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The Beauty That is GameTap
We've already discussed the Evils of GameTap, so it seemed only fair to talk about what makes GameTap so good. Gamers With Jobs' Julian Murdoch talks about how the GameTap system 'revolutionizes' the 90-minute gaming session ... all for the cost of a single console game. From the article: "The act of browsing in and of itself is a powerful, positive experience. I go to my local bookstore not just to buy books, but to drink black coffee and wander around the aisles, reading a page of that, a chapter of this. Gametap brings this experience to gaming, and it's uniquely suited for the ADD gamer with too much to do, and not enough time. Sure, I own a lot of Gametap's library already -- they sit out there on the shelves, their ROMs rest peacefully on servers 30 feet away in the furnace room. But I can't surf them.
"
kool, froth proueist
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I still don't play many games...
You all have Oo.o and Firefox, so get World Wind.
? :O
Ah yes, the sweet guilty pleasure of surfing an ever growing heap of crappy games that were crappy when they were new and somehow seem to stink even more as they age and decay. Such the deal. Sign me up where? I'll pass thanks. I think I am much more likely to enjoy surfing my collection of Steam games that are actually worth spending 90 minutes of my valuable time playing. :-)
He who hesitates is lost.
... was the ability to rent games for so much per month. I get a game, play it for a bit, if I like it, I keep it longer as I can keep it as long as I want. If not, I send it back. And if a game has real merit, I buy it eventually. It's certainly made me less tolerant of crappy games because I don't feel obliged to play it as I haven't bought it.
Copyright is theft! Resist the information fascists! Emulators forever!
US/Canada only. Rental model. Hope they die in a car fire or something.
Gametap has the ability to make old/obsolete games the source of revenue. If these old titles are percieved to have monetary value, they will put more pressure on the emulator community.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Well, I was SOO happy when I read the positive reviews for the new Sam & Max game, I went over to Gametap with the intention of signing up immediately, only to be met by "Your IP number says you are from Europe. This service is for US customers only. Sorry".
Why, oh why, do you set up a online delivery system and deliberately design your system to exclude potential customers? Do they get a kick out of pissing me off? Is my money not good enough?
You can of course go through a web proxy to hide your IP adress, and fake a US adress. Many people have apperently already done so. Also, I heard that Gametap was going to open up for international customers later, but I am so upset by now, I'll probably boycott them. I think Telltale games are going to sell the boxed game themselves later, so I will wait for that.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
I had actually paid for a subscription, based on the news of "Sam & Max" and "Uru", but after my first taste of the GameTap experience, called and got a refund. At least you get a free trial, so it was no problem, and I will say that it was a pleasant surprise to get a helpful person on their tech support line.
Actually I signed up for Gametap 2 weeks ago and have found it to be a great deal so far. The price was $9.95 for the first month, with the second month free. While I have little interest in playing a lot of the older console games (sports games on the Atari 2600?), others such as Golden Axe I-III and Altered Beast have immense retro appeal. I doubt anyone can argue that Black Tiger, Crazy Taxi and Joust (to name a few) are 'crappy games no one bought the first time'.
:)
Of course the collection of mainly older Windows games are what people like me who have broadband and mainly play PC games would be interested in. Some of the highlights:
- Planescape: Torment
- Disciples II: Rise of the Elves (played the rest of the series but missed that one)
- Serious Sam II
- Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow
- And the Sam and Max 'episode' released for Gametap is actually very polished and quite funny
- Space Colony is IMO a real gem that I also missed the first time, not being a huge Sims fan
- Kohan II: Kings of War. I've been waiting for this one to hit $10 in the bargain bin, and finally was able to play it along with all these other games for that price
Would it hold my interest at $10/month for a year or more? Only if they continue to add quality games every month, and I haven't used it long enough to vouch for that. Also, it claims that there are ~790 games online, but I'm pretty sure most of these are games that are applet-style, or were counted twice for being available single player and via their head-to-head internet ranking service.
Umm... http://www.gamefly.com/ the netflix of games though I haven't used them. If you rent a lot of games, and all it takes is something like 2 per month, then this might just be worth it for you.
People rejected this exact same model of getting MP3s. Why embrace it for video games? I've bought plenty of retro-compilations over the years. Want to shovel a couple dozen old Sega games onto a CD? I'll probably buy it. But I won't keep buying it month after month, just for the privledge of continuing to use it.
Bush: He's Liberal in all the wrong ways.
Anyone try GameTap with WINE? How's it work? It'd be great to get this going on Linux.
WeRelate.org - wiki-based genealogy
If it puts a more professional focus on emulators, why the heck not. OK, so now you have to pay (what is probably not an overly large amount) for the emulator/games. If the company who is being emulated produces the emulator (and therefore has a lot better access to internal code, specs, etc) you are going to end up having a better product, and in the end somebody is probably getting paid for the development work.
End result, a few more jobs, a better product, and slightly higher cost.