If we take the World of Warcraft model with this gem of an idea, we get a very cool system where once you run out of the X amount of time you payed for, you're automatically billed for the next. It doesn't kill immersion like metered play would, but it also would be prohibitive costwise for crazy nuts like myself who are willing to plug in 24 hours worth of gametime every two or three days. As Blizzard keeps your characters around regardless of whether or not you have a subscription, it won't cost them anything extra to have people who have characters and time they bought to play with but aren't playing.
It is true that most of my points are "X has been done by Y before". However, I was not saying such features were useless. I was addressing why people on slashdot commonly do no see them as innovative. It is hard to see something as innovative when something similar has been doing the same thing already for a good time.
Concerning the internet, Blizzard didn't go crazy advertising Battle.net for Warcraft III, because it was more of an "of course" than a "check out this cool new thing!" PC games advertize they can be played online, more than the online system itself.
I am in no way implying that any of the features of the Xbox360 are misguided or stupid. I am simply pointing out why any claims they are innovative are largely ignored.
You'll note a lot of people complain about the PS3 as well, or when speaking about the mere graphical update of the Xbox 360 indicate that the reason they wish to wait is because they want to choose whichever soley graphically updated system has the better games.
As for the innovative features you listed, a breakdown.
It's the first console with built-in support for wireless controllers.
The reason why this isn't viewed as very innovative is because the only reason it is the first console to do so is because it is coming out before the other two entries in this generation. At the same time the Xbox 360's wireless controllers were announced, so were the PS3's.
It's the first console with a built-in network media player.
This is also true. However, in addition to how little this will be used by Joe Somebody, there are already PCs that do this as well.
It's the first console to ship with an extensive unified online system - out of the box.
The unifedness of the system is innovative, and the fact that the Xbox360 ships with this in place is important. However, this is largely disregarded because it is the same system that the Xbox came to enjoy.
It's the first console where every game will play in HD - and where the system, not the game, handles the scaling to the proper resolution
PCs have done this for ages, with gamer having played in HD on their monitors since the days of Counter-Strike and before. While the Xbox360 is the first console to do this, consoles hook up to TVs, and most people don't have an HD ready TV. The benefit of this is minimal, especially at launch.
It's the first console to offer downloadable games and content from indie developers through a micropayment system
True, but again, PCs have offered these same functions, often for free. Bringing PC functions to a console is new and never before done. However, since the PC itself is a gaming platform, these actions are not viewed as terribly innovative.
Whatever the Xbox360 is about, when the most innovative aspects of the machine are either taken from PCs or also in the hands of the competition, they are viewed as being only marginally new and important, especially when they do not directly affect the experience of playing the game itself.
Gamers by definition will be thinking of the games and hardware first, and anything not directly relating to the performance thereof later. The MediaCenter functions, interesting as they may be, are more bells and whistles than important features.
If there's any vice out there which has been thoroughly taxed, known to be bad, and terribly unhealthy, it's the cigarette. Still, for all the effort that has been put into extinguishing the vice, people smoke, a lot.
It's not that taxes aren't deterrants. Higher prices certainly deter people from buying things. It's that when someone is addicted to something, price is no object.
All you do for an addict when you tax their addiction is make them pay even more money for it. The people who aren't addicted will be deterred and walk away, but the people who are addicted or closer to being so will hang on. They'll pay $1 an hour for WoW, EQ or StarCraft. They'll pay $2 an hour. They'll pay $15 an hour so long as they can get their fix. They'll pay every last cent they can spare, and then more, because they are addicted.
The rest of the populace will steer away from games, but the addicts will remain. You will successfully prevent the acquisition of new addicts to be certain, but you will also successfully force the industry to work as hard as they can to keep the addicts (now the only people who still fund the industry) addicted.
The best thing to do would be to start a charity that seeks to help people addicted to games. Individual solutions are largely better than governmental ones.
Is there any explanation for it that doesn't make the game industry look either absent minded or greedy?
Having been a child in those days, I believe I can answer this question.
The answer is yes.
Parents, even now, will have their own movies. Being adults, they would have adult movies. These aren't movies for junior, these are movies for mom and dad.
However, kids being kids, they'll find some way to reach you movies if they want to (barring you locking them up in a safe). Making it important to have some way to keep kids from playing inappropriate DVDs on the PS2, as they are very likely to be lying around the house.
Until recently, very few gamers were parents, let along parents of children who might play games. Beyond the whole issue of parents buying M rated games for their children, there are now parents who want to play M rated games. However, they would rather not let their kids do so. Having a parental lock is important to these people.
The parental lock is also useful for non-gaming parents, but the non-greedy reason for its lack of appearing before now is as above.
The following article eliminates thoroughly a point heavily relied upon by the article. Namely that Halo 3 and the PS3 will be released at the same time. I believe there was a slashdot entry on it, but I could not find it.
Additionally, the article itself admits to be speculation. It is based on little more than what those biased here on slashdot continually tout to claim their favorite console will be victorious.
The only thing the article managed to prove was that baseless projections are just as bad as what the experts say.
The article is interesting at best. While reviewing all the previous major console launches is a good idea, the result here is about 70% opinion and 30% fact. Instead of presenting us with much in the way of information, we have some vague statements about hype and retail shipments, followed by arbitrary statements as to how well the launch went, and how the system fared thereafter.
Anyone who ever tries to call any console a success or any other console a failure (beyond being immediately branded a fanboy) will ignite whatever medium used into arguments about how Nintendo profited on the Gamecube, Microsoft didn't even want to with the Xbox, and how Sony dominated.
Quite simply, the kids who thought they were too good for a kiddy console have now at last reached a level of maturity where having Pikachu in something does not automatically sell it. They now hate and despise the rat, and the only consoles where you can beat the crap out of the bugger and his pals are Nintendo's.
Basically, as it stands the well informed crowd, "gamers", are pretty aware that the hype surrounding all the players may not be what it cracks up to be. We know that Microsoft will pour money upon the Xbox 360 win, lose, or draw. We know Nintendo will make some incredible games for its controller even if everyone else either botches their attempts or doesn't bother, and we know Sony will ride on the popularity of the PS2. Everything else is hype, speculation, or insanity.
However, it is the casual crowd, the people who watch MTV, the people who still play nothing but Tetris, the people playing the Sims, the people who play the cheesy games on their cells phones and generally the people who are scared of using anything beyond Internet Explorer, Word, and Outlook Express on their PC that are the target of the three companies.
Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft all know that the casual game player doesn't read Slashdot, doesn't hear the word of mouth, and doesn't have any preconceptions about one system over another. Each is targeting these untapped fountain of cash with their crosshairs. Sony plans on using their tech hype and previous popularity, Microsoft is using a jump start on the competition and MTV (casual players are not going to buy more than one system), Nintendo is simply targeting everyone under the sun with a controller people will look at and not be as afraid of as the calculator on Windows.
All the speculation we have here is from a crowd who, for the most part, know what's going on. Biases included, we know more than Joe Somebody on the street when it comes to this. We've already decided which system we'll be getting, and nothing save from a miracle or a tragic mistake is going to change our minds. As such, the big three are only focusing on avoiding blundering with people like us, and and working to get the casual people into the game.
We laugh at the Halo 3 comparison, because we know all the sweeter, juicier FPSs there are. The casual crowd doesn't, they know Halo. Don't underestimate the casual players, they outnumber us, and they more than anyone else will be the determining factor in who comes out on top this coming generation, whether you measure success in marketshare, profit or both.
I remember watching a trailer for Ninety Nine Nights because I was curious as to why this would be the end of Koei's Dynasty Warriors series. I remember feeling rather insulted by it.
The portion arrives when the obligatory female character is displayed, and displayed she is. It is immediately implied she has nothing on, before she puts on what I can barely call armor (as so much is showing) with an entire camera shot showing nothing but her clamping her chest peice over he breasts.
Am I the only one insulted by this?
I'm a guy, but I make a point of treating woman as more than a pair of breasts and a reproduction center. I find myself continually insulted by the belief that I can only like women who not only have large mammaries but show them off to the world. Maybe I'm a jealous bastard, but I'd rather prefer any woman I dated to dres in such a way that all the other guys around can't oggle them.
Dynasty Warriors treats women a lot more fairly than most, as they are almost all (save for the amazon-like character) fully dressed. Having a single woman capable of decimating entire armies of men, while well dressed, is a good step towards better portayal of women, although not exactly a giant leap.
Being in Japan now, and having recently traveled all across it, I can assure you that the number of people interested in the Xbox360 is pretty analogous to the number of people in America interested in immigrating to Micronesia. Visiting even the largest of stores with huge sections devoted to video games will usually end without seeing anything related to the Xbox, although occaisionally an original Xbox and a copy of Ninja Gaiden will be lying around.
You may. They are the rates at which items of power and value drop. Common mods simply shoot these rates to 100%, so that every single item that drops is a Thor's Hammer of Electric Justice or a One Ring to Rule Them All.
Most basic mods of Blizzard's Diablo II revolve around editing a large set of relational database tables to get desired changes.
Unfortunately, this is all to often the creation of insanely powerful items, and equally insane drop rates of all the best items in the game and perhaps the overbuffing of a few skills.
The best mods all edit the actual code via dlls, with the database table work complimenting that.
I think the inherent problem here is that video games don't get a vote. If they did, I'm sure there'd be politicians just as interested in absolving them as they are parents.
Why is it that people can't come out and say exactly what the real problem is?
If we assume that Rockstar actually coded the sex scenes, and then removed access to them, how can we logically punish them for this? There isn't a secret button combination or set of actions you can use to activate the scenes, you have to hack the game to do it. How can we hold Rockstar responsible for this?
It seems to me the real reason this issue is being pushed is because Rockstar may have at one point intended to include scenes such as these in the game. The real reason why Rockstar is under fire (aside from being the de facto target of all video game ignoramus) is because Rockstar may have intended to put something like this in GTA:SA, and may still intend to do so in the future.
Honestly though, if the final version of the game contains no way in which these scenes can be accessed without using tools unavailible within the game, how can we blame Rockstar?
Is it just me, or is the original iteration on the far left of the shown iterations for the console (presumably from first to last, left to right) the coolest?
I don't know about the rest of you, but if they had released that, I would have been all over it. That, and if they had kept the name Xenon. Instead they pulled this crazy marketing crap, and now we have a console that looks like a coffee maker on crack, and with name that makes you wonder... "Xbox 360? What happened to the other 359?"
Not to mention the PS3. Honestly, you'd think they could have come up with a better name. I guess it makes sense, but come on now.
And then there's the Revolution, or Mini - PS2. Maybe it's an improvement in design, and certainly the least painful to gaze upon, but it really looks like a smaller PS2. Is Nintendo trying to confuse people into buying it?
Given statements to the effect that people wished the screenshots of the PS3 and Xbox 360 were fake, they may very well be.
I can't fully agree with the guy, but I must concede some of his points. Namely, the ones concerning the GameBoy Micro and developer interests. The Micro really seems like an ill placed idea as there are already two Gameboys that do almost exactly the same thing out there (not to mention the DS), and developers are most interested in porting their title and not worrying about other features.
The author's argument, that Nintendo will fail in hardware, seems plausible, even if I don't agree with it. The odd thing is, in the very last paragraph he paints a world where Nintendo seems to have lost in software as well, where innovation doesn't matter in both. This is a jump in logic and reason that doesn't make sense given his argument.
If Nintendo died, either someone would have to take their place as the innovators in the industry, or we'd face a second video game industry crash. Without innovation, gamers will eventually get tired of sequels and cookie cutter games. If the industry refuses to innovate, gamers will simply stop buying games that are exactly the same as the rest of the games they already own.
In short, if there was no Nintendo, it would be necessary for us to make one.
As as been said, one of the many problems facing the PSP is its lack of viable "pick up and play" games. Those short wondrous games you can just power on, hit start, and do something. Exactly why this is so damaging hasn't been hit on the head yet.
While huge, involved games are the power houses of the home console, the environment there is rather different. While there are a significant portion of people who do not have time to plunk into Final Fantasy XXIXIIVICIXIVIXM, a larger number of home console gamers have hours to waste on RPGs, and involved action titles.
The handheld market is the opposite. You have games there that take time to complete, and ask for a greater time investment per session (any Legend of Zelda game for example). However, the most common use of a handheld fits into the "I need to kill a half hour as I wait for X" category.
When most of your titles for a handheld fit the home console demographic better than the handheld one, you've got a problem. This is what Sony is facing. Nintendo hasn't dominated the handheld market for no reason whatsoever, they understand the demographic and have used that knowledge to well.
The PSP has sold enough units to potentially bounce back. It just needs to rework the battle plan a bit. Unfortunately, things have been set up to be an uphill battle.
Like all other things, we'll have to wait and see what happens.
Firstly, sorry if you're being driven nuts. But remember there is A) Always a fanboy whose heart will not be swayed until the corpse of Mario/MasterChief/Sonic/Sony's Exec is rotting in front of them B) Actually, there's quite a lot of them. Additionally, you're C) Never going to convince them otherwise and D) Are probably wasting your time if that is the demographic you're targeting with your post.
The people who I attempt to speak to are those who aren't on any side, and for those people insight as to why Microsoft rushing to go first is good for the Xbox 360, and Nintendo waiting to go last is good for the Revolution is valuable.
To respond more specifically to some of your points, Microsoft's, Sony's and Nintendo's different strategies are closely related in how one defines "winning" the console war.
Microsoft wants to grab a lot of market share as evidence of "winning" the console war (specifically to take out Sony). For that purpose, being the first on the market brings with it the bang of being the first.
Sony thinks along similar lines, but their console has usually come out after or about the same time as another console in that generation, and has managed to grab the largest market share. So, Sony is likely to do what has worked in the past.
It's pretty obvious that either Nintendo no longer bothers with trying to grab market share, or has at least gotten good at making a large profit regardless. For them, a smaller company without the ability to risk as much (as they don't have other divisions to make up losses) competing with the marketing machines of Sony and Microsoft by releasing the Revolution near to when their rivals consoles come out is simply wasted money. Certainly, they could potentially grab more market share that way, but it's only a potential market share, and if the potential market share doesn't make up for the expenditure of resources sufficiently to justify the risk, Nintendo won't do it.
It would be foolhardy to think that bringing in the rear is either devoid of benefit or devoid of detriment. This is true of any release date. No matter when you release the consoles, each is taking risks. Microsoft is risking suffering a similar response as what happened with the Dreamcast, Sony is risking Microsoft succeeding with its early launch, and Nintendo is risking losing out to whichever of the other two comes out on top.
Honestly, we could theorize about who could come out on top all day. That, however, would be utterly pointless. It's excessively easy to make statements like, "because of the hype Microsoft and Sony laid out for their consoles, gamers will be dissapointed by the actually graphics for the first wave of games and wait for the revolution" or "everyone will be dissapointed by the Revolution because it will be viewed simply as a gimmick". These statements are entirely unhelpful because even professional analysts can't predict how people will react and what they will do. I didn't claim that because the Revolution will be coming out last, Nintendo will crush the other two. All I said was that it was good for Nintendo to do so. We can't predict how the next console war will play out yet, we can only observe the strategies of the competitors and find where the holes and, and what actions are golden.
In fact, gamers should really hope that no one ever "wins" the console war. Were that to happen, there's simply be one gaming platform standing alone without competition to force innovation and creativity. We simply wouldn't have a choice.
In the end, I would make argument that each company is following very closely the path each must take to do as well as they can. Sony and Microsoft are huge companies that can tie in their consoles to all sorts of devices and software they make. Nintendo makes games and game hardware, and has nothing to tie into. So, it makes perfect sense for Sony and Microsoft to make the "media center" consoles they've designed, and for Nintendo to be more focused. If you look past the hype, and look
Slashdot Mirror
I would think that Mountain Dew ads in any video game these days would be targeting people who already are addicted. Pointless, eh?
As for the vaccuum cleaner, wasn't that the point of Luigi's Mansion?
If we take the World of Warcraft model with this gem of an idea, we get a very cool system where once you run out of the X amount of time you payed for, you're automatically billed for the next. It doesn't kill immersion like metered play would, but it also would be prohibitive costwise for crazy nuts like myself who are willing to plug in 24 hours worth of gametime every two or three days. As Blizzard keeps your characters around regardless of whether or not you have a subscription, it won't cost them anything extra to have people who have characters and time they bought to play with but aren't playing.
This just in! A span of three weeks is now simultaneous!
What would Einstein say...
I dunno, Tony Hawk's Extreme Wheelchair sounds like one heck of a game!
It is true that most of my points are "X has been done by Y before". However, I was not saying such features were useless. I was addressing why people on slashdot commonly do no see them as innovative. It is hard to see something as innovative when something similar has been doing the same thing already for a good time.
:(
Concerning the internet, Blizzard didn't go crazy advertising Battle.net for Warcraft III, because it was more of an "of course" than a "check out this cool new thing!" PC games advertize they can be played online, more than the online system itself.
I am in no way implying that any of the features of the Xbox360 are misguided or stupid. I am simply pointing out why any claims they are innovative are largely ignored.
Poor Joe Somebody isn't a popular guy here.
You'll note a lot of people complain about the PS3 as well, or when speaking about the mere graphical update of the Xbox 360 indicate that the reason they wish to wait is because they want to choose whichever soley graphically updated system has the better games.
As for the innovative features you listed, a breakdown.
It's the first console with built-in support for wireless controllers.
The reason why this isn't viewed as very innovative is because the only reason it is the first console to do so is because it is coming out before the other two entries in this generation. At the same time the Xbox 360's wireless controllers were announced, so were the PS3's.
It's the first console with a built-in network media player.
This is also true. However, in addition to how little this will be used by Joe Somebody, there are already PCs that do this as well.
It's the first console to ship with an extensive unified online system - out of the box.
The unifedness of the system is innovative, and the fact that the Xbox360 ships with this in place is important. However, this is largely disregarded because it is the same system that the Xbox came to enjoy.
It's the first console where every game will play in HD - and where the system, not the game, handles the scaling to the proper resolution
PCs have done this for ages, with gamer having played in HD on their monitors since the days of Counter-Strike and before. While the Xbox360 is the first console to do this, consoles hook up to TVs, and most people don't have an HD ready TV. The benefit of this is minimal, especially at launch.
It's the first console to offer downloadable games and content from indie developers through a micropayment system
True, but again, PCs have offered these same functions, often for free. Bringing PC functions to a console is new and never before done. However, since the PC itself is a gaming platform, these actions are not viewed as terribly innovative.
Whatever the Xbox360 is about, when the most innovative aspects of the machine are either taken from PCs or also in the hands of the competition, they are viewed as being only marginally new and important, especially when they do not directly affect the experience of playing the game itself.
Gamers by definition will be thinking of the games and hardware first, and anything not directly relating to the performance thereof later. The MediaCenter functions, interesting as they may be, are more bells and whistles than important features.
...people still smoke.
If there's any vice out there which has been thoroughly taxed, known to be bad, and terribly unhealthy, it's the cigarette. Still, for all the effort that has been put into extinguishing the vice, people smoke, a lot.
It's not that taxes aren't deterrants. Higher prices certainly deter people from buying things. It's that when someone is addicted to something, price is no object.
All you do for an addict when you tax their addiction is make them pay even more money for it. The people who aren't addicted will be deterred and walk away, but the people who are addicted or closer to being so will hang on. They'll pay $1 an hour for WoW, EQ or StarCraft. They'll pay $2 an hour. They'll pay $15 an hour so long as they can get their fix. They'll pay every last cent they can spare, and then more, because they are addicted.
The rest of the populace will steer away from games, but the addicts will remain. You will successfully prevent the acquisition of new addicts to be certain, but you will also successfully force the industry to work as hard as they can to keep the addicts (now the only people who still fund the industry) addicted.
The best thing to do would be to start a charity that seeks to help people addicted to games. Individual solutions are largely better than governmental ones.
Is there any explanation for it that doesn't make the game industry look either absent minded or greedy?
Having been a child in those days, I believe I can answer this question.
The answer is yes.
Parents, even now, will have their own movies. Being adults, they would have adult movies. These aren't movies for junior, these are movies for mom and dad.
However, kids being kids, they'll find some way to reach you movies if they want to (barring you locking them up in a safe). Making it important to have some way to keep kids from playing inappropriate DVDs on the PS2, as they are very likely to be lying around the house.
Until recently, very few gamers were parents, let along parents of children who might play games. Beyond the whole issue of parents buying M rated games for their children, there are now parents who want to play M rated games. However, they would rather not let their kids do so. Having a parental lock is important to these people.
The parental lock is also useful for non-gaming parents, but the non-greedy reason for its lack of appearing before now is as above.
Actually, it's supposed to be Death. Zonk just typoed.
The following article eliminates thoroughly a point heavily relied upon by the article. Namely that Halo 3 and the PS3 will be released at the same time. I believe there was a slashdot entry on it, but I could not find it.
http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/655/655574p1.html
Additionally, the article itself admits to be speculation. It is based on little more than what those biased here on slashdot continually tout to claim their favorite console will be victorious.
The only thing the article managed to prove was that baseless projections are just as bad as what the experts say.
The article is interesting at best. While reviewing all the previous major console launches is a good idea, the result here is about 70% opinion and 30% fact. Instead of presenting us with much in the way of information, we have some vague statements about hype and retail shipments, followed by arbitrary statements as to how well the launch went, and how the system fared thereafter.
Anyone who ever tries to call any console a success or any other console a failure (beyond being immediately branded a fanboy) will ignite whatever medium used into arguments about how Nintendo profited on the Gamecube, Microsoft didn't even want to with the Xbox, and how Sony dominated.
I can already hear the weapons being armed.
Quite simply, the kids who thought they were too good for a kiddy console have now at last reached a level of maturity where having Pikachu in something does not automatically sell it. They now hate and despise the rat, and the only consoles where you can beat the crap out of the bugger and his pals are Nintendo's.
Basically, as it stands the well informed crowd, "gamers", are pretty aware that the hype surrounding all the players may not be what it cracks up to be. We know that Microsoft will pour money upon the Xbox 360 win, lose, or draw. We know Nintendo will make some incredible games for its controller even if everyone else either botches their attempts or doesn't bother, and we know Sony will ride on the popularity of the PS2. Everything else is hype, speculation, or insanity.
However, it is the casual crowd, the people who watch MTV, the people who still play nothing but Tetris, the people playing the Sims, the people who play the cheesy games on their cells phones and generally the people who are scared of using anything beyond Internet Explorer, Word, and Outlook Express on their PC that are the target of the three companies.
Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft all know that the casual game player doesn't read Slashdot, doesn't hear the word of mouth, and doesn't have any preconceptions about one system over another. Each is targeting these untapped fountain of cash with their crosshairs. Sony plans on using their tech hype and previous popularity, Microsoft is using a jump start on the competition and MTV (casual players are not going to buy more than one system), Nintendo is simply targeting everyone under the sun with a controller people will look at and not be as afraid of as the calculator on Windows.
All the speculation we have here is from a crowd who, for the most part, know what's going on. Biases included, we know more than Joe Somebody on the street when it comes to this. We've already decided which system we'll be getting, and nothing save from a miracle or a tragic mistake is going to change our minds. As such, the big three are only focusing on avoiding blundering with people like us, and and working to get the casual people into the game.
We laugh at the Halo 3 comparison, because we know all the sweeter, juicier FPSs there are. The casual crowd doesn't, they know Halo. Don't underestimate the casual players, they outnumber us, and they more than anyone else will be the determining factor in who comes out on top this coming generation, whether you measure success in marketshare, profit or both.
I remember watching a trailer for Ninety Nine Nights because I was curious as to why this would be the end of Koei's Dynasty Warriors series. I remember feeling rather insulted by it.
The portion arrives when the obligatory female character is displayed, and displayed she is. It is immediately implied she has nothing on, before she puts on what I can barely call armor (as so much is showing) with an entire camera shot showing nothing but her clamping her chest peice over he breasts.
Am I the only one insulted by this?
I'm a guy, but I make a point of treating woman as more than a pair of breasts and a reproduction center. I find myself continually insulted by the belief that I can only like women who not only have large mammaries but show them off to the world. Maybe I'm a jealous bastard, but I'd rather prefer any woman I dated to dres in such a way that all the other guys around can't oggle them.
Dynasty Warriors treats women a lot more fairly than most, as they are almost all (save for the amazon-like character) fully dressed. Having a single woman capable of decimating entire armies of men, while well dressed, is a good step towards better portayal of women, although not exactly a giant leap.
Being in Japan now, and having recently traveled all across it, I can assure you that the number of people interested in the Xbox360 is pretty analogous to the number of people in America interested in immigrating to Micronesia. Visiting even the largest of stores with huge sections devoted to video games will usually end without seeing anything related to the Xbox, although occaisionally an original Xbox and a copy of Ninja Gaiden will be lying around.
Heaven forbid that the English have to deal with crappy American speak, when millions of Americans read Harry Potter daily.
You may. They are the rates at which items of power and value drop. Common mods simply shoot these rates to 100%, so that every single item that drops is a Thor's Hammer of Electric Justice or a One Ring to Rule Them All.
Most basic mods of Blizzard's Diablo II revolve around editing a large set of relational database tables to get desired changes.
Unfortunately, this is all to often the creation of insanely powerful items, and equally insane drop rates of all the best items in the game and perhaps the overbuffing of a few skills.
The best mods all edit the actual code via dlls, with the database table work complimenting that.
I think the inherent problem here is that video games don't get a vote. If they did, I'm sure there'd be politicians just as interested in absolving them as they are parents.
Good clarification. Thanks. :)
Why is it that people can't come out and say exactly what the real problem is?
If we assume that Rockstar actually coded the sex scenes, and then removed access to them, how can we logically punish them for this? There isn't a secret button combination or set of actions you can use to activate the scenes, you have to hack the game to do it. How can we hold Rockstar responsible for this?
It seems to me the real reason this issue is being pushed is because Rockstar may have at one point intended to include scenes such as these in the game. The real reason why Rockstar is under fire (aside from being the de facto target of all video game ignoramus) is because Rockstar may have intended to put something like this in GTA:SA, and may still intend to do so in the future.
Honestly though, if the final version of the game contains no way in which these scenes can be accessed without using tools unavailible within the game, how can we blame Rockstar?
Is it just me, or is the original iteration on the far left of the shown iterations for the console (presumably from first to last, left to right) the coolest?
I don't know about the rest of you, but if they had released that, I would have been all over it. That, and if they had kept the name Xenon. Instead they pulled this crazy marketing crap, and now we have a console that looks like a coffee maker on crack, and with name that makes you wonder... "Xbox 360? What happened to the other 359?"
Not to mention the PS3. Honestly, you'd think they could have come up with a better name. I guess it makes sense, but come on now.
And then there's the Revolution, or Mini - PS2. Maybe it's an improvement in design, and certainly the least painful to gaze upon, but it really looks like a smaller PS2. Is Nintendo trying to confuse people into buying it?
Given statements to the effect that people wished the screenshots of the PS3 and Xbox 360 were fake, they may very well be.
I can't fully agree with the guy, but I must concede some of his points. Namely, the ones concerning the GameBoy Micro and developer interests. The Micro really seems like an ill placed idea as there are already two Gameboys that do almost exactly the same thing out there (not to mention the DS), and developers are most interested in porting their title and not worrying about other features.
The author's argument, that Nintendo will fail in hardware, seems plausible, even if I don't agree with it. The odd thing is, in the very last paragraph he paints a world where Nintendo seems to have lost in software as well, where innovation doesn't matter in both. This is a jump in logic and reason that doesn't make sense given his argument.
If Nintendo died, either someone would have to take their place as the innovators in the industry, or we'd face a second video game industry crash. Without innovation, gamers will eventually get tired of sequels and cookie cutter games. If the industry refuses to innovate, gamers will simply stop buying games that are exactly the same as the rest of the games they already own.
In short, if there was no Nintendo, it would be necessary for us to make one.
The sad fact is I don't have enough money to buy either. :(
As as been said, one of the many problems facing the PSP is its lack of viable "pick up and play" games. Those short wondrous games you can just power on, hit start, and do something. Exactly why this is so damaging hasn't been hit on the head yet.
While huge, involved games are the power houses of the home console, the environment there is rather different. While there are a significant portion of people who do not have time to plunk into Final Fantasy XXIXIIVICIXIVIXM, a larger number of home console gamers have hours to waste on RPGs, and involved action titles.
The handheld market is the opposite. You have games there that take time to complete, and ask for a greater time investment per session (any Legend of Zelda game for example). However, the most common use of a handheld fits into the "I need to kill a half hour as I wait for X" category.
When most of your titles for a handheld fit the home console demographic better than the handheld one, you've got a problem. This is what Sony is facing. Nintendo hasn't dominated the handheld market for no reason whatsoever, they understand the demographic and have used that knowledge to well.
The PSP has sold enough units to potentially bounce back. It just needs to rework the battle plan a bit. Unfortunately, things have been set up to be an uphill battle.
Like all other things, we'll have to wait and see what happens.
Firstly, sorry if you're being driven nuts. But remember there is A) Always a fanboy whose heart will not be swayed until the corpse of Mario/MasterChief/Sonic/Sony's Exec is rotting in front of them B) Actually, there's quite a lot of them. Additionally, you're C) Never going to convince them otherwise and D) Are probably wasting your time if that is the demographic you're targeting with your post.
The people who I attempt to speak to are those who aren't on any side, and for those people insight as to why Microsoft rushing to go first is good for the Xbox 360, and Nintendo waiting to go last is good for the Revolution is valuable.
To respond more specifically to some of your points, Microsoft's, Sony's and Nintendo's different strategies are closely related in how one defines "winning" the console war.
Microsoft wants to grab a lot of market share as evidence of "winning" the console war (specifically to take out Sony). For that purpose, being the first on the market brings with it the bang of being the first.
Sony thinks along similar lines, but their console has usually come out after or about the same time as another console in that generation, and has managed to grab the largest market share. So, Sony is likely to do what has worked in the past.
It's pretty obvious that either Nintendo no longer bothers with trying to grab market share, or has at least gotten good at making a large profit regardless. For them, a smaller company without the ability to risk as much (as they don't have other divisions to make up losses) competing with the marketing machines of Sony and Microsoft by releasing the Revolution near to when their rivals consoles come out is simply wasted money. Certainly, they could potentially grab more market share that way, but it's only a potential market share, and if the potential market share doesn't make up for the expenditure of resources sufficiently to justify the risk, Nintendo won't do it.
It would be foolhardy to think that bringing in the rear is either devoid of benefit or devoid of detriment. This is true of any release date. No matter when you release the consoles, each is taking risks. Microsoft is risking suffering a similar response as what happened with the Dreamcast, Sony is risking Microsoft succeeding with its early launch, and Nintendo is risking losing out to whichever of the other two comes out on top.
Honestly, we could theorize about who could come out on top all day. That, however, would be utterly pointless. It's excessively easy to make statements like, "because of the hype Microsoft and Sony laid out for their consoles, gamers will be dissapointed by the actually graphics for the first wave of games and wait for the revolution" or "everyone will be dissapointed by the Revolution because it will be viewed simply as a gimmick". These statements are entirely unhelpful because even professional analysts can't predict how people will react and what they will do. I didn't claim that because the Revolution will be coming out last, Nintendo will crush the other two. All I said was that it was good for Nintendo to do so. We can't predict how the next console war will play out yet, we can only observe the strategies of the competitors and find where the holes and, and what actions are golden.
In fact, gamers should really hope that no one ever "wins" the console war. Were that to happen, there's simply be one gaming platform standing alone without competition to force innovation and creativity. We simply wouldn't have a choice.
In the end, I would make argument that each company is following very closely the path each must take to do as well as they can. Sony and Microsoft are huge companies that can tie in their consoles to all sorts of devices and software they make. Nintendo makes games and game hardware, and has nothing to tie into. So, it makes perfect sense for Sony and Microsoft to make the "media center" consoles they've designed, and for Nintendo to be more focused. If you look past the hype, and look