Cartel

In economics, a cartel is an agreement between competing firms to control prices or exclude entry of a new competitor in a market. It is a formal organization of sellers or buyers that agree to fix selling prices, purchase prices, or reduce production using a variety of tactics. Cartels usually arise in an oligopolistic industry, where the number of sellers is small or sales are highly concentrated and the products being traded are usually commodities. Cartel members may agree on such matters as setting minimum or target prices (price fixing), reducing total industry output, fixing market shares, allocating customers, allocating territories, bid rigging, establishment of common sales agencies, altering the conditions of sale, or combination of these. The aim of such collusion (also called the cartel agreement) is to increase individual members' profits by reducing competition. If the cartelists do not agree on market shares, they must have a plan to share the extra monopoly profits generated by the cartel.

Sniper rifle

In military and law enforcement terminology, a special application sniper rifle is a crew service, man-portable, high precision, shoulder-fired rifle used to ensure more accurate placement of bullets at longer ranges than other small arms. It is a common misconception that any scoped rifle is a sniper rifle, and while certain long guns are more suited for the application than others, it is the act of using a firearm weapon strategically as a sniper qualified-specialist that designates it as such.

A typical sniper rifle is built for optimal levels of accuracy, fitted with a telescopic sight and chambered for a military centerfire cartridge. The term is often used in the media to describe any type of accurized firearm fitted with a telescopic sight that is employed against human targets, although "sniping rifle" or "sniper's rifle" is the technically correct grammatical term for such a rifle.

The military role of a sniper (a term derived from the snipe, a bird which was difficult to hunt and shoot) dates back to the turn of the 18th century, but the true sniper rifle is a much more recent development. Advances in technology, specifically that of telescopic sights and more accurate manufacturing, allowed armies to equip specially trained soldiers with rifles that enable them to deliver precise shots over greater distances than regular infantry weapons. The sniper rifle itself could be based on a standard rifle: it's hard to define a sniper rifle by the fire modes as some latest designed sniper rifles are semi-automatic fire, for example the M110; however, when fitted with a telescopic sight, it becomes a sniper rifle.

Battlefield 4

Battlefield 4 is a 2013 first-person shooter video game developed by Swedish video game developer EA Digital Illusions CE (DICE) and published by Electronic Arts. It is a sequel to 2011's Battlefield 3 and was released on October 29, 2013 in North America, October 31, 2013 in Australia, November 1, 2013 in Europe and New Zealand and November 7, 2013 in Japan for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

Battlefield 4 was met with positive reception. It was praised for its multiplayer mode, gameplay and graphics, but was also criticized for its short and shallow single-player campaign mode, and for its numerous bugs and glitches. It was a commercial success, selling over 7 million copies.

Gameplay

The game's heads-up display (HUD) is composed of two compact rectangles. The lower left-hand corner features a mini-map and compass for navigation, and a simplified objective notice above it; the lower right includes a compact ammo counter and health meter. The top right displays kill notifications of all players in-game. On the Windows version of the game, the top left features a chat window when in multiplayer. The mini-map, as well as the main game screen, shows symbols marking three kinds of entities: blue for allies, green for squadmates, and orange for enemies, this applies to all interactivity on the battlefield. Battlefield 4 options also allow colour-blind players to change the on-screen colour indicators to: tritanomaly, deuteranomaly and protanomaly.