Entertainment Electronics Blog

Despite a tweet sent out suggesting otherwise, Call of Duty Elite is still coming to PC — we just don’t know when.

The service’s first week (it launched alongside Modern Warfare 3 last Tuesday) has hardly been what Activision, Beachhead, and all the rest involved with its creation could have been hoping for. Overwhelming demand resulted in a variety of issues as users found themselves unable to register, log in, or access some of the Founder perks they paid for. To make up for the mess, paying members (including anyone who signs up by the end of the month) will get an additional month of access to Elite on top of the year they paid $49.99 for. Those members are exclusively console players right now, however, as Elite has yet to be made available on PC.

The latest Activision Blizzard investors conference call has revealed World of Warcraft’s subscriber base continues to shrink. Roughly 800,000 subscriptions were lost over a span of about three months, and while that’s a pretty substantial number no matter how you slice it, it’s not as if it’s about to put Blizzard out of business.

In August the company reported WoW had 11.1 million members; that figure has since dropped to 10.3 million, reports GamesIndustry.biz. Blizzard’s CEO Mike Morhaime is happy to note that number is still enough to make it “by far the most popular subscription-based MMO in the world.” It’s also still “one of the most popular online games in China,” a market where the largest number of those 800,000 lost subscriptions came from.

Perhaps you were unaware that Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones were planning to save the world again. A release for Men in Black III was announced last month as May 25, 2012, and now Activision has revealed plans to launch a game around that same time.

Today’s press release promises the game — simply titled Men in Black, at least for now — “will feature action-packed, yet light-hearted gameplay mixed with edge-of-your-seat shooting excitement from the universe’s most elite peacekeeping force.” Activision Publishing executive VP David Oxford expanded upon that by claiming it will be a “genre-bending” experience with Hollywood-level production values.

“More details,” which is to say, any details, will be announced soon along with details on characters. It wasn’t mentioned if Smith and Jones would be voicing their characters of Agents J and K, respectively. Hopefully Rip Torn would also reprise his role if he can take some time away from breaking into banks while intoxicated and armed with a gun.

                          

Taylor Swift will soon be playing in a living room near you. Swift will be making her video game debut this November in “Band Hero.” Due for release in November from Activision for PS2, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii and DS Lite, “Band Hero” is being developed by NeverSoft, makers of the latest “Guitar Hero” games.

Her songs “Love Story” and “You Belong with Me” from her double-platinum album Fearless will be in the game, along with “Picture to Burn” from her self-titled debut record, which has gone quadruple-platinum.

“Anything that encourages people to pick up an instrument and play, I’m fully behind,” she said in a statement. “And I’m really excited about ‘Band Hero,’ because not only are fans getting to play my songs, but I’m actually in the game.”

“There are so many awesome things that go into being in ‘Band Hero,’ like getting to customize my band to look like my touring band, and it’s so cool for people to feel like they are experiencing one of my concerts,” Swift said. “This is one of the closest things out there to going to see me perform!”

Band Hero will use guitar and drum controllers as the Guitar Hero games do. Among the other music acts already announced to be in the game: the Jackson 5, No Doubt, Lily Allen and The All-American Rejects.