iTWire's Mike Bantick takes a look at the Radioactive IT top games of 2007.
Firstly, Bantick names the worthy GOTY contenders that missed out on being on the list and explains why for Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, Mass Effect, Super Mario Galaxy, Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction, The Orange Box, and Rock Band. Then he explains why Gears of War and Medieval Total War 2 are in the mix.
iTWire's Top 10 of 2007:
10. S.T.A.L.K.E.R : Shadow of Chernobyl
9. SKATE
8. AFL Premiership 2007
7. Gears of War
6. Medieval Total War II
5. Guitar Heroes II
4. BioShock
3. Super Paper Mario
2. Halo 3
1. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Honourable mentions: God of War II, Final Fantasy XII, Drawn to Life
(29 December 2007)
EA has introduced fully functional microtransactions in the Closed Alpha for its upcoming free-to-play title, Skate.
What do you mean by "more money"? It's a free-to-play game. No one paid anything to be in the closed beta. All purchases made during the closed beta will be converted back to in-game currency for players to re-use however they wish after launch.
More money than what EA is giving them to make the game. Didn't think id have to spell it out. How's about they finish the damn game first before asking people to dump money into it. It's not like they need the cashflow to get across the finish line, it's EA not some indie studio, or crowdfunded project
Or maybe it's a playtest and they want to play test the store to make sure it works before launching. Because if they launched the game and the store was broke you'd all be making silly comment about that. "tHeY dIdn'T eVeN TeSt ThE sToRe bEfoRe lAunCh."
Is anyone really surprised? This is the same company that once considered charging for every time you reload your weapon in Battlefield. These guys are the worst.
Microtransactions in EA Skate include bundles worth up to 20 US Dollars, with in-game credits apparently being difficult to earn.
Gears of War's creator has spoken out against the trend of turning established franchises into live services, urging developers to focus on single-player experiences.
Too bad he didn't have this opinion when he chased trends with Lawbreakers. Or when he chased trends with Radical Heights.
He learned from the mistake or he wouldn’t be advocating for more single player experiences. I find this refreshing in a world where we often see people so stubborn that they tend to double down on a mistake which results in making things even worse. Seriously, good for him!
@Popsicle
Oh for sure, better late than never. And better to somewhat own up to your mistakes, rather than just blaming your release window, or advertising partners, or gamers lol.
@Popsicle
Of course we will never know his intentions, but it's hard to believe he is just a naive agent that is learning from his mistakes.
He could have done one himself after Gears of War but he did Lawbreakers…look how that turned out.
Jawbreakers would have been a better name! Heck, I might just go and trademark that right now.
You're missing the point. His studio's short lifespan is what *inspired* him to make this comment in the first place.
Oh I know the point...I'm just stating the obvious and how stupid he was in the beginning to jump on a trend he had no real experience in. A first person hero shooter with heavy GaaS elements is a lot different than the multiplayer in Gears of War.
He'd have been better creating something like Gears of War again, a great single player story and a good online mode.
-"A first person hero shooter with heavy GaaS elements is a lot different than the multiplayer in Gears of War."
I mean... you're kinda muddying terms when Gears has always had a strong multiplayer component. Even if I grant you that, Cliffy B started cementing himself at Epic with Unreal Tournament, which was among the earliest shooter series to have "proto-GaaS elements" (downloadable maps, cosmetics, special editions that bundle stuff together). Lawbreakers and Radical Heights (were it finished) weren't major career shifts to him like they would be for, say, Fumito Ueda.
Regardless of that, it's still kinda useless to state the obvious when CliffyB himself made his comments with the benefit of hindsight already.
Look, these a-hole publishers can do this, in fact I want them to, so they can f*ck around and find out and fail hard scaring away everyone else from doing this live service push.
This industry is run by some of the dumbest corporate pieces of sh*t I’ve ever seen. They spend stupid amount of money with literally nothing that stands out from games from the previous generation (look at Arkham Knight to the $200 mill Suicide Squad comparison vids), you’re overpaying devs, and you focus on games as a service to milk consumers that a lot of them grew up off traditional games. We’re not idiots, we sniff this sh*t out and won’t touch it.
So, what’s your answer to not getting a ROI? Raise game prices and double down on GaaS so you can suck your consumers dry. That model only works for some games and even then how in hell do you expect it to work with multiple games!? They’re ruining the damn hobby with this corporate greed.
Cut back on dev budgets, cut back on how much your staff is getting paid, until sales for games bring in a profit. That’s the answer and make some games that feel like there’s passion behind them, not some cookie cut up game that feels like the entire existence behind it is to offer as little as it can with repetitive bullsh*t and selling off all this content throughout its life. It’s gross.
Games do bring in a profit, it's the greed that is killing the industry. Here is a fact, live service games overall make more, significantly more money than single player games
What you should be asking is executives not wanting continuous growth or firing them. Saying devs should be fired when those who are fitting the bills and setting unrealistic expectations would make things worse. What do y9u think would happen if they released say, 30 single player games and over half of them fail? You are going after the wrong crowd.
About time he learned. I guess he finally stopped blaming everyone else and took accountability for his mistakes and realized that people really don't care that much for trends or live service.
