I hate to sound typical, but I'm afraid this is going to be Nintendo's "Prince of Persia: Warrior Within". Ubisoft listened to the fans, and came up with crap. And, it shows. The game didn't get NEARLY the amount of attention that Sands of Time did. The loudest fans got what they wanted, and everyone else groaned as a good game with its own style and character got ground into "Hack and Slash in ruins # 35".
And that's what's happening with Nintendo.
Sure, Link's an older teen, so undoubtedly Nintendo will play up his strength and acrobatics. And the enemies are "darker". Whatever. The environments look bland, Link's face lacks any expression, and the combat seems hum-drum. Basically, the speculation puts all its money on "creative boss fighting".
And frankly, from the screenshots, it looks like Nintendo is going back to the unelegant solution of tying off a world with a treeline texture. Sorry guys, but the world barriers in Ocarina of Time stunk. I welcomed the Wind Waker's open sea tactic, it was a fresh solution to making a big world finite. I'll take cel-shading and cartoon lighting over bland faces and run-of-the-mill enemies anyday.
Actually, yes. The age of the children was disclosed, I believe they were all right around 12. That is from memory, however, so I will have to look it up to be sure.
I'm not finding it by searching, so I think that I found it on one of those online catalogs of psychological studies that colleges have memberships to, and to which I probably don't have access to anymore. (since I have gradauated)
In reply to the new subject, I would only interject that we as parents will have the responsibility of informing ourselves before we buy our children games. What I will have trouble with, however, is balancing out playing the games that I want to and limiting my child on what kinds of games he can play. I figure I will start out with cartoon violence (a la smash brothers) and play it by ear then.
However, my parents never felt the need to censor anything from me, and I turned out okay. I played Mortal Kombat when I was 12, and it was "cool". End result: I think kung fu is cool, and excess blood in games doesn't bother me, but seems cartoonish, and can easily bleed into "immature". I remember watching "Aliens" and the remake of "Night of the Living Dead" when I was younger, and the end result of that is: Zombie movies and Xenomorphs freak me out. Bottom line: Parents should be aware of what their children do and play, sure. But, they should sit down with the child at least, and make sure he knows how dangerous guns really are, or how people who do that in real life will eventually end up. Me, I'm going to sit down with my kid if he wants the next GTA and ask him "why?". If he can look me straight in the face and say "it'll be fun to pretend to be a mobster" or "I heard from Jimmy it was fun" then I'll probably let him play for a short amount of time. Assuming he's not 12.:)
I actually did some research on this for a paper a while back. The one study that I saw that was of any interest goes as follows:
Two sets of children, same age, same geographical area, same school, kept separate as much as possible to prevent "polluting".
Set A: Given video games to play for X hours a day.
Set B: No video games.
I can't remember for sure, I'd have to dig it up again, but I believe that Set B also was limited on their television intake.
Results: Set A children angered more easily and were more prone to hitting each other in play. Set B children were more patient, hit each other less, and had calmer attitudes.
At best though, this is only one study, so it was careful to point out that this drew a "correlation" between more violent play, quick tempers, and Video Games. They didn't list what games were played, or any details on the children, so results are dubious at best.
The way the current system works under Steam, if you buy Half Life 2 (in store or from Valve directly) you have to connect to a Valve server, to go through a key verification process. After that, Half Life 2 is "Unlocked", and you can play offline.
For the skeptics, log on to Steam, then shut steam down. Disconnect your LAN line. Now, run Steam again. It will say "Unable to connect" and give you options to shut Steam down, retry, or work in offline mode. Voila, you can play without being connected.
This is all covered in the steampowered faq, by the way.
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I hate to sound typical, but I'm afraid this is going to be Nintendo's "Prince of Persia: Warrior Within". Ubisoft listened to the fans, and came up with crap. And, it shows. The game didn't get NEARLY the amount of attention that Sands of Time did. The loudest fans got what they wanted, and everyone else groaned as a good game with its own style and character got ground into "Hack and Slash in ruins # 35".
And that's what's happening with Nintendo.
Sure, Link's an older teen, so undoubtedly Nintendo will play up his strength and acrobatics. And the enemies are "darker". Whatever. The environments look bland, Link's face lacks any expression, and the combat seems hum-drum. Basically, the speculation puts all its money on "creative boss fighting".
And frankly, from the screenshots, it looks like Nintendo is going back to the unelegant solution of tying off a world with a treeline texture. Sorry guys, but the world barriers in Ocarina of Time stunk. I welcomed the Wind Waker's open sea tactic, it was a fresh solution to making a big world finite. I'll take cel-shading and cartoon lighting over bland faces and run-of-the-mill enemies anyday.
Actually, yes. The age of the children was disclosed, I believe they were all right around 12. That is from memory, however, so I will have to look it up to be sure.
:)
I'm not finding it by searching, so I think that I found it on one of those online catalogs of psychological studies that colleges have memberships to, and to which I probably don't have access to anymore. (since I have gradauated)
In reply to the new subject, I would only interject that we as parents will have the responsibility of informing ourselves before we buy our children games. What I will have trouble with, however, is balancing out playing the games that I want to and limiting my child on what kinds of games he can play. I figure I will start out with cartoon violence (a la smash brothers) and play it by ear then. However, my parents never felt the need to censor anything from me, and I turned out okay. I played Mortal Kombat when I was 12, and it was "cool". End result: I think kung fu is cool, and excess blood in games doesn't bother me, but seems cartoonish, and can easily bleed into "immature". I remember watching "Aliens" and the remake of "Night of the Living Dead" when I was younger, and the end result of that is: Zombie movies and Xenomorphs freak me out. Bottom line: Parents should be aware of what their children do and play, sure. But, they should sit down with the child at least, and make sure he knows how dangerous guns really are, or how people who do that in real life will eventually end up. Me, I'm going to sit down with my kid if he wants the next GTA and ask him "why?". If he can look me straight in the face and say "it'll be fun to pretend to be a mobster" or "I heard from Jimmy it was fun" then I'll probably let him play for a short amount of time. Assuming he's not 12.
I actually did some research on this for a paper a while back. The one study that I saw that was of any interest goes as follows:
Two sets of children, same age, same geographical area, same school, kept separate as much as possible to prevent "polluting".
Set A: Given video games to play for X hours a day.
Set B: No video games.
I can't remember for sure, I'd have to dig it up again, but I believe that Set B also was limited on their television intake.
Results: Set A children angered more easily and were more prone to hitting each other in play. Set B children were more patient, hit each other less, and had calmer attitudes.
At best though, this is only one study, so it was careful to point out that this drew a "correlation" between more violent play, quick tempers, and Video Games. They didn't list what games were played, or any details on the children, so results are dubious at best.
When I find a link, I'll paste it.
The way the current system works under Steam, if you buy Half Life 2 (in store or from Valve directly) you have to connect to a Valve server, to go through a key verification process. After that, Half Life 2 is "Unlocked", and you can play offline. For the skeptics, log on to Steam, then shut steam down. Disconnect your LAN line. Now, run Steam again. It will say "Unable to connect" and give you options to shut Steam down, retry, or work in offline mode. Voila, you can play without being connected. This is all covered in the steampowered faq, by the way.