Posts by Izuno

  • Darksiders

    Ok speaking of Dante's Inferno (sorry to derail a little) for those of you outside the US and who may not realize, EA bought a SuperBowl add for DI. And they bought TV time during the NBA All Star game...and they bought a bunch more TV time. So the early offhand estimate for US only TV media spending is potentially $10million or more. I don't know if EA bought TV time in other territories for it, but they have spent a lot of money on marketing.

    But the initial reaction, at least on Xbox 360, is that it is getting crushed by Bioshock 2 and still Mass Effect 2. My guess right now is that it will have similar initial sales to Bayonetta or Darksiders which weren't the worst but to make up for the potentially huge marketing budget, DI will need sales more like Mass Effect or at least Bioshock2.

    In general I found DI to be quite a misfire for EA: if you are going to essentially copy the exact gameplay of another game, at least expand on it and bring something new and fun and at least have really good art design. DI, imo, fails to do both. Not to mention the uninspired level design.

    As for Darksiders, while not the greatest either I felt DS > DI. Further GoW > (DS+DI). :roll:

  • Heavy Rain

    On the acting front I was paying more attention to the way characters moved, which is part of the overall appeal of the presentation. The voice acting itself, sadly, isn't as good and Mazy is dead on with his analysis above. Still, I actually like the story. At least it is something different, even if we've seen QTE before. This will be the first game that is essentially all QTE? Kinda takes some balls of Sony to try something like this...

  • Heavy Rain

    only bumping this because the demo is out on PSN now. I played it tonight and sure does have that the QTE gameplay as seen/expected. I'm not totally sold on how it would hold up over a full game, but I enjoyed the demo. Even the QTE fight sequence wasn't really that bad. The writing and acting is pretty good, though we the lip sync could use work (oh...nm...it's a video game so I should be forgiving).

    Anyway, the demo has me wanting to see more of it. Anyone else play it?

  • Mass Effect 2

    A little analysis on Mass Effect 2 usage (only on 360, not PC) for January. We'll see how much it actually sold (erm...in the US anyway) tomorrow when NPD makes January top sellers public. http://www.industrygamers.com/news/mass ... -says-dfc/

    I actually have yet to play it due to busy-ness. Trying not to read spoilers since it sounds better than the first game in the series.

    Oh and btw, Mass Effect play went up ahead of ME2 launch, but that should not come as a surprise.

  • James Cameron's Avatar

    Sorry to bring this back on topic, but I finally took my wife to see Avatar. She generally falls asleep in anything sci-fi or fantasy. Her idea of torture is being forced to stay awake through Lord of the Rings. Anyway, she loved this movie. :megaman:

    As for me, I liked it even more seeing it for a 3rd time. I haven't seen a movie more than once in a theater since seeing the Matrix 12 times back in my Chicago days. It's funny, now I don't mind the weak dialogue, even though at first I thought it was distracting. I was not expecting it but for me it's gone from Friendly to Honored to Revered...almost to Exalted. I think i the long run it will be on my top 10 all time list (Cameron's Aliens is already on there...)

    Meanwhile, soundtrack is ex-ell-excellent, though I like most anything James Horner does.

  • Mass Effect 2

    Quote from KungFuSquirrel

    If I didn't have a child now, I'd take the day off from work for this one too.

    Similar thoughts here. I'm honestly not that much into console RPGs (though I loved Borderlands which is a kind of RPG...) but I feel that I didn't give ME1 enough time despite enjoying it, even more than Fallout 3 or KOTOR...

    WTF guess this may be one to suck up my time now...

  • Best iPhone/iPod Touch games?

    If you liked the board game Risk, then try Conquest. It's a ripoff but it's pretty good and has many modes/maps.

    Scrabble is a good version of the real game. It's made by EA so has an absurdly long loading screen, but oh well.

    Monopoly another EA licensed iPhone game, is fairly good. AI is sometimes way to hard or way to easy depending on setting, but another good one while sitting on the can.

    (hmm...this is 3 board games in a row...i detect a trend...)

    Brothers In Arms was one of the first shooter/action games I played. I liked it.

    Euchre! is a decent card and totally mindless card game that is 99.99% automatic and 0.01% strategy/skill. If you like card games this is a good mindnumbing one that i bought for 99 cents!

    World Series of Poker Texas Hold'em is my favorite poker game on the iPhone. This is the official WSOP version. Got my bankroll up to $25 million when i stopped playing. I got it for $4.99 and played it a ton. If you have WSOP fantasies of winning it all, this is another great game for trips to the toilet!

    Speaking of toilets, curious about what % of gaming on iPhones occurs on toilets? Has it cannibalized PSP/DS toilet gaming for anyone here?

  • my 2009 games ... and yours ?

    My top 5 are based on what I had time and interest to play, though some of these aren't the best quality

    1. Uncharted 2

    2. Ghostbusters: The Game

    3. Borderlands

    4. Tiger Woods 10 (on Wii with new WiiMotionPlus, for the Nintendo Wii! :roll: )

    5. Conquest (iPhone) it's a Risk knockoff

    biggest disappointment: Brutal Legend...wait...scratch that.

    The biggest disappointment/missed opportunity has to be the Avatar game which I am predicting sold shit in December. I mean, this is the first movie that I said upon walking out of it "I want to play that in a game." And then the game sucked. But didn't we all know that when at E3 they showed nothing to the public and instead had James Cameron up there rambling on for 30 minutes? No offense to Ubisoft, I still love thee but next time a billion dollar action/sci-fi movie comes your way, make a better game.

  • Help me decide what is the best company name.

    Of that list I guess I like Exit Strategy, though Sliced and Diced has interesting appeal. Exit Strategy seems to flow a little better off the tongue.

    [branding 101 you probably know already]

    Meanwhile, the coolness or quality of a game studio's name is shaped 99% by the games it puts out. If id or Valve or Blizzard all produced shit games/products (but somehow magically survived...) would we be more or less likely to think their names are cool or not? It's hard separate the quality or coolness of a game studio name from the games themselves. By itself is "Valve Software" cool? I suppose it is, but is it inherently cooler than "Exit Strategy" or "Sliced and Diced" ? I'm sure some people feel strongly one way or another but again, in the long run it will be about the games.

    [/branding 101 you probably know already]

    But for right now I like Exit Strategy or Sliced and Diced. Kind of indifferent since they both have an edge to them (wait did someone already suggest Edge Games? Brilliant by the way! Fear the wrath of IP Trolls!) You might want to consider if the studio name has a connection to the first game just to help it get attention of industry suits if that will be a concern. If you were making a kids virtual pets game a studio name of "Decapitated Puppy Heads" might not be a good choice...

  • Blizzard Vs Sentura

    true, a good product does not necessarily equal a high quality game. A good product by this logic is something that sells well. There are some high quality games (at least critically acclaimed) that were terrible products, like Beyond Good and Evil. I think this is an old discussion and a lot of have had it before on these boards. So Sentura, your point is heard loud and clear and I agree.

    As for innovation, I think Blizzard was hugely innovative with WoW from the beginning, but then it turned into this giant juggernaut of a game. Its innovation had to become subtle given they can't reinvent the game top to bottom with every major expansion or patch. If it ain't broke don't fix it, just maintain it and listen to what the customer wants. Will that strategy lead to WoW's eventual FAIL? Eh, perhaps. But Blizzard wants their next game to eat WoW rather than a competitor. Oy, I digress...must...make logical...arguments!

  • OnLive

    When consoles have multi-terabyte solid state hard drives that run at higher speeds, more reliability and cooler, one of the bottlenecks in digital distribution (again, on consoles) will be solved. I feel like this will happen before gaming-on-demand technology can fully deliver on shooters etc. In other words It's just a matter of time on widespread console digital distribution, though OnLine/Gaikai/Otoy etc. will be a longer time coming. Hmmm...hasn't everyone been thinking this anyway?

    I'm curious what kind of presence OnLive will have at GDC in March considering that last year it was a bit of a coming out party for them.

  • superiour sequels

    My 11 cents:

    1) Alien was sci-fi/horror, while Aliens added a huge action/military element making it almost a different genre so comparisons are tougher. I did find Aliens more enjoyable overall compared to Alien.

    2) Raiders of the Lost is hands down my favorite Indy movie, and as with Mazy probably my #1 movie of all time. Temple of Doom I found highly underrated but alas inferior to Raiders, but the series shot way up again with Last Crusade. And of course Indy 4 was a total rape of the series and character. Why Mr. Speilberg? Why!?

    3) Of the original Star Wars trilogy, Empire was clearly many peoples favorite. Probably my #2 movie all time. Jedi without the Ewoks = awesome so I can say I liked those sequels better, but Star Wars: A New Hope was a clear groundbreaker so it gets major bonus points. The prequel trilogy is up there with the 2nd and 3rd Matrix movies as the biggest disappointments of all time. However, on a recent Star Wars marathon on SpikeTV I found myself watching the prequel movies on and off throughout the day whereas if it were a Matrix marathon I'd skip movies #2 and 3.

    4) I'm undecided about Terminator 2 over Terminator. Similar to Aliens series, T2 was almost a different genre than T1. There was something about late 70s and 80s sci-fi horror that lacked the action-humor of T2 and Aliens that put T1 and Alien in a different category. T1 had some funny moments, but it was definitely not funny the way T2 was funny. T1 was darker and more ruthless, perhaps again because it was a groundbreaking film in terms of concept/execution.

    5) Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan was about 1 million times better than Star Trek: The Motion picture. Khan is my #3 movie of all time. In fact, as many people know even # ST movies were the good ones until Nemisis which blew chunks. Data died and I didn't give a shit. So in that sense the series went up and down in a cycle.

    6) Original Batman movies all sucked imho except for the first one from 1985. BB and TDK were a new breed and I actually liked TDK better than BB which was still awesome. Heath Ledger in TDK gave possible the best performance I have ever seen which pushed that movie over the top.

    7) The first 2 Jurassic Park movies were both awesome, but I actually think The Lost World was a bit better. Too bad the series took a huge nosedive with Jurassic Park 3. I'm still saddened that Michael Creighton passed away in 2008

    Similar to the Indy series, I found the original Bourne movie totally awesome as we got to know this character and learn about his capabilities. It was the first time we saw a spy like that in cinema. Now "going Bourne" has a whole series of meanings in popular culture. That is an incredibly influential film. The second movie in the series I thought was the worst, as with Temple of Doom in the Indy series, though still good overall. The series ended with an awesome 3rd movie that rivaled the first in excellence.

    9) As for the Lord of the Rings movies, I admit I loved all 3 and could probably watch all 3 extended editions in one day in a row (it would take perhaps 12+ hours, too). Since all 3 were made together the quality level and technical aspects don't really vary / improve much with each new movie. They definitely are not perfect but I feel the 1st and 3rd movies are the best. The first because it's the first time this world comes alive in film and the 3rd because it was epic beyond epic, despite it's 17 endings and the lamest "Gandalf!" line by Frodo at the end. Sheesh. I digress.

    10) Finally, I found the 3rd Harry Potter film to be my favorite, while the 4th was simply too much...I don't know what but it wasn't watchable to me. I haven't seen the 5th through 23rd films in the series.

    11) And as far as the Twilight series goes, my wife and I rented the first. It was OK. Didn't bother to see the second after it got a 17% on RottenTomatoes and my cousin's girlfriend wouldn't shut up about how it was the best movie of all time. Please. :roll:

    And in the un-asked for "THANK GOD THEY DID NOT MAKE A SEQUEL CATEGORY":

    1) E.T. The Extra Terrestrial...What Speilberg did in this film was incredible and it is the only movie that can bring tears to my eyes. A sequel would have pushed it into total lameness territory.

    2) Event Horizon...cause the only thing worse than seeing this movie would be seeing it again or a sequel

  • Clash of the Titans Teaser

    1) I hated the music in this trailer. I can see why it works for some people, but it felt distracting to me. Not sure what the right music would have been though.

    2) Yes, Mazy, ARRRGGG to jumping sword shot

    3) Original is a must see cult classic. It does not hold up well over time, but still a must see. It has this creepy awesomeness in a very campy way.

    4) Legendary takes very, very calculated risks. I can't imagine them completely flubbing this after risking so much and getting such a great return with Batman Begins and then The Dark Knight. While the trailer has great geek fanboy appeal, I'm not sure it will carry a more mass audience even though it has a respectable cast ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0800320/) including the previously mentioned Liam Neeson and then Ralph Fiennes and the awesome character actor Pete Postlethwaite (who was snubbed an Oscar nomination for his role in The Lost World: Jurassic Park... )

  • Robin Hood Movie

    BUT WHAT OF THE KEVIN COSTNERS? WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE COSTNERS!

    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO....

    I really liked gladiator and braveheart, so I'd see this just cause it's like mashing them together. I mean, isn't that how it works? You just mash two ideas you liked together and you get an idea that's at least as good as the sum of the two original ideas?