The date: January 6, 2006.

The subject: EA Jumping the Shark.

The quote: “[EA] certainly have enough cash to cruise on autopilot for the next year or so, but as the next generation of consoles emerge, you can mark my words there will be a new number-one publisher.” (original post)

The evidence: “Activision has become the first publisher this decade to topple Electronic Arts as the top grossing third-party publisher…” (source: Next Generation, July 24 2007)

’nuff said.

There’s something far more important going on with the HD format war than anything that ever happened during the DVD generation. It hit me last night as I was watching a HD feed of Night of the Comet on Universal HD. Which made me reflect on my recent viewing of Krull on HDNet. Which reminded me of my marathon session of the Die Hard trilogy in preparation for Live Free or Die Hard. Which I then promptly revisited Lethal Weapon 1 and 2. Yeah, that’s a pretty deep reference there.

All that made me realize, it’s not about which format wins, or has the best sound, or what the storage capacity is. At the end of the day, physical media won’t be a factor. As more and more studios prepare their catalog for the next era of pixel-popping eye-candy, more and more of these HD transfers are making their way onto cable and satellite broadcasts. And because high definition televisions are showing up in more and more households, there’s a wide audience to revisit these classics in HD. Like me.

So I’m watching these classics, or guilty pleasures, or whatever you want to call them; and after repeated and countless viewings on VHS and standard definition DVD, this is the first time I’m able to experience these films as they were intended. In some cases, the first time since I initially saw them in the theater 20 years ago; in others, having never seen them during their theatrical run, the first time ever.

It’s been a recent practice of remastering transfers to HD for standard DVD releases, and as such the titles from first half of the DVD generation have suffered considerably. Some never received a proper widescreen release; others are barely above VHS-quality. And I’m sure we’ll see the same in the HD generation – dirty prints being shoveled out in 1080p, only to be cleaned up when it becomes cost-effective to do so.

While HD-DVD and Blu-ray beat themselves into oblivion, I’ll be quietly curled up on my couch with a bag of popcorn, reliving the glory days of my youth in glorious digital 1080p.

Google “GameStop questionable practices” and you’ll find anecdote after anecdote about how GameStop employees screw over the average consumer. We’ve all seen it, we’ve all been affected by it. Yet the retailer reports quarter after quarter of increased profits in seemingly unstoppable fashion.

I recently went to the largest (in sales) area store to peruse the PC selection, and I was sickened by what I found. Some of this I’ve been seeing for years, some are just now evident, but it’s inspired me to sum up my experiences.

The practice of their used game policy is probably the most controversial. Every gamer feels slighted when GameStop buys a game for $1 that they turn around and sell for $20. The problem is, people keep selling games to them knowing this. The margins are huge, and although I applaud GameStop for successfully turning over games at such a profit, I don’t support it. Even more, I hate seeing used games on the shelves without box or manual, for only $5 off MSRP, knowing they bought them from consumers for pennies on the dollar. I avoid used game-only titles like the plague, but apparently someone is buying them because GameStop keeps taking them for trade.

There’s no question GameStop employees take games from the store to play at home. What kills me is that they still sell these as new, either as an unsealed “display” copy or deceivingly repackaged to appear as sealed to an unsuspecting consumer. Today I saw a display in the store with a bin of games marked “Final Clearance”, where most of the games were outright used or unsealed and marked as new.

Being back in the market for PC games, I decided to peruse their selection for some bargains. What I found were two shelves of “new” PC titles, all of which had the stickers sealing the boxes cut. Effectively, each one of these titles were opened, but were being sold as new. And it never fails, regardless of which GameStop store I go to, dating back to when EB Games existed, every PC game box on the shelf looks like it was peddled by a street vendor – weathered, kicked around and generally abused.

I don’t mind getting hounded for trade-ins and pre-orders, because frankly I know better than that to be bothered by it. If I absolutely need a game the hour it gets released, I’ll pre-order; otherwise I can just stroll down to the local Best Buy where they have an ample supply of new releases on hand. The problem is that the average consumer, aka soccer moms, isn’t as educated, so maybe exposing GameStop’s business practices for what they are isn’t enough – a targeted approach of spreading knowledge to these individuals might be more appropriate.

With my recent experience specifically, I am now more inclined to purchase a PC title from an online retailer like Amazon or GoGamer, or download through Steam and cut out the middleman entirely. It’s almost as if GameStop is more of a disservice to PC game developers and small publishers. The good news is it hasn’t deterred my PC game purchases; rather it has made me seek out more acceptable means of procuring my fix.

UPDATE: Apparently bad news doesn’t come in fives, they come in threes x 2. Kudos to 1UP for going forward with a story that started out as a potential gag on NeoGAF. The story involves “Da Man” Jeff Bell, Corporate Vice President of Global Marketing, Interactive Entertainment Business at Microsoft (let me repeat that for emphasis: Corporate Vice President of Global Marketing, Interactive Entertainment Business) pulling a Kramer and responding via Private Message to a heckler on the NeoGAF forums. Good job Jeff, way to go stir up the bee hive.

And I ask – what the hell is going on over at Microsoft?

Bad news comes in threes. So what do you say when it comes in “five”s? Or is it just another trilogy of horror? In this case, Microsoft has their hands full of bad news, the first time this generation where they’ve gotten used to Sony’s PR follies over the past two years. Even still, when all major news outlets have caught on to the PS3 “price cut” for what it really is, Microsoft’s avalanche of atrocities keeps on rollin’.

First and foremost is the dissention of Peter Moore. Here is someone poised as the figurehead of the second most popular gaming console worldwide, at a critical moment of its lifecycle, who decides to jump ship. Granted, his compensation at EA, including his $1.5MM signing bonus, was probably hard to resist. What we all don’t know is how long this deal was in the works. Perhaps his evident lack of enthusiasm during the E3 press event was because he had already “checked-out”.

His post-event interviews seemed off as well. I thought it was just because he was having a bad week. After all, having to answer to a $1 billion charge to repair defective consoles isn’t an easy thing to do. Or maybe he was just disappointed by the event’s critical reception. But now we all know, don’t we?

If he still had his head in the game, maybe he would have planned the event to make a bigger splash. Maybe he would have gone that extra mile to broker that next big exclusive deal. Or maybe he just would have hit pause about two times less than he now infamously did.

Does he know something we don’t about the future of the Xbox? Is the writing on the wall that it will be nothing but an unprofitable business venture for Microsoft? Does he hear the sound of Sony on his heels? Jumping ship at such a critical time, having arguably the strongest holiday lineup of any console this year, why leave when success is so close? Only time will tell, but I have a suspicion there are some good stories trapped in that head of his.

But with Microsoft’s billion dollar hit (bad news #1), the poor showing at E3 (bad news #2), and Moore’s departure (bad news #3); things could only get better, right? Wrong.

Let me introduce you to bad news #4 – Halo 3 will ship without cooperative play over Xbox Live. Before you start screaming, “fanboy!”, let me break it down. First, Gears of War set the next-gen standard with online co-op. Once something like that is done, it’s difficult for any title to go back – the bar is now raised. So for a showcase title like Halo 3 to exclude that, it tells me it’s nothing more than a rezzed-up version of Halo 2. Second, it gives Sony and Nintendo ammunition to shoot down the mighty juggernaut with words (“the Xbox 360 is technically deficient to handle online cooperative play”, “a pay service like Xbox Live doesn’t have the infrastructure to handle it, while PSN does”) and actions (watch for an announcement for Killzone 2 to have online co-op – Sony would be stupid not to make it work).

But the biggest problem, which may tie into Moore’s decision, is, “is this as good as it gets for the Xbox 360?” Will it be all downhill from here? For a first-party like Bungie to miss an opportunity like this may be the catalyst that turned the tides in the console war. Sure Halo 3 will still sell a gazillion units, but it doesn’t ensure that there won’t be a better console experience available on a competing platform three to six months after Halo 3′s release – a major departure from expectations and everyone’s experience with the unstoppable machine that was Halo 2.

But the bad news doesn’t stop there – Aaron Greenberg has stated there will be no X07. That means, not only did we not see what was coming in 2008 at E3, but there will be no big unveiling of 2008-and-beyond announcements and exclusives. That also means, for example, if Microsoft were to broker a big deal with Capcom, there would be no outlet for them to trumpet the partnership. That means, the word doesn’t get out to the major news outlets, at least without the pomp and circumstance usually required to garner their attention. Which means, Capcom loses out. Which means, why do an exclusive deal if it’s not going to make waves?

So while consumers scramble to buy a Wii on potential, and the PS3 gains momentum with a bright 2008 outlook, Microsoft is left to salvage their management team and scrape the bottom of the barrel of its remaining good news to counter the barrage of disappointment that is seemingly on the way.

Remember just yesterday when I explained the benefits of PC gaming being: a) the separation of physical media from the gaming experience; and b) the ability to purchase and download a AAA selection of games and software for instant gratification? Well, to fuel that argument, Steam announced a partnership with THQ to provide digital distribution of their catalog.

Granted Steam provides a similar discount schedule as their brick and mortar retail counterparts, I’m all over this. Right now, THQ is arguably the leading publisher of PC titles, with Company of Heroes, Titan Quest, Supreme Commander, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - that’s a killer lineup of titles released in the past year. If I can get CoH for $29.99 or better, the price I’d pay in the store, for the ability to download, install and play near-immediately; well, that’s just awesome. Add to that no CD required and no activation key required, and the deal is made even sweeter. Steam has a nice tendency to price games aggressively through sales and bundles, so I’m confident there will be some nice deals to be had.

So in comparison, I could spend $10 on Bomberman Live through Xbox Live, or spend $20 or so for a great Diablo-clone in Titan Quest. Which would you prefer?

Thanks to a recent technical malfunction on my five-year old BYO personal computer, I was able to convince my wife it was time to build anew. And so I have, with my brand-spanking new PC. Good to know this thing registers a nice 5.2 (of 5) on Vista, with my highly-overclockable dual-core CPU the weak link in the rating scale. Not to brag, because dual-core is now old-core, and I’m sure there are some out there pushing sixes on the Windows Experience Index. Ironic how my “Windows Experience” is absolutely awful on Vista x64, which has forced me to run XP as my primary OS.

But back to the point – although I’ve sold my better half on the system’s video editing capabilities, as most fellow parents would understand without hesitation, a pleasant “side effect” is the ability to keep up with the steep system requirements of today’s games. Or even yesterday’s. Hey, it’s been nearly two years since I was able to run games at a decent rate, so cut me some slack…

So as I have recently gone through the pain of installing nearly 50 GB of games I’ve stockpiled over the years, I now have a game machine which seriously challenges my Xbox 360 for my attention. And quite frankly, my PC makes the 360 look as it really is – a game console, nothing more. Whether it’s the PC’s multi-purpose nature, or the hard-edged, metallic sexiness of its design with faint blue glow; there’s just something about it which makes it more sophisticated.

Consoles still haven’t divorced themselves from physical media, so there is still a belief a CD, DVD or BD is essential for the gaming experience. After installing all those PC games, I say it’s not required. I still associate console gaming with tangible materials – disc, case and manual – and I feel a little bit of separation anxiety at the thought of playing Oblivion on the 360 without them. Kind of like jumping off a cliff without a net. However, with the PC, installing games is considered the norm. It’s a pain in the ass to have a game require a CD in the drive to play. So I’m more open to purchase full, multi-gigabyte game downloads from a service like Steam or TotalGaming.net sans materials.

There are several benefits to purchasing PC games, and software of any kind, for that matter. First, the requirement to install the game to play makes it pretty seamless. Larger and cheaper drives make it easier not only to install, but to back up files on separate hard drives, discs, etc. Loading times are rarely an issue.  But the biggest benefit is the selection of software available online versus retail. A game like Space Rangers 2 would be hard to find on retail shelves, and would probably only be available from an online retailer. Instead, I can have immediate gratification to purchase, download, install and play with little wait.

And as console titles approach PC-like patching, it’s nice to have the flexibility of adding mods at my leisure to my favorite titles, like the High Definition Texture Pack for Deus Ex. Anyone would tell you, if your PC has the cojones to run something like Oblivion, go for the PC version over the console one for the free user mods.

What’s my highest barrier of entry now? The control scheme. I was never a WASD kinda guy, and I felt if controls can’t be mapped to a game pad, it’s too complex. But now I’m thinking I just need a better keyboard and mouse, which are both currently in the mail as I write this.

One could argue the PC is a largely solitary experience. I’ll counter by saying with the rising popularity of online gaming on consoles, the two are closer than you think. It is only here where the Wii, DS and PSP start to differentiate themselves from the PS3 and Xbox 360. Which is exactly why my 360 is starting to feel a little jealous.

Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m being overly critical of this year’s E3 press events. But on the whole, they are pretty lackluster and without the grandiose fanfare the consoles were pushing the last couple years. It seems like a waste to spend all that money on these big AV spectacles when I can just go to the Coming Soon section on EBGames.com and see the same thing.

Nonetheless, I’m going to carry on my tradition of highlighting the lows of this year’s crop (or crap). First up: Nintendo.

• The trend this year is trumpeting one’s own horn by hammering the audience with consumer statistics only ESPN would be proud of. What seemed like a waste of time spent by Microsoft doing it on Tuesday night, perhaps they were responding to a leaked outline of the Nintendo event, because Reggie did pretty much the same. Kinda makes you think E3 is really for retailers and not for consumers, eh?
• Wii Zapper? Okay, I can dig it. But the Wii wheel? Yeah, wasn’t that already a cheap pack-in with a mediocre launch title? Not worthy of a press release, let alone focus at an E3 press event.
• “That Girl Who Played Metroid” is the new “It” girl of the Internet. Who is she? Jackie Goehner, from TheHylia.com Zentendo.com. She just might make SpotAnime’s Search for the Perfect Gamer Girl sweeps…

picture from Joystiq.com

• Weird, all that talk on being serious about online gaming, yet there wasn’t really a good example of an upcoming WiFi-enabled title that could show it off. And no talk about Friend Codes, or lack thereof.
• Didn’t Iwata-san look like his arms and hands were being controlled by someone else? He was like a big puppet on stage. And his message was particularly disturbing; to paraphrase: “Screw the traditional gamer!” I wonder how long that magic carpet will last for Nintendo…
• Super Mario Galaxy…Metroid…snore, snore. Mario Kart Wii? Looks like people’s worst fears are coming true, in that they are dumbing it down for the casual gamer. Looks like the N64 version with better graphics. Disappointing they didn’t use Double Dash as a stepping stone to advance the gameplay. Wii Fit? Someone tell Miyamoto it was already made a few years ago, without all the gimmicks.
• From the event, the Wii doesn’t look to have the legs needed to sustain its ridiculous sales figures. The DS, however, seems like it’s hitting on all cylinders, from Brain Age 2 to Picross to Dragon Quest. It has it all. I predict the juggernaut to continue to roll.

Overall, Nintendo looked like they were downplayed the event, much like Microsoft, as if they weren’t expecting the same level of attention garnered of E3 past. The DS saved them from a poor Wii showing. Score: C+.

Now on to Sony:

• Home continues to impress. Not because it’s great, but because it’s something different and ambitious. It remains to be seen how the masses will take to it. And Home on a cell phone? Looks like they are beating Live Anywhere to the punch.
• The emphasis on the PSP out of the gate was a good idea. The PSP is growing in popularity, and combined with the DS it seems portable gaming is making a serious run to take over home consoles. The redesign doesn’t seem to address the uncomfortable form factor or even make it a little less brittle, but the display out will win over some converts – including me. I drool at the thought of playing Wipeout Pure/Pulse on my HDTV, if only I still didn’t have to contort my wrists into an uncomfortable knot. I also liked the Star Wars Battlefront tie-in with the Darth Vader model. Even though it was previously announced, it was nice to see continued support from a high-profile franchise.
• Echochrome, Pain, Wipeout HD, Warhawk and SOCOM all for download through PSN was a highlight. While Microsoft is stuck between pushing XBLA and it’s 250MB limit, and toying with major downloads; Sony seems to have a clear focus and direction on where they want to take digital distribution.
• I’ve been bitching about the lack of exclusives being announced, and Sony came through with their announcements of Haze and Unreal Tournament III timed-exclusives, the deal with NCSoft, and confirmation MGS4 would be PS3-only.
• On the NCSoft deal, it’s interesting this includes all current and new franchises. That means City of Heroes/Villains, which was developed by Cryptic Studios, who is now doing the Marvel MMORPG for Microsoft. Maybe Sony has decided the previously announced (but strangely absent) D.C. Comics property wouldn’t make a competitive MMORPG? Guild Wars and Lineage will really drive sales in Asian markets if they ever show up, and maybe this also means we’ll see one of the few scifi-based MMORPGs, Tabula Rasa, given a showcase on the platform.
• I totally forgot about the Blu-ray/HD-DVD format war until Sony reminded me. And then I thought it was strange Microsoft didn’t make mention of it at their conference. On the flipside, Microsoft was emphasizing their Video Marketplace deal with Disney, while the much-hyped Sony announcement of digital movie downloads through PSN never materialized.
• Microsoft Game Studios might have Mass Effect and Halo 3, but Sony really came out in force with their self-published titles like Heavenly Sword, Gran Tourismo, Little Big Planet, Uncharted, inFamous, and of course Killzone. As a matter of fact, if Killzone plays half as good as it looks, people might be convinced to “finish the fight” there instead.
• The lack of any PS2 was surprising, since it was rumored a cheaper model with motion control would be released to take on the Wii.

I said on Tuesday after Microsoft dropped the ball it would be Sony’s show to take, and indeed they did. While not the greatest presentation, they were obviously focused on the win and left little behind in their arsenal. B+ (could have been ‘A’ range if they included the PS2, still selling strong against the next-gen consoles).

The tides, they be a’changin’.

After all the hoopla surrounding the death and rebirth of the Electronics Entertainment Expo, pulled from Heaven back to Hell on Earth like Buffy in Season 6 (had to put that Whedon reference there), it’s finally here. And after watching Microsoft’s press event last night, I’m betting there are some in Redmond who probably wished it stayed dead after its lethargic spectacle.

• First the obvious: no price drop announced. No MGS4 announced. It’s like opening your presents on Christmas morning and not getting that one gift you wanted above everything else. Disappointing.
• As a matter of fact, there weren’t any major Sony-stealing exclusives announced – no RE5 exclusive. No new franchises from developers loyal to other systems. Nothing.
• Viva Pinata: Party Animals? Could Rare have come up with a worse idea to extend that franchise? How about coming up with some nice downloadable content, say a true multiplayer component, or just patch some of the game’s several shortcomings?
• This year’s event gets the “Deja Vu” award, as in “didn’t they talk about all this stuff last year too?” I never thought I’d say it, but I’m starting to get sick of seeing Jadelicious parade Assassin’s Creed. After all, it’s what, the third year in a row for this title? Same with Mass Effect – we all know it’s coming, we all know it’s going to be good, just put it on the floor and let people play it. I don’t need to have Peter Moore jam it down my throat. And the GTA downloadable content? Sorry guys, we already knew about that.
• The Video Marketplace getting Disney movies? Good. The fact they can only be rented and viewed over a 24 hour period and not purchased? Well that negates the whole deal. Disney fans buying this stuff have no doubt seen them before, and would want to keep their HD purchase. It would have been better if Microsoft talked about integrating the Video Marketplace on Vista and allowing the user to purchase movies and share across MCE devices on a network. But I guess it takes more than me saying it for the past nine months to make people realize it’s a damn good idea.
• Scene-It! = Good idea. Scene-It! as a retail release = Bad idea. This should have been a downloadable title. And we don’t need special controllers for it, that’s just stupid.
• I guess the exclusive Call of Duty beta is a good thing. But it’s only a matter of time, after Shadowrun, Halo 3 and Warhawk, when beta is just another word for “demo” and loses its significance.
• If I were Bungie, I’d be pissed they took my golden child and dropped it in the mud on the way to the auditorium. In other words, they actually made us not care much about Halo 3. Was it was the timing, the oversaturation of all-things Halo at the moment, or just the ho-hum delivery, or a perfect storm of all the above? The live-action trailer looked like a student-made green-screen project that made its way onto the SciFi Channel. Not impressive. And the Halo 3 single-player footage? Well, the graphics sure do look better than we saw in the multiplayer beta, but at this point everyone’s played it, they’ve all pre-ordered it. There’s not much else Microsoft can do to convince people to buy it. Underwhelming.
• I guess that grey Xbox model turned out to be green after all. Even though a special edition Halo 3 console wasn’t previously announced, we all knew it was coming. The fact that it was green generated a collective “who gives a f**k?!?” from the audience. Only the details could have impressed, like if it was an Elite-based console, does it come with any exclusives besides the colored controller, would the Legendary bonus material be pre-loaded, etc. The other thing is, who would be the audience for this? With the original Xbox, $179 could allow someone to afford another console, but at $399+, I don’t see many people picking this up.
• At X06 we got Doom as a surprise XBLA title. This time we get – Sonic and Golden Axe? Oh joy of joys, it’s not like I haven’t played these on every friggin’ Sega collection over the past 10 years. And Sonic was announced by that putz Greg Canessa in early 2006, so the news was a little anti-climactic. Why not put Marathon out now, to ride the tide until Halo 3 is released? What’s the matter, Microsoft – afraid it would take away your Shadowrun audience?
• Another note about XBLA: 2007 is the year of the casual gamer, so why didn’t Microsoft announce some casual game line via XBLA? Scene-It! would have been a great start. Some suggestions – a partnership with Milton Bradley or an exclusive deal with PopCap; Peggle or Diner Dash on XBLA would have been nice. So would have Life, Monopoly, or Chutes and Ladders for the kiddies. Microsoft had the opportunity to mount a two-front attack on Sony and Nintendo and let it slip through their fingers.
• I thought it was weird Microsoft didn’t deliver a unified message. For example, the Xbox 360 Messenger Kit was announced via press releases, but nothing was mentioned of it during the event. Same with the new colors for wireless controllers.
• Probably the most impressive of the show was the Games for Windows push, especially since now I have a nice new PC able to handle these not-so-friendly system requirements. Gears of War PC? Yes we all figured it was coming, but it was nice to see it running smooth and high-res. With a level editor, no less – the Unreal Mod community will have a field day with this one. And kudos to Microsoft for making it run on both XP and Vista. One more good move – I think Viva Pinata will have longer legs on the PC than it did on the 360. Call me crazy, but I have a hunch the PC platform is a better fit for it.

As the latest internet craze is giving the press events grade scales, I say the Microsoft event was a solid C. I understand it was emphasizing their stellar lineup of 2007 releases, but people don’t go to these events to see stuff they’re going to be playing in a couple of months; they want to see the long-term plan, to get a comfort level the console they will be buying will hold up over the next couple of years. To be honest, I didn’t get that at all from Microsoft. E3 reaches well beyond the hardcore gamer now, with coverage from major media outlets and live feeds everywhere, and if I were an average Joe I wouldn’t have a clue what Microsoft had in store for 2008.

I now believe this E3 will belong to Sony. They could show the status quo and still come out ahead – they won momentum with the price cut announcement earlier in the week, and they have the most room to grow with first-party releases, online network functionality, and interoperability with the PSP.

Check back later for more E3 thoughts.