Shingro

If anyone remembers the very first bioshock had like 3-6 years of various on and off again working and reworking of ideas behind it, do people remember the 'slug in wheelchair' sketches?

Now imagine Ken wanted to have a similar long term working and reworking of ideas.

now imagine paying the salaries of 200 people for those years while producing very little final work.

Yeah, this does suck for the people affected, but I'm not sure I can put the moral responsibility on Ken to always produce another game with that team for the rest of his life.

Is it not his decision whether he wants to make another game or not?

Anyway, I suspect that's what's happening here. We'll only know with time though

Is it weird that my first reaction to the 'slight of hand' argument in that Bobservo tweet is to become suspicious where I wasn't before?

The real problem with the Kat article (besides namedropping Rapeplay which was never going to be a good idea for anyone) is that she just doesn't build a very good case, she states most things without evidence, makes wild connections that leave the reader scratching their head, and then the things she does back up people are reporting they saw differently.

She's certainly entitled to her opinion, but I suspect that opinion isn't going to be very useful to others. Considering no other reviewer even considered similar things I think the article says more about Kat then it does about Lords of Shadow (that's not a pejorative, just an observation since things on the internet must be spelled out)

Frankly, chances are good much like the Tomb Raider scene, the game's going to come out, the scene will hit youtube, everyone will watch it and say "Oh, that's it?" and likely feel dismissive of other articles of this nature, and in some cases the gaming feminism movement as a whole.

Net result is Kat will have delt a blow to the credibility of people calling out things in games that made them uncomfortable. and ironically (knowing Patrick's perspective) here Patrick is magnifying the effect willingly. The world is a very strange place.

Top marks I'll definitely add my praise to this level headed thought. Remember that the higher you climb the bigger the risks. Not everyone wants to cast everything on a throw of the dice for some 'higher moral/artistic principle'

Bioshock is an excellent example of a shooter, it's the full package, a story that's not disposable whether you agree it was a good idea or not, fantastic characters, interesting concepts executed on well (music, storyline, cycles, skylines, tears.) even good combat (skylines should frankly be a design nightmare as far as AI and design are concerned, but they aren't the hot mess they should be first run.)

Compared against almost any other shooter created in the last year, or even last few years it'd stand tall among the best or at very least most ambitious, which usually awards a grudging respect. If Bioshock Infinite was a new IP by an unknown developer I feel a lot of people's complaints would become muted.

It feels to me like hating it became a weird aversion fad. Most of the arguments are exactly the same and lack personal texture. Like people are reading similar critiques and just adopting it wholesale for social status reasons. Sorta like how very few people REALLY care about Justin beiber one way or another, but intentionally amplify their dislike.

That's probably not true in every case, just a thought. I'm probably talking crazy.

@gee_rad: At work so I can't reply in depth on my phone and your post implies we can have a good and civil discussion with our speech and I'd very much like to have that. Before we get started though I do have a nitpick. Be very careful about the phrase 'no one is saying' because it's pretty much never true. Dragon's Crown being an easy counter example.

I've no doubt that your comments reflect your own perspective, but guarantee it's not the only one out there. Phone glitching, I'll be happy to discuss more later.

Ah, Sorry I'd already moved (poorly apparently) onto the wider topic of the recent savaging of various games. Dragon's Crown comes to mind, the T rated game that was apparently 'problematic' enough to get mentions in almost every review of it.

Because.... because breasts? Poses? Seems like fairly weak items to really bring out the social censure bats for. Games are fiction. Fiction with a leaning towards fantasy always gets into sex and violence and power eventually. It's the nature of fantasies.

We do have the trouble that there's an easily identifiable majority demographic that can be appealed to, and thus a lot of stuff looks the same and caters to the same interests. Still, for all the "We want more games for everyone" I mostly see a lot of "This game isn't the thing I want, so it's awful." Besides which, I don't see the moral panic in a media catering to a specific set of interests. Romance Novels know their audience and creates stuff for them and if you like that great and if you don't there's no reason to buy them.

I dunno, the demographics are evening out, so we're going to get to new and different games for everyone... but it's kinda awful to be bringing out the pain and shame bats in the meantime.

Yep, exactly this. I respect that everyone has different perspectives on things, but the wierdness of people who fought for 'Games as art!' and 'Games as safe escapism!' Immediately turn around to deny games artistic privilege, and decry based on unproven 'effects on society as a whole.'

The difference? People in the US are comfortable with violence and uncomfortable with sex.

So all it needs is a moral wrapper and it goes down easy as pie.

I'll be very interested in @patrickklepek's opinions on whole matter in 5-7 years. Personally I think feminism is doing itself great harm in attaching to a cause with no good 'end game.' Betting against sexual fantasy being included in any media (especially new media) is a very very bad bet.

We're humans, and we have dark and twisted desires, and we'll always want a safe (often fictional) space we can explore our human darkness. Breaking bad, games of thrones, walking dead. Most of us (ESPECIALLY @patrickklepek) are familiar with that drive.

That is always going to happen. Prior mediums have been imperfect for that, and by contrast games are exactly perfect for that.

So strap in everyone, we're going to see games do things that'll make us faint before our lives end. The world will steadfastly refuse to end, and everything's going to be alright.

You know, as much as we like to rag on Kotick... I got to give him and Activision props in general for being the only large gaming company that hasn't fallen all over itself to appeal to the casual market. They make hardcore games for hardcore gamers, they haven't EA-ed everything up just because they're dominant, and if rumor (and what E3 stage they were primarily on) is to be believed they were the only large publisher to push against the Microsoft DRM restrictions.

So I'll fucking raise a glass to Bobby K if they keep remembering their main customer base is gamers, and not throw us under the bus to chase casual, tablet or mobile money like a seemingly endless processing of gaming companies are doing.

@syed117: Competition only works when a company is held acountable for it's policies and practices. The longer the consumer's 'memory' is when a company pulls a dick move the better it works. Sony got raked over the coals for YEARS and arguably STILL hasn't lived down "You'll get a second job to afford one" I don't see how you can tell people they're awful for having memories greater then one month in relation to the biggest power grab on consumer rights in the last decade.

As for indies, even people who worked and did exclusive deals with microsoft (the Skulls of the Shoguns guys in particular comes to mind) have complained about how they were treated.

Sure it's possible that EVERY indie developer have banded together in some Machiavellian smear xbox scheme, that gamers are doing this just 'cause it's microsoft... or is it a gaming culture more and more pissed off when companies dump their core audience to chase a mainstream market just aren't that interested in the XBO? Kinect is a neat toy for the casual, but it's never been a hardcore game experience. I won't deny that a lot of hardcore gamers are rooting for the system to fail, but frankly, I don't blame them. Nintendo's massive success with the Wii ment slim pickings in hardcore games for 6+ years, and they've still not gotten their mojo back.

Why should gamers forgive and forget over the course of one month when Microsoft seems to be more interested in being Apple/Nintendo then being Original Xbox?

@ei8htbit: Some quick notes

1: If that is the status quo, it is the status quo of those studios own choosing. They got the crazy budgets and the decisions to use microtransactions is their own responsabiltiy and will remain so regardless of whether the consumer retains purchase rights or not. Also, the logic that if the used game market disapeared they would give up a revenue stream in appreciation is flawed at best. Companies will take every revenue stream they can get their hands on. That is the nature of business.

2. Again, DLC and such are not intrinsically tied to used games. I notice Steam has plenty of DLC and even microtransactions around. This is a separate evolution path for buisness and will exist regardless of the availability of used games in the system.

3. You're right there, but in this case we have the weaker system being harder to squeeze power out of (because of the ESram on the die,) and the stronger system is easier to handle since it is all unified memory and such. There are some assumptions that can be made (including that MS will encourage devs not to let the PS4 version outshine the XBO version, the old consoles were closer to each other's spec and that happened then)

4 and 5 are totally legit, though if someone's a fan of the old way, they can get angry over a company's new direction.

as to your last point, with how everything's panned out it is fairly clear that MS wanted to get in early and dictate the rules and laws of the digital future. They used little to no carrots, carefully said little about the rewards offered, and highlighted the restrictions. It's very hard to see this as anything other then a power grab, a leveraging of historical power to benefit publishers over consumers. At very least you can say that the traditional customer (the hardcore gamer) was not the main focus of this new console. MS made a play for the mainstream and to do so they threw their traditional consumers to the side to some extent, to try to tap another market.

It is completely legitimate for that traditional consumer to get mad as well as bring his business elsewhere.