One of the greatest eras of home video was the early 2000's.
Go look at the special editions from back then. They are full of incredible artwork, incredible packaging, and some truly rare things. For example, The Dark Crystal has to be one of the greatest if not THE greatest special edition ever. You get a part of the original copy. You get a true replica of the notepad that Henson and his daughter used to make the story while stuck in an airport during a blizzard.
Unfortunately my head was in a bad place back then, and there were many movies I did not get that had great collector's editions. I am hoping that with Bluray I get another chance to having some of these neat things.
The same goes for HD remakes on the PS3. There are series that at the time I just did not want to have or did not get around to it. At the time I was scrounging up my large collections of late 90's PS1 RPG's. Then I got into NIS RPG's in the late 2000's. I had always intended to get Sly Cooper's trilogy, and Splinter Cell was always on my radar. I can't wait to get these and play them. Now we're getting PSP games remade.
I have no place for portable gaming. It is simply not a part of my life and I do not see it ever happening. So the fact that Sony is releasing some of the PSP games in HD remakes is very exciting for me. I am looking forward mainly to the God of War games. I'm already getting God of War 1 and 2 on the PS3, now I hope to get the others from the PSP too.
I think its a great move and a genius way to cash in on work that was already completed. I don't see it as a cop out, I was always a fan of GBA ports of old SNES games. This is just as great.
Now if we can get a PS2 emulator on the PS3 I'll be happy.
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Japanese playing around with DRM
This really is sad to me.
I loved having the Japanese as my videogame masters for almost two decades now. They chose the trends and they developed their "wacky" games, and I ate them up like they were candy. But Japan is xenophobic, and much like America they have a pride at being the best at everything, barely ever taking the humble route. I like that about them. I feel a kinship.
Now though, its just sad.
A few years ago we had Western(when I say western I mean culture) companies scrambling to include this new thing called "DRM" to our PC games to try and keep piracy down. It literally caused a few games to fail. The money made off sales did not make up for the money it cost to put something on PC, and for about a year they were blind, stuck to their guns and claimed it was all piracy, not DRM that did it.
Digital Rights Management, or DRM, is a way to make it difficult for pirated copies of a game to work. Its not as easy as it sounds, or as nice. Many games required that you were online to be able to play, even in a game without multiplayer. What you got was a flicker in your internet due to Yahoo restarting, and you'd get the great "Game Over you pirate!" message, and you were screwed.
They are beginning to see the light. It doesn't stop piracy, it just sets up a challenge to hackers. On top of not stopping piracy, it actually annoys the ever loving piss out of legit gamers that payed 50 bucks for your game. Entire websites dedicated to selling games without DRM are thriving(Good Old Games, Google it).
We thought DRM was done and on its way out the door...
And then someone in Japan goes "hey, can't we use an internet connection to somehow keep pirated copies from accessing the game?" and his buddies cheered "YES! its BRILLIANT! Why have we not thought of this before??"
So now, with Japan's game industry literally in the toilet, less and less of their game titles being made and selling in the West, they are about to shoot themselves in the foot. Because not only is their DRM schemes going to be annoying, its going to hit our market a full 4 years into us evolving this crap OUT of our own games. While the cycle in Japan will be: Indifference, Annoyance, Protest, Retraction, Acceptance, the west is going to be on step 25: Fuck it, I won't buy it.
I loved having the Japanese as my videogame masters for almost two decades now. They chose the trends and they developed their "wacky" games, and I ate them up like they were candy. But Japan is xenophobic, and much like America they have a pride at being the best at everything, barely ever taking the humble route. I like that about them. I feel a kinship.
Now though, its just sad.
A few years ago we had Western(when I say western I mean culture) companies scrambling to include this new thing called "DRM" to our PC games to try and keep piracy down. It literally caused a few games to fail. The money made off sales did not make up for the money it cost to put something on PC, and for about a year they were blind, stuck to their guns and claimed it was all piracy, not DRM that did it.
Digital Rights Management, or DRM, is a way to make it difficult for pirated copies of a game to work. Its not as easy as it sounds, or as nice. Many games required that you were online to be able to play, even in a game without multiplayer. What you got was a flicker in your internet due to Yahoo restarting, and you'd get the great "Game Over you pirate!" message, and you were screwed.
They are beginning to see the light. It doesn't stop piracy, it just sets up a challenge to hackers. On top of not stopping piracy, it actually annoys the ever loving piss out of legit gamers that payed 50 bucks for your game. Entire websites dedicated to selling games without DRM are thriving(Good Old Games, Google it).
We thought DRM was done and on its way out the door...
And then someone in Japan goes "hey, can't we use an internet connection to somehow keep pirated copies from accessing the game?" and his buddies cheered "YES! its BRILLIANT! Why have we not thought of this before??"
So now, with Japan's game industry literally in the toilet, less and less of their game titles being made and selling in the West, they are about to shoot themselves in the foot. Because not only is their DRM schemes going to be annoying, its going to hit our market a full 4 years into us evolving this crap OUT of our own games. While the cycle in Japan will be: Indifference, Annoyance, Protest, Retraction, Acceptance, the west is going to be on step 25: Fuck it, I won't buy it.
Friday, February 11, 2011
There is only one way to play Magic
Magic the Gathering is flippin' ridiculous.
If they did 2 expansions a year, it would be boarderline too much for me to play. They do 5 expansions with every couple of years hitting a magic moment when they do 6 expansions in one year. That is just blatant stupidity. You have to commit to that game and no other if you want to play Magic. I am not up for that. What you get is cycles of players coming and going through Magic instead of a steady stream of fans. You get those reports if you read and listen to interviews. "this expansion had a lot of return players, we hope the next one does too" then you read "our return players left and we were left with the core players."
The only way to play Magic is to come in during the start of a block, buy a ton of whatever "edition" they're on, and play that block only. By the time the next block rolls around in 7 months, all your players and friends will be sick of buying cards and will look and say "so all those cards I just bought... are... old? WTF?" And then you move on to the next game you want to play.
Anything else will just cause tension and hatred as some friends decide to skip this block but keep playing with new cards. Some will want to play only the new block. These blocks are made in a way where a new mechanic must be used to compete, so now its the haves and the have nots. Great for Wizard when you read it on paper, forcing players to buy the new stuff. Horrible in the long run for keeping people around.
These are the same guys trying to find a way to make the cheapest game on the planet(D&D) profitable by releasing 1/3rd set of books a year so you only get the full game in 3 years. So I'm not surprised. Just frustrated. Because I like Magic. Its just too far beyond itself. There is no casual playing of Magic. Only degrees of hardcore.
If they did 2 expansions a year, it would be boarderline too much for me to play. They do 5 expansions with every couple of years hitting a magic moment when they do 6 expansions in one year. That is just blatant stupidity. You have to commit to that game and no other if you want to play Magic. I am not up for that. What you get is cycles of players coming and going through Magic instead of a steady stream of fans. You get those reports if you read and listen to interviews. "this expansion had a lot of return players, we hope the next one does too" then you read "our return players left and we were left with the core players."
The only way to play Magic is to come in during the start of a block, buy a ton of whatever "edition" they're on, and play that block only. By the time the next block rolls around in 7 months, all your players and friends will be sick of buying cards and will look and say "so all those cards I just bought... are... old? WTF?" And then you move on to the next game you want to play.
Anything else will just cause tension and hatred as some friends decide to skip this block but keep playing with new cards. Some will want to play only the new block. These blocks are made in a way where a new mechanic must be used to compete, so now its the haves and the have nots. Great for Wizard when you read it on paper, forcing players to buy the new stuff. Horrible in the long run for keeping people around.
These are the same guys trying to find a way to make the cheapest game on the planet(D&D) profitable by releasing 1/3rd set of books a year so you only get the full game in 3 years. So I'm not surprised. Just frustrated. Because I like Magic. Its just too far beyond itself. There is no casual playing of Magic. Only degrees of hardcore.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Goodbye Guitar Hero
I've been saying this for years, putting your eggs in the basket of casual gamers is gambling.
I would make an argument that the casual gamer has only ran the market 3 times in videogame history. The early 80's, the later part of the NES, and now the Wii era. The early 80's lead to a crash. The post-NES era almost killed Nintendo and allowed Sony and Microsoft to enter the market. We've yet to see what will happen post-Wii, but we've seen the Move and Kinect added to the "hardcore" consoles, we'll likely see it be the basis for the PS3 and Xbox720whatever.
Anyways. Casual gamers. I myself like Guitar Hero, especially in a casual setting, like a group at a party. That's the same time I liked the Wii. The total shitstorm that happened after Guitar Hero created an entire cash cow centered around it. Instead of keeping a level head and pushing a new genre forward, they freaked out and milked it for what they could. The era lasted only half a decade or so.
Instantly the companies behind the first Guitar Hero split, and so you instantly got a competitor called Rock Band. You also got every record company in the business pushing "new" talent to go into these games that were originally about rocking out to the classic songs you always wanted to play. Suddenly you're playing a mish mash of bands you'll never hear from again, along with hip hop songs.
The worst part is, they turned out sequels like CRAZY with few improvements. So you had TWO franchises, putting out sequels, and they all did basically the same thing. That doubled the perceived amount of guitar games.
The difference between casuals and hardcore games is easily seen in the name themselves. Hardcore fans would buy the new and improved instruments, would buy the extra track lists for their favorite genre. The hardcore says "I've played these 40 songs to master, I need more to challenge me"
The casuals look and say "I already have 2 guitars, and the game comes with 40 songs, why do I need more? I wanna play Smells like Teen Spirit again, I know that one, its comfortable, I get 5 stars every time"
So Guitar Hero 3 sold something like 1.5 million copies in its first month.
Guitar Hero 6(the heavy metal looking, no licenses, "return to hardcore gaming" one) sold 180,000 in 6 months.
I think they thought they were catering to the usual gamer. Its the only thing I can think to justify things. In most game series you get a new one every other year. In 5 years we had Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero 2, Guitar Hero the 80s, Guitar Hero Metallica, Guitar Hero 3, Guitar Hero Aerosmith, Guitar Hero Van Halen, Guitar Hero 4, Guitar Hero Greatest Hits, Guitar Hero 5, and Guitar Hero 6.
Now add all that to 6 different major Rock Band releases, and 2 DJ Heros. There are hardcore gamers that would not buy that many games in so short a time. Even Madden fans, arguably the most rabid niche group, wouldn't buy Maddens released that fast.
They forgot who they were making games for, and for that they have lost their shirts and killed the genre within 5 years. Now they have to wait and find the next casual friendly genre, and who knows how far that is away. It could be 20 years, especially after the bad taste people have in their mouth about the whole band game thing. They think Dance Hero or whatever its called is going to save them. I some how doubt it.
But then again, this is not my demographic.
I would make an argument that the casual gamer has only ran the market 3 times in videogame history. The early 80's, the later part of the NES, and now the Wii era. The early 80's lead to a crash. The post-NES era almost killed Nintendo and allowed Sony and Microsoft to enter the market. We've yet to see what will happen post-Wii, but we've seen the Move and Kinect added to the "hardcore" consoles, we'll likely see it be the basis for the PS3 and Xbox720whatever.
Anyways. Casual gamers. I myself like Guitar Hero, especially in a casual setting, like a group at a party. That's the same time I liked the Wii. The total shitstorm that happened after Guitar Hero created an entire cash cow centered around it. Instead of keeping a level head and pushing a new genre forward, they freaked out and milked it for what they could. The era lasted only half a decade or so.
Instantly the companies behind the first Guitar Hero split, and so you instantly got a competitor called Rock Band. You also got every record company in the business pushing "new" talent to go into these games that were originally about rocking out to the classic songs you always wanted to play. Suddenly you're playing a mish mash of bands you'll never hear from again, along with hip hop songs.
The worst part is, they turned out sequels like CRAZY with few improvements. So you had TWO franchises, putting out sequels, and they all did basically the same thing. That doubled the perceived amount of guitar games.
The difference between casuals and hardcore games is easily seen in the name themselves. Hardcore fans would buy the new and improved instruments, would buy the extra track lists for their favorite genre. The hardcore says "I've played these 40 songs to master, I need more to challenge me"
The casuals look and say "I already have 2 guitars, and the game comes with 40 songs, why do I need more? I wanna play Smells like Teen Spirit again, I know that one, its comfortable, I get 5 stars every time"
So Guitar Hero 3 sold something like 1.5 million copies in its first month.
Guitar Hero 6(the heavy metal looking, no licenses, "return to hardcore gaming" one) sold 180,000 in 6 months.
I think they thought they were catering to the usual gamer. Its the only thing I can think to justify things. In most game series you get a new one every other year. In 5 years we had Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero 2, Guitar Hero the 80s, Guitar Hero Metallica, Guitar Hero 3, Guitar Hero Aerosmith, Guitar Hero Van Halen, Guitar Hero 4, Guitar Hero Greatest Hits, Guitar Hero 5, and Guitar Hero 6.
Now add all that to 6 different major Rock Band releases, and 2 DJ Heros. There are hardcore gamers that would not buy that many games in so short a time. Even Madden fans, arguably the most rabid niche group, wouldn't buy Maddens released that fast.
They forgot who they were making games for, and for that they have lost their shirts and killed the genre within 5 years. Now they have to wait and find the next casual friendly genre, and who knows how far that is away. It could be 20 years, especially after the bad taste people have in their mouth about the whole band game thing. They think Dance Hero or whatever its called is going to save them. I some how doubt it.
But then again, this is not my demographic.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Diversions
Well, I was making headway at getting better at Fatal Fury 2 when I got distracted by my new television. My laptop gaming has been put on hold while I'm learning and trying things out on the new tv. Dragon Age looks phenomenal on it, though I see much more the glaring problems the PS3 version of Dragon Age has with its graphics. Nothing game breaks mind you, and I still fully have enjoyed myself through several full on play throughs.
I did both dwarf origins in the last few days. I had finished my ambitious human mage run through and still wanted to see more of the game on the new TV. While I played a dwarf in World of Warcraft, but never considered myself the dwarf player. I've known dwarf players, they hardly ever think of playing anything other than dwarfs even in multiple MMO's. I am not a dwarf player. So I didn't mind making some throw away characters to go through these Origins.
If you have played the game only once, and you care about the story at all, I beg you to play all the Origins. They explain SOOOOOO much that you will not understand in a single play through. Particularly the Dwarven Noble Origin, which has had the most to do with the main story line than any of the other Origins. It explains what has gone on in the Dwarf kingdom in much less rumor and whispers than just going through in the main story.
I did both dwarf origins in the last few days. I had finished my ambitious human mage run through and still wanted to see more of the game on the new TV. While I played a dwarf in World of Warcraft, but never considered myself the dwarf player. I've known dwarf players, they hardly ever think of playing anything other than dwarfs even in multiple MMO's. I am not a dwarf player. So I didn't mind making some throw away characters to go through these Origins.
If you have played the game only once, and you care about the story at all, I beg you to play all the Origins. They explain SOOOOOO much that you will not understand in a single play through. Particularly the Dwarven Noble Origin, which has had the most to do with the main story line than any of the other Origins. It explains what has gone on in the Dwarf kingdom in much less rumor and whispers than just going through in the main story.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Final Streets of Fight
This isn't really a post about one game over the other.
Its a stealth post. It is really about the perception of Genesis vs SNES on newer gamers.
This is the perfect example of what I'm talking about. If you don't know, Final Fight was a Beat'em up by Capcom between Street Fighter and Street Fighter 2. Its graphics are very close to Street Fighter 2's graphics. You take one of 3 characters(in the arcade, 2 characters in the SNES version) and you walk through the game beating up characters. Similar to Double Dragon, River City Rampage, etc. The SNES got its port rights.
Streets of Rage was made by an in house Sega team. It was done in a similar fashion, a beat'em up starring 3 characters as they proceeded to take down a criminal organization. Each character could call in the Police to shoot various cannons and guns at the enemy. It featured multi-path decisions.
Here's the thing.
People that never played these games might go to Youtube and look at videos to compare and contrast these games. Doing this, with today's mentality, its obvious that Final Fight wins. The characters are huge, the graphics are crisp, the characters look like they play different.
And I say this is a falsity. As anyone I know that has PLAYED these games, almost always chooses Streets of Rage, especially when you bring part 2 into the equation. Why? The music of Streets of Rage was done by obvious early techno junkies, and it layed the ground work for other highly acclaimed music tracks. It actually revolutionized game music in Japan. You can hear its influence in the Soul Caliber games even today. Then, especially when you look at Final Fight 2 and Streets of Rage 2, the characters are EXTREMELY varied in Streets of Rage. Lets talk about the small characters... this allows there to be nearly 20 characters on screen at once in Streets of Rage. This allows for vehicles and all sorts of things to fit on the screen. You don't run out of nice looking things and NEW things to see during the game in Streets of Rage. Final Fight pretty much stays the same.
So, Final Fight wins on visuals. There is no doubt. THAT is why it wins today. Youtube and screenshots ARE only visuals. Tiny clips of music doesn't show the audio very well. So you say to someone that's only watched the 2 on Youtube "which was the better game?" and they will always pick Final Fight.
I owned them all, except Final Fight Guy. I had Final Fight, Final Fight 2 and Final Fight 3. Streets of Rage 1, 2 and 3 also. Beat'em ups were good for co-op play where it didn't matter if I owned the game, it didn't give the disadvantage to my friends.
Which did my friends, my family, and myself always seem to pick? I was always asked to hook up the Genesis for Streets of Rage.
Its a stealth post. It is really about the perception of Genesis vs SNES on newer gamers.
This is the perfect example of what I'm talking about. If you don't know, Final Fight was a Beat'em up by Capcom between Street Fighter and Street Fighter 2. Its graphics are very close to Street Fighter 2's graphics. You take one of 3 characters(in the arcade, 2 characters in the SNES version) and you walk through the game beating up characters. Similar to Double Dragon, River City Rampage, etc. The SNES got its port rights.
Streets of Rage was made by an in house Sega team. It was done in a similar fashion, a beat'em up starring 3 characters as they proceeded to take down a criminal organization. Each character could call in the Police to shoot various cannons and guns at the enemy. It featured multi-path decisions.
Here's the thing.
People that never played these games might go to Youtube and look at videos to compare and contrast these games. Doing this, with today's mentality, its obvious that Final Fight wins. The characters are huge, the graphics are crisp, the characters look like they play different.
And I say this is a falsity. As anyone I know that has PLAYED these games, almost always chooses Streets of Rage, especially when you bring part 2 into the equation. Why? The music of Streets of Rage was done by obvious early techno junkies, and it layed the ground work for other highly acclaimed music tracks. It actually revolutionized game music in Japan. You can hear its influence in the Soul Caliber games even today. Then, especially when you look at Final Fight 2 and Streets of Rage 2, the characters are EXTREMELY varied in Streets of Rage. Lets talk about the small characters... this allows there to be nearly 20 characters on screen at once in Streets of Rage. This allows for vehicles and all sorts of things to fit on the screen. You don't run out of nice looking things and NEW things to see during the game in Streets of Rage. Final Fight pretty much stays the same.
So, Final Fight wins on visuals. There is no doubt. THAT is why it wins today. Youtube and screenshots ARE only visuals. Tiny clips of music doesn't show the audio very well. So you say to someone that's only watched the 2 on Youtube "which was the better game?" and they will always pick Final Fight.
I owned them all, except Final Fight Guy. I had Final Fight, Final Fight 2 and Final Fight 3. Streets of Rage 1, 2 and 3 also. Beat'em ups were good for co-op play where it didn't matter if I owned the game, it didn't give the disadvantage to my friends.
Which did my friends, my family, and myself always seem to pick? I was always asked to hook up the Genesis for Streets of Rage.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Fatal Fury Recap
My write up on Fatal Fury was featured in a couple of fan-sites and forums. Its been many months so I will sum it up here before I get started into Fatal Fury 2 Special.
Basically I felt that Fatal Fury was probably starting out as a Final Fight clone. Evidenced by Japan's love of the Status Quo, and several in game. Fatal Fury - Final Fight - Double F's. Fatal Fury's South Town map is very much like Final Fight's Metro City map. Final Fight has 3 characters to choose from, Fatal Fury has 3 characters to choose from.
Next I talked about how the gameplay was. I described it as Punch Out meets Street Fighter 2. The opponents do not play by the same rules as the player. One even gets to fight while hanging from special ceiling bars. Another gets progressively more drunk as the round goes, taking a time out to get all maniac drunk. You figure out their patterns and you attack as you're supposed to.
I have no desire to spend time with the game in the future. The opponents are so unbalanced that you can not play with them in two player modes. The game is not refined, and the action is pretty slow. Later SNK games are viable alternatives to the Street Fighter 2 dominance, but not yet.
Basically I felt that Fatal Fury was probably starting out as a Final Fight clone. Evidenced by Japan's love of the Status Quo, and several in game. Fatal Fury - Final Fight - Double F's. Fatal Fury's South Town map is very much like Final Fight's Metro City map. Final Fight has 3 characters to choose from, Fatal Fury has 3 characters to choose from.
Next I talked about how the gameplay was. I described it as Punch Out meets Street Fighter 2. The opponents do not play by the same rules as the player. One even gets to fight while hanging from special ceiling bars. Another gets progressively more drunk as the round goes, taking a time out to get all maniac drunk. You figure out their patterns and you attack as you're supposed to.
I have no desire to spend time with the game in the future. The opponents are so unbalanced that you can not play with them in two player modes. The game is not refined, and the action is pretty slow. Later SNK games are viable alternatives to the Street Fighter 2 dominance, but not yet.
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