When Spencer entered the doors at Xbox’s headquarters in Redmond, WA he was putting out a lot of fires and he needed to change consumer perceptions about Microsoft’s Xbox One platform which didn’t debut well compared to the Playstation 4. He has done a lot for consumers since he started at Microsoft, but what he has done to internal Xbox team perceptions might prove to be his biggest coup. From the outside, at least, it looks like Spencer’s reign at Xbox has done wonders since the turbulent launch of the system.
Today President Barack Obama was in Poland to meet Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk. In 2011 Prime Minister Tusk gave President Obama a copy of Polish publisher CD Projekt Red’s popular game The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings to symbolize Poland’s position in the global economy. Even though the President has yet to play the game, every video game news site on the web has reported this story.
Let me explain the “news” again.
George Bush would have beaten the game twice by now. Obama needs more vacation.
I’m sorry to be trite. It must be hard to work for popular video game sites. I would kill to work at sites like IGN, Gamespot, or Polygon, but I am not sure how rewarding writing puff articles that merely mention “video games” would be for me. I am sure that I would love the opportunity to work at these companies, but I pride myself on writing well thought out articles that appeal to me and appeal to what audience may read my stuff.
Most of the articles also mentioned that CD Projekt Red will be having it’s annual Summer Conference later this week. The company will be releasing information about the third game in the Witcher series; The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. This part of the article is informative. But, I would assume, most mainstream websites have already written that rote press release article also.
FCC vs. American citizens
I’m sure that I am a minority. I like to get my news, not just video game news, from different sources. I get news sent to my RSS reader, so, like today, when the same story pops up 10 different times I lose a little faith in the business prospects of these companies. I am sure that each website has their own niche group that only goes to that one website. I have a friend who only goes to IGN and regurgitates everything that he reads on that website. I am so happy there are people like Leigh Alexander and Patrick Klepek who can write the articles that interest them. I am glad there are websites like Gamasutra that can write articles with more depth.
I am thankful that I learned how to think critically at a young age because it taught me how to take a puff piece and write something different.
Polygon’s Jenna Pitcher wrote an article on the announcement of Modern Warfare 2 and 3 for OSX. I was completely flabbergasted when I read this article. Who are the diehard Mac fans who have been waiting for this release?
I am a hardcore Mac user, but I gave up the platform to Boot Camp long ago. I know that Aspyr Media has been doing god’s work (porting games to Mac) for years now, but isn’t it a little too late? Does Aspyr recoup the cost associated with converting these games? They must or else they would have been flushed long ago.
When I contacted Aspyr Media, Sales Manager Michael Blair told me that the company housed a nimble staff of 50 Mac developers and QA staff. Just for context, Randy Pitchford, CEO of Gearbox, said in an interview with Polygon that Gearbox employs between 100 – 300 people. So, Aspyr have a pretty small staff of Mac evangelists and, since they have been in business for over ten years, they must be making enough to keep them in the Mac business.
Steam + Mac = True Love
Even with Steam’s push to make games playable on many different operating systems through Steamplay Mac has not been able to branch out much. They still have Civilization and there are tons of indie games and casual games that need to be distributed on every platform imaginable to make a buck, but they have never really been able to stand up next to the PC as a gaming platform. (They might be closer to Ouya.)
I am glad that Aspyr Media is out there porting games to Mac. Even with the Intel chipset becoming standard in all Apple computers and Boot Camp being a completely viable option to run Windows on a Mac, can they really sustain this kind of business model?
Mr. Blair thinks that his company’s business will continue making games for the Mac platform for the foreseeable future because of the hardcore Mac community that won’t play games on a Window PC.
Mac ABSOLUTELY is a viable platform and I urge you to launch Steam again to see the myriad of AAA titles now on the Mac along with a great number of impressive indie titles. Sure, its hard to see a future where Mac is as big a platform as the PC, but like many other Mac users, I can’t see a future of me ever using a PC. So there will always be an opportunity for gamers like you and myself.
Modern Warfare 2 and 3 were released 3 and 5 years ago respectively for other platforms. I would assume that their release for the OSX platform would be moot at this point. But according to Mr. Blair there are a lot of Mac gamers who have been waiting with bated breath for these games to be released.
I asked Mr. Blair how many concurrent players were playing Modern Warfare 3, the newest of the two games, he wrote back saying, “Usually, there are about 6-7k concurrent players on MW3 thanks to cross-platform multiplayer with the PC.” So, even if we forget that many of those people could be PC players, that is only 6000 – 7000 people. I know that many people do not even go online with many games, but that still seems like a pretty low number.
“Nuh uh! _______ is way better,” said every fanboy ever.
I am truly in awe that there are developers out there porting games to the Mac platform. As a long time Mac addict, I am always excited to play games in OSX, which in my opinion, is a superior operating system to others on the market. But, in the end, I am just too avid a gamer to wait for games to be released on the Mac.
Farokhmanesh confirmed the 8 person multiplayer, which can be turned on or off, which will allow the player to infiltrate another players world and using “encryption based PVP.” The player will impact the notoriety or fame of other player through hacking; your notoriety will go up with successful hacks and go down if you are hacked. (Could this just be a glorified Rush mode?) The Polygon video above has renewed my interest in the game.
From the gameplay footage that I have seen and through the information in the Farokhmanesh article and the Brian Crecente article that appeared earlier this month, I think that Ubisofts ” The Great Watch Dog Hope” looks like a mix of Naughty Dog action (Unchartedand TheLast of Us came to mind when I watched the action in the video.) and, hopefully, Syndicatestyle cyberpunk hacking. Although, Ubisoft doesn’t want their game to end up like EA’s Syndicate sales-wise.
I am much more excited to play Watch Dogs now after seeing the Polygon video and reading the two Polygon articles, so I guess that part of their marketing worked; for me, at least. The biggest question I have though is: What does this game mean to Ubisoft?
I know that Ubisoft is a big company and it is built to take a flop. But, can it take a flop like this? In this down economy no developer can risk losing money. Will this be Ubisoft’s uDraw?
uDraw kicks ass! Thanks Mom!
If Ubisoft is going out to places like Polygon right now, before the game comes out, are they really trying to be honest with the media? You can excuse me if I am skeptical that a publisher isn’t shoveling shit into my mouth and calling it chocolate. With the financial commitment that Ubisoft has put into Watch Dogs they would not shelve it at this stage of the game, but they just might get out there and try to convince the media and the public that they spent their extra time making their game into the new “be-all-end-all” of gaming.
I bought Too Human. I bought into all of that bullshit that Denis Dyack fed to me because I wanted to believe Too Human was good. That was my fault and I have learned from my bad decisions. But, you will excuse me if I am less than convinced that Watch Dogs is going to be anything more than a GTA style action game that had serious problems with development up until a few months ago.
I loved Costume Quest. Everything about the game is perfect; nostalgic feelings, jokes, pacing, RPG system, length, etc. I can see myself playing through the game every Halloween; just like some might watch the Peanuts cartoon or Ernest Scared Stupid. This year, I am going to have a couple new ways to enjoy this great franchise.
Polygon reportedDouble Fine, the developer of the Costume Quest video game series, and Zac Gorman are working together to bring Costume Quest and it’s cute characters to the printed page alongside the release of the sequel in a new graphic novel titled Costume Quest: Invasion of the Candy Snatchers.
Gorman, who’s Tumblr drew someone at Double Fine’s attention, has been posting comics, pictures, and musings on his blog, Magical Game Time, for years. I wished that I had heard about him before this announcement, but I guess it’s better late than never.
What do the game and comic have in common? Style!
In Gorman’s interview with Comics Alliance, he revealed that instead of following the human characters who starred in the game, his first stab at a graphic novel will follow Klem, a nice Grubbin (the enemies of the first game), on his journey during that same action packed night.
I wanted to tell a story from the other side of the fence. The series pretty thoroughly examines the human side of things, so I wanted to try something different. I thought it’d be fun to see Halloween from an outsider’s perspective. Initially, I wrote this really long convoluted plot which delved a bit more into the everyday life of the Repugians [the monsters] and their relationship with Halloween but I had to condense it down into something I could finish in a realistic amount of time.
I am exited to see that Mr. Gorman created that convoluted plot which he might be able to turn into other graphic novels if this one is successful. Needless to say, I am super excited about this coming October. Hell! I might even dress up.
Microsoft has been struggling to find it’s position on the NPD monthly sales charts. Today Polygon reported that Best Buy and Walmart are offering the Xbox One for $449, which could help Microsoft make a play at the top spot this month. Both retailers are also offering the new Titanfall bundle for the same price; so, essentially, you are getting a copy of Titanfall and a Xbox One for $449. I have seriously thought about going to Walmart four or five times tonight.
Walmart told Polygon that this $50 less price tag is “a limited time” offer, while Best Buy declined to comment on any specific end date for the price change. When Polygon reporter Samit Sarkar called Microsoft for comment he wrote this;
The $50 discount on the Xbox One isn’t indicative of a price cut from Microsoft, a company spokesperson told Polygon, saying, “This offer is available at Walmart and Best Buy retail stores in the U.S. for a limited time. Microsoft sets a suggested retail price, but specific pricing and offers vary by retailer.”
Microsoft has to give this kind of response to this news; whether they have anything to do with this or not. They want to distance themselves from this for whatever reason. The quote from Microsoft was written in such a way that it doesn’t mention “price drop” at all.
If they would have wanted credit for this they would have made this a huge announcement at CES, but a $50 price drop isn’t big enough news for that kind of announcement. I wouldn’t doubt though that Microsoft, an American company, went to Walmart and Best Buy, two of the biggest American retail companies, and asked them to be “test markets” for a cheaper price point.
The Fan Boy Brigade has taken to Microsoft Paint – Beware!
I really do believe that Microsoft needs to lower the price for it’s console. I am sure that they will do it, but “When?” is the the biggest question. I am sure that this “limited time” offer will give Microsoft some good data that will help them decide what to do before E3 starts.
Xbox head Phil Spencer has spent a lot of time trying to silence Xbox’s detractors but with Xbox One’s third month on top of Sony in NPD console sales it looks like Spencer’s approach is panning out for Redmond.
