@McRaider: Totally agree. Raising the frost wyrm out of the lake, how epic was that? But somehow, it was the voiceover by his father Terenas that just sent shivers down my spine. That's some serious story telling right there.
'Chess with Friends' by Newtoy (same as 'Words with Friends' in the summary... except with chess!) is such a promising iPhone app... but the reviews on the iTunes store are atrocious! About half of them say the same thing: great game, full of bugs, won't always run, etc.
I found a bunch of bugs on the free version, mostly due to the game hanging when I'm not online - which is pretty often, since I have an iTouch. But the game does have offline features, it's just that you can't use them when you're offline! Crazy. And there's no developers forum to report the bugs to on their website.
It's a shame to hear something so inspiring from a former developer of a studio I really respect, when the reality is that the new studio has just as many problems as the old one, they're just different types of problems.
Nothing wrong with the 360 (or PS3), the reason why it looks worse is that it was developed for one, then ported to the other later on in development.
On a side note, most top developers develop for both consoles and release on all languages simultaneously, but squenix is one of the most complacent developers i've ever heard of when it comes to it's western audience. They just expect that we will buy their games, however late they release, and whatever state their engine is in. I bet if they had decided to release the 360 version in Japan they would have put in some proper work at the outset of the project to make sure it didn't look like this.
R: well, there is a saying: good ideas are a dime a dozen, it's the execution that counts.
Fable 2 is one of those game that polarises people; you need to be emotionally involved in the world to really enjoy it. There is a lot to be said about having a world full of people that you can influence, towns to explore and jobs and quests to do, but the implementation is basically a series of minigames from a 1980's arcade wrapped around with a 3d facade. I mean, there's only so many times you can 'make someone love you' by doing the fart emotion over and over again before it wears a bit thin, you know?
EA discounts more than a dozen iPhone games to $1 each
Jun 23rd 2010 5:47AM (Joystiq)Breakfast Topic: Speculation on the Cataclysm cinematic
May 19th 2010 3:08PM (WoW)Breakfast Topic: Unfinished business
May 16th 2010 8:27PM (WoW)Jikan de Fantasia lets you play as a more-than-Half-Minute Hero
Apr 28th 2010 5:18PM (Joystiq)Square Enix 'Extreme Edges' is new label for publisher's violent games in Japan
Apr 27th 2010 11:59AM (Joystiq)Denki reevaluates release of 'finished, super polished' XBLA game Quarrel, cuts staff
Apr 5th 2010 12:39PM (Joystiq)Hooray for progress: Hamlet game coming next month
Mar 23rd 2010 11:38AM (Joystiq)Recently laid-off devs rant about being recently laid off
Mar 15th 2010 2:33PM (Joystiq)I found a bunch of bugs on the free version, mostly due to the game hanging when I'm not online - which is pretty often, since I have an iTouch. But the game does have offline features, it's just that you can't use them when you're offline! Crazy. And there's no developers forum to report the bugs to on their website.
It's a shame to hear something so inspiring from a former developer of a studio I really respect, when the reality is that the new studio has just as many problems as the old one, they're just different types of problems.
This is what Final Fantasy XIII looks like on Xbox 360
Feb 18th 2010 9:12PM (Joystiq)On a side note, most top developers develop for both consoles and release on all languages simultaneously, but squenix is one of the most complacent developers i've ever heard of when it comes to it's western audience. They just expect that we will buy their games, however late they release, and whatever state their engine is in. I bet if they had decided to release the 360 version in Japan they would have put in some proper work at the outset of the project to make sure it didn't look like this.
Molyneux calls on UK government to support games industry
Feb 17th 2010 2:56PM (Joystiq)Fable 2 is one of those game that polarises people; you need to be emotionally involved in the world to really enjoy it. There is a lot to be said about having a world full of people that you can influence, towns to explore and jobs and quests to do, but the implementation is basically a series of minigames from a 1980's arcade wrapped around with a 3d facade. I mean, there's only so many times you can 'make someone love you' by doing the fart emotion over and over again before it wears a bit thin, you know?