I have long held Dan "Shoe" Hsu in very high regard. He has been the Editor-in-Chief of one of my favorite gaming magazines (Electronic Gaming Monthly if one could not already tell haha)for a good while now and the magazine has continued to grow and change along with the gaming community. I'm very jealous that he gets to put out a magazine every month about one of my favorite topics, video games, and has become one of the figureheads in the world of video game journalism. Over the past few months however I have become distressed by the fact Sony, and the PS3 especially, has become the subject of much criticsm from EGM and Hsu in particular. I say PS3 because in the most recent month's issue a PS2 game got Game of the Months honors and the PSP has gotten similar awards throughout the year so it is not as if this magazine hates the company all together but rather the machine that moved gaming from something fun people can just 'do' into an actual investment with its big $600 price tag.
After reading their review of Lair, which got suprisingly low scores of 6, 5.5, and 5 I began to look back through my issues and noticed that the magazine has been quick to bite Sony's machine at every opportunity. First of all I cannot give my own opinion on Lair as it has not reached retail yet but most previewsI have read have been much more poisitive than the opinions put forth by EGM. Still though the game could be as bad as they say it is but I still feel my idea of bias against Sony's PS3 has at least some legs. In the case of Lair I see the biggest problem Lair had going for it was that it was supposed to be the first game leading into the heavy hitting holiday season for Sony. It was a game all PS3 owners have been waiting for since beating Resistance for the 12 time, mastered every character in Virtua Fighter 5 and beat Ninja Gaiden Sigma on the hardest difficulty and without much else as far as AAA titles are concerned. The company has steadily taken hits for not supplying games worthy of the price tag and Lair was going to be the one to send many over the hump, especially with the temporary price drop ("Huge title with a cheaper nextgen system but only for a limited time? Gotta get it now then!"). Playing it they must havefelt underwhelmed at first and then immediately betrayed. "This is what we get for our money?" is all I can envision them saying after their playthrough and from this mentality then they doled out the scores. I am not sure if an earlier preview of the game (which described the flight controls as "silky") was written by any of the later reviewers who loudly complain about the controls throughout their individual reviews but if so man thats quite a 180. Also, they complain about features that are lacking. One points out the lack of radar in such a huge environment. This would be a fair point but there is one problem: look at where the game takes place and ask yourself if a radar would make much sense. In a gaming world where recently less is more when it comes to on screen indicators (GTAIV and MGS4 are the biggest recent additions to this camp) and the fact the game's setting is something not far off from that of the LoTR I just dont see why it needed to be in. When I was done with their review I basically summed up their opinion towards Factor 5: "Make another Rouge Squadran game!". I mean what the hell?! This company has taken one of the lead positions in the PS3 lineup and basically had to lay the foundation for future flying games on the system using the sixaxis. At no point do they mention how this is the first major title where the sixaxis is actually used in a way that isnt tacked onto normal gameplay nor do they soften their opinions because this game has taken such chances in its developement and the fact they are obviously not ready to stop using sticks in flight and hate the fact there is no option for it. In all it just seems very unfair on the magazine's part to judge a game that is still in the first year of the system's life based on its hype alone and to only highlight the game's visuals as a reason to even purchase it (and thats only if you have a HD-TV)
In the very same issue EGM has done an absolutely huge story on Halo3. Seriously, I know the story every month is big but with 15 pages (and thats not counting the opening pages which are mostly pictures or ads inside the article) dedicated to the game thats quite a bit. On top of the article looking at the single player campaign there is an accompanying one based on the multiplayer game as well (written by Hsu ironically). A few months back when the Halo3 demo was being evaluated by gaming journalists there was a small thing on G4 (Attack of the Show) where Gamespot's own Jeff Gerstman (spelling? lol) talked about the demo with Hsu. Jeff pointed out, as many others have, that in the end for better or worse it just felt like more Halo. Hsu on the other hand pointed to all the 'new' gameplay elements in the beta as if the genre was taking some bug step foward and throughout the chat he kept praising the game. The man is obviously a huge fan and has put that fandom in front of his own credibility. Like the Lair review in a way (which he did not do by the way) he seemingly needs to justify is huge admeration of the Halo franchise by dropping praise on it constantly as if he would feel terrible knowing he dedicated so much of his time to an inferior game (like the reviews needed Lair to justify their $600 expense up to this point and where left wanting). I know Halo is a huge game in this industry and they have earned that respected but EGM in particular has continued to roll out praise month after month based on hype alone, until their recent 'exclusive' look at the single player campaign in this months episode.When released, Halo3will clearly be a good game but it wont do anything new and the story will likely be lacking again but I can make an educated guess it will get three 10's and a platinum rating without the bat of an eye.
As far as overall PS3 bashing its not hard to find in the magaizne over recent months. In fact they even did a cover story about how its launch ruined all the good press it had going into launch and assaulted Jack Trenton (who had just taken over at the time I believe). Although they did do a similar questionaire with Peter Moore about the 360's faults the PS3 interview was much longer and much more biting in its tone and overall negativity. Also recently they did a previews article on upcoming PS3 exclusives which I thought was very cool, and then I read the previews themselves and was dissappointed again. Uncharted: Drakes Fortunewas one of the few to escape unscathed which is weird because previews for any game are usually too poisitive because theyre PREVIEWS, not finished products. The article was supposed to excite people for these games, not make them question the games months and months before release. For example, talking about MGS4 they complain about how the AI moves too robotically.This at a time when even though it was not announced it would be pushed into '08 it was still common knowledge so there is still plenty of time to fix such a problem (especially in a game with producer known for getting the little things down). Eye of Judgement, which I know none of them will buy because they dont come across as card game players (hate the Yu-Gi-Oh games for example), was seen as gimmiky (DUH!). When talking about Heavenly Sword they for some reason bring up the fact Ninja Theory is, "known for the horrific Xbox1 party game Kung Fu Chaos." They dont even compare what was bad in that game and what could be bad in this one or anything they just plant a seed of doubt into gamers minds and that is very annoying to me. They actually dont find flying in Warhawk, which is weird seeing how much they hated doing it in Lair, and they like the fact Ratchet and Clank goes back to more platforming than shooting. Negative opinions like these have lead me to believe that the staff at EGM would rather not see the company take any risky chances on new properties(Lair, Heavenly Sword and Eye of Judgement) and focus on known commodities like Ratchet and Clank, MGSand Warhawk. I even feel they enjoy Uncharted so much as it reminds them of a more beautiful Tomb Raider. In the same issue as the Lairreview they do a small preview on LittleBigPlanet and overall it came away as a negative outlook. Saying the original GDC demo level, "wasn't terribly long" and hinting at the idea thatonly game developers could have the skills necessary to make truely great levels.Having watched on Gamespot the E3 floor demo of the game I know these problems to be unfounded but I guess they have to work with the idea people who pay money to read about games would never go onto the internet for free when not reading it and look up titles, even on their own homepage www.1up.com.
Its as if the cheaper the system the more they dont mind creativity because the investment is much less. They love the Wii and have yet to point out that pretty much every game aside from Zelda and Paper Mario has just been a collection of minigames and for the most part enjoy the 'innovative' controls of the Wii. Also, they like the fact in Persona 3 for the PS2 the game works off the idea of teens killing themselves to release spirits. However when Factor 5 throws their hat into the realm of innovation they are quickly attacked for it, straying too far away from (what else) Factor 5's biggest namesake, Rouge Squadran. Again I think it comes down to the fact they didnt like having to pay so much for a system and then not get exactly what they wanted. Although Im too young to have experienced it, when Neil Young was signed to some record company for a huge contract and then that same company sued him for not making music that made him famous but rather trying to become a more innovative artist I am reminded of this same situation (I know my knowledge of intricate details in that story were amazin, thank you haha). Its as if EGM wants Sony to be the EA of the consoles, putting out a product thats not innovative in really any way but in the end they still put out good stuff when they stick to what works. In the long run I feel if Sony was lower the price these types of comments would maybe be reduced but who knows, maybe they would feel even more betrayed by the idea they overpayed for a system when they could have waited to get 'good' games with a cheaper price.
I really want to start doing these more often but Im a lazy bastard haha. If anybody reads this and has comments please let me know, I love talking games with people and would also be more motivated to write blog entries. Maybe Im seeing something in EGM that isnt actually there haha. I do like other sections of the magazine like the Rumormill (which usually has a few good PS3 rumors every month) and Seanbaby's reviews of horrible games (a must read for any gamer) so I would also like to point out that Im not just a hater on the magazine. Thank you for reading this and have a nice day =).
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