Topic: Episode 260: Zero-Sum Xenomics

[Yoshidious]

Here's the story of a sword that ain't from around these parts.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/rfn/27933

This weeks' episode starts with Jonny celebrating his long-delayed victory over Ganon in the original Legend of Zelda, plus an update on Final Fantasy 3/6 on Virtual Console and more progress in Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. James continues to be obsessed with Xenoblade Chronicles, but he has identified some minor flaws as well, even as Greg delivers early impressions of the game and Jonny prepares for his own overseas delivery. Jon has an interesting report on Dave Perry's Gaikai, the streaming service for game demos your PC shouldn't be able to run. Greg wraps up New Business with the overlooked Star Fox 64 3D multiplayer mode and his thoughts on one of WayForward's numerous 2011 releases, BloodRayne: Betrayal for PSN.

Around the bend, we reopen the mailbag for a torrent of emails. First, there's a pair of comments on Monster Hunter 4's importance for 3DS. We follow that with two distinct economic arguments relating to Xenoblade; these are sure to be controversial, but we had fun discussing them. We round out the segment with a grab bag of topics including Minecraft, bad controls, and The Grinder. Thanks to everyone who wrote in recently! You can send your email to the show with this handy contact form. Also, we're soliciting ideas for the next RetroActive in the forum thread for nominations.

[KDR_11k]

I hope this will convince the remaining stragglers to finally get their damn copy of Xenoblade.

[Halbred]

I look forward to hearing Greg's thoughts on Bloodrayne. I'm enjoying it, but it's a frustrating grind at times.

[Fiendlord_Timmay]

Sorry for the off topic, but HOLY CRAP THE BILLS BEAT THE PATRIOTS!

Greg must be losing his **** right about now.

[Bboy]

Man, James, you make Xenoblade sound so cool, but I don't have the time or money to play it. Stop taunting me!

I'm glad I'm not the only one who wants to hear Greg talk about his team's crazy upset. Even though the Bears lost it's always good to see the Patriots lose.

[Kytim89]

Speaking of Gamestop and piracy, checkout this picture: http://kotaku.com/5843702/would-you-like-to-pre+order-a-california-roll

[Plugabugz]

Did The Greg (or anyone else) go to Eurogamer Expo this weekend?

The nintendo showing was poor shitty: ONLY Skyward Sword and Ocarina of Time 3D. And that was it. No other Wii/DS at the show at all.

[ejamer]

Odd comment: when the question came up about a lack of "shooters" on Wii, did anyone else think of Shmups instead of FPS? No wonder I enjoy the Wii: FPS as a genre is probably my least favorite type of game, and rarely enters my mind at all.





Oh, and the discussion about piracy vs used games was quite entertaining.

[Crimm]

Right now I'm upset with its devotion to rather cheap difficulty in boss fights. I can keep attacking, knowing I'll get it eventually… or go grind for three levels and pummel them. For whatever reason two or three levels tend to make a huge difference.

[KDR_11k]

The nice thing is that you don't have to grind much because you can go back, do quests and get experience that way while progressing the various locale storylines.


On Minecraft: Waiting for the "final version" shows that you don't have much experience with the development cycle many self-published indie devs are using. Such games can go through constant development with no real definition of Alpha or Beta (the switchover was completely arbitrary for Minecraft). AI War is already past version 5.0, they didn't call it a day after releasing 1.0.


Generally for objective based play you should probably look elsewhere. Minecraft is only now (less than two months before the finalization date) looking at objectives by adding leveling and quests. It's primarily designed for creativity with the survival part still fairly underdeveloped (consisting of a few easy monsters and a very short gear progression). The main alternative is Terraria which is being designed for combat and such primarily, including a huge arsenal of weapons (as opposed to the bow and sword MC gives you) and tons of enemies coming at various difficulty tiers plus bosses. For exploration and combat there's much more content in Terraria.


A new arrival at the scene is A Valley Without Wind from the AI War devs, that just hit Beta today. Seems to be all about exploration and combat with no digging element to it.


The main similarities are roughly:
Minecraft: Legend of Zelda 1 in 3D
Terraria: Metroid or Castlevania (with grappling hooks and jetpacks BTW)
AVWW: Zelda 2

[Crimm]

At level 75 that quest experience doesn't quite go as far as it used to.

[Kytim89]

There is a game called "Shadowgun" for the IOS systems and it looks like a console game. This is what has me worried about the 3DS and Nintendo in general. If the quality of a game like this can be sold cheaply then it is definently going to hurt Nintendo. 
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aVttB25oPo

[Crimm]

Looks like =! Plays like

[ejamer]

Also, assuming that Shadowgun actually does play well instead of just being another pretty piece of junk, that makes one game out of how many?


Until there are multiple releases every month that are competing with the experiences provided from the (home/portable) console space, then Nintendo/Sony/MS have little to worry about from iOS. The customers they are "losing" weren't going to be notable spenders in the gaming market anyway.

[Ceric]

No Connectivity plug.  I don't know you anymore :

[KDR_11k]

Gameloft has plenty of games that are like mediocre console games.

In addition to being hard to control the console like games are simply not as profitable as those cheapo flash-like games. They take like 20x as much to make and can only charge 5 bucks at most. Even then people will go "that's expensive, I'll wait for a price drop". While the pricing may be good for the consumer it doesn't allow the developer to invest much into a game unless it's a massive IAP moneysink.

[Praefectia]

What was that cross something url for the music podcast?  I thought he said crosstalk.com, but that's not it.

[Shaymin]

Crosstawk.

[Jonnyboy117]

No Connectivity plug.  I don't know you anymore :

We record on Thursday, and at that time we weren't sure if Connectivity would be ready to launch over the weekend.

[broodwars]

So where did you folks end up importing Xenoblade from? I tried going on Amazon, but all I can find there is the "Pre-order" placeholder page for Monado.  I wanted to hold on importing the game to give NoA time to come to their senses, but after listening to this episode I have to agree: It's too late.  NoA will never touch this game.

Just so I know, how much does it cost in U.S. dollars to buy an import copy of this game?

[Kytim89]

Since NoA has slapped me in the face with Operation Rainfall then I have cancelled my preorder for Skyward Sword and intend to buy that game used. Once the Xenoblade stock frenzy has subsided and Pandora's Tower and Last Story have been released in Europe then I will decide as to whether to get the game or cut my loses. I do not like the idea of moding my console to play games because I shouldn't have to and if Nintendo of America never does allow these games into America, I will remember it for the future. Lastly, I call for the resignation Reggie Fils-aimmee from the company. Hell, that chcik that told stories during E3 was much better than this guy.

[Crimm]

So where did you folks end up importing Xenoblade from? I tried going on Amazon, but all I can find there is the "Pre-order" placeholder page for Monado.  I wanted to hold on importing the game to give NoA time to come to their senses, but after listening to this episode I have to agree: It's too late.  NoA will never touch this game.

Just so I know, how much does it cost in U.S. dollars to buy an import copy of this game?

I bought it at zaavi.com
With shipping I paid $48.95

[NeoStar9X]

Wanted to play Xenoblade but really I can't be bothered to go the extra steps to import it now. Instead I did something else. I ordered a copy of Radiant Historia. I've heard good things about from other places and this podcast. I figure why not give it a shot. I had been meaning to check it out in the past. It has taken the place of Solatorobo as I feel that is shallower then I though it would be. Wanted something more. Hopefully it ships from Amazon.com later today (Tuesday) and I get it by Saturday if standard shipping goes out on time.

With me trying to get away from more FPS this should do a good job I hope. That should keep me busy until Zelda, Mario 3D Land, and Mario Kart 7.

As suggested I can only hope the seeming success Xenoblade, at least better then NoE expected,  is having might change Nintendo of America's mind on The Last Story. Of the two, I know people have said Xenoblade was better, I was looking forward more to The Last Story anyway. Even now after watching a LOT of video of Xenoblade and read up on it. Now that game could push me to import while Xenoblade couldn't make me make the final leap.

[NWR_Lindy]

Yeah, the nVidia Tegra chips are going to change a lot of people's perceptions of what "cell phone gaming" can be.  Games are getting REALLY good and smartphones are getting REALLY powerful.

The only thing stopping smartphones from taking over handheld gaming is proper controls, and that isn't hard to add to a device.  Add a slide-out D-pad/button combo like the Xperia Play and a couple of shoulder buttons and you have a very capable gaming device (with a built-in touchscreen, no less).

You can also say what you will about the battery life of smartphones, but the 3DS doesn't have them beat in that department with its 4-hour lifespan.  Besides, it makes more sense to have charging cradles at work and at home for your phone (which you pretty much need to have with you at all times anyways) than it does to have the same for a 3DS (which is an optional entertainment device that you don't need.

Smartphones are a big threat to Nintendo's handheld dominance, and they're only getting bigger as their tech gets better.

[Crimm]

While I don't disagree with you Jon, precious few phones do actually have buttons. The Xperia (that name...) Play has those buttons but it is the exception.


I had the opportunity to play a very impressive looking cell phone FPS on a "next-gen" Android phone. While visually it was the superior of anything the 3DS has seen to date (although there are games in the pipe that look comparable) it tried to do dual sticks and virtual buttons. It was a horror show.


You can design games that work well on the cell phone platform, even traditional titles. Nobody is going to make a good FPS without buttons. Cell phone gaming becomes a real threat when they stay their lane. Make creative titles that utilize the hardware appropriately.