ugachaka :: Jacob was here

The question has been posed all year with the breakout success of casual gaming and perceived casual console, the Wii.

How will casual gaming really affect the industry? Kill the hardcore market? Flood Xbox Live with a ton of soccer moms?

No.

I believe that the casual gaming market will help the entire industry in general.

For one, by bringing in a flood of new gamers playing a variety of non-violent, friendly fun games like Scene It! and Guitar Hero on the consoles, we might finally be able to raise off the stereotype of violent loner gamers that seems to hang so predominantly in the minds of every politician in the world.

Second, more gamers means more good games that may be more niche. With a larger market, game developers can devote the resources necessary to produce a game that may only be fun for fans of the Dr. Who TV series or Battlestar Gallactica. Don’t call me out if those aren’t niche enough audiences for you, but I am only suggesting that game developers can now focus on hitting up topics that may not have appealed to the hardcore gamer.

Regardless of the success of the consoles, hardcore gaming will not be abandoned. Even on the Wii, you are looking and a slew of new titles this year and next including Super Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Bros. Brawl and a new version of Mario Kart. You have already had Metroid Prime 3. Altogether, these games will make the console a smash success for diehards and casual gamers alike–if any of them can find one in stores.

Overall, the market stands to get better because of this big push. If you are a true hardcore gamer, just ignore the casual ads. They are not for you, but guaranteed, once every three years or so, a studio will put out a masterpiece for you to enjoy just like you always have. No worries.

I am a huge fan of ONnetworks and all their HD-produced podcasts. My love stems mostly from two of their programs: The 5 Minute Drill for my fantasy football addiction and Play Value for an entertaining “Best Week Ever”-style doc on the history of videogames from the very beginnings of Nintendo. The podcast follows along nicely with a book I am currently reading called Game Over on the history of videogames. You can check it out at the link below.

Game Over Press Start To Continue

Check out the latest edition of the video cast below, and be sure to check out all the Play Value episodes to feel smarter about your own knowledge of the videogame industry.

I haven’t played Assassin’s Creed yet myself, but I have read the numerous mixed reviews around the Web. Many have lamented about it’s repetition or the twist in the plot being revealed right at the beginning, but I’ll still give it the benefit of the doubt.

Destructoid pointed out the part of the game that excites me the most–the free running and combat system.

 Indeed, once I got the hang of countering and attacking, and once I found myself in fights with up to six or seven guards at one time, I was stringing together counters and offensive slashes to create a goddamned ballet of death and destruction. I’m not at all exaggerating when I say that Assassin’s Creed contains the single most visually rewarding melee combat system ever implemented. I found myself picking fights with guards just so I could experience the pleasure of countering their attacks and viciously finishing them off with well-timed sword blows. Granted, the sword fighting gets way too easy after you get the hang of it: as you might see in an old-school Kung Fu flick, Altair can be surrounded by ten or fifteen guys at a time, but they’ll only attack one at a time, making a fight against three opponents just as easy or hard as a fight against twenty. I would have really liked to see some more aggressive enemy AI in the sword fighting. Still, though, the fighting is enjoyable.

UbiSoft took it’s time in making this one–over three years–and even though it will be strange to have a movement system without having to time jumps–I still think it looks like one of the best games to come out this year.  Again, disclaimer: I haven’t played it yet, so my honest opinion will have to be held back until I check it out.

A recent published story brought to my attention via Joystiq pointed out the hidden message behind console ownership.  I can’t say that I really agree with what the article Joystiq is reporting on concludes about gamers.  For some of the input, it seems to pull straight out of a target market blurb from the marketing department of Sony, Nintendo or Microsoft, but other notes just jump right off the deep end.

• PlayStation: The consensus is that this guy is an early adopter who demands the best from his game experience “and probably his women.” This is the guy who is hard to keep up with because he’s either working or out on the town. He uses video games to relax.
• Wii: This guy is fun. He also knows that this is the best date machine as many games appeal to both sexes. He’s also fiscally responsible because the system is the cheapest least expensive.
• Xbox 360: He’s probably a serious gamer and women should ask to see his gamertag to see how much time he’s logged. These guys like “violent, visceral games, as well as the social aspect of connecting with friends online. They may be living out an active and social life through games, because they are a bit on the shy side.” According to one comment, these men are passionate about gaming and transfer that to the bedroom.

The reasoning behind this article is to give women some idea about the men they date.  I can’t say that I agree with the PlayStation summary.  With the popularity of the PS2, some PS3 owners are still sort of casual gamers.  Some of the lucky PS3 few just happen to have purchased one because of the hype and enjoy the PlayStation series of games.  They are fine buying the system and waiting for the next Metal Gear Solid.  I wouldn’t consider a Sony fanboy someone who “demands the best” from his women.

Nintendo Wii’s were hard to come by there for awhile, so not everyone got them on the cheap.  I would say a better summary for someone who owns a Wii would be someone who likes to have a good time and play party games.  I wouldn’t consider any gaming machine a “date machine,” but I guess the Wii is the closest if I had to pick one.

The Xbox 360 like “‘violent, visceral games.’” Geez, that sounds like we are all about to go on a rampage.  I would say your 360 gamers might be more on the hardcore side, but also probably could fall into the category the commenters defined for PS3.  Some 360-ers are early adopter types who like cutting edge graphics and gameplay–not necessarily complete and utter violence.  Microsoft currently has the largest library of games, so they might be more in-tune with the gaming industry and just want to take advantage of that large catalog–along with the robust online system for communicating and multiplayer gameplay.  Hey, maybe a 360 gamer is just a lonely tech junkie.  You never know.  We don’t have to hurt people and love violence just because we own the console that produced Halo.

Maybe the best lesson from all this commentary is just not to try and generalize gamers for a console purchase–not even trying to define a select subset or few.  It would probably be a better idea to try categorizing people by the games they buy and not the systems.

This is a JJ Abrams-themed post…

First, Cloverfield is rumored to have an official name soon, but Monstrous is not it. It might not be any form of -ous even though many promotional movie posters are circulating on the Web at the moment.

Gotta hate the photochopping evils of those who like to play with the emotions of fans. We have to wait until the official release or statement about anything to really get excited these days.

They have revealed that the movie poster (minus fake title) is official though.

In other fake real news, Lost is getting its videogame debut next year from Ubisoft. Many rumors have circulated around concern for it slowly repeating the same storyline from the show, but there is hope that it could follow a completely separate (but interlaced) plot.

With Ubisoft on the case, we can only hope that Jack is free running across the island slitting the throats of others a-la-Prince of Persia and Assassin’s Creed.

Nielsen just started up a gameplay metrics system. I know your excited.

First of all, the PC study shows that tried and true games are occupying most of computer gamer time despite the latest and greatest new games. I guess no one updates their video cards anymore. Shocker…World of Warcraft somehow dominates. I think they should change the name of the game to “computer gamer crack.”

The other “sad of Sony” stat is that the PS2 is the most played console while the PS3 is at the very bottom of the list as least played. It is like a little console list sandwich by Sony. All the other console-makers put their game consoles in couples, but PS2 and PS3 can’t play nice together.

After news of the 80 GB PS3 came out here in the colonies, the Sony Computer Entertainment Europe President David Reeves just had to mouth off about how the 80 GB really wasn’t much of an improvement over the 60 GB.

While his statement may be correct, is there no universal goal within Sony around the globe to make sure any message from any part of the company gets a positive reception. If Europe is still going to badmouth every mover here in the US, Sony is going to have real trouble convincing American gamers that it is alright to come out of the shadows of the PS2 and buy a PS3.

Don’t corporations like Sony do media training? at least for their executives? Sony has a lot of Barry Bonds in the upper management.

For all the grief that Sony has gotten for lack of good games, they do have one coming.

I haven’t really followed every game in the Metal Gear series, and to say that, I mean, I haven’t done more than watch other friends of mine play through the game. From this cursory view though, I can still say that the series seems to be one of the more intricate plots and storylines that has come into gaming. I would consider it beyond Halo with the epic nature of its story.

It is cool when fans really get into the plot of the games they play such as one Metal Gear-head that Joystiq’s Jared Rea pointed out from YouTube.

Dan Dormer breaks down and analyzes all that Sony and Kojima is giving with this latest and supposedly last installment of the series. The videos may be long, but they made me feel edumacated.

Part One

Very well done, Dan. I wish someone would break down every game trailer with such detail in this YouTube format.

Part Two

With any E3, even the dismal boring, business one that was this year’s event, the talk as soon as the final press conference ends is always who won. Really, there is no metric to measure which big console-making publisher brought down the house.

This year, without the crowds of excited fan boys, all the press conferences seemed to be a slightly uneventful presentation. The slight woohoos and yeahs from the crowd were weakly scattered between awkward long pauses by the speakers. Game journalists just don’t hoot and hollar as much as the fans did last year, and, of course, there are less people around.

Kotaku believes the winner was Nintendo. They definitely put on a good show this year and will no doubt catch a lot of attention from the casual gamers and consumer media outlets for the Wii Fit reveal, but the hardcore gamers of E3 found little be excited about in the new announcements. The only item of information I found worth noting was the announced release date of Smash Bros. Brawl.

Microsoft’s conference was just focused on announcing games coming out this year. As many game journalists commented, this marketing move was intended to make PS3 and Nintendo look behind by comparison since the Xbox 360 is a year ahead as far as software development and happy to brag about it. This focus took away from the norm of E3 though since no surprises–besides a clip of the next Resident Evil–really jumped out at anyone. Everyone already knew about the titles coming out of good old M$.

Sony had a lot of ground to cover and came in with a price drop looming over their heads. After presenting their press conference in a very casual and unimpressive forum, they also didn’t have many more games and surprises to throw at us this year.

So the final verdict? I didn’t see a clear winner out of any of it. While Nintendo may get the most press from their announcement, I think Sony made the most progress in changing their image and generating an increase in excitement. They had a lot of room for improvement since there was almost no excitement going in Sony’s direction this year after all the trouble they have had with the PS3. I still don’t even like Sony, but I hate to say that I think they did the best job in making the most of E3.

I subscribe to the GamesIndustry.biz weekly newsletter. The site is based in Europe and usually covers a variety of European complaints and concerns about the gaming industry, but they also frequently cover topics relevant to the United States market and the world.

This week, the newsletter column covered the retirement of Ken Kutaragi, known to many as the “Father of PlayStation” at Sony. His retirement seems to come too close to the commonly felt failure of the PS3. I thought, as in American companies, that it was probably a forced retirement as punishment for the failure. According to GamesIndustry.biz, it goes a little deeper than that to a Japanese tradition for shareholders.

No, Ken Kutaragi’s retirement has to be considered as an offering to shareholders who are understandably upset that the hugely expensive PS3 has failed, so far, to look like the all-conquering platform Sony had hoped for. It is, essentially, a head on a plate; the long-established Japanese tradition of an executive being helped to fall on his sword to placate unrest among investors.

I do think that someone really jacked up the PS3 in the Japanese and US markets. The PS3 is just too high-priced with no real justification. I know my gamer friends and I are not running out to buy Blu-Ray movies just yet, and many don’t even have an HD TV to play those movies.

The lack of software is the biggest drawback of purchasing it from my perspective. Sony needs a hit game, and it needs it now.

The newsletter column ends in saying that Sony must now make strides to recover and show that Kutaragi’s “seppuku” was not in vain. As we move through the summer into holiday season, all eyes–especially those of their shareholders–will definitely be on Sony.