kosayn

The issue isn't really the basic act - a journalist building a story by requesting information from someone who put herself out there as a witness to a traumatic event. That's ordinary.

The issue is bad manners for the situation, basically. And without there really being much to the 'situation' on social media, it's not as easy as it normally is to seem like you care when you don't.

Even just as a form message rather than the tact the situation demands, those tweets need some work.

I fall pretty strongly on the side of gun control rather than media control on this one - it's a small percentage, but some people lose the plot and accidents happen, and I'd rather there be some defined limits on how efficient the killing tools we have available to us are. When nobody in your family or friends has guns in their lifestyle, not even some weird uncle, they are basically just not something you think about.

But I also think investigating how media affects people could be worthwhile - if it's actually about science and not just a pretext for legislation. My first exposure to American news and TV was around the time of the 1st gulf war, and it was really surprising to me how much more the overall tone was embattled, nervous and fearful compared to Canadian TV, which still has the matter-of-fact, detached aspect of the BBC about it.

@JoeyRavn said:

@JeanLuc said:

Sigh. I'm going to have to review this, aren't I?

Yes. Yes you will Alex.

Alex should do it, but with a twist: write a short review NOW, months ahead of the game's release, and the compare it to the actual game to see how close his predictions were. From the looks of it, probably pretty damn close.

Yeah, then if things don't turn out you can claim it was really just a fan review.

> You decided to spend time with the PS2. Since you have Logitech, a Controller of the Wireless Arcana, you might get along with this console...

pour one out...

The PS2 is that much greater, I think, because it overcame a lot of early skepticism from the community. The mags and fansites served up endless screenshots of jaggies, complaints about the price, and eager mockery of launch titles like Fantavision and Eternal Ring. But when unbelievable screens from games like MGS2, Tekken 4, and Silent Hill 2 started showing up, that tune changed. The fetishistic pursuit of the perfect marketing screenshot has pretty much not stopped since then.

Gaming grew up so much on the PS2. SH2 and Ico pioneered subtler storytelling in games. JRPGs boomed, trying to recapture Square and Nintendo's successes from the past generation. Even an RPG with middling gameplay like .Hack sold disproportionately well, pioneering the episodic game before online stores gave the concept a proper place. Despite only being a simulated MMO, it also raised awareness of them for a lot of people (WoW didn't hit till a year later). The PS2 brought us Xenosaga, Disgaea, DQ8 and FFX, among many others that are still influential. The JRPG heyday did die down eventually when the mainstream turned to shooters, but people are still raving about Persona 4.

Regarding the negative influence of games... I don't disagree with any of what that essay expresses. I know those feelings. But I do think that it's that failure, angst and ambition cycle that can sometimes drive unassuming people to do great things. I think feeling that way is what life is about, for people that struggle to find their calling and their community. But those external things don't have to be the only anchor for your self-worth.

And I think you can't really discount how games make so many people feel good when making this argument, just because being skilled at a game doesn't also write their name on some mythical leaderboard in the sky. A great career doesn't really do that either. Games, and personal plans and projects, should be appreciated for their own sake. If it's not satisfying while you're doing it, It'll probably never satisfy you when you've accomplished it.

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Otherwise, I feel that Shining Force 2 does not actually hold up, having played it through for the first time back in June. It's okay in the early going, and the graphics are very good. But the story and quality of translation really falters in the back half of the game. The battles also get larger than they need to. Finally, some of the later characters will probably never 'get good' for you, no matter how long you carefully feed them easy kills.

Shining Force 1 is a much more solid game, in my opinion.

Presentation matters, is the thing to take away from this. Doesn't really change my opinion much... the environments still look simple but okay. All the other stuff, the AI, enemy graphics, and gameplay shown do not look remotely interesting. But it's more acceptable for it to look totally unfinished in 20 second clips than in a teaser trailer.

Not usually one for conspiracies, but it seems sort of like a stunt to defuse the long-expected backlash against the game prior to a real trailer.

So Monster Hunter and Animal Crossing are in localization limbo, I guess.

Fire Emblem's the only reason I have a 3DS - at least that's on track. And a hard game to screw up, really.

You'll look pretty hard to find someone who gives a damn about the marketing for a game having to be too politically correct - most people just don't like being advertised to period, especially on facebook.

It's the creative content of the game itself that matters. I don't even like the past Hitman games, but I'm glad they can be made. If we're going to say that Video Games can't have anything that conflicts too much with conventional morality, then they definitely shouldn't be considered an art form.

And it is specific culture-based morality that makes 'small tits' or nuns, in particular, a thing that is over the line, a thing that is in poor taste. I wouldn't want to hang out with people who represent themselves like the Square Eidos folks have (over both this game and Tomb Raider) but I think we've all played games that the general public would consider morally offensive at one point or another. Try to get someone really offended by Doom or Bully these days if you think moral attitudes aren't constantly changing. A lot of the time, today's offensive art is tomorrow's masterpiece.

Funny that JoeGuy seems to have come up with better, comparable content for that ad with only a moment's thought.

It's good that the fans helped fix resolution for the PC, because ports should fit their system. But I feel that From Software operates from some sort of alternate dimension where it is still 1989, and to be honest, I hope that never changes.

All fans of Dark Souls - a great game - should find themselves a cheap PS3 and play Demon's Souls, which has the same great challenge and exploration elements, but also a more gamelike, more dystopian world design. And better working non-Namco multiplayer.

It's the only truly necessary game of this console generation. It's nothing but a giant middle finger in disc form to all its contemporaries; their tutorials, and their checkpoints, and their quicktime button prompts, and their mocap facial animations, and their DLC, and their unpredictable AI, and their cinematics.

It behaves like a real video game - for the most part, we've forgotten what that is for the last 7 years.