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So it was time again for the annual Video Game Awards last night. Its a strange affair. The general populous looks upon it as an “oh, neat” kind of thing, I feel. Us in the industry and hard core gamers alike however seem to be a bit divided between “dear god not this again” and “sweet, something else to help boost the industry’s image!”

Sadly the cast of the train wreck that is Jersey Shore trying to banter with Mike Tyson does NOT help our image :\ Especially when it follows Snoop Dog performing.

I have to admit each year the presentation has gotten a bit better. At first it pandered to the stereotypical audience they expected that would watch this on Spike.. and it was embarrassing for the industry really. In the last few years though it has really turned around, something I credit Geoff Keighiley with having a hand in. Still it needs work. For starters there is a fairly hefty list of categories, this is a good thing. However they seem to bookend a single award with a trailer/reveal and another of the same or a musical performance, followed by a commercial break. Now this isn’t to fill the 2 hours… no… because twice in the show they rattled off a list of award winners for several categories with no mention of the other nominees. If they would just cut out all the big hype marketing bullshit, and only cover the awards we could fit it all in. I mean you don’t see this shit on the Oscars!!

Now I know your thinking “Well they HAVE to put all that in there to generate interest to make enough people watch it!” well I understand that, but I don’t care. If the show cant stand on its own they they need to just keep adjusting until it can, but they need to phase this shit out slowly as they do it.

Also some of the categories though need work. They have best sound track and best score. This makes sense really, one is geared towards the selection of mainstream music, the later is which had the best in house music. A good divide if you ask me to split games like Halo and Dragon Age who have incredible original music from those like Brutal Legend that have amazing sound track selection. The problem is all of the nominees except one for “best Soundtrack” were RHYTHM GAMES (Rock Band Beatles, DJ hero, etc) WHAT THE FUCK???!!?? There is already a “Music Game” category, so why put this shit here as well? I mean is there really a quantifiable difference in the songs between Rock Band 2 and Band Hero, and Lego Rockband? A totally wasted and ruined category if you ask me. Also we have the category “Best DLC” which is a noble cause, but the 4 nominees were 2 packs for GTA IV and 2 packs for Fallout 3. That’s kind of stupid, because its essentially down to 2 possible winners really.

My last major gripe is the timing, I don’t think the show should be on in mid December when the holiday blockbusters are still fresh and the early year super-hits (I’m looking at your Arkham Asylum) are growing dust. They need to be in the spring for the prior year if you ask me, that way there are no just-release-last-week titles contending for space when everyone is still riding high on the PR.

One good thing to come out of it all though is the general populous has far less if any impact on the winners now, and its entirely industry based on he voting, this is good, and how it should be. All in all, the show is getting better and I hope in two years time its where I want it to be, at which point I plan to attend

Talking with some folks today about UT, and being invited to play some UT2k4 in an interdepartmental gaming group that gathers over lunch got me thinking. It made me remember one of *the* most epic moments in LAN Party history in my life, and one of the hallmarks of what was so amazing about being honored with the Gummi Bear clan tag, both in game and out.

We were at Asylum Lan. The exact one I don’t remember sadly. I think 2k4 had been out for less than a few months though. GB was in the final match (no surprise there) playing the new and awesome Onslaught mode. Now bear with me because the details of my memory are fuzzy, as are the exact mechanics of ONS and the map in particular. Perhaps a fellow Gummi will drop by to flesh out anything I forgot. Sadly, I think this was one of the rare matches we don’t  have a video cap of

It was best 2 out of 3, and on round 1 we steam rolled fairly well. I think we linked up the nodes to their core, and damaged it down in under 2 minutes. Nothing spectacular, about on par with our performance the whole tourney, but fast enough to demoralize the other team a bit. Then round 2 came up. Now, this particular map, if memory serves me correctly, had 2 nodes outside each teams core, where only one was needed to link up to the chain across the board. (For those who have never played ONS mode, you take over nodes to build a straight link from your core to theirs, which drops the shields on their core and allows you to damage it.) We strategically had people in the right place at the right time to take over the first node faster than normal, and two guys in place to start capping the second node the instant we had #1. By time #2 was then taken, the team that took #1 was already at #3 bunkered in and ready to start the process, using link guns all along to speed things up. In the time all this went down, the opposing team was still at the alternate #3 taking it, and preparing their vehicles for a convoy to #2 to try to take it from us en mass. Something major was about to go down though that no one other than Stale knew. While we were working on #2 and #3 he had peeled off in a vehicle and flown up to grab the Redeemer, and then hauled his ass up high in the air. Before #3 was even fully ours, to complete the link to the Core, he fired it off on a slow path to their core. Because of this, when we took node #3 the message popped up on everyones screen saying the Red Teams core was exposed. Before the message even faded and anyone had any time at all to react however, BOOM the core was destroyed and we won the match. I think it was a good 20 seconds before the other team realized what had happened and it sunk it.

My hazy, 5 year old memory wants me to think it was 45 seconds into the match.

Yeah, we fucking rocked that shit in record time. I still have the trophy from it! Ahhhh memories. Such a different time in my life that I do indeed miss at times like this!

Gummi for fucking life, yo.

So bouncing around some ideas with some fellow industry peoples on twitter has seeded an idea.

What about some forums somewhere for people of all studios/publishers/etc to come together for an industry themed hang out? One thing I have learned over the years is that we are an AMAZINGLY social group of great people who have great ideas. These people are the very reason I use twitter as much as I do, its such a great way to stay in touch with everyone of the same mindet. Also, given the rough times the industry is going through, as a whole, it would be a fun resource for former people from shut down studios and mass layoffs to trade info on potential job opportunities with those of us still inside. There would be a few simple guidelines.

1: Industry only, this does not include media. The whole point is a place for us to talk with each other without all the background chatter and fanboyism to clutter things up. (NeoGaf is fun but I had wading through 50 posts to get to one from someone I care to discuss things with).

2: NOTHING nda breaking or even remotely close discussed, ever. Its a place for us to geek out over games. Talk shop about development. Bitch about that jerk reviewer on gamethatrockmysocks.com who rates every singe game under a 50 just to fuck up their meta critic score. And maybe trade free copies of game X for game Y under the table

3: Self policed. Something like, you have to register with a work email address, and have your account manually approved by someone upon review. After that you get dumped into a user group assigned to your company, with a designated person from that company who manages the membership from there on out to handle folks who come and go as time goes on. Its not a perfect system, its not intended to be. Were not trying to make an iron clad secret order or anything, just a place with enough of a buffer zone so that we can chat without obnoxious interruptions. There is no intention for it to be secure enough to get away with talking about trade secrets. (might I remind you to read point 2 above?)

4: the whole thing administered by a random selection of folks from all over, to help make sure there is no feeling of “such and such company runs this site”

what do you guys think?

So I started playing Prince of Persia on the 360 this weekend, and I must say I am incredibly impressed. The game gets rid of the stress and time sink of dying, reloading, frustrations and complications related to it all. You cannot fall to you death in this highly acrobatic based game…. you just get “saved” back to the last area you were standing by Elika. You cannot die in combat, you simply loose a Quick Time Event (you dont even have a health bar!) and when you loose that QTE, Elika simply saves you with a quick magic attack, and the Boss re-heals himself up a good chunk.

Also there are virtually no other beings to fight, just the same 4 bosses, repeatedly in their respective realms. All in all I love it. You can focus on the story they want to tell, the impressive visuals they want to show you (and they are indeed impressive) and the puzzle and acrobatic challenges they want to make you jump though… and thats that. It totally redefines platformers, and I LOVE it!

aaaand I’m back at the condo Its VERY rare for me to be at a gaming event and call it a night at 11pm, but when you factor in the time change, its 2am, and damn it I’m tired!

Today has been an absolute fracking blast. After getting in the hall early around noon (yay media badges!) I spent the two hours of media-only quietness trying things out before the lines got stupid, and saying hi to tons of people who would be otherwise busy the rest of the day. I finally got to meet Spyke, our Beta Producer for Warhammer Online in person, and ran into a random person in the food line who, it turns out, is our EA rep to Wal-Mart down in arkansas. After eating food while ignoring all the chaos around me I teamed up with BananaHammock and ran around to various things, and he introduced me to a handful of people I know but never met in person. After that I bounced around between hanging out with him and E and Kitty, and catching up on old times with The Girls, and watching V3nus destroy every single person who came up against her at the Plantronics booth in UT3. (Even I tried.. it was… tragic..) On day 1 the hall is only open from 2-7, so it wound down fairly quick on the show floor side. I got side tracked and missed out on the Key Note speech by Ken Levine, which made me a sad panda AND forgot all about the Final Boss/Freezepop/Jonathon Coulton concert… grrrr. Instead though I had just as much fun at the GamerDNA party at the hyatt.. Rockband FTW! (speaking of.. i saw rockband 2… OMG!)

Forgive me for the lack of insight into WHAT I saw, as I spent little time playing games and seeing new stuff today. I last was able to be social in person with my gaming community crowd in SEPTEMBER of last year, at WSVG Toronto, so I was really longing to say hi to a lot of people. Tomorrow I plan to “play tourist” and check things out, and flex my Media Pass muscle to skip a bunch of demo lines, heheh. I’ll upload some pics later tonight or tomorrow and link em here when I can.. however I shall be calling it a night now, my feet are absolutely KILLING me.

so day one is not over but winding down. Eating at Fox Sports grill with BananaHammock, Litheon (the poor guy who has to run major nelsons blog) and some others. Just left the Gamerdna party in the hyatt which was a rockband and free beer filled blast, and after this who knows. Day one at the hall was kick ass, a long recap will come sooner or later tonight methinks, once I get back to the hall and can use my own laptop. (I’m carying stales Air for the day right now since its light and fits in my messenger bag, hehe)

God I’m so glad I came on this trip… oh yeah got invited to E’s inafamous PAX Party sunday night, gonna be a blast, will be taking my suitcase with me and getting ferschnickerd, and catching a ride in the morning to the airport with one of the many who will inevitably have to do the same, lol.

For anyone who cares, I have a new blog up at http://dnd.sargonas.com which follows the adventures of the D&D 4th Edition campaign I am partaking in, with blogs from the point of views of the characters. Check it out if you are into that sort of thing.

No, no.. not the PBS childrens show about math from the late 80’s and early 90’s… Im talking about how I am back to square one. My xbox 360 has a fried hard drive. Its tossing up a single red ring segment with an E 67 error. Microsoft’s KB article on it states this is one of the three possible hard drive errors. This particular one is the worst.. and its accompanied with a grinding, scratching sound when the system first fires up. In other words, 2 years of saved files, game data, and 7,000 gamerpoints worth of work are gone. (well i still have the gamer points, but the WORK is gone) the only thing that was on the memory card I have was my profile, and my Mass Effect and Rockband info… I am so sick I could throw up over this.. it really is heart wrenching. I know this is somewhat laughable that I could be so upset over something like this, but from my point of view, this is two years worth of hard work and effort I have put into my biggest hobby.. *sigh* and I was going to buy a new 120gb drive soon and port all my data over.. guess I waited too long huh :\

I’m taking up a collection for donations to buy a new 120gb drive… I need to collections cause quite frankly at the moment I cant afford one.. *sigh again* if you feel generous, click the link below… I’m going to sit in the dark and cry now.

So… another post about guitar hero 3. You know, the game I ranted on endlessly about for two or 3 posts and several twitters?

Hm yes, well you see, when the gleeful joy of the early adoption lust has worn down, and you have a moment to sit back and reflect on what you just did, things always take on a new light. As they say, hind sight is 20/20. I for one kind of wish I had been wearing my glasses when I first took at look at Guitar Hero 3. To be honest I did give it a few low marks, well I should say, I made a basic attempt to tone down my praises with a few counter comments at best. In either case, in reflection I didn’t do that enough. I beat the game on Medium, which was for the most part easy. However now I have gone back and taken a stab at Hard and Expert, and let me tell you, here is where they fucked up. Guitar Hero 1 and 2 flowed when you played, even when you worked up in difficult. When you played those songs, even the ones that were tweaked for maximum concentration and dexterity, you still felt like you were playing a guitar, with a natural flow to it. Medium on GH3 felt the same way, so in reality, it was nothing I was looking for, or comparing. It was all a subconcious understanding that I was happy. However now that I took a stab back at Hard and Expert I have learned something, Neversoft said fuck that noise, and just decided to stick notes wherever it looked like it would cramp your fingers and be considered harder.They gave no thought whatsoever to the concept of music and flow.

These are base instincts to Harmonix, a dev studio that has an entire employment roster engaged in one or another personal band. Not a week goes by in the Cambridge area where SOMEONE from the studio is playing a show with their band. Neversoft I think simply does not have the innate understanding Harmonix did to get this concept. It is most evident in the expert songs. You do not feel like you are playing a more complex version of a song, trying to really rock it out like a pro. You feel like your fingers are playing a torturous version of DDR in a futile attempt to keep time with a pack of drunken riverdancers. These are not words based on my inability to beat these songs, just because its hard I dont feel this way. Even the hardest songs for me on 2 and 1 i felt like i was playing real music. This simply restates the obvious, this is an unproven, and unwelcome genre for Neversoft to dabble in, and that Rockband, when it hits the stores next week will triumph over all. (Well goes on sale that is, as it is already in stores, and I set eyes on my own copy of the bonus bundle in person at my regular Gamestop today, although the Manager, in awe as much as his staff and him are of me and my job, had no desire to loose his job by letting my have my copy early, heh. In any case, I sincerely apologize for leading my select few readers who care about my blog astray into thinking the game was a triumph of success for the franchise. It is more like the Episode II:Attack of the Clones of the series. 

Now then, Assassins Creed. I know I said I would reserve judgement untill I have completed this game, and I still intend to, but I will tell you this.It is a rental. It will be the first game ever for the 360 that I intend to trade in when I complete it. I never trade in games, under any situation. I simply deny the fact that such an option even exists to me at a store level. However this one, is being sent back in for sure. If I ever wish to revisit it, I will bring it up in my GameFly queue. The game is NOT bad, and I AM finishing it however I see little to no replay value in it at this time. The rest I will save upon completion, unless I return it to Gamestop before then, and apply its credit towards something more substantial. 

Lastly, there is a copy of Mass Effect at this time sitting at our house awaiting Dan and I. Ok, well, mostly Dan in the beginning, but in either case, don’t hate us too much, we cant help the fact we know people.

5 years ago this week (today actually) Xbox live launched. Since then it has evolved a lot, a WHOLE lot, but its still Xbox Live and the are still gamer tags. Everyone comment and share a memorable live moment, favorite feature, or how about the turning point where you realized your soul was irrevocably sold to Live, or to the advancement of your gamer score