Plants and Zombies Cuteness

PopCap is legendary for their ability to churn out quality games over and over. Their latest game is Plants Vs Zombies, a tower defense game where the player controls a flower who must defend her planter against hordes of zombies. The game's graphics and music are cute and the game play well made. Definitely check out this game if you have time.

Scratch Vs. Activision Decision Upheld

An LA County Superior Court upheld the previous decision by a lower Los Angeles County court ordering Activision and 7 Studios to hand over source code to Scratch DJ's game. 7 Studio's has already turned over software and assets but until now haven't turned over the actual source code leading to the new ruling today.

Source: Kotaku

Anyone up for lunch at EA?

Image credit: Kotaku

Starcraft II Open Beta Finally!

Yesterday Blizzard announced that Starcraft II's Beta would be open for sign-up for current Starcraft Battle.net users. The beta would begin during the summer and signals the final stage the games development.

Graphics VS. Developers

I've always seen the graphics card business as being in an arms race with video game developers and it seems like Twenty Sided agrees with me. PC gamers usually need to update their video cards every 2-3 years while game consoles like the Playstation 3 can last for almost a decade.

Eurogamer Scandal

Eurogamer is facing outrage over allegations that they gave a negative review to Darkfall Online without giving the game a chance.

Darkfall Online claims - and has activity logs from their servers - that Eurogamer's Editor spent 2 minutes in the game's startup menu but didn't actually play. A second member of Eurogamer spent 2 hours and 33 minutes playing during which he constantly asked other players "how do I cast spells...help" and "this game is awful".

The allegations are disturbing if true, game critics have great influence over what players decide to buy. A negative bias by an individual reviewer would cost a game developer and undermine the credibility of game critics eerywhere.

Darkfall online currently seems to be in the right, they've offered to fly Eurogamer's IT techs over to Darkfall to inspect their logs and verify their claims but have been refused. Further compounding Eurogamer's problems is the fact that the biased reviewer, Ed Zitron, has been accused of simmilar things in the past.

New Class Announced For Star Wars: Old Republic

Star Wars the Old Republic is the highly anticipated MMORPG based on the Star Wars universe. It's developer BioWare announced a new playable class this morning.

HONOR, DUTY, DEFENSE OF THE REPUBLIC

Not all heroes carry Lightsabers. Some just have the will to fight.

For decades, the armed forces of the Galactic Republic defended their civilization against the seemingly unstoppable Sith Empire. Despite countless setbacks, the men and women of the Republic military never backed down until the Senate ordered them to do so. These brave souls remain ready and willing to lay their lives on the line today.

In the wake of the Treaty of Coruscant, the Republic military has begun recruiting from within its own ranks, creating cutting-edge Special Forces squads for the inevitable day when the war with the Sith Empire begins anew. These advanced strike teams are comprised of only the most talented and disciplined soldiers—a new breed of elite Republic Troopers.

These Troopers are the embodiment of the Republic military’s highest aspirations—the most advanced fighting force in the galaxy. They are equipped to face any foe in any environment, but it’s not their gear that makes them tough—it’s their guts. The Troopers’ greatest weapons are their indomitable spirit, their unwavering sense of duty and their undying loyalty to each other and to the ideals that the Republic represents. In this age, the stakes have never been higher. The Republic must win or face extinction. The fate of the galaxy rests upon ordinary men becoming extraordinary heroes. This is the path of the Republic Trooper.

RELATIONS WITH THE JEDI

The Knights of the Jedi Order have defended the Republic for generations, but they have not fought alone. A host of unsung heroes have marched at the Jedi’s side—common men courageous enough to enlist and face the same risks as their Jedi comrades despite not having access to the Jedi powers of protection. These heroes have not gone unappreciated by the Jedi. The men and women of the Republic military are accorded complete respect and admiration by the Order and by the Republic’s political leaders.

In the years since the Treaty of Coruscant, the Jedi have withdrawn in significant numbers to their homeworld of Tython. Their presence in the Republic military, though still significant, is not what it was during the war. In many ways, the Republic’s newly-trained elite Troopers have stepped up to take charge of the Republic’s defenses. When Troopers are partnered with the Jedi, they are a force to be reckoned with on any battlefield.

The game's coming along great, can't wait for it to be released. World Of Warcraft needs real competition.

A response to: "Ethics and Bullshit Morals"

A writer going by the alias "K" has posted an article over on Angry-Gamer titled "Ethics and Bullshit Morals". The article is a profanity filled analysis of the video game industries hypocrisy. K's arguments can be broken down into a few main points:

• "Its human curiosity to find out what kinds of reaction you can get by employing force and it’s simply natural to enjoy the suffering of someone else."
• If a gamer wants to he should be allowed to kill children in Video Games because it’s not any worse than anything else he can do in the game (his example is killing the child's parents.)
• Sex should not ban while hardcore violence is encouraged.
• "Rapelay" (A Japanese rape simulator) is a great game that has been given a bad rap.

K's entire rant seems to predicate on the idea that human's enjoy the suffering of others. This statement is widely inaccurate and highly generalized. I personally find human suffering to be a horrible condition and seek to alleviate it (as I did in Fallout 3). To say that it is a fundamental human characteristic is flawed and shows K's warped view of reality which led to this article.

His second argument about the double standards of video games has more merit. He cites Fable 2 and Fallout 3 as games where you can go on a murderous rampage - slaughtering whole villages - but as soon as you attempt to hurt a child you find yourself unable to do so. Yet what K doesn't understand is that video game developers have made their in-game children invincible for a variety of reasons. Video game developers are first and foremost, businesses; they must take public outrage and ESRB ratings into account when designing a game. A "MA" or "AO" rating would put a serious dent into a games sale as younger gamers find themselves unable to purchase the game. Public outrage may have worked for Grand Theft Auto but it seems to be the exception, not the rule.

Another reason developers frown upon the killing of children is for the simple fact that it is the killing of children. Society reacts differently to the death of a child because "they were so innocent" or "they were so young", a child’s death disturbs people because as creatures whom take of their young we are conditioned to protect our offspring -- we are given the inclination to protect those that are unable to protect themselves.

Video games create outrage every time it includes sexual content or is alleged to have sexual content. K has a valid point when he asks why sexual content is taboo when murder is not. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas generated controversy when a secret mini game titled "Hot Coffee" was revealed. The mini game depicted the main character having sexual intercourse with his in game girlfriend. The scene was never intended for release, it showed no nudity, was crudely animated, and feature animation problems. In addition the programmers locked away the game so that players could not access it. The only way to play the scene was to hack into the games software and make modifications. Despite all this "Hot Coffee" sparked media frenzy, news agencies condemned it, politicians decried it, and parents were incensed.

When Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was only about running around and killing people there was no uproar, people accepted that it was a violent game but still bought it for their children. Yet as soon as something sexual was revealed (regardless of the fact that it was the gamers, who went to extraordinary means to access it,) people went ballistic. K equates this rightly as a double standard, it is indeed hypocritical to criticize one and not the other, but his argument that "more developers should have the balls to display some nudity or show a sex scene" is again erroneous for the same reason as the killing of children: Video game developers are trying to sell games, if the ESRB dislikes it or parents don’t buy it for their children then sales will drop and the company may go out of business.

The most incendiary of K's arguments is his belief that Rapelay, a Japanese rape simulator, is harmless. Rapelay is an extremely controversial game which made my skin crawl just by reading about it on Amazon (yes the internet giant briefly sold the game online.) I won't go into any detail but if you really want to learn more or just want to see something horrible you can look at its Wikipedia page. K's twisted argument is that because the developers were paid and the consumers paid for it, the game isn't hurting anyone. It goes back to the argument that video games are fiction and therefore no one is really getting hurt. His argument goes further and calls Rapelay a "well deserved piece of entertainment", but is it really? Is a game whose main objective is rape really a "well deserved piece of entertainment?"

K does make a valid claim when he asks why rape is considered worse than murder. Why do people accept games whose only goal is to assassinate people and then condemn Rapelay? To understand this you must first examine mainstream violent video games. In every case the developer has tried to put in a story explaining why the protagonist is doing the things he does. The player could be fighting Nazis, or terrorists, or a myriad of other unsavory characters, but there's always some kind of reasoning behind it. When players go out and wantonly slaughter civilians it is their choice but not the intent of the developer. Rapelay is different; the developers specifically made the objective rape and are unashamed of it. Its players are playing the game for one reason, they enjoy that sick concept. And that is why Rapelay is so disturbing to people, there is no use for the game other than to appease a sick perversion; the game adds no real value to society. Unlike contemporary games it has no well written back-story, no attempt at teaching morals and ethics, no entertainment value - it is the very definition of useless garbage.

The article is brought to a close with the following summation:

"All I wanted to say is that developers shouldn’t enforce their bullshit morals unto us and that there should be no limit to artistic expression. Good labeling to warn the buyer of the content is essential, but never should someone’s imagination and creativity be limited by someone else’s fear or displeasure."

The closing argument is well written and has valid points. Some people feel that developers are hypocritical enforcers of a double standard and as such cannot tell us the gamers what is acceptable and what isn't. He has a valid argument that imagination and creativity shouldn't be stifled by one person’s personal objection (an argument that has been debated inconclusively in forums much greater than the blogosphere.)

Then he ruins his arguments by jokingly suggesting that the Pussycat Dolls should be "gagged, raped, sliced up and fed to wild orcas". Seriously? Not cool.

Microsoft financing a 3rd Season of "The Guild"

Felicia Day must be jumping with joy right now. Her labor of love "The Guild" has been approved for a third season by Microsoft. The Guild's first two seasons were financed through viewer donations and garnered 9 million views.

"The Guild is a independent sitcom webisode about a group of online gamers. It is written for gamers, about gamers by a gamer. Episodes vary from 3-6 minutes in length, and follow the Guild members’ lives online and offline."

You may know Felicia from her starring role in another internet sensation, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog along with Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion.

Nintendo Sales

Nintendo released sales figures for the Nintendo Wii and the DS this morning.

Microsoft trying to acquire Big Park Studios

Microsoft is attempting to buy Big Park game studios.
Big Park is working on a Xbox 360 title that will "expand gaming audiences around the world and bring them together through accessible and highly entertaining interactive experiences."
This is clearly a play by the Redmond Giant to try and fight the Nintendo Wii's hold on women and young children gamers.

THQ's Q4 Losses

THQ just posted record losses in their fourth quarter earnings reports.
Check it out here.

Video game accessories getting more expensive

RockBand is counting on the popularity of the Beatles to help it sell video game accessories. The music rhythm game has signed a deal allowing it to sell replica controllers based on the instruments of the Beatles:

• Paul McCartney’s Hofner bass
• Ringo Starr’s Ludwig drum set
• John Lennon’s Rickenbacker 325
• George Harrison’s Gretsch Duo Jet

The new instruments will be available September 9th along with the newest installment of the RockBand series.

Free Music Videos from Playstation

Sony announced that it will offer a free music video streaming service this summer. The feature will be a Playstation 3 exclusive and include thousands of music videos for free. Sony has gotten the backing of several major record labels so content should not be a problem.

The feature allows users to save music videos onto their Playstation hard drives and stream it onto their PSPs (Playstation Portables). Users can also arrange their downloads and form custom playlists.

As I wrote before, the Playstation 3 is definitly becoming the better buy in the long run.

The Rise of the Playstation 3

At the end of World War II a man by the name of Masaru Ibuka founded a small radio repair shop in the devastated city of Tokyo. Throughout the next few years Masaru would slowly expand his company until 5 years later, on a trip to the US, he was able to convince America's Bell Lab's to license the newly invented transistor to his company. His company quickly developed the first commercially available transistor radios which quickly became a huge success, selling hundreds of thousands of radios to the Japan and America.

With the success of their transistor radio business Masaru moved his company to Tokyo and after careful consideration combined the Latin word “Sonus” (the root word of sonic and sound) and Sonny (a colloquial term used in 1950's America for boy) in order to create Sony Corporation. Sony went on to become a leader in electronics, video game consoles, and motion pictures. In 1993 Sony Corporation spun off its video game division into its own company, Sony Computer Entertainment. Like its parent company it quickly became a leader in the video game industry. Within a year of its inception it released the Playstation -- a revolutionary video game system.

The Sony Playstation was released in December of 1994; at the time American gamers knew little of Sony and it's Playstation console and their ambiguous launch campaign, “Enos Lives”, didn't help(“Enos Lives” was meant to be read, Ready Ninth Of September, the official launch date of the Playstation.) Sony quickly revised its campaign and it is now known for its innovative –and sometimes controversial-- campaigns produced by famous directors and animators helping it sell over 102 million units, cementing the Playstation series in video game history.

The console's successor, unimaginatively named Playstation 2, carried on the record breaking sales tradition by selling 136 million units and counting. The system is famous for its longevity and massive game library. Released in 2000 the system is still going strong with strong sales for a console that’s been around for nine years. Even now as more powerful consoles are being offered by Microsoft and Nintendo game developers are making hit games for the Playstation 2 such as God of War II and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, incredibly the system is projected to have over 1900 titles available by the end of this year.

Playstation launches are usually enhanced by their roster of blockbuster games. The Playstation 3 (also known as the PS3) broke this tradition by launching with a limited selection of lackluster games. Sony decided on making a system with advanced components and revolutionary software, as a result game developers found the system extremely difficult to program for.

To compound Sony's problems its competitors Microsoft and Nintendo both came out with their own Next Generation systems, the Xbox 360 and the Wii respectively. Microsoft released their system a year earlier capturing a sizable portion of the market and developing many hit games. The Nintendo Wii became a hit with young children and women, an audience the other consoles ignored.

Many had given up on the PS3 calling it the downfall of Sony yet there are signs that things may be turning around: first, game developers are finally utilizing the PS3 to its full potential and making great games, second, the technical superiority of the PS3 is finally becoming apparent, and finally, the PS3 has finally found a marketing strategy that works.

When the PS3 first came out its game lineup was rated mediocre at best. It's games didn't fully utilize the Playstation's capabilities and it's A-list game franchises – Metal Gear, Midnight Club, Final Fantasy, and Gran Turismo, to name a few-- we're still in development. However if one examines Playstation's current lineup the story is completely different. Games like Killzone 2 and Heavenly Blade have graphics surpassing anything the Xbox 360 and the Wii can produce and in the case of Heavenly Blade are rendering objects in previously unheard of numbers. Metal Gear Solid 4 and Midnight Club: Los Angeles were both released in America this year to impressive sales and rave game reviews. Final Fantasy XIII and Gran Turismo 5 are on the verge of release with most critics anticipating huge sales figures and graphics surpassing anything seen yet. Playstation 3 is also creating new game blockbuster Gaming Franchises with innovative games like Little Big Planet and Killzone 2. As Playstation games continue to improve and expand more and more video gamers will be driven to purchase PS3’s increasing its market share in the long run, a process that has already begun.

Many consumers were driven away from the Playstation 3 by its steep cost, $699 US dollars, nearly double its competitors. Yet as the saying goes, “you get what you pay for”; The Sony Playstation 3 comes with a built in Blu-ray DVD player, backwards compatibility, wireless adapter, 60 gigabyte hard disk, and online play. When compared to its closest competitor, the Xbox 360, the difference really hits home. Microsoft backed Toshiba in the HD-DVD versus Blu-Ray war and lost when all the major movie companies sided with its rival. Sony’s Blu-Ray is now industry standard, making the Xbox’s drive obsolete. The Xbox offers wireless adapters and extra hard drive space at $100 dollars each eliminating their price advantage. This price advantage is completely gone when online play is factored in, Xbox Live (Microsoft’s online gaming service) is offered for $15.99 a month, Sony offers its Playstation Network for free – for life. Microsoft and Nintendo are already developing new systems to replace their aging consoles, meanwhile Sony plans on producing the PS3 for another six years, a testament to its quality.

Sony’s initial ad campaign for the PS3 seemed reminiscent of the failed original Playstation marketing. Their ads took place in a empty white room with ordinary objects acting in strange, surreal ways after an encounter with the PS3. Consumers were confused and left uninformed as to what the Playstation 3 offered. Recently however Sony seems to have hit upon a marketing strategy that works.

The company has spent 4 million US dollars in a surge of television ads demonstrating the graphical superiority of Killzone 2 and Major League Baseball: The Show, both Playstation exclusive games. Meanwhile another set of television ads is running that features a visually stunning mural made of PS3 games moving across a dark city. All of these ads are meant to communicate one thing to the consumer; Playstation 3 has the best games. Playstation 3’s increased marketing spending coupled with its competitor’s cutbacks is poised to make Sony a leader in video games once again.

In January of 2009, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe’s President, David Reeves, told the press that he believed the Playstation 3 would become the leading console in the next few years. He was quoted as saying “I’m very, very, optimistic for what I see for Playstation’s future.” The Playstation 3 is indeed on the verge of taking the market by storm. In the next few years gamers will flock to the system as more and more blockbuster games are released. Others will be converted by the built in hardware which more and more people are considering the better long term purchase. And all of these gamers will have been influenced by Sony's hard hitting marketing campaign. Playstation 1 and 2 became such huge successes because of the staying power of its hardware; games were being released on the systems years after their competitors had moved onto new systems. People took notice and Sony developed a reputation for building quality machines. After a rough start Playstation 3 is set to continue the tradition, a triumph of interactive entertainment.