Rezurrection is available now for Xbox 360.  Release dates are still pending for PS3 and PC.  Here’s some delightfully vanilla press info directed from the mouth of Activision:

ONE GIANT LEAP FOR ZOMBIE-KIND ON THE MOON: ACTIVISION AND TREYARCH LAUNCH CALL OF DUTY®: BLACK OPS REZURRECTION
TO ERADICATE THE INFESTATION

The Undead Onslaught Culminates With the All-New Level “Moon,” Four Remastered Classic Zombies Maps, Enhanced Zombies Soundtrack and New Zombies Theme

Santa Monica, CA – August 23, 2011 – Call of Duty® gamers leave earth’s atmosphere today with the release of Rezurrection, the fourth downloadable content pack on Xbox 360® for the best-selling first-person-shooter title, Call of Duty®: Black Ops. Rezurrection’s stellar payload features the never-before-seen Zombie frag-fest Moon, as well as four re-mastered levels from Zombies past, an enhanced Zombies soundtrack and new Moon theme.

Moon features outrageous new weapons, futuristic gear and hordes of low-gravity undead beasts, delivering Black Ops’ most expansive, visceral, and otherworldly Zombies experience yet. Meanwhile, bolstered with the firepower and visual splendor of Black Ops, players can relive the nightmare of “Nacht der Üntoten,” escape the Zombie madness in the asylum of “Verrückt,” battle back the undead Imperial Army of “Shi No Numa,” and pull the plug on “Der Riese,” the zombie factory that started it all.

“Our Zombies fans are so incredibly engaged with us in the ongoing development of the franchise, and we’re excited to deliver them our first all-Zombies content package,” said Treyarch Studio Head, Mark Lamia. “Rezurrection is Zombies nirvana, with four of our best Zombies experiences, topped off with the awesome, all-new level Moon.”

Once Rezurrection is downloaded, Black Ops will make available a free Zombies soundtrack with three tracks never before available for purchase, and a free Moon theme. For our fans who purchased the Black Ops Hardened or Prestige Editions and have already downloaded the Classic Zombie pack with re-mastered maps, the pack can be redownloaded to get Rezurrection with Moon; and Black Ops will make available the soundtrack and theme for free.

Additionally, the team at Treyarch has once again partnered with avid Call of Duty fans and rock superstars, Avenged Sevenfold, to feature their classic track, Nightmare, in the “Moon” level of the Rezurrection map pack.

To mark the release of Rezurrection and help kick off the first ever Call of Duty fan celebration, Call of Duty XP, this September 2-3, the team will host Double XP over the Labor Day holiday weekend from Friday, September 2 through Monday, September 5th.

Developed by Treyarch and published by Activision Publishing, Inc.(NASDAQ: ATVI), Call of Duty: Black Ops is rated “M” (Mature) by the ESRB for Blood and Gore, Intense Violence and Strong Language.  Call of Duty: Black Ops Rezurrection is available first on Xbox LIVE® Marketplace for the Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft for 1200 Microsoft Points. Players who purchased the Call of Duty: Black Ops Hardened or Prestige Editions can download Rezurrection in its entirety for free. Free with the purchase of Rezurrection, the Zombie soundtrack and Moon theme must be downloaded separately. For full details on download options and instructions please visit http://www.callofduty.com/intel/492 for complete instructions.

For additional Call of Duty updates and information, visit us on the web at www.callofduty.com/blackops, www.facebook.com/codblackops, and also via Twitter @Treyarch.

You can expect a review of Killzone 3 to be forthcoming.

The most common phrase thrown around to describe the gameplay in Deathly Hallows is “Gears of Wands”. That’s right the news Harry Potter game is a third person shooter in the vein of Gears of War. You play as Harry, obviously, and you Ron and Hermione play through the entire storyline of the movie on which the game is based. Despite always having multiple characters in the action at all times, The Deathly Hallows doesn’t have co-op support in the Single Player campaign and zero online co-op either. This more of a note than a problem.

Most of the games settings are overtly recycled to the point of absurdity. Each time Harry and friends enter a new level, they blast their way through the linear path way to reach the goal. Once the goal is reached they have to turnaround and work their way back out, down the exact same path they used to get in. This would be ok if it happened once or twice or even if it made contextual sense, but it is done on every level of the game, often without any grounding in the story on which the game is based. The game could have benefited from being shorter, and that’s one of the principle factors working against its length.

Harry’s wand spells, are all variations of common shooter weapons. “Stupefy” is a pistol, “Confringo” is a charge shot/rocket launcher, the lazily named “Exploding Potion” is a grenade, “Wingardium Leviosa” is the gravity gun, and “Expulso” is an assault rifle. There’s many others, but in all actuality, outside of a few obstacles, the game can be largely beaten while only using the Stupefy spell. The left trigger locks on targets, but it can be largely unpredictable at times, especially when Harry is attempting and failing to hide behind cover.

Oh did I not mention that its also cover based? However, again, the whole game can be easily completed on normal difficulty without ever going into cover. In fact, trying to properly use cover makes the game harder. It makes aiming harder, and with 8 angry wizards flinging spells at you all at once the destructable hay bails and boulders disappear all too quickly. Also, the game doesn’t make it clear just what objects are acceptable to use as cover. You’ll find yourself slamming on the “duck behind cover” button alot with no response from your character, which leads to many quick deaths. Instead, don’t hide, just keep moving aim for the head and Stupefy everything you see.

By everything, I mean wizards, and…well that’s about it. There are other enemies, but the wizards are really the only ones that pose a threat. The spiders and skeletons can be easily dodged, and the Walloping Willows, will hit you, but if you keep running, you won’t die. The boss fight’s are uninspired and are usually just Harry shooting the same wizards over and over.

It takes a while to get used to the controls, not because they are mapped strangely but because they are clumsy and less responsive than other 3rd person action games. The lock on function works for quick spells, but with any of the charged spells you run the risk of enemies stepping 1 foot to the left and dodging your magic bullet.

The graphics are alarmingly ugly and I swear if I never hear Harry Potter scream “Stupefy!” again, I will die a happy man. The spells aren’t chanted every-time you use them, but they are said enough times that they become very obnoxious very quickly. Even my wife complained about the voice-work and she wasn’t even playing the game.

Have we not reached a point in modern gaming where camera issues are a thing of the past? The camera, like in most 3rd person action games is mapped to the right thumb stick, while still trying to stick close to just over Harry’s right shoulder. This works extremely well in most games, but here, not only is the camera unpredictable, often times, it just doesn’t go where you point it. Any level with tight quarters is going to be a erractic ride, just because you can’t trust the camera to not get stuck on things.

If Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 has a bright spot (and I stress “if”) it would have to be the Kinect support. As you’ll undoubtedly see in my video, the Kinect missions are separate from the normal game and are buildt in the already rendered environments of the single player campaign. These missions are either single player or co-op and are played entirely using the Kinect Sensor. The missions play out much like an on-rail shooter, with Harry and friends traveling on a predetermined path populated with snatchers and wizards.

The spells you use are mapped to different arm motions. Each of the motions end with you pointing at the Kinect Sensor. The spells have the same characteristics they do in story mode, but you’re limited to doing 2 spells in each mission. The magic shooting from your wand is roughly traveling in the same direction you are aiming. Aiming doesn’t work too well, but accuracy is obviously not the focus in the Kinect missions. The focus is getting the arm motions right and launching your spells quickly. While not perfect, the Kinect support is a charming addition to package.

Being a wizard isn’t cool. Using a wand and spitting magic out of it isn’t cool. Harry Potter as a character isn’t cool. However, the magic of Hollywood has done a good job of covering this up by taking a compelling story and sprinkling in just enough magic to not remind you that the whole concept of wand welding is kinda dumb. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 the video game does the exact opposite of this. It exposes the source material to its own flaws that its been pretty good at hiding all along.

In conclusion, it would have been smarter for EA to chop off the Kinect support, and release it separately as a stand alone downloadable XBLA game for $15. Your Harry Potter nuts are still going to pay $60 for the story mode on disc, but a $15 dollar price point on a “not terrible” Kinect minigame this soon after the Kinect launch would have raked in piles and piles of green from the casual Potter fans looking to get a little more use from their brand new Kinect sensor. Trying to bank on a on box blurb to push additional sales of a $60 retail game (especially after the consumer just spent $150 on Kinect) is weak at best.

Verdict: Buy this game in 2 years for $7 after the Kinect crash of 2011, and have a good laugh about how Kinect was supposed to the “future” of gaming.

5 years, yeah its only been 5 years since Activision released Guitar Hero and changed the landscape of rhythm gaming as we know it.  Since then, all hell has broken loose and everyone has their finger in the rhythm game pie.  Harmonix (creators of Guitar Hero) broke off and made Rock Band, Konami tried their hand at it with Rock Revolution and Activision has produced the spin off series DJ Hero.  All in all the rhythm game genre has seen massive growth.

In the 5 years since the original Guitar Hero, there have been a total of 14 Guitar Hero games (not including the myriad of portable titles), 6 Rock Band games (not including the portables and the 6 track packs) and 2 DJ Hero games.  The problem is that saturation happened much too quickly and the general public’s tolerance for plastic instruments piling up in their home is wearing thin.  2009 was the most egregious year for GH games with 5 different disc based console GH games being released.  Both sales and profits significantly dropped last year.  Activision has apparently learned their lesson and scaled the releases in 2010 down to 2, DJ Hero 2 and Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock.

Neversoft the most recent developers of GH were again responsible for creating this year’s installment.  They’ve been the chief dev team on Guitar Hero since Guitar Hero III: Legend of Rock.  They’ve handled the 360 and PS3 versions, while Vicarious Visions cranked out the Wii installments.  In contrast to last year’s attempt to gain new players across the board with Band Hero, and Guitar Hero 5, Warriors of Rock caters specifically to the audience that made Guitar Hero III such a phenomenon.

The songs are harder and more guitar centric and the art style leans very heavily in the direction Legends of Rock took.  The visual tone is one of demons and metal gods, pretty much what you would find on the cover of a speed metal album from the 80’s.  Just like in GH3 that art style has its charm, and quirk but that style has been integrated into the all new story mode of the game in a way that will turn a lot of people off.

Most of what you will see in Warriors of Rock is standard fair, but the all new “Quest Mode” is the crux of this release.  Quest mode replaces the standard career mode seen in previous GHs and is narrated by Gene Simmons.  His haunting voice fits the game well, but his tendency to over-pronounce his words makes it obvious that he is not a professional voice actor.  In “Quest Mode” the player assumes the roles of several Guitar Hero characters, I.E. Johnny Napalm, Pandora, Lars Ümlaüt, etc. and earns stars by playing songs.  Once a predetermined number of stars are reached the character transforms into a warrior and his/her character model gets a drastic metal-fide makeover.  Each character also gets special game effecting power and the player moves onto the next rocker.

Once all the characters are transformed, the player must use them to free the Demi-God of Rock that has been imprisoned by “The Beast”. Where this “Demi-God” fits in the canon between the God of Rock and Lou (The Devil) is unknown, but its clear that to beat the game you must free him.  If you are still interested in this I suggest you just play the game.   In all actuality the Quest Mode isn’t bad its just completely disposable and sometimes gets in the way of just playing the game.  It adds a little bit of non-linear gameplay to the mix, but the structure to the progression isn’t different from what was seen in GH5.

By dropping the number from the name Activision is turning more attention towards the Quest Mode of the game than what is really necessary.  Had they named the game “Guitar Hero VI: Warriors of Rocks” it would have more clear that this was a true successor to Guitar Hero 5 and that the Quest Mode was only an addition to the stellar formula in place already.   As it stands, Warriors of Rock looks like a confusing product on the shelf.

Speaking of Guitar Hero 5, I am on record saying that minus the atrocious lag calibration, GH5 was the best GH game to date.  Well, Warriors of Rock builds very nicely on the foundation in place from 5.  Some things that carry over from 5 are the song specific challenges, Party Play, imported songs from previous games and non-traditional band setups.  The most disappointing thing that has not changed in the year since 5 is the lag calibration.  With the calibration tool in hand I again fiddled with the audio and video lag to get best setup possible out of the crap tools in place.  After about 6 failed attempts at calibration I decided it would just be easier to boot up Band Hero and see what my settings on it were and just copy them over.  Those settings weren’t perfect, but they were good enough.  Shame Neversoft shame!!!!

The challenges are now found on the quickplay menu and instead of having single instrument challenges; each song has multiple challenges for all instruments.  Even the DLC and imported songs have challenges.  This is a huge benefit to the game, as it adds replay value and incentive to dig into your back catalog of music and also encourages multiple plays through each song.  Speaking of the catalog, just days before the release of WOR, Activision announced that in addition to the Band Hero, GH: Smash Hits, GH:World Tour and GH5 songs being exportable, GH: Metallica’s songs (at least most of them) can now be added to your greater Guitar Hero library.  That leaves GH: Van Halen as the only Post GHIII game whose tracks are not exportable.

Another thing I stumbled upon when playing through the challenges was my high scores from other games.  Songs I had imported from previous games, GH5 and Band Hero had their high scores from those respective games bleed over into Warriors of Hero.  This was an unexpected addition that was also very welcome.  Every song has a leader board that allows you to directly challenge any player that has previously played a song.  The additions to quickplay and the robust stat tracking are impressive and are the right things for the franchise to explore.

The track list in Warriors of Rock is less dynamic than what was in last year’s GH5.  The songs cling closely to the genres Rock, Classic Rock and Metal with a few punk tracks thrown in the mix.  Highlights include “Bohemian Rhapsody”, “Free Ride”, “Jet City Woman”, “Wish” and “Burnin’ for You”.  The entire epic that is Rush’s “2112” is included and plays a large part midway through the Quest Mode and Megadeth contributed three songs that will make your fingers bleed.

The biggest problem with the set list is that many of the songs were already in Rock Band as either DLC or as on disc tracks.  I counted 15 tracks I already own in my RB library.  Many of the songs that are exclusive are from bands that have already been heavily featured in GH and RB games.  Bands like Foo Fighters, AFI, Ozzy Osborne, Rush, Nine Inch Nails and Lynyrd Skynyrd are already all over used in this world and should be retired ASAP.

For a limited time your purchase of Warriors of Rock gets you a free copy of Soundgarden’s pseudo greatest hits package “Telephantasm”.  I’m not sure why this is included, as I don’t see many Soundgarden fans rushing out to get GH:WPR because of its inclusion and since it has most of what you would want out of a Soundgarden CD anyway, future Soundgarden purchases by newly found fans seem unlikely.  Either way it’s a neat addition.

Finally, the most impressive part of the entire packageis…the guitar!  The idea of a guitar that has the ability to swap out entire body pieces sounds silly and a bit 3 years ago, but that can be over looked since the quality of the guitar is nearly unrivaled.  From the clean storage compartment for the formalities (batteries, usb dongle etc.) to the effortless strumming provided by a revamped strum bar,  the current best fake plastic guitar’s (the Rock Band 2 Stratocaster) crown could be in jeopardy.  Obviously not all attachments are created equal.  The Quest Wing guitar replacement body that was included with my review copy of the game makes the guitar terribly uncomfortable, but if you stick with the stock body, you will love it.

I was completely prepared to trash this game in this review for its shallow and gimmicky story mode, that takes itself way too seriously, but I simply can’t.  Warriors of Rock has alot of really good things going for it.  Anyone that is still interested in guitar based rhythm games will enjoy its breadth of features and the hardware has never been better.  The track list could use some alterations, but for the first time in a long time due to massive amounts of existing libraries the feature set is more important than the content of the music.

Verdict: Guilty Pleasure Worthy

Unboxing!

Here’s some more stuff!!!!