It seems like a Chinese company buying into Epic would be silly, since China bans the official sale of consoles. Of course this is assuming that Tencent doesn't do the worst and just want to turn Epic into another free-to-play MMO factory.
Still, I do find it interesting to watch countries we don't traditionally associate with the gaming industry starting to creep into the periphery, like China with Tencent and India with UTV.
Im probably in the minority here but if an always online xbox with installed games means I can launch all my games from the dashboard without ever having to switch discs? I am 100% onboard.
The mandatory Kinect thing could be a dealbreaker thing for me depending on how they handle it.
You're not in the minority. A lot of people own PCs.
Uuum, I play almost exclusively on the PC and always-on is dumb as shit, not to mention that every PC game that has come out that used extraneous always-on DRM has had massive scandal and failure involved. Steam is most definitely not always-on DRM, which is definitely the standard for PC gaming.
Plus having mandatory installs removes one of the conveniences consoles have over PCs. It's a small thing, but it's there. I own a 360 and a PS3, and I still get annoyed whenever I have a PS3 game that requires me to sit around for 10 minutes rather than let me play immediately.
Though again, I'm hoping the 720 mandatory installs are because the in-development dev kits haven't been optimized.
The "leak" in question says "you can start playing few secs after installation starts" so I'm not seeing the problem. Sounds like they want to play from the harddrive (which is just flat out better) and they want to institute a system where you can play the game while installing. So it seems to me like the best of both worlds, so I have no idea why people are complaining.
If you wanted to be paranoid, having to install the game would probably make it easier for them to tie the game to an account or to the console, i.e. it would help them cut out used sales.
Unless the transfer speed on the Blu Ray drive is unbelievably low, this seems to be the only explanation. There's no other reason for it to be mandatory across the board unless it is a change to game licensing.
Which is just about the dumbest move I've ever seen, ever. If they slip that in when they do the big reveal at e3, we'll be looking at a Sony-esque five-hundred-and-ninety-nine-you-ess-dollars type of furor. Message boards would massacre them, especially off the back of Sim City.
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SirUltimosDon't talk, Rusty. Just paint.Registered Userregular
StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm, the second salvo in Blizzard Entertainment's three-pronged sequel to the beloved RTS, has managed to entice 1.1 million gamers in its first 48 hours. The 1.1 million figure accounts for sales across both retail and digital.
Predecessor StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty managed to sell 1.5 million copies worldwide in its first 48 hours. Both can't match Blizzard's launch of Diablo 3 last year, which moved 3.5 million copies in its first 24 hours and helped Activision Blizzard enjoy historical profits in 2012.
I always assumed Starcraft was, by far, the more popular franchise.
Is there some other sales technique used in South Korea that eliminates a lot of sales? Or were people simply slowly to convert, SC1 and Brood War being so beloved?
Diablo kinda took on this whole level of hype even without PR doing it's job. It was one of those series that was considered the very best of gaming and what everyone played in the day. Not that many might say the same about Diablo III or Starcraft II in any shape or form, people use to consider Blizzard one of the golden boys but these days the writing and direction they have taken is not exactly what people want so they've definitely lost a lot of luster.
SCII sales were impaced in S.Korea because of the big fight Blizzard was having with one of the companies that do the E-games down there, they hated how Blizzard was demanding money so they actually were able to get SCII rated higher than SC to impact it. Yeah they take things serious there SC wise.
Starcraft 2 had the issue of being Chess 2. Slower (relative) adoption rate because the amazing popularity of Starcraft was Mostly with Starcraft 1, not the Starcraft franchise itself.
Meanwhile, people were SUPER hungry for new Diablo content, and there wasn't a professional gaming scene to hold things back.
HotS is a pure expansion pack, so it has a smaller likely customer base (people who bought WoL) vs. Diablo 3 (Everybody who ever played Diablo 2 in the last decade+). I'd guess Blizzard is pretty happy with their current adoption rate, though.
Diablo has a broader audience than Starcraft. I don't think you need any other reason than that.
There's a reason Diablo 3 is coming to consoles and not Starcraft 2.
Like the fact that you need a pointer interface for SC2 and not Diablo 3? :P
StarCraft 2 would make an awesome Wii U game.
The great thing about the WiiU, as I see it, we actually have a very effective mouse-simulation for consoles. So all the mouse-hungry games, like Torchlight, Civilization, Starcraft, are going to be working their way onto consoles. especially after Xbox and Playstation implement a touch-screen controller. An exciting world of possibilities indeed!
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Diablo has a broader audience than Starcraft. I don't think you need any other reason than that.
There's a reason Diablo 3 is coming to consoles and not Starcraft 2.
Like the fact that you need a pointer interface for SC2 and not Diablo 3? :P
StarCraft 2 would make an awesome Wii U game.
Blizzard said over a year ago that the Wii U might work for Starcraft, but obviously nothing's publicly come from it.
Fixed :P (p.s. they are announcing something at PAX East tomorrow... just sayin' :P)
Surely Diablo related, seeing as we've seen all their Diablo 3 console version screenshots from PAX a few days earlier and know it's going to be there. Probably some modes, new systems or something, right? I can't imagine they'd double up on franchises at something as provincial as PAX. There are bigger and more important trade shows to announce Starcraft 2 on consoles at.
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Diablo has a broader audience than Starcraft. I don't think you need any other reason than that.
There's a reason Diablo 3 is coming to consoles and not Starcraft 2.
Like the fact that you need a pointer interface for SC2 and not Diablo 3? :P
StarCraft 2 would make an awesome Wii U game.
Blizzard said over a year ago that the Wii U might work for Starcraft, but obviously nothing's publicly come from it.
Fixed :P (p.s. they are announcing something at PAX East tomorrow... just sayin' :P)
Surely Diablo related, seeing as we've seen all their Diablo 3 console version screenshots from PAX a few days earlier and know it's going to be there. Probably some modes, new systems or something, right? I can't imagine they'd double up on franchises at something as provincial as PAX. There are bigger and more important trade shows to announce Starcraft 2 on consoles at.
They said it was a new game (and not a sequel to an existing franchise or another MMO). I actually think it's going to probably be a side project, like a game-version of the WoW Trading Card Game, or something.
That leaked release schedule from a few years back listed the WoW TCG, but also had something called "StarCraft Phoenix" on it. Both listed around the same time as HotS's release, which would be now...
I'm pretty sure Blizzard can afford to publish their own games now :P Keep in mind they were still under a publisher at the time (Cendant? Or maybe they had moved on to Vivendi at that point.. edit: It would have been Vivendi)
For what it's worth, it wasn't unprecedented either. WarCraft 2 and Diablo were both on the PSX. So they were doing console ports back then quite a bit.
AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
Ummm.. Cedant owned Sierra and Blizzard since just after the Silicon and Synapse days. Like.. they were around from 94. They could afford to publish their own titles then. Vivendi bought Cedant wholesale, then sold their gaming division off to Activision.
So they could most certainly afford to publish their own games back then.
Ummm.. Cedant owned Sierra and Blizzard since just after the Silicon and Synapse days. Like.. they were around from 94. They could afford to publish their own titles then. Vivendi bought Cedant wholesale, then sold their gaming division off to Activision.
So they could most certainly afford to publish their own games back then.
They could, but they didn't. EA published Diablo on Playstation.
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It's a fairly safe bet that the Blizzard PAX East announcement will be Blizzard All-Stars (Blizzard DotA). It was originally going to be an official SC2 custom map, but it never came out despite having a playable demo at...Blizzcon 2011? Maybe? It's likely just a DotA clone with Blizzard characters, though they said somewhere in the past that they wanted something different from your average DotA clone.
It's a fairly safe bet that the Blizzard PAX East announcement will be Blizzard All-Stars (Blizzard DotA). It was originally going to be an official SC2 custom map, but it never came out despite having a playable demo at...Blizzcon 2011? Maybe? It's likely just a DotA clone with Blizzard characters, though they said somewhere in the past that they wanted something different from your average DotA clone.
Maybe we'll get lucky and it'll be a new Lost Vikings game or a new Rock n' Roll Racing.
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Developers, like Rockstar, have bragged in the past that games make more than films at the box office, so why not fund games like Hollywood does? 2K Games is doing just that by throwing nearly $200 million at BioShock Infinite, according to The New York Times which cited unnamed analysts. Not since Grand Theft Auto IV -- allegedly $100M and produced by 2K's owners Take-Two -- has so much money been thrown at a project
Around $100M was spent on Infinite's production and as much as another $100 will be spent on marketing. Remember when we were all gobsmacked that Gears of War cost $10 million? While game budgets have gone up, BioShock Infinite is pushing to the top of the list of most expensive productions. Shenmue ($94M in today's economy) says hi!
Destructoid recently reported that Ken Levine decided to axe the BioShock film when Universal declined its $200 million budget. I wondered where that ridiculously high number, usually reserved for major franchise sequels (Harry Potter, Transformers), came from. Well, it may have come from BioShock Infinite's budget. Hard to go back to a measly $80 mil, right guys!?
The exclusive review, generous pre-purchase offers, and massive marketing push around this game is all starting to make sense: 2K doesn't want to take any chances after investing so heavily in this risky venture. Even a 90+ Metacritic score and strong ad push may not be enough to make this bird fly. I sure hope so, as the resulting dialog among publishers may lead to less ambitious games in the future.
So basically Bioshock Infinite and the studio are fucked. There's next to no chance of ever pulling a profit unless it becomes an absolute uber hit numbering at least 5+ million sales, and even then that might not be enough.
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
On one hand that's a lot of money for a game. They'd need to sell what, 5 million plus to break even?
On the other the first game has sold over 4 million, and I admire Levine and 2K for being willing to get behind something ambitious. I'll probably buy it, and I hope it does well.
AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
Bioshock Infinite will be fine, unless the game horribly bombs after people get their hands on it.
... I need to find a journalism thread to bitch in, though. "Winner of 85 awards?" I remember when Half Life pulled that shit with their Game of the Year edition, and it pissed me off then too.
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Still, I do find it interesting to watch countries we don't traditionally associate with the gaming industry starting to creep into the periphery, like China with Tencent and India with UTV.
Unless the transfer speed on the Blu Ray drive is unbelievably low, this seems to be the only explanation. There's no other reason for it to be mandatory across the board unless it is a change to game licensing.
Which is just about the dumbest move I've ever seen, ever. If they slip that in when they do the big reveal at e3, we'll be looking at a Sony-esque five-hundred-and-ninety-nine-you-ess-dollars type of furor. Message boards would massacre them, especially off the back of Sim City.
http://www.joystiq.com/2013/03/21/starcraft-2-heart-of-the-swarm-infects-1-1-million-in-48-hours/
Didn't it take SimCity a couple weeks to hit the same number?
e: upon reading my post I have no idea what I'm getting at. I'm on no sleep and working 9 hours a day so leave me alone!
I always assumed Starcraft was, by far, the more popular franchise.
Is there some other sales technique used in South Korea that eliminates a lot of sales? Or were people simply slowly to convert, SC1 and Brood War being so beloved?
SCII sales were impaced in S.Korea because of the big fight Blizzard was having with one of the companies that do the E-games down there, they hated how Blizzard was demanding money so they actually were able to get SCII rated higher than SC to impact it. Yeah they take things serious there SC wise.
Meanwhile, people were SUPER hungry for new Diablo content, and there wasn't a professional gaming scene to hold things back.
There's a reason Diablo 3 is coming to consoles and not Starcraft 2.
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Remember Starcraft 64 which also had extra stuff.
Like the fact that you need a pointer interface for SC2 and not Diablo 3? :P
StarCraft 2 would make an awesome Wii U game.
The great thing about the WiiU, as I see it, we actually have a very effective mouse-simulation for consoles. So all the mouse-hungry games, like Torchlight, Civilization, Starcraft, are going to be working their way onto consoles. especially after Xbox and Playstation implement a touch-screen controller. An exciting world of possibilities indeed!
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Blizzard said over a year ago that the Wii U might work for Starcraft, but obviously nothing's come from it.
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Fixed :P (p.s. they are announcing something at PAX East tomorrow... just sayin' :P)
Edit: Also I would totally double-dip if they released a Wii U version that bundled the three campaigns.
StarCraft Ghost! :rotate:
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Surely Diablo related, seeing as we've seen all their Diablo 3 console version screenshots from PAX a few days earlier and know it's going to be there. Probably some modes, new systems or something, right? I can't imagine they'd double up on franchises at something as provincial as PAX. There are bigger and more important trade shows to announce Starcraft 2 on consoles at.
They said it was a new game (and not a sequel to an existing franchise or another MMO). I actually think it's going to probably be a side project, like a game-version of the WoW Trading Card Game, or something.
That leaked release schedule from a few years back listed the WoW TCG, but also had something called "StarCraft Phoenix" on it. Both listed around the same time as HotS's release, which would be now...
... Which Nintendo published, lest us forget.
I'm pretty sure Blizzard can afford to publish their own games now :P Keep in mind they were still under a publisher at the time (Cendant? Or maybe they had moved on to Vivendi at that point.. edit: It would have been Vivendi)
For what it's worth, it wasn't unprecedented either. WarCraft 2 and Diablo were both on the PSX. So they were doing console ports back then quite a bit.
So they could most certainly afford to publish their own games back then.
They could, but they didn't. EA published Diablo on Playstation.
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Maybe we'll get lucky and it'll be a new Lost Vikings game or a new Rock n' Roll Racing.
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http://www.destructoid.com/bioshock-infinite-among-most-expensive-games-of-all-time-249310.phtml
On the other the first game has sold over 4 million, and I admire Levine and 2K for being willing to get behind something ambitious. I'll probably buy it, and I hope it does well.
Unless most of the money went into licensing the song for the TV commercial, I'd like to see where that $100 million went.
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I recall the same sort of talk when Red Dead Redemption came out and it was said to cost $100 million+ and it did something like 12 million.
... I need to find a journalism thread to bitch in, though. "Winner of 85 awards?" I remember when Half Life pulled that shit with their Game of the Year edition, and it pissed me off then too.
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