Backlog: The Embiggening – June, 2017
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 05/28/17 at 03:40 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! June is traditionally the start of the dreaded Summer Game Drought. Fortunately for all of us, this year, the deluge that started two months ago is continuing unabated. Should we be grateful for this influx of new releases, or is it transforming into a destructive monsoon of crap?
Only three pieces of shovelware are coming in June. By some cosmic coincidence, all of them happen to be racing shovelware to boot: “Cars 3: Driven to Win” will probably be the best bet for fans of Kart racing, as that genre has been quite neglected lately, “Micro Machines World Series” will probably be the best bet for fans of the also-neglected Vehicular Combat sub-genre (though it’s weird to see a new game based on toys from 25 years ago), and “The Official Motocross Game” (which was delayed from last month) should be the choice for those who prefer realism to fun.
There are a whopping 10 releases in the port/remaster/compilation …
Microsoft’s Reality Mix-Up
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 05/21/17 at 04:04 PM CT
Three years ago, I was rather excited about the potential of Virtual Reality hardware, like the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and PlayStation VR, as well as Microsoft’s weird, special snowflake take on the Reality gimmick, Augmented Reality via the prototype MS Hololens. We haven’t heard much about Hololens since E3 2015, and I was beginning to think that the lukewarm reception of VR technologies by the consumer public caused Microsoft to get cold feet about AR.
That is not the case! It appears that late last year, Microsoft partnered with some of their numerous third-party hardware manufactuerers, like Acer and Hewlett-Packard, to create a new type of headset device that shares more in common with VR than AR. These so-called ‘Mixed Reality’ headsets now have an official name – Windows Holographic – and were apparently up for pre-order for a while but no longer appear to be. These new MR headsets are supposed to work with a previously-unknown set of Microsoft motion …
5 Windows Store Games to Keep Your Elderly Mother Occupied
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 05/14/17 at 02:16 PM CT
Way back in 2014, I put together a list of 5 Wii games to help bridge the generation gap between Gen-X-ers and their mothers on Mothers’ Day. In the intervening time, the Wii came to the end of its glorious life and was replaced by the abysmal WiiU. In the same timeframe, Nintendo seems to have largely given up on the ‘Blue Ocean’ of non-gamers. Instead, apps have become the new way for non-traditional folks to enjoy a videogame or two.
While the new generation of Millennials surely has little to worry about regarding their parents and technology, Gen-X-ers with elderly parents are still in the same boat we’ve been in for 20 years: Mom and Dad just can’t figure out that darned computer. And don’t even try to teach them how to use a smartphone in their 60s unless you also want to explain to them how they managed to run-up massive data overages on their bill. No, the parents of Gen-X have been passed over by technology, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible for them …
Xbox Scorpio: What It Will Be; What It Should Be
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 05/07/17 at 04:55 PM CT
While it still doesn’t have an official name or release date outside of ‘holiday 2017,’ recently new information has been revealed about the upcoming successor to the XBONE, the Xbox Codenamed ‘Scorpio.’ As an Xbox hater since the very beginning, when Microsoft began adapting many of the most annoying aspects of PC gaming for console gaming consumption, anything Microsoft might do that has ‘Xbox’ in the name is a hard sell for me. But the company has proven that the flow goes both ways, and I have gotten significant use and enjoyment out of a number of their console-centric ideas that found their way into the Windows PC operating system.
With Scorpio, Microsoft is running off a ‘four-pillar’ model, with four key areas of focus that they hope will allow their next effort to redeem the utter failure of the XBONE (and perhaps become the first Xbox console to turn a profit). These four pillars are as follows:
1. Regain the hearts and minds of …
Backlog: The Embiggening – May, 2017
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/30/17 at 04:29 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! May is continuing the downpour of Spring releases that started last month. Shall we see if the garden has started to blossom?
Shovelware weeds are starting to poke their noses out of the dirt. There’s plenty of variety too! There’s two licenses superhero pieces of shovelware, “Injustice 2” for DC fans and Telltale’s “Guardians of the Galaxy” serial Adventure for Marvel fans. For those who aren’t into licensed shovelware based on fiction IPs, there’s a new annual release in the “Official Motocross Game.” Lastly, there are two new releases in that shovelware archetype that is just so casual that it’s inconceivable they can make any money: “Cooking Mama: Sweet Shop” for 3DS and “Baila Latino” (which means ‘Latin dance’ en español) for PS4.
Once again, there are plenty of ports and remasters. “Lock’s Quest,” which was supposed to come to PS4 and XBONE last month, is leading the way, along …
Japanese Games: Big on Steam… But Not in Japan
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/23/17 at 04:09 PM CT
At the beginning of the year, I took a look at what Japanese gamers are playing, since they obviously aren’t getting all of the Western releases that we are in North America. Ironically, Japanese publishers have started pushing multi-platform releases more and more onto PC via Steam. This trend of Japanese publishers releasing games on PC is a fairly new phenomenon, despite a handful of abortive efforts dating all the way back to the 5th Generation, where certain ‘Final Fantasy’ titles received PC versions.
Clearly releasing “Final Fantasy 7” on Windows didn’t do a lot for Squaresoft back in the day, as they quickly chilled on the concept, only revitalizing the practice within the last few years, offering ported PC versions of most of their old games as well as multi-platform releases for a number of new ones, such as “NieR Automata.”
Square Enix is not the only Japanese publisher increasingly releasing multi-platform games and including PC as one of those …
Pointing the Finger: Mobile Gaming is the Cause of the Industry’s Ills
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/16/17 at 03:03 PM CT
Since February, 2017, the themes of my column here on MeltedJoystick have been perhaps a bit more doom-and-gloom than usual. I have had a very difficult time coming up with anything in games industry news and opinion that I can think positively about. Whether it’s gamers hating on each other to the point of Civil War, predatory The-House-Always-Wins tactics becoming increasingly common in the non-gambling space of videogames, Steam getting overwhelmed by garbage titles, Nintendo following the herd and adopting maligned concepts such as Season Passes and subscriptions, or Free2Play games obsessively advertising each other with no visible source of incoming revenue.
Colin Moriarty, one of the four kindred spirits who runs the Kinda Funny Games YouTube channel has an explanation:
Every single one of these negative threads in contemporary Games Industry leads back to the same tangled knot. If we tug on these threads, will the knot unravel? Or will it simply tighten to the …
Circular Advertising
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/08/17 at 04:18 PM CT
Last weekend during our regular Sunday brunch, my mother, who has gotten a lot of enjoyment out of my Xbox Live account and Microsoft’s casual games on Windows 10, asked me, “Do your tablet games show you a lot more ads lately?” Being the fan of “Microsoft Mahjong” and “Microsoft Solitaire Collection” that she is, Mom has been playing the daily challenges with the same dedication as a typical hardcore MMO player. Commonly, these casual Microsoft games stream a video advertisement between daily challenges (or between attempts, since these typically take more than one try).
My reply was that the so-called “tablet” games (really, she meant “mobile,” but isn’t tech savvy at all at age 68) I play don’t typically show me ads unless I ask them to. However, I did play (and somehow manage to FINISH!) “Bad Piggies,” which was an ad-supported “free” game that would randomly show me videos between stages, and also show me videos when I would choose to watch …
Backlog: The Embiggening – April, 2017
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/02/17 at 04:43 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! April has a lot of releases slated, especially compared to recent months of unwarranted drought. But don’t be FOOLED, as the upcoming titles for the idiots’ month aren’t looking to be particularly stellar. Maybe there will at least be something to care about…
Only one piece of shovelware this month… and it’s also a port! So let’s just move on to that bloated section of the article.
There are going to be a ton of ports and remasters release in April, mostly of stuff that didn’t really deserve a second chance in the first place: “LEGO City: Undercover” is the most shovel-ready port, but there are plenty more. “Air Conflicts: Secret Wars” and “The Silver Case” are both coming to PS4. “Valhalla Hills,” “Bulletstorm,” “Lock’s Quest,” and Indie darling “Stardew Valley” are coming to the 8th Gen PC-likes. The ‘Outlast’ series of Survival Horror zombie schlock is getting a compilation …
Nintendo is the Most Tone-Deaf Member of the Band
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/26/17 at 03:11 PM CT
When it comes to the popularity of PC-like consoles over the last decade, nobody really seems to understand “why.” Sony spent quite some time pondering why the PS4 did so well at the beginning of the 8th Generation, but never came to any conclusions (at least that they announced publicly). Rather, the company is merely content to accept the fact that they are currently loved. They will likely expect this love to continue into the 9th Generation, despite never figuring out a cause, and thus no way to replicate the circumstances that brought about their current popularity.
Nintendo is, as always, in the same boat with Sony; neither company truly understanding why they’re doing what they’re doing. Unfortunately for its fanbase, on the rare occasions when Nintendo plays Follow-the-Leader and adopts ideas from other game industry giants (specifically Western ones), they always seem to miss the point.
Ever since the Wii first brought Nintendo into the online marketplace for …
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