As those of you who might have noticed when going to Google.com, Google has turned 14 today. Back in 1998, who knew that it would become the premiere search engine, before branching out to pick up such sites as YouTube, and starting its own web browser?
Here’s to Google, which is in the midst of puberty. Salud.
Bethesda Softworks vice president of marketing Pete Hines is critzing publishers and developers who shoehorn multiplayer into their games that doing such a thing is “a waste of time” and advises, “Just drop it, don’t bother…it’ll make for a worse game.”
In an interview with Next Gen BIZ, Hines states that using online multiplayer as a tool to prevent used game trade-ins and rental simply doesn’t work, and robs developers of valuable man-hours.
Hines stated:
“(People ask us) for a game like Skyrim or Prey 2, why doesn’t it have multiplayer? Well, our question is always the opposite when we talk to a developer. If you’re doing multiplayer, why are you doing multiplayer? What are you trying to accomplish?
“If you’re doing it just to check a box or because every other publisher says you’ve got to have multiplayer, then just drop it, don’t bother, it’s a waste of time, a giant distraction and it’ll make for a worse overall game.
“We want the best game possible. If that’s a singleplayer game that’s 15 to 20 hours, then make that! Don’t waste your time on features that don’t make the game better.”
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Prey 2 are two Bethesda properties that will lack multiplayer, but one of the tools to encourage games to keep both games will be downlodable content and, even more important, good communications with the game communities and nurturing the fandom for both games.
Activision’s Dan Amrich posted in his One of Swords blog that two million users have signed up Call of Duty: Elite‘s beta, who said the number “blew his mind” when “they hit that number in less than two weeks. That should give the dev team at Beachhead plenty to work with to kick off the beta, which officially starts July 14.”
“The official start of the beta is a month away, so there’s still plenty of time for you to sign up. When the studio head at Beachhead said this would be a live beta, he was not kidding — your participation really can make a difference in how Elite evolves,” added Amrich, “And don’t be discouraged by the big number, thinking you shouldn’t bother because they already have enough people — two million volunteers among 30 million Call of Duty players is a small amount. More would be even better. Once you’ve signed up, just watch your email inbox for an invite.”
The 2M beta applications aren’t necessarily an endorsement for Elite. Rather, users are probably curious to see the beta and if it pleases them. The paid subscription portion reportedly only represents 10% of Elite, anyway, and is aimed at more “professional” and “hardcore” gamers, aka clans.
Users can apply for the beta here.
Today’s gaming podcast covers some recent gaming news and hits some gaming history on Starcraft and the game designer Brian Reynolds. Hitting some community feedback and checking out a few gaming tattoo’s! Here are a couple of the submitted tattoo’s we were looking at in the show:
This weeks gaming news includes:
This week’s question of the week, what’s your opinion on some really crazy achievement lists? Do they frustrate you?
GameStooge, 2Old2Play and Gaming Podcast have joined forces with Telltale Games and are offering three chances to win the PC version of Wallace & Gromit’s Grand Adventures – the entire four episode season!
That’s right – you can win the entire season, a $34.95 value, which includes:
Winners get the order code to get each chapter as it comes out for free!
For Gaming Podcast, you merely need to post a comment stating your favorite brand of cheese. Just let us know which cheese makes you drool – whether it’s the tanginess of cheddar or the mildness of Gouda. The majesty of Roquefort or the commonness of American. You don’t even need to restrict it to cow’s milk cheese, too – if you love goat cheese, let us know! Only one entry per user, and you have to impress us with your love of that fine dairy product. The contest ends March 24, 12 noon EST.
You have two other chances at GameStooge and 2Old2Play – please head over there and checkout their contests!
As a huge fan of Showtime’s Dexter, we’re excited (afraid?) to hear they’re making a game in its image. We actually pay for an Amazon Unbox because we’re too cheap to buy Showtime for all their other shows. A Dexter game could be killer on the PC and iPhone.
Obviously the first problem to concern ourselves with is the franchise name, all too often we end up with ‘branded’ named games that produce awful results. It’s easy to get lost in the idea of making money on the name Dexter than putting in the time to a quality game release.
There is a high probability a Dexter game is going to suck, but we can hold up our hopes they do the franchise justice and create something scary but entertaining with a good storyline. How else can you represent a TV series in which the main character is a serial killer and he justifies his killings?
(Thanks, Joystiq)
The last few weeks we’ve often brought up, on the gaming podcast, our reasons behind why Gears of War 2 wouldn’t be a PC title and only an Xbox 360. Our theory was more of a marketing tactic, assuming there would be no PC version because Microsoft wants to focus the attention of their big titles to the Xbox 360 as it’s a real gaming platform and they want more attention on it. We might have been wrong.
In a recent interview, IGN asked Epic’s Cliff Bleszinski some pointed questions about the PC release. Like us, everyone has been questioning the move to NOT release Gears of War 2 on the PC especially considering the first game made a PC debut and Epic has always been a big PC developer. Turns out, Epic is utilizing the Xbox 360 as a nice big can of DRM.
“Here’s the problem right now; the person who is savvy enough to want to have a good PC to upgrade their video card, is a person who is savvy enough to know bit torrent to know all the elements so they can pirate software.” (ign)
Following this answer he confirmed with a definitive no that we won’t see GoW2 on the PC. Of course, they also underscore the fact that the PC can have a wild array of hardware chipsets for video cards and catering to the masses with compatibility is pretty much a nightmare. A system with great DRM and a closed hardware platform is hard to pass up.
When you hear the word Wolfenstein what game do you think of? Constantly, I recall Wolfenstein 3D and all the memorable times I had building my first person shooter fingers. From a new-generation FPS perspective, Return to Castle Wolfenstein for the PC back in 2001 was my last touch on a Wolfenstein game series. I enjoyed it a great deal and would love to see more out of the game series.
It seems Activision and Raven Software are working on a PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 game, currently titled Wolfenstein set to be released “when it is done.” The game follows the same concepts as most of the Wolfenstein titles of the past, a bit of dark science fiction and undead matched with World War II settings with Nazi’s and the main character BJ Blazkowicz.
This series seems to be full of re-hash and repeat with plots, characters and overall feel. Developers seem to favor re-makes over sequels to the famous franchise, eventually putting out one or two sequels of their re-make hits well with customers.
Is this the correct direction for the Wolfenstein franchise? In my humble opinion, it doesn’t really matter to me because I’m such a fan of the series. Perhaps they will continue to re-make the game until the larger demographic screams “Not again!”
(Thanks, Eurogamer)
