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The Player 1 Podcast Topic

O

Oxx

Member
Ha. CJ and Greg last week lusting for reviews 'just about the game, man' and free from writer agendas.

What a bunch of #gamergateaus
 
SuperPac

SuperPac

Member
CoachKevin said:
Will be worth it for the better audio quality.
Click to expand...

Yeah I'm going through and giving this a proper "edit" - taking out (some) coughs, baby noises, talking over each other, and pete opening and pouring drinks. Woke up this morning and got about 30 minutes in. Confident that this one'll be out this evening.

If we recorded on a Friday night or even Saturday I could probably give this kind of attention to more episodes, or if we switched our release day to Tuesday. Easier for me to do things on the weekend since I can just stay up late and not take away family time. When we record on a Sunday night and have a Monday release - pretty much just have to slap it up there as-is. :D

Oxx said:
Ha. CJ and Greg last week lusting for reviews 'just about the game, man' and free from writer agendas.

What a bunch of #gamergateaus
Click to expand...

No I am not for objective reviews. Give me a review that's as subjective as can be, please. But, if the reviewer's going to spend the majority of the review on an angle outside gameplay, graphics, mechanics, level progression, difficulty or multiplayer/social, then I'm less interested in reading it. Or yes once they've mentioned that they find the combat in Hyrule Warriors repetitive can they say anything else constructive about the game? No? Then why are they reviewing this game outside of being assigned to it.
 
L

LiK

Member
^ agree, I like reviews to be honest but also fair. Someone purely shitting on a game in a review is not interesting.
 
S

stewy

Member
As far as reviews go what I was saying is I want something that is in service to the reader. Way too many reviewers are all the way up their own asses and write nothing but self-indulgent crap.
 
M

mrkgoo

Member
I pretty much just go by word of mouth and podcasts for game impressions these days.

The concept of professional games reviews doesn't really work for me any more.
 
M

Maastricht

Member
I went in the complete opposite with my new game site, which is basically an ever expanding feature database you can use to describe games. But a database has a lot of cool advantages obviously - want all non-violent 1080p 60fps games that have local coop? Want to compare features across platforms? What about games that support 3D, 4k, or have a horde mode? Steering wheel support? Or what about game breaking issues? Campaign length? Game world size? Crafting? Level creation?

Of course, someone has to punch in that data. But once it's there, you can even make nice graphs. :p Anyway, I thought it would make for a nice counterpart to all the hipster opinion pieces that bloat the web ... ;)

It's actually coming along quite well, started last month and it's alread up: www.techingames.net ... I (and one or two early enthusiasts) put mostly technical data in there so far but whenever I knew something else like local multiplayer I added that too. Still optimizing data entry and search options are limited so far (no combination of features just yet), but its getting there much faster than I dared to hope.

Anyway, I'm going to hunt down this weeks episode on YouTube and relax, been pushing myself a bit hard (like you guys I have a family, day-job and am oldish ;)).
 
O

Oxx

Member
I sometimes go back and read reviews after I have finished with a game.

But in general I try to avoid most coverage of games I'm interested in other than a word-of-mouth yay or a nay.
 
F

frostyxc

Member
What? You guys/goils don't like reviews where the Arthur... *cough* I mean the AUTHOR weaves in clumsy metaphors about having strings strummed? You don't like a reviewer spending a whole review implying that they know game design and programming far better than people who actually do it? You don't like to be condescended to/outright insulted in the process of reading a review?

It's almost like you don't want to be told what you should think, or something! You're ignoring the art of reviewing games if you expect such things! Art!

Does anyone have some gum?
 
B

brianmcdoogle

Member
I'm sorry, but are we really suppose to listen to the man human subhuman Canadian who purposefully gave Chrono Cross a low score just to sabotage that game's platinum in EGM?!?!!?! #neverforget
 
P

Planet_JASE

Member
Episode 419: Embargoed Until Tuesday

This week! Guests Kevin Larrabee, Rich Grisham and Pete Dodd join CJ and Greg for nearly two hours of video game radio. Topics discussed include Assassin’s Creed Unity (and that embargo), the effectiveness of Microsoft’s holiday pricing strategies, Sony’s ‘stay the course’ positioning, Nintendo’s DLC practices, online problems for the Master Chief Collection, and a whole buncha stuff in between. Plus: Sunset Overdrive - great game or greatest game?, Forza Horizon 2, Sonic Boom: The Rise of Lyric, FIFA/PES 15, NBA Live/2K 15, Lords of the Fallen and So. Much. More. Join us, won’t you?

Audio: http://traffic.libsyn.com/playerone/11_17_14-Episode419.mp3
Blog: http://www.playeronepodcast.com/419
iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/player-one-podcast-video-games/id202883543?mt=2
Youtube: http://youtu.be/B5BKd_w6Wvw
 
E

eznark

Banned
One of the big arguments against going digital from these guys seems to be getting "refunds." Greg keeps calling trade in refunds which is fine, except that real, full value refunds happen all the time when you go digital. Since you are dealing with the platform holder, and not a retailer, the desire is generally to satisfy the customer. In both the Halo thread and the Drive Club thread there have been many people saying they received a full refund simply by asking.

I go digital mostly because I don't really give a shit and can't be bothered to trade in a game and I have never asked for a refund personally, but if I were pinching pennies it seems like going digital has some advantages when we're talking about strictly broken games.
 
SuperPac

SuperPac

Member
eznark said:
One of the big arguments against going digital from these guys seems to be getting "refunds." Greg keeps calling trade in refunds which is fine, except that real, full value refunds happen all the time when you go digital. Since you are dealing with the platform holder, and not a retailer, the desire is generally to satisfy the customer. In both the Halo thread and the Drive Club thread there have been many people saying they received a full refund simply by asking.

I go digital mostly because I don't really give a shit and can't be bothered to trade in a game and I have never asked for a refund personally, but if I were pinching pennies it seems like going digital has some advantages when we're talking about strictly broken games.
Click to expand...

For me, I *generally* (doesn't always happen) wait until a couple reviews are out and a consensus has been arrived at or I hear people I trust on other podcasts giving their impressions on a game. I've been burned twice in the last year - Killzone and Watch_Dogs. Maybe a couple others I don't feel like I've gotten my money's worth out of but it's almost no different than when I was buying physical copies. :D In a few instances where I'm heavily anticipating a game I'll pre-order (Sunset Overdrive, Far Cry 4, The Last of Us Remastered). But I've been pretty happy with the digital future. I generally buy movies, music, and books digitally, too.

It's causing me to be a bit more cautious on buying day one, but then I was also never the guy who sold back or traded in many games. And especially now that the physical versions offer no manuals and have the flimsiest packaging possible - convenience wins. :D Now if I could buy a physical copy, install it and then not need to stick the disc back in there I'd buy physical (as I do occasionally with movies on blu-ray that I rip and keep on my home server). But that ain't happenin' anytime soon.
 
S

stewy

Member
eznark said:
One of the big arguments against going digital from these guys seems to be getting "refunds." Greg keeps calling trade in refunds which is fine, except that real, full value refunds happen all the time when you go digital. Since you are dealing with the platform holder, and not a retailer, the desire is generally to satisfy the customer. In both the Halo thread and the Drive Club thread there have been many people saying they received a full refund simply by asking.

I go digital mostly because I don't really give a shit and can't be bothered to trade in a game and I have never asked for a refund personally, but if I were pinching pennies it seems like going digital has some advantages when we're talking about strictly broken games.
Click to expand...

But if there's nothing actually wrong with the game and I just don't like it then I would never ask a publisher for a full refund.

Also worth mentioning that I'm not trading in games solely because I don't like them. If I finish a game and I know I'll likely never play it again, a physical copy can be sold or traded, while a digital copy offers 0 return.
 
E

eznark

Banned
SuperPac said:
For me, I *generally* (doesn't always happen) wait until a couple reviews are out and a consensus has been arrived at or I hear people I trust on other podcasts giving their impressions on a game. I've been burned twice in the last year - Killzone and Watch_Dogs. Maybe a couple others I don't feel like I've gotten my money's worth out of but it's almost no different than when I was buying physical copies. :D In a few instances where I'm heavily anticipating a game I'll pre-order (Sunset Overdrive, Far Cry 4, The Last of Us Remastered). But I've been pretty happy with the digital future. I generally buy movies, music, and books digitally, too.

It's causing me to be a bit more cautious on buying day one, but then I was also never the guy who sold back or traded in many games. And especially now that the physical versions offer no manuals and have the flimsiest packaging possible - convenience wins. :D Now if I could buy a physical copy, install it and then not need to stick the disc back in there I'd buy physical (as I do occasionally with movies on blu-ray that I rip and keep on my home server). But that ain't happenin' anytime soon.
Click to expand...

For me the benefits way outweigh the negatives. Being able to jump from game to game means I am playing way more stuff than I normally would on consoles. I also own two ps4's, so not having to worry about having the right disc in the right system is a nice bonus.

It also means I give games more of a chance. I probably would've traded back Black Flag if I bought it physically, but I still jump into it every now and then. Same with a couple other PS4 and WiiU games. Knack I bought physically, beat it, traded it in, and now I want to buy it again because that game is dope!

stewy said:
But if there's nothing actually wrong with the game and I just don't like it then I would never ask a publisher for a full refund.

Also worth mentioning that I'm not trading in games solely because I don't like them. If I finish a game and I know I'll likely never play it again, a physical copy can be sold or traded, while a digital copy offers 0 return.
Click to expand...

Right, but Driveclub, MCC and Unity were games brought up with the "glad I didn't go digital" argument, when all have been giving refunds I think.
 
S

stewy

Member
eznark said:
For me the benefits way outweigh the negatives. Being able to jump from game to game means I am playing way more stuff than I normally would on consoles. I also own two ps4's, so not having to worry about having the right disc in the right system is a nice bonus.

It also means I give games more of a chance. I probably would've traded back Black Flag if I bought it physically, but I still jump into it every now and then. Same with a couple other PS4 and WiiU games. Knack I bought physically, beat it, traded it in, and now I want to buy it again because that game is dope!



Right, but Driveclub, MCC and Unity were games brought up with the "glad I didn't go digital" argument, when all have been giving refunds I think.
Click to expand...

Fair enough. I'm just pointing out that my argument against going all digital is not solely based on broken games.
 
E

eznark

Banned
stewy said:
Fair enough. I'm just pointing out that my argument against going all digital is not solely based on broken games.
Click to expand...

Totally true, I just felt you guys lumped broken games in with trade in games, as though there was no way to recoup the cost of a broken game when you go digital.

Christ I think people were even getting refunds on Destiny, or at least on the DLC stuff. The game companies seem to be overly generous with refunds on digital content, probably because not many people take advantage of it (and often times they give back store credit)
 
SuperPac

SuperPac

Member
stewy said:
Fair enough. I'm just pointing out that my argument against going all digital is not solely based on broken games.
Click to expand...

You just need a smarter pre-ordering strategy where you cancel a potentially bad game before it ships instead of getting it anyway just to save $20 then have to return it. :p

I actually wish we'd see more instances where pre-ordering digitally would get you the game early (as Nintendo experimented with in the case of Wind Waker HD). I pre-ordered Guardians of the Galaxy through iTunes and got that today - the rest of you suckers have to wait until December.
 
C

codhand

Member
anecdotal but my experience with Unity on PC has been great. improvements to the AC formula everywhere. graphically and mechanically.
 
O

Ondore

Member
SuperPac said:
You just need a smarter pre-ordering strategy where you cancel a potentially bad game before it ships instead of getting it anyway just to save $20 then have to return it. :p
Click to expand...

We can, if we call Best Buy/Shop of the Future. The problem is with something like Unity where we don't find out until Canada Post has the game that it's a broken piece of trash.
 
S

stewy

Member
SuperPac said:
You just need a smarter pre-ordering strategy where you cancel a potentially bad game before it ships instead of getting it anyway just to save $20 then have to return it. :p
Click to expand...

But that doesn't make any sense. What "strategy" should people employ? The whole idea of the discounts on preorders is that you're taking a risk on a game being good months in advance in order to save a chunk of money.

If you wait until you know whether the game is actually good or not, you've missed out on the opportunity. Two recent examples:

Assassin's Creed IV - Series has a good track record, and thanks to review embargoes there was almost no way to know about the problems until after the pre-orders had shipped.

Sonic Boom - Again, no pre-release review copies were sent, so by the time anyone knew the game was bad the game had already shipped. And you can say that we should know better than to pre-order a Sonic game, but four of the last five Sonic games were actually good games (Sonic Generations, Sonic All-Stars Racing, Sonic Colors and Sonic All-Stars Racing Transformed).

So what smarter pre-order strategy should people have used? :)
 
C

CoachKevin

Member
Here is an easy fix. Don't pre order games any more. Wait at least 24 hours after the release date. Or at least don't open the game until you get some reviews/impressions/streams.

All problems solved?

Try to avoid hype and be patient to play a new game. Worst case rent first.
 
S

SaitoH

Member
I just returned my pre-ordered AC:U to my local Futureshop after the reviews dropped. There's no issue returning an already shipped game.
 
S

stewy

Member
CoachKevin said:
Here is an easy fix. Don't pre order games any more. Wait at least 24 hours after the release date. Or at least don't open the game until you get some reviews/impressions/streams.

All problems solved?

Try to avoid hype and be patient to play a new game. Worst case rent first.
Click to expand...

But then the game is $20 more expensive.
 
L

LiK

Member
Digital only is quite a gamble unless the game is cheap. I don't think I would ever bother unless there's no way to buy it physically.
 
N

Neuromancer

Member
Waiting for reviews is a great idea if your opinion is always in lockstep with the critical consensus. However I've found that not to be the case for me.
 
E

Einbroch

Banned
I'm glad to hear the mention of renting.

You can avoid a lot of issues with the media/gaming industry by utilizing Gamefly, Redbox, or a local rental store.
 
SuperPac

SuperPac

Member
So any comments on the sound quality this week? I actually edited this one! Should I continue doing that? (When time allows?)
 
P

Planet_JASE

Member
SuperPac said:
So any comments on the sound quality this week? I actually edited this one! Should I continue doing that? (When time allows?)
Click to expand...
I'm just happy that the podcast comes out each week; any further refining of the product is just the icing on the cake. If you have the time and it doesn't take you from your family or other interests, then sure, I will never complain about any extra time you choose to spend. On the other hand, if you hate it and your time with your family suffers...

Regardless of how much time you spend, thank you for the time that you currently invest.
 
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