Easy Mode Volume 2.6

[Matt]

Easy Mode Volume 2.6 by Matt

PALGN Feature: 10 things I hate about you.

[View Article]

[TheAnswer]

Another great read there Matt and I can definately agree with your reasonings, especially about Microsoft and Nintendo.

No Sony hate though, are you a Sony fanboy?
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[Matt]

Nah, I think the Sony hate is so thorough that anything I said would have no effect, hehe.
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[Nev]

Yeah, I'll be honest - I love HD. It looks fantastic. But truth be told, I only bought a HDTV for games, and so had the 360 and PS3 not had HD, I still wouldn't have one. Well, probably not.

The generation is still young, but I'd rather developers were focusing on elements like physics and animation. Surely by this stage, fully destructible environments and procedurally-generated animation should be the NORM, not the exception?

I like to think that advances like these could fuel a Sonic game that was actually GOOD. Imagine a game at the speed of Sonic Adventure 2, where every time you jump and swerve to avoid obstacles, Sonic is ducking and weaving and leaping realistically - like a CG version of the Sonic CD anime intro movie. And more so, realistic physics would produce entirely different results. Smash through a cardboard box? Easy. Smash through a wooden crate? Better build up some speed first. Smash through a steel crate? Ouch, good luck with that. Better yet, with realistic friction, it'd add a whole lotta strategy to affairs - curling into a ball on a highway would give you a massive burst of speed, whilst the same on a rougher surface (grass) and you'd roll to a gentle stop. Sonic on 360/PS3 may've looked snazzier than Sonic Adventure, but that's where the improvements ended.

I guess I'm of the mind that better technology and faster processors should first improve the gaming experience - THEN they can spend time to tighten up the graphics. Was Half Life 2 awesome just because it looked great? I'm pretty sure the Gravity Gun had something to do with it.

[LeonJ]

I personally feel happier as a gamer then I ever have EVER in my gaming career. I shudder at the thought going back to stale stand-alone consoles with no online interface, market place, music options, video streaming etc. This is the kind of stuff I wanted last gen.

Blaming M$ is poor, they have revolutised online gaming and making the other two players do things they wouldn't normally consider. I am personally happy they quickly moved from from the Xbox, I see this more as a positive.

HD gaming is very nice and brings big wide smiles to my face on my 120 CM HD TV. While the PS3 has not delivered, I have truely enjoyed the next gen offerings of the Wii and 360. While the 360 is top heavy with FPS, it's certainly has a cream of golden alternative titles that is very impressive since it's launch. I remember playing through through FFXII and thinkig I was watching a muddy pixely picture everytime I turned on the PS2.

Tekken Tag? Geeze man, that games looked terrbile compared to SC on the Dreamcast (and nice and painfully slow on the PAL PS2 as well). Rotating bitmap ground my ass.

Viva Pinata rocked and cancels out PDZ, RARE are still OK in my book.
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[arbok]

Wow thats a lot of bitterness. Are you at boiling point with most of these issues? Or are they only niggling ones... myself I agree with most of your points but there's still been some good gaming to be had.

1. I agree it was two years too soon - I still haven't finished GOW2, Shadow of the Colossus and Final Fantasy XII.

2. Microsoft have banked on their strategy.... money talks, online gaming and charging for every little single thing. Some of it has worked, some hasn't. One thing is for sure, MS fans are living a pipe dream if they think MS are doing them a service. Its total business with them, they'd be in the toaster business if the toaster business had potential to make money.

3. HD gaming rocks and I wouldnt go back to 480i.

4. Rare sucks.

5. Pricing sucks - the only thing worse is to hear Americans complaining about a $50 or $60 game.

6. Online gaming - Live should be free.

7. The Games - No masterpieces this generation....

8. Stop charging for picture packs and themes. Ridiculous. Using picture packs would probably mean more advertising for the game anyway.

9. Nintendo sucks - Controller is limiting... Lair/Warhawk and Wii games have proven motion controls was a big mistake. Works well with Wii Bowling, but thats about it. DS software library is not as good as everyone says it is.

10. Shenmue III will most likely never come out... Sega has lost a heap of money on it.
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[The Brett]

Another fantastic read, Matt. I love it.

RE: HD gaming. Sure, it might not make sense from our perspective, but Microsoft and Sony would be stupid not to go into that market now. Both have a vested interest in the technology (Microsoft with HDDVD and Sony with HDTVs and Blu Ray) and, while infantile, there's alot of money to be made there. HD is obviously the big new money source for electronics companies, so Sony especially are well served pushing it with PS3 and sufferring a bit of a loss for long term gain. Plus, it DOES look pretty good, even if it isn't mind-blowing.

Overall, if you're thinking about getting a next gen console now, basically don't. You'd be much better served raiding the PS2 library while the games are still both widely available and also dirt cheap. Forget the new consoles until late 2008/2009.

[ObsoletE]

good read, but aren't points 1 and 2 the same thing?

i don't really know about it being 2 years too early though, i think Sony pretty much got the timing right relative to their last gen launch, but i do agree that the X360 and the Wii launched a little sooner than players of their last gen offering should probably have had to endure.

i also think that paying for XB Live is retarded - and i play WoW, so i know about retarded pay-to-play pricing.
i also love the arse-kissing surrounding Live too - sure, it's good from a console perspective, but it should be, it's been around for 10-15 years already. only then it was on the PC, and was called MSN GameZone - and was free.
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[Nev]

[Dracusis]

I hate the term "Next-Gen". When do we stop using it? When did we start?

Can't we just call things what they are, and not by use all of these silly relative terms.

That rant aside, I really can't agree with much of the article...

HD is a pain, it's pricey, but *support* for it is necessary. I'm not saying we should abandon SD, and indeed none of the consoles have, but *not* supporting HD would hurt the industry a lot more. Perhaps something is skewing your perspective here, but it's a necessary evolution. SD resolutions are simply too low to offer the kind of vaulted online and interactive services you seem to want. You prise Sony's Home, but would you sing the same tune if it was SD only?

As for the launch titles not being up to scratch, when are they ever?

The Launch titles for the PS2 were little more the graphically enhanced PSX games, you mentioned Tekken Tag but that was little more than a visual upgrade for Tekken 3. GT3 has less cars than GT2 and so on. Perhaps the issue isn't the timing, perhaps it takes developers time to learn and adapt. GT4 was better than GT3. Perhaps the industry on a whole needs to start developing anything before it starts to change and evolve.

Hindsight is awfully unforgiving, as is this article.

[ObsoletE]

[Qbert]

Nice read Matt, I definatly agree with your point of launching this current gen way too early. Microsoft would have performed much worse if they waited though.

Love free online gaming too, I was just thinking about this today. Sony seems to be going in the right direction with a Nintendo meets Microsoft approad (Free but not terrible, aka Nintendo WiFi Connection). Paying around $70 for LIVE for say 4 years does really level out the cost between the PS3 and 360.
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[David]

[VOOK]

Amen to point #9, I been saying this since April

Matt where you play MP3, import?
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[döppelgangbang]

Ahh yes, a bit of healthy complaining. Gaming has certainly become a bitter little pill. There's that odd balance between the most fun you can have on the couch and the agony that comes from being dependent on consumerist corporations for your hit.

I'd love to combine the best parts about all 3 consoles and be done with it! Imagine an affordable online HD game sytem with a pointer that didn't die 5 minutes out of the box. Squeee!

[Matt Bassos]

Pessimistic much?

[Harry Milonas]

[littlemo]

Best Article Ever.

Completely agree with all of this and finally someone in the press has the balls to come out and say it without mincing words.

[ohayes]

I didnt really like the article and I think a lot of it is whinging about nothing. Every 'generation' usually starts off with a lackluster library and this is not unique to this one and I dont agree that starting the 'next gen' in 2007 would of made a difference, in fact I think that the reason we are playing so many great games today (right now I for one am extremely pleased with the game releases in the past 12 months) is because the hardware was released earlier.

what surprises me the most though, is you say that it was 'two years too soon' then another one of your points refers to Shenmue, which was a brilliant game and a technical achievement on the Dreamcast which was far ahead of its time, a system which was released 'early' just like the 360, just seems a little contradictory to me. You also refer to the brilliance of Soul Calibur, which I still cherish my copy but that too was also a Dreamcast game. The reason these games were so beautiful and so ahead of their time is because the revolutionary platform was there to develop it on.

HD is also a godsend I think not a bad thing, I love being able to play my games with a higher resolution image as PC gamers have been enjoying for a long time, plus the marrying of HD and consoles improves the adoption rate of HD sets which is only good for the consumer, who can complain about a better image? people can still use their normal tv's as well so it is not as if they're losing out.
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[Kaboth]

[Frozencry]

[fireflybck]

I pretty much agree with the article. Obviously one can also argue the dramatic mistakes Sony have made but they're too many and well covered.

HD is great for image, but I hate sacrificing 60FPS for it. Games like God of War 1 and 2 showed that a game can look fantastic at 60 FPS. Unfortunately a lot of new games on any system are trying to cut the speed and replace it with more detail. Nice for screenshots but poor for motion.

Out of the 3 systems, the 360 was probably the quickest to get decent titles on the shelves from their launch date, even though like the rest, most of their launch titles were nothing special.

There are some positives to come out of this generation.
No region lock for PS3.
Decent internet gaming - at least for 360 and PS3.
Connectivity - HDMI (maybe not on the first batch of 360s) USB 2 and Hard drives ( We missed out on PS2 hard drives).

As for the argument of this generation being less of a jump than the previous one, that's because some the the fundamental obstacles have been overcome. The jump from 2d to 3d, storage capacity (cartridge to disc).
The new obstacles are more complex. The limitations on CPU Mz speed (heat and power), the jump to HD, more network features, motion control.

I agree with the problems with pricing. We seem to be going back to the bad old days of the Super Nintendo when Street Fighter 2 was $120. I'll never pay $100 for any game.

As for internet gaming. I'm surprised Sony doesn't try to emphasis that paying $80 a year for 360 gaming eats into the overall value for money of the 360 compared to the PS3.

I disagree with Tekken Tag tournament (aka Jaggy central). But Soul Calibur and Rogue Squadron 2 were brilliant.

As for the hardware revisions. So much time and money is spent getting the machine on the market and then they go and update the bloody thing. 360, PS3, PSP and DS should have been correct from the start. Although one may argue the new PS3 is a downgrade with no emotion engine (Us PAL players weren't affected though).
The DS was mainly cosmetic, can't complain. The PSP however had a chance to really take it to the DS but instead they it just a fraction thinner and bumped the memory up slightly, big deal!
The 360 at this point is a white elephant. Until they fix it fully I wouldn' t touch the thing.

[Crestfallen]

frames per second are over-rated anyway. The difference between 60 and 30 locked isn't life-changing.

I have it so all my PC games are running ~22FPS.
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[LeonJ]