So this is why the HDC was so messed up. [link inside]

[PureBlackAura]

It seems that Kojima calls most of the shots with very little sayso from Konami.

But yeah, Konami only cares about the moolah. Yes, every game dev is in it for the moolah, but Konami is pretty much a Japanese version of EA or Activision in a sense, much like Capcom. They'll milk their franchises in a heartbeat.

No truer words have been spoken. Hell, Capcom will release 3 versions of the same game, include DLC on disc, and charge players $20 for 12 characters that were ALREADY THERE.

Except EA still has quality and even in their worse they're still better than Konami is. They'll even cater to fans. (I've seen it with Sims, Dragon Age, and Mass Effect.) This is... I don't even know what to make of it. It shows that Konami doesn't even care it seems about Silent Hill.

Eh, yes and no. The thing with Dragon Age and Mass Effect is that Bioware is catering to the fans, not really EA. The Sims was all Will Wright, but if I'm not mistaken, he's left Maxis. Even still, Maxis has proven to run great on its own with EA just publishing and distributing.

However, let's look solely at EA. EA is known for their licensed sports games. They release a new iteration of each annually. As of late, they've incorporated the "Online Pass" feature that requires you to purchase the game new to play online (or some in-game features, too). Of course you could purchase the Online Pass via Live or PSN. I know the reason that's in place, so we don't have to get into that.

This is the sticky part for me. Let's look at Dead Space. The first one was developed in-house (that studio branched off into Visceral Games before the release of Dead Space 2). You could buy "extra" upgrades for about $2 each that made your guns fire "faster" and "hit harder." That's a simple parameter swap that you end up paying for. Let's look at Dead Space 2. The game included a DLC campaign on-disc. EA planned to "release" this DLC later on, but modded save files be damned. The DLC was discovered and EA ended up "giving it away for free."

Now that's just plain stupid. If you plan on releasing the damn DLC either put it on disc PLAYABLE before release, or leave it off the disc entirely and actually MAKE it DLC.

Don't even get me started about Warden's Keep/Stone Prisoner bullshit that Dragon Age: Origins pulled. :/ I bought Origins new a year or so ago (before the "code expiration") and I still couldn't use my Stone Prisoner or Blood Dragon Armor code.

I wish EA would capitalize on something that actually has a demand. I'd love to actually play the original Mass Effect on PS3. I'd love to have a competent Sims port on console, too. The Sims 3 was great, but it didn't allow the creation of multiple families, multiple neigborhoods, shit... it doesn't even keep track of your dead family members. They just fucking disappear from existence. I know consoles have limitations, but... grawr. :/

I think Rocksteady does DLC correctly. The upgrades that are available for download are purely optional. They're releasing their first and only story expansion later this month (alongside a Game of the Year edition).

It's almost becoming unwise to buy games at release (seeing as the "full game" will be released a year or so later).

Rockstar created deep expansions of their games for DLC (GTA and RDR), but I still can't help but feel that if we can include it all on one disc now, why could we not include it all from the beginning?

I apologize for the rant.

Rant on man, Everything you said there was true. I'm just wondering if Hijynx is working on fixing "all the problems" how are they going about doing this .... and won't it exceed the patch limit on the Xbox 360? While were still on the topic of patches. Even though we kinda know what's in store for the HDC and kinda why it had so many glitches to begin with. That's still leaves downpour with barley any info about its patch.

[Purramid_Head]

My codes for Dragon Age worked fine that I got.

As for Mass Effect 1, that has to do with something beyond EA's control, it has to do with Bioware. They were buyinhg them when it was released and I think the PC version has no EA logo or something.

As for sims, everyone knows that sucks on console so why are you still buying it? That goes for the other games too, they're way better PC games.

[NarooN]

Even though MGS's story has been pretty ridiculous ever since MGS2, Kojima knows how to make great games. I think his studio, KojiPro, are one of the few Konami studios who are managed correctly. It seems that Kojima calls most of the shots with very little sayso from Konami.

But yeah, Konami only cares about the moolah. Yes, every game dev is in it for the moolah, but Konami is pretty much a Japanese version of EA or Activision in a sense, much like Capcom. They'll milk their franchises in a heartbeat.

Except EA still has quality and even in their worse they're still better than Konami is. They'll even cater to fans. (I've seen it with Sims, Dragon Age, and Mass Effect.) This is... I don't even know what to make of it. It shows that Konami doesn't even care it seems about Silent Hill.

More like EA's studios have quality, not EA themselves as a company lol. And from what my friend (who is a massive DA fan) said about DA2, it was abysmal besides the combat. I'm still waiting on Mirror's Edge 2 myself, but I still blame EA for telling DICE to put Mirror's to the side to work on Battlefield #59239. I used to like BF, but I've gotten bored of it as well as any other generic modern day military game. Mirror's was different and unique, yet it gets pushed off in favor of flooding the market with BF games. Bioware has lost credibility with a lot of their fans as well over the aforementioned DA2 thing and the recent ME3 drama which I don't wanna go into detail about lol.

EA as a company is pure trash, they have been ever since the mid-2000's. Online passes, bullshit DLC (and disc-locked content), shutting down online servers to games a year after they come out (even on PC!! what type of garbage company doesn't even offer dedi server support on the PC?!), and many other things that my man Q. already pointed out. They're abysmal and show no sign of going back to their former glory days. I miss the EA who made WW2 espionage FPS games and snowboarding games where you could do ten backflips before landing. Now, they're just shadows of their former selves.

[Q. Valintyne]

@NarooN; the recent debacle with Diablo III is a great indicator of where gaming is going is the future (and it looks grim). I hate the concept of being constantly logged on a server in order to play a singer player campaign. I'm not a Diablo player, but I can imagine how frustrating it must be.

As for sims, everyone knows that sucks on console so why are you still buying it? That goes for the other games too, they're way better PC games.

Because I have hope that one day the PC experience will be faithfully recreated on consoles. It's a dream.

As for the Mass Effect thing, I'm not buying that. People said it'd never come to PS3 in the first place. I still don't understand why they decided to start with ME2 (and port it using the ME 3 engine at that).

But blgksgksd;lfjsgkjsklgjdrg. That's what I think.

Also @NarooN; I wish they'd come out with another Mirror's Edge game. Damn that game was so much fun... and original gameplay-wise.

[Purramid_Head]

DA2 isn't the result of EA, it's a result of some of the heads at Bioware. I remember fans blaming someone specifically for changing the game, it's not EA. It wasn't David though.

Also, ME3 is getting dlc to resolve the issue with the ending and it's free. That's probably not EA's fault either, more like the guy who made ME.

[NarooN]

The ME3 DLC will only further explain things that your Shepard did in the game to give closure on them, but it won't actually explain the currently nonsensical ending. The indoctrination theory tries hard to make sense out of it, and it's really the only rational way that ANY of the ending could make sense, but Bioware already stated that it's not true, so it just shows how incompetent their writers really were.

And yeah, the 'always logged in to play' thing was stupid from day one! It's funny how game devs, especially PC ones, always try to say that the reason PC gaming has died down in recent times is due to piracy, when they fail to understand that the main reason people pirate PC games in the first place is to not have to deal with BS DRM and other ridiculous policies.

It's similar to how paying customers who buy a movie on DVD or Blu-Ray still have to sit through 10+ minutes of pointless ads, splash screens, and other shit before they can even see the movie, whereas if you pirate it, all you see is the thing you came to see: the friggin' film! The hypocrisy of the gaming industry (or more correctly, the entertainment industry, since this extends into the music and film industries as well) today is astounding.

And yeah, Mirrors 2 is needed. The first game wasn't flawless, but it was a great change of pace to the FPS genre. Even in 2008 I was beginning to tire of these modern day war games.

[Purramid_Head]

Oh and thanks for spoiling Mass Effect 3's ending for me. Awesome.

[Floodclaw]

Oh and thanks for spoiling Mass Effect 3's ending for me. Awesome.

There's spoilers in that post? Only thing I can thing of is the mention of the indoctrination theory, and that's not what you think it is by looking at the name alone, so nothing was really spoiled. And as NarooN said, it isn't even true. :V

Offtopic more: the reason ME3 ended the way it did was because it deviated from the original story. The entire story as it was meant to be was written around 10 years ago, so I hear, and around the time EA got a hold of BioWare (towards the end of production of ME2) they decided they could write a better ending. And they didn't. The original ending makes a lot more sense.

[schlaufuchsMIKE]

ME3 Spoiler:

REVEAL SPOILER

The only thing that I thought was bad about the ME3 ending was the thing with the kid being the catalyst. Seriously, that was pulled out of someone's ass for sure. In any case, I thought the ending was fine, otherwise. The variety was limited, sure, but the point was that it was an ending of an era. Actually, I kind of like it.

[NarooN]

Oh and thanks for spoiling Mass Effect 3's ending for me. Awesome.

Like Floodclaw said, I didn't spoil anything lol. The indoc theory isn't what it sounds like it is just going off the name alone, and it was confirmed by Bioware to not even be true.

The reason why I don't like the ending so much is because it just makes no sense and contradicts a lot of things that the previous two games established. It's just a clusterfuck of madness and ridiculous fallacies.

But yeah, lol @ how off topic this got. Not that I mind or anything. <3

[Q. Valintyne]

DA2 isn't the result of EA, it's a result of some of the heads at Bioware. I remember fans blaming someone specifically for changing the game, it's not EA. It wasn't David though.

Also, ME3 is getting dlc to resolve the issue with the ending and it's free. That's probably not EA's fault either, more like the guy who made ME.

I never referred to either one of these titles. I only mentioned ME 3 because ME 2 runs on its engine for the PS3. DA2 was a grand departure from Origins' more "free and creative" nature, but I've never played it so I can't say too much about it.

Offtopic more: the reason ME3 ended the way it did was because it deviated from the original story. The entire story as it was meant to be was written around 10 years ago, so I hear, and around the time EA got a hold of BioWare (towards the end of production of ME2) they decided they could write a better ending. And they didn't. The original ending makes a lot more sense.

Yep. And just in case... {Mass Effect 3 SPOILLEEERZZ}

REVEAL SPOILER

pretty much all of your decisions don't mean shit in Mass Effect 3. You will encounter different people and different scenarios sure, but your ending is pretty much inevitable. I haven't even played ME 3 yet and I can't say that reading all of these things makes me any more likely to do so. I've beat ME 2 once (I'm going through it again since I got both the prequel and Arrival DLC), but I'm not even motivated to play it anymore. The ending for Mass Effect is the worse cop out since St. Elsewhere.

@NarooN; game companies aren't taking risks anymore. They're doing more of the same in hopes that people will keep buying it. That's why Activision released like... 5 Guitar Hero games/spinoffs in a fiscal year (and they ended up losing a shit ton of money).

Here's a new quote from Bobby Kotick, the CEO of Activision Blizzard, featured in the new Rolling Stone issue:

"Game designers aren't stars; that's why it's such a good business." [He] noted, during an earnings call, that his goal is to find game franchises that can be "exploited every year" with safe, profitable sequels.
-The biggest asshole ever.

One of my favorite lines in the article is this:

The game's secret is an engrossing style [that Activision publishing CEO Eric] Hirshberg calls "epic realism...." "It doesn't strive to be a simulation game.... it also strives to feel real, but also deliver an over-the-top scale." (Earlier this year, Norwegian mass-murder Andre Behring Breivik claimed that playing the game helped him get a feel for using gun sights.)

I have no bloody idea why RS felt compelled to include the bold part, but damn it made me laugh my ass off. Their subtle jab suggests that games breed killers. What surprises me the most is that their stance on the issue has been rather liberal in the past. I don't want to spark that debate, but I just found that part hilarious.

I hate seeing game developers being pretty much "abused" for profit, but it happens. I'm not sure if Treyarch or Infinity Ward could make anything other than FPS games even if they tried after being conditioned to do only that for so long. I'm almost certain if the Silent Hill HD Collection would have been a success Hijinx would've been contracted to port the remaining games, too.

Of course, that's only my opinion.

[NarooN]

Spoiler lifestyle for ME3:

REVEAL SPOILER

I installed ME3 a few months ago on my PC after it first came out. Played it happily until I inadvertently spoiled the ending for myself. Then my curiosity got the better of me, so I decided to investigate to see why the endings didn't make any sense (mind was blown, so wasn't thinking too rationally at the initial point lol). I just couldn't fathom how Bioware could literally lie their asses off and say the ending was gonna be this ultimate ending of devastation that encompassed everything you've done in the past three games when quite literally, every player ever will get the same ending basically.

But yeah, one of the top reasons I hate Activision now is what they did to the rhythm game industry. I still play Rock Band 3 every now and then with friends, it's just a fun game. I started with rhythm games way back in the day with Parappa if that counts, then started with DDR in 2004 and then with the original Harmonix-developed GH games in 2006. Then years later, Activision decides to run the genre into the ground by oversaturating the market with bundles and band games every two seconds. The rhythm game genre's huge booming popularity a few years back was mostly a fad, just a lot of people hopping on trying to be cool I guess lol, but honestly, the level of popularity it's at night is the same as it was before the fad came about. The only people who play these games now are people who legitimately liked them in the first place.

I wonder how much longer they can last with milking CoD out. Probably quite some time since millions of casuals are completely unaware of the huge amount of vastly superior FPS games out there, and seem to have no problem paying $60 each year for over-priced expansion packs mistakenly labeled as "new games". Quake, TimeSplitters, Unreal, Counter-Strike, old-school Medal of Honor, System Shock, STALKER, Half-Life, etc. Such a pity. -_-

[Q. Valintyne]

That Decision Tree was heavily enlightening. Holy shit. :/

Parappa definitely counts. I fell in love with UmJammer Lammy when I first played it. I had played a demo of Parappa previously and I kinda knew what to expect. But man... UmJammer Lammy (to me) was the best out of the little series; Parappa 1 and 2 were just incredibly short. Awesome, but short. I used to play the DDR games like crazy, too. Your Rain was one of my favorite tracks (before I even discovered Silent Hill). Man... nostalgia.

EA had their share of running the music-game market in the ground as well (and had planned to do it more). I haven't got a hold of Rock Band 3 yet, but I still want it. I've broken several Rock Band (and one Guitar Hero) drumsets. I've been lucky enough to find them for really cheap and/or free replacements from EA at times. The next planned installments (from what I read in press releases and online) for Guitar Hero and Rock Band was a Red Hot Chili Peppers and Pearl Jam iteration respectively. I would've bought the hell out of both of them. Shit, if they were ever to make a Rock Band or Guitar Hero Nirvana game, I'd be all over that.

The very first Guitar Hero is what inspired me to pick up guitar again and actually learn and I'm thankful for that. I probably wouldn't have discovered certain bands or songs either.

I definitely see the fad aspect of it. People who would never otherwise touch a video game system were playing Guitar Hero. Tournaments were every fucking where in my area (and I kicked ass at a few of them) and playing it with friends as a band was a big social event. As much as I'd like to see a possible reboot of either one of the game series, I know the same magic it had when it first came out could never be matched. The sole mention of a "new GH or RB" project will be followed by several scoffs from the industry.

I'd still play it.

This year, we have Black Ops II coming out. Next year, it'll be Infinity Ward's turn to put out Modern Warfare 4. Then, Treyarch will decide whether or not to do Black Ops III, or develop a new spin-off. It's a deadly cycle. :/

[NarooN]

Yeah, it seems like the rhythm genre is on a massive hiatus now. The next RB game is a spin-off game called Rock Band: Blitz, where you use a normal PS3/360 controller to play the notes over various lanes, similar to Harmonix's earlier titles Frequency and Amplitude. It looks a bit interesting, and you can use most of the DLC you have from RB to play tracks on there. As for Activision, no idea what they're gonna do when they try to reboot. Unless they try to allow you to use a real guitar or bass like RB3 and Rocksmith did, I don't see what they can do to pick up interest again.

Speaking of real instruments, I was reading about this hella-interesting new game coming out called Bandfuse (http://www.joystiq.com/2012/02/22/bandf ... al-guitars) which is yet another game that lets you use a real guitar to play. Sadly it looks like it's only gonna be on the 360 (curse them!), but if it turns out nicely I might actually pick up a 360, just maybe, to play it. Then again, there's a PC port of Rocksmith coming soon, so I might just get that instead...

Anyway, it looks appealing to me since any game that lets me plug in my real Strat and start jamming away sounds nice. The main things that drew me in about it was how you can go into a jam session mode and even record that stuff and share it with other people. You can use a variety of amp models and pedals to modify your sound. There's even the ability to have jam sessions online or locally with others and record that too. Sounds really nice, especially since I live in a small town and I don't really know anyone else who plays instruments here, and no one has the same taste in music as I do lol.

RB3 did the real guitar thing first methinks, and the way it worked was awesome, just that you were forced to buy one of their two guitars for it to work (one was a guitar with around ~100 buttons simulating the frets, and had strings on the guitar body which you'd strum, this model was modeled after a Fender Mustang; the other model was modeled after a Strat and was a "full" real guitar with strings and whatnot, naturally it costed a lot more). Rocksmith lets you use any guitar, and PowerGig, well I don't even remember, but that game was horrible lol. So my hopes for this one aren't too high since it's from a studio I've never heard of before.

Also not too fond of the generic song selection they have, though a few tracks seem cool. Not trying to sound like a hipster but stuff like Maroon 5 doesn't really agree with my tastes xD.

[Q. Valintyne]

PowerGIG did the real guitar thing before Rock Band did (by a few days), but a new "franchise" just didn't take off (because Rock Band and Guitar Hero dominated the market). Don't forget that Konami tried to cash in on this fad as well.

From what I've seen, Rock Band: Blitz is a lot like Rock Band Unplugged for PSP (which I thoroughly enjoyed).

I've wanted to pick up Rocksmith for a while (it's a lot more interesting than reading tabs online). The only bummer is that new "songs" cost about $2 a piece as DLC. :/

Being a lefty kinda sucks sometimes. It really sucked for Guitar Hero and Rock Band on guitar/bass; all of the damn buttons were all up in my hand space. That's kinda why I like Rocksmith's premise; I can use my own.

Once the price drops again, I might pick it up. Heck, I may even wait for the PC version. I haven't bought a game for PC in years.

[NarooN]

PowerGig failed mostly because the devs wasted budget trying to do viral propagandist marketing, taking jabs at Neversoft and Harmonix (they had a video where they threw dozens of GH and RB controllers out of an airplane, I kid you not), and mostly because PowerGig was just a horrible game lol. It didn't really teach you anything about playing guitar besides a few basic power chords. The controller for it was some lame 3/4 size contraption as well.

Konami tried to cash in on it with Rock Revolution. That game was also terrible, inferior in every way to RB and GH, which is ridiculous since they're the same company that came up with the guitar controller thing many years before with GuitarFreaks (and DrumMania). Way back before Harmonix even did Rock Band, in the arcades players of GuitarFreaks could link up the cabinets with DrumMania cabinets and do bandplay. Those games were great, and Rock Revolution somehow found a way to be inferior to all of these games lol.

Rocksmith PC was supposed to come out this summer, but it got delayed *again* to October of this year. Wtf are they doing, lol? It's supposed to ship with support for bass as well, which is cool.

[PureBlackAura]

PowerGIG did the real guitar thing before Rock Band did (by a few days), but a new "franchise" just didn't take off (because Rock Band and Guitar Hero dominated the market). Don't forget that Konami tried to cash in on this fad as well.

From what I've seen, Rock Band: Blitz is a lot like Rock Band Unplugged for PSP (which I thoroughly enjoyed).

I've wanted to pick up Rocksmith for a while (it's a lot more interesting than reading tabs online). The only bummer is that new "songs" cost about $2 a piece as DLC. :/

Being a lefty kinda sucks sometimes. It really sucked for Guitar Hero and Rock Band on guitar/bass; all of the damn buttons were all up in my hand space. That's kinda why I like Rocksmith's premise; I can use my own.

Once the price drops again, I might pick it up. Heck, I may even wait for the PC version. I haven't bought a game for PC in years.

I have Rocksmith for the 360 ... its a really good game but it get really freaking challenging about halfway through and I've been playing the Guitar religiously for about 5 years now. I bought it mostly for amp mode and I've been extremely satisfied

[Q. Valintyne]

PowerGig failed mostly because the devs wasted budget trying to do viral propagandist marketing, taking jabs at Neversoft and Harmonix (they had a video where they threw dozens of GH and RB controllers out of an airplane, I kid you not)

Holy crap. How did I miss that?

I think it's funny that Konami tried to sue Harmonix and Activision for using their patents (with permission):
[From Wikipedia]
"Bloomberg reported on July 10, 2008 that Konami had filed a lawsuit against Harmonix and Viacom for patent infringement over Rock Band at the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, claiming it infringed on Konami's patents on music simulation games. They also requested cash compensation and an order to stop sales of Rock Band. In February 2009, Harmonix sued Konami for infringing on their patents, which actually cited some of Konami's patents on music simulation games as references. Konami had licensed their patents to Activision for use in the Guitar Hero series."

Lulz.

@PureBlackAura; How hard is it to get used to the scrolling? Is there any substantial lag with the amp mode?

[NarooN]

Yeah, I remember that lawsuit. I was literally like "LOLWAT?" That's just more proof that the bigwigs at Konami have no idea what they're doing

I'm also interested in knowing about the amp mode. Would be cool to turn my TV and such into an amp and just jam away.

[PureBlackAura]

@PureBlackAura; How hard is it to get used to the scrolling? Is there any substantial lag with the amp mode?

I'd be lying if I said there isn't any lag but most of the time it's unnoticeable. The scrolling takes some getting used to even I'm still not completely used to it and I've had the game for about three months but after a few songs you will be well enough used to it to play the game and if there is a track that is going to fast that you can't tell what the notes are (happens quite a bit toward the middle of the game) you can always fall back on practice mode (there are three versions of it) In free speed mode it will stop the track and lets you play the note before going to the next one so that you can learn it and it won't be that hard when you actually play it for qualification.

I'm also interested in knowing about the amp mode. Would be cool to turn my TV and such into an amp and just jam away.

Well amp mode is unlocked after the first set the game presents you with and after you unlock it Its always available by pressing X on 360 or square on PS3 on the main menu. You unlock different effects by playing though the game.
About the jamming out part ... Its defiantly possible I do it all the time!