Episode 452: Goodbye Princess Leia, Hello 2017

The year has ended, as the last podcast of 2016 was recorded last week, and released today. There’s much discussion that was cut out and saved for a future outtakes episode. Regardless, there’s plenty of show to go around, and the sound quality is also far better than ever thanks to Jonah getting a professional headset and mic.

This week’s news includes:

  • Nintendo registers trademark that could point to a SNES Classic Edition
  • Windows 10 may be getting a new “Game Mode” option
  • The next game by That Dragon, Cancer‘s dev is not what you’d expect

This week’s Question of the Week is “What game in 2017 might you buy that you normally wouldn’t?”

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Episode 406: The Oops! EditionEpisode 406: The Oops! Edition

If you’re wondering what happened to Episode 405, it was recorded, but Jonah’s power supply self-destructed, and wasn’t available til Wednesday, and by then it was too late to post it. (It will be posted at some point in the near future.)

Instead, check out these week’s news:

  • Afro Samurai 2 removed from online stores, players get refunded, episodes 2 and 3 canceled
  • Activision apologizes for Nuk3town pre-order mix up
  • PlayStation 4 is getting PlayStation 2 emulation, Sony reveals
  • Electronic Arts doesn’t want to “nickel and dime” gamers with microtransactions

Question of the Week: Do you or have you pulled videogame all-nighters on weeknights?

Xbox 360 Silver Accounts, Free XBL Cross-Platform GamingXbox 360 Silver Accounts, Free XBL Cross-Platform Gaming

Microsoft has announced they’ll be giving Xbox Live silver accounts access to play some multi-player cross-platform games for free until the fall update. Recently, Microsoft announced free online play with Games for Windows titles, effectively giving PC gamers “gold accounts” to play online.

Most people agree the move to give gold subscriptions to PC gamers was done because PC gamers don’t care to play Games for Windows games online if they have to pay for it. The culture of PC gaming is much different than console gaming on XBL, gamers expect the online experience at no cost; they’re already paying an ISP for network access, paying for a match-making system with a yearly subscription is not desired.

Console gamers don’t have a choice, buying the 360 experience arrives with simple to play games (no drivers, no installs) but limited online choices: pay or go away. Now, silver members will get a little taste of network play, along side PC gamers in the cross-platform Games for Windows titles.

“Supported cross-platform titles include Universe at War, Shadowrun, and Lost Planet: Colonies Edition.” (gamespot)

We question the intention here… is this as a good faith move or are they wetting people’s appitite for XBL so they’ll want to upgrade to gold in the fall? Or, maybe there are some logistical reasons to doing this in the Xbox Live infrastructure to prepare for upgrades where making it free solves a few of their internal upgrade paths and, as a side effect, gives gamers some games to play.

Of course, we’ve seen few people playing Shadowrun or Lost Planet lately. Maybe this will re-popularize a few older titles as well.

Episode 366: Hashtag GamerGateEpisode 366: Hashtag GamerGate

One again, the episode gets a little political as it deals with the GamerGate controversy again. No Gaming Flashback or Gaming History, but plenty of annoyed podcasters. As a side note, there will be no podcast for the next two weeks as Paul will be on a trip. However, there will be a new podcaster when the show starts up again.

This week’s news includes:

  • Sarkeesian cancels Utah State presentation following threats of shooting
  • Former GamerGate member explains his departure
  • Unreal, BioShock dev Digital Extremes sold to Chinese companies
  • Games driving “nearly all” Google Play’s revenue growth in US
  • Mobile spending driven by 35-44-year-olds

All this plus Listener Feedback.