This will be the first review I will ever write for a game but this is something that I have been passionate about for many years now and I figured Black Ops 3 would be the best game to write all of this about since it's a game that has been really special to me, that and Black Ops 2.

This is something bigger than just my own words, this is bigger than just COD. This is something that I never want to see replicated in any other gaming medium, through any other publisher or developer. The thought of this makes me feel physically ill. This is people's passion, heart, and soul being put into something only for it to be snuffed out, and I am just not for it in the slightest.

For anyone who doesn't know, as of yesterday a couple tweets came out by the creators of the BOIII and Xlabs clients stating that Activision/Blizzard enforced a cease and desist order on them, forcing them to be shut down.

Anyone who is unfamiliar with this, Xlabs is a fan made client launcher for the old Call of Duty games. They are one of the, if not, the ONLY alternative for playing these old games without the risk of hackers compromising your entire PC and therefore your private information.

You have Plutonium which is the client for Modern Warfare 3, Black Ops 1, Black Ops 2, and World at War

You have Xlabs which is for Modern Warfare 2, Ghosts, and Advanced Warfare

Then there was the newest client which is BOIII, which allowed you to safely play Black Ops 3. And I know quite a lot of people in my own friend group who still played these games, ESPECIALLY Black Ops 3 just for the modded Zombies scene.

So not only was SM2 shut down, but Xlabs and BOIII, literally the ONLY way you would have been able to play Black Ops 3 in a polished state, has been completely terminated. You can't even access their websites anymore.

Apparently there has been a lot of gossip going around about why SM2 was shut down and it was speculated by many that it was either because of the engine swap from the 2009 MW2 engine over to the more recent 2016 Modern Warfare Remastered engine and because of this, the developers of SM2 had to state that you no longer needed a Steam copy of MW2 in order to play the game in case there were people who bought the game before this change happened.

But what the hell is the excuse this time?? Xlabs, Plutonium, and BOIII not only required you to own purchased copies of these games in order to play, but they have been the ONLY solution for any one of us to be able to properly play games that we all grew up with because a. The official servers are dead as ♥♥♥♥ so you'll be waiting 45 minutes for a match to start if at all and b. These old games are INFESTED with hackers.

There exists FACTUAL EVIDENCE these games being completely swept by RCE exploits.

Anyone who is unfamiliar with this, RCE stands for Remote Code Execution. An RCE is when an attacker accesses a target's computing device and makes changes remotely, no matter where the device is located. RCEs have a broad category of attacks that can either have minor effects on a victim's system, but they can also be quite serious.

An example of an RCE is the WannaCry ransomware worm which spreads by exploiting a vulnerability in the Server Message Block Protocol (or SMB for short). This vulnerability is what allows an attacker to execute malicious code on a person's machine, enabling ransomware to access and encrypt valuable files.

NeroCinema is a prominent voice in the Call of Duty community and has been a victim to one of these rat exploit attacks while just trying to play Black Ops 2 on PC on vanilla servers, because remember, these old games still use peer to peer connectivity unlike these days where we have moved onto dedicated servers because Activision/Blizzard are so bad at their job that they can't even do the bare minimum requirements necessary to keep these games up to date.

Do you wanna know what would happen if you tried to play some Black Ops 2 or Black Ops 3 Zombies with your friends running on the official servers? I'll put it lightly

You
Are
SCREWED

And don’t bother dusting off that old PS3 because even on Console, these games are riddled with dead lobbies, and if you do manage to find a lobby, it’s full of cheaters.

This is a whole new level of despicable if I have ever seen it. Activision/Blizzard are actively selling 10+ year old games on Steam such as Black Ops 1, 2, and 3 as well as Modern Warfare 2 and 3, still retailing them at $50-60 and are charging full price for all of the DLC, they do not update their games so that everyone can actually safely play them, so when the community turns around and decides to do THEIR job and fix their ♥♥♥♥ for them, FOR FREE might I add, Activision responds by shutting down any chances of there being any possible way to play these games.

So now we are stuck at a standstill with there being NO way to play like, half these COD games anymore, and I bet your ass it won't be long until they go after Plutonium next.

This is Black Ops 2 we're talking about here, one of my favorite games of all time. And it's just going to be deleted from history, all for the sole purpose of getting people to play their gutter trash new games and spend $30 on their Battle Passes and buy their 3000 COD Point bundles.

Well you know what, I may be just one person, but I don't care, I’m taking a stand against this. I’m not gonna sit around playing with my thumbs as I watch as my childhood burns right before my eyes. As of yesterday I uninstalled my Blizzard launcher. And I would suggest you do the same. Do not, and I beg of you, DO NOT support this company any longer.

Do not buy any more of their games, do not buy skins in any of their games, just don’t even bother booting up their games anymore. Hell, don't even pirate these games. It is not worth it.

Because they have proven time and time again that you are nothing more than a disposable piece of garbage but with an income. And as a matter of fact, I’m taking this even further. They should not be allowed to sell these games on the Steam storefront. So I’m going to do what I have never done before and I’m going to submit report tickets of these games to Valve. Do you want to help me? It’s up to you. I’ll even assist you on how to do it.

Just for the record, the games that are affected by these RCE exploits are

World at War
Modern Warfare 2 (2009)
Black Ops 1
Modern Warfare 3
Black Ops 2
Ghosts
Advanced Warfare
Black Ops 3

First, go on any store page for any of these Call of Duty games, then scroll down until you see the flag icon on the right side, and check the box that says "Harmful"

Then in the box as you write your report, make sure you mention the exploit CVE-2018-20817. Anyone that is unfamiliar with this, CVE-2018-20817 is the name of the RCE exploit which allows attackers to execute code on the user’s PC when sending an authentication request to Steam when trying to play any of these old COD games which is where the damage happens.

And until Activision gets taken to court over blatantly breaking the law by ignoring this widespread problem, they won’t do anything about it because they don’t give two ♥♥♥♥♥ about any of their fans' feedback.

This is a clear violation of consumer rights law, because if they are going to sell you a product, especially if they still retail it at full price, and provide services to the consumer, they are, BY LAW, obligated to protect the consumer from any harm from using said products. So if you ever want to make a tweet or something at them saying they can get sued for not abiding by this, well then there you go.

Because if you tried to submit a ticket to customer support to address this issue to them and have them try to fix it, they will either hang up on you, or just close your case without responding back to you. I'm not joking. That is how bad this situation has gotten. And it will continue to happen until you start holding them accountable.

Thank you and take care.