Remember the old days? When you'd buy a game, and find an honest to goodness manual in the box
with the disks? A manual, usually of a fair weight, big enough to
kill all but the most hardy family members, should it fall on them.
Strategy guides are a giant scam pulled on the gaming population. You now have to pay for information you used to
actually receive in the box. Worse still, in the case of PC games, quite often the strategy guide is useless after the
first patch. A very big example: Warcraft 3. Painstakingly lists all the unit stats. The guide is about as useful as a
chocolate kettle the instant Blizzard decide to tweak units.
Not only that, but most information turns up on GameFAQ's within seconds of the strategy guide appearing, so do we
even need them? Or do they serve a valuable purpose? Such as something to read while in the bathroom.
For the record, in answer to a question the article asks, I'm a gamer who doesn't have GameFAQ's bookmarked. That's
what my browsing history is for.
Engadget
TUAW