By: Jamaal Ryan
Well, the next gen console race has officially kicked off.
Let’s take a look at a week in gaming from Monday 5.20.13
Finding More
Meaning than Violence (5/20)
Rally Games head Jeremy Pope has long since departured from
the development of violent videogames since his production job at Rockstar
Games where he worked on GTA 3, Vice City and Max Payne. He admits to the
influence of his family values helping steer his decision to pull away from
violent videogame development, but he also brings up points that have been
echoed before from within-industry critics.
Pope encourages developers (and most importantly,
publishers) to take risks in finding a more abstract meaning of conflict rather
than its most basic depiction, the infliction of violence. He sheds light on
platforms such as Steam and the App Store that avoid focus testing and
publishing constraints which allow artists to create content that’s
conceptually abstract rather than iterating on more graphic and visceral images
of violence.
The Rally Games head admits that, “I think it’s often easier
to do violence that it is to generate meaningful, interesting conflict through
nonviolent ways.”
I argue this: while the criteria that equates to an ESRB
rating of M is certainly content not meant for young, impressionable minds,
they’re largely sophomoric fantasies nonetheless.
Here’s to a more fulfilling meaning of mature content with
more complex dilemmas, life choices and emotional themes.
The Big Day: Xbox
One (5/21)
Microsoft held their long awaited new Xbox reveal at their
Redmond campus in Washington. Here
are some of the major points of the conference:
Operational Features
-
Xbox One is capable of instant saves, allowing
users to resume their content from their previous session even after the system
was off, much like the Playstation 4.
-
The system’s three operating systems allow it to
seamlessly jump from running application to running application. It was
demonstrated switching from TV to movies, to games, to the web browser.
-
The system is also capable of what’s called Xbox
Snap, where you can operate two applications simultaneously.
-
Kinect functionalities are deeply integrated
into the system in both navigation and software input. At 1080p with photon
measuring speed, Xbox One’s Kinect tracts movement with higher accuracy
recognizing your face, voice, and even allegedly, your pulse.
-
Users can pinch applications to the home screen
via Kinect, or expand them to full screen.
-
Skype is used through Kinect.
-
Xbox One will be connected to their cloud
service powered by 300,000 servers (larger than the world’s networking power in
1999, as they say) where they can offload computation in games and likely other
cloud expected features not mentioned in the event.
-
Games can be edited and shared thanks to the
system’s DVR like functionalities.
-
Xbox One works with SmartGlass.
-
The new controller is redesigned with an
improved D-pad, round edged triggers with impulse feedback, an unknown “Guide
surface” at the top, and recently revealed buttons now known to be View and
Menu.
-
Achievements now track how they’re achieved.
Media
-
TV, movies, music and the web browser can all be
accessed via Kinect.
-
Live TV allows users to switch to live
broadcasted television via HDMI input.
-
Xbox Guide allows the browsing through trending
and your favorite media as well as free navigation through channels by saying
“Xbox, HBO, CBS, MTV, etc.”
-
ESPN allows you to access your fantasy teams via
Kinect.
-
Xbox teams up with NFL.
-
Steven Spielberg partners with 343 to create the
Xbox exclusive Halo television series.
Games
-
New EA Sports games -- FIFA, Madden, NBA Live,
and UFC -- will all run on the new Ignite Engine.
-
Forza 5 announced.
-
Max Payne and Alan Wake developer Remedy
announces new IP Quantum Break which appears to join the television series with
the game. Theme centers on time manipulation.
-
Call of Duty: Ghosts shown
·
Written by Oscar Award winner and writer of
Traffic and Syriana, Stephen Gaghan.
·
Canine companion integral to the story and
gameplay.
·
Newly improved engine that, though not quite as
technically impressive as other next gen titles, will still prioritize 60 fps
and low latency controls.
·
New manuverabilites will be featured such as fast
mantling which allows you to vault over obstacles similar to Brink’s S.M.A.R.T.
system, sliding which allows you to slide from the line of fire, and you can
now fire from behind cover akin to what was used in Rainbow Six.
·
New
dynamic maps will be featured that can spur earthquakes, floods, and allow
players to interact and manipulate them
·
Players can now customize cosmetic features such
as the head, body and gear of their multiplayer avatars.
-
15 exclusive titles are being developed, 8 of
them are new IP’s.
What Microsoft Didn’t
Address
-
How will players keep games and other media with
only 500 GB of hard drive space?
-
What are the full system specs?
·
Blu-ray
·
Game DVR
·
8GB DDR3
·
8 Core Microsoft custom GPU
·
500 GB hard drive
·
USB 3.0 support
·
External Storage support
·
Cloud Storage
·
Mandatory installs
·
Required internet
·
No Backwards Compatibility
·
HDMI input and output with 4K support
·
Gigabit Ethernet, WiFi
-
What are the specifics behind recording and
sharing tools?
-
Is Illumiroom compatible with the system?
-
Is it always online
·
Only every 24 hours
Takeaway.
The conference set out to be exactly what Microsoft
stated that it would, to be heavily entertainment focused. The ability to
seamlessly jump between different forms of entertainment, TV, games, web
browser, etc., is super baked into the Xbox One’s entertainment push. People
question X Box One’s departure to the entertainment space -- particularly with
television -- as more and more people are moving away from cable. However many
forget that the 360 was one of the leaders in non-cable entertainment with Nextflix,
Hulu, Amazon Video, and HBO GO. Microsoft is covering all of its bases with
entertainment in a hyper aggressive and all-encompassing way.
What was missing from the conference we can only guess
will be at this year’s E3. The system specs (listed above) as well as more and
more games should be revealed to make up for the deliberate lack that we
witnessed at the conference. Microsoft still didn’t put some concerns
completely to rest. Can gamers access games if they have four concrete walls
with an outlet and a television? (No). What freedom do gamers have when taking
games away from their “assigned” console? (Addressed later).
The X Box One’s reveal was half as long as the PS4’s,
but didn’t necessarily trim all of the fat into a satisfying show, leaving us
with almost as many questions as we received answers. We’re three weeks away
from E3, let’s hope that this year’s press conference ditches the entertainment
pitch and discusses everything we gamers care about.
Xbox One: The Make
Up for the Fuck Up. (5/22)
Microsoft responded to the questions asked by many gamers.
Is the system always online? How will the system handle used games?
Microsoft finally answered the long awaited question of the
rumored always online feature. While the system won’t require a consistent
internet connection, it has to be able to connect every 24 hours. This is fine
and dandy for a large part of the United States, but what about other parts of
the globe that aren’t as fortunate as us with easy internet access? Playstation
4. That’s what’ll happen.
Turning to the topic of used games, they painted an
interesting yet confusing scenario, illustrating one taking a game to a
friend’s house. The copy you play on a friend’s system can only be accessed in
two ways, if you’re playing on your own account or if they purchase the rights
to it. This left services like Gamefly and retailers like GameStop in question,
which was clarified later in the week.
An Impressive yet
Old Engine (5/23)
The Call of Duty franchise doesn’t get enough credit. In a
two year development cycle and releasing annually, Call of Duty has managed to
deliver a great shooter every year since the very beginning of this generation
at the Xbox 360’s lunch.
Kicking off next gen with Call of Duty: Ghosts, Infinity
Ward’s animation lead Zach Volker reports that the engine used in this next
generation of Call of Duty is still based off of the Quake III engine that
they’ve been using for years since Call of Duty 4.
…but that’s still pretty damn impressive.
He explained that it would be impossible to build a new
engine from the ground up in just 2 years.
Xbox One’s Used
Games Sales Explained (5/24)
After days of speculation, we finally have a firmer
understanding of how Xbox One will handle used game sales. Microsoft allegedly will certify
certain retailers to participate in their used game sales program. When a
customer trades in a game into that retailer, that game is logged into
Microsoft’s Azure cloud system and then their system’s rights to that game is
terminated. For every copy of that game sold, the publisher and Microsoft will
get a cut of that sale, leaving retailers with what is reported now as roughly
10%.
Even more questions
generate from this unveiled system.
What will become of retailers like Gamestop who previously
earned 100% of the profit of used games?
Will publishers favor Xbox One since they’ll now be
receiving a cut from almost every game sold?
Will Sony respond to that shift by launching a used games
program of their own after being the only console publisher who participated in
online passes?
And how much healthier will game publishers be health now
that they’ll be receiving more money from consumers?
Only time will tell.
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