Pressing Buttons

Advertising is no longer our scape goat

I believe we finally have substantial evidence that a game can fail by any means necessary, absolutely no amount of advertising dollars can make a title sink or swim.

For the longest time, blaming the commercial troubles of a particular game fell into the hands of every publisher's advertising department. They'd probably be able to take that blame and spin it into something beautiful, but our kind would still see them in a negative light.

I think there'd be no publisher better to explain their feelings on the matter than EA. Forever the source of gaming's ails, they've never seemed capable of supporting that cult-followed title as much as its adoring fans would have liked. They only went so far as to produce or develop that extraordinary title and release it to the masses. Damn them.

Games like Psychonauts and Beyond Good and Evil are icons of this blame game, and to an extent, those doing all the moaning are right. Neither title was marketed particularly right, as they certainly had the components of "the next big thing."

But what I'm seeing today contradicts the faults of advertising. Both the aforementioned titles had success written all over them, but only in parts. There were obviously areas of those games (and others like it) that didn't resonate with the people that could make those titles break out successes. Nothing more than that.

This year really opened my eyes. In 2007, I thought that the more you put into a game's marketing, the more you got out of it. Instead, it doesn't matter whatsoever.

LittleBigPlanet in particular stands out. Despite a good couple of years worth of hype, and an impressive ad campaign (in both style and scope), it's not achieving the instant success many predicted. We could point out the areas in which it's marketed wrong (the commercials give little idea of it's main hook of "play, create, share"), but are those flaws ones that when even corrected would spur greater sales? At it's core, LBP is a game that just doesn't appeal to a wide range of people. But we shouldn't let that affect how we feel about it.

EA is yet again feeling the pinch of the advertising bug, as both Dead Space and Mirror's Edge aren't selling like gangbusters. But both titles got plenty of face time of the covers of very popular magazines, and found their way inside the ad space of many more. But, they just didn't resonate that strongly.

I think pointing the finger as the advertising budget of any particular game is just silly. Sales numbers are such a ridiculous thing to look forward too, as we'll never be happy. Developers have found so many ways of making money with the games we play, we should never write anything off as a failure. LBP may not be in millions of homes, but it's wide array of downloadable content will produce plenty of cash money for those behind it. Dead Space and Mirror's Edge may not become the new faces of EA, but they were both incredibly fun, and I'm sure we'll see more of them, if not their ideas.

Sales may not have been their strong suit, but they've all undoubtedly left an impression.

JRPG's land everywhere but PS3

Up until 4 years ago it was a forgone conclusion to think, "Hey, I bet all my favourite Japanese RPG's are coming to the Playstation 3. Honestly, it's the evolution of the PS2, your one stop shop for all things JRPG. Even the bad ones."

But then this gen got rolling, and the PS3 wasn't the instant winner everyone imagined it would have become. Everything is falling in the 360's favour. And it all comes down to install base, whether anyone likes it or not. Japanese developers are seeing that Japan isn't the lone continent of the world, in fact, there's many others where money could be made. And it just so happens that the 360 is quite popular in these other regions. And as long as Microsoft is alive and breathing, it'll keep trying to make it's console efforts ever more popular in their not-native-land.

But not everything is like Final Fantasy XIII, at least the PS3 is seeing that too. A lot of stuff has become 360 exclusive, like the latest Star Ocean. That's a huge blow to anyone who expected otherwise.

At least Sony has Nintendo to talk to, they understand what it's like to be abadoned for reasons they didn't see right in front of them.

Oh...wait. I sit corrected (I'm sitting down, can you believe it?).

Nintendo actually got into the cool club again, because....and don't tell Sony this just yet...Dragon Quest X is is development for the Wii.

If the Wii didn't own Japan yet (and they do, I just want to make a super cool point), they do now.

Monster Hunter 3, Dragon Quest IX, and Captain Rainbow ( '_' ), all for the Wii? Anyone who's anyone has a Wii, and if they didn't, they better pray they can make one in time.

I'm just getting into DQ now, and I can understand why it's so popular. I'm only playing IV on my DS, but if I can expect more of this, then I'm down.

The only thing that's kind of weird is who's developing this beast? Level 5 did VIII and is working on IX, but are they necessarily a shoe-in? They do have a lot on their plate, I find it hard to believe they're doing this on the site.

I'll go crazy and say that Monolith Soft is working on it. Or it's internal. But the Baten Kaitos creators working on the next DQ would make head's spin until they twist off.

Oh, and I think this is payback for the terrible Dragon Quest Swords.

Like a hamburger with onions inside

And by a hamburger with onions inside, I'm talking about something that is just so good you can ignore the gross bits that may have ruined your appetite.

In Mirror's Edge, forced combat is that bit of onion that makes me wretch.

The last time I spoke of Mirror's, I was already looking past one of its blemishes to see that inner beauty it possessed. And much like those awful movies starring Rachel Leigh Cook, Mirror's Edge was a beautiful game underneath those ugly glasses.

But, now that I'm in the post-mortem stage (does a video game ever really die? I'm not being philosophical, I just think using the term is bizarre) of the title, another pimple bubbled to the surface. Forced combat.

There are several instances where your ability to run is kaboshed, usually be a ladder you have to climb or a door with one of those spinny cranks you see on submarines. When you come up against one of those time-consuming obstacles, you can bet on your bottom dollar that there's a few goons barrelling down on you.

For awhile, I stuck to my guns. There was no way I was going to take the cowards way out and use a gun. I was going to be justly rewarded with a virtual trophy for doing so, why throw that away?

But as the game went on, and my patience wore thin, these moments ate away at me. Starting over dozens of times just to meet the same brutal fate forced me to shoot my enemies. Oh, how hard I tried to simply subdue them. But the tiny fraction of time provided to disarm an opponent (the "bullett time" move didn't help often, Faith would inexplicably reach out and attempt to grab the gun herself, leaving me vulnerable to the enemy's deadly advances, and I don't mean poison chocolates) would never be enough, and quickly after I would be killed by the gunfire of four enemies.

I'm not sure why games of this nature force such antiquated encounters on you. In a game about running, that more often than not discourages you from confronting foes, you should never have to worry about an ambush. But sure enough you do. It's funny too, because I never felt a greater rush than running away from crazy ninja enemies. And when I did confront them, abusing the same slide-kick move over and over just ruined that sense of "I'm underpowered, but I can still hoof it".

It's just a detriment to an otherwise perfect game. And as much as I'd like to hope that a possible sequel would eshew of these tendencies, I know they'll simply be improved or some such thing. The best solution would be cutting away of this disease, but I'm sure I'll be endowed instead with a greater repetoire of moves and attacks.

Too bad.