MORPG?

MMO's on consoles have been wanted for a while but who says that you always have to be online? Why can't an RPG just have online elements and options. Fable 2 was possibly the first RPG to include online play but including online play hardly enhanced the experience. I say that an RPG doesn't have to be MMO or not, why not just include the option for online play? Instead of trying to do the whole game online just do a mission or objective with friends. Using a certain mission would rid the problem of making it an mmo but still include enough online play to make it possible to play with a friend.

The death of rythm games

Guitar hero is a game that has been sweeping the nation from people bragging about beating the fire and flames on expert to just being a fun party game, but has this time passed? With the release of guitar hero world tour the question was raised on how many good songs are left to create on guitar hero or rock band. As I played through every song in the game I started to notice how few songs there were included on the disk and how easy they were in comparison to the last few games. Mind you, I have beatin guitar hero 3 and 1 on expert as well as rock band, rock band 2 and now guitar hero world tour but what i loved about guitar hero 3 was the challenge. I only failed one song on guitar hero world tour and haven't played the game since. I found that when the songs are easy, it's boring to play them over and over. The newest addition to the family, Guitar Hero Metallica, has promise briging the challenge back to guitar hero but is still no guitar hero 2 or 3. It seems to me that with the addition of the new instruments there came a drop in difficulty and a rise in variation of song type. Spanish songs are abundent in GHWT and the incoming country pack brings more variety to the song list but niether category delivers the difficulty for which i lust. Why is it that trying to make the game more user friendly such as adding a begginer mode means that the challenge on expert has to be watered down so that new users will buy the game. I refuse to buy any guitar hero game new until the difficulty returns and I beleive that the community should follow. It's great that they want to get more people playing their game, but taking away the finger numbing songs that appeared in previous installments to make room for this new market is rediculous. If i buy guitar hero metallica, it will be used and for well under $50. Frankly, I'm content playing fallout 3 or mass effect again instead of playing a fake guitar game that I will beat in a week. 

The problem with online play...

Online play is great. If you are sitting at home alone in the middle of a blizzard, you can still meet your friends online and play halo or gears of war with them at any time of day or night. Finding peoeple to play with on other games however...might be more difficult. Wich brings up the question, do the scores given by critics affect the number of people who get the game and completely ruin the online experience for others, and is it really worth it to get a game that is more than a year old.

Army of two is a game that was given very low scores from almost every magazine and site but when you get right down to it, playing with a friend is really fun despite the movement issues. However, if your friends will not play this game with you (such as mine) how can you expect to find anyone to play with when no one else got the game? The main focus of the game is meant to be playing online either in co-op or versus mode. If anyone can get online and find one game of versus, they are incredibly lucky. No one is ever on this game, not to mention if anyone paid for the DLC and is online to play that. Games such as Army of Two are completely ruined by the lack of people online. This is not the only case. As well as the orange box sold it is now a game overlooked by many because they have already beaten portal and half life. Others  have moved on but what about the people that still want to play team fortress 2? They are left in the cold because others have moved on. Why should the ones that bought a sub-par game or got it late suffer? Online gaming is great, but how long before you try to get on left 4 dead and have to play with bots who can't tell left from right not to mention talk to you.

The Abuse of DLC

RE5 has created much controversy from the assumption of racism to unfair price gouging but why this game? why has this never been brought up before? With the recent outcry of hatred towards the impeding RE5 DLC which adds multiplayer to the game which hasn't even been out for a month, I started to wonder if any other developer has been holding out on us. The first blatent case of (attempted) misuse was whem EA and DICE announced the use of microsoft points to purchase multiplayer weapons in Battlefield:Bad Company. This, of course, was nitched due to the outcry from the community and the impending boycott of the game but now with RE5 making the whole multiplayer experience downloadable, the issue arises and along with it so do questions. Like whether or not other developers have disguised DLC as something they should have included in the game but just neglected to in order to gain more money. Gears of war 2 was released and with a new copy came the flashback map pack which seemed to bother people enough that used copy gamers would have to buy it off of marketplace but I have never once heard any outcry or talk in general about the combustible map pack. This map pack was released barely over a month after the retail game launched and many opted for the download and with it new achievement points. Was this just a matter of timing, achievement points, or just making a few extra bucks? It seems like with the timing the maps should have been done before the game was released. Now with 1250 gamerscore under its belt, Epic games is releasing another map pack, again including achievement points with the pack. The snowblind map pack as it's being called seems like it should have been the first DLC for the game as it seems more random and less in theme with the rest of the maps on gears of war 2, yet there is no fight against this and for the limited edition holders of the game $90 will be spent to get on a game with mediocre servers. This is only the begining, the game hasn't even been out a year and the DLC is already pouring in but unlike (the DLC in) Rock Band, downloading these maps is almost necessary to keep up with the gears community. The only reason this is such an issue in my mind is there are many more issues to be worked on than new maps such as an ending that doesn't suck and servers and matchmaking that works. No, I'm not calling Gears of War 2 a bad game, in fact I believe it to be incredibly fun but DLC should not be a focus at all at this point in the games career. Another Q4 2008 game releasing tons of DLC is Fallout 3. This game definetly delivers enough gameplay from the retail and seems like the DLC so far is just adding to the experience but is not neccessary. However the Pitt and Operation Anchorage seem very short in comparison to Broken Steel which is the last of the new missions to be downloaded sometime next month. Is selling these two seperately really necessary? or is it another case of hidden profit by a company. Bungie is also following suite in this divide and conquer tactic towards DLC. Yes the limited edition of Halo wars got the Mythic Map pack first, but that's understandable and a good marketing strategy. What really seems to be the profit margin is splitting up the mythic map pack into two seperate downloads. I don't care if it's 6 maps, release it all at the same time, or at least charge less for the individual downloads, DLC started out as a way to expand the game experience but it is quickly becoming a way for companies to earn extra profit. All this DLC is making me wonder how long until updates become something to buy?

Can the used game industry make peace with game developers?

There has been lots of opposition from game developers towards used game sales and trading such as playswitch, gamestop, gamecrazy, and renting games by service like gamefly or blockbuster. Game developers are going to lenghs to stop this by doing such things as including DLC codes in new games that a used game customer would have to buy. Others are wanting to start %100 online distribution of their games which would completely halt the used game sales as data cannot be re-sold. I say that developers should be trying to work with used game sales and trading instead of butting heads. I know I have done my fair share of buying, selling and trading used games at gamecrazy but that does not mean I don't want to support the companies that make the games. Why can't these companies start tacking on charges that would be pure profit towards the developer? It wouldn't be as much as they would get from a new game, but it would help to end this conflict while still supporting the companies that make gaming possible. I do like the 20 or 30 bucks I save buying used but i always feel bad not supporting the industry and only supporting gamecrazy (I am completely against gamestop and believe them to be ignorant about games). I would love to pay an extra $5 or so of money to go directly to the publisher and developer. granted, I'm not sure how much profit per new game a developer makes but I would absolutely love to get a discount on the used copy as well as give money to the developer that worked for months or years to design and code the game. I see no problem to this, I already pay $3 for gameguard (if i break, even snap, my disk I get a new one), so why not pay an extra 5? In times such as this where money is tight people are looking for bargains, but if a bargain does not support anyone but the store it does absolutely no good to anyone. Send the word that used game sales should support developers, not that developers should despise used game sales.

Jumping right in:2008 Q4 overlooked games??

Q4 of any given year is always a time for video game developers to bombard the gaming community with video games of all types. 2008 was no different with fallout 3, left 4 dead, and gears of war 2 being some of the AAA titles 2008 had to offer. But, with all the buzz and hype surrounding these games and funds running low, many games were not bought and are diamonds in the rough as some may say. Games such as the EA releases of Mirrors Edge and Dead Space saw poor sales. Well, I beleive these two games to be very inticing and at least worth a rent if not a buy. Dice truly brought gamers a new experience that can be described as Assasins Creed or Prince of Persia (another Q4 title) in a first person perspective. While Mirrors Edge has a much more distinct appearence of a brightly colored city rather than taking advantage of natural beauty this style works very well for the first person perspective. I say this because it provides a beautiful view but most beauty lies in front of the player. Yes to the sides there is a city that can be viewed in times of leisure but when the running is "intense" the faith still offers the player spectacular scenes in front of the player. The controls take some getting used to but as you play they become as natural as using the right trigger to shoot in any fps. While there is no multiplayer the leaderboards for time trials and speed runs offer a close to multiplayer experience. The game allows you to download ghosts of other users time trials. While this is not direct multiplayer you can race any ghost, including your friends, and try to beat them or get some ideas for a better route to improve your time. Mirrors Edge is a must play, whether its a rent or a buy is up to your specific tastes. If you are expecting lots of combat this is not your game. There is limited combat and most of the fun is avoiding combat and finding a way around it. The story mode has limited replayability except to find the runners bags and increase the difficulty level. I will say that the time trials has lots of replayablity and contains hours of entertainment.  Any person who owns a gaming console (not the wii) must play this whether it is rented or bought is up to the particular person but it is a must play game for everyone, hardcore or not. 

The second title I beleive has been overlooked is Dead Space. I rented this game and want to play it again. Again there is no online play and is purely a single player game. The lack of a HUD seems like the experience would be different from any other game and it is, but it makes the experience so much better. The weapons are very inventive and all have a second attack. The first weapon received can be shot with a vertical bullet line or horizontal bullet line. While this seems like a useless tool the main (and basically only way) to kill an enemy is to shoot off the limps of all enemies. This mechanic makes the game somewhat harder but can also be easier in some scenarios. The third person camera rarely gets caught on object but it can and when your view is blocked it's problematic. As portrayed by the "lullaby trailer" the game is supposed to be scary. The main scare is the mood and music rather than shock value. Yes there are some jump out of your seat moments but the horror is mostely in the suspense and the sheer look and difficulty of ememies. The ending is truely scary and the story is very interesting. This game has lots of replayability and is required to get most achievements. This game is very original and entertaining. Dead Space and Mirrors Edge are among many games overlooked in 2008 and I'm sure there are many more to come in 2009.

Welcome to lagged loading screen:personal info and podcast galor

Hello fellow gamers and such. This is a video game blog and nothing else. I will do my best to keep up but with school and other commitments I may not stay entirely up to date. My goal is to update once a week and to at least keep you informed via twitter. So a little information about myself. I am a 16 year old male in colorado. I currently subscribe to many podcasts devoted to gaming, notably OXM podcast, Sarcastic Gamer red(orange), blue and, pink, the video game show, every ign podcast such as game scoop and three red lights, geekboxx and invisible walls are the ones i listen to (or watch) every week. So in the spirit of podcasts I would like to say that if you are reading this and own an xbox the OXM podcast is a must. Sarcastic gamer red and orange show are among my favorites. I do not own a ps3 but still listen to the blue show and would recommend it to anyone who owns a playstation product. Invisible walls is a video podcast and can be found on i-tunes or gametrailers.com. As well as listening to podcasts I (of course) play video games, mainly xbox 360 but the occassional wii game at a friends house or computer rts is not out of the question. My xbox gamertag is trueShortDude to whom it may concern so send me a friend request if the mood may strike you.