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I don't know about that, I used to buy a ton of EA games, especially the MoH series and after they moved to Origin and cranked up the douchebaggery to 11 i haven't bought a single thing from them, and I know several people who have done the same.

Sure like Madden you'll always have the hardcores, like my friend Dale who actually has a deal set up with the local gamestop so every Madden and NASCAR game is dropped off at his house on release day so its waiting when he gets off work, but you're certainly not gonna grow if ALL you get is the hardcore. Since EA has cranked the asshole meter I'd love to see the before and after figures because i wouldn't be surprised if they are running off all but the hardcore which will limit the growth and longevity of the series. compare to valve that actually treats customers decently where I've already dropped a good $150 on the sale for me and my boys and its just getting started.

In the end if you support pricks? You deserve to get fucked. While I know the 3 sales that would have gone to me and my boys won't be noticed by EA if enough guys get tired of being treated like dirt by these corporate asswipes then we CAN see a difference. I bet the guys that are making Torchlight II are quite happy for example at the douchebag behavior surrounding D3 as i bought copies for my whole family and I know many that joined me in buying TL2 over D3. Support those that treat you right and be sure to send an email to EA telling them why you won't be buying from them. if they see sales drop enough they'll have to rethink being giant pricks or get into another line of work. I agree with Jim Sterling that EA is "A prime example of the bloated, wasteful, shitting mess that is triple A gaming" and frankly we should all give assholes like that a big piss off and go elsewhere.

If you don't know then perhaps this song will illuminate it for you. WARNING: Its catchy!

How about letting us vote for some changes to Steam itself?

I know there is a couple of things i would love to change, such as 1.-On the big lists of games on the Steam sales have an icon or change the color of the listing or SOMETHING that lets us know the game uses any DRM other than Steam. I already got bit in the ass by a GFWL game thanks to THAT one, and 2.-Have a setting where we can choose to tell our friends "This user prefers ONLY Steam and no third party DRM" because when you receive a present from someone its kinda hard to tell them you don't want it because of DRM, especially family. I got TAGES on my system now thanks to the Steam XMas sale and a present bought for me by one of my nephews.

Finally as for EA? Fuck EA and the horse they rode in on. To see what kind of douchebags they are watch this Jimquistition video where he lists just a few of the truly douchebaggy things EA has pulled over the years. i like how he says that "EA even looks worse than Activision who are positively fricking satanic" but the simple fact is Origin is nothing but an attempt by EA to make PC gaming just as expensive as the consoles. Hell if they had their way they'd probably charge you by the fricking clip in their FPS games, while ignoring the fact that the reason why valve has so many customers is they OFFER A BETTER VALUE than shitty companies like EA. Hell I've got over 60 games in Steam now, couldn't i have just pirated them? yep but steam gives me 1.-Cheap prices, 2.-easy matchmaking MP, 3.-Chat with my friends and family, 4.- hassle free patching, 5.-DLC cheap and in many cases on the sales included with the game.

So while I love Steam and have switched both my boys off of the consoles for Steam it can always be better. lets hope some valve dev reads this and brings it up because I know I'd probably buy even more games on the Steam sales if I could just check games off the list without having to go to the game page on every. single. one. just to make sure I don't get Starfucked.

BTW OT but anybody know when the big summer sale starts? My youngest has been saving up for it and I swear every other question is "Has it started yet?" so knowing the date and time would be nice, thanks.

Well, we have the zero punctuation take: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/1569-Final-Fantasy-XIII

FF13 was too linear and the battle system runs itself (auto battle everything)

That is why we need to call them what they are, just as they think they can turn copyright infringement into theft we need to label them with a name that denotes their true purpose....Leeches. that is ALL that they are, they are the middle men, bleeding the consumer AND the artist of every Shekel they can, wanting to destroy one of the most powerful free communication systems in world history for their own gain, leeches.

Jim Sterling at Zero Punctuation has a nice rant and while his is mainly about games the sentiment is the same, its leeches pushing draconian crap like SOPA and PIPA and its all about control, so they can leech.

Of course it can. "The law" is not a computer program, it's interpreted by people. And the law and those people can't somehow infer that an entire medium is now illegal because someone used it to do something illegal. Movies, photos, and comics (Japanese or not) are entirely the same in this regard.

People want to pretend this is some slippery slope, but you know, it really isn't. Jeez, since when did NAMBLA have such a big following on slashdot?

How can bet parent rated +4 informative? Comics or drawings of virtual (nonexistent) minors in indecent poses are clearly illegal in many western countries including USA, Sweden or Britain. Many people are prosecuted for its possesion even if no real children were harmed in its creation. See http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.175488-Hentai-Collector-Sentenced-to-Jail-Over-Obscene-Material?page=1 or http://www.animenation.net/blog/2010/08/02/sweden-fines-translator-for-having-hentai-images/ for examples.

One other point: I have read the thread so far and it seems that a large portion of the people are complaining that Japanese hentai are what people get busted for. While that may be true in rare occurrences like someone sharing gigabytes of CP manga... I've worked with law enforcement on CP cases, and they really don't care that much about comics. Yes it's part of the law, but at least in the US, the FBI normally goes after the people with REAL CP and not cartoons. And even then, they go after the people with true collections and not 1-2 images in their cache that they stumbled into while searching random sites. Please link me to a news article that proves me wrong if people are getting busted for single images, since I am only an individual person and could have missed something. And before someone says "they don't report on small time CP busts," yes they do. Every time I've been involved with a CP case, the media is all over it as soon as they find out. They love to put the 'bad guy gets busted' stories in the news.

If they don't care about comics, why are the comics illegal. There is no harm in sharing even gigabytes of hentai images and the law that allows busting people for possesing/sharing virtual child porn is clearly bad. And yes, there are people who had problems just for small amount of hentai images, see here: http://www.animenation.net/blog/2010/08/02/sweden-fines-translator-for-having-hentai-images/ (arrested for one scanlation) or here: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.175488-Hentai-Collector-Sentenced-to-Jail-Over-Obscene-Material?page=1 (arrested for six books)

It's history repeating itself again. We saw similar nonsense when Lolita from Nabokov or Howl from Gingsberg were initialy published. How many people will need to be busted for lawmakers to get the the idea that the illegality of something must be based on it's level of social dangerousness and not on some false and ever-changing morality? The proponents of those bans often say that hentai/Howl/Lolita/whatever has no artistic value and is obscene, so it should be illegal, but who are they to judge the artistic value of something? And even if something realy has no artistic value, is it enough to justify its ilegality if it is otherwise harmless? I don't think so.

I agree with the rest of your post (creation and sharing of child porn involving real children should be prosecuted, maybe with some exceptions to cover cases like 17 years old partners e-mailing nude images of themself to each other).

Updates on PC's are done automatically too.

As far "headaches" that are comparable to what you deal with on a PC, I picked a recent AAA title and this is the first result I got in a search. The point is, even some people have headaches with consoles. And really, similar issues tend to happen with games on consoles, where they don't work, or you need to download the patch on launch day to play the game.

Consoles are only marginally better these days for a few things. Their ease of use is dwindling. The "it always works" argument isn't true. The split-screen multiplayer aspects are being used less often in newer games. With the next generation there's a good chance there's little point to reselling your games. Consoles are more and more trying to be like a PC in regards to potential headaches. It's definitely a backwards step.

They're taking some serious steps to keep going, though...

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/116811-NASA-Announces-Bake-Sale-Fundraiser

Three words: The Banner Saga. Three people who, while industry veterans, are relative unknowns among names like Sid Meyer and Tim Schaffer, making a new property that people are donating to because it looks amazing.

As far as donator recourse... there is none. Kickstarter has a slight vetting process to weed out the obvious cranks, but you're pre-ordering something several months in advance based on a pitch, and you shouldn't pretend it's anything more. Personally, I did not give money to Tim Schaffer because a) "some adventure game" is way too vague for me and b) though I may get crucified for saying this, he's never made a game I liked. But I have given money to The Banner Saga, Wasteland 2, and Shadowrun Returns because Hell Yes on all three counts.

As far as the developers pocketing half the money? I hope they do. They deserve payment for the work they're doing. Like, with The Banner Saga, if they pocket half the $440,000 that's pledged so far and split it three ways, that's about $70,000 each, which is hardly an unreasonable salary. Sure, Tim Schaffer's Kickstarter got $3 million, but $1.5 million split 50 ways (or however many people are going to be working on the game) is still probably a reasonable salary. And if Tim Schaffer personally pocketed $1.5 million, he'd never be able to sell another game again because of the fan backlash; he wouldn't be, "Tim Schaffer, the mind behind Psychonauts and Grim Fandango," he'd be, "Tim Schaffer, that douche bag who ripped us off on Kickstarter."

I mean, The Escapist a while back had a Rocket Hub thing for "Send Yahtzee to PAX" which created enough controversy that they had to shut it down and give an official apology because people thought they were soliciting donations to send Yahtzee to PAX, when really they were pretty open about it being "Buy enough merch and we can afford to send Yahtzee to PAX."

Generally speaking, a crowdsourced vetting process is more skeptical than most, since people are naturally suspicious of strangers trying to sell them things that don't exist yet.

It makes more sense for all of us to jump of the sinking ship [of Adobe Flash].

In this analogy, what do lifeboats represent?

Some games solve [the completely flat touch screen on an iPhone or iPad] by (eg - Age of Zombies) making the left and right controls appear wherever you place your thumbs

So the movement gesture is done by placing the left thumb at a "neutral" position and then rolling it in a direction rather than sliding. I can see how this would work, but I can foresee problems in platformers and other games where the player is expected to hold a direction for a long time, and not having an iPhone or iPad with which to test it myself, I can't see how the games end up solving them. (My current Android device is an Archos 43 that doesn't support multitouch.) And what about the other thumb? How would it work with more than one button, such as a jump and fire button, or punch and kick, or punch and magic? Or are practical on-screen gamepads limited to one button like an Atari game?

And obviously it doesn't really apply to the massively popular puzzle games that are hugely successful (eg - Cut the Rope, Draw Something!, etc).

There are two different kinds of block puzzle games: those that work by manipulating objects already in the field (e.g. Bejeweled), and those that work by guiding objects into a field (e.g. Tetris). I tried Tetris on a relative's iPhone and could never get nearly as fast as I routinely do on a DS, though Klax might work with downward and upward flick actions. So are falling block games worthless? And even in games with touch, there's the problem of seeing around the finger, though I admit that's more of a problem with the iPhone, where the finger is larger relative to the display.

Hey you, it's called something like Steam.

As long as I have my username and password even if I lost 100% of my computer (and in the case of movies and music the discs) in a freak accident and I get a new computer, I still have my games. Granted it has to download again, but it's still accessible. Steam doesn't have money issues at all either, they aren't tanking due to piracy because their service is actually EASIER AND MORE CONSUMER FRIENDLY THAN PIRACY: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114391-Valves-Gabe-Newell-Says-Piracy-Is-a-Service-Problem

Can you imagine what would happen if something like Steam went into the media content provider part as well? Whoever makes it will make loads of money, but it certainly won't be the MPAA making it. The cat's out the bag already with iTunes, and they don't want it to happen again.

This is not Commodore, this is not the Amiga. This is a fucking bastard.

No one cares, sadly. I complained about Escapist Magazine's managing editor abjectly fucking up the history of the Commodore 64 in an article they wrote, got no response. For those who don't want to click:

Commodore's amazing 64-bit computer dominated the 1980s and I'd be willing to bet there's not a nerd over 30 who doesn't have fond memories of playing or even programming games on it. To capitalize on that nostalgia, Commodore has released a new version of the computer that maintains the look of the original but packs it with modern components. The stylish taupe exterior might look ultra retro, but this is a modern PC gaming machine, complete with a 3.3 GHz processor, 4GB of memory, a DVD drive, wireless n wifi, and every possible type of connection you could want. Commodore will even be releasing a new version of its classic OS Vision, which allows you to really dig into the 8-bit awesomeness that made the original system the best selling computer of all time. (...)

It's a great item to play a spot-the-errors drinking game with. By the end of the paragraph you're too drunk to care.

But you are missing the point, Bay puts out schlock, schlock makes an assload of money, next year we are ass deep in schlock and any movie with a brain is screwed because it doesn't look like Bay schlock. Its like how we were practically buried for a time in what i call "Yo dudebro, guns" movies. The ones were the trailers always start off 'In a world', such as 'In a world without law, one man with bigger muscles and even bigger guns will tip the scales'. Try watching this review as it will help you to understand.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/115323-George-Lucas-is-Retiring-From-Film

Maybe we can finally see what he is really capable of instead of milking SW for all its worth...

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.100198-Space-Warfare-Almost-Everything-You-Know-Is-Probably-Wrong

Pretty much everything you see in movies is wrong. And in video games. And on TV. And read in books.

I really want to buy Far Cry 3. Chances are however I will not be. Because Ubisoft is no doubt going to put their "always on" DRM on it. This article is the exact reason that that is unacceptable to me. So, Ubisoft can go about all they want championing how they're "putting it to those evil pirates" (roll-eyes) but in the mean-time they are losing out on me, yes, the person who wants the game but isn't going to submit to their idiocy. So, I lose because: no executive with a testosterone problem is going to back-off and admit he has shit for brains. And the cycle continues.

And as Gabe Newell so succinctly put it: Piracy is a Service Problem. So what's Ubisoft doing? Creating more value in the pirated versions. Way to go guys, golf-clap.

Gamecloud just interviewed Kenny Dinkin, VP of PlayFirst, a new casual publisher. Dinkin praised PlayFirst's successful game Diner Dash, developed by gameLab:

What I love about Diner Dash is its innovation - it's the platonic ideal of what we were shooting for - a game that had none of the presumed necessary trappings of a gamer's game: It has an everyday metaphor, a female hero who's a regular gal, 2-D graphics, humor and even a job where you work a shift!

"Innovation"! That's so cute! Diner Dash is, in all these respects, a straightforward imitation of Betty's Beer Bar by Mystery Studio. (Mystery is a two-man team based in, believe it or not, Uruguay.)

Later in the same interview, Baghdad Kenny continues:

It's tempting to be conservative and copy stuff. But trying new things is what drives us. We're really enjoying incubating the unique vision of each of our developers. And for me personally, it's exhilarating to oversee a growing portfolio of new ideas.

Source

On steam, there's the knowledge and expectation that your game is tied to your account. In most cases you don't buy a physical disk, you buy a license for *your* account.
(except the copy of HL2 I bought way back when, that had a disk and needed steam... lame).

When I buy a physical disk in the store, I expect that everything that came with that disk originally should be available for future installs, or a used sale, whatever. Unfortunately, physical disks are often worse than online sales these days, because you end up not only with a incomplete-for-resale game (for a greater price), but also some horrible nasty DRM scheme that may eat your DVD drive etc.

And then there are things like Origin, which does stuff like scanning your *entire* HD so that EA can advertise to you (or possibly sue you if they find Warez or whatever on your HDD)
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.308724-EAs-Origin-is-creepy-and-watches-you-sleep

Rights are rapidly going downhill, and the "entertainment" industry wonders why people don't want their crap.

I'd like to know how they propose to "battle online piracy" without draconian laws.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114391-Valves-Gabe-Newell-Says-Piracy-Is-a-Service-Problem

Microsoft seems to be rushing to embrace the set top box world.

Unfortunately, with their latest dashboard release, Microsoft have announced their intention to be a set top ad service with a tiny amount of space in between dedicated to content. When sites are having to post how tos on how to hack your dashboard back to something less offensive, you've gone too far more.

On top of that, they've apparently intentionally degraded video quality for third party providers more.

If you want to be the best set top box, Microsoft's setting the bar very, very low. Just show up*, don't be evil and, simply by default, you'll offer a far more compelling service.

*Note: By showing up, you actually have to show up in reasonable time with a product this time. That whole need to run a DVD from Netflix just to run the software to stream Netflix? That barely counts as showing up. Sure, you fixed it eventually but how many users got used to turning to their 360 instead because you put out such a boneheaded system? Even if it was Netflix's fault, they're a huge plus point for your system - send engineers over there to help them, do whatever it takes, get the core services right.

Take these little gems as evidence of a real, vicious problem in geek culture:

"It’s by far the worst coding-related experience I ever went through. That made me retire from Open Source." http://www.zdnet.com/blog/violetblue/when-software-offends-the-pantyshot-package-controversy/509

“I was trying not to, but it needed to be said.” http://skepchick.org/2011/12/reddit-makes-me-hate-atheists/

"c'mon. you're not a girl if u don't show us pics." http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_17/109-OMG-Girlz-Dont-Exist-on-teh-Intarweb-1

Forgot to mention a couple of the best ones. Minecraft and mojang will go dark (19M users). The entire family of icanhazcheezburger humor pic sites too, including FAIL Blog, Know Your Meme, Memebase and The Daily What (16M users). I do believe that the lack of lolcats will spur some serious action. Firefall company Red 5 Studios will also go dark. nVidia has come out strongly opposed to the legislation, but hasn't announced any action yet. This is really starting to roll, and blackout day is still 5 days away.

Start with the fact that you can't even use Tor to stream ZP, much less CP...

Troll.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114616-Miyamoto-is-Not-Stepping-Down

If its like the rest of the gaming mags lately where EVERY game gets a "happy ending" review of 80% plus? Good riddance to bad rubbish. Frankly the game mags have gotten so damned bought off that I only trust the MOR reviews in Amazon anymore. The top reviews you have to watch for the astroturf but the ones in the middle of the pack are usually just normal Joes.

Frankly I gave up on the mags when they started handing out glowing reviews for even the bottom of the barrel dreck like Turning Point: Fall of Liberty. The whole point of the mags was to see what was coming up and what was shit and what was good, but now all they do is hand out glowing praise.

Now the only reviews i look for besides Amazon is I check out what old Yahtzee at Zero Punctuation has to say. Yes he is a smartass brit but even when he tears into a game i think I'll like he points out the flaws in a way that makes it easier for me at least to decide. And if he thinks a game is shit he'll be the first to say so, like his review of Kane & Lynch II which he called "deep fried tampons" and as someone who bought the game for a whole $1 I can say his review was right on and it wasn't worth even that.

They could use the super-slippery material from Harvard University, the one used to end the Ketchup Conundrum.

Watch this http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/2679-Fair-Game. What you point out isn't just slashdot, it's a lot of internet communities now and it's horrible. You either like x or y, and if you like one then you're a fanboy and must hate the other.

the iPotato?

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/loadingreadyrun/1430-iPotato

Take Cassio's lament about his reputation from Othello, and how important your resume is, and how much time people spend gossiping, trying to size people, up, etc. It seems to me that all of these things could be made a lot simpler.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.181750-Professor-Abandons-Grades-for-Experience-Points

Or look at the culture of the Dwellers in The Algebraist by Iain Banks, or many other examples from SF.
It seems to me like we will use education to get people involved in life, then use XP or kudos to track their performance. The details would be no more crazily complex than CDO traunches or insurance futures.
And a high amount of welfare seems inevitable as long as our education system is not equal opportunity for all and much more highly respected (not to mention exellent STEM). Just set it up so that as long as you are drawing on state support (aside from as a full-time college student living independently), you can't earn any XP/kudos. No judgement.

I quit about 4 months ago after about 4 years of playing the same class/role (warrior tank). The driving factor for me was that the game had massively shifted from being huge and exciting, with a real sense of achievement, to inevitable victories and reinforcement pellets.

I used to love playing with my girlfriend, levelling and exploring the new content. We felt skillful completing raids with a group of people. We were never the best, but we worked hard and achieved our goals. Even when Wrath of the Lich King came out, it still felt epic and there was a lot of new content to explore and play.

However, now it's just a Skinner box. See here and here for great articles on this.

So, no new content, a lazy achievements system and uninspired story telling made me quit. This time, I don't think I'll ever go back.

Well - obviously not. But should they be denied the ability to play the game? How much further would you take it - if the next generation of Windows required to be on line would it be fair to remove their computers?

How is this significantly different from requiring a certain generation of graphics card? Or a minimum amount of RAM? Or having a PC instead of a Mac?

In order to provide the game experience they want to provide (which is what you're paying for) the developers have decided to place certain requirements on the equipment required to play. If you don't have the required equipment, you will be unable to play.

I really don't understand all the hoo-ha - maybe the people who don't have a reliable net connection should buy one of the MYRIAD of competing products which don't have that requirement?

Only those are not determined by where you live, unless it is a 3rd world country. If that is the case, then I think there are other things to fuss about than playing Diablo 3.

The real issue is that there is no apparent gain for being always connected for single player. I do see what they want to do, but I don't see enough incentive to want me to connect all the time.

Blizzard's vice president of online technology said:

He also claimed that the always-on requirement has absolutely nothing to do with DRM. "I don't think [DRM] ever came up when we talked about how we want connections to operate," he said. So why not just make an offline mode for people who want to play that way? "You're introducing a separate user flow, a separate path that players are going to go down," he explained. "And, at the end of the day, how many people are going to want to do that?"

I am surprised no one suggested the Extra Credits video on Gamifaction

They also did a followup on Gamifying education

I am surprised no one suggested the Extra Credits video on Gamifaction

They also did a followup on Gamifying education

Just rename it "Dice Edge"!

Oh... wait, that won't work either.

This is one of the games that I was really looking forward to, but I'm not going to support "always connected" DRM. Thankfully I looked it up and it appears that the decision for this game has been reversed.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/111941-From-Dust-Always-On-DRM-Rumors-Denied-UPDATED
*Check the update

Unfortunately the reversal only went part-way. Apparently the game will still phone-home on launch, though, which is basically as bad.
http://www.shacknews.com/article/69474/from-dust-pc-doesnt-use-always-online-drm

Yeah, I'm not buying it.

Counter-argument here. Funny that it's actually from the same site...

My June 2007 article in the online gaming magazine The Escapist about the 2005 "New Game Enhancements" that pretty much destroyed Star Wars Galaxies: "Blowing Up Galaxies"

Yes, but look at the study.

It's certainly strong enough to warrant more studies.

A game teaches a lot of things.
The ability to change different tactics to accomplish a goal. The ability to continue on after a major problem occurs, the feeling of control(agency) .

It talks about those thing regarding education, but those very same thing will help people feel like a contributor, instead of a disenfranchised person. Feeling no control, not knowing how to figure out your options, as some of the biggest reasons for crime.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/3167-Gamifying-Education

I wrote about the Gygax Memorial effort last year in the online gaming magazine The Escapist, Issue 251 (April 27, 2010): "The Tower of Gygax : Honoring the man who started everything."

Yeah, somewhere on the Minecraft website Notch even admits he'd like to add more Terraria-like elements to Minecraft. I haven't played with Terraria yet, but the demo movie makes it look kinda boring, but I also admit I was never into Castlevania.

I have enough fun with Minecraft, and it's the first thing I've managed to get my wife addicted to since the Sims.

Anyway, I shall now troll you with obligatory giant golden wang: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/2680-Minecraft

But to be fair a lot of the "GTA style" games isn't about actually doing the missions but just seriously fucking off. One of my absolute favorite games is Just Cause II, which if you have never played it brings "just fucking off" to the height of crazy. You have this crazy hookshot grapple hook thing that lets you do crazy shit like tie a bad guy to the bumper of a chopper and use him for a fricking wrecking ball, tie two cars together while going 100 miles an hour on top of a third, totally crazy shit. Frankly I quit giving a shit about the story after like the third mission because I was having too much fun going nuts to really care.

If anyone here watches Zero Punctuation old Yahtzee pointed something out that is really wrong that I hadn't even noticed before. He said basically "we are awash in a sea of brown chest high walls surrounded by thick neck marine types" and frankly he is dead on! Too many of these developers seem to forget that ultimately its a game and games are supposed to be fun not a dragging your ass around while following the numbers snoozefest. I swear if I see one more WWII shooter or one more game featuring thick neck marines with convenient chest high walls I'm gonna scream!

Ultimately it wouldn't be so bad if games ripped off one another if they just did like Just Cause II and remembered that games are supposed to be fun. If they would have made the game in ANY way realistic it would have been the uber suck. After playing Stalker I already know how I would do in a real war, very very badly. So how about make it fun! Give me AI that is a challenge without obvious cheating, like how EA shooters will have grunts that can instantly spot you even when you are behind cover and snipe you from 1000 yards away with a pistol while taking more rounds than the T-800, give me something to shoot other than the same damned weapons everybody else has, like the sneaky crossbow in NOLF II, or even the "angry kitty" bomb! Who cares if that "would never happen in real life" because it ISN'T REAL LIFE it is a fricking game!

You don't have to give us five legged kittens riding purple ponies devs, just quit rehashing the same old shit, okay?

"This was an unprecedented situation," he said. "Most of these breaches go unreported by companies."

At first I thought this was just to spread generalized fear, take a cheap swipe at their competition or even shift attention to something else, but it appears we'll get to see how pervasive this becomes. Perhaps he wasn't completely full of lies ...

Duke never tried to be real, it was completely over the top from the start.

Reminds me of Yahtzee's rant on Doom being "so unrealistic" in his Bulletstorm review.

People are getting disgusted with MMOs, it is inherently amoral business.

Eventually, player realizes what excatly is being done to him:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/2487-The-Skinner-Box
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operant_conditioning_chamber
http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html

Once you realize that, everything about MMO stops being fun, every reward is spolied because you know it is conditioning to keep you playing to get further rewards. Then you get slightly pissed at authors for abusing skinery-boxy mechanics of human psychology. And you quit for good.

Changing MMO does not help: it is just differently colored lever you have to press to get pelets. Nothing devs can do can help past this point except abandoning notion of chaining player to game.

There is no cake.....

People are getting disgusted with MMOs, it is inherently amoral business.

Eventually, player realizes what excatly is being done to him:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/2487-The-Skinner-Box
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operant_conditioning_chamber
http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html

Once you realize that, everything about MMO stops being fun, every reward is spolied because you know it is conditioning to keep you playing to get further rewards. Then you get slightly pissed at authors for abusing skinery-boxy mechanics of human psychology. And you quit for good.

Changing MMO does not help: it is just differently colored lever you have to press to get pelets. Nothing devs can do can help past this point except abandoning notion of chaining player to game.

Oh, you joke.

Nethack, as itself? Almost certainly not. Nethack, reskinned to immerse the player in an artistic or cultural situation? With a sufficient advertising budget to convince people to actually play it? That might pass and, depending on the situation or scenario you present, it might even be worthwhile.

As a further example, remember that any game which would be suitable for this grant doesn't even necessarily have to be playable, just evocative. Consider the innocuous-seeming board game Train , which was pretty much designed to make you want to stop playing most of the way through the first time and never to try it again. That one didn't just hit its mark, it kicked it in the kielbasa. To its detriment, some people failed to realize that the board game was villifying the original event, and instead chose to hate on the board game for celebrating it.

This comment is all kinds of stupid.

No, it's a fairly common viewpoint among rational Nintendo customers. But it does omit Nintendo's battle with pirates. I think the DS and its latest incarnations is a neat little device and so I purchased a certain cartridge for it recently for $5 from some Chinese site. Unfortunately upon visiting the site to retrieve the latest firmware for their cart, I noticed that they were also hosting movies and roms for the latest games (of all regions) in their file directory tree. This is reality. You might not see it here but you can walk down the street in some Asian nations and pick up every game for the DS on a tiny little cart for very little money ($50?). On the other hand, I want to tinker with what I paid for! My device? Then I'll run what I want to run on it.

Nintendo does well because their business model is sensible. They make money on their hardware.

So that's interesting because if they make money on their hardware, why do they care what I do with it after I buy it? Why don't they market it as a gaming/development platform? Why don't they just release all their tool chains for everyone to use to develop on their systems if they already make money on the hardware? I mean, you'd probably sell more platforms that way, right? Why do I need to pay some absurd amount of money for a developer's license and a kit to play with them? Perhaps because their business model also relies on a walled garden and though they may make money on the console, the real money comes from sales of games for that console. I think if you had the numbers, you'd see that their profit model is not a whole lot different than Sony or MS. Everyone plays that game.

They also offer things that everyone wants. MS fanboys need to realise that not everyone wants to play as a big fat space marine or some other "extreme" character doing the same damn thing in every sequel while spurting out god awful dialog that sounds like it was written by the 13 year olds play the game.

Having just played through Beautiful Katamari and Rapala Bass Pro Fishing on my 360 last night, I have to question this statement (not that fishing games don't exist for the Wii). I think your statement works well generically. Observe: (MS|Nintendo|Sony) fanboys need to realise that not everyone wants to play as a (big fat space marine|big fat Italian plumber) or some other ("extreme"|"cute") character doing the same damn thing in every sequel while spurting out (god awful dialog|It's a me, a Mario|PikaPikachu) that sounds like it was written by the (13 year olds|racists) play the game.

So I'm not seeing how you feel Nintendo is worse than the competition. Your comment is uneducated fanboy verbal masturbation at best and not surprisingly all the other little uneducated xbots gave you a +5 interesting for spouting crap.

I think the key here is that the three big names have their ups and downs. Why on earth do you act like there are no "downs" with Nintendo? If price is important to you, go with Nintendo. The Wii was the first of the three I bought. If graphics are important to you, go with the PS3. If online FPS is important to you, go with the XBox 360. If offline multiplayer is important to you, go with the Wii. Etc, etc. I own all three. And I play all three. Your post ironically makes you look like the fan boy and RogueyWon look like a well tempered gamer. Some of your acclamations for Nintendo are more than questionable ...

This game is dead on arrival to me. I was looking forward to a new "Quake" (read: multiplayer awesomeness) and it seems like they are giving us a single player only (for all intents and purposes) game instead.

Now, single player games are fine. I really like Mario, Zelda, a lot of the games on XBLA (Castle Crashers, Limbo, etc, etc) and I could name a ton more games that are fun single player/co-op experiences. That being said, id isn't a company I expect great single player games from. I expect great multiplayer games from them! Games with lasting power.

Sure, playing a great single player game could take 12 hours to complete, and another 10 to replay if it's that good, but multiplayer games can make me want to play for _years_. Quake 1/2/3, I don't want to know how many hours I put into those with friends on a LAN. When RAGE was announced, I was excited for new IP from id! What new things are they going to think up for multiplayer to push themselves ahead of all the rest in the competitive scene? It seems, so far, there are no dedicated servers! no deathmatch! and NO CTF!!! That's grea..... wait, what? The only multiplayer they are going to have is vehicle combat and co-op? Who is creating this game again?

No Dedicated Servers: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/95955-John-Carmack-Says-No-Dedicated-Servers-for-Rage
Co-Op/Vehicles with NO DM/CTF: http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/04/19/rage-multiplayer-modes-revealed-no-deathmatch-or-capture-the-flag/

Ok, so, it's pretty much a single player game only. I'll save my $60 thank you. I was sincerely looking forward to another AAA awesome multiplayer title. I guess if you want to play a multiplayer shooter, go grab CoD#12 or whatever they are up to now.. shudder.. id software is apparently removing themselves from the running. Movie style, linear games, seem to be the RAGE.. I think I'll get off my own lawn now..

Obligatory Zero Punctuation on Motion Controls.