OrtizGames

This may have just be Michael Bay rambling, and I don’t exactly trust Michael Bay. But it seems like there were various sources suggesting earlier this year that Microsoft wants to fight Blu-Ray with HD DVD just so they can drive both formats down. It seems that Microsoft’s ulterior motive was to keep the format war at a standstill so they could work on and release their Direct 2 Drive purchase system. So Microsoft’s support really hasn’t been about movies all this time–sorry, moviegoers, but this is actually closely tied in to the videogame industry.

I know it’s relatively old news, but I mention it now because 1) I really felt a need to talk about this, 2) I’ve had it on the backburner for a month now and haven’t gotten to it and 3) we has reached a general consensus the Blu-Ray versus HD-DVD war is more or less over. Blu-Ray wins.

But from thinking on HD-DVD’s “downfall”, I start to wonder whether Microsoft was really aiming towards competing. My theory is that, if anything, they were hoping just to slow Blu-Ray down, and never planned to even give HD-DVD a chance–which is rather uncool, in my perspective–it’s kind of on the same moral standing as Wal-Mart coming into third world countries and lowering their prices to dirt cheap in order to bankrupt all local businesses, and then raising their prices back to normal when they hold monopoly.

Thing is, I think this strategem was doomed from the start. You can’t really remove the physical element from game ownership–people don’t have the internet infrastructure necessary to download whole games that work in Hi-Def, so Microsoft would have had to sell physical copies anyway. And then there’s the issue with space–where are Xbox 360 owners going to save all those games? Their minute yet extremely lunky Hard Drives that are shipped with their consoles? PS3 at least gives owners the option of purchasing a computer hard drive and installing it in place of their standard drive on their computer. Microsoft holds exclusive market over the manufacture of their 120GB drives. 120GB aren’t going to cut it in this day and age. Computer hard drives are rapidly approaching massive space range–I can get a 500GB hard drive for 500 bucks at Best Buy.

In the end, PS3 would have been able to compete with Direct 2 Drive par on par. Especially since PSN downloads are so simple and straightforward.

So, we give you a send off, HD-DVD. I’m sorry you were just a tool. We’ll bury you near to all your fellow dead formats, like Beta.

(The following video is NSFW due to language and the fact that they’ve chosen Hitler to represent HD-DVD, which is somewhat mortifying.)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=friS4OOcdgQ]

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I’ve realized that from a design perspective, demos are some of the most powerful tools available to experiment with your game mechanics in a real, out-of-studio setting. Previously, I always saw demos as an advertising tactic, and I never really appreciated the idea of getting only a fraction of a game–it made me feel like I was being sucked into eventually buying the full version. But now I see demos as such an exciting phenomenon.

Weekly I’ll check my news to see what’s been uploaded to the PSN Store. I’ll download most any little demo that comes out–Sam and Max, World in Conflict; you name it, I want to try the beta. I love to be able to see how the mechanics of a game work, and what the premise and definition behind it are before the studio actually gets around to releasing it.

The trouble is, most companies do still see it as an advertising tactic in order to get people excited and buy the product. The only time you hear the word “testing” related to demos is when it’s been grafted to the words “beta” or “alpha”. Which is fine, I suppose–but why don’t we see much beta and alpha on consoles, now that we have such intricate systems as 24Connect, XBLive and PSN? We’re seeing some examples–Playstation Home has had a private beta for a while, though we’ve still been waiting on the public one. I’m sure there’s other games that are being considered for alpha and beta release. But I want to see more of it–demos shouldn’t just be a “sneak preview” factor, but an experiment to see how the gaming community reacts to the dynamics being presented to them. Look at the Burnout Paradise example, and the different things EA tried (including amping the online multiplayer–for a demo of a game, of all things).

There should be more attempts to exploit the tool provided by releasing demos–or beta tests, if you want–and seeing the public’s response to the premise and mechanics.

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And indeed, there are more FFXIII screenshots available.

I have to say, this game has me the worst kind of excited. The kind of excited where you’re so excited you barely feel it any more and any more news is just adding to the load of anxiety you have because you want to be satisfied so badly. But as it is, it doesn’t come out till December. Until then, I’ll be suffering from my Final Fantasy blueballs and losing myself in Assassin’s Creed.

Here’s a recent hi-quality scan of a couple of pages of the mag–the rest can be found by following the link. It’s exciting!

Final Fantasy XIII Magazine Scan – Click for Full Size

PS

I beat Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. Honestly, it was such an awesome, fun experience. I recommend it to everyone who’s bought a PS3–no matter what genre you like. That game is solid.

Now I need to get all the achievements.

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Kevin McCullough, columnist behind the Mass Effect article I last posted about, somewhat recanted today by making himself look even more like an idiot.

I’m amazed someone can be so wrong about so many things and still manage to hold an aloof air of superiority when they’ve been beaten to the ground. I guess it doesn’t help that so many gamers replied to the article–we should have read it, been amused, laughed about it with friends and come to forget it instead of giving it the limelight.

Honestly, after reading what he said in retaliation against replies to his article, I’m not at all impressed. Especially since to a certain degree I could agree with some ideas he had–parents should be actively seeing what their kids play, like my parents did me, and I somewhat have done with my little brother. But the sheer ego demonstrated in the lines, “Many challenges stated that unless I played it myself then I had no business pointing out its objectionably content. Would they say the same of a strip club at the end of their block or hookers knocking at their door? (Well maybe sexually repressed gamer-nerds would…) Normal people would not.” I mean, he’s just full of himself. He’s trying to get a rise. And of course, he’ll probably get it from people who aren’t so eloquent as he is, and he’ll be able to use their comments to further bloat himself like a greasy pig. It’s disgusting. Trust me, he won’t be getting any more attention from my end of the field. I’d love to see him deflated.

He also proceeds to insist it wasn’t he who was misinformed–no, it was his “Gamer Nerd” friends who gave him faulty information. So, you’re trying to point out it’s the “Gamer Nerds“‘ fault? That’s rather rich of you, Kevin. Especially since you, as a journalist, are technically supposed to be responsible for what you write as well as your sources. It doesn’t reflect badly on your scapegoat when you’re wrong–it reflects badly on you.

Had he taken this more graciously and admitted that perhaps he had not gotten the details right, and maybe he needed to actually play the game before he decided what it was about (he watched a YouTube video, for Christ’s sake) I probably would have respected him a great deal more and would have loved the opportunity to interview him.

Now, if I ever get a reply from the site about an interview, I’m going to tell them to forget it–Kevin McCullough isn’t worth listening to.

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Give this a read.

Apparently, Mass Effect (which is an M-rated Star-Wars-like RPG shooter game where you basically race across the galaxy in order to stop the destruction of all universal life as we know it) has now been compared to a virtual sex game (totally NSFW). While I understand the shock upon learning that there is sex in an M-rated video game (God forbid, since we all know R-rated movies don’t have any sex in them and kids can totally watch them) I’m a little unconvinced as to the validity of the analysis of the situation. I mean, I’ve been playing Mass Effect for over 10 hours now starting Sunday night, and I haven’t run into any sex whatsoever…

And it’s not like this article is all wrong. See, I agree perfectly with the idea that parents should be focused on what their kids are doing. Absolutely. My parents didn’t let me watch Titanic, and I’m glad–I didn’t even like the movie when I watched it once I was “old enough.” Same goes for video games–you think something in the home is any less dangerous than outside? Just because your kid can’t get into a movie theater to see an R-rated movie doesn’t mean he can’t just pop in your Tarantino DVDs back at home. Do you want your kid watching Tarantino?

That’s why game companies have added things like Parental Control on their consoles. You can actually set up a console so M rated games and T rated games won’t play without your consent.

The thing that bothers me is 1) how incorrect, and disgustingly warped the review of Mass Effect is and how misinformed it leaves the reader and 2) why are people pointing the fingers at game companies and the game industry in general? I mean, we don’t make games like Mass Effect for kids, any more than Tarantino makes Reservoir Dogs for kids.

I’m going to go ahead and apply for an interview with the writers, though I know I probably won’t get it. It’s just… it blows my mind to see how people come to such extremist conclusions on the most basic and tentative steps. Maybe we really need to listen to the critics and ask them what exactly is the reason they’re so adamant. Maybe they need to listen to us. I don’t know. It’s a really messed up world out there.

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One of my friends recently told me today (after having read my People Hate the PS3 post) that while I had hit many of the key points as to why PS3 was getting such bad rep right now, the reason he personally “hate[ed] the PS3 with a passion” was because it was just too expensive. He also said the games coming out for the PS3 weren’t interesting to him, though I was intrigued as to how he liked Perfect Dark Zero and PGR3 over Resistance and Motorstorm.

After listening more and more, I came to the conclusion that, in all honesty, he was just a casual gamer. He pointed out that none of the games PS3 had come out with were easy to get into or had really fun split screen. I thought about it, and realized the games he plays on his Xbox (Rock Band, Guitar Hero, Halo 3) are all just glorified party games, and not really all that hardcore at all. Wait, Halo 3, a casual game? Halo, I concluded after a while, could really just be called casual. It’s pointedly simple, quick and requires very little strategic learning or improvement. Most people I know are good at Halo because–just that–they’re good at Halo. They didn’t practice, they didn’t get better–they’re just good at it because they are. This is from a biased perspective, of course, but I suspect it’s more or less the issue. People CAN get better–there’s the whole Rock Band and Guitar Hero progressive improvement based on difficulty level, same for Legendary Mode–but really, I can do voice on Expert at Rock Band, and I barely struggle. I was just GOOD at it… and I know there’s plenty of people that were good at Uncharted and Gears of War, but those games were bound to provide a real challenge to complete.

So that’s just it–what IS casual? What is hardcore? Where can you find them? It seems my friend would rather play games on his Nintendo Wii, so maybe that’s a more “casual” console? He bought the 360 because it’s cheaper than the PS3, but in all honesty does he like it more? Is it “more casual” or “less casual”? He says he’s neutral towards the 360 while hating the PS3, but I’m thinking if the PS3 were to release a few more on-console multiplayer games (like Killzone 2 or LittleBigPlanet, for example) and he had waited until then to make a decision between Xbox and PS3, he wouldn’t know which to buy. He’d go for the cheaper one, I’m suspecting–and the PS3 is lowering in price, now that production costs are at 400$ per console (Sony actually is making money off sales now). So what would happen in that instance?

In the end, I’m not sure. I’ve figured that the real competitive showdown in the industry is between those games that are deemed casual and those games that are deemed hardcore. Who’s the bigger audience? Casual. Who’s more likely to take to a game? Hardcore. How do you balance these out?

I’m thinking someone needs to come up with a symbiosis–something truly extraordinary, that will appeal to people all over. Games like SPORE (and maybe Rock Band?) come close to what I’m thinking, but nobody’s hit it on the nail yet–a merge between hardcore and casual, a game anyone can play but that feels just as epic as a game like Mass Effect. Something that appeals to everyone.

Portal? Maybe.

I don’t know. I’m just at a loss tonight.

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To expand on the post I just put up, here’s a second video displaying the amazing sync of Heavy Rain’s face capture technology.

[vodpod id=ExternalVideo.454661&w=425&h=350&fv=] from play.tm posted with vodpod

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!![Edit: This article is so old but people keep reading it. For more new news on Heavy Rain, please check my recent posts, such as this one.]!!

A while ago, it was plastered all over my Netvibes that co-founder of Quantic Dream, Guillaume de Fondaumière, announced that the uncanny valley which had so plagued the game “Heavy Rain” when it was in technical demo stages (still magnificent stages, but understandably somewhat awkward and at times unappealing) is now no more.

To recap for you readers who aren’t huge on clicking my alluding links, the Uncanny Valley is a phenomenon, predicted by the roboticist Masahiro Mori in 1970, that occurs when a viewer becomes unsettled as they watch something attempt to be too human and fail. I’ve heard it being presented as a viewer interpreting something as being “too real,” but I’ve come to learn that this is a misnomer. Were game developers to make a game that looks absolutely and perfectly true to life, people would have no trouble enjoying it. The problem comes in when something is attempting to be real, and cannot attain the ultimate perfection. Humans will be thrown off by the tiniest hints–no blemishes, unnatural skin tone, perfect teeth… those things will hint to you that what you’re seeing isn’t real, and you will be not only discomforted but repulsed by it.

To illustrate, I present to you the original tech demo from way back in 2006.

[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9133667929405103814]

It’s beautiful, but a bit unnerving, right? The lip animations and almost too-perfect teeth and tongue are what throw people off when they watch this. The motion capture technology and the well-rendered eyes is what really makes the visuals so impressive. When the actress in the video isn’t speaking, and is simply making faces, I become entranced by how lively she looks, how full of personality. When she speaks, and her mouth and lips move irregularly, I becomes rather turned off by the visuals.

Well, French company Quantic Dream, the fellows behind a beautiful and key game dubbed Fahrenheit also known as the more-popular-titled The Indigo Prophecy, which I loved. Understandably, I was dying to see what de Fondaumière was talking about when he said that they had done what was previously expected to be, if not impossible, highly unlikely until at least two or three years have passed, but no more demos or revelations came, and I spent December in relative misery while I waited for further news on this much-anticipated game. Of course, good things come to those who wait: with the new year, we’ve received new screens.

There’s not a lot to gawk at, to be honest. There’s two close-up screenshots of a woman’s nose and eyes, with a bit of hair visible and a wonderful focus effect to the camera. Mostly what impresses me is the sheer amount of detail and realistic imperfection in the skin. I’ve always found it hilarious that many women worry so about their skin and wearing makeup in order to hide imperfections, when often those imperfections make them all the more interesting and alluring. Then again, I love skin details because I’m into game design and textures. I may just be a freak of nature.

Still, as it stands, these screenshots are frighteningly beautiful and I’m ecstatic to see in-game shots or a trailer. If Quantic Dream has indeed bridged the Uncanny Valley, Heavy Rain: The Origami Killer marks an entry into video games that had previously existed only in imagination: the perfect visual representation of life.

Virtual Reality to soon follow.

Also, this game has not yet been declared as to which consoles it will appear on. Most people seem to readily assume it’s a PS3 exclusive, as previously stated by Quantic when they released their tech demo. Later on, however, Quantic revealed they were considering releasing it for every console, including the Nintendo Wii. I’m not certain if that’s even possible, but let’s assume for now that Quantic has an idea of what they’re doing when it comes to consoles. My verdict: PS3 owners, I guarantee you this game. Xbox 360 owners, pray for ports. Wii owners, you’re getting a different game.

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And it’s not something wicked. Rather, it’s something really cool.

PS3 has a lot of things planned for this year, including a new XMB update that will finally give us the ability to play music, talk with friends and check downloads while in-game. The only thing we need to do is wait–the trouble with that is that most of us don’t want to. I want it all now.

Of course, I can’t afford it all. I still have Rock Band, UT3, NGS and Oblivion to buy, and then DMC4, GTA IV, Killzone 2 and Haze come out in the next few months. Couple that with the upcoming promise of MGS4 in June, LittleBigPlanet in September (not April as previously thought, sorry peeps) and both Final Fantasies in December… I am going to have one penniless year. But it’ll be well worth it.

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Remember how a while ago, soda makers said video games make kids fat? Well, now McDonald’s–McDonald’s, which peddles lousy, unhealthy food that gives me three different kinds of illness whenever I eat there and was the main focus of the documentary Supersize Me–is accusing games of the same.

I’m not sure how to react to this. I guess I should be upset, but I’m more amused than anything.

Also… Darth Vader and Yoda. In Soul Calibur IV. I didn’t know how to think about this for a few minutes, and then I decided it was awesome. As awesome as this picture.

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