This week’s episode is unremarkable. Don’t expect any surprise guests or news, just a lot of chatting about comics and wandering way off the topic of video games.
The news items for the week are:
Let us know what you think.
It’s the fabulous 250th Episode milestone, and this particular podcast features a major surprise for longtime listeners. Not only is this one of the funniest podcasts in a long while, but there’s plenty of show to go around, too. First, the Gaming Flashback checks out the classic shooter No One Lives Forever, while the Gaming History examines the infamous Gizmondo handheld gaming console.
As for the news:
There’s no Question of the Week, but we’re definitely sure there will be plenty of comments for the podcast hosts.
The same company that brought us the NES Advantage has proven the Wii control scheme isn’t as bad as critics speculated. The beauty of adding the “waggle” technology is limiting your button count to a reasonable level without overwhelming gamers.
We’re seeing casual gaming on the rise both in the press and in the public. Yet, each “next generation” console brings new features and functionality to the consoles, games and accessories. Since NES birthed the SNES we’ve seen button count increase on controllers.
Nintendo has usually been conservative on buttons, trying to work “shape” over sheer volume of buttons, barring the C button count on the N64 controller. Nintendo controllers change shape with each generation and they’ve evolved, not innovated, their way around with the Wii control scheme. Each function of the controller exists, on its own, in other products but nobody has built a fully functional controller in such a way for a game console until now.
Sony took pieces of this concept in their PS3 controller and its ability to detect “tilt.” Xbox 360 stuck with the beefy controller with lots of buttons and analog sticks. Not just a D-Pad but two analog sticks and a ton of buttons to press, some pressure sensitive as well. What of our next-generation console? Maybe a few new buttons?
Or, maybe a few new motions? Wii evolved the control scheme and Sony validated their decision, what’s next? Are the controllers just too damn complicated in today’s world? Or, perhaps limiting the buttons brings in more gamers, like Grandma and Grandpa, to play your console as well.
By now everyone is used to paying more for Rock Band than meets the eye. The game disc is usually packed in several bundles for guitars, drums and, of course, stand alone. With The Beatles: Rock Band, MTV Games plans to release one product SKU, a game only disc. That game only disc, on the Wii is going to cost the same as other consoles: $59.99.
You remember when Wii games were $49.99 and everyone made titles that hit this price point or lower? MTV isn’t going to stick to this standard, regardless of “last gen graphics” because you’ll buy it anyway, right? Rock Band is one of those games that has hit huge strides in the market over the last few years as people buy big plastic instruments to rock their house.
Now we’re going to see if those same people willing to pay $10.00 more than normal in order to play The Beatles songs. The Wii has a large audience of gamers but they’re the style of gamer that wants a good value for their product, after all, the Wii is cheaper than every other console and the games probably should match its differences compared to games for the other consoles.
This is an interesting decision, as the market plunges into despair MTV gouges games for $10.00 more because “The Beatles” happens to be in the title. Are you going to pay more for the Beatles? Not us.
(Thanks, 1up)
