Video: 'Black Ops II' villain back story

Treyarch is shedding a little more light on the villain in its upcoming release Call of Duty: Black Ops II, due Nov. 13 for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PCs.

This new video, also available on YouTube and the official Call of Duty site, sets up Raul Menendez as "the Messiah of the 99%" to the populace, but has global terrorism on his mind.

The teaser video notes the contributions of writer David S. Goyer (co-writer of The Dark Knight Rises) and Trent Reznor (Academy Award-winning music composer for The Social Network) on the game.

Treyarch's Dave Anthony, who directed and co-wrote the story, told Game Hunters recently that Black Ops II "is like an eight-hour movie, and we're doing story branching, so the game can have multiple outcomes as you are coming through it. So Trent not only had to somehow assimilate this eight-hour story but he also had to take in all the multiple character arcs that could happen depending on how you play it."

The game continues the story of Special Forces operative Alex Mason, who helped thwart Russian attack plans in the Sixties in 2010's Black Ops. The sequel picks up after the events of Black Ops, but at the same time takes the story into the future, the year 2025, where Mason's son, David Mason, is a Special Forces operatives assigned to protect the President.

Menendez is manipulating a cold war between the U.S. and China and the countries' reliance on rare earth metals. (Technology consultant Peter Singer talked about the reality of such a thing in a recent interview.)

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Bloomberg sites blocked in China days after Xi family wealth story

BEIJING | Wed Jul 4, 2012 4:45am EDT

BEIJING (Reuters) - Bloomberg's news websites remained blocked in China five days after it issued a story about the finances of the extended family of the country's vice president, highlighting how Beijing is trying to shape public opinion ahead of a leadership transition.

Bloomberg said it believes its English-language website and its Business Week site were blocked on Friday by Chinese authorities after it published details about the multi-million dollar fortunes of Vice President Xi Jinping's extended family.

Beijing will hold a once-a-decade leadership transition this year during which Communist Party chief, President Hu Jintao, and Premier Wen Jiabao will hand power to a younger group of leaders, headed by the party chief heir apparent Xi.

The government is determined to guard against any signs of discontent that could escalate into broader protests and threaten the Party's authority as the new generation takes over amid destabilising scandals and economic uncertainties.

In an emailed statement, Bloomberg spokeswoman Belina Tan said: "Our website is currently inaccessible in China in reaction, we believe, to a Bloomberg News story that was published on June 29."

She would not comment on whether Bloomberg was in talks with the government over the issue, but said "there is no impact" to the company's other services, including terminal feeds used by clients to access economic data and news.

Asked at a foreign ministry briefing last week about the blocked websites, a ministry spokesman did not respond directly but said all websites must abide by China's laws.

In its article, Bloomberg stated that no assets were traced to Xi, his wife or their daughter, adding there was no indication Xi intervened to advance his relatives' business transactions, or of any wrongdoing by Xi or his extended family.

Privately-held Bloomberg competes with Thomson Reuters, Dow Jones & Co, a unit of News Corp, and other news and data providers.

China's blocking of websites and censorship of search results for politically sensitive terms is known colloquially as the "Great Firewall of China", though some Internet users have skirted restrictions by using code words.

Government censors ban numerous overseas websites, including Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, and some foreign media outlets, fearing that sharing of images and information could cause social instability and harm national security.

(Reporting by Michael Martina; Editing by Ken Wills, Ian Geoghegan and Dean Yates)

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