Are they going to do something to update the end of the main quest so it doesn't feel quite so "unnoticed?"
You take out, or support, or in some fashion "handle" the biggest boogie men in the Commonwealth and you get a few comments, here and there, and some extra wandering critters?
5 hour game / $60 = $12 per hour. For that same $12, I could go see a 2 or 3 hour movie or just buy a movie.
Game is repayable, sure, but being story-based, replay value will be limited after initial play-through. For that same $60, I could have bought Skyrim at it's original purchase price. Skyrim has logged hundreds of my entertainment hours. If I'm going to pay $60 for a game, I'd prefer a Skyrim over an Order.
I don't usually disagree with Tom, but I do, this time. I thought the pacing in the game was perfect and the story was fit very well to the ups and downs in tempo. Overall, the whole thing was amazing and I was left staring at the screen in shock and amaze. There was a great deal of introspection, as well. I love the overall uncertainty the ending created and the way the game lead up to it was perfect.
"Maxis to deliver Update 2.0 for city-building game on Monday; applying the changes will take game offline for a few hours."
Why do they even bother to say things like this? Just say "will require down time" and then be happy IF it is only a few hours. Given past track records and the stability of the game, in general, they are looking at closer to a day than a few hours. I will be shocked if it's only a few hours and I'm not just riding on Maxis for being a git about the whole "online single-player game" thing. They're being unrealistic from a technical stand point.
It's a sad thing to say, but OF COURSE THEY ARE! Both of these games are beautiful, graphically, but their gameplay and premise are tired and boring. The stories don't engage. The gameplay doesn't keep the player involved. By the end of the first games I was so tired of quicktime events that I could cry. Why bother with more games filled with that?
Mr. Yerli's statement is so wrong as to be an intentional deception. Games that are graphically beautiful without having engaging gameplay and good story DO NOT SUCCEED. "It's so beautiful!" will get it bought, played, and then reviewed poorly if that comment does not go along with "It's so FUN!" and "It's so absorbing!" The mobile game market is an easy example to point to. The graphics on those devices are in no way comparable to the graphics on a console or PC, and yet MILLIONS of copies are sold of popular games. On consoles and PCs, games with terrible graphics (Minecraft, anyone?) but fun gameplay will sell millions of copies.
Gamers want FUN. Pretty is good, but not without FUN.
Huh. I disagree with the premise of the article that parents wouldn't read this to kids without giving them nightmares. My mother read the Hobbit to me when I was still in single digits and it's part of what has given me my love of reading. LotR is just an extension of that.
It was just last month that EA squashed rumors that the two co-founders of Bioware were leaving, and now they do. Too often that seems to be the case. Rumors, they leave, big changes come in at the studio, then it's closed down.
Thanks, EA. Good shot, yet again, at crushing gaming industry stalwarts.
slong's comments