Remember when the Xbox was first announced and the "big thing" was that it would be super-simple to port games from Xbox -> PC and vice-versa? I can see why they would delay the release of this game for business reasons, but they're blaming it on technical difficulties. What's going on in Redmond?
From the article: in the vastly profitable home-entertainment-console market, Nintendo's GameCube sits an ignominious third, behind both Sony's PlayStation 2 and even upstart Microsoft
It's a great article, but the Gamecube is only placing third in North America... it runs second to the PS2 in terms of worldwide sales, and I believe that Nintendo makes waaaay more money than the Xbox or Playstation divisions. The author could have done a little more research before hand...
9/10ths of the entries into the MMO market are there because they like the MMO business model. The developers don't stop to think "does making this game massively-multiplayer actually improve gameplay?" They don't want to consider that the game they have created might be more appropriate in a traditional, no-monthly-fee, non-massive online setup. I'm sure Maxis would have had higher net profits if they'd skipped the entire Sims Online venture and simply added the ability to create and run your own multiplayer servers for The Sims 2. They could have sold the "multiplayer expansion" and made a killing. We should move away from the FPS and RTS-style lobby system. Guild Wars is a great compromise IMO. It'd be nice if Diablo 3 ripped them off in this regard.
EA is the publisher for Free Radical, which employs most of the original Goldeneye team and produces games with a greatly enhanced version of the Goldeneye engine (or at least a Goldeneye playalike).
Call me crazy, but: Bond license + next-gen engine = killer, multiplatform, online Goldeneye remake
So does that mean I can mail them my Chaos Theory DVD and get an unencumbered version that will actually work on my computer? I guess I can't really complain. There was an extremely tiny warning on the box that it might not work with all DVD drives. Unfortunately the only way to find out for sure it to buy it, open the box (at which point it becomes unreturnable) and pop it in the drive. I wouldn't be so upset if they'd at least bothered to answer the e-mail or postal mail I sent them about the issue.:P
Analysts predicted the death of Nintendo at the release of the Genesis, PSone, Dreamcast, PS2, Xbox, PSP and Xbox 360. It seems like I read about Nintendo making record profits every other day. I wonder if this news will effect the predictions in any way?
Guess we have to wait on the PS3's eventual release to find out.
Phil Harrison President SCE Worldwide Studios "Our job is lead and innovate. We've done it faster and at higher price points."
The Playstation 2 is a great machine, with a great library of games. But when you get right down to it, it's a Playstation 1 with more RAM, more muscle and more storage. And the Playstation 1 was an SNES with more RAM, more muscle and more storage.
And the Playstation 3 is... well you get the idea.
Just because they're in first place doesn't mean they're leading. $10 says the PS3 gets an updated controller with gyro sensors within two years of its release.
I guess I don't really see the logic behind this. They're going to capture the casual market by relying on their existing (non-casual) userbase? And their plan is to undercut Nintendo by $100 with severely underpowered hardware that has no WiFi adaptor or integrated online service. Even if they did pull this off (and Nintendo has everything about the Revolution controller patented, so good luck), the PS2 just doesn't have the right developers to make those sort of games. The industry is going to have to wait for Miyamoto to make some games and teach them how this whole gyro thing is going to work. That's how it went down when he brought back analog sticks.
I remember seeing those ads here in Canada. What pissed me off the most was that they showed a review snippet that said something along the lines of, "visually breathtaking." I kept wondering, if the graphics are so great, why don't they just show them in the commercial? Still, ask any Playstation owner about graphics and they'll swear on their life that Final Fantasy 7 had much better graphics than, say, Mario 64, as they gesture wildly at screenshots of FF7's (admittedly amazing) prerendered cutscenes. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
Maybe Microsoft should try to beat Cedega to the punch and port DirectX to Mac OS X? They could sell it for $30 per major revision, with free updates in between to keep things in sync with Windows. MS could start losing some serious business if Cedega ever gets "good enough" (although this doesn't seem to be the case so far). Also, if it was done really well, it would discourage the development of native OS X games, which I'm sure they'd see as a nice bonus.
They're definitely not important game elements, but they can certainly help you tell a story. The mechanics of Final Fantasy games haven't changed since the series' NES debut, even though they are now basically CGI films with nice little "gaming breaks" to draw out the experience. I would like to say that, unless they're taking the place of a loading screen, cinematics need to be skippable. As much as I love Nintendo, this is something that they're very bad about. The last boss of Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door features a five minute long cinematic with text bubbles that must be closed by tapping the A button. Starting a new save in Four Swords Adventures results in the exact same situation - what a way to kick off a multiplayer game!
If Nintendo can make a solid platformer that's controlled with bongo drums, they can certainly make plenty of great games for the one-handed and nunchaku Revolution controllers.
I honestly have no problem buying new games, even if it costs a bit more, because I like to support companies that do a good job. I only have three used games and that's because I couldn't find them new at any store. However, I'd like to make this perfectly clear: any company that takes steps to prevent me from lending games to friends or buying used games will never, ever receive another dollar of my money. I don't see what CliffyB has to complain about. Their recent games are Unreal, UT, UT2003/2004, and the upcoming UT2007. That's one evolutionary (not revolutionary) game every 2-3 years. The other 3/4 of their releases are "Game of the Year Special Edition" deals, basically DVDs with a few nice (free) maps and mods dumped in. Even so, they're making money hand over fist. The issue isn't that they're losing money, or even that they're just breaking even. They're upset because they're not making insane profits. These are the same complaints that we're hearing from the RIAA/MPAA. So, to the game industry: we (consumers) are good allies. We don't hate you (yet). Stop being greedy, get off the soapbox and get back to work. We'll be happy to buy any good games that you release.
Developing for Gamecube is pretty well understood, and in terms of hardware the Revolution is an extra-beefy Gamecube with a network card built in. Sadly, most of the Cube's 3rd-party releases were rushed ports of PS2 or Xbox games. This meant that, even though the Cube was more powerful than the PS2, the graphics and performance were often worse. Now we have the least powerful system, but I think that the quality of the ports will remain about the same. I think that Nintendo's focus on low-def is a good thing. Given that a 360 running on a regular TV looks about as good as a plain-old Xbox, I think we can probably expect the same out of the PS3. So I think that Revolution will look the best on the old-fashioned, outdated TVs that 99% of us still have.
You'll certainly be able to play Gamecube games on your Revolution using your current Wavebird. However, I'd be surprised if Revolution games would be able to use the Gamecube controller connectors. By implementing the "classic" controller as a shell over the Revolution controller, you'd get the gyro features in addition to standard control sticks and shoulder buttons. Also, Nintendo likes money so why not force people to buy a controller + shell?
I downloaded the demo of F.E.A.R., installed it, started it up and... it ran terribly. Doom 3 runs like a dream on this system and F.E.A.R. barely chugs along at 640x480. Game developers are getting greedy on behalf of the hardware manufacturers. A 1GB minimum RAM requirement is just too much. The solution? I'm going to play Guild Wars on my PC for as long as it'll run (hopefully the expansions won't push the requirements too high), and spend the rest of my gaming budget on my console. I could easily buy all three current-gen consoles for the price of a decent gaming rig, and I only need one to keep myself occupied.
Given the way the downloadable client works, I'd say you'd be perfectly entitled to use your account with the Mac version if it ever ships. Unfortunately A.net went with DirectX for everything so porting it anywhere else would be a big job.
The Game Boy Advance, due to its longer lifespan and greater install base, still took the majority of the handheld game market, claiming 52 percent of portable game sales. So if the PSP is dominating the handheld market with its distant third, does that mean the Gamecube is dominating the home console market with its distant third? Just curious, because whenever we talk about the PSP, we always say that it's, uh... dominating the market. Even though its selling less, has less games, and is making less money. *cough*
Maybe it's just me, but I wouldn't describe Wind Waker or Super Mario Sunshine as "buggy." They're certainly not any more buggy than the original Super Mario Bros. or Legend of Zelda, and they're far more complex. I've only seen one Nintendo game crash (Metroid Prime), and it's only happened once to me in hours and hours of play. I haven't played a PC game in the last few years that wasn't patched within a week of release, but most console games are definitely very playable out of the box.
The Simpsons isn't going anywhere. If you thought Star Trek fans went nuts when they wanted to cancel Enterprise, just wait for an attempt to cancel the Simpsons. This show has hundreds of millions of obsessive fans who will watch it without fail, no matter how bad the shows get. No amount of merchandising, product placement, spin-offs or even live-action films will kill the Simpsons.
Revolution won't have ethernet but there'll certainly be a USB-based adaptor. However, I don't think that WFC is terribly complicated. Turn unit on, select AP, play game. It's pretty hard to buy a non-wireless router nowadays, and they're getting dirt cheap. And people will buy routers for online play - what else are they going to do, swap the cable between the console and computer?
It's up to the developers to decide if they want dial-up users playing their games. It's not like Revolution is going to have voice chat in any case.
Finally, I think the PS3 will also have a no-subscription, wireless capable internet connection. So, what's the difference? Just the controller? Besides about $200? An online service (PS3 is the same as PS2, just give developers the docs for the ethernet card) that is able to deliver patches and extra content, as well as allowing players to track stats, find friends and match up against players with similar skill levels. Seems a bit better than leaving every developer to start from scratch.
Slashdot Mirror
Remember when the Xbox was first announced and the "big thing" was that it would be super-simple to port games from Xbox -> PC and vice-versa?
I can see why they would delay the release of this game for business reasons, but they're blaming it on technical difficulties. What's going on in Redmond?
From the article: in the vastly profitable home-entertainment-console market, Nintendo's GameCube sits an ignominious third, behind both Sony's PlayStation 2 and even upstart Microsoft
It's a great article, but the Gamecube is only placing third in North America... it runs second to the PS2 in terms of worldwide sales, and I believe that Nintendo makes waaaay more money than the Xbox or Playstation divisions. The author could have done a little more research before hand...
9/10ths of the entries into the MMO market are there because they like the MMO business model. The developers don't stop to think "does making this game massively-multiplayer actually improve gameplay?" They don't want to consider that the game they have created might be more appropriate in a traditional, no-monthly-fee, non-massive online setup.
I'm sure Maxis would have had higher net profits if they'd skipped the entire Sims Online venture and simply added the ability to create and run your own multiplayer servers for The Sims 2. They could have sold the "multiplayer expansion" and made a killing.
We should move away from the FPS and RTS-style lobby system. Guild Wars is a great compromise IMO. It'd be nice if Diablo 3 ripped them off in this regard.
EA has the Bond license.
EA is the publisher for Free Radical, which employs most of the original Goldeneye team and produces games with a greatly enhanced version of the Goldeneye engine (or at least a Goldeneye playalike).
Call me crazy, but:
Bond license + next-gen engine = killer, multiplatform, online Goldeneye remake
So does that mean I can mail them my Chaos Theory DVD and get an unencumbered version that will actually work on my computer? :P
I guess I can't really complain. There was an extremely tiny warning on the box that it might not work with all DVD drives. Unfortunately the only way to find out for sure it to buy it, open the box (at which point it becomes unreturnable) and pop it in the drive.
I wouldn't be so upset if they'd at least bothered to answer the e-mail or postal mail I sent them about the issue.
Obviously, uh... Nintendo is... dying?
Analysts predicted the death of Nintendo at the release of the Genesis, PSone, Dreamcast, PS2, Xbox, PSP and Xbox 360. It seems like I read about Nintendo making record profits every other day. I wonder if this news will effect the predictions in any way?
Guess we have to wait on the PS3's eventual release to find out.
Phil Harrison
President
SCE Worldwide Studios
"Our job is lead and innovate. We've done it faster and at higher price points."
The Playstation 2 is a great machine, with a great library of games. But when you get right down to it, it's a Playstation 1 with more RAM, more muscle and more storage. And the Playstation 1 was an SNES with more RAM, more muscle and more storage.
And the Playstation 3 is... well you get the idea.
Just because they're in first place doesn't mean they're leading. $10 says the PS3 gets an updated controller with gyro sensors within two years of its release.
The only think you can know about a Sony release is that anything can change, up to the day it hits the shelves.
I guess I don't really see the logic behind this. They're going to capture the casual market by relying on their existing (non-casual) userbase? And their plan is to undercut Nintendo by $100 with severely underpowered hardware that has no WiFi adaptor or integrated online service.
Even if they did pull this off (and Nintendo has everything about the Revolution controller patented, so good luck), the PS2 just doesn't have the right developers to make those sort of games. The industry is going to have to wait for Miyamoto to make some games and teach them how this whole gyro thing is going to work. That's how it went down when he brought back analog sticks.
I remember seeing those ads here in Canada. What pissed me off the most was that they showed a review snippet that said something along the lines of, "visually breathtaking." I kept wondering, if the graphics are so great, why don't they just show them in the commercial?
Still, ask any Playstation owner about graphics and they'll swear on their life that Final Fantasy 7 had much better graphics than, say, Mario 64, as they gesture wildly at screenshots of FF7's (admittedly amazing) prerendered cutscenes. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
I can't wait to buy Dance Dance Revolution Revolution!
Maybe Microsoft should try to beat Cedega to the punch and port DirectX to Mac OS X? They could sell it for $30 per major revision, with free updates in between to keep things in sync with Windows. MS could start losing some serious business if Cedega ever gets "good enough" (although this doesn't seem to be the case so far).
Also, if it was done really well, it would discourage the development of native OS X games, which I'm sure they'd see as a nice bonus.
They're definitely not important game elements, but they can certainly help you tell a story. The mechanics of Final Fantasy games haven't changed since the series' NES debut, even though they are now basically CGI films with nice little "gaming breaks" to draw out the experience.
I would like to say that, unless they're taking the place of a loading screen, cinematics need to be skippable. As much as I love Nintendo, this is something that they're very bad about. The last boss of Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door features a five minute long cinematic with text bubbles that must be closed by tapping the A button. Starting a new save in Four Swords Adventures results in the exact same situation - what a way to kick off a multiplayer game!
If Nintendo can make a solid platformer that's controlled with bongo drums, they can certainly make plenty of great games for the one-handed and nunchaku Revolution controllers.
I honestly have no problem buying new games, even if it costs a bit more, because I like to support companies that do a good job. I only have three used games and that's because I couldn't find them new at any store.
However, I'd like to make this perfectly clear: any company that takes steps to prevent me from lending games to friends or buying used games will never, ever receive another dollar of my money.
I don't see what CliffyB has to complain about. Their recent games are Unreal, UT, UT2003/2004, and the upcoming UT2007. That's one evolutionary (not revolutionary) game every 2-3 years. The other 3/4 of their releases are "Game of the Year Special Edition" deals, basically DVDs with a few nice (free) maps and mods dumped in. Even so, they're making money hand over fist.
The issue isn't that they're losing money, or even that they're just breaking even. They're upset because they're not making insane profits. These are the same complaints that we're hearing from the RIAA/MPAA. So, to the game industry: we (consumers) are good allies. We don't hate you (yet). Stop being greedy, get off the soapbox and get back to work. We'll be happy to buy any good games that you release.
Anime is already destroying American animation. Let's not let it within 100 miles of any more beloved franchises.
Developing for Gamecube is pretty well understood, and in terms of hardware the Revolution is an extra-beefy Gamecube with a network card built in.
Sadly, most of the Cube's 3rd-party releases were rushed ports of PS2 or Xbox games. This meant that, even though the Cube was more powerful than the PS2, the graphics and performance were often worse. Now we have the least powerful system, but I think that the quality of the ports will remain about the same.
I think that Nintendo's focus on low-def is a good thing. Given that a 360 running on a regular TV looks about as good as a plain-old Xbox, I think we can probably expect the same out of the PS3. So I think that Revolution will look the best on the old-fashioned, outdated TVs that 99% of us still have.
You'll certainly be able to play Gamecube games on your Revolution using your current Wavebird. However, I'd be surprised if Revolution games would be able to use the Gamecube controller connectors. By implementing the "classic" controller as a shell over the Revolution controller, you'd get the gyro features in addition to standard control sticks and shoulder buttons. Also, Nintendo likes money so why not force people to buy a controller + shell?
I downloaded the demo of F.E.A.R., installed it, started it up and... it ran terribly. Doom 3 runs like a dream on this system and F.E.A.R. barely chugs along at 640x480.
Game developers are getting greedy on behalf of the hardware manufacturers. A 1GB minimum RAM requirement is just too much. The solution? I'm going to play Guild Wars on my PC for as long as it'll run (hopefully the expansions won't push the requirements too high), and spend the rest of my gaming budget on my console. I could easily buy all three current-gen consoles for the price of a decent gaming rig, and I only need one to keep myself occupied.
Given the way the downloadable client works, I'd say you'd be perfectly entitled to use your account with the Mac version if it ever ships.
Unfortunately A.net went with DirectX for everything so porting it anywhere else would be a big job.
The Game Boy Advance, due to its longer lifespan and greater install base, still took the majority of the handheld game market, claiming 52 percent of portable game sales.
So if the PSP is dominating the handheld market with its distant third, does that mean the Gamecube is dominating the home console market with its distant third?
Just curious, because whenever we talk about the PSP, we always say that it's, uh... dominating the market. Even though its selling less, has less games, and is making less money. *cough*
Maybe it's just me, but I wouldn't describe Wind Waker or Super Mario Sunshine as "buggy." They're certainly not any more buggy than the original Super Mario Bros. or Legend of Zelda, and they're far more complex.
I've only seen one Nintendo game crash (Metroid Prime), and it's only happened once to me in hours and hours of play.
I haven't played a PC game in the last few years that wasn't patched within a week of release, but most console games are definitely very playable out of the box.
The Simpsons isn't going anywhere. If you thought Star Trek fans went nuts when they wanted to cancel Enterprise, just wait for an attempt to cancel the Simpsons. This show has hundreds of millions of obsessive fans who will watch it without fail, no matter how bad the shows get. No amount of merchandising, product placement, spin-offs or even live-action films will kill the Simpsons.
It's hopeless. Utterly, utterly hopeless.
Buy the USB adaptor. It only accepts connections from approved Nintendo systems (i.e. you have to authorize each unit on your computer).
Revolution won't have ethernet but there'll certainly be a USB-based adaptor. However, I don't think that WFC is terribly complicated. Turn unit on, select AP, play game.
It's pretty hard to buy a non-wireless router nowadays, and they're getting dirt cheap. And people will buy routers for online play - what else are they going to do, swap the cable between the console and computer?
It's up to the developers to decide if they want dial-up users playing their games. It's not like Revolution is going to have voice chat in any case.
Finally, I think the PS3 will also have a no-subscription, wireless capable internet connection. So, what's the difference? Just the controller?
Besides about $200? An online service (PS3 is the same as PS2, just give developers the docs for the ethernet card) that is able to deliver patches and extra content, as well as allowing players to track stats, find friends and match up against players with similar skill levels. Seems a bit better than leaving every developer to start from scratch.