February 10, 2009 - Last week, a nation mourned over the loss of our last launch Xbox 360. Microsoft felt our pain. Following our obituary, Microsoft sent its condolences, accompanied by some lovely flowers. The mega-corporation also provided a coffin for our dearly departed 360.
The card that came with the flowers read:
“Our deepest condolences on your loss. Our thoughts are with you.”
aThe European Commission (EC) has granted Mozilla, the open-source collaboration behind the Firefox Web browser, the right to join its antitrust case against Microsoft, a spokesman said Monday.The Commission, Europe’s top antitrust authority, charged Microsoft last month with distorting competition in the market for Web browsers by bundling in its Internet Explorer (IE) browser with the Windows operating system.
If the charges stick, then Microsoft could be forced to change the way it distributes IE, as well as pay a fine for monopoly abuse.
Mitchell Baker, Mozilla’s chairperson said in a blog that appeared over the weekend that she wanted to offer Mozilla’s expertise “as a resource to the EC as it considers what an effective remedy would entail.”
She said there isn’t “the single smallest iota of doubt” that Microsoft’s tying of IE to Windows “harms competition between web browsers, undermines product innovation and ultimately reduces consumer choice.”
Mozilla has been granted what’s called “interested third party” status in the case, which allows it to submit arguments to the European regulator, to see the confidential statement of objections the EC sent Microsoft last month, and to participate in a face-to-face hearing if Microsoft requests one.
However, it isn’t a complainant in the case. That role goes to Norwegian Web browser Opera, which complained to the EC just over a year ago about Microsoft’s practices in the browser market.
Firefox is IE’s nearest rival in Europe, according to market share data from French researcher XiTiMonitor.
Last November IE’s usage share in Europe stood at 59.5 percent, Firefox 31.1 percent, Opera 5.1 percent, Safari (Apple’s browser) 2.5 percent, and Google’s recently launched Chrome browser at 1.1 percent, XiTiMonitor said.
Google and Apple weren’t immediately available to comment on whether they too would apply to join the EC’s antitrust case.
The EC’s browser case follows a landmark antitrust ruling against Microsoft in 2004, resulting in fines of over US$1 billion. Part of that case dealt with the bundling, or tying, of Media Player to the Windows OS.
Besides fining Microsoft, the EC also ordered the company to offer a second version of Windows with Media Player stripped out.
The second version bombed in the shops as it was sold for the same price as the bundled version.
Jon von Tetzchner, Opera’s chief executive said last month he hopes the EC won’t apply the same remedy in the browser case.
“The only way to give users a genuine choice is to strip out IE from Windows and either replace it with a rival browser or offer users a list of browsers to choose from,” he told IDG in an interview.
Resident Evil has been in the hearts and minds of gamers for well over a decade now. Every time it appeared as if the series was growing stagnant Capcom found a way to inject life into the series. Resident Evil 4 was the series grand opus. It was the culmination on a decade worth of work and in many peoples eyes, the perfect game. Now that the 7th generation of consoles is upon us. Gamers have become harder and harder to impress. Games that do not offer anything new are often left in the bargain bins at GameStop.
Now that the Resident Evil 5 demo is available on Xbox Live and PSN gamers are having their say. The reaction thus far has been mixed. Here is GamingFront.nets take on the demo:
If I could pick one word to describe the demo for Resident Evil 5 it would be “Horrible”. As a fan of the series I never thought that I could say that. I loved every game in the series so far and was excited for the coming release of the game. After the demo though, no way!
For starters the graphics in the game are bland and uninspired. Sure the graphics look good in screen shots but in motion, well its another story. Everything in the game looks sun bleached. Maybe it’s due to the locale that the game is set in, but I just found the game to look very bland.
The biggest problem that I had with the demo was the controls. It feels like a regressed version of Resident Evil 4. The gun sight is deadly slow while the enemies are extremely fast. Walking around is still a bulky slow endeavor. Also the new inventory system is all wrong. One thing I always loved about the series was the ability to pretty much pause anytime and go into your inventory. In Resident Evil 5 the action does not pause and you are forced to navigate the inventory while in battle.
The animation remains the same as it was in Resident Evil 4. It was cool when Resident Evil 4 came out. The pin-point accuracy of the laser sight was a (pun time) sight to behold. It was amazing back in the day to shoot a foe in the arm and watch him react accordingly. In Resident Evil 5 is looks the exact same. This is a huge problem. When you take a game as popular as Resident Evil into a new generation you had better step up the game. Capcom seems to have failed at this on so many levels.
GamingFront.net will have a final review of the game when it is released. As of now it seems that Capcom slapped some new paint on an old engine and said sequel done. Lets just hope the finished product is better than the god-awful demo was.
If there are two ways to get people riled up on the internet, one is to question their religious or political beliefs, and the other way is to make fun of their favorite video games.You see that your favorite game franchise of all time is listed on Old-Wizard’s most overrated
video game franchises? Surely it can’t be! You know us though, we have a knack for knocking down the typical things people enjoy.In this list, we tried to think of
video game franchises that just plain piss us off because everyone else loves them and we think that they’re total ass. Going into our thinking process when considering these overrated
video game franchises were their lack of creativity and a lack of entertainment that they possessed, as well as the fading quality of each subsequent game in the series. We don’t think that these next ten video game franchises are necessarily bad, but we also don’t think that they deserve the critical acclaim that they’ve received either.10. God of War
God of War 2 on the Playstation 2 had to be one of the most over-hyped games to ever be released.The reason could be that IGN gave the first game in the series a 9.8, even though it was pretty much nothing more than a repetitive hack and slash game. While there are puzzle portions to these games, they are really slow, and they only serve to slow the games down. There’s also no real innovation in either game. But if you’re a big fan of mindless button mashing with good graphics, you’ll probably like this series, but I doubt that many fans of the golden age of video gaming who have played classic games like A Link to the Past and Chrono Trigger would give this game a 9.8.
9. Guitar Hero
I’ve never been able to figure out why anyone likes the Guitar Hero series.Why has this
franchise sold so many games?Is it because of the shitty background graphics?Or maybe it’s the bad music in the series, especially in the third installment, the so-called “Legends of Rock,” which features songs from overrated bands like Kiss, and the Sex Pistols.It’s because of these reasons that unlike many of the other franchises on this list, the Guitar Hero games aren’t just overrated, they aren’t even good.When you think about how bad these games are, it’s hard not to laugh at the fools who pretend to “riff” with their most rock star inspired poses in their dorm room, surrounded by a bunch of drunk or stoned friends.It’s also hard not to include Guitar Hero on this list.
8. Tekken
Every
time I hear someone say that Tekken is the best fighting series ever made I think that he or she is a rookie.Anyone who has ever played the Street Fighter series or the Mortal Kombat series would laugh when hearing this claim.The graphics in the Tekken games are good, but the fighting is utter crap.It mostly consists of button mashing.You’re either executing a 9-step combo that takes away half of your opponent’s life, or you’re getting in one hit that puts them in the air and then you juggle them until they die. Or my personal favorite, you knock them on the ground and do three sweeps before they can get up. Compare this style of game play to a much more fun fighting game like Super Smash Brothers Brawl where it’s much harder to button mash effectively, and you’ll see one of the many reasons why Nintendo is currently dominating the
video game market.
7. Halo
When someone tells me that Halo is the greatest
video game
franchise ever made (and believe me, this happens a lot.O-W must have received a hundred emails asking us why we left all three Halo games off of our Top 100 Video Games List) the first thought that pops into my head is that the person telling me that is twelve years old.I don’t think that you’ll find too many old school gamers who have played truly epic games like A
Link to the Past or Super Mario 3 saying that Halo is the best
video game
franchise of all
time.Does Halo really compare to old SNES classics like Super Metroid or Mega Man 2? The first game is short, has repetitive level designs, and a pretty small array of guns.The second game is often heralded for how “revolutionary” because players can wield two weapons at once, steal vehicles and have online multiplayer. Have these people ever played GoldenEye or pretty much any other first person shooter made since Doom 2?Yes, the Halo games can be entertaining for an hour or two at most, but don’t ever say that either one is better than Super Metroid.
6. Sonic
Sonic 1 was a pretty good game, and Sonic 2 could even be considered a great game.Even we wouldn’t deny that.But after Sonic 2, the Sonic series was worn out. While Sonic 2 was an improvement over Sonic 1, in the third installment of the series everything stayed the same. There’s Sonic, and Tails, and new levels with shitty music (compared to the often overlooked soundtrack of Sonic 2.) Sonic 3 though is championed amongst Sega gamers as continuing the Sonic “tradition” of always improving games. Oh yeah, you could play as Tails. Whew, what an improvement that was. And then when Sonic went to 3D, we saw a new low point of the series. The 3D games veered further and further away from Sonic’s simple, yet elegantly satisfying roots, and entered into a territory of uninspired game play, pointless mechanics, and annoying supporting characters.
I’ve owned Half Life for about six years now and I can honestly say I’ve maybe played it for a total of two hours. The
Half Life games suffer from several shortcomings, not the least of which is a complete lack of enemy variety.People often ask us why we’re such big fans of older games, as opposed to newer games.Compare how many different types of bad guys there are in
Half Life 2 to a game like Super Mario 3 and you’ll see why we like games from the 16 bit era so much more than the games released today.The game play is repetitive, and neither game in the series has a huge selection of weapons.I’m not saying that
Half Life 1 and 2 are bad games, but neither game is deserving of the massive hype that surrounds this series.With
Half Life 2 receiving an average rating of 96%, and Maximum PC calling it “The greatest game ever made” we think that the
Half Life series deserves its spot on this list.
4. Ghosts N’
Goblins
Talk about overrated.For some reason the Ghosts N’
Goblins series is one of the most loved video game franchises among retro gamers, and yet I have to wonder when the last time any of the people who constantly defend these games had actually played them last.1/8th through the first level of the first Ghosts N’ Goblins you’re surrounded by mounds and mounds of enemies. As you’re walking as your character, you’re basically surrounded by a force field of enemies coming at you from every possible angle. Okay, maybe if you had a lot of energy or someone decent armor, you could take the level one onslaught of nefarious enemies. As you walk, you see that you do have armor, looks like pretty strong armor, until a weak ass looking bird swoops down, barely hits you, and your armor comes flying off. Not even faux-Halloween armor is this poor. I’m pretty sure that if a bird touched a plastic suit that you wore for Halloween, it wouldn’t come flying off. As your worthless armor comes flying off, you’re left with an almost-naked character who is left with nothing on except underwear. Q: Who wears nothing under armor? Am I inept to mid-evil tradition or is there something completely untenable about someone wearing nothing
under armor? You’re basically left naked running around in the wild with a force field of petulant enemies surrounding you at every second. This stultifying
game play leads you to give up after 1 to 2 minutes making you feel like shit and making you retire to much more germane games with more sane difficulty levels.If you still wanted to play Super Ghouls N’ Ghosts after playing this game, then you’re probably insane.
3. Resident Evil
If there was ever a
video gamefranchise that didn’t deserve the endless praise from the mainstream
video game press it’s the Resident Evil series.Before you even read the reviews of a new RE game from IGN and Gamespot you just know that it is going to get a nine point something.Resident Evil 4 received a 9.8 from IGN and a 9.6 from Gamespot.Really, is RE4 a close to perfect
video game?Sure it looks cool for a while, but then it becomes dull as hell.You walk around and random things attack you.Its not scary, it just bad horror flick shit when someone comes from behind you trying to attack you.You get the usual weapons to fight off the usual suspects.You can get devoured by parasitic monsters everywhere you turn. Where have I seen this before? How about every fucking Ghosts N’
Goblins remake there ever was. The over-the-shoulder approach to this game couldn’t save it from being just plain dull.I’m not saying that the Resident Evil games are bad games, they just don’t deserve the exorbitantly high scores they constantly receive from the mainstream
video game press.
2. Grand Theft Auto
Old-Wizard’s dislike of the GTA series is well known.Like many modern day
video game franchises, the GTA games focus too much on being realistic and too little on the actual
game play.IGN gave GTA 4 a 10 out of 10, while giving a really fun game like Super Mario Galaxy a 9.7.The only rational explanation for this is that press version of GTA 4 must have come with some drugs.Was GTA 4 really perfect?Did these guys even play
the game before Rockstar gave them a boatload of cash?Why is this game perfect?Is it because it looks good?Is it because you have a cell phone in
the game (which is fucking annoying by the way)?Anyone who can’t find some little fault with a
video game shouldn’t be a
video game critic.While the sleek graphics of the Grand Theft Auto games may look good enough to fool the sheepish mainstream media, anyone who reviews the game for themselves will notice how they mimic our worst instincts of modern pop culture, like our love for unadulterated violence and hedonistic images.The Grand Theft Auto series is unquestionably one of the most overrated
video game franchises of all time.
1. Pokemon
Ask almost any twelve year gamer what the best RPG of all time is, and they’ll probably tell you that it was Pokemon.But ask any old school gamer who has ever played Final Fantasy 3 or Chrono Trigger what they think of the Pokemon games, and they’ll tell you that they were an annoying fad at best.It was because Pokemon Red and Blue that civilization had to endure the endless amounts of Pokemon-mania that came after it. The characters were irritatingly soft, and the
game play tried too hard to be simple, and lacked the kind of depth needed to make a RPG great. The games in Pokemon series certainly tried to act like an RPG, with turn based battles and areas in which you could speak to another friend, but c’mon, look at some of the enemies you had to face; happy bats and mice that looked like the kind of mice your cat brings back to you to show you affection. RPGs are great in that they transcend the small ambitions of the real world and escape into epic fantasies. Pokemon lowered the standards for the great game style of the RPG.
Sony is a great company. No one can deny the force that they have become in the gaming industry. Anyone who thinks that Sony is on the brink of collapse is a fool.
As a brand the Sony PlayStation is here to stay. The Playstation 1&2 combined have sold 270 million units world wide. This by itself secures Sony a place in the industry for a long time yet to come. Yet if you take into account the estimated PSP Sales of 44 million world wide sales total of you come to the number 314 million PlayStation Brand units sold. (Keep in mind this number neglecting current sales of the PS3) So all Sony haters need to just let it go, Sony is not going anywhere anytime soon.
With all that aside, in Sony’s third generation of life as a console manufacture life is not so great right now. The PS3’s install base is estimated to be around 20 million. While this is a decent number it pales in comparison to the Wii. As for the battle for second place with the 360, Sony trails by around eight million units. On the surface these numbers don’t seem to be too bad, however when you look at the bigger picture you can see that Sony is going through a very rough patch.
Let’s just face the facts. Sony’s expectations of the PS3 are just not being met. Sony did not intend for the PS3 to be eating the Wii’s scrapes and biting at the 360’s heals. They intended for another round of console domination. After three years Nintendo sits on top of the console world at an estimated 45 million units sold. The table this generation has been completely flipped upside down by Nintendo’s underdog turned wonder dog. These facts alone have got to frustrate the hell out of Sony. The PS3 is just not simply producing the way Sony intended it to.
On the software side of things Sony is failing at keeping pace with the Wii and 360’s software sales. The executives at Sony have got to be standing around scratching their heads in disbelief. Prior to the PS3 Sony only new software and hardware dominance, so right now it is not too far fetched to believe that the people over at Sony are in shock and it shows.
As recently as last week Kaz Hirai was quoted by Eurogamer as saying the “Xbox 360 lacks longevity” and that Sony still has “official leadership” of video game industry. He went on to add “unless things go really bad, there’s no way that at the end of a life cycle our competition is going have a higher install base.”
Mr. Hirai what are you talking about? How bad do things have to get before Kaz Hirai and Sony decide to pull their head out of the sand? Instead of facing reality they try to spin it in a positive light.
Despite what everyone thinks about the PlayStation 3 being expensive and in need of a price cut to make it a “reasonable” buy, Sony might need a lot more than a price cut to catch up to Microsoft’s Xbox 360.
Forgetting about Nintendo (who hasn’t) and just looking at what advantages Microsoft has over Sony, Sony looks to be in a pickle. Microsoft has come hard this generation with an early start and has continued to compete and outdo Sony, sales wise, despite the 140m+ fan base Sony had last generation. Microsoft seems to be playing their cards right this time around.
Microsoft has the price advantage going into a new year, but they also can drop the price a second time leaving them at $150. That alone will put a dent in Sony’s hopes and dreams. The Xbox at $150? And with a wide variety of casual games, RPG’s, and shooters to fill any gamers’ needs? It’s a dream come true! The PlayStation 3 needs a price cut early this year to be more attractive to more people with the bad position our economy is currently in.
Another advantage would be that the 360 is far easier to develop for. Although the PS3 is more powerful, a lot of developers out there are lazy and just want to make a game that is “good enough” and not try to surpass the ordinary. This is why the 360 is the platform of choices for a lot of them.
Microsoft all together is in a better position than Sony right now, and I’m not saying Sony isn’t in a good position. It’s just that Microsoft is in a better one. On top of that Microsoft has marketed their console till no tomorrow and the message is already out there that Xbox 360 is cheap, has the best online service as of now, and the list goes on.
Sony really needs to get their act together because not only does Microsoft have the advantage, they also have the money, and money equals power, and power equals control. You can’t deny the fact that Microsoft has a lot of advertising deals with certain gaming and news sites, which means they have more control over who says what and what people hear. Sony needs to begin to market their consoles and games as well as Microsoft if they plan to catch up to the 360 this generation. They need to start it off with their big hitter Killzone 2 which launched in just a few weeks now.
Right now Microsoft’s advantage is clear, it is obvious that they have what it takes to compete in the gaming industry and will continue to provide us gamers with a great gaming machine. Let’s just hope (almost a guarantee) that their next console will be more reliable.
I want to like this game. I truly do. I want to like it so much that I even recommended a friend to create a European account just to try the demo early.I don’t know much about the Killzone franchise, so please don’t butcher me with my knowledge of past games. From what I understand is that the first Killzone was a rather mediocre game on the PS2 scoring a 70 on Metacritic. So why all the hype about Killzone 2? Apparently a video surfaced before the release of the PS3 and had people going crazy over the graphics and fluidity of the game. The video turned out to be a CG experience however the developers promised that the game would look as good upon release.
So, as we are close to release the Killzone 2 demo became available for pre-orderers and the European market. I want Killzone to be an awesome experience giving me a reason to love my PS3. In fact Sony seems to believe that Killzone 2 is going to be the game to make the PS3 a household name.
So to my impressions. First off the graphics are pretty amazing. Even for me not having a 1080p television the visuals were incredible. My favorite animations had to be the reload of your weapon and the fluidity of the environments while you were reloading. Your squad-mates and Helghast enemies all looked terrific and moved with human mobility. I was also very impressed with the hit detection on your enemies. They reacted very realistically to your bullets and that was satisfying. The explosions were visceral and awe-inspiring.
Here’s what I didn’t like. Firstly, the language is going to be an issue. A lot of cursing in just the small bit of dialogue that I heard. For some it’s probably not a big deal but for others this could be a drawback. In addition to the cursing the movement of your character was slow and tank-like. I felt like I was controlling a mech of some sorts. I increased my sensitivity for the controller and I still felt sluggish and strange. It’s possible that I am used to the fast-paced action of a game like Left4Dead but the slow movement and almost delayed reaction of my character was a real turn-off. If they could have adapted the movement of a character on Call of Duty than I think it would have been more appreciated. Yes, I do understand that your player is wearing armor and that it is probably very heavy but it just was not enjoyable.
I did enjoy the destructible environments, I liked how things were chaotic around me and that certain things could be destroyed with my grenade or gun. The absolute most favorite thing for me about the demo was destroying the stantioned fans in the second half of the demo. If you shoot at the fans not only do you destroy the blades but you also can cause the fan to bend and go limp. This was pretty neat, I know it’s corny but it was fun taking out the stupid fan!
All in all the game looks promising but it didn’t make me say “Wow I’ve never seen that before”. I also don’t think that the PS3 was built for FPS’ but I will attribute that to the fact that I am used to using the 360 controller and I can forgive that. The only way I can see Killzone 2 become “the” game I play for the PS3 is if the the multiplayer offers something unique compared to other online games.
Back in December of 1992 Nintendo Power released it’s monthly magazine to it’s readers and inside was a little surprise…The Super Nintendo was going to compete with the Sega Genesis that was ever so popular and gaining steam on it’s competition with it’s Sega CD. How was Nintendo going to do this? They had formed a partnership with Sony to create the Super Nintendo CD-Rom system that would boast ” a custom 32-bit processor”. The agreement with Sony didn’t last long as relations disintegrated. Nintendo was convinced that the world was not satisfied with 16 bits and that it was necessary to upgrade to the next generation of console gaming so they eventually partnered with Phillips to bring this new system. Of course Nintendo didn’t announce it’s new partnership with Phillips until after Sony had announced their partnership with Nintendo, catching Sony off guard.Sony and Nintendo did eventually patch things up and got back to work on the Super Nintendo CD but that didn’t last long. Nintendo decided that a CD-Rom based system would be impractical due to long load times and eventually dumped the idea. Sony also saw the shelf life of the Super Nintendo as short and they too did not want to continue with their arrangement.
With the constant indecision of Nintendo and Sony, agreements were off and Sony decided to pursue developing a CD-Rom based gaming system ultimately deeming it the Playstation. Upon release the Sony Playstation sold 300,000 consoles in the first 30 days. Hitting the market head-on the Playstation became a household name, and still is today.
So in short, all you Sony fanboys out there have someone to thank. The top selling video game console in the world today is the grandfather of your Playstation 3. Thanks Nintendo for not using any foresight.
Side note: Based on Sales Daddy is giving you a Spanking Playstation
