smalldeath.net/blog

I’m starting work on a site redesign, I’m thinking of going with dark blues and cars as my design, since that seems to be what most of my interest is in at the moment. I’m really digging the color scheme I dreamed up, should look great and be very readable.

I’m hoping to have a slightly “busier” background than I currently have, with some graphics that span from one side of the content area to the other, which should be pretty cool, if I can do it anyways (which isn’t assured by any means). Graphics aren’t my strong point, but might be a good learning experience. Hoping to mix in some of the Java I’ve been messing with as well. Nothing fancy (no wavy water, promise), but subtle enhancements to add to the overall look.

Wish me luck, I’ll need it. Sorry for any typos in this post, as I haven’t slept in 24 hours, and it’s starting to hit me!

Yes, thanks to the bastards at the IGN GT board, I am getting hooked on GT4 again. Getting more into the photo thing, playing around, random cars on random tracks, etc. this time around, as I’m already at 100%. Also doing some of the competitions people are posting… let’s see how bad I really suck!

The photo thing is a lot of fun, especially as it gives me a chance to get pictures of some of my favorite cars, such as the XJ220!

Think my next project is to take some good pictures of the Espirit!

Also, thinking of starting a resdesign of the main page again, had this one for about a year, I think its time for a new look! Maybe something darker this time, got a few ideas floating around in my head, but nothing solid yet.

I can’t wait for this game, man it’s looking better every day.

If you don’t know what it is, it’s produced by the original Everquest development team (Brad McQuaid and crew). It’s been in development for at least 3ish years that I know of. Beta is supposed to start real soon, and here’s to hoping I get an invitation to an early beta. If you want to know more go to Vanguard’s site and check around, and be sure to read some of the forums as there’s some great info on them.

Anyways, check it out, it should be a really cool game. If I get into Beta, you’ll probably see a few updates about the game itself, if they allow it in the early betas (most games allow some basic gameplay info to be commented upon, but no specifics, and sometimes no screenshots, but that depends on the publisher/developer).

So I can actually write things and make them appear on the front again. That was odd, but wasn’t hard to fix. Anyways, here’s another picture of the puppy just so I actually have something worthwhile in this post!

Not much to say, but ain’t he cute

A nice article showing some of the reactions of people “in the biz” (developers and such) is on the Next Generation site. Interestingly, the developers seem to be OK with the decision to have 2 initial flavors, saying they were told not to rely on a hard drive being there in the first place. Many of the publisher/studio VP’s and such seem to be a bit more upset by it. I would have thought it would be the other way around.

The more I see it, the more I don’t like it. To me it seems , as Dave Halverson of Play Magazine says, “$299 becomes the sound bite price while 399 is the actual article.” How true, who wants a substandard piece of equipment with corded controllers, no hard drive, and no backwards compatibility? Not me, that’s for sure, because I know there will eventually be a game that you absolutely HAVE to have (Halo for Xbox for example) that will require a hard drive. And the corded controller thing, if that’s true, is just silly, as Microsoft has hyped the whole “wireless age” thing hugely ever since the official announcement of Xbox 360.

So a new batch of reports (these actually released by Microsoft) about Xbox 360 pricing. It seems that the basic version will run at $299. The “enhanced” version with all the perks will start at $399.

Obviously the $399 version will be the one with a HDD, and the coolest thing is that apparently it will have backwards compatibility (and the basic version won’t). That’s not too bad of a deal, you can off your old Xbox for probably $60-100 bucks and make it even a bit cheaper if the backwards compatibility is good (remember this is an ATI chip, and the old Xbox is NVidia, so not all games will work right most likely…).

I’ll still be waiting for the HD-DVD version myself, considering that a HD-DVD player alone will probably run in the $200 range. Hopefully it comes out within a couple months, or I’ll probably end up breaking down and buying a “basic” Xbox 360. Save me from myself.

Well originally it was said it would be between $300 and $400 to buy an Xbox 360 on release. Most people figured that would mean it would cost $360 bucks. Cute, and not TOO awful of a price.

But recently, there’s been a couple articles detailing some new pricing. They say a price of 386 Euros, or 264 British Pounds. If you know anything about current conversion rates, that means it will be really, really expensive, somewhere in the range of $475 dollars. Don’t forget that this won’t even have a HD-DVD at release (which is one of the reasons I will most likely be waiting till sometime after release to purchase one), or most likely the “big” hard-drive.

Xboxes will be released in “flavors” as opposed to a single design. You will be able to buy big hard drive systems, or no hard drive, HD-DVD (eventually) or normal DVD (maybe even no-DVD capability). I seriously hope any version of Xbox that costs $475 is the god-like system, 120+GB HD with 2 Controllers, plus whatever other “options” there will be. You can build a decent (not great by any means) gaming PC for $475, so I can’t see the Average-Joe-Gamer shelling out that much for a console.

Anyways, /rant off, and good luck getting that release day Xbox 360, suckers.

Ok so, you have 3 consoles coming out – most likely within the next year – and all 3 have different focuses, but they also have a common focus: multiplayer. Multiplayer has been the domain of the PC for a long time, but will the next generation of consoles change that? That may seem like a simple question, but there is no simple answer.

To begin, you have to understand a few things that each system (consoles vs. PCs) can do that the other can not.

For multiplayer, the differences are interesting. A PC can use a seperate program (such as ASE, or Xfire) to connect to different games. You click where you want to play, it starts the game. Simple enough. A console either uses an embedded system (such as the Xbox Live welcome screen when you don’t have a disc in the console), or uses an in-game multiplayer interface. The advantage of the console interface is that the console manufacturer (in this case, Microsoft) can create a uniform system to connect and play games; the disadvantage is that you are forced into using that system, if you don’t like it, tough beans buddy, use it anyways or don’t play. Of course, in the case of PS2, there is no uniform system, and most games use a fairly user-unfriendly multiplayer screen, hopefully that will be fixed with the PS3.

Next you have to look at how games are changed and expanded through patches and addons. With the release of the Xbox, consoles had a way to have real game patches (in theory you can patch a PS2 game with the memory card, but it’s a crude way of doing it, and uses precious space on the card). The patches usually are pretty basic for the time being, mostly fixing bugs and changing small gameplay elements, but at least they exist. The PC has the large advantage in this area though, most games are now open to make small changes and complete changes to, (and here’s the real great part) all by the gamers. The company may make small fixes and changes, but the really great changes come from the gamers themselves. Think of Counter-Strike, Desert Combat, Team Fortress, (even Capture-The-Flag was originally a gamer-made addon for Quake) and the list goes on and on. These required fairly large downloads, and completely changed the game. That’s simply not possible with consoles, at least in this generation, and most likely not the Xbox 360 or PS3 either.

I really want to talk about the choices of input for gaming. Computers have a great ability to use a variety of inputs, even one that wasn’t out when a game came out. I’m really hoping that the next generation of consoles allows more types of controllers/keyboards/etc. I really love being able to use a keyboard/mouse for most games, it’s simply the most versatile setup of any controller out there, but I do use a controller or flight stick for other games. I hope that option opens up for consoles.

One last thing, and the one thing that consoles will probably never have, is lifespan. Sure a console lasts a long time, the PS2 has been out for 5+ years, but it’s been the same console for all those years. Graphics on it have “improved” a bit, but not as much as people seem to claim. A PC has this great ability to evolve. Need better graphics? Buy a new video card. Computer running a bit slow on the newest game? Add more RAM. Games like Everquest have actually went in and redesigned their graphics engine as computers were so much faster than when it was released. Consoles can’t do that (well, I added a HD to my PS2, but that didn’t improve it much, you can’t even save games directly to the HD, sigh), and if they could, they would become a computer.

Alright so with all that taken together, what can we say about the future of gaming for the next 5 or so years?

• There will be a shift from multiplayer gaming being a PC dominated market, that’s almost a given (it’s actually started already with Xbox live, which is a user-friendly and well layed out multiplayer enviroment).
• There will be a push to make consoles more PC-like, in that they will have more non-game social networking (such as Xfire for PC, where you can either talk or join the same gaming server as a friend).
• Gaming types dominated by one platform will begin showing promise on other platforms. First-person-shooters have begun to populate the consoles, and arcade-style game (such as GTA:San Andreas) will appear more often on the PC. MMORPG’s will probably start appearing on the next generation of consoles as well.
• Patches, Mods, Conversions, and the like will become more and more common on the consoles. I don’t think the immediate coming generation will be fully ready for total conversions like Counter-Strike was for Half-Life, but will be headed in the right direction. End-user changes will still be minimal on consoles for a long time to come, which is a real loss for gamers.
• You’ll see more uses for consoles than “just gaming.” An xbox that’s also a DVR? Not that far off most likely. Or maybe you’d prefer a PS3 that doubles as your e-mail system on your nice big HDTV. Maybe not, but it wouldn’t be that hard to code into the system.

So I really have high hopes for this coming generation of consoles. If they deliver on the promises they’ve given us (although I still don’t like the idea of the “marketable multiplayer” system Microsoft is using), which include amazing graphics, easy-to-use multiplayer, and more gaming variety, it could be a really great time to be a gamer.

I am going to start writing a few tidbits of gaming information, or just whatever I find interesting, and start doing it today.

For starters is one of the best gaming ideas I’ve seen in a long time. Using DDR (Dance Dance Revolution, for the uninitiated) to lose weight! Not being sarcastic, it actually could work, as I’ve seen some people doing some serious workouts playing high-paced DDR. Only problem is, a lot of people with no rythm could never do the higher-bpm songs and more difficult versions, so how much of a workout would they really be getting? A 120 bpm (or Beats-Per-Minute) is pretty slow in the world of DDR, and the easier versions of those require maybe a movement of the foot every second or so… not much of a workout. Of course, a 200+bpm song is quite fast, and some of the more difficult settings on those songs can be quite intense.

In the more techish realm, there is a interesting poll that says people are really not as interested in the Revolution this time around. Not surprising really, Nintendo has yet to show off anything all that interesting, even in “their domain” of puzzles and original gameplay. Also of interest is the fact that a lot of people seem to think the Xbox 360 will have better graphics than the PS3, which if the hardware is any indication, shouldn’t be the case. As the article says, this is most likely a holdover from the current generation, which the Xbox has far surperior graphical capabilities. I think the two consoles will be pretty even this time around, and HDTV will continue to get more prevalent as a gaming necessity, which makes graphics look simply incredible.

I am really looking forward to the next generation of consoles, and I think that they will also push PC gaming to the next level. Now if only we can get a keyboard and mouse for a console, I might actually consider playing an FPS on it.