The groups for the ESL European Championship for Quake Live have been announced.
Thirty-two players have been divided into eight groups of four players each. The top two players of each group will advance to the finals taking place off line in early 2010.

Group A
Anton 'Cooller' Singov
Felix 'smoke' Pafel
Karl 'fooki' Johansson
Dan 'zsx' Sanders
Group B
Alexey 'srs/rzr/cypher' Yanushevsky
Fridbjorn 'xrebzy' Davidsen
Alexander 'muZ' Ihrfors
Aaron-Anton John 'VIZARI' Jones

Group C
Marcel 'k1llsen' Paul
Michael 'madix' Hindersson
Romain 'dem0n' Leclercq
Marius 'guard' Ivanauskas
Group D
Kévin 'fnaticMSI.ql strenx' Baeza
Pelle 'fazz' Söderman
Gareth 'GaRpY' Marshall
Geo 'geow' Molenaar

Yesterday the qualification stage has been completed, and we now know the entire list of participants for the IEM European Quake Live Championship.
Half of the players were invited, while the other half had to go through four qualifier cups. Next Wednesday the groups will be announced on ESL TV!

These are the 32 Quake Live European Championship participants:

Invited players
Richard 'noctis' Gansterer
Magnus 'fox' Olsson
Michael 'madix' Hindersson
Benjamin 'calipt' Jakob
Aaron-Anton John 'VIZARI' Jones
Alessandro 'stermy' Avallone
Marcel 'k1llsen' Paul
Kévin 'fnaticMSI.ql strenx' Baeza
Pelle 'fazz' Söderman
Jeffrey 'draven' Debipersad
Alexey 'srs/rzr/cypher' Yanushevsky
Anton 'Cooller' Singov
Sebastian 'Spart1e' Siira
Maciej 'Av3k' Krzykowski
Pierre-Emeric 'l1nkje' Portier
Felix 'smoke' Pafel

After it became known that Modern Warfare 2 was going to be hosted at the i-series, a lot of players and enthusiasts frowned their eyebrows on how this would translate to competitive gaming.
Multiplay has now released the details by which the MW2 tournament will be ran.

The biggest change is the gametype, which is now Capture The Flag instead of the Search & Destroy mode featured in all previous Call of Duty games.

The mappool consists of the following 6 maps:

• Favella
  
• Quarry
  
• Karachi
  
• Highrise
  
• Sub base
  
• Terminal

Activision says you should "expect" paid-for online models such as those in World of Warcraft to make the transition to other games, including Call of Duty.

Activision Blizzard CFO, Thomas Tippl said the following during yesterday's BMO Capital Markets Conference:

Quote

While WoW's model is difficult to replicate, players should expect new monetization models for its other games soon.

It's definitely an aspiration that we see potential in, particularly as we look at different business models to monetize the online gameplay. There's good knowledge exchange happening between the Blizzard folks and our online guys.

We have great experience also on Call of Duty with the success we had on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. A lot of that knowledge is getting actually built into the Battle.Net platform and the design of that.

I think it's been mutually beneficial, and you should expect us to test and ultimately launch additional online monetization models of some of some of our biggest franchises like Call of Duty.

Today Modern Warfare 2 officially launched world-wide.

You can read up on reviews here:

http://ps3.ign.com/articles/104/1043552p1.html
http://www.joystiq.com/2009/11/10/review-call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2/
http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2009/11/10/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2-review-200-hours-down-the-tubes/
http://www.gamearena.com.au/pc/games/title/modern-warfare-2/reviews.php?id=5033868
http://tweakers.net/reviews/1441/1/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2-singleplayer-hype.html (Dutch & SP only)
http://uk.videogames.games.yahoo.com/d1/modern-warfare-2-52c0d1.html
http://www.strategyinformer.com/pc/callofdutymodernwarefare2/review.html
http://cheatcc.com/pc/rev/callofdutymodernwarfare2review2.html
http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/pc/games/158267.Call-of-Duty-Modern-Warfare-2/reviews/134131.Call-of-Duty-Modern-Warfare-2/
http://www.gamearena.com.au/pc/games/title/modern-warfare-2/reviews.php?id=5033868

With only one day to go before we can all enjoy our (pirated?) copy of Modern Warfare 2, the next instalment of the Call of Duty series, the anticipation can't be more extensive.

Retailer Gamestop purposely broke the November 10th street date this weekend, which means a whole lot US citizens are able to buy the game before the official release date, resulting in Modern Warfare 2 footage has spawning all over the internet.

With merely five days to go until MW2 hits the shelves, Infinity Ward has put yet another teaser trailer on the web. By the beats of Eminem we can see a lot more footage from the Single Player, which promises to be a thrilling experience.

Check it out over at the Infinity Ward website for the best quality or bellow for the youtube version:

ESL has announced the format and prize money for the Intel Extreme Masters QL European Championship. The best 32 duellers of Quake Live will battle it out for a total amount of $13,200.

16 players will be invited based on their previous results and another 16 will be selected by four qualifier cups.

Association of Gaming Professionals (in short: AGP) revealed its very own Quake Live duel ranking last night. Similar to the G7 ranking players are ranked on their performances in different tournaments, online cups as well as ladders.

Beginning with the 2009 QuakeCon Masters and Open tourneys and the recent ESL Extreme Masters Dubai international LAN tournaments, the AGP Rankings awarded points based on progression to all participants. QuakeCon, having the most prize money and tournament spots this year, awards more points between the two. In the future, online tournaments will be awarded the third most, following last by Ladders.

Expect complete point breakdown of competitions involved in the next few weeks as well as regional and national rankings based on this same point system.

This is the AGP QL Duel Ranking:

• Shane "rapha" Hendrixson (SK Gaming) - 3.000 Points
  
• Alexej "Cypher" Yanushevsky (serious-gaming) - 1.400 Points
  
• Sebastian "Spart1e" Siira (fnatic) - 1.290 Points
  
• Tim "DaHang" Fogarty (Evil Geniuses) - 820 Points
  
• Magnus "fox" Olsson (mousesports) - 680 Points
  
• Alessandro "stermy" Avallone - 580 Points
  
• Brian "dkt" Flander (compLexity) - 400 Points
  
• Richard "noctis" Gansterer (Vitriolic) - 360 Points
  
• Michael "madix" Hindersson (excello) - 330 Points
  
• Tom "griffin" Wall - 320 Points
  
• Chance "chance" Lacina (Evil Geniuses) - 300 Points
  
• Pär "fazz" Söderman - 300 Points
  
• Pierre-Emeric "l1nkje" Portier (fnatic) - 240 Points
  
• Maciej "av3k" Krzykowksy (serious-gaming) - 210 Points
  
• Marcel "k1llsen" Paul - 210 Points
  
• Anton "Cooller" Singov (mousesports) - 180 Points

Related: http://www.agptour.com/

Infinity Ward has released the PC specs for Modern Warfare 2. We can see a slight increase in requirements compared to CoD4.
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 2.4 GHz or AMD Athlon 64 2800+ processor or any 1.8Ghz Dual Core Processor or better supported
Memory: 512MB RAM (768MB for Windows Vista)
Graphics: NVIDIA Geforce 6600 or better or ATI Radeon 9800Pro or better
Harddrive: 8GB of free hard drive space

With "Internet Connection required for activation" Activision probably wants to lower the amount of pirated copies but this type of activation never has been any problem for people who intend to crack the game.

System Requirements:

OS: Microsoft Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 (Windows 95/98/ME/2000 are unsupported)
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 3.2 GHz or AMD Athlon 64 3200+ processor or better supported
Memory: 1 GB RAM
Graphics: 256 MB NVIDIA GeForce 6600GT or better or ATI Radeon 1600XT or better
DirectX: Microsoft DirectX(R) 9.0c
Hard Drive: 12GB of free hard drive space
Sound: 100% DirectX 9.0c compatible sound card
Internet: Broadband connection required for Multiplayer Connectivity. Internet Connection required for activation.
Co-op/Multiplayer Hosting: To host Co-op or MP matches, a 2Ghz dual-core or better processor is recommended.

Infinity Ward didn't mention recommended requirements though.