While it's only been about two months since Infinity Ward's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 hit store shelves and shattered countless sales records, rumors of the studio's next project and the inevitable Modern Warfare 3 are already making the rounds. Citing "industry sources," Destructoid claims Infinity Ward's next will be a massively mulitplayer online game, with the studio reportedly hiring Sony Online Entertainment (EverQuest, Star Wars Galaxies, PlanetSide) veterans and possibly getting help from fellow Activision Blizzard studio Blizzard (World of Warcraft, Diablo, StarCraft).

Whether this turns out to be the oft-mentioned Call of Duty MMO or not, franchise owner Activision is still likely to continue releasing annual entries in... Read more

Citing anonymous sources, a new report from Variety's Cut Scene Blog claims that studio owner Activision Blizzard has Prototype developer Radical working on a new Spider-Man game, with High Moon, The Bourne Conspiracy folks, on Transformers.

High Moon's Transformers game won't be based on any particular movie, Variety claims, and should be expected to arrive at some point in 2010. Activision has previously announced that the game for the second movie is due this June.

As for Radical's Spider-Man, the site merely noted that the open-world wall-running exploits of Prototype are a near-perfect fit for a Spider-Man game. No release estimate was provided, with Variety doubting that this fall's Spider-Man game will be Radical's.

While Activision has yet to comment on the rumors, more Spider-Man and Transformers titles would come as no surprise for the sequel-heavy publisher, especially in the wake of the marketing leak last year that detailed 14 different Spider-Man game concepts.

Nearly 100 Radical Entertainment employees, 60 High Moon Studios staffers and at least two games mark the latest causalities in parent company Activision Blizzard's streamlining efforts, according to reports.

Word of the Radical layoffs, which make up almost half of the Prototype-developing studio, arrived via The Vancouver Sun and was confirmed by the studio. Gamasutra cites numerous independent sources for the departures from The Bourne Conspiracy developer High Moon, which represent less than half of the company.

Left, Radical's Prototype. Right, High Moon's The Bourne Conspiracy

"Activision Blizzard is committed to making the best games possible and has elected at this time to reduce the number of titles that Radical is developing from four games to two," commented Radical human resources VP Leah Rubin. "Therefore... Read more