SiN

The Playgrounds feature reeks of self-importance. Crecente's video was painful to watch. But more importantly, it didn't really say anything. I read the article and watched the video and don't feel like I gained an insight into Video games, its culture or journalism. Which is why the comparisons to The Verge's What's in your Bag? feature are misguided. With that feature you gain insight into how the journalists do their jobs. Now granted, it mostly involves MacBook Airs and iPhones, but every journalist has a couple of interesting gadget quirks and recommendations. Playgrounds is less "behind the scenes" and more E! Celebrity Homes. As for the backlash: it's not really "thinly veiled jealousy", it's just good ol' self-deprecating British humour at its finest. The RPS guys do this kind of thing a lot, and The Internet routinely misses the point. That said, I really do like Polygon. Yes, they promised to Change Everything and then proceeded to rewrite press releases. But the features have been seriously top notch. Just in the last week I've read their well written, well researched features on Double Fine and Starbloom. The Homefront feature is required reading. And there are a bunch of smaller, behind-the-scenes development features that have been great. If the price I have to pay for these features is sifting through crappy news posts, I'm totally down with that. (heck, I'm pretty sure you could just subscribe to the Features feed and call it a day)

I'm too afraid to start using it. :/

Haven't tried this yet, but it looks useful. Especially for you, Thunderpeel. http://www.productivityowl.com

:tup: :tup:

ELECTRONIC ARTS of It's in the game fame

Ah okay, just checking. It's easy to blame publishers, but a bunch of the blame is ours too. But yes, this is sad. One solution is that taking risks is easier on smaller games. I hope in the next gen we see more price points. Ideally there'd be $5-$15 and $25-30 downloadables, and $50-$60 retail games. A game like Overstrike could exist at $30 with a budget of $10-$15 million, where the profit (as a % of revenue) is higher due to the lower overhead on digital.

Just to play devil's advocate here: it probably *is* a way to sell more copies and make more money. If looking at the past is a reasonably good way to predict the future games like NOLF, Wind Waker, and (closer to home) Psychonauts and Brutal Legend go some ways toward proving that non-realistic art styles just don't sell in the mass market. I'm not saying I agree with this, but I am saying that if it were *my* $20 million (minimum!) I'd want to play it safe too. Yeah, they're both bland results of their own respective art styles. Overstrike's art style is rarer in shooters, so it wins the "less bland" title. Going on the trailers, I like that Overstrike actually had some personality. Yes, cheezy as hell, but I'll take that over nothing.

I think it's fairly safe to say that the art is gorgeous, but the layout is indeed generic. I like it though. I get the feeling that when you're making a game as bat-shit crazy as Infinite, some concessions need to be made to the publisher. I'd rather it be the box art (or even the marketing message) than the game. (Sounds a lot like Bioshock 1, doesn't it?)

I feel like in theory I should enjoy these games, but in practice RPGs in general just bore me to tears. I played Mass Effect because I thought the universe was interesting, and the combat was ... well, at least better than fighting rats. But the dialogue is all "Hello, here's my life story" *drones on for 5 minutes*. I like dialogue, but I don't like big chunks of exposition, especially when I don't understand (or care about) half of what they're going on about. Adventure games (the LucasArts kind) did a much better job of pacing the exposition and storytelling. Then there's the whole level-threadmill thing, which kinda conflicts with telling a well-paced story. Anyway thumbs, am I the only person who feels this way? Or have I just picked the wrong game(s)?

With regard to managing expectations, I think it would've been a good idea to give away the older Amnesia Bundle games (Brazen, Happy Song, and Costume Quest). That way potential contributors could play them and get a rough idea of what to expect for the current batch of prototypes.

"all in the shape of a guitar!" http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/11/27/the-post-where-i-notice-simcitys-clumph-noise/ THE BEST.

To be fair, the N64 roster was pretty safe as well. (It's been a while, but) I think the unlockables contained fan service, but All Stars has Parappa, so it balances out. What has the critical reception been like? Those mechanics certainly sound kinda crazy, but maybe they actually work? The bigger issue is just being a new franchise. All-Stars will succeed if Sony takes a long-term approach to developing the franchise. And I suspect we'll get better fan service if the series goes on.

Ah, I see. Yeah, he definitely does loosen up over time. But there's always this tension between being badass / taking control, and his ambition leading to things being outside his control. So he's never quite in control and/or easy going. I'm probably stating the obvious though.

What is this? I don't even. Is that one of those fancy Optimus keyboards, or does Toblix have a secret keyboard manufacturing business?

@brkl @subbes Random semi-spoiler(ish? maybe?) (sorry for bringing this up from page 1, but I just caught up with this thread) I felt the same way at the start, but you come to appreciate the nuance in his character (and his situation) as the show goes on. Walt is never in a binary state of badass or not. It's like he has flourishes of badassery when required, but is still the same old Walt underneath it all. He does get more badass over time, but it's a more gradual transition.

Re: season 2 ending

AND IN THE GAME...

I just concluded an all-day Halo 4-a-thon. We have a solid system: there are three of us, but we play 2p co-op. The spectator subs in when a player gets tired/frustrated, and thus the gaming goes on indefinitely. We got through the campaign on Heroic in around 8 hours, I believe. Really enjoyed it overall. There's just a solid consistency throughout the campaign, in terms of the level and encounter design. With previous Halo games, there was always a super-backtracky bit, and the eventual introduction/tedium of the Flood. Halo 4 is just consistently good throughout. Especially on encounter design, I feel it lives up to the Bungie games. But this consistency also means that the game felt a little same-ish the whole way though. Looking back, I can recall some great moments we had ("like that time you finally jacked the Banshee and then immediately crashed it", etc), but in terms of narrative, set piece, and level design, it all blends together. I'd take this over CoD-esque set-pieces obviously, but I don't feel the two have to be mutually exclusive experiences. 343 pulled off some pretty stylish artwork. Requiem (I think? The glowly levels) was particularly memorable. The humans/Covenant/Prometheans are distinct looking and relatively easy to parse, even on a squished split-screen. Similarly, the weapons design packed a lot of character. The story started out well, but at some point it just got buried in its own lore. There was some interesting themes along the way, but they weren't explored deeply enough. Instead there was more lore related dialogue that failed to keep me interested. Overall though, an enjoyable way to spend a day.

What's crazy is that's actually not that far from the truth regarding the PS3 (except replace "big" with "expensive")

The RPS crew have talked about this a bunch. Their take is the "you're in my house" analogy, which I totally agree with. A little moderation goes a really long way, apparently. RPS comments aren't perfect, but they're the best of the bunch. Heck, it's the only website I bother commenting on. Sites like Verge and Polygon annoy me because extremely obvious flamebait gets a pass. I mean, any article even vaguely related to Google/Apple bursts into flames over the same snide comments every time. Even if there were something constructive in there, it's been lost. IMO that is a boring echo chamber.

This is, in theory, what's suppose to happen. I started playing really early (twitter told me), so I was the 600-and-something-th person in, and it worked as advertised. Hopefully they'll get these server issues sorted soon. As for the game, it's not the deepest thing ever, but it's a fun little creative toy. I don't even care about What's In The CubeTM, it's just fun to doodle things and play around with whatever is on the cube.

Wow, they really picked the wrong fight. Source link?

Bangai-O Spritis!

It uses its own OS based on Android. Android apps work on the Fire, HOWEVER they need to exist & be purchased through Amazon's App Store. So I'm pretty sure any apps you buy on Google Play are not transferable to the Fire. However, apps that you've got on Amazon's App Store on any Android device (Amazon branded or otherwise) will be transferable to your Fire.

Well, his exact phrasing was: (source: http://www.1up.com/news/gabe-newell-ps3-total-disaster) The comments are "compatible" but only in the loosest sense of the term. If it were anyone but Gabe (like anyone from EA or Activision) I suspect the tone of these replies would be totally different. Personally, I have no issues with people changing their minds about things.