Nintendo’s next console is gonna go a little something like this…

If people like Patcher can get paid money to pull stuff out of their ass and call it “analyzing” I figure I can toss in my two cents about the industry as well, and it won’t cost you a penny.

The best case scenario is that the company gets its head out of its ass and gives us:

- A Wii 2 with sensitivity surpassing even what we have with MotionPlus
- It’s nearly if not just as powerful as the competing consoles on the market
- There is a hard drive on the system of a respectable size allowing for not only larger downloads but patches as well (patching could fix so many problems, but that’s another story)
- The removal of fucking friend codes and an online multiplayer setup equal at least to the current PlayStation Network even though that’s not perfect.
- But wait, this is supposed to be a “best case scenario” which means we’d want something like Xbox Live. Now Nintendo, I know that the casual audience is all that seems to matter to you at the moment, and the only people that seem to really care for anything you have to offer so let us people who want that XBL experience pay for it, while allowing everyone else to just play with a simpler and free online set up.
- Regardless, friend codes are a pain in the ass and need to go.
- A HEADSET for online voice chat, I cannot stress that enough. A HEADSET is great, WiiSpeak is a piece of shit.

Enough of this, predictions!

The majority of Wii owners who can be called core gamers have either already put their Wii away letting it gather dust, or they’ve just now realized that the system is lacking in so many areas. Certainly there’s still a few hold outs but now that I can see clearly I can see that Wii is easily the worst console of the generation, sales numbers be damned!

Don’t get me wrong, the system has some great and even amazing games. Super Mario Galaxy is one of my favorite games of this generation and I’m eagerly awaiting the sequel. The Metroid Prime series is my favorite trilogy of games, period. And there’s others but there are so many missed opportunities. Brawl, Mario Kart, Animal Crossing are all held back of their true potential by Nintendo’s insulting online setup. But I digress. Where was I going with this? Ah right, Wii is OK, but can’t hold a candle to PS3 and 360.

So then, Nintendo’s future. There’s no denying that the Wii has been able to do as well as it has thanks to the casual market. But now how many people really think that the same casual market will go out and purchase a Wii successor? Most will just think that their current Wii is good enough and they’ll stick with Wii Sports and Wii Fit, unwilling to make another large investment into a new console.

Now what about the core gamer? If Nintendo keeps its current (stupid) philosophy then we’re still going to have things such as friend codes and that over-protective-parent type of online experience. I could see a headset happening considering there is a DS headset (though I said the same thing a couple years back about Wii) however Nintendo won’t support voice chat as well as they should and discussions would still be limited to only friends. A single, universal friend code is also a possibility just don’t hold your breath for any kind of XBL Dashboard type interface to let you know what your friends are doing and what games their currently playing. The graphical power of the system is a toss up. Nintendo could go and match Microsoft and Sony or they could do the same thing and give us a console as powerful as the 360 next gen.

The point I’m trying so long-windedly to make is that the core gamer isn’t going to be satisfied either. Of course, I could be entirely wrong, but if Nintendo goes down the path I think they’re going to follow then their next console isn’t going to be welcomed by neither the casual nor the core gamer. Could Nintendo go and make their next console an entirely core gamers console? Well, no, they just won’t do that. Judging by where Sony and Microsoft are headed, everybody wants a piece of the casual pie.

I don’t believe that making a “gamers” console would work for them either. Nintendo has successfully alienated the core audience by not living up to what is expected of a game console in not only 2009 but back in 2007 as well. Have I mentioned how much I loathe the Nintendo WiFi Connection?

So if the casual gamer won’t buy it and the core gamer won’t buy it, what’s left? Will Nintendo create a new demographic to sell its console to? Or maybe all it needs is a new gimmick to get the casuals and a handful of the core gamers on board.

For one thing, I know of many people who won’t be buying Nintendo’s next system if things don’t change drastically just because of the let down that the Wii is, myself included.

What The Conduit’s Multiplayer Needs

Three things stick out at me as sorely missing from The Conduit’s online multiplayer set up.

1. The ability to invite friends into a game. While it might be easy to join a friend that’s already in a game there doesn’t seem to be any way to invite any of your friends into a private match you’ve created. You just need to hope that they notice you’ve got a private game set up and that they join it.

2. A way to kick players for team killing or report it in some way. I just played a game with a real douchebag who spent the entire game just killing teammates. After about the 3rd time he killed me I was fed up and just left. There’s no way to boot the guy out of the game, even though the game is able to recognize when I team kill is committed.

3. When you’ve been killed Wii Speak ends up turning off. You aren’t able to talk to anyone or hear anything they’re saying. It’s just a little weird to have a conversation cut off by a death and need to announce something like, “Just a sec guys, I died”. I really don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t be able to keep chatting.

Damn you Nintendo and your lack of foresight to support patches on Wii. This, along with the few bugs that have affected the online experience, could all be easily fixed and patched had Nintendo realized that their game console should have had at least as much internal storage as many of the higher end MP3 players these days.

I feel nothing for BioShock 2

Yeah, I know I said I’d said that I’d write up some E3 thoughts but I feel it’s too late for that now. So, moving on, I never really wrote about how I felt about BioShock after completing the game, just about how things were going part way through. To put it frankly, it’s one of the best games I’ve ever played. The gameplay, environments, characters, and story all came together perfectly to make one hell of a video game.

That being said, why am I not at all excited for BioShock 2, the sequel to one of my favorite games ever? I’ve watched the trailers, I’ve dug through the site reading every bit of information there, and I’ve read many previews and impressions. Yet I never come away with that feeling of really wanting to play the game.

Maybe part of it has to do with Kevin Levine, the man who almost single handedly wrote the original BioShock, not being part of the project. The story 2K Marin has presented to us so far just doesn’t work for me. While the original BioShock had this mystery and intrigue about a plane crashing in the middle of an ocean and discovering an incredibly underwater civilization, along with great characters and wonderfully written dialogue. The story in BioShock flowed perfectly along with the action and the gameplay while early impressions leave me feeling as if BioShock 2 will merely use the story as a carrot hanging in front of a player’s head but never reaching a really compelling or interesting point. It’s kind of hard to put into words exactly what I mean but basically I feel that BioShock 2 is merely trying to take all the great action moments from the original and make more of them. For anyone who has ever finished the original, I get the feeling that we could have a lot of moments similar to the disappointing final boss fight.

Maybe part of it just has to do with playing as a Big Daddy. It instantly brings back memories of the annoying time in the original BioShock spent in a Big Daddy getup, protecting a Little Sister. In fact, with the early gameplay footage we’ve gotten it seems like there will be a lot more of that in the sequel. Joy.

The whole Big Daddy thing just doesn’t sit well with me. For one Big Daddies are slow, lumbering behemoths and yes I know that you play as a prototype Big Daddy who is apparently faster and more agile than his younger brothers, but that’s just it. We all know that prototypes of just about anything are never as good as their final versions. It’s admitedly a pretty weak point but some that just annoys me when I think about it. Another quick thought, since Big Daddies are really just human beings under the suits the prototype Big Daddy (ie. You) can use plasmids. So this means that regular Big Daddies would be capable of using plasmids, so why weren’t they ever given extra plasmids? Just something I thought of, it’s not to say that they lacked foresight or anything like that.

Finally, maybe it’s just because we’re returning to Rapture. Encountering Rapture for the first time was amazing. BioShock has perhaps the best initial 15 minutes of any game I’ve ever played. Progressing through the city to discover how these people once lived and how they came to their own demise was intriguing to say the least. Now with BioShock 2 we’re put back into this same environment. The sense of awe and wonder simply isn’t there anymore. Sure they can perhaps further explorwe the back story to Rapture but it just won’t be the same. Well actually, it will be the same. It will feel no different than it did in BioShock except we’ll be missing the awe, wonder, and intrigue mentioned earlier.

Of course, it may seem a little hypocritical for me to say these things when some of my most anticipated upcoming games are Modern Warfare 2 and Super Mario Galaxy 2 but those are entirely different games. It’s like comparing a stereo and an iPod. Sure they both play music, but they have different functions, designs, and contexts, but I digress.

Spoilers from the original BioShock start here. I wanted to avoid them as much as possible so just skip this short little paragraph.

We’ve already discovered the biggest mystery Rapture had to offer with Jack. Well, I shouldn’t say that since they could easily just conceive a new mystery to discover. Maybe the Big Daddy is also Andrew Ryan’s son?

End of spoilers

It was said in an interview that Rapture has been rebuilding which I find hard to believe when you consider that the remaining inhabitants were either spliced out of their minds, insane, or just plain evil, and anyone who was still holding on to some of their sanity was killed not long after having met them. Frank Fontaine did mention at one point that he’d planned on running the city with Ryan out of the way which I found laughable for the reasons mentioned above. There would be nothing to run, the city is dead. Considering Fontaine is presumably killed at the end of the original game that means that someone else has stepped up to take the lead of the city rotting at the bottom of the sea.

The point I was trying very clumsily to make is that BioShock 2 feels like it will just be BioShock all over again through the eyes of a Big Daddy and nothing more. Nothing they’ve shown yet has made me think that they’ve done a few things different to set this game apart from the first. As a side note, I feel that Modern Warfare 2 and Super Mario Galaxy 2 have both accomplished this task. Maybe I just don’t want to ruin that memory of BioShock and have it bleed together with the sequel. After all, a memory is a powerful and albeit unreliable tool. I remember loving both Mega Man Legends games as a kid and yet everywhere I look people keep mentioning how bad both games were. It’s why I haven’t gone back to play either since. I don’t want to ruin the great memories I had with those games and replace them instead with disappointment and boredom.

E3 Thoughts Coming Soon

I really want to let loose some of my thoughts on E3 but I just need to find a good time where I’ll be able to just sit down and write. Right now isn’t one of those times, but expect something in the very near future.

Pre-Ordered The Conduit

I don’t know if I’ll be getting any pre-order bonuses with it but usually when stuff is announced for the US it’s the same up here. Which is good because I love the special edition box art.

Nintendo’s Completely FUBAR

I guess you could say that I was more than just a little annoyed when I heard that Nintendo was going to be using friend codes with Wii. I simply could not understand how such a large corporation would not be able to see the absurdity of the tedious system they’d just unleashed upon the world with the DS’ terrible friend code system. So when the guys at High Voltage Software mentioned that they were forced into only allowing voice chat with friends and friends of friends I can’t say that I was surprised, but I was definitely angry.

I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like playing a shooter without being able to fully communicate with teammates in-game. Just think about what it would have been like if a game like Left 4 Dead had been released on the system. It would have been just an annoyance to play online. Previously I’d always wondered why we were getting so few FPS games on Wii and now I think I know why. Every FPS is almost required to have an online multiplayer mode (it’s an unwritten rule or something) and it wouldn’t surprise me if many developers and publishers simply don’t want to deal with Nintendo’s ridiculous iron-fist rules regarding online play. So while I can certainly respect everything that High Voltage has done with The Conduit, I’d be very surprised to see them working on Wii again if they were given the opportunity to develop for systems that didn’t have completely broken online experiences (ie. PS3 or 360).

But wait, I hear you saying that at least this is better than a complete lack of voice chat in games like Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 and Call of Duty: World at War? Well yes, it is better but it’s like choosing between having someone piss on your face, or having two people piss on your face. Sure, there only being one person is better, but at the end of the day you’re still being fucking pissed on! And don’t get me started on the piece of shit that is WiiSpeak. Not only can I not have a headset, but the voices of all my friends are coming through my TV simply adding to the cacophony of noise coming from the speakers.

So that’s really it, I’d been hanging on for some time now but I now no longer care about Nintendo. I no longer care about Wii, or whatever they’ve got planned for next gen and I won’t start caring until I hear that we’ve got an online system and voice chat solution that is up to par with the others on the market. So I guess this is a farewell to Nintendo, a company that took my money and the money of others that supported them during the GameCube and N64 days when things weren’t really looking so great, a company that then took that money to create a new console that went completely against everything all those supporters had been expecting. So goodbye Nintendo, I hope you one day snap out of it some time soon and I hope that all those still convinced that Wii is some form of revolution for gaming come to realize that for every step forward the system has made it has taken about 50 steps back. Thank God I now have a PC to do some real gaming on.

More PC Gaming

I’ve caught a PC gaming bug and I just can’t shake it. As soon as my transfer from my bank account to my Paypal clears I’m going to be buying Braid, Half Life, and The Orange Box off of Steam. Something about buying “the best game of all time” just got to me. Left 4 Dead as well some time in the future.

Suddenly, I’m a PC gamer?

Seems like Bioshock was my gateway drug into the world of PC gaming. Steam has become my new best friend and the weekend deals are terrible for a person like me who makes many impulse purchases. Good for me as a gamer, but terrible on my wallet. First thing’s first, Bioshock was phenomenal. While the ending was somewhat annoying and far too short the ride getting there was absolutely amazing, and it contains one part that is easily one of the greatest and most well executed moments in gaming, ever.

Past that, I’ve now got Fallout 3, Dead Space, and Braid up next on my list of games to play and I’ve already started a bit of Psychonauts. I’ve also now decided that once I’m out of school I’ll be building myself a kick ass gaming PC. Speaking of school, I’ve got an essay due in under 48 hours and I’ve yet to finish the book I’m supposed to be writing about. Wish me luck!

Cleaned up sidebar

It just hit me how ugly, cluttered, and long the sidebar was so I went and made some changes.

The first 3 items remain unchanged.
The Twitter feed now only displays 3 items, and it does it in a much neater and condensed way.
The Tags heading is now a drop down menu instead one long list, and I also removed a lot of the useless ones so it’s a shorter listing in more ways than one.
The Archives are now also a drop down menu for the sake of conserving space.
And the search is gone from the sidebar because you can find it in the page header.

BioShocked

My laptop got in on Friday evening and I’ve been absolutely loving it. I’m currently trying to figure out what I’m going to do with my old one so if you’ve got a suggestion let me know.

One of the first things I did with my new laptop was finally play BioShock. I’d bought it such a long time ago when it was on sale on Steam just for the day that I would finally get a PC capable of running it. I’m currently a few hours in and have made it to the second area (Neptune’s something) and have been loving every minute of it. The game oozes with style and atmosphere at every turn and while it looks visually impressive it’s the audio that really stands out for me. Even if I were playing on the lowest settings, its all the ambient noise that really pulls you in.

Part of the game also entails a little exploration giving it a slight adventure feel, nothing like Metroid Prime mind you, but certainly not the run and gun, ignore your surroundings kind of game that is something like Halo. The creepy atmosphere and the claustrophobic feeling of being trapped miles under the sea really sets the stage for a few horror elements. While the game doesn’t seem to be going for a full blown horror tone it does it well on the occasional times that it’s presented. The game even feels more like a survival horror than modern day Resident Evil games which have become full on action. Especially early on in the game you will find yourself almost always precariously low on ammo while trying to fight off enemies.

I also borrowed Fallout 3 from a friend and plan on starting that as soon as I’m done with Bioshock. It also made me realize that I’ve now filled that void I had that I’d wanted to fill with a PS3 or 360. With my laptop I’ll now be able to play the majority of the games coming to both consoles along with those PC exclusives. Plus, things like the Steam weekend deals just keep on delivering great stuff for ridiculously low prices. So I’m now content with my Wii and laptop for this gaming generation.

Side note: Played through Portal for the third time now. One of my favorite games ever.