Nijhazer

This post got me thinkin'. Where I live, there are three places where games can be purchased: 1) Walmart 2) Best Buy 3) GameStop Though this is a small, poor town, there are nevertheless seven GameStops here. They look like pawn shops, they're run like pawn shops, and frankly, I'd expect better customer service in a pawn shop. So I've long since passed the point where I decide that I've had enough of their bullshit. I've been buying my games from Amazon for years now, and they just keep making me happier about that decision. Amazon's prices are usually lower, shipping is free, there is no tax, I get 10% off with my ECA membership, and there are frequent incentives with new game purchases. For example, my total price for Brutal Legend after ECA discount and Amazon's regular price was $45, and on top of that, Amazon gave me a $10 credit towards the purchase of any other game. But when I read this post, it made me wonder whether or not I would still be buying from Amazon if there were actually a retailer here that gave a shit. If there were a place to shop that treated its customers and its products with respect, a place like this independent retailer you've described, then I'd probably shop there exclusively-- just to support that. And that's with full knowledge that I could be saving a sizable chunk of cash by continuing to buy all my games from Amazon. As it is, the idea of a game retailer that actually gives a shit seems like a foreign concept. The closest we've come was a local store called Rhino Video Games, which was only a step above GameStop-- even so, I bought all my games there, just because it wasn't GameStop. Then GameStop bought them, and shut down all their stores.

Great show as usual, guys-- thanks for a year of casts and blasts! Storytelling in games... Naturally, I'd have to agree with Mr. Remo. There are really no games that I've played that have storylines I would describe as "good". Many games leave an impact on me nonetheless-- after all, a game can be effective and powerful as a sum of many expertly-crafted parts even if the storyline isn't one of them-- but the actual storytelling components wouldn't hold up under a critical analysis to the degree that one would see in the best books and films. This isn't necessarily a problem, of course. From a narrative perspective, what usually hooks me about a game is its characters. Give me fascinating characters with significant development, and I'll follow your storyline to completion even if I hate the gameplay mechanics. I'll be interested in their stories, even if I'm not interested in the main storyline of the game. I don't watch TV, but I get the impression that this is the same principle that brings in fans of TV shows. A TV series is, in the long term, much more of a time commitment than a movie. You can watch a movie in a couple hours, whereas one season of a TV series could be 13 hours or longer. And whereas movies have a central premise, a central plot, many TV shows do not-- instead, you're tuning in to spend a little time with the characters you know from week to week. But for fans of these shows, the enjoyment that they get from that show is just as great, if not greater, than what film enthusiasts get from their favorite movies.