There’s Some Shady Shit Going Down On The European PlayStation Store
When a major retailer launched a “buy one, get one free” promotion that includes AAA new releases, the internet generally pays attention. This can be a great thing for consumers, especially those of us who don’t usually have the cash to rush out to get the latest games right at launch. It can also be a huge negative when companies try to fuck over their customers like Sony Computer Entertainment Europe may have done with their most recent promotion.
This most recent promotion allows a European PlayStation owner to login and snag a digital license for two select games (out of a list of 25 eligble titles) for the price of one. It sounds like an absolutely fantastic deal, right in line with the price slashing that Sony Computer Entertainment America has been doing with the Holiday Sale. Except something isn’t quite right…
Using price tracking website it’s easy to tell that games like The Order 1888 have had their prices increased by up to ten Euros! When the digital version of your game jumps from £34.99 to £44.99 just before this current promotion – it becomes obvious that this promotion won’t benefit most customers. Add into the fact the same games can be purchased for as little as £17.99 on Amazon.co.uk for a physical product and it’s no wonder that people in Sony’s comment section are furious.
Maybe next time you try and ramp up sales, you should make sure your product is actually on sale and not arbitrarily inflated instead.
Competitive gaming is huge business – estimated to be worth around $194 as of current – and the latest industry giant to enter the scene is none other than Electronic Arts. News broke today that long time Chief Operating Officer Peter Moore will step down from his existing role and assume the role of Executive Vice President and Chief Competition office with the formation of the EA Competitive Gaming Division.
EA holds the keys to some of gaming’s most well known franchise including Battlefield, The Sims, Need For Speed, Peggle as well as exclusive licenses with FIFA, the NFL, NHL and more recently Star Wars.
Speaking about the role that the new EA Competitive Gaming Division will have within the e-sports community current CEO Andrew Willson said:
“EA’s CGD will seek to build a best-in-class program to centralize our efforts with new events, as well as the infrastructure to bring you the world’s preeminent EA competitive experiences.”
Electronic Arts has already been preparing its existing franchises for this shift to e-sports. Speaking with IGN Peter Moore said this of the company’s development teams:
“We’re already very engaged with our development teams around the world to make sure our games have got modes that lend themselves very well to competitive gaming, built-in from the get-go. Not as something that’s put in as an add-on mode or a last-minute afterthought”
Will EA be able to make a name for itself in a market that is dominated by free-to-play titles and older titles that never were necessarily $60 annualized experiences? It’s hard to say – as of the writing of this article the following are the top 5 games as ranked by competitive earnings:
DOTA 2 – $54 Million +
League of Legends – $26 Million +
Starcraft II – $18 Million +
Counter Strike (original) – $10 Million +
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive – $9 Million +
It might take some time before we see the next Battlefield or Battlefront to crack into the top ten, let alone the top five competitive e-sports games. Rival publisher Activision announced a Call of Duty: World League earlier in the year that focuses on competitive COD.
Today Oculus and CCP announced that the commercial version of the Oculus Rift will come bundled with a free copy of CCP’s upcoming EVE: Valkyrie.
Speaking about this announcement Oculus CEO Palmer Lucky said:
“EVE: Valkyrie is one of the most anticipated virtual reality games, and one of the first true VR games to go into development. It perfectly captures the promise of immersive gaming, shooting you into a sci-fi adventure as you pilot a spaceship in search of combat. Battling your friends (and enemies) in multiplayer space dogfights is the ultimate VR thrill, and we’re excited to partner with CCP to bring this experience to Rift owners everywhere.”
EVE: Valkyrie is a multiplayer online spaceship dogfighting game powered by Unreal Engine 4 currently in development at CCP. It is being co-published by CCP and Oculus and isn’t just confirmed for the Oculus platform but will also be released on the PlayStation VR as well. Valkyrie was originally unveiled to the world in March of 2014 as a technical demonstration for the Oculus before being confirmed as a full commercial title. The development team isn’t just looking into your standard free for all death match but also team modes as well ad objective modes like capture the flag.
I like Undertale. I like it a lot, and I don’t seem to be the only one. As of the time of writing this article, Undertale has just beaten out Pokemon Red/Blue and secured itself a spot in the quarter finals of gamefaq’s contest to determine the “Best. Game. Ever.”. This contest is a pretty big deal, with the last one being held in 2009 (The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time) and the one before that in 2004 (Final Fantasy VII). It attracts a lot of people to the website who all want their favorite to win. This is even mentioned in the description of the contest itself.
“It’s all a big popularity contest, and visitors who have never visited GameFAQs before will be sure to stop in and vote.”
“Will outside forces rally around an upstart, or will they not care enough to bother?”
Gamefaq has always encouraged people who don’t usually visit the site to come and vote for which game they think deserves to win, and why wouldn’t the site? This kind of contest can bring in a huge amount of traffic that otherwise wouldn’t visit. It doesn’t even require you to register an account. Anyone that stumbles onto the front page can vote for whatever contest is going on at that point in time. They could not be making it any easier for non-forum users to join in on the conversation.
Yet it seems that not everybody is pleased with how this year’s competition is going. You see, nobody was actually expecting Undertale to do particularly well. In the first round it was matched up against Mass Effect 3, a game that has had a mixed reaction by the general gaming public but is a title with far more name recognition behind it. As expected, Undertale quickly fell behind in the polls. Undertale didn’t lose however. Through the use of platforms such as twitter and tumblr, those who enjoyed the game encouraged each other to vote for it, and in the end Mass Effect 3 had to surrender its chance for the win to Undertale.
From this point onward Undertale had a steady fan base willing to vote for it during its rounds, to the….displeasure of some of the regular visitors of gamefaqs. Topics were created, rally cries were had, and slurs were thrown around with reckless abandon all in the name of stopping this tyrannical force that was corrupting the results of the holy contest. The main argument seemed to be that the people pushing for Undertale were an outside force that shouldn’t be counted, which is strange because, as shown earlier, outside forces rallying for votes are encouraged on the very page explaining the contest.
The reason Undertale winning the contest wasn’t acceptable wasn’t because it wasn’t being voted for primarily by forum regulars. The reason it shouldn’t win, was because it was one of those games. You know the ones I am talking about. One of those fancy pants artsy games about feelings that get made by girls with brightly colored hair in their basements when they aren’t colluding with the UN to destroy videogames. Ironically some of the hyperbole going around on the forums ended up being so hilarious that it started being passed around on social media, creating even more awareness for the game. My favorite one had to be a thread demanding that Undertale creator Toby Fox, who as far as I know has not involved himself in the contest or tried to rally support for his game in any way, go out and tell the fans of his game to stop voting for it. Because ethics.
But while the situation is absolutely hilarious, the reason Undertale’s continuing success is significant is not the massive amounts of salt being produced. The Undertale contest represents something important. It represents a situation in which people can vote anonymously and give voice to their opinions without having to worry about being charged out. There is no way to stop these supporters from casting their vote, no way to chase them out, no way to make clear to them that this is an environment that doesn’t appreciate these kind of opinions. It is a way for a very large group that often stays silent so as not to be harassed and yelled at to assert their presence in a way that is visible.
The reason for Undertale’s surprising domination of the polls is two-fold: Firstly it is an excellent game that was enjoyed by a large number of people, but that goes for most of the games participating in the competition. The second reason Undertale is doing so well is because it is represented by a group that often feels unwelcome in forums such as those on gamefaqs website. A group that is incredibly passionate about gaming and its continued evolution as a medium and art. By being able to vote in the competition without risk, these folk are allowed to show that they do indeed exist in great number. Apparently even greater number than those that believe Pokemon is the better game.
But I don’t want to end this article gloating. As I said at the start, I like Undertale, and that no doubt colours my opinion of the entire situation. I will be cheering for it to win, but if you feel another game is more deserving of the top spot, vote for it! If your friends feel the same way, ask them to vote for it too. Don’t get angry at people for liking a game you don’t think is all that great, but celebrate the games you love. After all, that’s what the people who are voting for Undertale are doing. Embrace the love you and them both share for gaming. A love that runs so deep you’re both willing to take time out of your day to go vote on a silly internet poll that, let’s be honest, doesn’t really matter anyway. The people that care enough to vote for Undertale have already proven they care about gaming by casting their vote. Instead of talking about what game shouldn’t win, let’s do what this contest is really supposed to be about and celebrate our own favorite games. Maybe enough people will agree with you that your favorite suddenly finds itself dominating the polls. There have been some strange upsets this year after all.
Remember Star Wars 1313? Honestly if you feel asleep for two weeks in 2012 you might have missed it, it was a game announced at the tail end of the Lucas Arts tenure over Star Wars games, and featured a grim gritty Star Wars world that hadn’t really been seen in games before. In case you need a refresher hers the sum total of every singe bit of video of the game the public ever saw Featuring fan favorite Bobba Fett’s early years of bounty hunting on Courscant, the game was pretty gritty cover based shooter. It was pretty for 2012 and fan reaction was good. Unfortunately, the acquisition of the whole Star Wars world by Disney put and end to Lucas Arts as a game studio and 1313 feel in to “developer hell”
It seems Disney likes the idea of Star Wars money and games, as in a recent interview with Slashfilm, Lucasfilm chief Kathleen Kennedy made mention of the huge archive of unrealized Star Wars-related material that Disney “would very much like to explore, Our attitude is, we don’t want to throw any of that stuff away. It’s gold. And it’s something we’re spending a lot of time looking at, poring through, discussing, and we may very well develop those things further,” she said. “We definitely want to.” Well 1313 wasnt mentioned specifically and saying, “We’re not throwing anything away” is as much a hard confirmation as saying that there will be 24 more Battle Front games. Many fans continue to hope that 1313 will eventually see the light of day. Personally with the recent release of Star Wars Battlefront and the hype of the moves being released themselves, I really dont need any more Star Wars in my life, even if it is a gritty reality cover based shooter.
I can’t even start this Life is Strange review without worrying about how it’ll sound. That’s how this game has me: in a fluster of emotion, insecurity, and anger. This game perfectly embodies the high school experience – perhaps a little too well. While I am on in my years I remember my years in high school with a kind of clarity that set me on the path I took for college and, by proxy, the rest of my life. I don’t look back on those years fondly. When I purchased the game via the PlayStation Store I thought I was going to get a kind of Lean on Me experience that told a story that happened to kids that were in school and not highlight the school part of their lives so vividly; not only was I wrong but it felt as if part of the purpose of this game was to expose the player to a side of high school social life that the developers felt wasn’t talked about enough. However, this isn’t said to say that Life is Strange isn’t a good game or a good story: no, it’s just the opposite. What I’ll be talking about here is how you can use a good game as a vehicle to tell a compelling story that purposely goes out of its way to rub you the wrong way.
Last weeks Game Awards were apparently a great sucess. If you by chance missed the show, and want to know what went down and who did what, take a few minutes to give our breakdown a read. But if like me you watched it live you already know that compared to last year at least it was a MASSIVE sucess. Now Polygon has an interview with show creator, financier, and host Geoff Keighley, where in he says that the show pulled over 2 million viewers and did over 20% better than last year. Additionally the social media game was completly crushed with over a billion (yes thats with a B) Twitter impressions the night of the game awards. That combination of factors esentailly guarantees us another iteration of the game award next year.
Keighley said in an interview with Polygon yesterday “That success, , means that a Game Awards 2016 show is very likely, though it’s too early to say when or where it will be held. With the growth this year and all the sponsor support, I feel pretty confident we will be back next December for The Game Awards 2016,” he said. He went on to say he was very happy with the format of this year’s show and that he feels it addressed the three big concerns he had coming out of the inaugural show. Personally I agree, and if the production values were just a tiny bit better the show would have been perfect. It seems Geoff is on the same page as me as he went on to say “A tighter production technically, a shorter run time, and more on-stage awards,” Keighley said. “The format feels good, and it’s been nice to see the audience response — two solid years means we’re on the right path.”
The founder and chief presenter did mention at least one this he wanted his show to do better “Next year will be about adding other elements around the show,” Keighley said. “One thing I wanted to do this year was a big eSports tournament the day of the show, but we just didn’t have enough bandwidth to get it done.”
Honestly this really shouldn’t be a suprise, E-sports is a huge draw, and again unsurprising to most people will be the reaffirmation that an awards show about games doesnt need to be on TV, but rather should stream live on the consoles, Twitch, and YouTube. Hopefully next year we get a similar format, as I personally really enjoyed the musical talents of Chvrches and Deadmau5, as well as the moving tribute to Satoru Iwata, and Geoffs call out of Konami for their shit treatment of their golden goose.
overall I loved the show, and really hope that it comes back stronger, better, and faster next year, and it seems like Geoff shares my opinion.
Tribes: Ascend is getting a new patch, which is surprising seeing as the last one was in March 2013. At 5 PM EST today the servers will go down for a total of six hours, after which the new patch will be live. The changes the patch makes to the game are too many to list here, but the major improvements include 3 new maps, new weapons, changes to the way the game’s premium currency works, and the rebalancing of existing classes and weapons. The patch notes can be found here. Read More
Sony’s annual Holiday Sale is usually awaited with baited breath by the PlayStation community. It is in these final few weeks leading up the holidays that we can sometimes find some fantastic deals on digital games. This week marks the beginning of multi-week sale on all currently active PlayStation platforms – for a full list of deals check out the official PlayStation Blog but listed below are some of my favorites.
