to run down pirates who released pirated copies of the game early. And PC gamers are in an uproar because Activision Blizzard has reversed its policy and taken control of game servers itself, rather than allowing game clubs known as clans to run them on their own. Activision Blizzard argues that its own matchmaking system for multiplayer games is easier for players to join and it eliminates rampant cheating in games.

The game also has spurred shock and dismay from people who are offended by the fact that you can take on the role of a terrorist at a certain point in the game.

But gamers will care about the way the game plays. This one includes multiplayer combat with lots of cool perks as you climb up the ranks and fight enemies on 17 new maps. The single-player campaign takes place five years after the last game and you’re after a Russian terrorist. The battles take place in Russia, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan and Brazil. The game is available on the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

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