While 99.9% of the time I’m extremely happy that I’m a Mac user, today isn’t one of them. With the StarCraft II Beta now available (and sitting for download in my Battle.Net account), I am seriously wishing I had a PC to play this thing. Those of you pwning with Protoss, I envy you.
While Merrie just got a new kick ass gaming rig, I’m sitting here with my MacBook Pro wishing I had a Windows machine to use. I keep telling myself to make the investment, but I just haven’t pulled the trigger. I think it might be time to order a new gaming box…
I know most of you are probably console gamers but maybe some of you still game on a PC like me. I used to be a console gamer only then about four years ago I slowly switched to PC gaming and I’m hooked. I started out playing on a heavy duty laptop then got myself an HP computer from Best Buy. After upgrading it as far as I could go, I decided to take the step of buying a gaming computer. It’s a big step and it’s not cheap. I tried to do it over a year ago and ordered an Alienware which turned out to be a fiasco. It never worked. You can read about it on my blog site. This time I I wanted to go a different direction. I googled top gaming computers and found a list. The top three were Dell (heard the service sucks so I’ll pass), Alienware (not doing that again) and Falcon Northwest (hmm, let’s take a look).
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Really? Is this real? Is this real life? I seriously had trouble believing this news story to be real, but you did read that title correctly: digital trade-ins. Games that you pay to download over the internet, can now be turned around and sold to someone else, with you getting a little piece of that action back towards the next game. I thought this article was from The Onion Network for a second (fake satirical news), but turns out this shit just got real.
Green Man Gaming is set to roll out a new distribution service that will allow gamers to buy games and then trade them in for credit. The London based firm is set to roll out the service sometime in the coming months (they mention a first quarter release date) with over 400 games ready to download and trade back in over and over. Later in the year their goal is to constantly add titles to the list of downloads and have it grow to over 2,000 by the end of 2010. Green Man Gaming also concludes that they promise to “pay significant royalties to the publisher each time the game is traded in.”
The COO of Green Man Gaming Gian Luzio had this to say:
“Previously the minute you had paid and downloaded your game it had no resale value. This is extremely expensive for the gamer and does not encourage the consumer to try new genres or franchises. Our leading edge technology gives downloaded games a value that gamers can trade-in at any time.”
How is this not a hoax people? To really try and get peoples’ money for buying a “used” install of a game? Last time I checked, an install is an install is an install? They are the same over and over again. The only way one might get messed up is if the CD-ROM is scratched corrupting an essential file, but this doesn’t even have that!
This all essentially sounds like what goes on at companies all across the world with their IT software. The company pays a crapton of money to get unlimited licenses for software like Microsoft Works, Outlook, etc. that they need, and then issue out the software to all of the lower minions and workers who need it. The company has the ability to install the programs as an image on as many computers as possible. Only with Green Man Gaming, they are buying the licenses and getting their money back (and a shit-ton more). My guess is that everyone can’t be GameStop, but they can sure try to be with these digital trad-in downloads. I really see this company trying to be the ant (Green Man Gaming) that jumps on the gorilla’s back (GameStop) in order to get some used game revenue.
What do you think about this Loot Ninja gamers? Is this worthwhile? Would you use something like this?
[via GamePolitics.com]
If the PS3 Beta for Bad Company 2 didn’t give you enough or you just prefer the mouse and keyboard, EA and Dice are launching a Beta on PC January 28th. You’ll be able to play with up to 32 players in Rush on the Port Valdez map with Snow. Both Vehicle and Infantry will be available, so you’ll get a feel for headshots and tank cannon blasts. The Beta will run through February 25th giving you plenty of opportunity to get your multiplayer gaming fix.
You’ll have to preorder the game through EA or GameStop to ensure getting into the Beta. Other retailers will hop on board, but nothing is final as of press time.
I have a feeling the PC Beta will be just like the PS3 Beta for the first few days — people running around checking out the map and getting a feel for the destructible environments, not having a care for the game type objectives. That changed towards the end on the PS3 and I’m sure it’ll be the case on PC as well. The real question is will this contend with Modern Warfare 2 and others in the online FPS space. Based on what I’ve seen and played, it very well could come out near the top of the heap.
Crimecraft has been the most difficult review I’ve had to do for Loot Ninja thus far – not because of conflicted feelings on the game, but because it happened to be the most bland and uninteresting game I’ve been asked to review. Seriously, it’s been a painful one.
At first glance, it looks good – Grand Theft Auto meets MMORPG. On paper, it sounds good, but in practice, CrimeCraft is at best a loosely held together world with shoddy mechanics and less than stellar animations, and ultimately fails to engage on any level.
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As reported a few days ago right here, Steam is still offering games at huge discounted prices!! Just about every game offered on Steam is discounted, some as much as 80%. I sat here for over an hour picking out games to buy and ended up with a Star War Premier pack for 50% off. This includes KOTOR and 9 other Star War games for $24.99. I also got Torchlight for $4.99, some Indie games like Braid and Lumines for $2.99 and Dragon’s Age for 25% off for $37.49. Need Left 4 Dead 2? $37.99. You get the picture, super prices to try games you might not otherwise play. Every day they are offering special deals on certain games for an even higher discounted price. This sale ends on Jan 3rd so if you like PC games and you like saving money, take a look!!!
PC Left 4 Dead 2 players take note: the Left 4 Dead 2 Authoring Tools (also known as the SDK) are now available. That means mods and custom campaigns will be coming your way just as soon as the inventive minds behind such undertakings get around to developing them. Being that it’s Christmas vacation, I’d say a few of them will have a little extra time on their hands.
Some of the original Left 4 Dead extra campaigns were great (see here). Here’s to hoping the new batch of content turns out to be as good if not better. Since I have the Xbox 360 version and have a Mac, I’m shit out of luck, but I know Karl and Merrie will be really happy to hear this news.
Next up in our 2009 Game of the Year picks is Best PC Game. There was a lot of controversy in the PC world this year, but some games clearly flourished. Fire up Steam or hit up your favorite local retailer and make sure you own all of these games. Click on through to find out the winners.
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In case you couldn’t get enough PC gaming action from Steam, Impulse, and other current digital distribution platforms, Microsoft is jumping in the ring with Games for Windows Live Games on Demand. That’s a mouth full. That’s what she said. The launch lineup isn’t spectacular and you most likely already have these games in one form or another.
- Dirt 2 ($40)
- Fallout 3 ($50)
- Kane and Lynch: Dead Men ($20)
- Red Faction: Guerrilla ($40)
- Shadowrun ($10)
- Street Fighter IV ($40)
- Viva Pinata ($10)
Considering most of us have these games already, I don’t really see this service thriving. Steam pretty much has the market cornered, so unless Microsoft goes balls deep here, I don’t think they’ll take over.
Valve is already hard at work on the first batch of DLC for Left 4 Dead 2. Titled “The Passing,” you’ll get your hands on new single player, multiplayer and co-op gameplay for the PC and Xbox 360. No pricing has been set yet, but you can bet your ass this will cost a few ducats at least on the Xbox 360.
“The Passing” takes place just after the Dead Center campaign of L4D2. Set in a small town in rural Georgia, players assume the role of the L4D2 Survivors as they meet with the L4D1 characters.
I’m excited to see the L4D1 characters make a comeback and hopefully they’re involved in the new co-op challenge mode. We’ll also get a new melee weapon, new firearm, and a new “uncommon common” zombie class, whatever that means. It’ll be interesting to see the pricing scheme since so much extra is being introduced, but we’ll have to wait until closer to the early Spring 2010 release date for more info.
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