By Vermouth , 31st July 1:49 pm
About freaking time! I was actually really surprised to see how many people were freaking out over the announcement that E3 was going to be cancelled and replaced with something of a great deal smaller scope. I know I don’t speak for everyone on this note, but it’s about time that this bloated show went away and didn’t come back. E3 had developed a gigantic cost both from the standpoint of putting on a show and from a standpoint of everything getting lost in the shuffle as the show had just gotten to be too big. If this report can be believed the announcement is set for Monday July 31st, the day the party stopped for business reasons.
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By Cyrris , 24th July 9:20 pm
It doesn’t get much more convincing than shots of the CEOs shaking hands. The official announcement hasn’t been made as I write this, though I expect it to come shortly afterwards.
To be honest, I’m not sure what to make of it. AMD’s latest price cuts (which, if you are interested, are huge and worth checking out) show that it’s now on the back foot with Intel’s new chip being crowned performance king. ATI’s video cards seem to be fine, but last time I checked, it’s AMD motherboard chipsets were somewhat lacking in the reliability department (though were blazingly fast). Perhaps from that point of view it’s a good thing - it’s consolidates AMDs position and it can probably give ATI what it needs to make chipsets that aren’t just fast, but also bug-free.
As far as AMD and Intel competition goes, I don’t see this merger changing anything substantially. What I am worried about though, as some have noted already, is the potential loss of balance which we currently enjoy between Nvidia and ATI. Watching these two slog it out for graphics cards, chipsets, and even console graphics has been fun to watch, and reassuring that competition is fierce enough for consumers to benefit. Nvidia makes great AMD chipsets - though it did tick me off when their SLI would only work on said chipsets. Likewise, I don’t like the idea of CrossFire only working on ATI chipsets. It limits choice. With AMD and ATI now snuggled up, and with the potential for them to offer bundled deals and the like, I see hard times ahead for Nvidia. If that means more fierce competition then great, but then if it means everything is split between two camps, with Nvidia deciding to refocus it’s work towards Intel, then the consumers will again lose out on choice.
By Plagiarize , 7th May 5:18 am
Hot coffee, ah yes, I remember hot coffee. Who doesn’t? I actually wanted to see the ESRB chewing out Take Two on that one, because, you know, it was less of a hit to the industry if the ratings board came away as victims. Take Two and Rockstar HAD violated certain guidelines, and the ESRB can’t be expected to go through every single animation in the game to check there’s nothing hidden in there.
It didn’t take long for politicians, and the mainstream media to convince everyone that somebody needed to take the blame for Hot Coffee. I don’t think most people really cared, but when the press and politicians get together it’s easy to get the impression that America is united in its anger, whether or not it actually is.
So, the ESRB covered its ass, Take Two lost a lot of money, and that was the end of that.
At least it should have been.
While many are quick to defend the ESRB in the ‘Elvish titties’ debacle, as the naked skins are apparently sat right there on the disk, just inaccessible, I’m not cutting them any slack this time, and while I’ll be sad if the rating system is destroyed as a result of this, it’ll be the ESRB’s own stupid fault.
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By Plagiarize , 13th April 6:02 am
In the debate on violent video games, there’s one company who’s name doesn’t generally come up.
Nintendo, with their family friendly image, a small percentage of M rated games on their system and an online set up with the DS that’s entirely based around protecting kids, are understandably not in people like Jack Thompson’s targets. Nintendo are probably one of the only major game companies not to have been sued or threatened with a law suit by the SLAPP happy lawyer from Florida.
But all that my friends, is about to change.
The fuse is already lit, and the flame is winding its way across the floor towards the barrel of gunpowder labeled ‘Revolution’.
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By Plagiarize , 27th January 4:28 am
A lot of focus is put on how America reacts to anti game crusading (or pro family crusading as I’m sure they’d prefer me to call it). My bizarre debate with Jack Thompson got linked left right and center, but what is angering me today is pretty simple.
Britain has exactly what Jack Thompson et al claim they’re trying to achieve over here. This is something I’ve brought up before I know, but for anyone not familiar with this, I’m going to detail it again.
An independent group of censors rate videogames that are seen to have violent or sexual content in. Those ratings are legally enforced. It is illegal to sell a video game that has been rated for a given age to anyone younger than that age.
Pretty simple. I have no problems with the suggestions of a similar system here in the US (though that suggestion of adding 50% tax to violent video games as at least one state is proposing is abhorrent in so many ways not least because it punishes the people the mature adults that no study has been able to suggest have any adverse reactions to the games) for the reasons that should be plain to see.
» Read all of “What is wrong with Britain?“…
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