Basically (for those of us who know nothing about video games and the like), when you play this game you have a big gun and you do a lot of shooting. Let me put it another way for you: I know when my roommate is playing this game…because I hear gun shots coming from his room.

Still this M-rated military game, which was released on Tuesday, earned $310 million in opening-day sales alone. According to Daniel Terdiman, a blogger for CNET news, 4.7 million copies were sold in the United States and the U.K. alone in order to break this record.

Just to put this in perspective for you, The Dark Knight made $155 million in the opening WEEKEND. The next top-selling video game was Grand Theft Auto IV which also made $310 million in first-day sales worldwide. (Modern Warfare made $310 million in just the U.S. and U.K.)

So, for those of you who are against violent video games, you may not want to join the millions of people who have purchased this game. I’m not into video games so much, but for those of you who are… What do you like about this game? Why is it so popular?

World of Warcraft.

Cataclysm, the new expansion pack slated for release of the growing massively multi-player online game, takes the world of Azeroth, the shattered Outlands and the distant continent of Northrend and adds yet another layer to the cake:  Deathwing, the black dragon of Warcraft lore that sought dominance over all the other dragon races and was chased into exile by the red dragon queen Alexstrazsa, makes his return in the latest expansion, being the key villain for players to defeat, as Illidan Stormrage and the Lich King Arthas before him.

Along with Deathwing, several other changes to the game have been made, from the inclusion of two new races, Worgen for the Alliance and Goblins for the Horde.  Several other races have also received increases in the class types they can play, such as the ’shortly anticipated’ Gnome Priest and Blood Elf Warrior.  Other additions include guild achievements and rank, new battlegrounds, new PVP progression and archeology as a profession.

As every expansion before it, Blizzard will probably capitalize and make a ton of money selling a rehashed product with new sparkly packaging in order to retain its slowly eroding player base.  The game is on the decline and this may be the last expansion we see for the game, but Blizzard is a company that does not settle for mediocrity, so gamers can rejoice; it will be a quality product.

Here’s the list of the good stuff in that latest patch: 3.2.

- Mount system changes

- Experience gains in battlegrounds tweaked

- The Death Knight nerf.  Death Knights brought off of cloud nine to maybe cloud eight so they’re still better than you, just not able to be played by a one armed blind squirrel.

- New quest hubs, daily quests, rewards and all the other time sinks that completionists crave.

- Some new shape shift forms for druids, a shaman totem bar for quick stick dropping, and changes to instance timer locks

- New battleground as well as a coliseum to test your mettle against monsters a wee bit more interesting than a kobold.

All in all, it’s another routine patch for Blizzard that tries to cater to those who are on the fence about continuing to spend $15 a month for a game that is several years old, and in many ways stale.  

With the future of Blizzard’s games shifting toward anticipated releases like Starcraft II and Diablo III, World of Warcraft may be approaching the end of its days when the Lich King raid goes live and yet another historic figure in Warcraft lore earns a trip to the taxidermist.

Powered by its CD driven system — compared to game cartridges like Sega and Nintendo — Sony had way more along the lines of flexibility with game design and manipulating hardware.  Nintendo launched its Nintendo 64 and woo’d back some of what they had lost.

Then Sony launched the PS2, while Sega launched Dreamcast.  Dreamcast was Sega’s greatest system, but it was utterly ignored due to the lack of good software to play on it, whereas Sony had its PS2 double as a game console and DVD player.  The cross-platform entertainment device then easily outpaced both companies and Sony ruled the console market.

Then Microsoft opened up its checkbook.

Xbox was released to mixed reviews, but it did what neither Nintendo or Sega could: it challenged Sony by offering more exclusive content worth playing.  Halo catapulted the Xbox into the minds of first-person shooter fans and Xbox solidified its niche where Sony couldn’t respond.

Then with Sony’s PS3 and Xbox 360 from Microsoft, the tides turned completely.  Sony’s market dominance evaporated while Xbox took a year lead on sales, and compared to the overpriced PS3, Xbox was a bargain offering the same, if not better, experience.

And in our current recession, Microsoft seems to be the only company pulling in strong numbers as people find themselves at home more often and seeking forms of entertainment that last longer than a $60 bar tab.  

Microsoft is outpacing both Sony and Nintendo for retail sales and console sales, as well as online purchases, firmly planting Microsoft in the dominating position for the console war, with no intention of making risky calls that could jeopardize that in the future.

As many speculate these are the systems in the end of the console gaming era, it means that Microsoft might have once again taken control of an entire industry.