With the release of Modern Warfare 3's first two maps, Call of Duty players have discovered a frustrating change to the game's DLC policy. Those who have shelled out the money for a premium Elite subscription can download and play the maps just fine, but any other profile on the system will be unable to access the content without a separate Elite membership.
One thread on the official forums has now spawned eight pages of disgruntled players upset that their friends or family are unable to access the new maps without paying separately.
What's more, this new policy doesn't mesh with the terms of service you encounter when you first download the content, which rather plainly states, "You can use this item on the first Xbox 360 console you downloaded it to. Access to this item will also be granted to all users on this first console."
Traditionally, downloadable content on the Xbox 360 has been user agnostic. While your purchases (and any future redownloads) may be tied to a single account, any Xbox Live Arcade games or in-game DLC on your hard drive is playable by any account on the system. In that regard, Microsoft's digital ownership scheme rather nicely mimics physical ownership — so long as someone has access to the content, you can let someone borrow what you own and play it on their own account.
The Call of Duty Elite service has apparently changed this tradition, requiring any user account that wants access to have its own premium subscription. Have more than one rabid Call of Duty player in the same household? You're now looking at $60 for a copy of the game, $60 a year for each Gold account, and $50 a year for each Elite subscription.
As a result, it would now be considerably cheaper for any family with more than one Call of Duty player to simply wait around for Activision to bundle the DLC into standard packs, as these will presumably retail for the usual price of $15 and allow content to be shared between profiles. While you'd miss out on early access and Elite's other premium features, you'd be saving somewhere between $55 and $45 a year in a household with two players and considerably more as the number of accounts increases.
There's a chance that this restriction might be an unforseen technical glitch caused by the new subscription model, but Activision has yet to comment officially on the issue, instead leaving fans to speculate and seethe in the dark.
