Hi Brian -

E3 2011 has placed caps on this year’s media badge assignments in consideration of the high number of requests for media badges and to offer multiple types and sizes of media outlets the opportunity to attend the trade-only E3 event.

As part of the credentialing process, the Media Team uses a variety of measurement/ranking tools to determine media badge approvals for online-based applicants including Compete.com, Quantcast.com, Xinureturns.com and Alexa.com. This ensures we get a good sense of web traffic and unique visitors in addition to reviewing each outlet for content, publisher recognition, news and industry involvement. We also do not count YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, or MySpace pages as editorial.

While we do consider outlets on an individual basis, we generally look for sites to be fully launched, operational for six months, feature ongoing games industry coverage, and that the web site receives a minimum of 8,000 monthly unique impressions as a baseline for each media badge issued.

Based on the above, we will not be able to issue you a media badge at this time, but we encourage you to try again next year.

Thank you for your interest,
The E3 Media Team

While the editorial staff here at Powered On feel that denying smaller outlets the same access as the larger more established outlets to the event hinders our ability to grow to meet the baseline guidelines they are measuring registrants against, we understand that the E3 Media team have the right to set the guidelines they choose and we respect their decision in this matter.

All that having been said we will still be covering E3 to the best of the great abilities of the Powered On Team, and we hope you will tune in for our continued in depth coverage of the games industry as a whole!

Anyone who has listened to the Life Inside the Box podcast knows my reluctance for reliance in the cloud for gaming. Cloud Computing is the concept of converting our points of interaction, be it computers or consoles,from isolated units to terminal access locations. Over the last few years we have seen a steady move to this system. Some beneficial to users, like external backups of save files and game configurations ala SteamCloud. Some dubious, such as OnLive’s proposed gaming service. Lastly, some draconian like Ubisofts recent DRM scheme requiring gamers to be online and connected to authentication servers the ENTIRE time they are playing.

More and more we trust our data, our games, and our rights as consumers to third parties. Services such as Xbox live Arcade, PSN, Steam, and Impulse are all digital distributors of our games, they provide us with service to access the games we want without having to obtain and keep physical media. by doing so we are losing our rights as consumers to exercise our privilege to resell these games through the first sale doctrine as established by the American supreme court in the 1908 Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus case (apologies to our foreign readers as this may not apply to you.) We are trading security for convenience. The quick and easy access to the games we want without leaving the home, or not having to look for that CD/DVD case for hope that the service we use will remain to work in the future.

This is the side of digital distribution and cloud computing people seem to forget. These are services offered by corporations. Services that cost them money to maintain. in the between February and March of 2010, Electronic Arts will shut down 30 multi-player servers for online games purchased between 2007 and 2008. Why? Because, it is no longer profitable to maintain support for games that are not actively being played by a large audience. These closures by the way are steadily becoming an annual event with Electronic Arts.

Electronic Arts states the reason for these closings as prioritizing to the majority of their customers:

Despite some people’s perception, there is a lot of behind-the-scenes work involved with keeping these older games up and running. We would rather our hard-working engineering and IT staff focus on keeping a positive experience for the other 99.7% of customers playing our more popular games.

As time goes on however we should ask ourselves do we really want our purchases to be at the mercy of someone who, by law through their fiduciary responsibilities, is not looking out for our best interest, but instead looking out for their shareholders pocketbooks?

Even Valve a development house known for it’s loyalty to customers and fans has not definitively stated how they would handle such as situation as evidenced in this quote credited to Gabe Newell:

“If you right click on a game in Steam, you’ll see that you can back up the files yourself. Unless there was some situation I don’t understand, we would presumably disable authentication before any event that would preclude the authentication servers from being available.

We’ve tested disabling authentication and it works.”

But most recent events are even more troubling. Over the last weekend the Ubisoft Authentication Servers suffered a denial of service attack preventing users from authenticating their games. For over 7 hours people who purchased legitimate copies of an Ubisoft product, and adhered to the DRM scheme were denied access to the ability to enjoy their game because Ubisoft was unable to authenticate their product license.

Sometimes when you look up into a thundercloud you can see the lightning inside. This weekends outage is that self same thunderbolt. The Cloud Computing can have its benefits, but there is danger for consumers as well. Caveat Emptor.

This is the double-edged sword of trophies/achievements for me at least. I’ve completed the campaign, found every collectable and solved every puzzle yet I haven’t mastered the last fourth of the game in it’s extra content of challenge modes. These are actually okay by me, the developer has a set of challenges and obstacles that push the player to get a mastery for the game after they beat the campaign and they reward that mastery with the corresponding trophy/achievements.

While I’m fine with that, there’s also the fact that most games offer trophy/achievements for completing a game on the higher/highest difficulty settings. Completing the game on normal earned me both the trophy for beating the game on normal mode and the trophy for beating it on easy mode, but the trophy concerning HARD mode will always be tempting me, the reason many will never get that coveted platinum trophy. Should gamers have to beat a game multiple times just to fill up a progress bar to 100% ?

At least in the case of good games like Arkham Asylum it’ll be a pleasure to go through the journey again someday in the future. And at least certain games like Half-Life 2 and it’s corresponding Episodes have a chapter selection option so I could go back and squish every Antlion Grub.

Achievements have come a long way since 2005 and the layout surrounding them has been settled mostly. I just wish that sometimes, the games didn’t always try to goad me into another playthrough right after the credits finish. But at least if I do make another journey through many of the current games with multiple difficulties, there will be a reward waiting for me at the end, making the journey’s worth a bit more sweet than it already is for a good/great game. – The Ben

Operating profit was 104.4 billion yen ($1.2 billion dollars) falling from last year’s 252.2 billion yen profit of H1 08.

The Wii has now outsold the SNES with lifetime sales of 56.14 million units while the DS is up to 113.48 million units. This is horrible as the SNES was a true gamer’s machine.

Last month’s price cut which took effect late in September, was still counted in the quarterly one report and eligible to be commented on by internet denizens as “Not good enough lol. Make some HARDCORE GAMES.”

So today all hardcore gaming journalists can rest easy knowing that they’re finally winning the battle between the plebeian casuals and their casual games. TRUE HARDCORE GAMERZ knew that the Wii’s success and failure hinged only on smoke and mirrors, and this news in no way, shape or form represents the Iwata-acknowledged fact that there was shit all to buy in the first quarter first-party-wise aside from Wii Sports Resort and Metroid Prime Trilogy.

Oh and I love how almost everyone reporting on this story includes a mention of Apple’s success with the iPod and iPhone. I mean yeah they’re successes but I don’t reeeeeaaaally think parents hold a game console (these articles are the same ones that rightfully mention sluggish Wii sales in their title as the reason for the drop in profit) in one hand and an iPhone in the other and it’s this big battle and OH MY GOD APPLE PLEASE MAKE A CONSOLE IN FACT I’M GONNA WRITE AN ARTICLE BASED ON CONJECTURE AND SPECULATION ABOUT THAT RIGHT NOW.

I mean, if they were talking about the iPhone being a competitor to the DS then yeah that’s a valid comparison they’re both portables. But just randomly inserting phrases like “Low Wii sales may also be related to the rise of the of the PSPGO and the iPhone” in these professional news stories (and these are professional online news outlets I’m seeing this at, not hobbyist gaming blogs) is…..GAH. -The Ben

Update: You think I was JOKING ABOUT THAT LAST PARAGRAPH? Goddamn FORBES just did it:

HONG KONG — Super Mario Brothers, Cooking Mama, Donkey Kong and all the other game characters Nintendo has conjured up weren’t powerful enough to fend off the challenges of a stronger yen and a new competitor called the iPhone.

Ha ha, I love a cheeky opening to a news story.

Demand for Wii, the bestselling videogame console produced by Nintendo, has been cooling down in the past few months as Apple’s iPhone has been growing in popularity as the platform of choice for handheld game players.

But…they’re two different…GAH.

On the subject of how many games are available and the buying experience via Phil Schiller:

“Games are expensive — $25-35 per title. Worse isn’t the price, it’s the buying experience, going to a store is just not a lot of fun. Built into every iPod touch is the App Store… you’ll see a big difference.” Chart time. PSP: 607 titles. DS: 3680. iPhone OS: 21,178 titles.

Okay, the buying experience isn’t exactly perfect, but that’s no reason to stop buying games that come on physical media. Having a store on your device is great and will eventually be the standard for all devices but again, that’s not going to put the brick and mortar stores or the physical media out of existence.

Phil again, on the iPod Touch in general:

“It’s a great portable game player as well. … when the PSP and DS came out, they seemed so cool. But once you play on the iPod touch, they don’t stack up anymore!”

I don’t know, they’re both still cool to me. I know most of what he’s saying is just standard press conference chest beating that every company does when they’re on stage, but while I’ve seen the Apple App store become successful, at the same time I haven’t seen the PSP and DS suffer as a result. I know there have been people who only play portable games exclusively on their iPod Touches and iPhones but I haven’t seen the other platforms drop in notoriety. Both are still coming out with games all year round and have both been successes in their own right. It’s been pretty balanced in terms of success for all the portable platforms this gen, each with their ups and downs and revivals again.

And regarding what Phil said about the tribulations and horrors of shopping for games at stores;about the stores, fuck it I’m just going to go ahead and say it I like shopping for used games (both portable and console) at places like Gamestop. It’s fun. It’s cheap and it’s fun. I like digging through the used games, seeing the crap and the gems that span almost an entire decade now. Stores might get smaller, hobbyist shops might get put on the chopping block, but just like how music and books have managed to survive for the last decade or so as physical media, so will video games as long as there’s a market that still wants to buy their products that way. – The Ben

The Dreamcast was an interesting connector of a console, bridging the first true 3D generation and the generation of maxing out those models with depth, complexity and emotion (according to the developers of the time at least). While most ten year anniversaries for games are generally met with an “Eh, it hasn’t aged that well” type of response, the games that the Dreamcast offered while not very impressive technically now a days, seem to remembered more for their value of fun in the memories of those retrospecting those days when SEGA was still in the hardware business.

While the Dreamcast’s time may have been short, that might work in it’s favor when you’re talking about retrospecting. Unlike other systems where you have pauses in between great releases and the universal lull of titles following a system’s release, most of the best memories surrounding the Dreamcast were at that time of release, all in one condensed package of launch title greatness. While it had it’s own dry period that ended up never recovering, the system’s life was so short that the lull doesn’t seem as bad compared to it’s elder brother the Saturn, which was still “Alive” up to the Dreamcast’s release, but nobody really thought of it as such in America. The Dreamcast came and went just as fast, and the industry’s memories of it seem to be all the more better for that reason. I think the industry may have soured on Sonic Adventure after it’s initial launch game hype wore off though. – The Ben

The most obvious answer to this very important question is that Quality Assurance is often seen as an austere entry-level position into the video game industry, thus making entry-level QA a binate entry-level position. It’s a double negative that does not resolve to a positive. Imagine you are in a D&D campaign and your character is trying to haggle with the leader of an adventurer guild on the price of services rendered, but you fumble your diplomacy check then critically fail when you roll to confirm. This is what being paid as a novice game tester is like.

Practically all entry-level positions on the market have basic prerequisites and Quality Assurance is no exception. Looking at the Blizzard Entertainment Employment Opportunities page, every qualification for their Night Shift Game Tester gig is simple and rudimentary. For example, some of the requirements listed include having a passion for games, willingness to work long and odd hours, and possessing good communication skills. Companies can get away with paying QA minor duckets for a thankless job because almost everyone who becomes a game tester has no prior experience with the profession or the industry. Starting salary is very low, with reports showing the average income sitting solidly in the range of 20k-30k for less than three years of experience in the industry.

Being underpaid isn’t just a stigma of the entry-level game tester either. No no, for even lead QA positions earn less than their counterparts from other game development disciplines. According to Game Developer magazine’s 7th annual salary survey (April 2008), the average income for QA Leads with 3-6 years of experience was barely under 42k while an equivalent position with comparable experience in Production made nearly 56k on average. That is quite an alarming difference in compensation for two similar occupations that are so closely connected to one another; especially considering how often QA will move into associate producer roles. This leads me to my final point…

It all boils down to the amount of time spent in Quality Assurance and the video game industry itself. It’s no secret that QA is frequently seen and used as a stepping stone to bigger and better positions. This proclivity to alternative advancement facilitates an existing “revolving door” syndrome: Fledgling QA join specifically to learn the ropes of the industry and then generally transfer out to other branches in game development. The same survey from Game Developer magazine also disclosed that only 38% of all QA total had between 3-6 years of experience in the industry. Sadly, this means there are not enough experienced game testers that stay in QA long enough to substantiate higher salaries.

Each of the game development disciplines is indispensable. While Quality Assurance is paid far less than their counterparts, this does not mean the job is any less important, relevant, or fun. It is awesome to do something you love for a living, even if the stipend is meager at best. Wade Tinney, CEO & Co-Founder of Large Animal Games, once said to me that, “Good QA are worth their weight in gold.” It’s just too bad that they aren’t traditionally paid their worth as well.

I’ll be covering all of these points over the coming posts, but first, let’s take a quick look at the biggest myths behind being a fabled game tester.

Big Myth Number One is that game testers just sort of sit around and play games all day long, not doing any actual “work” whatsoever, at least by the dictionary.com definition of the word, anyways. There will be plenty more articles about the methods behind game testing later on, but for now I will say that the only time QA actually get the chance to truly play the games they are working on is when they aren’t actively searching for/attempting to recreate bugs, which is practically never. Playing games for fun’s sake is called Exploratory (or Ad-Hoc) testing and is a very small, but satisfying part of the QA process.

Big Myth Number Two is that it’s a fun and exciting job. Yeah, I’m totally having a lot of fun doing the same mundane, repetitive tasks for 8 hours straight and spending another 4 hours on the same freaking day staring at scores of excel spreadsheets and test plans until I start crying blood. I JUST WANT TO STRETCH MY LEGS AND TAKE A SHOWER! ;_;

Going off on a quick tangent, Big Myth Number Two actually leads into a somewhat known fact about QA that many game testers themselves frequently forget about, probably because they have stricken the memories from their minds in order to keep some semblance of sanity: incredibly long, nightmarish hours. Good luck having a social life or even a private life during crunch time. Your body and soul now belong to publishing company XYZ.

Big Myth Number Three is that QA, like the rest of development, get paid to make games. This is splitting hairs but can be just as crucial as the others if you don’t happen to be a secret lovechild of Bill Gates. While QA essentially do get paid to play video games, the “grunts” typically scrape the bottom of the barrel in terms of employee payroll. They actually tie with Customer Support for being the lowest paid positions within video game companies. Entry Level QA positions start out paying around 10 dollars on the low end and 12 dollars on the high end, or roughly 20k to 25k. Better start brown bagging it, buddy!

So, why even want be a game tester? It’s a thankless job that frequently gets little respect within its own industry. And for that matter, why do some QA, having experienced all of the negative aspects of the profession, not go running and screaming into the hills? Is it shell shock or maybe willful ignorance? Could it be that they are all just crazy? (I am, admittedly, quite crazy myself.) The primary and most important answer is the simplest to explain: Yes, they are crazy! Ha ha! Didn’t see that one coming, did ya? People want to become game testers because they love games and some are even willing to walk over the proverbial coals barefoot to achieve their dreams.

It is completely understandable that people who dream of doing something that they love professionally will often overlook all of the negative aspects in order to accomplish the positive, as this happens very frequently in other fields of work. Athletes will train extensively, to the point of exhaustion, for chances to compete and fulfill their dreams. Social workers shoulder the burdens of others while receiving very little pay because they strive to help others.

A dream job doesn’t suddenly lose it’s potential to become a reality just because reality itself sets in. Let’s face it: Quality Assurance testers actually do get paid to play games all day long and at times, it can be fun and exciting. But they will also acquiesce to being over worked, underpaid, and even under-appreciated just to do what they love. The biggest myths behind being a game tester do have glimmers of truth to them and it is these shiny, shimmery glimmers that steady the QA as they trudge through the fiery pits of hell itself.

What I mean is that, well while E3 had returned to the larger, more big production sort of ordeal that it was known for back at the turn of the century this past June, most of the “fluff” that the gaming media loved the most about the show while reported on, just wasn’t that much interesting to the actual gamers reading their show reports and podcasts. I’m mostly talking about the fluff of the booth-babe variety. The giant set pieces that companies refer to as booths. Sure many sites had a “LOOK AT DEM BOOTH BABES!” feature and I’m sure those articles got a lot of hits, but gamers just didn’t seem to care anymore about the actual booth babes.

Most of the fluff that would be remembered from this past E3 would be those moments where the people advertising the game actually meant something. Would you rather have a booth babe, busty and voluptuous she may be stand at your side while you demo Shadow Complex or the next Epic Games….epic. Or would you rather be able to have the developers, the Cliffy B’s or the Will Wrights walk you through the game.

Even when celebrities hock games these days, more often than not they’re at least involved with games on a level beyond that of “Just gimme that paycheck”. Most journalists and gamers who read the articles about Spore during development probably remember Robin Williams actually having fun creating creatures for the audience rather than being paid to simply come up with jokes about gamers that fall flat on their face. He was paid to have fun, it was win-win for him!

PAX seems to be the kid of place that both the gamers and the presenters look forward to. Panels ranging from charities within the gaming industry to showcasing the newest and best independent games; there’s a multitude of different panels beyond developers simply showing off their latest games.

PAX has already sold out this year and stands to keep getting bigger every year. Not because it’ll have the latest and greatest new games to show off and demo (although it’s a good incentive to go), but because it’s a celebration of gaming as a whole, for anyone who has a love of gaming. – The Ben

One such expo of the gone by generations is the Retro Gaming Expo in Portland, Oregon. While not the only retro gaming expo out there, it’s design and events are what you’d expect from this genre of convention, with each expo having it’s own unique events and twists that make them worth checking out.

The Retro Gaming Expo for instance may not have a tournament featuring the first person shooters you see at most game-related conventions, but instead offers a ten-man Saturn Bomberman tournament and a Nintendo World Championship competition as well. The competition may not have the same glitz as Video Game Armageddon had in The Wizard, but the same concept of competing through three different NES games for points against other gamers is still intact.

These expos are always interesting to see just how far gaming has come in the last half century, not just to see how technology has progressed, but how things can still keep their “fun value” years, even decades after release. The next modern gaming convention may have Gears of War 2 or the next Call of Duty competition going on. But there’s a chance that ten years from now the only game you’ll constantly see appearing in retro gaming tournaments won’t be titles such as those, but Saturn Bomberman getting the most attention from attendees when it’s a ten-man bomb-fest. – The Ben

The thing about “Best Year in Gaming EVER!” to me is that a lot of the time, I won’t get to play every game or even most of the games on these lists until the next year or even a few years later. One of the best things about the used games business is that while some titles may still be costly considering their age, they can end up being more satisfying than the latest sixty dollar big budget release the store has posters littering their doors and walls with have. As a lot of those new sixty dollar games age and are relegated to the same “Used Games” bins as the last generation games are, those last gen games will inevitably disappear from the mainstream game stores all together.

So this holiday, if you finished your backlog and the big name titles that do make it out this year, check out a bunch of Golden Oldies that made those “Best year in gaming ever?!” lists from years past. They may not have achievements, but they’ll most likely cost less than the newest version of Madden does.- The Ben

But this is something the whole industry is dealing with this generation, the phenomenon of gaming being at it’s peak for so many, that the games that do surprisingly well at retail seem worse now by comparison.

Lemme move away from Nintendo and focus on some third party examples on other consoles just to show that this isn’t unique to any specific area. Call of Duty: World at War sold eleven million copies by this past June. That’s eleven million copies of what some would call just a “yearly sequel” in the grand scheme of things, gamers bought the last iteration, they’ll buy the next iteration, just another entry for the books. Look back to just a a generation or two ago and see how different things were when it came to defining a title’s success through sales. A lot of the games we remember these days as classics everybody had to have played seem like mere “semi-successes” if you don’t take into account that the market was smaller back in the early 90′s.

But then even when the Playstation came to bring genres like RPGs to the masses it was a phenomenon when Final Fantasy VII sold as much as it did. FF7 just broke the 10 million mark in copies of the original game sold thanks to the PSN release and the constant 10th year anniversary marketing Square keeps up with. Just 10 million copies. It was finally able to reach a milestone that certain games these days, the ones that find themselves in the right place, at the right time, with all the right qualifications, can pass in just under a year.

So I guess where I’m getting with this is, in the end, what’s going to happen to those games currently in development that we’re all waiting for if they only sell two or three million copies? Psychonauts is remembered for being a slow cooker on the sales spectrum, never even getting to the one million mark. Here Tim Schafer says as of 2007 Psychonauts managed to sell 700,000 units. Even last generation you could make a good case for the title not being a total flop sales wise, 700,000 is a hella lotta people when you think about it.

But this gen, where games are expected to sell in the millions like parents expect their kids to at least get higher than a “C” on their report cards, what’s gonna happen to the games that can’t even cross that milestone, let alone being able to sit at the big kid’s table with Call of Duty 5, Guitar Hero 4, Mario Kart 5, and all the other big fish? – The Ben

Originating out of a discussion on neogaf about game graphics and rising prices Eat Sleep Play Founder Dave Jaffe took the discussion to his twitter feed and put words to a fear of publishers and gamers alike. Can the video game industry back down from the 59.99 price point?

[...]Be nice to be able to make our version of mid range movies now that we can make our indies. But at the moment, there is no room for games like THE PROPOSAL, THE HANGOVER, or TAKEN. That’s not 100% true (L4D) but if new game@39.99@retail was a real deal, that would rock! But most gamers see new game@$39.99 and question the quality and stay away

As it stands now the industry standard is for AAA games to be at the premium price point, and games that may be of questionable quality either start at a discount, or quickly fall there as retailers clear shelf space for newer titles. There is one example of a franchise dropping it’s price point to good effect, ESPN NFL Football. Unfortunately that attempt was preempted by EA sports acquisition of an exclusivity contract with the NFL, canceling the series.

On the other side of the argument should publishers lower the price point, or instead raise it; as Activision has done with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 in the European market?

While many gamers would love to see their hobby become cheaper, and it’s possible that sales would increase, it is unlikely that we will see it happen this gaming generation.

The press seems more worried about this prospect than the gamers but why? Aren’t these the same gaming journalists that complain that the holiday season is too packed with games and there’s “Too much to play!” every Christmas? Weren’t they also the ones delighted that this past spring was chock full of meaty and polished hardcore titles like Street Fighter IV, Resident Evil 5 and a load of other titles with merit?

Why such a panic over this? Many gaming podcasts seem to have “Whatchu been playing?” segments in which the hosts go on about playing games in their backlog and going back to old favorites longer than they discuss the current new hot game of the month. So what’s the problem if not every year can be “BEST YEAR FOR GAMES EVER AAA” in your end of the year writeup? – The Ben

Having been absent from HOME since, well since I first checked it out months ago, I went to check out Namco’s new digital hangout and see what it was like. I have to give it to them, it’s an arcade. A bit too pristine to recall the authentic arcades of decades past but it sets the mood right with dim lighting, game posters adorning the walls and….anime girl soda machines? Yes, in bringing the entire arcade space over to the states Namco even kept these bizarre Idol M@ster soda machines that let you play a chance mini-game to win various Idol M@aster related things to adorn your own personal Home space and/or avatar.

So I chose one of these soda machines to see what it was all about, why so many Helghast Helmet adorned persons were crowded about it, and played the little mini-game for kicks. My first try, I won a mask of a girl’s face from the game for my HOME Avatar. I’m talking creepy, unsettling mask of anime big-eyed horror.

Actually in the expressionless avatar world of HOME, it’s not as creepy as it would be in real life. In fact it fits right in with the Street Fighter IV costumed people running around the HOME Mall dancing in synchronicity. i’ll give the HOME service one thing, it’s definitely unique in that sense. – The Ben.

Media Molecule’s own support of LBP post launch can be looked at two ways. On one hand they have been creating new DLC month after month, but the problem lies with what the DLC actually consists of. Most of the time all the DLC is are costume parts for your Sackboy, various stickers relating to the theme of the DLC pack, and if you’re lucky actual objects or sounds to use when creating your own personal levels. The first DLC pack consisting of Metal Gear Solid-themed bits and bobbles may have seemed a bit lacking when it was first released, but only now do I realize how much was in that one pack compared to what MM has been cranking out recently. Not only did the pack come with stickers and the like, but they even put in an actual level pack with a little story for you and your friends to play through, along with an entirely new gun object (The Paintinator) that brought totally new level ideas into play for users to kick around with.

The worst part about this though, is how MM not only seems content with continuing their trend of anemic DLC, but that they hype these DLC announcements. That’s where the news section of this article comes into play. This morning the official Playstation Blog posted a little teaser for the next DLC pack for Little Big Planet, a Ghostbusters themed one by the looks of it. Now it’s well within their rights to keep producing these DLC packs, but hyping them up like they’re a substantial piece of DLC like the MGS pack was is kind of lame at this point. But, the game is still fun after nine months personally, just wish there was more to do in the Little Big Planet World. You can only play a roller-coaster level so many times. – The Ben.

It all started in a way looking forward to Sonic’s 18th Birthday. While the news was nothing more than fluff PR for SEGA, it was an interesting milestone none the less. Along with another entertainment icon I’ll get to in a bit, Sonic personified the 90′s in a big way. While the games started out with just being thrilled by the title the game’s biggest factor, eventually “Story” and “Features” became the selling points for future Sonic titles. Sonic seemingly never grew out of the 90′s, as the era changed and gamers began wanting things like FMV-sequences and free roaming environments. Sonic was caught between two different identities as we entered the 21st century and the next generations of gaming. He was best known for his 90′s attitude and devil may care game style. Now the later games were suddenly stress-inducers where one wrong move would send Sonic into an enemy that while prevalent in his early titles, gained notoriety as he got older. The bottomless pits.

The other icon of the early 90′s of course is Michael Jackson, who’s passing seems to have hit gamers harder than any other hobby aficionados. Sure there’s music sites posting remembrance articles by the hour, but that’s to be expected. What I hadn’t expected was the similar outlook of articles by gaming enthusiasts. At first glance Michael Jackson may not have seemed to have been a major player in the video game industry. Sure he had his own Genesis game Moonwalker and appeared in various titles over the years but at some point he seemed to have joined the cavalcade of entertainment industry icons who wanted to get involved with gaming just to boost their own image with a new generation.

What strikes me most about all these developer memory and rememberance articles is that while there was a part of his involvement that was for publicity purposes, Jackson was just as much a gamer as any of his fans at the time. It was because of his love for gaming that helped him become an icon of the 90′s. Moonwalker may have been a cash-in for some, but for Michael it was that and the ability to make his own fantasy into a game. Look how many entertainment personalities star in games but are really only there for monetary or obligatory reasons. The latest Ghostbusters title may be an awesome game but Murray didn’t have any real emotion attached to his contribution at that point.

Some of the only other personalities I can recall off the top of my head who wanted to get involved in gaming because they loved games were 50 Cent and Vin Diesel. And hell, both of their first attempts were either not well received critically (Fiddy) or commercially (Riddick) but they liked the concepts so much they had next-gen installments made. Just as you’d ask why 50 would be interested in a title where he goes to the Middle East to find a Crystal Skull you’d ask why Michael why his fantasy movie/game involves him turning into a giant robot. You don’t see ideas like that in the gorge of “Celebrity Pet Projects” come to fruition that often.

While Sonic may not be able to “Pass Away” anytime soon, the era of “Sonic Mania” is all but silent now, and it took Jackson’s untimely death to bring back one last “Michael Mania” explosion. The early 90′s didn’t leave us it seems, everyone left it, but interestingly enough it didn’t just automatically stop living, it keeps going for as long as it can, as long as there are still a few fans left to want it to stick around. – The Ben

The point I’m making is that you could call this franchise fatigue, if the franchise was indeed suffering from fatigue. The two most recent Mario Kart games still make it onto the NPD charts while many high-profile games released this year have already fallen out of the Top 20, never to be seen again. NSMB DS was released three years ago, and Mario Kart DS almost four damn years ago.

Some people like to lump this milking into the same category of SEGA’s manhandling of Sonic, but the difference there is that with the exception of Europe where Sonic is still treated like Royalty, he’s not that popular in the rest of the world. What SEGA does with Sonic is in response to his falling stardom. Sales are down? Well then the answer is simple, the games need MORE INTENSE STORY LINES with love interests and death and loss. That didn’t work either? Well then we should try getting Sonic back to his roots….but still through in an unavoidable gimmick section that makes up almost more than half of the game play time as you keep dying and trudging through the Werehog sections.

Mario meanwhile just does whatever. He doesn’t appear in Role Playing Games because of some unfounded theory that it’ll make him more hip with the kids. They just make those Mario RPGs because they get to work with the Mario Universe. Like with my thoughts on the Zelda series, I believe that each Mario genre appeals to certain gamers. Mario Kart Wii may have turned off many hardcore gamers with it’s emphasis on randomized items and social gaming, but obviously more than enough people liked the title enough to make it one of the best selling games of this gen period. Some call it a way to squeeze some money out of Mario’s popularity after Mario Galaxy came out, but what do you call it when the spin-off becomes far more successful than the supposed “Epic 3D Adventure” title in the franchise did. When more new gamers will remember karting around with Mario years from now instead of going on some epic-story driven crusade?

And then there’s Mario Galaxy 2, which people are already pointing to as just a quick cash grab that while fun will only dilute the Mario brand further than it already has.

Well they’re right. I mean before Galaxy 2 no other Mario game had reused the same engine only a few years after release in order to have a shorter development time and implement new ideas that didn’t get used the first time aroundoh wait a minute. We’ve been squeezing a dead cow for twenty years.

The SHAME OF IT ALL! – The Ben

And look at Trico/ The Last Guardian. It has so much hype and potential because of the developer’s previous titles. So much so in fact that most of the gaming public already thinks they know how the game is going to end. It’s not going to be a surprise if the main draw of the game dies in the final act trying to save the young boy, or any combination of that sort. It would be a bigger twist to not kill off the main characters and let them live their lives in peace after the credits role. Hell, that was my favorite part of Metal Gear Solid 4 to be honest. Now that it’s been a year I think I can at least say that at the end of MGS4, Snake doesn’t die. Nope, he doesn’t die. He’s aging, he’s dying as much as he was at the start of MGS4, but he still ends the game with his ticker beating.

If you don’t wanna play sequels because you feel that you’ve already gotten the most out of that particular Universe, then fine. But the best thing games have going for them are how fast you can develop new entries into particular Universes and how much Lore can be added each generation, as opposed to movies and TV which are always on strict schedules, with each season potentially being the last look for us into these Universes. – The Ben

You’re treating them like they’re some all mighty deity that you expect to do no wrong and act so shocked when they slip up or conduct business like a normal company. You’re so shocked that this company could be so bland and ruthless, not the Willy Wonka-esque dream factory you were expecting. If you just treated them like a normal developer and manufacturer you wouldn’t keep getting let down when you realize the company is less than god like.

Here’s one example of this phenom to prove that I’m not talking about some hypothetical person that doesn’t exist.

“I don’t know what it is. Is it my skewed view? Is it that we have loved Big N for so long that we expect nothing short of perfect from him?-”

Yes, that’s what it is. It’s that you’re loving a company who has the prime directive over all else to make money. Now that doesn’t mean they’re totally heartless. You can be a philanthropist of good feelings to your consumers and still make money. But stop treating them like they’re above Willy Wanka and Uncle Walt in perception. It’s that perception that makes it harder when you realize that they, nor any other company that has so much of a burden on them, aren’t your friends.

Now, some might point to Valve as the ultimate example of a company that always meets the needs of the fans. And you’re right, but Valve doesn’t have to carry so much weight in comparison to hardware manufacturers like Nintendo. They don’t have to support an entire production facility to make the hardware to play their games on. They can focus purely on the software they want to make.

And then of course you’ll get the inevitable, “Well, in that case…maybe Nintendo shouldn’t have been so successful with the Wii and gone Third Party.”

To that I say, “Well, there’s just no pleasing some people. Fuck all y’all I got the Koopa Kids.” – The Ben

But they’ve always done shit like this at every E3, not just in the recent Casual Era of success. One of these “Pet Projects” that was shown off at E3 years ago that might be unknown is Stage Debut. For years Nintendo was trying to get the Mii concept working, ever since the Famicom days. Whenever Stage Debut and it’s ilk was shown at E3, it was mostly puzzling to every passerby in the Expo. And even more puzzling to those who did remember it after the convention was over, was that it was never even released. It just showed up one E3, stuck around for a bit, and then left.

Of course while Stage Debut in the form journalists played around with never came out, the concept was integrated into the Wii’s Mii system. I guess what I’m trying to get at is, the Vitality Meter that Iwata showed off wasn’t a big deal to them even. It was just Iwata coming up on stage to shoot the shit about gaming philosophy, and even though that probably wasn’t the best thing to do a press conference, it wasn’t the company’s main focus like Wii Music ceremoniously was at last year’s E3. It was just a small application Iwata thought would be neat, that’s all. – The Ben

The Top Ten “Games we wanna see at E3 YEAH E3 FUCK YEAH WOOOOOO!” Lists have returned in full force. A good number of entries on that list haven’t even been announced yet and there’s a good chance some of them might not even be announced at the show. Everyone’s so hyped on seeing a new Zelda unveiled that if one isn’t shown off then it’ll be Nintendo’s fault for not telling them before hand that there won’t be a new Zelda announcement. And it’s Square’s fault of course for attendees not getting to spend as much time as they want with the new Final Fantasy XIII demo.

One need look no further for what appears to be the source of this influx of hype then the Game Critics Awards. The ironic thing about the awards is that the critics don’t even have to play the games at the show, they get their own “Game Critics Awards Judges Day” before hand a few weeks before the show when many of the big companies invite them to play their games and take ‘em into consideration for the coveted awards. Of course if you didn’t have a “Game Critics Awards Judges Day” for your game then you’ve just gotta hope they honor you with their presence at your booth.

Looking back at the winners of the Game Critics Awards from years past, there seem to be two categories of winners. One category is made up of the winners who not only perform well at E3, but end up doing well on release as well, so much so that when people recall the product, it’s about the product itself, not the hype from E3. These include Half-Life (1 and 2), the Wii, Rock Band, Halo 2, products that had substance to back up the hype (even if the substance wasn’t quite to your tastes, as was the case with the Wii and it’s evergreen titles to a number of gamers)

Then there are the other winners. The ones who seemingly had the most potential and promise than when they were finally released. These are comprised of Black and White, Doom 3, the PSP, and Ssssssspore. I want to talk about Spore for a minute as it almost seemed to be a game designed to win E3 awards. The gaming judges had their minds made up long before that E3 in 2005, back at GDC when Spore promised so much. It didn’t matter if they got to play the game, they just needed to see Will Wright do his stuff and they were sold. And I admit, Spore more than any other game that E3 probably deserved the Best of Show award. It brought the gaming community together with promises of the game not only delivering the gaming industry’s “Citizen Kane” but “…its Torah, its “Origin of Species” and its “2001: A Space Odyssey” all rolled into one.” as N’Gai proclaimed so long ago.

For a lot of the gaming press, this was going to be the one. The game that would not only be known as “THE GAME” to everyone in the world, gamers and non-gamers alike, but the one that would actually be fun to them to play as a game. The “Hardcore Gaming Press” didn’t catch onto The Sims as much as mainstream media did because it wasn’t much of a game to them. There were no grandiose stories with real-time cut scenes in both first person and third. They couldn’t see any sort of saga in the game and moments they would be able to recall at parties among friends years from then with a tear in their eye. Even though many a Sims player could probably come up with at least one moment that occurred in the game that stuck with them, it wasn’t one the GAMING JUDGES could put on their “TOP TEN MOMENTS IN GAMES THAT MADE US CRY. ;______;” lists, unless it was for hilarity purposes.

But Spore, Spore would different. It would be the one. The one that would make the stories and events on the fly. The one that would be accessible and complex and adjustable to likings of every gamer. It would be Citizen Kane AND the Torah. It would be the Godfather AND the Ten Commandments. They built the game up to be something it inevitably couldn’t. It could still be fun, still be awesome, but it couldn’t be that game. The one they could not only show their friends and family and say “SEE, SEE THIS IS AWESOME!” and Grandma would be like “OH SHIIIIT IT IS AWESOME HOLY SHIT!” and everyone would enjoy the awesome.

But, journalists, gamers, GAME CRITICS AWARD JUDGES, that’s already happened. It’s not one game that’s going to do it. It’s been happening for decades. Just because everybody can’t agree on one single game that both hardcore and non-gamers champion doesn’t mean you can’t just say “Video Games can be that connecting bridge between people of different backgrounds, creeds, and lifestyles.” And I’m sure that at this E3, they’ll be games that do that. – The Ben

Well it’s been a quiet week in Lake Hylia recently it’s been this way for the past few months. You can tell when there hasn’t been a new release in the Zelda series in a long while when the fan mutter surrounding the series becomes as quiet as you can imagine. And it’s ironic that things are quiet during this season of mum words as you’d think the period where the fans would be most quiet would be right after the release of a new Zelda game. But of course there’s always a vocal minority that just has to get their opinion out concerning the new game as soon as the disk is popped into the system.

Contrast that to the articles and impressions of the game around four or five years after it’s initial release, almost all the time they’re articles about how the gaming community may have underrated the game. Yes underrated. The Zelda series is one of the few video game series that seems to be in a constant cycle between whether or not the titles are overrated or underrated. A few weeks, few months and then a year or so after the release of a title you get the obligatory “______ Overrated?” articles and many of the articles bring up good points about the game’s design and how the flaws were overlooked at the time of release. However the main point of these articles stems from the fact that there was too much hype surrounding the game, and then particular people were let down.

The opposite on the other hand concerns the other Zelda titles. No not the CDi ones the ones that weren’t what longtime fans of the series would call traditional entries. These ones are noted by detractors as being too much of a departure while supporters of the titles herald them for “turning everything you know about Zelda on the head”. A few years after these entries are released they finally get mentioned as being “unjustly looked down upon at the time” for being too different from tradition. This happened first of course with Zelda II.

Without the internet at the time it wasn’t as easy to find these admissions of love for the black sheep of the family and the common assumption by the early to mid-nineties was that Zelda II was for all purposes the worst of the Zelda titles. Every magazine you’d find Zelda 1 and Link to the Past topping the Favorites Lists and any mention of Zelda II wasn’t about the experience the writer had with the game but a small blurb simply acknowledging the fact that it was “the black sheep” of the series.

You see this happen with almost every entry in the series but more often than not it happens with the off-season entries. Zelda II, Link’s Awakening, Majora’s Mask and Wind Waker are most common examples of articles consisting of sympathetic affection towards the outcast titles. This was most noticeable to me during the Virtual Console releases of both Ocarina of Time and more recently, Majora’s mask. With Ocarina of Time the general consensus seemed to be that while it was great that the Virtual Console was getting more games, most wouldn’t buy it because they’ve already played it multiple times before, and only really recommended buying it on the VC for those that never experienced it before. Not only that, but accusations of “It hasn’t aged that well graphically” and the like were thrown around, as if they were trying to say “Eh, you don’t really have to get it” but almost felt like they were unjustly mistreating the game by doing that.

With the release of Majora’s Mask on the US Virtual Console in the last week the sentiment seems to have been one of a vastly different attitude. Cries of “If you’re going to download one game on the Virtual Console this year, make it this one.” are being heard and fellow gaming journalists are coaxing their peers who were too cool for Zelda by 2000 into giving the game another go.

I used to think that the Legend of Zelda series was one that was built on a foundation of agreement among fans. That the mindset of every single one was in compliance with the rest of the group. As the series got bigger and older fans got older while new younger fans were brought in, I noticed my original assumption couldn’t have been further off the mark. Every Zelda fan has one game in particular it seems that they’ll point to and go, “There. That one. That was the best one.” But they won’t always agree and they’ll fight and try and use irrefutable evidence that the other person’s opinion is wrong. “That game’s so overrated no THAT one’s so overrated how can you be so stupid” the process never seems to end and continues with each new release. It’s because of this controversy in the end though that I think the Zelda series is better off because of it. Each title has at least one super fan who will defend it’s importance through and through, from the NES to the portable entries. Hell, in the future some kid who got a Wii for Christmas as a child and a copy of “Link’s Crossbow Training” because his mom saw that came with an extra piece of plastic will probably defend that entry as their favorite as well.

There’s no one universal hatred for any specific title in the series and yes, after years of searching without any luck, there’s at least one person who fancies the CDi adventures as well.

Well lemme back up a bit and set the stage of what happened today. Nintendo held their conference for the last fiscal year to investors, basically saying ‘Yeah we sold a lot DS and Wii systems.” Among their talk during the conference were things like ‘The new Zelda will appeal to everybody and the usual. Kotaku picked out this one specific quote in which Iwata said to investors that, “In the challenging and competitive gaming industry, which consistently requires new and innovative products, Nintendo will strive to expand its business and increase revenue and profit by capitalizing on being the only hardware platform producer with powerful in-house software development teams.”

He said that to investors, y’know, to make them keep investing into the company. He didn’t call out Sony and Microsoft saying “FUCK ALL Y’ALL SUCK IT” or told gaming journalists how much MORE awesome they are. Iwata just said that they can do hardware and software business at the same time. Hell, he’s been having to say that all decade long. Don’t forget it was only like six years ago he and his colleagues had to say things like “When Nintendo gets out of the hardware business, we will also get out of the software business” just to shut up every journalist going “WHY AREN’T YOU THIRD PARTY YET?”

While trying to look for a source for that above quote that I’m sure Iwata or someone close to him said I came across this old TIME Magazine article from 2003. Just read the article and you’ll see how Iwata and Co. have been saying the same thing for an entire decade. And while it took five years since he took over for the change to prove fruitful, he never strayed from the mantra the company was giving.

Reading that Time article, most INDUSTRY ANALYSTS believed and personally wanted that the only way for Nintendo to stay profitable was to do what they wanted. That they should make some NEW INTELLECTUAL PROPERTIES. Well God Damn they did. It may be as bland as a sheet of paper but Nintendogs, Wii Sports, Wii Fit, those are new IPs. No, they aren’t the cool and edgy IPs you wanted. Just like how you got Wind Waker instead of that dark and edgy game where Link has to fight through hell to rescue Zelda after she’s murdered in cold blood by Ganon. You don’t like it? LEAVE. And that’s what a lot of people did, and that’s why Nintendo made Wii Fit, the game more successful than 98% of all EPIC Japanese made games in the last decade.

Alright this news posting has gone on for too long already so I’ll just leave you with this last quote from the 2003 Time story:

By doing this Nintendo’s growth might become limited, but the company could become a profitable boutique video-game brand that caters to children, newcomers and enthusiasts. In fact, game analyst Hisakazu Hirabayashi insists that scenario has already happened. “Since around 2000, Nintendo was no longer a member of the video-game industry. Its philosophy and method are fundamentally different from the other console and software companies. It’s not a loser only because it’s taken itself out of the race.” Every kid who’s booted up Super Mario for the first time knows what happens when you run out of lives and can’t secure enough gold coins: game over.

Doooo ho ho ho ho ho ho.

-The Ben

You wouldn’t believe how many sites still do that.

So what are you all looking forward to for this year’s E3 Convention? It was only a few years ago most of the industry believed this year would begin the first unofficial rumblings of the next generations of consoles. After all the PS2 launched in 2000, and Sony had already begun talking about the Voltron-esque Cell Processor by the beginning of 2002. For all their proclamations about how each of their consoles is set on a ten year life cycle, they can’t help but begin to hype their next big machine shortly after.

With Kutaragi gone from making any actual decisions for the company now that may be farther off now. With the way the economy is and the PS3 selling well but not setting a precedent for the industry like the PS and PS2 did, it could very well still gain momentum over ten years, but that fabled PS4 journalists thought they’d start hearing insider whispers about seems nothing but a far off fantasy at the moment.

Luckily this year’s E3 seems to be focused on the here and now. Games for systems out now instead of hype about future prospects. Do you remember E3 2005? I’m sure a lot of people who attended that expo would have proclaimed it to be on of their favorites due to every single company talking about the future and promises of the next generation. But look at how many of those promises came to fruition? Hell, even the tech demos of possible games using graphics that are standard now a days never came into being.

Looking back now on 2005, most of the hype was for…well just that. Hype. Remember Microsoft’s ARG for the 360? Most of that video is spent talking about the aura of the 360 instead of the games themselves. J Allard was more concerned with the 360 looking cool with it’s conclave design instead of making sure the innards didn’t cook themselves as a result. I’m not kidding about how important the look of the 360 was to Microsoft’s hype machine in the days leading up to E3 2006. Reading this Wired Article from 2005 you’d have no idea that anyone was worried all that next-gen tech would suffer as a result of J Allard wanting the 360 to look like it was “breathing in” so that it would be more appealing to the Japanese. Yes the 360 has finally sold a million units in Japan, but that has less to do with it’s look as much as it had the rights almost every next-gen RPG in town for the past few years. “The Xbox is hueg” yeah? Well the PS3 is a giant in comparison and managed to hop past the 360′s sales in Japan.

Whatever, E3 will be here again before we know it, and we’ll get to see just how much journalists missed the old style of booth babes and giant IMAX sized screens for just one booth.

There’s still no Kentia Hall this year though, if you were wondering.

Late last year, GameStop CEO Don Dematteo told GameDaily that he wasn’t frightened of digital distribution, citing a recent study that indicated that no network was in place to handle the sale of full games via the internet. Maybe he hadn’t heard of Steam, Impulse, and Good Old Games. Then again, maybe he was just plugging his ears to the sound of the gaming world’s looming paradigm shift.

GameStop deals almost exclusively in tangible media, that is, discs. The advent of a viable digital distribution system is therefore very frightening to such a company. However, denial won’t change the fact that services such as those mentioned earlier are becoming more popular every day, and that for the first time, we can purchase full console games directly from our living room. Moreover, it seems that Dematteo was destined to eat his words, with the announcement of the OnLive service coming only a few months later at the ’09 GDC.

OnLive’s service will allow decentralized gaming on any computer and from any location as long as you have internet access. No longer will you need to lug around consoles and discs, all you need is a controller and the OnLive box, which is barely larger than a deck of cards. OnLive’s service, while having a few glaring flaws, is evidence of something huge; digitally distributed games are coming to the mainstream. We can already purchase games like [blippr]Warhawk[/blippr] for the PS3 without leaving the house, and the fact that something like OnLive is actually viable is a testament to the invalidity of Dematteo’s claim.

Now, when you get down to it, there are some definite pros and cons to both physical media and digital media. For years, when Steam was picking up speed, many gamers were hesitant to purchase games through the online store. Some would say that lacking a physical connection to the purchase was something they couldn’t sacrifice. Others felt that it would be too easy to ‘lose’ the online game, as easily as one forgets a password, or, in some cases, as easily as one has their account hacked. However, it is obvious that these are only minor qualms; if you forget the password to an account worth hundreds of dollars, perhaps games are not your biggest concern.

Similar arguments are made by proponents of digital gaming. Some say that being tied to physical media and CD keys is a burden, not a joy. CDs and DVDs can be scratched, broken, and lost, and having to hold on to the tiny paper insert of the jewel case for the CD key becomes difficult after a few years. However, with digital distribution, the only thing you need to remember is your account information. Of course, you can always back up the CD keys on your computer and purchase CD imaging software to keep digital copies of the discs, but then, why not just take the next step and purchase it all online anyway? Organizations like Good Old Games allow you to simply keep the install file for the games on your computer, which eliminates the need to remember any keys or passwords.

However, if you want proof, all you have to do is look at stores like Amazon, iTunes, Napster, and so on. These stores have all become successful by selling digital copies of music, with no discs to be had. Skeptics once said that digitally distributed music would not take off for a long time, but the massive success the iTunes store has had suggests otherwise. Obviously, physical media will not be counted out completely any time soon, as a tangible disc still has plenty of use. However, the digital age is already upon us, and simply wishing it weren’t so will not be enough to stop it. GameStop will have to adapt and update their business model if they want to stay current, otherwise, for once, they’ll be the ones left in the dust.

In mid-February 2009, at the DICE Summit, Gabe Newell uttered the five words that could cause even Electronic Arts to shake in its boots; “Video games are too expensive.”

Now, it’s easy for him to say, being a former Microsoft developer and the President of Valve Software. However, maybe he’s onto something. Newell cited some numbers pertaining to sales during one of Steam’s weekend deals, and they are bordering on the outrageous. Among the figures he presented were statistics for an unnamed game that saw a revenue increase of 18,000 percent and an increase in copies sold of 36,000 percent during its weekend deal. The other numbers were no less astounding, and they all supported Newell’s claim.

It’s no secret that Steam is changing the way video game developers do business. Some publishers are now releasing games exclusively through Steam, and still others choose to use Steam as their DRM. Recent releases such as [blippr]Dawn of War 2[/blippr] can be purchased at a brick-and-mortar store, but still require Steam activation upon install. Still others such as [blippr]Saint’s Row 2[/blippr] and [blippr]Unreal Tournament 3[/blippr] have arranged with Valve to allow their CD keys to be entered into Steam, unlocking them as if they had been purchased via Steam.

What does this all mean? Well, if you recall, a few months back, Bungie Audio Lead Marty O’Donnell criticized the first-sale doctrine, saying that video games should be exempt; what this means is that the end user should not be able to resell their video games when they’re done with them as it takes sales away from the developers. Many gamers and gaming press, myself included, were quick to call O’Donnell out on his declaration. After all, who is he to deny us the right to sell off a video game once we’ve beaten it?

While the outcry following this announcement was overwhelming, going almost unnoticed was the fact that once you buy a game through Steam, that game is non-transferable. This is obviously a special case, as it is difficult to resell digitally distributed content, but it raises the question, why is it okay for Steam to do it, while it isn’t for Bungie?

There are several possible explanations for this discrepancy. Firstly, one could argue that O’Donnell was referring to console gaming, which lends itself well to reselling, as there are no required CD keys and discs are interchangeable. On the flip side, many PC games these days require registration with the provided CD key, essentially making the product specific to the first user. Moreover, the market for secondhand PC games is much, much smaller than the Gamestop dominated market for used console games. PC gamers are accustomed to not being able to sell their games, and, as such, Valve doesn’t face the antagonism that console-centric developers face.

I, however, submit an alternative explanation. Gabe Newell’s recent declaration brings to light an interesting idea; maybe people who purchase games through Steam aren’t looking to sell their games like they would had they purchased them for consoles. Imagine purchasing Left 4 Dead for the Xbox 360. You go to your local retailer, dish out sixty dollars plus tax, and when you’ve had your fill, you turn around and sell it to Gamestop for ten dollars. On the other hand, say you purchased Left 4 Dead via Steam during the weekend deal for a mere twenty-five dollars. The math does itself. After selling the 360 version, you’re out fifty dollars plus tax, and have no game to show for it. However, after playing through the Steam version, you’re only out twenty-five dollars, and you still have a game to play, should you want to. Obviously, it would be nice to be able to get even five dollars back for your game, but if you’re still ahead on the numbers, who cares?

This carries through to the later stages of a game’s life. In a year or so, a new copy of Left 4 Dead for the 360 may only be selling for forty dollars. Likewise, Gamestop might only be willing to pay five dollars for the game. However, if you purchase the game on Steam, you might be able to get it for a cool twenty bucks, and still be ahead of the curve.

Sure, sure, I will be the first to admit that it’s not the same when you’re ordering games through Steam on launch. You’re paying full price for the game, and if you end up hating the game, you’re stuck with it. However, most games get a 10% discount on Steam if you preorder. It’s not an ideal situation, but I can guarantee you that it helps ease the pain that our wallets feel when buying online. For whatever reason, Steam gets a break in this regard, and I think they deserve it. Digitally distributed games already have a few strikes against them from the onset, but with online distributors offering such deep discounts on their products, perhaps it all balances out.