Reviving the Real-time Strategy Game in 2013

To be quite frank, my outlook on console gaming has been steadily declining over the past couple years. What was once a revolutionary form of digital recreation has now become something of a bore and a frustration in many cases. What I associate with console gaming on the Xbox 360 and PS3 nowadays is repetitive, run-of-the-mill modern war shooters and money-grabbing game developers trying to hoard every last penny through overpriced DLC’s (downloadable content).

Lately, I’ve wanted nothing more than to return to my PC gaming roots for a little while. In particular, I’ve been looking to delve back into a fun and currently underappreciated genre of video games: real-time strategy (RTS) games.

I remember spending countless hours of my time on Starcraft, Age of Empires, Warcraft III, and Command & Conquer. There was some real satisfaction to be had from commanding an entire swarm of Zerg bugs to wipe out a base full of Terran soldiers, or having a full-scale showdown online with my friend playing as the orcs and me playing as the humans.

With RTS, the style of gameplay forced you to really stay vigilant and on your toes at all times. You had to take calculated risks and make smart strategic decisions in order to destroy the enemy army. The generic Call of Duty first person shooter method of recklessly going lone wolf, taking out the entire enemy team on your own did not exist in this realm of gaming.

Over the past few years, with all the hype focused solely on first person shooters and RPG’s on the console, PC gaming – and thus RTS games – have largely disappeared. In fact, the last time I went into a local Gamestop, they only had a single shelf of PC games while the bulk of the store was comprised of Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii games.

Missing in Action: Video Game Movies

For those of you who pay attention to news within the gaming industry and social media, do you ever notice how often developers seem to squeal with excitement when they announce that they’ve attained the rights to turn their video game into a film adaption. And while that’s all well and good to hear that some of our favorite games are supposedly going to make it to the big screen, we usually end up going a few years wondering…uh, ok, what’s the status on these movies?!

I can think of a few recent examples of how films were announced for some of the most popular video games out there and how years later, we haven’t heard an ounce of news about how far along into production these movies are. Gears of War was slated to begin production of a film through New Line Cinema back in 2007 but, to the best of my knowledge, we haven’t heard much else. Well, other than the fact that the director supposedly fronting the movie dropped out to focus on other things.

Blizzard Entertainment announced a Warcraft film (also in 2007…go figure) and initially established that the film would be set for a 2009 release date. Here we are three years after that supposed arrival time and Legendary Pictures hasn’t given us much to hope for quite yet, other than the fact that Sam Raimi (Spider-Man director) would be directing the film and that the movie had supposedly begun production. WoW fans can only hope that Raimi can shift gears toward the project now that Spider-Man 4 was flushed down the toilet in place of a recently-released reboot.

Part of me also can’t help but wonder if we all really want to see these wayward movies released eventually. Video game movies have an infamous reputation for sucking after all. I don’t think a single video game movie released in the last two decades passed a 50% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Are Mass Effect Fans 'Greedy' and 'Entitled'?

Blog posted on Deadlymint.com.

Fans of the popular sci-fi and rpg trilogy were abuzz with excitement over the release of Mass Effect 3 in March. The third entry into the franchise concluded Commander Shepard’s space-faring story and brought multiplayer into the fray for the first time in the series. Since its release, the game has garnered universal praise from critics and social media and had sold nearly 4 million copies in March alone.

But, although the game has received critical acclaim and mostly good reviews, the majority of recent controversy primarily lies with the game’s endings. It would be an understatement to say that most fans were disappointed by how the game ended, despite the stellar performance of the overall game.

Mass Effect has always been a largely decision-based type of game. From the very beginning of the trilogy, you customize your Commander Shepard character and go through the game making pivotal choices as you interact with the main characters and move the plot forward. Concepts like morality come into play in this game in ways that I’ve scarcely seen before in other video games. For example, a choice that you make could save one character but get another character killed, or spare an entire species but completely annihilate another species.

Developers Bioware had promised and assured fans many times prior to the game’s release that the huge decisions that you made in previous games would come into play and effect how the ending plays out. In some ways, those decisions do affect some of the game, but they play almost no role in the ending as the developers promised.

Many fans banded together on the Bioware forums and through various social media outlets to protest the ending, demanding the developers to change or expand it. I would suspect that Bioware received a great deal of hate mail interlaced with the occasional death threat due to the endings of Mass Effect 3.

Finally, after weeks of Bioware producers seeing such positive response to the overall game and such negative response to the game’s endings, they announced that they would be releasing a free DLC (downloadable content) sometime over the Summer which would expand on the endings and provide players more closure to the storyline.

Because of this, others within the gaming community have retaliated against Mass Effects fans, saying that the fans are “greedy” and “feel entitled” because of them demanding that the ending be changed. Bioware was also partially criticized for spoonfeeding and catering to their fans by releasing expanded endings.

As far as this issue goes, I’m a bit conflicted. Part of me feels that it was a bit ridiculous and that fans did go a bit overboard by “demanding” that Bioware change the endings. But the “Mass Effect fanboy” part of me can’t help but agree that, yeah, the endings were pretty freakin crappy and that Bioware didn’t exactly tie up the trilogy the way they promised they were going to. As far as I’m concerned, the fans had every right to be angry over the endings because the company made certain claims about player decisions but then didn’t integrate them the way they said they would.

Personally, although I am a huge fan of the game and although I too hated the ending, I’m not among those people on the warpath demanding that Bioware release new content. I do think that those select few were a bit obsessed and that their demands did get a bit out of hand in some cases.

However, I also don’t necessarily agree that the fans are “greedy” or “entitled” merely because they were irritated about the ending.

I feel that critics are only calling Mass Effect fans greedy because Bioware is actually following through and doing something about it. Nobody literally held a gun to their head and forced them to add new content to the game. They chose to do that of their own accord. Bioware could have just done nothing and sat back to reap the rewards of their millions of game sales. Eventually, the fans that were fired up over the ending would have simmered down and gotten over it in time. Instead, Bioware chose to heed devoted fan response and add more to the game to make it more enjoyable. If Bioware hadn’t done anything about it, the fans would just be angry fans. But instead, because of Bioware’s decision to release expanded endings, they are considered “greedy” fans.

What do you all think? Are Mass Effect fans’ demands justified, or do these fans come off as winey and greedy?

Sell Your Digital “Loot” For Real Cash in Diablo 3

The game industry and gamers alike are abuzz over the recent launch of Blizzard Entertainment’s highly anticipated new game, Diablo 3. This third entry into the classic best-selling dark fantasy RPG has brought about a huge gathering of loyal fans and endless midnight launch lines. These avid gamers have long been awaiting the sequel’s release since the launch of Diablo 2 eleven years ago.

A very controversial new feature for the role-playing juggernaut is the addition of the online Auction House. This feature (not yet implemented into the game) allows players to collect digital armor, weapons and other “loot” that they in the game and buy, sell, and trade them with real players online. What sets this apart from other online games? The consolation prize for these transactions is real life money, not digital gold coins.

What does this say about the growing economic legitimacy of online video games? It certainly shows that social media enterprise has extended to the point that even incorporeal, digital products (in-game items) can now be bought and sold for value online just as much as real products and services.

This phenomenon can be related to the growing concern over many video game producers trying to exploit players for more money through online service fees and expensive DLC (downloadable content). Furthermore, there are a number of fans who are irked at the idea of spending their hard earned real money to purchase digital items that hold no actual value. In the past, there had been illegitimate websites known for scamming video gamers out of their money by promising to sell them rare in game items or video game currency. The only difference now is that this Auction House system is sponsored and maintained by Blizzard Entertainment.

The Auction House system is due to be released via Diablo 3 beginning May 29. It should be interesting to see how effective this method of online digital commerce will be or how players will react to a growing emphasis of marketization within their beloved video games.