Although this is a bit old, after reading a 1UP article I stumbled across this:
http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=13886
This is a September interview between GameDaily and Jack Tretton of SCEA.
So let's discuss some of the laughable statements in here, shall we?
"They have the market all to themselves... and they're doing worse numbers," Jack Tretton on Xbox 360's sales performance
Umm... They are? He describes that in a rather subjective way. Although it is true it is still being outsold by PS2's, it is outselling PS3 and even Wii. Though that is partially due to the limited supply of the Wii and PS3, Microsoft states that the 360, contrary to Tretton's comment, is the worlds fastest selling console. It is already at 8 million and if Christmas goes as planned, it will be 10 million. Wii hit 1 million in less than a month and is the fastest selling console in UK and AU history. Despite high demand, the outlook looks good to hit the 4 million mark by 2007.
"We feel motion sensing technology allows the player to be much more proactively connected to the game, than the passive, reactionary rumble technology."
Although it is different from Wii's motion sensing capabilities, the fact that he is trying to say PS3 is trying to immerse you in the game experience is a flat out lie, and is proven when he goes on to say that rumble was sacrificed to make room for tilt controls. It wasn't sacrificed, it was removed due to a lawsuit which Sony lost. Rumble immerses as much as tilt control does and even then if you want motion control you can get a Wii for half the price of a PS3.
"I think obviously our competition, the handheld devices from Nintendo and specifically in the case of the DS, we really feel like they're appealing to the same audience that Game Boy has always appealed to. And if you look at the adoption rate of the DS over the first 17 months, not only does it trail the PSP but it also trails their other platforms... They're potentially losing some of their core audience and they're not really expanding beyond that and we think we're expanding into a completely new audience as we did with PlayStation. And we'll do just what we did on PlayStation; we'll dip down to the younger consumer eventually and we'll ultimately appeal to that vastly Earth wide audience we carved out with the original PlayStation."
Slow down! Is the PSP really outselling the DS as this quote may imply? I think not:
DS-27 Million
PSP-15 Million
Even GBA has topped PSP sales in recent months.
It is also innacurate to say that Nintendo is targeting mainly their core audience with the GBA. Not really. They are targetting all ages, but specifically people who haven't played video-games. And as for games themselves, DS actually has more third party support than PSP, Square Enix even decided to make the next Dragon Quest game to be a DS game (not PS3 or PSP) which will get the real time battle treatment ala FFXII. Figures that Japans hottest franchise only fits Japan's hottest portable. 1UP's Jeremy Parish believes this could be a sign to come for other developers.
"As far as the largest online gaming audience, it's PS2. Despite the popularity of Xbox Live, the largest online gaming audience is the PS2 and it does exceed the Xbox and I certainly think it exceeds the Xbox 360 at this point..."
Really? It was made pretty clear that Xbox dominated the Online battle and with the 360, 60% of its users are online. Halo 2 and Gears of War are helping out and from current reviews, Xbox live is set to be unequaled. There were very few notable PS2 online titles.
"Do you know that over the course of the industry no company has ever dominated two life cycles in a row?" But we did. We've faced this throughout our entire history and I think it's just par for the course."
That is not true. Nintendo has also dominated two generations, with the NES and SNES. And now JT is saying that based on past success, they will dominate again. But signs are pointing that this next battle is going to be much closer than the last when Sony trounced their competition 5:1 with the PS2. The Xbox 360 has a great start and promsing library and the Wii's lower cost and innovation not only make it more inviting to consumers but to developers, so it won't suffer droughts like the Gamecube.
Overall it is an interesting interview and now that the consoles are out it is pretty easy to laugh at.
XBassXUmbraX Blog
What's the deal with Zelda?
by XBassXUmbraX on Comments
It is safe to say the "next-generation" is the current generation. I have had a 360 for nearly a year and I have had a Wii for three weeks now. Zelda is something that has caused heat on the forums here so much that CJayC himself had to water the flames. I was surprised by the 8.8 score myself. Now that I own Zelda I have somethings to say, as well as some opinions of other takes on this "issue".
My main point here is that I have never gotten too involved with a 3D Zelda game before. I played about 2 hours of Ocarina of Time and I have never played Majora's Mask or Wind Waker. I have played some 2D Zelda games like Four Swords, A Link To The Past, and Oracle of Seasons, and I loved all of those. Still, from the few moments of Ocarina of Time, 3D Zeldas certainly feel a lot different. And after 10 hours into Twighlight Princesss, my opinion in that respect hasn't changed.
But let's get straight to it. Twilight Princess is probably one of the best games I have played this year, and the only other game that has given me the same amount of joy this year is Oblivion. Although like Oblivion, it started out a bit slow, the game certainly picked up once the tutorial was over. Before I knew it I was a wolf and I was constantly tormented by this impish yet really cool shadow being called Midna. Such a memorable character. In fact this game has a really great story. Being a wolf is fun too, especially how Midna mocks your emotions and how you watch your friends scuttle in fear hopelessly when they can't even see you. Or when these really cool looking portals open up and shadow beings pop out and attack me and they have to die at the same time. Hyrule is also very large and it sometimes feels hard to believe how much distance you have covered. Riding Epona and battling on horse is also cool. This game even has a Lord of the Rings feel, attempting to cross the great bridge of Hylia simply felt epic. And even though graphics are Gamecube esque and the sound is MIDI, they still felt right and they didn't detract from the experience at all. There were even some other cool charms and mini-games, including sumo wrestling, which becomes mandatory in the story. Some of the dungeon puzzle were pretty awesome like the magnetic boots in the Goron mines. The Wii controls aren't exponentially better than any other system I have played but they don't detract from the experience either. It really is a fantastic game.
First of all, the reason I mentioned how I am unfamiliar with 3D Zeldas is because it entitles me to have much smaller expectations of this game than anyone that has. This brings me to Oilers' rant on the purposes' of sequels. I am bringing this up because I agree that games should simply be looked at on their own merits. Some notable Gamespot editors have downplayed Twilight Princess for not reinventing the wheel. And that us why my opinion differs. I can't really be dissapointed with Zelda because I haven't bothered with any of Link's previous 3D outings. Games like Zelda don't exist in a vacuum and it certainly should not be judged that way. So what if the current Zelda isn't as impressive as Ocarina of Time was? Is it not an impressive game on its own merits? I'll take my other favorite next-gen game and reveal that I haven't played any previous Elder Scrolls game. I didn't have any set biases upon playing it. I just played with it, and I certainly loved it. GameSpot did too but some Morrowind fans were certainly turned off that it didn't feel "Elder Scrolls" enough. So what? It still is a very impressive game. Again this relates to how I have never played any ES game before. I didn't have anything to be overly dissapointed with.
Another great example is Eurogamers Zelda Review. It talks about all the flaws but it also gives it a fair review in the sense of how some games can be very fun that the flaws don't matter. This is a major point also brought up by 1UP editor Jeremy Parish (Who gave Zelda his first ever 10). He even talks about how 1UP's review up Gears of War talks about all the negatives but it still was such a fun game that it recieved a ten. Zelda may not have an ultra deep combat scheme and Oblivionn may have several technical issues and some overly "run and gun" quests, but they are seriously awesome games in which fun alone can more than make up for the flaws.
And while I can say that it is easier to look at games this way when you don't have such high expectations, I think it is time other gamers should stop looking at franchises like Zelda as merely franchises but unique games. It's also why some people should really stop dissing Nintendo for relying on old franchises and Microsoft for relying on Halo.
My main point here is that I have never gotten too involved with a 3D Zelda game before. I played about 2 hours of Ocarina of Time and I have never played Majora's Mask or Wind Waker. I have played some 2D Zelda games like Four Swords, A Link To The Past, and Oracle of Seasons, and I loved all of those. Still, from the few moments of Ocarina of Time, 3D Zeldas certainly feel a lot different. And after 10 hours into Twighlight Princesss, my opinion in that respect hasn't changed.
But let's get straight to it. Twilight Princess is probably one of the best games I have played this year, and the only other game that has given me the same amount of joy this year is Oblivion. Although like Oblivion, it started out a bit slow, the game certainly picked up once the tutorial was over. Before I knew it I was a wolf and I was constantly tormented by this impish yet really cool shadow being called Midna. Such a memorable character. In fact this game has a really great story. Being a wolf is fun too, especially how Midna mocks your emotions and how you watch your friends scuttle in fear hopelessly when they can't even see you. Or when these really cool looking portals open up and shadow beings pop out and attack me and they have to die at the same time. Hyrule is also very large and it sometimes feels hard to believe how much distance you have covered. Riding Epona and battling on horse is also cool. This game even has a Lord of the Rings feel, attempting to cross the great bridge of Hylia simply felt epic. And even though graphics are Gamecube esque and the sound is MIDI, they still felt right and they didn't detract from the experience at all. There were even some other cool charms and mini-games, including sumo wrestling, which becomes mandatory in the story. Some of the dungeon puzzle were pretty awesome like the magnetic boots in the Goron mines. The Wii controls aren't exponentially better than any other system I have played but they don't detract from the experience either. It really is a fantastic game.
First of all, the reason I mentioned how I am unfamiliar with 3D Zeldas is because it entitles me to have much smaller expectations of this game than anyone that has. This brings me to Oilers' rant on the purposes' of sequels. I am bringing this up because I agree that games should simply be looked at on their own merits. Some notable Gamespot editors have downplayed Twilight Princess for not reinventing the wheel. And that us why my opinion differs. I can't really be dissapointed with Zelda because I haven't bothered with any of Link's previous 3D outings. Games like Zelda don't exist in a vacuum and it certainly should not be judged that way. So what if the current Zelda isn't as impressive as Ocarina of Time was? Is it not an impressive game on its own merits? I'll take my other favorite next-gen game and reveal that I haven't played any previous Elder Scrolls game. I didn't have any set biases upon playing it. I just played with it, and I certainly loved it. GameSpot did too but some Morrowind fans were certainly turned off that it didn't feel "Elder Scrolls" enough. So what? It still is a very impressive game. Again this relates to how I have never played any ES game before. I didn't have anything to be overly dissapointed with.
Another great example is Eurogamers Zelda Review. It talks about all the flaws but it also gives it a fair review in the sense of how some games can be very fun that the flaws don't matter. This is a major point also brought up by 1UP editor Jeremy Parish (Who gave Zelda his first ever 10). He even talks about how 1UP's review up Gears of War talks about all the negatives but it still was such a fun game that it recieved a ten. Zelda may not have an ultra deep combat scheme and Oblivionn may have several technical issues and some overly "run and gun" quests, but they are seriously awesome games in which fun alone can more than make up for the flaws.
And while I can say that it is easier to look at games this way when you don't have such high expectations, I think it is time other gamers should stop looking at franchises like Zelda as merely franchises but unique games. It's also why some people should really stop dissing Nintendo for relying on old franchises and Microsoft for relying on Halo.
Welcome to the blog!
by XBassXUmbraX on Comments
Well I finally decided to start my own GameSpot blog with the next-generation now being the current generation, and I have had this account for a while. I guess I got tired of seeing that "chronic procrastinator" message pop up.
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