Interesting article. Didn't expect Atari to be put in there. It's an optimistic look to the future though, considering how everyone seems to be critical of everything. But I hope we'll hit that sweet spot too.
Leave it to Magrino to take a dig at the French. Good to see him continue to maintain good international relations. The Wii might be a pop culture phenomenon but the DS is still the better system between the two. It's because the DS had a ton more good games than the Wii, and now it looks like it's gonna be the same thing again with Wii 2 and the 3DS. It's hard to talk bad about Nintendo seeing what it's done to bring gaming to casual audiences and stellar first party games, but the fact is that the majority of Wii games are crap. Publishers, who wanted to ride the hot gimmick trend, and just shoveled out half assed games. Yes, there are also crap games on other consoles but there's just more crap on the Wii, not to mention the crap versions of AAA multiplat titles. I know, I said crap a lot. So what will Nintendo do? Get back to the traditional controller based gameplay with motion gameplay just as an option? It looks like that according to rumors. So here's hoping. The Wii might be a huge success but gamers just remember it as bold system with a crap game library.
Also, the most recent video game music that got to me was Mass Effect 2. The Suicide Mission soundtrack at the end of the game, oh man, gave me epic chills. But it's interesting that Kevin mentions games earning the right to manipulate you through music, because Mass Effect 2's music has that grand score (like Hans Zimmer) that would make even brushing your teeth in slow-mo cool. I, personally, feel that ME2 earned that right but some people would feel otherwise because they might be disappointed by the final boss.
I remember when playing MGS4, you ********spoilers******** return to Shadow Moses base from MGS1. You're making your way across the blizzard, when the storm clears and the base comes into view. As if the sight of the Shadow Moses base wasn't enough, they hit you with "The Best Is Yet To Come" (MGS1 ending theme) and cue the 18 wheeler truck of nostalgia hitting you. It was such a powerful moment for me, just remembering MGS1 from when I was a kid, the song just made everything so bittersweet and beautiful. It was just amazing. Music is tied so deeply in our memories, it can never not matter.
Most of my favorite games have great stories or are heavily story based and character driven, because I feel good stories stay with you longer than good gameplay, which is funny cause it's a GAME. Longest Journey had possibly the best story ever but it could only be that good in the adventure game setting where story and characters are given so much priority. MGS was cutscene heavy which helped its cause for the story. Half Life 2 and Portal are probably the only games that balance superb gameplay with great story and characters and dialogue. I could go on and on but I'll stop. Anyway I love KV's articles. Please write some more.
If the over-the-top nature of the game isn't noticed by adults, then there's no helping them anyway. Sexism is present in real life, so when there are shows like Californication and Entourage ,that pretty much just use women as objects of lust with the way they're portrayed in those shows, Duke Nukem is the last of anyone's concern. At least you need to be 17, to buy Duke Nukem but if you don't have any parental controls on your TV, anyone can watch Californication or Entourage.
Again, loving all these articles on GameSpot recently but to the point of the article, Bioware has done a lot towards this front in getting strong female identities that women would like and delve into. After social games, RPG's are the next biggest female gaming base so I think going the Bioware route is good for now while if some others could somehow bring back adventure games. Women love adventure games and it doesn't have a convoluted control schemes, just point and click. Hell, I love adventure games. And if people remember, April Ryan from the Longest journey is one the best protagonists of all time(male, female, animal whatever).
RealHarry's comments