Uhm, really? "New Ubisoft game" is, even for the average gamer, as informative as "New Warner Movie", meaning not at all.
"New bioware game" or "new id game" on the other hand... (though id is both developer and publisher i think)
I'd even say that studios are even less interesting to the average movie viewer, since marketing and interest is mostly centered on the director and actors (trying to come up with an example, i just had to look up that Spielbergs studio is Dreamworks actually)
I really don't understand how you come to your conclusion.
I am not opposed to paid DLC, though I usually have played the game to a point where some minor expansion packs can't rekindle that interest when they come out.
The most ridiculous PAID DLC was for Tales of Vesperia. You could actually buy 5 levels for your character. In a non-MMORPG. So you don't have to level up in a single player RPG.
That's a little like buying an autopilot for a Truck driving simulator.
The unethical part is that they want to add the arrogant, slow, chatty and (after purchase) unfriendly Apple store employees to their minions.
Just my personal experience, may have been my bad luck.
Im so sick of the "guilty of stupidity" argument so common here on slashdot. For most people, computers are still a small, convenient part of life, so they don't educate themselves about it's threats.
But even if they are actually stupid, as in low IQ or poor planning abilities, that does NOT make them guilty in any sense if they're victims of some sad, controlling stalker.
Reminds me a little of some people who say that people who get caught smoking pot 3 times deserve the 25 years in prison they get in some stone-age places i heard of because they were "so stupid".
Stupid people suffer, too, and are mostly not at fault for their stupidity.
Strange. I have one in my bathroom, no enclosure (straight in the socket) on the wall. Lights up completely in about 2 seconds, cost 1.95 Euro (discounter brand, "Aldi") and hangs there now for 4 years. Its a small bathroom, too, so it gets pretty humid every morning when i shower. Anecdotal evidence, i know, but of all of the energy saving bulbs (6) i installed when i moved in 4 years ago, a total of 2 have died so far. It pays to buy good quality bulbs, which don't have to be necessarily expensive.
I switched from exclusively PC gaming to exclusively console gaming about 5 years ago and never looked back. I could probably buy a house if i had saved the money i wasted in a hardware pissing contest i had with my friends ("doom looks so much smoother with my dx4/100. Oh, are these real instruments in the background? Have to buy a 200 Euro wavebank soundcard.") when i was younger. Though i know high end PC hardware is cheaper now, i still enjoy not worrying if a game will work, if i really get the best/intended experience with my rig or if i rather should have waited a month to buy gfx card xy instead of xy+. I have the same PC since about 5 years now, and will probably buy a new one when they become so small that you could accidentally inhale them.
I heard they just inject it once when they get in a fat loss phase to reach a state of ketosis practically overnight.
A bad idea nonetheless, but there are few professional sports that dont ruin your body in the long run.
Wow, that was the easiest way to get rid of these pesky modpoints ever. Go back to the old article and retroactively mod everyone up who vaguely mentioned something spaceshuttly.
True, but short and good games certainly have their place, too. A different approach would be to add some value (nicer, bigger cases instead of the standard DVD-cases, infocom-like trinkets etc.).
The road game companies currently take with DLC (yes, downloadable is one word, we all know that) severely devealues games in my opinion. I usually buy a game, play the shit out of it and shelve it and cant really be bothered to play it again unless its a big, shivering isles-like expansion at the least. I also know that i don't have the complete version in my precious collection and am more likely to sell it and maybe get a preferably used copy when a gold/goty/whatever edition comes out.
But i love and collect games, so my opinion on this subject may differ from people who trade in 3 perfectly good games at gamespot for a meager discount on a new one.
If we only make games with great replay value, we'll only have roguelikes, sportsgames, randomly generated strategy games, motion-controlled solitaire collections and maybe a few other genres i can't think of right now (multiplayer games are a different beast obviously).
We wouldn't have a Mass Effect, Final Fantasy, Persona, Monkey Island, Sam & Max, Baldur's Gate etc.
Some of these provided me with 80-100 hours of fun, though i wouldn't think of playing them again. For me, games like this are like a good book - i will probably never read it again, but i still leave it on my shelf.
Replay value really isn't and shouldn't be that much of a point when it comes to games.
Replay value is a very, very small portion of what makes a good game. After 60 hours of mass effect or 100 hours of final fantasy or 20 hours of mario/hl2/whatever i don't really feel the need to replay them (I keep them, nonetheless, like a good book).
This is the golden age of gaming, i can barely keep up with the titles i know i absolutely MUST play.
Hopefully this little rant someone at penny-arcade posted will make the ending suck a little less for you - it did for me.
SPOILER
SPOILER
SPOILER
Fuck video game logic.
Fuck the idea that games have to end with a final climactic boss fight. Fuck final bosses with super-attacks and a third ultra form with an extra wing that summons meteors and shit.
Fuck hitting his glowing vulnerable spots. Fuck a gimmick battle where you have to run between three switches until he drops his shields and then you can shoot him.
Fuck waiting for the god damn villain to finish his monologue before you shoot his stupid god damn face
You know why Reaver shot Lucien?
Because you, being a gamer, were sitting there patiently waiting for the guy to finish his monologue before you began SUPAH BOSS-A BATTRE-YU.
He was standing there, and you had a gun pointed at him.
SHOOT HIM IN THE HEAD
But you didn't, because you thought there was something more to this then just getting simple revenge on the guy who fucked your life up.
There isn't. Shoot him. Now.
I loved the whole end of this game exactly because it flew directly in the face of video game logic. Specifically, it flew right in the face of bullshit JRPG logic that is poisoning all RPGs and has been doing so for years.
Yes. No more Fable, Fallout, Final Fantasy, Resident Evil. Who needs big, epic games you can dive into for dozens of hours.
Tower defense, world of goo and dwarf fortress should be enough for everybody.
I admit that i dont know how complex that tuning is and that i never tried keyboard and mouse on my couch; i would imagine it puts a little mor strain on the wrist since you have to bend your hand upwards, but i dont really know.
You can turn much faster and are more acurate with k+b than with a gamepad - i think that's the whole point why people want it on consoles anyway. So if you play matches on a server with mixed k+m and gamepad users, playing with a gamepad would be rather frustrating and would practically require all to play with a km setup to compete. And i doubt that many people play quake or unreal matches on a PC with anything else but k+m.
Some thoughts why K+M isn't really that practical on consoles:
- Since most 3d Shooters now have online functionality, the users would have to be separated into k+m and gamepad groups - As mentioned by others, most consoles are played in front of the tv, and crouching over a low couch table isn't really a comfortable way to play. - Single player games have to be tuned to a certain movement / turning speed; this would have to be done for both input methods.
I know some people play their consoles in front of a monitor, but they are a tiny minority.
I work all day oin front of a computer, and just lounging on the floor or on the couch with a controller in the evening gives me a real break from that.
The first time i heard on slashdot that the movie industry doesnt complain.
Also, i think that movies have a much longer shelf life, you can still buy "the matrix" or even "ben hur" on DVD or rent it, while games older than half a year (PC) / about 4 years (console) are usually considered obsolete and don't make any money for the publisher / developer.
For the games i play (mostly console RPGs) a price difference of $10 really doesn't matter too much. I paid 69 Euro (about $90) for Fallout 3 because i bought it on the day it came out, and i would have paid up to 100 Euro for it. Same goes for games like mass effect, lost odyssee etc. They all have so much playtime - i am a slow player and can sink 80-120 hours in any of them - that i wouldn't really mind higher prices.
I imported dead space from the UK (~$62), and i think i wouldnt have bought it on release for the 69 Euro it cost here that time, so i agree with you when it comes to shorter games. But that was a reduction of $30.
Maybe because i concentrate on the real jewels of my favourite genre, i dont consider prices too important.
Slashdot Mirror
Uhm, really? "New Ubisoft game" is, even for the average gamer, as informative as "New Warner Movie", meaning not at all.
"New bioware game" or "new id game" on the other hand... (though id is both developer and publisher i think)
I'd even say that studios are even less interesting to the average movie viewer, since marketing and interest is mostly centered on the director and actors (trying to come up with an example, i just had to look up that Spielbergs studio is Dreamworks actually)
I really don't understand how you come to your conclusion.
I am not opposed to paid DLC, though I usually have played the game to a point where some minor expansion packs can't rekindle that interest when they come out.
The most ridiculous PAID DLC was for Tales of Vesperia. You could actually buy 5 levels for your character. In a non-MMORPG. So you don't have to level up in a single player RPG.
That's a little like buying an autopilot for a Truck driving simulator.
The unethical part is that they want to add the arrogant, slow, chatty and (after purchase) unfriendly Apple store employees to their minions. Just my personal experience, may have been my bad luck.
Im so sick of the "guilty of stupidity" argument so common here on slashdot.
For most people, computers are still a small, convenient part of life, so they don't educate themselves about it's threats.
But even if they are actually stupid, as in low IQ or poor planning abilities, that does NOT make them guilty in any sense if they're victims of some sad, controlling stalker.
Reminds me a little of some people who say that people who get caught smoking pot 3 times deserve the 25 years in prison they get in some stone-age places i heard of because they were "so stupid".
Stupid people suffer, too, and are mostly not at fault for their stupidity.
Strange. I have one in my bathroom, no enclosure (straight in the socket) on the wall. Lights up completely in about 2 seconds, cost 1.95 Euro (discounter brand, "Aldi") and hangs there now for 4 years. Its a small bathroom, too, so it gets pretty humid every morning when i shower.
Anecdotal evidence, i know, but of all of the energy saving bulbs (6) i installed when i moved in 4 years ago, a total of 2 have died so far.
It pays to buy good quality bulbs, which don't have to be necessarily expensive.
Whatever happened to just taking hike to closest Mt. Doom and throwing disk to molten lava hole?
I switched from exclusively PC gaming to exclusively console gaming about 5 years ago and never looked back. I could probably buy a house if i had saved the money i wasted in a hardware pissing contest i had with my friends ("doom looks so much smoother with my dx4/100. Oh, are these real instruments in the background? Have to buy a 200 Euro wavebank soundcard.") when i was younger.
Though i know high end PC hardware is cheaper now, i still enjoy not worrying if a game will work, if i really get the best/intended experience with my rig or if i rather should have waited a month to buy gfx card xy instead of xy+.
I have the same PC since about 5 years now, and will probably buy a new one when they become so small that you could accidentally inhale them.
I heard they just inject it once when they get in a fat loss phase to reach a state of ketosis practically overnight.
A bad idea nonetheless, but there are few professional sports that dont ruin your body in the long run.
Wow, that was the easiest way to get rid of these pesky modpoints ever. Go back to the old article and retroactively mod everyone up who vaguely mentioned something spaceshuttly.
17. Carefully wash your hands after enclosing your former home in a cement/concrete sarcophagus
True, but short and good games certainly have their place, too. A different approach would be to add some value (nicer, bigger cases instead of the standard DVD-cases, infocom-like trinkets etc.).
The road game companies currently take with DLC (yes, downloadable is one word, we all know that) severely devealues games in my opinion. I usually buy a game, play the shit out of it and shelve it and cant really be bothered to play it again unless its a big, shivering isles-like expansion at the least. I also know that i don't have the complete version in my precious collection and am more likely to sell it and maybe get a preferably used copy when a gold/goty/whatever edition comes out.
But i love and collect games, so my opinion on this subject may differ from people who trade in 3 perfectly good games at gamespot for a meager discount on a new one.
If we only make games with great replay value, we'll only have roguelikes, sportsgames, randomly generated strategy games, motion-controlled solitaire collections and maybe a few other genres i can't think of right now (multiplayer games are a different beast obviously).
We wouldn't have a Mass Effect, Final Fantasy, Persona, Monkey Island, Sam & Max, Baldur's Gate etc.
Some of these provided me with 80-100 hours of fun, though i wouldn't think of playing them again. For me, games like this are like a good book - i will probably never read it again, but i still leave it on my shelf.
Replay value really isn't and shouldn't be that much of a point when it comes to games.
Hand in your geek card, youngster. I was flying this.
Replay value is a very, very small portion of what makes a good game. After 60 hours of mass effect or 100 hours of final fantasy or 20 hours of mario/hl2/whatever i don't really feel the need to replay them (I keep them, nonetheless, like a good book).
This is the golden age of gaming, i can barely keep up with the titles i know i absolutely MUST play.
SPOILER
SPOILER
SPOILER
Fuck video game logic.
Fuck the idea that games have to end with a final climactic boss fight. Fuck final bosses with super-attacks and a third ultra form with an extra wing that summons meteors and shit.
Fuck hitting his glowing vulnerable spots. Fuck a gimmick battle where you have to run between three switches until he drops his shields and then you can shoot him.
Fuck waiting for the god damn villain to finish his monologue before you shoot his stupid god damn face
You know why Reaver shot Lucien?
Because you, being a gamer, were sitting there patiently waiting for the guy to finish his monologue before you began SUPAH BOSS-A BATTRE-YU.
He was standing there, and you had a gun pointed at him.
SHOOT HIM IN THE HEAD
But you didn't, because you thought there was something more to this then just getting simple revenge on the guy who fucked your life up.
There isn't. Shoot him. Now.
I loved the whole end of this game exactly because it flew directly in the face of video game logic. Specifically, it flew right in the face of bullshit JRPG logic that is poisoning all RPGs and has been doing so for years.
Yes. No more Fable, Fallout, Final Fantasy, Resident Evil. Who needs big, epic games you can dive into for dozens of hours. Tower defense, world of goo and dwarf fortress should be enough for everybody.
Thanks for the info and links, i will have a look at it on monday - i dont have a 3.1 installation here.
OK, i wasnt aware of that. There seems to be a very limited intersection of codecs browser vendors could agree on, though.
Yep. I guess most video sites will move swiftly to javascript-decoding and rendering their flvs and mp4s.
I've actually found this bug quite charming.
I just thought "Man, radiation really fried peoples brains here. Maybe living in a bomb crater isn't such a good idea after all".
Other than that, it crashed only one time (xbox version) in about 120 hours playtime total.
I admit that i dont know how complex that tuning is and that i never tried keyboard and mouse on my couch; i would imagine it puts a little mor strain on the wrist since you have to bend your hand upwards, but i dont really know.
You can turn much faster and are more acurate with k+b than with a gamepad - i think that's the whole point why people want it on consoles anyway.
So if you play matches on a server with mixed k+m and gamepad users, playing with a gamepad would be rather frustrating and would practically require all to play with a km setup to compete.
And i doubt that many people play quake or unreal matches on a PC with anything else but k+m.
Some thoughts why K+M isn't really that practical on consoles:
- Since most 3d Shooters now have online functionality, the users would have to be separated into k+m and gamepad groups
- As mentioned by others, most consoles are played in front of the tv, and crouching over a low couch table isn't really a comfortable way to play.
- Single player games have to be tuned to a certain movement / turning speed; this would have to be done for both input methods.
I know some people play their consoles in front of a monitor, but they are a tiny minority.
I work all day oin front of a computer, and just lounging on the floor or on the couch with a controller in the evening gives me a real break from that.
The first time i heard on slashdot that the movie industry doesnt complain.
Also, i think that movies have a much longer shelf life, you can still buy "the matrix" or even "ben hur" on DVD or rent it, while games older than half a year (PC) / about 4 years (console) are usually considered obsolete and don't make any money for the publisher / developer.
For the games i play (mostly console RPGs) a price difference of $10 really doesn't matter too much. I paid 69 Euro (about $90) for Fallout 3 because i bought it on the day it came out, and i would have paid up to 100 Euro for it. Same goes for games like mass effect, lost odyssee etc. They all have so much playtime - i am a slow player and can sink 80-120 hours in any of them - that i wouldn't really mind higher prices.
I imported dead space from the UK (~$62), and i think i wouldnt have bought it on release for the 69 Euro it cost here that time, so i agree with you when it comes to shorter games. But that was a reduction of $30.
Maybe because i concentrate on the real jewels of my favourite genre, i dont consider prices too important.