Video Game Pulse

Anyone who owns a PSP and knows what DVD’s are probably was excited to hear that movies would soon be available on a format called UMD. Soon after the hype ended we realized a problem, and it wasn’t anything small. These UMD Video’s don’t come with any extras, they can’t play on a regular DVD, and you are paying more for it then you would a DVD. Anyone who has a 2GB Pro Duo card is lucky enough to be able to just purchase the DVD and put it on the card for viewing later on.

In a not so rash and completely predicted move by Sony, they have decided to cut back on production of UMD Videos. It really makes a lot of sense, these companies aren’t selling enough of these things, and it costs to much to make them. Later on down the road when the format is cheaper to make, it will probably be more feasible. Articles such as that on Defunct Games reported on this when the system launched, their feature is titled “How the DVD killed the UMD“.

This news should not be a surprise to anyone, but what is news is that Sony wants to make the format playable on a TV, and what a better time to do it then with an addition to the PS3. Nothing has been confirmed about this speculation, but it makes enough sense. There was early rumor of a UMD burner inside the PS3, but when E3 2005 hit, and we didn’t see it that rumor kind of died off. If Sony wanted, they still may unveil a UMD player for the PS3, or a stand-alone unit.

Eventually it will become so cheap to manufacture these UMDs that the cost won’t matter. No more then 4 years ago, a DVD-R for a consumer cost anywhere between $2-5, now you can get them for pennies. A 1x DVD Burner In 2001 cost $600, a 4x in 2003 cost $300, and my brand new 16x DL-DVD Burner from 2005 cost me $30. Times change fast, and things get cheap, UMD Videos will probably be a logical step in two to three years.

MMORPG is probably one of the longest and most tongue twisting acronyms in the gaming industry. This word may strike fear in the hearts of many, and may strike happiness in others. Personally, I have never had a great MMORPG experience to justify the expense of a monthly subscription. Many of my friends; even the ones without jobs, play World of Warcraft and they constantly try to suck me into their realm. Members of my own family have gotten so addicted to these types of games that they spend hundreds a month on the game.

Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game’s are something that has had roots since the early days of Phantasy Star Online and Everquest. The question you need to ask your self is simple though, have you heard of SoG? Well, from the acronym I haven’t a clue what it is. SoG is the prequel to Dark and Light. The game takes place in the land of Ganareth, where you will be part of the first territorial conquest to build the fortresses of Ysatis and Agnar. Settlers of Ganareth (SoG) is not only the prequel of Dark and Light, but it also doesn’t cost a dime!

Don’t get the wrong idea though, just because it is free doesn’t mean that it is going to suck. Many fun and great MMORPG’s start out free, many made by the Koreans. This game could suck, but it could rock, the real thing many may have to worry about is if this will eventually got to a pay service like all the other MMORPG’s of its kind.

“Settlers of Ganareth is a cost-free prelude to the most anticipated MMORPG game of 2006, Dark and Light.” said Jason Ovitt of SSPR. I’ll let you ponder that quote for a second. They are stating that it is the prelude to a game that hasn’t even been released yet. Are they going to get people hooked to the free prequel and then pull it, forcing people to continue their fix playing Dark and Light? Can this game really be called a prequel when it is coming out before Dark and Light? Wouldn’t that make Dark and Light a sequel? Maybe I’m just reading too much into it, I’m sure it will be a great baiter…. err… game.

Last week there was apparently something foul about as they tried to rebuild the Ostarian Bridge, which links players from English, French, Spanish, German, and Italian countries. It was a failed attempt to reclaim it as a free territory of Ganareth. With that, I will leave it to you to keep and eye out to see who wins the race to release. Will SoG be a prequel, or will Dark and Light be a sequel? All this and more in the wacky and wild world of miss-reporting!

The people who come to this blog often (you know who you are) will notice from time to time that I publish press releases that I receive from various companies, Most notably, I-Play’s Anna Brog, and SNK’s Michael Meyers. I have no bias however when I post press releases, as long as it is topical to gaming. So it seemed odd when I received an email from a learning software company by the name of Fogware. “Thank you for taking the time to review our press release.” says Mike Rothstein, Fogware’s co-founder and president.

I immediately started thinking, “hmm, well I’m glad that my PR work has been noticed”. I decided to hunt down the post where I talked about whatever product they e-mailed me about, but I couldn’t find it anywhere. I looked through my email and still, I could not find any traces from Fogware. To suffice, I am either reading this wrong, or they are out and out lying to me. Either way, I have a few choice words about the product they are trying to push off onto me.

STUDENT HOME LEARNING SYSTEM is the newest from Fogware, set to release on February 27, 2006. The Student Home Learning System is comprised of 200 educational software titles, 20 hours of DVD video, over 200 hours of audio books, a total of over 20,000 lessons, activities and Q&As, as well as an array of top reference materials, all meant for grades 2-12 and at an affordable price of under $150, it is everything needed to provide a full range of educational materials.

Mike Rothstein, Fogware’s co-founder and president goes on to state that, “The Fogware Learning System contains everything the student will ever need, without having to go on-line at all.”. This is where I am a little biased in this area, I used the internet for everything when I was in grade school. Everything from Math to Science to Literature, the internet had the answers I was looking for. I’m not saying that this software is bad or anything, or isn’t very informative, But the reasoning why you should use it is illogical, there is no way that any piece of software can contain the expansive knowledge of the internet. Consider this, Fogware wants people to buy this product by having people advertise it on their websites and blogs, but you give the parents good enough reason not to have internet, and you just cut your self off from them.

I’m not going to sugarcoat it, the internet can be a wild and dangerous place, full of graphic images, violent depictions, and crude language. The same can be said about TV and Magazines and Video Games. That is why there is content blockers, be it the MPAA, ESRB, or AOL, or Parents themselves. I suggest that if you have children, you should buy them this software, because I believe that every child deserves the opportunity at learning all they can at a young age, but don’t buy it to replace the internet. Until next time, when I rip apart Game On, yet another piece of controversial software from Fogware.

Many have contemplated if websites like Gamespot.com and IGN.com would replace the need for magazines like Gamepro and Electronic Gaming Monthly. The simple fact is that nothing will replace the felling of a good (or bad) magazine in your hands, you can’t take your computer into the bathroom with you, or on the road, or in a plane, or in a boat going to Spain. Maybe if you have a laptop and a wireless connection you can do some of these things, but how mundane would that be? I think both can co-exist.

However, what about a magazine that you can subscribe to on your computer? And read on your computer? With digital advertising? This is the very thing that Computer Games Magazine plans on doing in the near future! I’m not sure I really like this idea my self, if I wanted gaming news on a computer, I would go get the most recent up-to-date info off a website, not read a monthly magazine on my desktop. I really think that Computer Games Magazine missed the ball on this one, I’m not too sure they understand what the vantage point of a magazine is and what its limitations are.

Apparently they will be publishing it through an online company named Zinio; who specializes in this exact thing. I’m not to sure how popular or useful this service is, but subscribers will have to download the Zinio Reader to be able to read the magazine. Interestingly enough this company also publishes quite a handful of other popular magazines, including Penthouse and Playboy. Now, when I am looking for pictures of girls that get my goat, I usually head over to Vivid.com, Google Image Search, or some other place that is a hotbed of nude photos of women, Heck even Penthouse.com! They are all updated more often then a monthly magazine, and need I mention the necessity of taking a Penthouse in the bathroom??

Yet another publication available from Zinio is Business Week, now I guess I must have missed the point of this one, Business Week is one of those magazines stock traders and the like in the big NY read while in a cab or on the subway, right? I mean, head over to money.cnn.com, or any other outlet that will tell you minute by minute what is going on in the business industry!

Keep in mind, I don’t plan to rip apart every publication they offer, even though I could easily. There is however a few that just stands out from the crowd. How many times have you been in an auto repair shop, or a friends garage and they have had a stack of dusty, oil soaked Popular Mechanics magazines? Well, now they can get it on a computer, far away from the car!

I’m not sure what crowd this technology is marketed for, but it is over my head why you would get a digital subscription to a magazine that is outdated minutes after it hits your desktop. Blogs, game sites and more get updated more then half an hour a day, making what you are reading in your digital subscription to EGM a complete waste of technology.

In order for me to better familiarize myself with the crapfest that is a Uwe Boll film, I decided to watch the films he has made, that way I can bitch with knowledge. As I started to watch House of the Dead, I began to make a list in my head of the funny and outright stupid things that I was bearing witness to.

Soon this list grew too large, and so I quickly opened a notepad file and started typing away, below you will find some of my thoughts on the film in the form of a “Top Ten” list, keep in mind, these arn’t actually in order of importance, and there are probably other key points that deserve this list that I am not thinking of at this moment, enjoy!

1) Instant Neo!

When the chips are down, it seems that even the Sega girl can kick some matrix ass! Not to mention how everyone knows how to use a gun, and all the girls are equipped like Lara Croft. All in all, this movie proves that when the time is right, you can tap into your inner core, and kick some major ass with absolutely no training!

2) Cut Scenes

During the ad campaign of Doom, there was some FPS shots of the actors, us gaming types prayed to heaven that this was not going to be in the final cut of the film. We were disappointed when the film eventually came out, A majority of the film was spent in First Person mode. When House of the Dead hit the theatres, people were appalled that the game included actual footage from the original Playstation version of the game counterpart.

3) The Acting!

I’m not sure if it was meant to be stupid, but it sure wasn’t meant to be serious. The “skipper” says at one point, “muerte, its Spanish for death. In case you don’t speak Mexican”, who is writing this stuff, President Bush?? The characters, including the underwear model all try act their part, but Uwe Boll just can’t write or direct even if his chips were down!

4) Consistency

I guess it is too much to ask that a guy missing a hand should be missing his hand 30 minutes later, and not lifting heavy crates. How about the fact that a 6 shooter revolver can seem to shoot unlimited ammo in a scene where it would look cool, but when you need to move the story, the gun is only loaded with two bullets. I guess this would make even more sense if there WAS a story to move along.

5) The Lack of a House!!

Ok, I guess there is a house, more like a shack, and none of the action actually takes place “in” the house. This movie might as well be called “Island of the Dead”, or “Shack of the Dead” … at least Radio Shack could use it in their advertising.

6) Some God Damn Sense!

So the story is that a man was banned from Spain (not mexico) for performing experiments that were not of god, they were taking him to some remote location when he killed the crew, and took the ship. He ended up landing on this island where he kills anyone who steps foot on it. So again I ask, where does the zombie part play a roll, Boll? Let’s not forget that the San Juan islands are in Washington State, far the fuck away from Spain! This guy got here before America was even discovered.

At one point in the film, they have no reason to go back into the island, everyone they know has just died, and they just killed all the zombies on the boat literally in front of them. Logical choice would be to get the fuck off the island onto the boat, and deal with the few zombies that MAY remain on the boat… OR you could have the following conversation…

Girl 1: “we got to get back on that boat, but I ain’t going in that water”

Guy 1: “we can’t go anyway, its too far, besides, we don’t know what is still on that boat”

Girl 2: “what about that house?”

Guy 1: “it’s defensible, and it’s shelter”

Girl 3: “it’s a good idea”

This is where I ask, WHERE IS THE GOD DAMN SENSE??? “it’s a good idea”?? These people haven’t taken drugs at the rave… where the fuck do you get the sense that it is a good idea, instead of leaving right the fuck now on the boat that is less them 20 feet in front of you? Oh ya, Boll forgot to include the house/shack in the movie, and we are only 45 minutes into the film… got to fill it with more crap.

7) Uber Fast Zombies

Zombie movies all have one thing in common, the zombies move slowly, they are tons of them, and no matter how far you try to run, you can’t get away from them. Uwe Boll takes it to the next level, and allows the zombies to run, sprint, jump, and kind of fly! They can also breath underwater, but I guess that is to be expected.

8) Quality!

For the budget this film was awarded, I could have done a much better job, and I don’t know the first thing of making a movie. Aside from the acting being complete rubbish, the filming is even worse. I’m not talking about the fact that it uses screen shots from the video game, or way to much matrix shots, or even that the camera can’t stay stable. On second thought, I am talking about all that, and even more.

9) Makeup

Last year at E3 there were “dead” people wandering about the convention center, pressed up against windows, and in general, scaring the crap out of you when you didn’t expect them to be there. They were advertising the game Infected by Majesco. The game didn’t get received to well by critics, but the makeup was probably about 90% better then what is in this movie.

10) Scare Factor

It takes a lot of things to make a movie scary, even if with cheap thrills, and clichés. A few things are suspense, makeup and unique camera angles, which this movie lacks all of. As previously mentioned, the makeup is sub par, Since there is a techno beat playing the entire time of the movie, there is no suspense, and without any of those, it doesn’t matter what camera angle you use.

What if I told you that Playstation 2, Gamecube and XBOX games were going up to $100 and XBOX 360 games were going up to $120? Since most likely you are a gamer, and realize how insane this is, you probably have to change your underwear about now. Well, maybe after I tell you that this is going to become a reality!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok lets tone down the hyperbole. This will only affect those that live in Texas. “The Republican primary candidate wants to eliminate property taxes by heavily taxing games the government deems ‘violent.’” Reported Tor Thorsen of Gamespot.com earlier this week. Chances of this law passing are hopefully very slim. I’m not quite sure what the gamer/conserve-republican (non-gamer) ratio is in Texas, If any of you reading this live in Texas, please chime in with a response; If you are a conserve-repub, I await the hate mail!

This man goes by the very erotic name of Star Locke, He is all about the health of our children or as he says, “our most precious blood”. I don’t have an issue with some of his policies, But he went too far the other day. Star Locke’s Family Security and Protection Act aims to take away liquor tax, property tax, and vehicle tax! He will balance this out by creating a board of 10 people that he chooses; they will deem what is violent and what isn’t. The Music/Movies/Games that are deemed violent will have 100% sales tax, any food cooked with grease will have 50% sales tax, and any beverage to contain sugar will also have 50% sales tax. These are all the things that us gamers crave, and live off of!!

Besides the fact that this is the reason the constitution was made in the first place, he will not win the election. There are a lot of gaming companies and companies that sale games that are based out of Texas, they will flood the competitors campaign just to make sure he wins. Some of you may have played Perfect Dark Zero, a game set in the future where companies control everything; unlike today where … companies control everything! Even in the off chance that Star Locke makes it, he will be tried for treason the second he passes one of these laws, because it is against EVERYTHING the constitution stands for, Taxation without representation.

Jane Pinckard, The hook-up from Game Girl Advance, The journalist from 1up.com just recently reported on a story regarding Rockstar/Take-Two and their most recent lawsuit, which pins them with a $10 million dollar hit. What are they being sued for now you ask? Misleading an investigation. Oddly enough it isn’t Jack Thompson leading this battle, but rather the Los Angeles city attorney’s office.

City Attorney Rockard Delgadillo claims that Rockstar/Take Two deliberately withheld information that would have kept Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas off the shelves of major retailers. The suit also charges Rockstar with having blamed hackers for code that was subsequently found to be programmed by the developers.

The reader response of this article has been varied, with some saying that Rockstar deserves what is coming to them. The simple fact is that Rockstar doesn’t deserve any of this. They didn’t “hide” code, they simply scraped the idea. Have you seen the hot coffee video? It looks like shit! I have seen music video’s that turn me on more then that crapfest.

Think about this logically, Rockstar programmed a game with an extra feature of “virtual sex”, they decided to scrap the idea, due to the fact that it was stupid looking and would not pass the rating board. Instead of rebuilding the entire code of the game to completely eliminate this feature, they stripped it from being accessed. Rockstar should not have to predict that a person with a Game Shark, and knowledge of a Memory Card trick would uncover this code. And since when did dry humping become so evil?? I hate to break the news to everyone out there, but the Grand Theft Auto series is made for adults, not children, the M on the cover means that it is advised that you are 17 or older to play the game. People put the blame on video games, not on parents. The rating system was implemented so parents could monitor what their children were asking them to buy. It says on the back that it contains “Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Strong Sexual Content, Use of Drugs”… wait a fucking minute!!! Did that just say “Strong Sexual Content”??? This is the game box info as of its initial release, so why wasn’t this a tip of for parents?? Why can’t parents be held responsible? What are we afraid of??

If you have ANY evidence that Rockstar/Take Two is targeting children with their GTA series, let me know. If you can think of any (logical) reason letting a 15 year old play GTA is bad, let me know. I really want to hear the logical point of view on the other side of the fence.

P.S. I was going through adding the links as I do… and was going to add a link to the ESRB Rating Description Page. While doing so, I discovered that AO is described as “Titles rated AO (Adults Only) have content that should only be played by persons 18 years and older. Titles in this category may include prolonged scenes of intense violence and/or graphic sexual content and nudity.” One thing that caught my eye was “prolonged scenes of intense violence”, doesn’t that count Manhunt, and a bunch of other M rated games?? As for the Strong Sexual Content that was already listed on the original box, it is described as “Graphic references to and/or depictions of sexual behavior, possibly including nudity”. I’d say the ESRB did their job, and the parents didn’t!

Awhile back we did an exposé called “Dawn Of A New Era”, which was about how Sony was letting their PSP fall into the ranks of so many others that have dared to wage war against the machine known as Nintendo. The Lynx, WonderSwan, Sega Nomad (does that count?), Game Gear, and many others have felt the pressure of not being able to compete with the Game Boy.

In our article, we talked about how Sony isn’t releasing their own first party games, and how they are leaving it up to the third parties to support the system; we mentioned how Sony doesn’t even have a first quarter line-up! None of that has changed since then, but Sony has made a move.

Instead of making first party games that take advantage of the features and capabilities that only the maker of a system can show the full potential of, they have taken a different route. Sony has been acquiring quite a bit of developers lately, the most recent is military developer turned video game developer; Zipper Interactive. You probably have heard of Zipper Interactive, they make the XBOX exclusive MechWarrior and Crimson Skies series. Most notably though is their SOCOM franchise. It is no doubt that a company that has been making training software for out troops in the field would be able to accurately portray it in a game setting, but will their other titles lack, will they stay XBOX exclusive? Or will they simply disappear?

Some, if not all debate why on earth Sony has not adopted an online community similar to XBOX Live, and some still ponder why they still won’t have it in the PS3! There was however one shocking statement made during the acquisition. Jim Bosler, Zipper Interactive president and CEO talked about online functionality in a recent statement. “As a part of the Sony Computer Entertainment group we can look forward to introducing innovative titles that push online functionality and community experiences even further.”

There you have it, “online functionality and community experiences”, word for word out of the horse’s mouth. Will Zipper Interactive be able to show Sony the light? As mentioned before, they have done a lot of military networking projects; maybe they can bring that to the table for the PS3. As for the PSP, it doesn’t count if you buy up all the people making games for the system! We are looking for games developed by SCEA, SCEE, and SCEJ, not published!

While acquiring Zipper Interactive will probably be good for Sony, I certainly don’t want all the game makers in the pocket of a magazine publisher, or a console maker. The sad fact is that smaller publishers just won’t be able to survive on their own in this next generation. Majesco last year at E3 had a huge booth, contests, and tons of scary people in make-up advertising their game Infected for the PSP. This year they have closed up shop on almost all their games, it looks like the only one we will be seeing is Jaws Unleashed! A game I wasn’t even remotely interested in.

“This month we’re celebrating the publication of our 200th magazine (currently on sale at any bookstore or newsstand worth a crap!). In this magical moment of ink-stained fingertips, blistered thumbs, and spontaneous fits of hugging, why not take the house lights down a notch and contemplate the 10 lowest-scoring games in EGM history?” boasts 1up.com in their recent top ten list.

1up.com names the following as their pick of the top ten worst reviewed games. Batman Beyond, Who Wants to Beat Up a Millionaire, Powerpuff Girls: Paint the Townsvile Green, Powerpuff Girls: Bad Mojo Jojo, KISS Pinball, Urban Champion-e, The Guy Game, Mortal Kombat Advance, The Flintstones: Bedrock Bowling, and finally Ping Pals were the lucky few to make the list. 8 issues in total were named, none of which go back further then 2001!

Now I know this may seem hard to believe, but at 12 issues a year and 200 issues to date, that would be close to 17 years of magazines to choose from, why is it that 1up.com isn’t willing to go back any further then 5 years? The answer may be shocking, but back then a “worst game of all time” would get at its lowest, 2 out of 10. Does this mean that when 1up.com does a “worst reviewed of all time” top ten that it should be purely based on numbers? I personally think not. They need to consider that pre-2001 a 1/10 of today was a 2/10 of back then. The fact that issue #139 makes its self on this list 3 times shows the lack of work put into this article. Hell, the lack of interest can be seen all the way down to the person who coded the page, considering it sports quite a few broken links. Maybe I just shouldn’t expect much from the programmers who have no respect for the GameCube!

Keep in mind, I agree the games listed; especially Mortal Kombat Advance, are among the worst games of all time, but not of the worst reviewed games by a magazine with a 17 year history. Trust me, I have played enough bad games between 1989 and current that should be on this list too. Just because EGM was too afraid to give something a 1 out of 10 back then should not eliminate those issues from consideration. Maybe one day I will provide you (the readers) with my own top ten worst games of all time.

“Creditable Journalism”, a term that assures confidence, something that says you got what it takes and that you aren’t talking out of your ass. Would anyone debate that we shouldn’t have creditable journalism? Would anyone want something that is so untrue or misjudged at first sight based on unreliable sources, or no evidence? Some of the readers over at VGM Watch sure think so!

Keep in mind, this is not an attack on VGM Watch or Kyle Orland, this is a testament to the readers of his blog, and how they seem to not care if a person knows what they are talking about or not. Take for example a snippet from Kyle’s latest blog post, which addresses David Pogue’s recent column in the New York Times on rules for effective trolling.

David Pogue’s recent column in the New York Times on rules for effective trolling should be read by anyone who writes anything on the Internet. Some of the points, though, seemed especially applicable to our particular sphere of interest:

2. Having a violent opinion of something doesn’t require you to actually try it yourself. After all, plenty of people heatedly object to books they haven’t read or movies they haven’t seen. Heck, you can imagine perfectly well if something is any good.

What David is talking about in that column is a person like Jack Thompson, who has probably never played a Grand Theft Auto game in his life. Jack Thompson is the type of person who would attack a game based off a children’s show, if only because Rockstar/Take-Two Interactive made it. A random person could probably send Jack Thompson an email depicting non-existent violence in any given game, and Jack would take it as fact. This is exactly the type of person that David is talking about.

“Point two is debatable. The old saw [sic] ‘you don’t have to eat shit to know it tastes bad’ comes to mind.” says VGM Watch reader, Gus Mastrapa. Another reader by the name of Apreche talks on behalf of failed expectations. “For example, if you’ve played Tony Hawk 1, 2, 3 and 4. And you hated all of them. And Tony Hawk 5 comes out, you can be reasonably certain you will hate it. Just like how you can watch the first episode or two of a TV show and decide whether you will like the rest of them or not.”

I think the problem the readers at VGM Watch are having is that they aren’t actually reading Kyle’s posts. Kyle started his post by stating that the article was regarding journalism and not personal opinion. He also states that anyone who writes anything on the internet should read the article. Apreche and Gus are looking at this numbered list as what gamers should go by, not journalists as it is intended. Personally I don’t take to much stock into what a Nintendo fanboy on a forum says, or in a readers collumn of EGM. However, The instant that fanboy start writing for a Playstation or XBOX website/magazine, I will take there journalistic integrity into question. Writing for a blog gives you the freedom of cramming in as much opinion as possible, but professional video game journalism is un-biased. I expect a journalist to tell me a game lacks a good soundtrack, tell me the graphics are great, but not to tell me that it sucks because it wasn’t released on their favorite system. The last thing we need is more stuff like Jane Pinckard’s early reporting on 1up.com.