This weeks gaming podcast is epic, as per the usual, we had some really thought out community comments about DRM, game history on Krull and a bit of history on D. Gottleib & Co. This weeks news includes:
And, our question of the week, would you give up your job to be a video game tester?
The regular podcast is back, after the Dr. Who outtakes podcast last week. The show runs a little long but it’s full of insight and wonderfulness. Mostly. This week’s Gaming Flashback is the classic arcade motorcycle racer Hang-On.
The podcast also has two week’s worth of news items, including:
Plenty of Listener Feedback, but no Question of the Week – just ask us anything.
This weeks gaming podcast is packed with content, our emotional rant on the latest news and we take a look back at Rygar and its infamous stupid pause system. This weeks news covers:
This weeks soap box, we explain our emotional disappointment with Spore’s DRM news and its 1-star amazon vote. Also, lots of great listener comments, touch on our own personal podcast history and another great contest! This time we’re handing out eight copies of Peggle Nights! Winners will get the title the day it releases, but can win before it’s out.
The guys discuss the week’s goings-on, including Diablo speedrun sleuths proving a 15-year world record was fake after reverse-engineering the game and failing to replicate the run in 2.2 billion possible randomized dungeons, Call of Duty’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover costing $90, Valve releasing the Team Fortress 2 source code, and a mystery Tony Hawk remaster mentioned by pro skater involved in the game.
For the first time in years, we have a Gaming History: The Civilization II Eternal War.
The news includes:
Let us know what you think.
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Well I do really like my job and plan to continue working in the field of surveying & GIS. But if I was granted the opportunity to become a game tester for Valve or Bungie then I would seriously consider it. When I was younger I basically had a full time job not playing halo 2 but testing for any bugs or glitches I could find.
Funny side story
My sister goes to Murdoch University and one of her mates Grant is currently studies Law with no ambitions or interests in Law just that his parents wanted him to. Even so Grant is really smart and a real nerd when it comes to games (his brain is Wiki Videogames). Anyway his family knows a lot of people and found himself having dinner with the Australian CEO of EA games, the man was explaining how EA have had a really bad year and Grant gave him run down on the reasons why. @ the end of the night. The EA Ceo was amazed at Grants knowledge and ideas and said that he could really do with some one like meet around the office and offered him to be his personal assistant. Grant responded saying “ Naa I don’t really wanna move out of home”……………. My sister and I have come to the conclusion that Grant is a Retarded. (Grant is now also studying a Major in Japanese….. so he can pick up Asians)
Well I do really like my job and plan to continue working in the field of surveying & GIS. But if I was granted the opportunity to become a game tester for Valve or Bungie then I would seriously consider it. When I was younger I basically had a full time job not playing halo 2 but testing for any bugs or glitches I could find.
Funny side story
My sister goes to Murdoch University and one of her mates Grant is currently studies Law with no ambitions or interests in Law just that his parents wanted him to. Even so Grant is really smart and a real nerd when it comes to games (his brain is Wiki Videogames). Anyway his family knows a lot of people and found himself having dinner with the Australian CEO of EA games, the man was explaining how EA have had a really bad year and Grant gave him run down on the reasons why. @ the end of the night. The EA Ceo was amazed at Grants knowledge and ideas and said that he could really do with some one like meet around the office and offered him to be his personal assistant. Grant responded saying “ Naa I don’t really wanna move out of home”……………. My sister and I have come to the conclusion that Grant is a Retarded. (Grant is now also studying a Major in Japanese….. so he can pick up Asians)
Fortunately for launch owners, the time clock bug self-corrected.
Fortunately for launch owners, the time clock bug self-corrected.
hahaha. Guys, GFWL is Games for Windows Live, Microsoft’s PC version of Xbox Live.
hahaha. Guys, GFWL is Games for Windows Live, Microsoft’s PC version of Xbox Live.
Lol, loved how this show started 😀
@The Nintendo Wii being picked on again:
Derrick, you do have a point there. The DICE guy is a bit out of his league. You can’t ask
@WoW authenticator:
Oh man :))
Thing is even communication based on SSL is not secure, and again, the issue is the Man In The Middle.
I guess Blizzard is finding out how it feels to be No. 1 in a market. It’s the same reason why there are more viruses for Windows than for MAC.
@StarCraft II
I would not cancel my vacation to play Starcraft II. Or any other game.
@D&D online
It’s quite interesting, this could become a very successful model.
Derrick, the post says “growing the franchise’s revenue over 500% since its launch in September.”
Let’s wait and see.
@Question of the week:
No.
When I did some testing (for game mods) I was more interested in finding game play bugs, rather than find that one place in the floor where I could fall out of the map.
Something tells me that this kind of more technical tests (find collision issues etc.) is part of the job requirement, and I don’t like that too much.
Lol, loved how this show started 😀
@The Nintendo Wii being picked on again:
Derrick, you do have a point there. The DICE guy is a bit out of his league. You can’t ask
@WoW authenticator:
Oh man :))
Thing is even communication based on SSL is not secure, and again, the issue is the Man In The Middle.
I guess Blizzard is finding out how it feels to be No. 1 in a market. It’s the same reason why there are more viruses for Windows than for MAC.
@StarCraft II
I would not cancel my vacation to play Starcraft II. Or any other game.
@D&D online
It’s quite interesting, this could become a very successful model.
Derrick, the post says “growing the franchise’s revenue over 500% since its launch in September.”
Let’s wait and see.
@Question of the week:
No.
When I did some testing (for game mods) I was more interested in finding game play bugs, rather than find that one place in the floor where I could fall out of the map.
Something tells me that this kind of more technical tests (find collision issues etc.) is part of the job requirement, and I don’t like that too much.
In answer to the question of the week… Yes, immediately. Without a second thought.
That might have something to do with the fact that I’m currently unemployed, and a student (bring on the debt), but I’ve ‘taken’ a lot from the gaming industry by way of playing the games a lot, and I haven’t ever been involved in modding or the like, so I rather enjoy the idea of giving something back to the industry (other than money, obviously).
On the PS3 clock-failure problem;
I think it made news in the first place because of the pure geekiness of the problem, many people (myself included) find that type of fault very interesting.
It’s not that people consider the fault to be on par with the faults that plagued, and continue to plague, the 360 (which are in many ways completely inexcusable) it is simply that it is a new, and more interesting, fault than the one associated with the 360, which is simply down to God-awful design.
As I consider myself a PC gamer with a purely academic interest in console gaming, and therefore have little or no emotional attachment to any of the current gen. consoles, I tend to rank them on Reliability and Versatility, rather than the number of games released for them. Which is why I always tend to prefer the PS3 in the commonplace ‘Which console is best?’ arguments, due to the fact that it is highly reliable and has the added bonus of the BluRay player (which is counted as one of the best BluRay players for it’s price bracket, even when compared to standalone models).
As always, the podcast was brilliant, cheers and peace.
In answer to the question of the week… Yes, immediately. Without a second thought.
That might have something to do with the fact that I’m currently unemployed, and a student (bring on the debt), but I’ve ‘taken’ a lot from the gaming industry by way of playing the games a lot, and I haven’t ever been involved in modding or the like, so I rather enjoy the idea of giving something back to the industry (other than money, obviously).
On the PS3 clock-failure problem;
I think it made news in the first place because of the pure geekiness of the problem, many people (myself included) find that type of fault very interesting.
It’s not that people consider the fault to be on par with the faults that plagued, and continue to plague, the 360 (which are in many ways completely inexcusable) it is simply that it is a new, and more interesting, fault than the one associated with the 360, which is simply down to God-awful design.
As I consider myself a PC gamer with a purely academic interest in console gaming, and therefore have little or no emotional attachment to any of the current gen. consoles, I tend to rank them on Reliability and Versatility, rather than the number of games released for them. Which is why I always tend to prefer the PS3 in the commonplace ‘Which console is best?’ arguments, due to the fact that it is highly reliable and has the added bonus of the BluRay player (which is counted as one of the best BluRay players for it’s price bracket, even when compared to standalone models).
As always, the podcast was brilliant, cheers and peace.
“The DICE guy is a bit out of his league. ”
Wrong. He’s very knowledgeable. The problem is that the guys took his response out of context.
He was asked if he’d ever develop a game for the Wii. His answer:
”If I got paid to develop a Wii game I would do it. I would not put an original IP on the Wii today unless I thought I had an absolute home run.”
When asked why, he answered correctly:
Third. Party. Games. Don’t. Sell. On. The. Wii. They just don’t, for the reason he gave: people buy the Wii because it’s a cool toy, not because of the games you can buy – just the stuff that comes with it.
“The DICE guy is a bit out of his league. ”
Wrong. He’s very knowledgeable. The problem is that the guys took his response out of context.
He was asked if he’d ever develop a game for the Wii. His answer:
”If I got paid to develop a Wii game I would do it. I would not put an original IP on the Wii today unless I thought I had an absolute home run.”
When asked why, he answered correctly:
Third. Party. Games. Don’t. Sell. On. The. Wii. They just don’t, for the reason he gave: people buy the Wii because it’s a cool toy, not because of the games you can buy – just the stuff that comes with it.
QotW: yes, but I guess I’m in a similar position to eni. Although I am employed, I have a pretty boring and repatative job so spending hours doing boring bugtesting is hardly much worse that what I do now, with the added benifit of not having to deal with customers hopefully.
Also nice context Jonah tot he DICE quote. It always makes me wonder how many other out-of-context quotes and propoganda I believe when I see this sort of reporting. I must admit I thought the DICE guy must have a screw loose before I read the context you provided.
QotW: yes, but I guess I’m in a similar position to eni. Although I am employed, I have a pretty boring and repatative job so spending hours doing boring bugtesting is hardly much worse that what I do now, with the added benifit of not having to deal with customers hopefully.
Also nice context Jonah tot he DICE quote. It always makes me wonder how many other out-of-context quotes and propoganda I believe when I see this sort of reporting. I must admit I thought the DICE guy must have a screw loose before I read the context you provided.
@jonahfalcon: My bad on the DICE guy in that case. Funny how one (missing) sentence changes things 🙂
@jonahfalcon: My bad on the DICE guy in that case. Funny how one (missing) sentence changes things 🙂