Xbox Living

Halo 3’s long-awaited Mythic Map Pack has finally arrived on Xbox Live — at least, for those who didn’t already get it with the Halo Wars Limited Edition.

The Mythic Map Pack adds three new maps to Halo 3’s multiplayer: Assembly, Orbital and Sandbox. It can be downloaded from the Xbox Live Marketplace for 800 Microsoft Points.

The Mythic pack also contains new achievements that can be earned specifically on the new maps, such as the search for skulls hidden within them.

Online retail giant Amazon has begun selling Xbox Live Arcade titles, along with Microsoft points, from its online store.  Amazon.com launched the new store yesterday in the U.S.

When purchasing Microsoft points or Live Arcade games from the site, Amazon will email you a code to use on Xbox Live in order to download the title.

The advantage of this is that it prevents Microsoft from obtaining your credit card information.  I’ve personally had this problem — where Microsoft billed my credit card when it wasn’t supposed to, and reversing the charges (and getting them to remove my card) took quite a bit of work over the phone.  I’ve vowed never to give my credit card information to Microsoft again, so buying from Amazon gives me an alternative to purchasing points from a physical store… that is, if the service ever comes to Amazon.ca.

A new teaser trailer has arrived for Battlefield: Bad Company 2:

Although the trailer doesn’t show any specific gameplay, it does tell us a bit about the changes in Bad Company 2.  One obvious example is the ability for snipers to operate in prone position.  This was oddly missing from the first Bad Company, although I wonder if this will make snipers too powerful, if they can be even more stealthy.

The trailer also suggests that there may be blood effects as well, since blood is prominently displayed.  The way the knife is used in the trailer is also different from the standard slashing movement in the game — I’m not sure whether this is for show or not, though.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is due out next winter — probably in early 2010.  The 3-map Xbox Live Arcade title Battlefield 1943: Pacific will be out this May to keep us busy until then.

Lionhead’s Peter Molyneux has told Kotaku that the next batch of Fable II DLC will be out this spring.  The new content will be titled See The Future.

“This time we’ve taken a little bit more time on it, it’s a little bit more story driven. … If you’re a real fan of Fable, it answers some of those questions. It’s going to test you a little bit emotionally as well. But I think the real unique thing here is it starts to tease and hint at what it starting to happen in the world of Albion and what is happening in the future.”

This also hints at what’s to come in the next title, the rumored Fable III.

“If you play See the Future you’re going to be getting a flavor at what’s going to be happening.”

I’ll let you know when I find out more about the DLC.

The original Call of Duty seems to be set for re-release.  The game has been sighted online as having been rated and certified for release.

The original Call of Duty was released on PC platforms in 2003 and quickly became a hit.  The game will be appearing on Xbox Live Arcade sometime in the near future, and will also appear on the PlayStation Network.  No release date or official announcement has been made.

The news comes just after Activision and Treyarch have released the first map pack for Call of Duty: World at War, and Infinity Ward have given Modern Warfare 2, the CoD4 sequel, a November 10 release date.

Activision Blizzard and Infinity Ward have announced the release date of their upcoming first-person-shooter, Modern Warfare 2. The game will be released on November 10, 2009.

This is in keeping with the general trend of releasing a Call of Duty title anually, although the game will drop the Call of Duty brand from its name — the title Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 has been shortened.

Modern Warfare 2 is the sequel to Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, the hugely-successful installation that broke the series out of its traditional World War II setting.  Although the series’ fifth game, Call of Duty: World at War returned to WWII, developer Treyarch employed Infinity Ward’s CoD4 game engine to create it.

Modern Warfare will, obviously, return to a modern setting.  Beyond that, little is known about the game’s setting or other new features.