Episode 431: Pokemon NO!

The past week has been rife with news about Pokemon GO! and all of the chaos the mobile game has caused around the world with people hunting creatures in museums and police stations. The podcast mostly avoids the craze.

The news this week includes:

  • Fake Pokemon Go! apps could contain malware and force your phone to click on porn links
  • Fraudsters force RimWorld dev to stop giving out Steam keys
  • Bethesda defends $60 price tag for Skyrim Remastered
  • Xbox One S arrives August 2

We also announce the winner of the contest.

0 thoughts on “Episode 431: Pokemon NO!”

  1. Goldeneye 007 on the N64 looked bad, but it was one of my favorite N64 games other than Banjo-Kazooie, Mario Kart, and etc., but I would not like playing it now because I dislike controllers for first person shooters, I played it in its entirety, and I dislike playing against AI, so I would only want to play against friends, which is not so easy without the internet.

    Congratulations, JerryK!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Post

Will Wright is Right: E3 is DeadWill Wright is Right: E3 is Dead

Imagine that, a well known game developer finally says what everyone has been thinking, “it’s the walking dead.” Will Wright, famous for TheSims, SimCity and upcoming Spore believes E3 is in a state now where we’ll never see the old E3 and we’ll never accept the slimmed down anorexic thing we’re getting now.

End result is simple: it’s time to move on and create a new event and begin our arms race anew. Or, bring a version of the Game Convention over here from Europe and allow a new convention group to see what they can do with it, booth babes and all.

It’s hard to argue with the sheer amount of money that was spent to “compete” at a PR level with each major publisher and console maker. However, allowing E3 to die and starting a brand new design means people will be able to think ahead of “what’s to come” before re-igniting the exact same brand under a new name. We need something as exciting and invogorating without the massive hommoraging of cash.

(Thanks, GameStooge)

Episode 225: Voodoo DoughnutsEpisode 225: Voodoo Doughnuts

We’re back this week, as a ton of major news has hit in the past week. Paul starts going insane over doughnuts, Nintendo, and Max Dominic. There’s no gaming history or gaming flashback this week, but a ton of reader feedback.

This week’s news items include:

  • Nintendo in deep financial trouble
  • Diablo III requires constant internet connection
  • Tribes Ascend developer states free-to-play on 360 is “inevitable
  • Gamestop offering in-store purchases of Deus Ex: Human Revolution digital download
  • Xbox co-creator brags “consoles have won!”

This week’s question of the week: Do you wait for a price cut before buying a console system? Let us know.

Small Games Make Big WavesSmall Games Make Big Waves

The game industry is doing “okay” in this bad economic time compared to other industries.  Primarily, Nintendo is rocking the house with their games, hand-held’s and consoles while mobile developers are showing some great successes in the industry. Many success stories in our industry are based on small titles, downloadable games of the more “casual” style while a few larger titles are experiencing slower than expected sales trends.

wiiwareWe’ve mentioned this in the past, but the tough economy gives many smaller developers great opportunities for success. While big publishers struggle to look good in the eyes of the investor, tiny developers can produce quality titles for minimal cash investment and time to market. Ten years ago, smaller developers tried to compete with the big boys making larger titles, cloning successful titles or simply asking investors to put it on the line for their game. Today, developers can create a small iphone app, a cute WiiWare title or exploit the XNA efforts of Microsoft for Xbox Live Arcade and actually have a chance.

There are still challenges with these smaller developers when working in the WiiWare and XBLA publishing channels, your game marketing and promotion becomes highly reliant on Nintendo, Microsoft or Sony for PSN. Tom Prata, senior director of Nintendo of America talked to Gamespot about this issue:

“Finally, there’s the problem of promotion. It’s not enough to make a great game if nobody notices it. Prata specifically said Nintendo will be devoting more resources to support the promotion and development of WiiWare games in the future.” (gamespot)

Of course, in the world of smaller game titles and downloadable casual games, you’re going to be at risk of finding a lot of “shovelware” — products that are only released to make a quick dime, often based on some license or popular theme/character. The great game titles will, hopefully, rise to the top and show themselves off amongst all the wanna-be money makers.

Those smaller developers putting a huge passion into their titles actually have a chance in this new industry trend. Game makers, internationally, now have a chance to grasp a small piece of the industry and make their dreams come true. The core audience may see this as a trend of noisly low quality titles, but I believe the industry needs this change to grow a new generation of developers based on niche interests.

While many can wait for their next release of Madden the rest of us will continue to spend a little money to see what the future innovators are going to be bringing to the table.