Three Ideas, One Half-Assed Title

Tonight, since I was unable to really pick between the ideas I had come up with, you're going to get three bite-sized pieces for the price of one, which is, well, free. The first is a follow up to an earlier piece on what developers can do to interest me in next-gen. The second is a bit more in the epic saga of Microsoft trying to bury themselves with the upcoming console generation. The third is a bit on the Katamari franchise, the rise and fall thereof, and why it was so important.

What Developers Can Do to Interest Me in Next-Gen, pt 2.

Open Betas -

One of the chief complaints with otherwise competent and unique titles tends to be an overall lack of polish, typically in the form of numerous small bugs reaching a critical mass. A lot of these problems can be solved with a longer or more thorough beta period, taking some of the work of the hands of the often maligned, never praised quality assurance department. Whether this is something more akin to Steam's early access, or a complete publicly available version won't make a huge difference, and it's something I'd like to see more developers take advantage of, especially considering it was touted as a feature on the Playstation 4. 

More to Do -

Although I applaud developers for adhering to the $60 price point, they still need to do more and, accordingly, give me more to do to keep their disc spinning in my console. Rockstar has come up with probably the finest example of this, with Grand Theft Auto Online. Another thing that applies with my completionist nature is more achievements/trophies, and for more unique things. Less with the shoehorning of collectibles into an already completed game, and the tedious grinds of 2000+ multiplayer matches completed, and more interesting fun things that would normally not be attempted in normal gameplay.

That's all I've got for right now, but they're both pretty huge points that I can't believe I missed the first time around.

Microsoft, again.

The first TV spot for the X1 came out about a week ago, with absolutely no mention of games. Instead, repeating the mistake of their reveal, they focused on Skype, fantasy football, and it's use as a TV box. This is even after announcing that they're releasing a week after the Playstation 4, November 22nd. By the time people get their X1s, it will already be beyond the half-point of the regular NFL season, and that's just for the day one adopters. Those that recieve them from their significant others, parents, et al, for Christmas will miss all but the last game of the regular season, and that's assuming they're not spending more of their time playing the launch titles, and have figured out the system enough to access these features. This is a terrible marketing strategy, and once again, we've seen Microsoft fumble, and come launch day, we'll see who recovers the ball.

The Rise and Fall of the Katamari Franchise

Katamari Damacy was something of a sleeper hit, with most of its sales being the end result of word of mouth recommendations. It was so popular that Namco ordered a sequel for the following year, which was then followed with a PSP spin-off, a mobile phone game in Japan, and then, in no particular order, titles for the XBox 360, iOS, the DS(in Japan), the PS3, and the PSVita.

With the lack of new features, and the appearance of not taking advantage of the power of newer consoles, the Katamari series fell out of favor with critics, and soon after, it's fans. Katamari Forever for the PS3 was primarily a rehash of levels from previous games, and Beautiful Katamari was decried for it's use of on-disc DLC, and for being too short. Touch My Katamari was a launch title for the PS Vita, and utilized the touch screen in a particularly gimmicky way, but has not sold well both due to poor console sales and poor reviews.

The reason for the rise of Katamari Damacy was its quirky sense of humor, its inclusiveness, and its ease of play. Not since the beginning of the video game era had something so simple been so addictive, and the "casual" gamer(now commonplace with facebook apps and mobile games) helped that rise. For the hardcore, there were other playable skins(called cousins) and various gift items to be found, in addition to achieving better times and larger katamaris.

However, with later titles in the series, the gameplay had grown stale due to the lack of new innovations, and the reuse of many challenges and levels, and that's something I hope to see rectified in a next-gen release. The Katamari franchise suffered greatly from the annualization now widely spread across the market, and ultimately a victim of its own successes.