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Denver, 3:03 AM
Wed Nov 25
53 posts in the last 24 hours
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Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
11/20/09
I know plenty of people that have those. Sure, more iPods out there, but it's not 100% a monopoly like it was.
11/20/09
iPod is just a brand name.
11/20/09
They did this all not by price fixing, or manipulating government law, or questionable practices. They simplified offer an easy to use stream lined alternative to retail copies and even pirating.
11/20/09
Don't judge me, and most importantly don't be afraid. You'll make the switch too.
11/20/09
11/20/09
Hopefully Stardock will offer more selection of games next year. I just love the fact I don't have to run impulse to play my games, only for updating and validating my purchase.
11/20/09
11/20/09
I could care less if EA store has it for $40, since most if not everything in EA store has limited activation and if you ever need to redownload your game it'll cost you. I don't know if this is true now but the last time I checked the policy has not changed.
I rather buy a game from D2D then EA store and I really don't like D2D (must be because of all those advertisements IGN).
11/20/09
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11/20/09
I'll be buying L4D2 off store shelves though since it's more or less the same price and I won't have to re-download the whole thing whenever I move computers.
11/20/09
What happened to ÂŁ25 New Releases!?
Steam is still the black hole of my wallet though, damn you weekend deals.
11/20/09
Of course, Amazon is still a lot cheaper than both on the whole.
11/20/09
11/20/09
11/20/09
The service seams pretty good, and they do have alot of games.
But what I want to know is; does anyone here use Steam, but they don't play or like any of Valves games?
Thats the case with me at least. I don't like Valves games but I will say that Steam is pretty good from what I see.
Like I said. I DO have Steam on my PC, so I know that they have more that just Valve titles. Much more.
But does anyone use it that doesn't play Valve games.
11/20/09
11/20/09
I did also pick up the Orange Box bundle at one point when it was dirt cheap, but I haven't really played that much (for as good as it is I'm just not an FPS fan).
So I would say that I qualify as someone who uses Steam primarily for non-Valve games. If Steam stopped offering such games or offered them at much higher prices then I would stop using them.
#speakup
11/20/09
1) The weekend/mid-week deals
2) No tax on the games
11/20/09
impulse has weekend deals as well. (weekend impulse buys). And where I live there is no tax on the games.
11/20/09
The Steam percentage sounds pretty believable, no one else has managed to be as successful as they are and I doubt it'll change any time soon.
11/20/09
11/20/09
11/20/09
#speakup
11/20/09
11/20/09
First off, it doesn't have high compatibility with filetypes. It'll play mp3,mp4,wma and a couple of others but no flac support was a disappointment. The sound out of it is fantastic though and that's the main reason I got it.
I can't comment on the video quality too well since I don't use it for that but the built in radio and the ability to download podcasts on it is handy.
Another thing I didn't like was that when using an SD card to add memory to it, the content on the SD card remains seperate to the rest of the content that's stored internally.
If you're looking to upgrade, I'd suggest a Cowon D2. When I was buying the Zen X-Fi, this was another option on the table but despite countless reviews and user comments calling it the best player on the market, I didn't know the brand so I chose to go with the name I trusted. Not long after, a friend got the D2 and I regretted choosing the X-Fi over it. It supports flac which alone puts it above the X-Fi in my book.
Here's a link to the Cowon site: [www.cowonglobal.com]
You should have no problem finding reviews on it either.
11/20/09
#speakup
11/20/09
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11/20/09
Valve...does that name ring any bells? ;)
11/20/09
11/20/09
The lack of TF2 updates show they don't particularly care for 360 too much either. Though Valves attitude to PS3 is a bit harsh and unwarranted.
If you want the best experience from a Valve game, its common knowledge you get it on PC.
11/20/09
11/20/09
@El-Suave: I love the double standard this brings to mind. If PC gamers complained that a developer or publisher didn't release a PC version of their game, we'd be called whingers and whiners yet when Valve (a PC developer) chooses not to develop for a console, it's alright to hate on them.
11/20/09
11/20/09
11/20/09
Another video game blog; let's call it D-toid. No wait, too obvious... Destruc-T... called out this console's champions. They are a special group of people and they are quite vocal about things.
But hey, it's cool to whinge about the 360 getting FF13, since it's "their" game, but the moment someone else gets something they don't get, their developer is a fat ass who eats small children and the countries they live in.
10/03/09
The purpose of advertising is not to demonstrate support for a given TV show, it's to expose a target demographic to your product; whether that demographic likes to watch Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann or Nazi rallies often doesn't affect whether they buy your product, and I don't think anyone looks at the commercials for a program and associates them with that program's editorial viewpoint in the first place.
Pulling support is itself a form of advertising; you're choosing to advertise by NOT advertising, and in doing so assuming an actual editorial viewpoint that you didn't have before on an editorial viewpoint that used to be irrelevant to your product.
Stardock is choosing to advertise by not advertising people who are advertising by not advertising Glenn Beck, taking an editorial viewpoint on an editorial viewpoint on an editorial viewpoint.
Maybe Microsoft should now boycott Stardock, taking an editorial viewpoint on an editorial viewpoint on an editorial viewpoint on an editorial viewpoint. Y'know what, fuck it, let's all fly to Australia.
10/03/09
10/03/09
Also, while not advertising on Program Z may well be a form of advertising in itself, it's one that doesn't cost Company A anything. And of course, they're no longer financially supporting Program Z that Group 2 finds so despicable.
What it comes down to is, what is more profitable: advertising Product X to Group 1 while supporting Program Z and losing customers from Group 2, or pulling advertising from Program Z and alienating Group 1 but retaining all customers from Group 2? Barring actual political activism on the part of Company A (and that's increasingly rare in this day and age), the more profitable path will always win.
10/02/09
Guess what? Steam had it's fair share of issues, and more than it's fair share of complainers (even today) and DRM (it's still DRM, people)and I think it's turned out ok.
Yea, this time it's big bad evil Microsoft at the helm, ready to squeeze the last drop of blood out of the PC stone. I get that- hell, I even agree sometimes. But for me, GFWL is a feature that can get me to look twice at a game I might not have paid much attention to initially.
Aside from the Gears of War certificate issue (not even sure that was a Live issue), and some confusion the first time it needed a GFWL update, it has been a seamless experience for me across quite a few games and hardware changes, and improves with each version.
I actually like having contact with my Xbox Live friends, earning achievements, sending voice messages, joining chats, all while I'm playing through the best versions of Fallout 3, GTA 4, Resident Evil 5, Gears, Red Faction, or Batman, or whatever other games I have that support it. (No good titles? really?).
People hate anything that cramps what they perceive as freedom. But the pc market has been wide open for so long, and look where we are as a result? Massive piracy combined with terrible sales and everyone packing up and moving down the street to Console Land. So MS is trying to reinvent the market in a way that they view is in opposition to the current trend. Is it the best way? No, not by a mile. But has it gotten better, become free, expanded its lineup, and started a reasonably solid platform for the distribution of game updates and DLC (both paid and free)? I think so. And who knows, maybe it will be the final nail for PC gaming- but at least they're trying to do something different , you know, even if it's "nowhere near as good as Steam is".
10/03/09
Being unintuitive and ass-backwards as fuck is as valid criticism of Steam as it is of Live, more or less depending on the platform. Two wrongs don't make a right.
10/03/09
If MS doesn't listen to these developer issues, and if they are in fact genuine issues, then they'll eventually have no more support for their service and it will wither away. I won't cry if that happens, but while it's here, I'll enjoy some of the GFWL features.
10/03/09
@Killtacular: Microsoft not only launched a sub-par service when the road was already leveled out by Steam... Roller... They actually completely neglected improving it for, what, two years. It might have been a great thing if it was the only thing on the market, but it's not.
If it works for you, that's great, and that's really all that matters. But objective discussion flies out of the window when personal opinion walks in.
10/03/09
But what has GFWL brought to the table for games like Fallout 3, GTA IV, and Batman?
The only thing GFWL does with fallout 3 is offer DLC, which I would much prefer to buy with Fallout 3.
GTA IV on PC, which I own by the way, is one of the shittiest ports I've ever played. The voice chat is awful, there isn't even a push-to-talk option, there's NO ANTICHEAT! You can't join a game without having to deal with moders.
The only thing you get with Arkham Asylum is achievements.... which you can do on Steam.
The main argument for GFWL seems to be that it attaches your PC profile with your XBL account. Personally, I don't think that's a good thing at all.
PC and xbox are two separate platforms. It's all part of Microsoft's effort to make the PC into the same uniform system that they have with Console Gaming.
10/02/09
First of all, Microsoft refuses to port games that it published on the Xbox 360 - so, no Fable 2, no Gears of War 2 and no GTA4 episodes, even though original copies did receive a port.
Secondly, the actual service betrays the lack of any interest by Microsoft in the platform. Whereas Steam has something new practically every day, the GFWL site is a ghost town, with games from last year still advertised on the front page. The need to get an Xbox live account just to run the service betrays further where Microsoft's priorities lie.
The problem is that, early on, Microsoft realized that they could charge Xbox 360 users for annual subscriptions for multiplayer and for extra junk like clothes for virtual avatars, whereas PC players would take none of their crap, especially with far superior online services being available for free.
As a result, their interest shifted to the Xbox and they now wish to extricate their players from the PC using the same tactics that they would once use to get Netscape users to Internet Explorer. The best method, according to them, is to extend their exclusivity policy (ie the art of pushing the developers that you fund to no longer make products for a competing platform) to exclude the PC. For a long time, the PC userbase was a threat to the Xbox 360, as any "exclusives" to the system would come out for the PC 6 months later. Now, Microsoft wishes to convince people that all support for the PC has been removed while still somehow maintaining a token "service" that will no doubt disappear within a year or two.
The fact that the platform they are trying to repel/support is also home to Steam, which manages to provide an online service for free, removes most of the piracy issues that developers are worried about, goes out of its way to genuinely care about the customers that pay its bills (which, really, is Adam Smith common sense) and somehow manages to do all that without nickel-and-diming users while staying in the black, shows up GFWL as an even greater embarrassment to the PC community.
10/02/09
10/02/09
I'm just saying that Microsoft is severely, deliberately neglecting and alienating a userbase for the sake of promoting its console, where they are far more capable of making additional profit off stuff like themes, avatar clothing, etc. They are also one of the few Western publishers that do not port their games to the PC, even though it's to an OS that they designed.
I wouldn't call these actions a conspiracy, just as I would not call them mere incompetence. It's just business.
10/02/09
10/02/09
a) Ports of newer games - small audience generally
b) People getting ridiculous value out of their older games - medium audience playing titles like StarCraft, CSS, and TF2
c) People playing MMO's - pretty large audience, especially since there are no real console MMO's.
Why is this a problem? Why should we care about GFWL in such a world where so few people fit in category a)? Steam failed as a "community" (i.e. Steam Community not forums) in that most people still just go off and do their own thing. Face it: Steam is a retail store that gives good support after initial purchase. It's good at that and that's where it's place is. GFWL is dead, don't even try to fix it.
10/03/09
Microsoft has made it very clear that the 360, and not PC, is where their focus lies. It's a more controlled market with higher profit margins. GFWL is nothing but lip service, and what's entirely infuriating is that Microsoft continually sends mixed messages. They'll come up withnew DirectX protocols but then publish a game like Alan Wake, a PC exclusive before the 360 was even on the market, exclusively for the 360.
10/03/09
After that, you go into talking about how Microsoft is shoehoning the PC and while that has a certain air of truth (PC gaming certainly isn't their focus), They aren't trying to get rid of PC gaming to make more people play the 360. They've actually made a decent enough effort over the past year or so with PC gaming, at least it was more of an effort than many developers. Also, GFWL has free online just like Steam.
Sure, GFWL has it's problems and it isn't the greatest but on the consumer side of things, there isn't a whole lot to complain about it.
10/03/09
10/03/09
Gears of War was massively pirated on PC because of the same reason: most of the people who were going to play it already had played it on the 360, and the exclusive PC content only made the players feel cheated.
After all, who wants to spend $50 on another copy of a game you already own to play a couple of levels? Not many people.
10/03/09
10/03/09
As for the pricing structure, I apologize. You only needed to originally pay $50 a year for certain features in multiplayer (I didn't initially research that one well). This was later changed to free. However, this was also the point when new Microsoft Games Studios games were no longer announced for the PC, suggesting that they were no longer as profitable.
I would consider Microsoft's current effort to be akin to Nintendo's commitment to the hardcore Wii crowd back in 2008, before recent announcements of new Marios and Zeldas. There is simply nothing available at the moment.
I'm actually very impressed with just about every other publisher at the moment. Ubisoft, Activision, Capcom, Bethseda and EA not only support my platform by releasing (almost) every game they make on it with the odd delay (often with extra features as a compensation), but also by making sure that the ports are of excellent quality and that all the DLC is also available (sometimes even for free!).
And yes, PC gaming has many other problems besides Microsoft. However, discussing them all is beyond the scope of this post and would probably require a blog all to itself. At the moment, I just wish to focus on one major offender.
10/03/09
10/03/09
I can't vouch the same for multiplayer games, though. Anyway, I've got about 50 games bought, no issues.
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10/03/09
I'm not trying to throw my support behind Microsoft here. I think GFWL is pretty pointless as a whole and it was in shambles for ages. Right now though, aside from the developer issues in which I wholeheartedly back the developers point of view, there really isn't anything to complain about the service from a consumer standpoint, the major bugs have been patched and it runs fine...at least for me it does.
10/03/09
You're half right but you're half wrong. PC gaming is still relatively big. There are still a lot of PC only developers that are doing perfectly fine in the sector, in fact, PC gaming has seen a rise in profitability over the past year. As for the second part of your comment, I can only blame ignorance. While building a gaming PC that will run the newest games is $100-200 more expensive than buying a PS3 or 360, the overall cost of PC gaming is probably cheaper than console gaming what with free online, oftentimes free DLC and games that are often $10-20 cheaper than console games (MW2 excluded). Certainly, PC games don't sell as well as console games but they never would anyway, even if piracy rates were drastically cut. It's a smaller market but an important one nonetheless to the industry as a whole and it won't be going away.
Who really plays pc games now outside of MMOs?
A lot of people. Modern Warfare on PC still has over 10,000 servers running it with many of them full to the brim. games like BF2 and BF2142 also still have a suprising amount of active servers. Company of Heroes and Dawn of War II still see plenty of multiplayer action and games like L4D often have you waiting in line to play they can be so busy. That's just a pick-n-mix of the multiplayer aspect as well. The casual market on PC is huge (and before you say that shouldn't be counted as PC gaming, it's still a section of the gaming market on PC, just like it is on consoles) and more new PC developers are popping up the whole time hoping to take advantage of the lack of restrictions, the generally cheaper development and the strong community support. Like I said at the start of this, A lot of people play PC games and a lot of people play PC games outside of MMO's. To believe otherwise is ignorant.
10/03/09
I still think that Microsoft's neglect of the PC is intentional. It certainly helps the Xbox 360 make them a bit more dough when they have exclusive titles.
10/03/09
He says his reasons for not making Gears 2 for PC is because of horrible Gears 1 sales.
He blames it on piracy...
I blame it on a release date that was what? 1 and 1/2 years after the Xbox version, which said ON THE BOX "Exclusively for Xbox 360" so that many PC gamers who actually wanted it just went on to buy it for the 360.
yeah...