I’m writing a bit of a speedy Weekly Retrospective this week, so I’ll get straight to the point: we have a new writer, Mezino! Some of you may have seen him around the site already in the comments and/or read his first ever post on StartGame, the World of Goo WiiWare review. He’s been gaming since the Speccy 48K days and is currently an avid Nintendo gamer, so he’ll be concentrating on the Wii and DS side of things.
We’re trying out a new spin on first impressions by introducing our “5 Minutes With…” series that Hodgi started today. It combines both a written impressions and a 5 minute video (see what we did there?) showing off some gameplay, so you can see what we thought of the game and then check it out for yourself. I’ve also got something special in the works for those budding games developers out there, so watch out for that.
I’d also like to touch on the issue that has been raised a few times before: the “paying to play” thing that’s been getting a lot of coverage recently. Several companies have introduced a system where anyone picking up pre-owned copies of certain games will have to cough up to play online. My thoughts? Well, it depends where the money’s going – if it’s being handed over to the developers for their hard work, it’s a great idea.
It is a fantastic way to combat piracy, after all, especially on those games where the online content is key. It’s no secret that game piracy is all around, so it’s just a way of ensuring that those who choose to pirate have a significant portion of game locked away from them. It encourages people to purchase the full game, and may even drive down prices of pre-owned games. You wouldn’t pay £30 for a used title, knowing the additional cost, when the new, full game is a similar price.
On a slightly different note, those DLC unlock packs have reared their ugly head again on the store. You pay a certain amount of dosh, and a certain amount of content is unlocked from the word go, negating the need to actually unlock it. Why isn’t all the content available to use in a certain mode? Why can’t there be a cheat to unlock it all, like there used to be? Well, the issue is is that gamers are ready and willing to pay for it.
It happened in Burnout Paradise and the same is happening in Split/Second: you unlock all the cars, then you take them online. There are those out there that enjoy racing with the cars they’ve earned; if these packs are going to be made available, please make them offline only. The age old argument is that the devs/pubs are businesses and we should assume they’re greedy, but there’s a certain amount of common sense that should be used when releasing packs like this.
It’s up the individual whether or not they pay for this stuff and how they justify it, but it’s just not sporting when it encroaches on others’ enjoyment of the game. I know the feeling of going online on Burnout and being hounded by a new player driving the F1 cars he just bought from the store. You don’t want someone to get the upper hand on you just because they spent a few quid and you didn’t, on stuff which is on the disc anyway and you totally paid for already.
Anyway, I guess it wasn’t that speedy after all and if you want to share your own views, drop them right in the comments down there. Enjoy your nights, people!
mynameisblair (75)
wick15 (17)
toutski (14)
Daywalker (13)
gazzagb (12)
I have to agree with you, LS, on the subject of unlock packs. I’m going to have to avoid Split/Second online for a while if people are just buying the stuff. Personally, I enjoy the thrill of working through the single player first (in most cases) and then taking what I’ve earned online (and getting subsequently shot down in flames by some sad prat with more time on their hands), and the prospect of the unlock packs just seems unsporting.
Either that, or games should be balanced via a lowest-common-denominator approach, or just have the visuals of the cars, with all cars being the same spec-wise (such as in the A1 GP), where the player’s skill/luck is the only differing factor.
Unlock packs as an idea are fine – it’s up to people what they spend their money on – but they shouldn’t interfere with the balance of online play. It’s kind of like someone paying an extra couple of quid to unlock all the weapons and killstreaks in MW2 from the off.
I think that having all cars as the same spec would be an idea. Allow people to customise the body shape, visuals etc, but have it all come down to skill in the end.