If you read my last post, you'll remember that I was complaining about 3rd party developers ignoring Nintendo. The new Strider was my prime example. Well, just a couple of days after I made that post, Double Helix, the developers of the new Strider, said that a Nintendo version would be done if the demand was there for it. Now don't get me wrong, I'm certainly not claiming any influence in that decision. But I'm very happy to hear about it. If you're a Nintendo fan like me and would like to see the new Strider on the Wii U, be sure to tweet @DoubleHelixGame and @Capcom_Unity. Use the hashtag #StrideronWiiU.
I know, Twitter campaigns don't work, blah blah blah. It doesn't take much time out of your day to send a couple of tweets, and these companies can't know what we want if we don't tell them.
In related news, Namco Bandai has announced an HD remake of Soulcalibur II, which was an awesome game. But, once again, it's not for Nintendo! This one is really mystifying to me. Here's a bit of backstory for those who don't know. Soulcalibur II was originally released back in 2003 for GameCube, PS2, and Xbox. Each version of the game got an exclusive character. The Xbox version got Spawn, Todd McFarlane's comic character. Very cool. The PS2 version got Tekken's Heihachi. Kind of an odd choice, putting a fighter who just uses his fists into a fighting game known for using weapons, but still decent. The GameCube version got Link. Now, the GameCube was not one of Nintendo's greatest successes. It was, in fact, the third place console in sales during gen 6. Despite that, it was the GC version of Soulcalibur II that sold the most. People loved being able to play as Link! I knew a lot of guys that had the game back then, and not a one of them had any other version. Even today, when you go to retro game stores, the GC version isn't exactly rare, but you see it far less than you do the PS2 or Xbox versions. People kept their GC Soulcalibur IIs!
So now it's getting redone in HD, and we won't be able to play as Link? Boo! Boo, Namco! This remake is coming out on Xbox 360 and PS3. I have read that Spawn and Heihachi will be appearing in both versions of the game. So, after reading that I did understand a bit more why Nintendo wasn't getting this. If it were on the Wii U, Nintendo would expect their version to have Link in it. But if that happened, Microsoft and Sony might complain about Nintendo getting an extra character. And of course, there's no way Nintendo would allow Link to appear in the 360 or PS3 versions. But still, platform-specific bonuses like this happen all the time. See Kratos appearing in Mortal Kombat on PS3. It happens. So why is Namco ignoring Nintendo?
It's not like they have a bad relationship. Namco is helping to co-develop the two new Super Smash Bros. games coming for Wii U and 3DS! If Nintendo trusts Namco enough to let them co-develop one of their biggest franchises, I'd guess they're pretty tight. So why would Namco not try to recreate the success of the GC version of Soulcalibur II by making this remake on Wii U with Link?
Okay, enough of this. My apologies for waving the Nintendo banner for a second post in a row. I promise next time I'll find something else to talk about. As always, thanks for reading! Please tell your friends about the blog, and follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI.
Today's music: Listening to my Reds beat up on the Giants in a double header!
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Friday, July 19, 2013
New Strider? Great! Not for Nintendo? Boo!
You may not have heard yet, but Capcom has announced a brand new Strider game! The trailer looks pretty fantastic. I love it any time a game comes out that is 2D and has an old school style, even if it's not based off of an old series. But here's the thing I have an issue with. This game is coming for Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360, and PS3. No Wii U. Sorry Nintendo. Even though your NES was the first home system Strider appeared on, you don't get this game. Even though Capcom is bothering to make versions for the now-last-gen 360 and PS3, both of which aren't quite as powerful as your current system, they're still not bothering to make it for you.
Are Wii U sales really that bad? I know the month-to-month numbers are very low, but I was under the impression that the Wii U still has better lifetime sales than the Xbox 360 and PS3 did at this point in their lifetimes. Plus, it's July! This is always a slow time of year for the industry. We've only really had two blockbuster AAA releases all year, Bioshock Infinite and The Last of Us. Sales are slow all around. Or is it something more than that? Is there a grudge in place here? There are many third party publishers that used to work closely with Nintendo, companies like Capcom, Konami, Square-Enix, Tecmo-Koei, and EA, who now are not. Or in some cases they'll put out a couple lazy ports then complain it's Nintendo's fault when they don't sell well. Is this all because of the way Nintendo used to treat the third parties back in the NES/SNES days? I can't imagine these publishers, companies whose main goal is to make money, would lose out on profit just to spite Nintendo. It can't be denied, however, that Nintendo used to be pretty heavy handed with the third parties. But hey, newer third parties, that weren't around or weren't as big back in those days, do this too.
Could it be, as so many people around the internet say, that third parties don't like to put stuff on Nintendo's systems because their games are always outsold by Nintendo's own games? Nintendo's first party games do tend to sell more than anything else on their systems. Let's look at one example in particular. When the Wii U launched, EA made a Special Edition version of Mass Effect 3 for the system. The Mass Effect series was very popular in gen 7, selling huge numbers on both Xbox 360 and PS3. It was very cool to see it appearing now on a Nintendo console. How did is sell? Abysmally, by all accounts. Why was this? Was the draw of New Super Mario Bros. U just too strong? Well, that might have been part of it for some people. Let me tell you my opinion on the matter. I love the Mass Effect games. I very much enjoyed the multiplayer on ME3. I had plans to buy it on Wii U so I could continue playing the online for free (my original copy is for 360, and I don't currently have Gold). It was listed at $60, which I thought was a bit high for a year old port, but I loved the game so much I was considering it. Then some information came out. The Mass Effect Trilogy, a bundle of all three games, was announced as coming out at the same time as the Wii U version, but only for Xbox 360 and PS3. It was to sell for the same price as ME3 on the Wii U. On top of that, EA also said that there was no plans to bring the ME3 DLC to Wii U at all. Upon hearing all this I abandoned my plans to buy ME3 Special Edition. I may still pick it up eventually, if I find a cheap, used copy.
How could EA expect Mass Effect fans to be happy with a $60 year old port with no DLC support, when the entire series was being re-released, with DLC support, for the same price on older consoles? And then they had the nerve to complain that it didn't sell well and blame Nintendo for that! The tinfoil-hat-wearing part of me thinks it was all a conspiracy. They wanted sales of ME3 to be low so they could use it as an excuse to stop making games for Nintendo.
Okay, I'm going to stop myself here, before I get into fanboy territory deeper than I already have. Bear with me, folks, please. Yes, I do accept the fact that I can be a fanboy at times. But, that said, I do own all the systems, and always find great games to play on each. I love me some Halo, Fable, and Gears of War. I love Uncharted, Infamous, Jak and Daxter, and plenty of other Sony games as well. To this day the only controller I feel comfortable playing a Tony Hawk game with is a DualShock. So why should I care what games show up on which system if I have them all? Nintendo just happens to be my favorite. Even before the NES days, Donkey Kong was one of my favorite games on my parents' old Atari 400. Nintendo is always going to be my favorite company. They've given me so many happy memories. I just hate seeing them brushed to the side of the current game industry. Many out there might say they're doing it to themselves. I say Nintendo is still making the exact same kind of quality, fun games that they have been for more than 30 years. So it bugs me to see an old school series like Strider coming back as a modern 2D game, but not on Nintendo systems. Especially since the 360 and PS3 are getting a version.
That's it for my little rant. If you're a big Sony or Microsoft guy, don't let it scare you off! I like those systems too, I promise! Before I finish, let me also say that if you're a fan of horror movies, get yourself to the theater and see The Conjuring! I just got back from a screening before I started typing this out. It was one of the best horror movies I've seen in years! Great atmosphere, lots of good scares without relying too heavily on jump scares or so-called "cheap" scare tactics. Some really nice practical effects, and most importantly it didn't fall victim to dumb-ending syndrome. So many otherwise-good horror movies have been ruined by the writer not knowing how to end them properly. This was a very well written movie based off of a supposedly true story. Go see it with a bunch of friends!
As always, thanks for reading! Be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI!
Are Wii U sales really that bad? I know the month-to-month numbers are very low, but I was under the impression that the Wii U still has better lifetime sales than the Xbox 360 and PS3 did at this point in their lifetimes. Plus, it's July! This is always a slow time of year for the industry. We've only really had two blockbuster AAA releases all year, Bioshock Infinite and The Last of Us. Sales are slow all around. Or is it something more than that? Is there a grudge in place here? There are many third party publishers that used to work closely with Nintendo, companies like Capcom, Konami, Square-Enix, Tecmo-Koei, and EA, who now are not. Or in some cases they'll put out a couple lazy ports then complain it's Nintendo's fault when they don't sell well. Is this all because of the way Nintendo used to treat the third parties back in the NES/SNES days? I can't imagine these publishers, companies whose main goal is to make money, would lose out on profit just to spite Nintendo. It can't be denied, however, that Nintendo used to be pretty heavy handed with the third parties. But hey, newer third parties, that weren't around or weren't as big back in those days, do this too.
Could it be, as so many people around the internet say, that third parties don't like to put stuff on Nintendo's systems because their games are always outsold by Nintendo's own games? Nintendo's first party games do tend to sell more than anything else on their systems. Let's look at one example in particular. When the Wii U launched, EA made a Special Edition version of Mass Effect 3 for the system. The Mass Effect series was very popular in gen 7, selling huge numbers on both Xbox 360 and PS3. It was very cool to see it appearing now on a Nintendo console. How did is sell? Abysmally, by all accounts. Why was this? Was the draw of New Super Mario Bros. U just too strong? Well, that might have been part of it for some people. Let me tell you my opinion on the matter. I love the Mass Effect games. I very much enjoyed the multiplayer on ME3. I had plans to buy it on Wii U so I could continue playing the online for free (my original copy is for 360, and I don't currently have Gold). It was listed at $60, which I thought was a bit high for a year old port, but I loved the game so much I was considering it. Then some information came out. The Mass Effect Trilogy, a bundle of all three games, was announced as coming out at the same time as the Wii U version, but only for Xbox 360 and PS3. It was to sell for the same price as ME3 on the Wii U. On top of that, EA also said that there was no plans to bring the ME3 DLC to Wii U at all. Upon hearing all this I abandoned my plans to buy ME3 Special Edition. I may still pick it up eventually, if I find a cheap, used copy.
How could EA expect Mass Effect fans to be happy with a $60 year old port with no DLC support, when the entire series was being re-released, with DLC support, for the same price on older consoles? And then they had the nerve to complain that it didn't sell well and blame Nintendo for that! The tinfoil-hat-wearing part of me thinks it was all a conspiracy. They wanted sales of ME3 to be low so they could use it as an excuse to stop making games for Nintendo.
Okay, I'm going to stop myself here, before I get into fanboy territory deeper than I already have. Bear with me, folks, please. Yes, I do accept the fact that I can be a fanboy at times. But, that said, I do own all the systems, and always find great games to play on each. I love me some Halo, Fable, and Gears of War. I love Uncharted, Infamous, Jak and Daxter, and plenty of other Sony games as well. To this day the only controller I feel comfortable playing a Tony Hawk game with is a DualShock. So why should I care what games show up on which system if I have them all? Nintendo just happens to be my favorite. Even before the NES days, Donkey Kong was one of my favorite games on my parents' old Atari 400. Nintendo is always going to be my favorite company. They've given me so many happy memories. I just hate seeing them brushed to the side of the current game industry. Many out there might say they're doing it to themselves. I say Nintendo is still making the exact same kind of quality, fun games that they have been for more than 30 years. So it bugs me to see an old school series like Strider coming back as a modern 2D game, but not on Nintendo systems. Especially since the 360 and PS3 are getting a version.
That's it for my little rant. If you're a big Sony or Microsoft guy, don't let it scare you off! I like those systems too, I promise! Before I finish, let me also say that if you're a fan of horror movies, get yourself to the theater and see The Conjuring! I just got back from a screening before I started typing this out. It was one of the best horror movies I've seen in years! Great atmosphere, lots of good scares without relying too heavily on jump scares or so-called "cheap" scare tactics. Some really nice practical effects, and most importantly it didn't fall victim to dumb-ending syndrome. So many otherwise-good horror movies have been ruined by the writer not knowing how to end them properly. This was a very well written movie based off of a supposedly true story. Go see it with a bunch of friends!
As always, thanks for reading! Be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI!
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
The Video Game Years
For those of you keeping track, yes, I meant to have this up last night. Sorry.
I'd like to talk to you today about a very cool show over at Retroware TV. There are plenty of great shows on Retroware, from Pat the NES Punk to 16-Bit Gems, The Game Chasers, and more. Now imagine all of those guys getting together to talk about the history of the games industry, year by year. Picture VH1's I Love the '70s/'80s, but for video games. The guys from Retroware, plus special guests from other major classic gaming sites, tell not only the history of what happened each year, but also their own stories on how it impacted them. They started in 1977, the year the Atari 2600 came out and started gen 2. Each year gets a number of 10-or-so minute episodes dedicated to it. They are currently up to 1981. Personally, I can't wait until they get to 1985 and start talking about the very early days of the NES.
A month or so ago they had an Indiegogo page set up asking for donations for the show. Up until that point they had been putting them together in their spare time for no money. But considering the amount of editing and technical work that had to be done for each episode, they didn't want to keep asking people to work on them for free. The Indiegogo goal was met very easily, and Retroware has promised to keep producing the show as long as they can. They've said they'd like to get as far as the Dreamcast, which came out in 1999. That's a lot of episodes!
So please, if you like learning about the history of the video game industry and want to be entertained while you do it, get over to Retroware TV and check out The Video Game Years! The show is very well made and the guys at Retroware are clearly having a great time making it. And watch their other stuff while you're at it, it's all quality.
Before I'm done, I want to quickly touch on the new head of Microsoft's Xbox division. Don Mattrick's replacement has been named, and it's Julie Larson-Green. Julie's been at Microsoft for almost 20 years and was one of the people who made Windows 7 happen. Now she's in charge of Xbox. I know a lot of people are upset that a woman with no video game experience has been put in this position. Stop that. She's clearly an intelligent person. Give her a chance to show what she can do. It's not like she won't be surrounded by people that do have video game experience that can help her learn the industry. And honestly, could she be any worse than Mattrick?
As always, thanks for reading! Please tell your friends about the blog, and be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI!
I'd like to talk to you today about a very cool show over at Retroware TV. There are plenty of great shows on Retroware, from Pat the NES Punk to 16-Bit Gems, The Game Chasers, and more. Now imagine all of those guys getting together to talk about the history of the games industry, year by year. Picture VH1's I Love the '70s/'80s, but for video games. The guys from Retroware, plus special guests from other major classic gaming sites, tell not only the history of what happened each year, but also their own stories on how it impacted them. They started in 1977, the year the Atari 2600 came out and started gen 2. Each year gets a number of 10-or-so minute episodes dedicated to it. They are currently up to 1981. Personally, I can't wait until they get to 1985 and start talking about the very early days of the NES.
A month or so ago they had an Indiegogo page set up asking for donations for the show. Up until that point they had been putting them together in their spare time for no money. But considering the amount of editing and technical work that had to be done for each episode, they didn't want to keep asking people to work on them for free. The Indiegogo goal was met very easily, and Retroware has promised to keep producing the show as long as they can. They've said they'd like to get as far as the Dreamcast, which came out in 1999. That's a lot of episodes!
So please, if you like learning about the history of the video game industry and want to be entertained while you do it, get over to Retroware TV and check out The Video Game Years! The show is very well made and the guys at Retroware are clearly having a great time making it. And watch their other stuff while you're at it, it's all quality.
Before I'm done, I want to quickly touch on the new head of Microsoft's Xbox division. Don Mattrick's replacement has been named, and it's Julie Larson-Green. Julie's been at Microsoft for almost 20 years and was one of the people who made Windows 7 happen. Now she's in charge of Xbox. I know a lot of people are upset that a woman with no video game experience has been put in this position. Stop that. She's clearly an intelligent person. Give her a chance to show what she can do. It's not like she won't be surrounded by people that do have video game experience that can help her learn the industry. And honestly, could she be any worse than Mattrick?
As always, thanks for reading! Please tell your friends about the blog, and be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI!
Sunday, July 14, 2013
Nothing today
I had planned on doing a post today, but I think I've changed my mind. America has a lot going on today. Not that I'm claiming all of America reads this blog, I see the numbers and clearly they don't. I just think today might not be the day I need to be writing about video games and movies.
For those of you that do read, I should have a real post up hopefully Tuesday. Thanks for your patience. And let me just say, at the risk of bringing politics into this blog (something I desperately don't want to do), that no matter which side of the current national argument you fall on, let's try to remember that we're all one people and we need to keep things as positive as possible. Peace.
For those of you that do read, I should have a real post up hopefully Tuesday. Thanks for your patience. And let me just say, at the risk of bringing politics into this blog (something I desperately don't want to do), that no matter which side of the current national argument you fall on, let's try to remember that we're all one people and we need to keep things as positive as possible. Peace.
Thursday, July 11, 2013
Odds and ends
I don't have any one topic I want to talk about today, so I'll just cover a few things briefly.
I saw Man of Steel a couple of nights ago. I pretty much hated it. I know it's been getting mixed reactions, some people love it, some hate it. I just can't understand how anyone liked it. The characters in this movie were all boring and unlikeable, with the possible exceptions of Jonathan Kent and Jor-El. I'm not going to go into specifics since I don't want to spoil anything for those of you that still want to give it a try, but I will say a few things. The acting was bad. Or maybe just the direction, as the people in the movie are all competent actors. But Superman was so wooden! He never seemed to care about anything. He made Christian Bale's Batman seem cheery! And the movie never seemed to give me any reason to care much about any of the characters, especially Superman, and even more especially Clark Kent. Some of the Kryptonian lore was very off from the comics, too. I just couldn't find much at all to like about this movie, and I couldn't really recommend it to anyone.
Next I'd like to talk to you a bit about Nintendo and their practice of region locking their systems. This means if you have, say, a US 3DS, you can't play any import games on it. Nintendo are the only hardware maker that still do this. The PS4 and Xbox One (and I believe the PS Vita) are completely region free. Any import games you buy for those systems will work just fine. You might not be able to understand the language, but the game will play. I don't know why Nintendo is holding to region locking so strongly. They've given some excuse about conforming to each countries rating systems for games, but that seems flimsy. It hasn't stopped Sony or Microsoft. So, if you care at all about importing games, please let Nintendo know! Send tweets to @Nintendo and @NintendoAmerica with the hashtags #NintendoRegionFree and #EndRegionLocking. If you have a Wii U, be sure to post on Miiverse about it as well. I believe there are a couple of online petitions floating around also, you could look for some of those.
Sorry for the short post. Hopefully next time I'll have more in-depth things to talk about! But, as always, thank you for reading. Be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI!
I saw Man of Steel a couple of nights ago. I pretty much hated it. I know it's been getting mixed reactions, some people love it, some hate it. I just can't understand how anyone liked it. The characters in this movie were all boring and unlikeable, with the possible exceptions of Jonathan Kent and Jor-El. I'm not going to go into specifics since I don't want to spoil anything for those of you that still want to give it a try, but I will say a few things. The acting was bad. Or maybe just the direction, as the people in the movie are all competent actors. But Superman was so wooden! He never seemed to care about anything. He made Christian Bale's Batman seem cheery! And the movie never seemed to give me any reason to care much about any of the characters, especially Superman, and even more especially Clark Kent. Some of the Kryptonian lore was very off from the comics, too. I just couldn't find much at all to like about this movie, and I couldn't really recommend it to anyone.
Next I'd like to talk to you a bit about Nintendo and their practice of region locking their systems. This means if you have, say, a US 3DS, you can't play any import games on it. Nintendo are the only hardware maker that still do this. The PS4 and Xbox One (and I believe the PS Vita) are completely region free. Any import games you buy for those systems will work just fine. You might not be able to understand the language, but the game will play. I don't know why Nintendo is holding to region locking so strongly. They've given some excuse about conforming to each countries rating systems for games, but that seems flimsy. It hasn't stopped Sony or Microsoft. So, if you care at all about importing games, please let Nintendo know! Send tweets to @Nintendo and @NintendoAmerica with the hashtags #NintendoRegionFree and #EndRegionLocking. If you have a Wii U, be sure to post on Miiverse about it as well. I believe there are a couple of online petitions floating around also, you could look for some of those.
Sorry for the short post. Hopefully next time I'll have more in-depth things to talk about! But, as always, thank you for reading. Be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI!
Saturday, July 6, 2013
V/H/S 2 and The Last Exorcism 2
First off, a belated happy Fourth of July to you all! I hope you got to see some good fireworks. In my area it rained all week, so I didn't get much of fireworks this year.
Today I'm going to talk about a couple of horror movies I saw recently. Both are sequels to movies I rather liked, V/H/S and The Last Exorcism. Both of these movies were handcam movies, which I enjoy. V/H/S was an anthology movie with a pretty unique premise, at least in my experience. It centered around a group of guys who were payed to break into a house and steal a VHS tape. When they break in they find the house's owner dead and piles of tapes all over. The stuff on the tapes make up each segment of the movie. It wasn't a perfect film, but I enjoyed it. V/H/S 2 didn't let me down. The story in this one follows a PI hired by the mother of one of the guys from the first film to find her missing son. They go to his house and find a pile of VHS tapes. Just like before, those give us our segments. I'm not going to go into details about the segments, but most of them are pretty cool. Both films give you a nice mix of styles, with each segment being written and directed by different people. If I had to choose, I'd say the first one was slightly better overall, but the sequel has the best segment. A handcam story about alien abduction? I've been waiting for one of those for years, ever since I saw Incident in Lake County back in the day! A bigger budget version of that could be the most terrifying film ever made. The short in V/H/S 2 comes close to it, but it's just a short. Anyway, if you're looking for some good horror flicks, the V/H/S movies are pretty cool.
Now for The Last Exorcism 2. The first movie was another handcam flick, about a preacher who performs exorcisms, but doesn't really believe. In the movie, he's filming a documentary about what will be his last exorcism, hence the title. Of course, this one just happens to involve an actual demon. I'm not going to go into specifics, I can't without spoiling it, but it was a good movie with a cool ending. Horror movies, especially in recent years, have crap endings far too often. This was the problem with The Last Exorcism 2. The sequel follows the story of the possessed girl from the first movie as she attempts to get on with her life. The sequel is not a handcam film like the original, just a traditional movie. That's fine, I don't need all my horror films to be handcam. My problem is that it features some inconsistencies from the original, plus has a really, really stupid ending. So while I would highly recommend the original, I can't do the same for the sequel. It's not terrible, just not very good. Definitely a disappointment to me.
As always, thanks for reading! If you want to recommend me some good horror movies, leave a comment below. You can also follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI.
Today I'm going to talk about a couple of horror movies I saw recently. Both are sequels to movies I rather liked, V/H/S and The Last Exorcism. Both of these movies were handcam movies, which I enjoy. V/H/S was an anthology movie with a pretty unique premise, at least in my experience. It centered around a group of guys who were payed to break into a house and steal a VHS tape. When they break in they find the house's owner dead and piles of tapes all over. The stuff on the tapes make up each segment of the movie. It wasn't a perfect film, but I enjoyed it. V/H/S 2 didn't let me down. The story in this one follows a PI hired by the mother of one of the guys from the first film to find her missing son. They go to his house and find a pile of VHS tapes. Just like before, those give us our segments. I'm not going to go into details about the segments, but most of them are pretty cool. Both films give you a nice mix of styles, with each segment being written and directed by different people. If I had to choose, I'd say the first one was slightly better overall, but the sequel has the best segment. A handcam story about alien abduction? I've been waiting for one of those for years, ever since I saw Incident in Lake County back in the day! A bigger budget version of that could be the most terrifying film ever made. The short in V/H/S 2 comes close to it, but it's just a short. Anyway, if you're looking for some good horror flicks, the V/H/S movies are pretty cool.
Now for The Last Exorcism 2. The first movie was another handcam flick, about a preacher who performs exorcisms, but doesn't really believe. In the movie, he's filming a documentary about what will be his last exorcism, hence the title. Of course, this one just happens to involve an actual demon. I'm not going to go into specifics, I can't without spoiling it, but it was a good movie with a cool ending. Horror movies, especially in recent years, have crap endings far too often. This was the problem with The Last Exorcism 2. The sequel follows the story of the possessed girl from the first movie as she attempts to get on with her life. The sequel is not a handcam film like the original, just a traditional movie. That's fine, I don't need all my horror films to be handcam. My problem is that it features some inconsistencies from the original, plus has a really, really stupid ending. So while I would highly recommend the original, I can't do the same for the sequel. It's not terrible, just not very good. Definitely a disappointment to me.
As always, thanks for reading! If you want to recommend me some good horror movies, leave a comment below. You can also follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI.
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
Don Mattrick leaves Xbox
Apparently Don Mattrick has resigned as the head of the Xbox division for Microsoft. If you're reading this blog I'm sure you know about the issues going on over there in the past couple of months. Microsoft first announced their new system, the Xbox One, would have all kinds of restrictions in order to block used games and such. Don Mattrick, as the face of the Xbox division, had many chances to try and spin it to look good for consumers. Instead he kept sticking his foot in his mouth, saying things like, "People without internet can just stick to Xbox 360." I'm paraphrasing there, but that was the gist of what he said. And of course he and others from Microsoft went on to say that these restrictions couldn't easily be changed.
Shortly thereafter, the restrictions were changed.
Many people have been wondering if Mr. Mattrick would be keeping his job. As someone who keeps kind of close tabs on the game industry, I can say that Microsoft's image was definitely hurt by what happened. I've heard plenty of people say, even after the restrictions were done away with, that they had no interest in getting an Xbox One, specifically because they didn't trust Microsoft anymore. So it wouldn't have been a surprise to me to hear that Mattrick had been fired. Instead, he has resigned his position at Microsoft to become the new CEO of Zynga! If you're not familiar with Zynga, they're the company that makes Farmville and numerous other popular Facebook games.
So I have to wonder two things. One, did Mattrick leave Microsoft voluntarily? It's possible they might have wanted to get rid of him, but gave him the option to "resign" on his own to save face. I guess lucky for him Zynga was hiring if that was the case. And two, why would Zynga want this guy? Zynga already has kind of a bad reputation as being the maker of annoying Facebook games, and also has been accused of too-closely copying other games. Why would they want a guy who's proven himself to be less than stellar in the PR department like Don Mattrick? Only time will tell where this is all going to go. It may be interesting to see what Mattrick can do with Zynga.
In the meantime, Microsoft has yet to name Mattrick's replacement. Apparently for now all of Mattrick's former top men will be reporting directly to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. I can't help but wonder if they'll bring someone in who will try to fix the damage done by the Xbox One restrictions. I'm not sure how they could do that, exactly, or even if I really want them to, but it'd definitely be interesting.
Thanks for reading, folks. As always, tell your friends about the blog, and be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI. And leave some comments below if you like!
Shortly thereafter, the restrictions were changed.
Many people have been wondering if Mr. Mattrick would be keeping his job. As someone who keeps kind of close tabs on the game industry, I can say that Microsoft's image was definitely hurt by what happened. I've heard plenty of people say, even after the restrictions were done away with, that they had no interest in getting an Xbox One, specifically because they didn't trust Microsoft anymore. So it wouldn't have been a surprise to me to hear that Mattrick had been fired. Instead, he has resigned his position at Microsoft to become the new CEO of Zynga! If you're not familiar with Zynga, they're the company that makes Farmville and numerous other popular Facebook games.
So I have to wonder two things. One, did Mattrick leave Microsoft voluntarily? It's possible they might have wanted to get rid of him, but gave him the option to "resign" on his own to save face. I guess lucky for him Zynga was hiring if that was the case. And two, why would Zynga want this guy? Zynga already has kind of a bad reputation as being the maker of annoying Facebook games, and also has been accused of too-closely copying other games. Why would they want a guy who's proven himself to be less than stellar in the PR department like Don Mattrick? Only time will tell where this is all going to go. It may be interesting to see what Mattrick can do with Zynga.
In the meantime, Microsoft has yet to name Mattrick's replacement. Apparently for now all of Mattrick's former top men will be reporting directly to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. I can't help but wonder if they'll bring someone in who will try to fix the damage done by the Xbox One restrictions. I'm not sure how they could do that, exactly, or even if I really want them to, but it'd definitely be interesting.
Thanks for reading, folks. As always, tell your friends about the blog, and be sure to follow me on Twitter @RevLink_GI. And leave some comments below if you like!
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