Why Microsoft needs a fresh user base for the Scorpio to succeed.

The moment is almost here and as gamers all around the world count the hours, we get near to the final unveiling of Microsoft's new console, up until now called Scorpio (which is a kick ass name so they should keep it). Now the question is... how can Microsoft convince gamers that their new console is the real deal after the Xbox One lost the battle against the PS4?

The answer is easy... They need a fresh user base with a more open mind. 

Take a moment to think about what happened to the Xbox One. Regardless of how dumb the initial pitch was and how their PR disaster hurt the console's launch, it managed to recover and sold relatively well. Some people thought that they were going to have a comeback in the console race, especially after the console had a really strong Christmas 2016, but once January 2017 came it all deflated and has been practically inert ever since. You want to know why? Well prepare yourself.

The main reason the Xbox One lacked the strength to close the gap was because its user base was really narrow in their gaming selections and that limited not only the amount of players, but also the opportunity of having a good variety of games, which most often than not turn into direct sales of the console itself. Sadly the Xbox One carried the effects of the blight of 2008 and that really hurt the potential of an otherwise awesome console.

What was the Blight of 2008?

I like to call "the blight of 2008" to that period in the previous generation of consoles where all the attention in the market shifted to two three genres which were first person shooters, racing and sports games. Every other genre was basically ignored and month after month the leaders in sales were games in the genres previously mentioned. Don't take me wrong, I love those types of games too, but on those days they were like a giant black hole that was swallowing everything. It was so bad that even the once proud Japanese companies started imitating their Western counterparts in a desperate attempt to have better sales. It was the couple of years that had sad incidents like the president of Square Enix giving his infamous "ultimatum" about them catering to the west and the death of many good games because of  poor sales. This went on and on with many franchises been either changed or dumbed down until the current consoles came and brought back the balance we had enjoyed for the previous 20 years and had momentarily lost in the days of the blight.

So what does the Xbox One has to do with the blight?

It makes me sad to say it, but it seems that some people believed that we are still living in the days of the blight and so they didn't supported anything that went away from their comfort zone as if they were still living in 2008. I am not pretending everybody to buy every game, but sales numbers show that the Xbox One user base was basically saying "meh we just want shooters, racers and sports", which is a thing that discouraged most third party companies of releasing good exclusives for the console and made the Xbox landscape to be based almost entirely of multi-platform games with some few exclusives thrown there now and then.

Don't believe me? Check out these articles:

79% of UK Final Fantasy XV sales were on PS4, 21% Xbox One

ReCore News: Sales Gone Bad? Microsoft Finally Made Their Move

Poor sales continue as Quantum Break hits Steam

You see? Those are examples of one multi-platform and two exclusives not performing well on the console in terms of sales. They were all good games so those failures were uncalled for.

Then what Microsoft needs to do to fix this?

What Microsoft needs to do from today on can be divided in two things. First they need to win over people that fled to other consoles because of the lack of the games they wanted and second, they need to re-educate they loyal fans to support more types of games than they did with the Xbox One. They need to immediately state that the console will be powerful, sexy and with lots of different games to support that power. Otherwise, they may have another Xbox One situation on their hands and that would be really devastating for the Xbox division within Microsoft.

E3 2017: Keys to Victory

In pay per view boxing matches, there is something called "keys to victory" which is a small pre-fight analysis of what each boxer needs to do in order to maximize his chances of winning. Today we are going to once again use that format to do a little analysis and see what each company needs to do in order to get that "winner of E3" title.

Why is winning E3 a big deal? Well, when a company "wins" an E3 event the grand prize is lots of hype and most often than not hype traduces itself into sales and sales very often turn into good games been considered for the platform in the near future. So without any further delay, lets see what each company needs to do in order to win it.

Microsoft

Up until now, Microsoft has had a really tough first half of the year. Looking on the bright side, the Xbox One has been getting good initiatives like the Netflix-like gaming service, but without many games to keep its user base engaged it has remained quite cold in the house of Xbox. In order to win this year's E3 their strategy has to be to push the Scorpio along with a barrage of exclusive games. Seen a revival of Scalebound as a Scorpio exclusive will sting a little (if you own an Xbox One), but would be a valid strategy. Other big games that could be revived are Fable and even KOTOR (Star Wars: Knights of the old republic). Once again the key for them is variety as the Gears-Forza-Halo combo will not be able to carry their new system to where they want it to be. They need to re-shape their fan base into something that welcomes more types of games and this E3 event is a great chance for them to do so.

Strength: Having a new machine to show gives them an edge if they know how to use it.

Weakness: Consumer confidence is quite low considering the poor first half of the year that the Xbox One had.

Sony

Sony is in a complex situation. They had a wonderful first half of 2017 with a parade of great third party games, but with few announcements and rumors in the last 5 months and with Final Fantasy 7 remake and Kingdom Hearts having difficulties it looks as if they have spent most of their bullets and are now facing a drought. With their situation been like it is... Can they win it this year? The answer to that question is yes, but they need to prove that the drought is not coming and that we have something to look forward to in the next 5 months. We all know that new gameplay will be shown of some games that were already announced, but if we don't get some cool surprises along with some solid release dates, we might have a so-so conference at best. The pressure is on them to keep the ball rolling.

Strength: Great first half of 2017 has the consumer as happy as they can be. The overall attitude is positive and many expect Sony to have an ace under their sleeve as they have done for the last 3 years.

Weakness: Expectations are so high that Sony will have a hard time topping themselves and anything less than what's expected could be seen as dim and uneventful. 

Nintendo

Right now, Nintendo is having a great time. Their gamble with the Switch paid off and they are as we speak a very close second to the PS4, month after month since the Switch was released. Now, the problem for them with this years E3 is that most of their surprises have once again (like last year) been either leaked or announced on ahead of time, leaving them with little mystery and intrigue, things that are needed in this type of event in order to have a big impact on the audience. 

Another fact is that even with the success they are having, they still won't give a big conference and once again rely on their Nintendo Direct videos, which are cool, but don't have that extra "umph!" that big time conferences give. So if things are like this then what does Nintendo need to win? The best bet they have is having secret stuff that they can use to blow us away when they are finally mentioned or showing what they have in a brilliant way, so they can lure us into the hype train. How can they do this? Well, details about the Splatoon 2 and Arms tournament can be a good start along with details about their Netflix-like retro game service and maybe one or two new Switch games that haven't been announced.

Strength: Great momentum since the Switch was released, even bigger that the one they had with the Wii in 2006.

Weakness: Unless they have some good secrets to unveil, everything new about the big N is already known.

Wrapping things up:

E3 Fight Forecast

This years E3 will be a good one with solid game play and maybe a few surprises in a really close fight between the main competitors, but try not to expect a "dreams come true" hype fest like the last one, because it is very unlikely. Let's just enjoy what we will get and get excited about the things that will be announced while hoping that the momentum that 2017 brought can last for a long time. 

Game Doctrine E3 Special

Game Doctrine is a little side project I have been working up with a friend and what better way to introduce our little wacky antics than I showing you our E3 special. If you don't understand some aspects of this episode you can look for previous ones so you can see what it is all about, hope you all enjoy it.

Game Doctrine is shaping up to be a channel that mixes up gaming discussion and criticism with a simple storyline and lots of extras that will be added as we go. I know we have a lot to improve, but we are working to make this a better channel and have lots of ideas that we will be implementing in the future. If you liked the video then help us out by liking, subscribing and sharing the video as it will be of great motivation to us.

E3 2015 - Keys to Victory

We are basically 15 days away from this year E3 event and the stakes couldn't be higher. Sony has a big lead in the console war, but the PS4 is running the risk of becoming slow in the sense that their biggest guns are not ready and demand for new games has become very intense. Microsoft has been on the losing side for the last couple of years, only managing to win some months in terms of sales, but the lack of powerful games in the past could lead them to give gamers a lot of good news that have been building up until now. On the other hand, Nintendo has been recovering little by little, relying on their solid fan base. Don't get me wrong, we all know that the Wii U is still struggling (even though it is a very good console with a good game library), but it has at least gathered enough power to survive.

Now let's see what needs to happen for any of the companies to win...

Pros:

• Expectations, having the chance to announce a lot of exclusives.
• The Xbox One fanbase is still strong.

Cons: 

• Out of the Xbox One fanbase, morale is low and people are clearly thinking that Microsoft only cares about certain genres. 
• Many gamers feel left out and have no strong reason that could justify buying the console.

Keys to Victory
In order to win the E3 battle, Microsoft must come up with an attractive offer, not only to their long time fans, but to other gamers too. For example, if all of their announcements are about shooters and sports, the possibilities for them to end up victorious are greatly diminished because neutral gamers (potential buyers at this point) will feel left out and because of this, Microsoft will find themselves in the same place they did last year.

Another thing that they should use to lift themselves over the others would be to take a lost franchise and revive it. The Silent Hill rumor was proven to be false, but it wouldn't surprise me if the higher ups at Microsoft have given Konami a couple calls after seen how gamers reacted on the web making this an opportunity that could make them win this year E3. Other options for them would be to give some love to their own flagship franchises like Gears of War and Alan Wake (which has a small chance of ending up on PS4) in order to use these fan favorites as reinforcements for their new projects (by keeping the platform relevant to their fans while trying to win new ones).

Bottom line
This year it is all about games with Microsoft and they need to have quite a bombing run in order to pull up the Xbox One from the fact that they are lagging behind by more than 10 million units. If they do this right, they can take the E3 event by storm, but if they don't then it will be just another year of them falling behind Sony in the console race.

Sony
Pros: 

• A great market advantage and popularity.
• Gamers still believe in Sony's promise of bringing a new PS2 era.

Cons:

• Their first party lineup for the rest of the year looks weak.
• Most of the previous big announcements are for games in 2016 or have no release date at all.
• Sony is still carrying the burden of past mishaps (the christmas DDOS attacks, Driveclub issues, The Order 1886 failing to meet the expectations of the mainstream crowd).

Keys to Victory

Sony needs to have some big announcements for this E3 event or else they will have a very hard time. For starters they should at least show some game play of Uncharted 4 in order to keep their fan base all hyped off and to prove that the game will be worth the wait. They should also prove that they will have a lot of third party games that the Xbox One doesn't have (mostly from Japanese studios) and that these games can cover up for the fact that the PS4 first party lineup looks kind of empty for 2015.

They also need for their conference to be fun and dynamic because last year it looked as if they could learn a thing or two from Nintendo who has changed their image from dull goobers back to the trolls they used to be in the 90's and this means less of the "boring politician" style and more of a radical feel to it. Another thing that they should also improve in their conference offering is to talk more about games and less about statistics.

Another thing that Sony needs to do is to unleash their speculated franchises unto their fans. Many PS4 users are eager to hear about the new Gravity Rush game as well as the rumored (and apparently fake) Medevil game that took the net by storm because of some picture, so there you have two possible heavyweights. Now last but not least if they really want to give their E3 conference the equivalent of a nuclear bomb, then they should show something about legendary non-existent (at least for now) games like The Last Guardian or maybe revive Crash Bandicoot or Legend of the Dragoon at least. Yeah I know that those last 3 games I mentioned are very unlikely to happen, but hey we can still hope.

Bottom line
For Sony to hold this year E3, they need to keep reassuring gamers that the "PS2 era" that they promised to unleash on the PS4 is still happening. If things are like Andrew House said and 2015 is more of a year of investment and planting seeds for the future, then they need to give us a glimpse of that future or else skepticism will hurt all that they have managed to achieve up to this point.

Pros:

• Fanbase is as solid as ever.
• The Wii U has gone from nothing, to now having the most interesting exclusive game lineup in the console wars.
• Nintendo has recovered from the slump they were into and now they are looking at profits again even though the Wii U console itself it still lagging behind.

Cons:

• Haven't been able to convince enough skeptics to give a chance to the Wii U.
• Legend of Zelda U was delayed and some key games still have no release date.

Keys to Victory

Nintendo is in a very good position for this year E3 even though the fact that they delayed the Legend of Zelda for the Wii U may push you to think otherwise. The first thing that Nintendo needs to do in their E3 Nintendo Direct is to be as straight forward as they can and show the games they have been teasing us about for a long time. We need to see more about games like the Shin Megami Tensei / Fire Emblem crossover, the new Star Fox game for the Wii U, See a little bit more about Mario Maker and of course, finally get release dates for Xenoblade Chronicles X and the new Fatal Frame localization to the west. 

For Nintendo to be able to get a hold of this year E3 (which would be a back to back win, considering that they "won" last year) they need to make their presentation to be both informative and exciting at the same time. So they should once again start with a bit on the wacky side as they did last year and follow through with updates on their games, coupled with some new announcements in order to keep the fan base interested and well seated on the hype train. 

As for the Nintendo World Championships, they need to be as impressive as the one in the 90's or better. We need to see the Nintendo of old still living and breathing in this modern era and I think that the Championships are a good way to show it. If the championship ends up been an over the top event, then it will add up to their whole E3 efforts in a very good way.

Botom line

Nintendo has a real chance here to continue their climb up to the minds of Skeptics that up to this point still believe that Nintendo is only for kids. For Nintendo, this year E3 has to be all about placing themselves in front of the competition and displaying their might for all of us to see, which means showing the games that their platform has and the others don't. If they go around it passively, they will not defend their past year win, so they need to come as strong as possible while giving it that hilarious Nintendo twist that they had accustomed us to in their previous recent offerings. 

So in the end... Who will win?

Like in a sporting event, the game isn't over until its over so predicting a winner is not a wise move. I personally expect Microsoft to come up swinging, Sony keeping a well hidden surprise to us and Nintendo doing their thing without any problems at all. In the end it all comes down to who can shock us or at least give us more enjoyment with their announcements so that #1 spot is still up for grabs.

The West Fall From Grace With Japanese Imports

At some point in the past, we at the west were having a blast with Japanese imports. Most games had their version for the west be it with subs, dubs or even the all powerful multi-language feature that has become basically extinct in these days and the only games that were kept in Japan where the ones that were extremely strange in nature and had no market over here. It was an era where censors and marketing people were a little looser they are now. At the time, the market was more open in terms of risk taking and companies were all into been the most "bad-ass" rather than the extra profits and austerity that they show at our present time. At that point in gaming history we used to be showered with cool Japanese games that complemented our own locally made games.

So...What Happened?
Well, if you grew up with the previous scenario you may have noticed that we have become kind of secluded in terms of imported video games. Yeah, we have a local video game market that is quite strong, but that doesn't mean that we are not going to support games from the other side of the world. On this day and age, any Japanese publisher thinks about it like 1,000.000.000 times before making a simple localization that on the past would had been a no brainer. Just to give you an example, approximately 10 years ago, we got 3 Fatal Frame games, while today as of October 2014, people at Koei Tecmo said that they think that the new Fatal Frame game (Wii U) will be a Japan only release. All of this while survival horror is making a big comeback into the west market which makes this all to be painfully ironic.

If we talk about Japanese franchises that vanished from the west, Yakuza is a big one.

The problem with all this situation is that we are been starved of a lot of awesome games and nice things because of some really dumb misconceptions like:

1) Japanese games wont sell well in the west.
Answer to that: Nonsense! Just because one game of the series flopped in the past (for a plethora of other reasons) it doesn't mean that all of them will do so too. Most of the time some imports fail in the west because of bad marketing and the lack of advertising efforts. That notion that the west generally see Japanese games as weird is a dumb generalization that must stop. The really weird aspect of this misconception is that some Japanese games have a great chance of success because they resemble games that are popular on our side of the planet, but many publishers still refuse to localize them.

2) Japanese cultural references will not fit with the west.
Answer to that: Are you kidding me? I think that Japanese marketers need to take a look on how popular anime has become in the west, especially within North American and Latin American Audiences. Many series are huge in the west and many aspects of the Japanese/Korean cultures are revered on this side of the world, not only as video games, but television series, music and movies. You don't need to "predict" how are we going to react. If the game is fun or at least interesting then we will be able to handle it.

3) Their business models don't fit with the west.
Answer to that: This one looks as if it is enough reason to keep a game out of our turf, but if you see it from a deeper point of view you will notice that the whole gaming market presents different types of opportunities that are not limited to one type of consumer. There are several business practices available including platform exclusivity, extra deals favorable to the players or even the creation of extra content and/or game elements. It is understandable that their business model may differ with the popular ones on our side, but they can re-shape their current ones into something that can help them profit from releasing the game overseas instead of succumbing to their lack of faith in the occidental gamer.

So you want to play PS VITA games on your TV set? Nope, only in Japan.

O.k, but who's to blame then?
If we are going to point fingers the first ones to blame would be Japanese publishers themselves. In the last 10 years, many Japanese gaming companies began to radically change their games instead of evolving them into modern versions of their winning formula. This gave the false impression that we were just not interested in Japanese games anymore while the truth was that those erratic experiments they made were the ones that pushed the fans off some franchises that used to be quite popular. All of this just because they wanted their games to have an American feeling which is a complete betrayal of their original style and the wrong thing to do, as imitation meets failure more often that you may think.

Other ones that are to blame are the marketing people for these Japanese companies that have the mistaken notion that the west hate their games and the third and final piece of the blame game belongs to us, the western gamers. Why? because when one of the few Japanese imports actually reaches our shores, we cheer and all but still ignore it or just wait too much time to get it. Its like we like the game, but don't want to put our money where our mouths are and then we complain when they don't want to release games over here anymore.

This is one of the currently missing imports that saddens me the most.

Wrapping it up
We can once again be what we used to be for Japanese developers, but in order for that to happen we have to show our love for the games, rather than just speak about it and moan when the games fail to be released. It sounds harsh, but it is the truth because many of us old school gamers and Japanese game fans have become too complacent and haven't realized that we are not in the 90's anymore and that in the world we live in today, if there is no solid demand for a product, it wont happen. So we need to sober up from all the good times reminiscing and keep up with what is happening today if we want some good imports to come our way.

A Videogame Generation Without Consoles, A Curious but Unlikely Scenario.

Videogame generations have always been characterized by the existence of game consoles. The PC has always been there as a gaming platform, but what really brought the games closer to the common household were and still are stand alone gaming machines. Nowadays, some analysts have predicted that consoles will cease to exist very soon, some of them stating that the current home console generation will most likely be the last. Arguments supporting their point of view include the advent of mobile gaming and increasing production costs in a fragile economy. Most gamers just take those analysis as doom and gloom nonsense, but let's make a small analysis of our own and see what would it take for a console-less generation to happen and see how feasible or unfeasible it really is.

There are lots of gaming companies, but the focus is on the big 3 of the console market.

A Matter of Competition.

First of all, for a console-less generation to sucessfully happen companies will need to beef up competition to very intense levels because they would no longer have any hardware to support them. One way to do this is to increase the rate of platform exclusive games up to a point in which we receive no less than 5-8 exclusives per year. If this is not done, then we will have different first party cloud based game services featuring the same games. Another option they have is to get creative and give their cloud platform an edge by giving the players some out of the ordinary incentives to play their games. One example of this would be to feature special points with each unlocked achievement or trophy and let the player use those points to buy more games. Another good idea would be to have monthly competitions with real prizes, encouraging games to play on their platform, polish their skills and compete, be it directly (fighting games, first person shooters) or indirectly (game records, score, speed runs, etc). 

These are just two ideas that could make an interesting first party cloud gaming market and while it sounds like tons of fun for us as consumers, it is a nightmare for gaming companies if we see it from a financial point of view. In reality, exclusive game development is getting slower while multi-platforms are thriving and getting faster. On the other hand giving real and direct incentives to the players is something that is almost non-existent as companies are looking to spend less and earn more in a market that is not custom tailored for us players anymore. 

A pro-player environment is something they have been running from for a long time.

Features We Love, But Nightmares They Fear. 

Let's imagine for a while that consoles have already vanished and that every first party company has its own cloud gaming service. Would they implement pro-player features that would make their networks a lot friendlier or will they go the dictator's path and keep player convenience out of the loop? If everything is cloud based we as players will need things like an offline mode, game sharing, game trading and lending between users, remote play, etc. Some of these features are to be implemented in consoles (with offline play currently existing on Steam) but if we were talking about a completely cloud based environment then companies would get nervous about what freedoms they give us. Will they go ahead and implement compulsory DRM even though everybody hates it? Will they fear people tricking the system so much that they will force countless limitations on us? Even if they go the opposite way and give us a gaming paradise, will the publishers be o.k with this?

If these feared features are something that has been very controversial on consoles, imagine how would it be if everything were to be cloud based. The probabilities of a giant backlash/fiasco are enormous, especially if you take into account what happened to Microsoft at the beginning of the current generation. Remember this?  

Console-less Markets And Their Customer Friendly Ways

This one is all about game prices. Console-less markets like Steam, Origin, Humble Bundle thrive of the idea of low prices or even give whatever you want type of systems. On some occasions we see new games getting price cuts that would seem barbaric for the console market investors. Steam is a great example of this as on Valve's little gold mine, sometimes we can find gaming deals on big name games that are quite recent, especially on seasonal sales. This is because on a console-less market, the price of games is a little more tied to demand than on the traditional game selling environment. 

Many publishers would cringe on the idea of everybody getting their game for cheap so it is either this or (once again) give the players a strong incentive to buy your game at full price (something that doesn't involve X set of armor, a "special" vehicle or an extra weapon). They need to make people really want the game quick or else they will wait for a price drop and that would hurt their profits more than the Red Wedding (spoiler alert!) episode did to Game of Thrones viewers. 

Wrapping it up:

A console-less generation of games can happen and that is a truth that can't be denied, but just because something can be done it doesn't mean that it is a good idea for everybody. From the point of view of us the consumers, it can be quite nice and convenient, but from a business stand point it is a quite difficult task to do. Gamers are getting smarter in deciding how will they spend their money, so one little mistake can spell disaster and first party companies/publishers know this very well. So, to wrap things up let's say that a console-less gaming generation is NOT feasible unless we (the players) are the ones who dominate the market. If the men in business suits are good with that, then we could be having this as soon as the next generation comes, but if not, then we are not ready for this and will have to wait at least another 20 years to get it. 

Post E3 - The Battle for the 2014-2015 Supremacy

Well folks, the big event has passed and all that its left are the reactions to everything that was shown. Let's analyze the stuff that each of the biggest companies presented at the conference and see how well they did with their respective showcases. Anything counts in the fight for the hearts and minds of gamers around the world, so without further delay, lets begin our little recap:


Category: First Party Companies

How it went:
Microsoft content for this year E3 was actually not bad. It featured known franchises like Call of Duty, Halo, The Witcher 3 and Fable while giving us a glimpse of new things like Sunset Overdrive and even the return of the cult classic Phantom Dust and the appearance of some other third party games. This time around Microsoft focused on gaming itself, which is a good thing compared to the blunder they made last year so it is an improvement and their appearance on stage looked refreshed (even the music track at the beginning of the conference sounded like a warrior on a struggle).

On the other hand, the hype and speculation they caused prior to the conference was not entirely satisfied, as not even one of the most rumored games were shown and most of the showcase was based on obvious decisions, most of them already known to the public. In summary a good conference, but a missed opportunity to turn the tables and get the best out of the occasion.

Final Score: 7 / 10

How it went:
Sony's conference went the same path as Microsoft's, but with a game lineup that seems a little stronger. Games like The Order, Little Big Planet 2, No man's land, Let it die, ABZU, Bloodborne, Uncharted 4 and a whole bunch of good indie titles and other goodies like a new DLC for Infamous: Second Son. The only drawback was that after each trailer for a new game we had to see the numbers 2015, meaning the almost all of the games mentioned will be coming next year, which means a pretty dry Christmas season for the PS4.

As for the appearance that the company had for the conference, the first thing that very surely everybody felt was the big hole left by Jack Tretton as he left the company. Also the new CEO kind of lacked the charisma that Tretton had and that was kind of a disappointment, but let's cut the guy some slack, its his first time in that position. Another thing was talking about movies, series and apps. That kind of thing took precious time away that could had been used to promote games and talking about games well... There were no surprises which prevented the conference from having that "boom" effect that it had last year.

Final Score: 7.5 / 10

How it went:
Nintendo's conference was different as it was last year, where instead of giving a physical media briefing they gave us a 50 minute podcast with the newest things that Nintendo had to offer. The showcasing was very good and straight to the point with the occasional hilarious mini sketches made with clay figures (which reminded us all about robot chicken). This year, Nintendo did everything right with their presentation and in those 50 minutes they showed some very ineresting looking games like Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker, Yoshi's Wooly World, Bayonetta 2, Mario Maker, Splatoon, Hyrule Warriors accompanied by real heavy hitter like the real Wii U Legend of Zelda and Xenoblade Chronicles, ending with a small clip of Miyamoto playing Wii U in front of a blurred TV with a game that looked like Star Fox. Later on the Star Fox game became official on the Nintendo Treehouse event, along with two other Miyamoto games that made good use of the Wii U pad in an effort to bring more interest into the heavily criticized controller (see the Legend of the 7 Stars: Nintendo keys to victory.)

Final Score: 9 / 10


Category: Third Party Companies

How it went:
EA's conference had a little more bang this year with a showcase of Dragon Age: Inquisition that clearly showed that the game has really progressed from when it was shown for the first time. The new Battlefield game, called Battlefield Hardline gave a twist to the known Battlefield formula with a more urban setting and a cops vs bad guys scenario even featuring an open beta available on PS4 from the moment the game was shown. They also showed The Sims 4, which is good news for the fans of the series (I know people that still play the previous games a lot as if they still were brand new) also showing a little bit of work in progress for Mass Effect 4 and of course their line of new sport games which is a given for EA.

The appearance of their conference was classy and directly to the point, which is a plus to any third party conference out there. The woman playing the cello was a nice touch and everything ran smoothly

Final Score: 8 / 10

How it went:
This year, the Ubisoft conference went very straight forward, announcing games like Assasin's Creed Unity, The Crew, Far Cry 4, Tom Clancy's: The Division and Valiant Hearts: The Great War and Rainbow Six: Siege. All went well  in an all around conference that sparked new interest for their upcoming games in the way that Ubisoft has done since the first time they stepped on the E3 conference floor.

The conference was neat and complete, showing the games that with the pass of time have made Ubisoft grow from a common third party / publisher to a powerful gaming force. Another story that came up just after the conference was that they did not mentioned the Wii U at any time, fueling the notion that the company has abandoned Nintendo. Ubisoft representatives said this was not true and told people from the gaming media that they still had faith in Nintendo and would be talking about new games for the Wii U at a later time.

Final Score: 8 / 10

To wrap things up

To get this out of the way first, the winner of this year E3 event is:

This is because it was a complete showcase that not only was good, but it basically accomplished most of our expectations and had nothing boring about it, been funny at times and a hype train on others. This Nintendo E3 presentation has started to make the Wii U look like the underdog that is slowly recovering (sort of like the 3DS did before it) and it gave us a lot to talk about, becoming the first time in years that Nintendo actually wins an E3 event and making us all feel like the Nintendo of old has emerged.

It is also important to point out that this year there were NO losers. All conferences were good, they showed their stuff and set the stage for a very busy (and wallet beating) 4th quarter 2014 going all the way to 2015 which will most likely be the year of the mother of all battles in the console war of this generation. The most important thing is that after all is set and done, gamers around the world are the ones with a real advantage with all the games coming up in the future. So sit tight and get ready, because this year E3 event showed us that this generation will be just awesome.

An alternate universe: Sony and Nintendo making the SNES-CD.

It is quite certain that most of you are well aware of what the gaming world looks like now. We have 3 major home consoles coming from Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo, two handhelds coming from Sony and Nintendo and gaming PCs that have always been there. You know who are the top players and who are the underdogs, but do you know how different it could had been if certain decisions were made at specific points in time? Today we are going to look into one personal theory I have about a particular "alternate universe" that would had happened if:

If this had happened, maybe we would had played Donkey Kong Country as a 2.5D game.

Nintendo and Sony had kept their partnership (1991).

Note: This is just a personal theory so your own opinions may greatly differ from the ones expressed on this article, so bear with me and if you have any different ideas, leave them on the comment section as it is always interesting to talk about these things.

The classic champion of the 90's

The origin of the first Sony home console is a story of separation. It is said that at first, what we came to know as the PlayStation (or PS ONE) was just going to be a disc drive peripheral for the Super Nintendo, that would had enabled the console to jump to the next generation without having to actually make a new machine. For a while it seemed that Nintendo was going to take that path, until they decided otherwise and then Sony decided to go solo which led to the birth of the PlayStation which meant the end of Nintendo's dominance over the industry and the beginning of Sega's downfall.

What could had happened differently if the Nintendo/Sony alliance had been kept?

Imagine if this war had never ended...

(1991 - 1999)

•  The Nintendo/Sony alliance would had crushed the Genesis and later on the Sega CD even before it had a chance, because they would simply have the better games vs the unimpressive library of interactive movies that the Sega CD is known for. 
•  Sega would had realized that it wouldn't be wise to make the 32X because they would had been cut to size again, so they would had jumped straight to the Saturn, later on overtaking the SNES-CD because of having superior technology and more advanced looking games. Another important thing would be that because of the success of the Saturn, Sega of America and Sega of Japan would had most likely kept the peace instead of going against each other and because of that, promising games like Sonic Xtreme would had been released without any problems. 
•  Sega had become a fan favorite, but Nintendo was not stupid and had been in development of the Nintendo 64 all along so now the Sega Saturn and a disc based Nintendo 64 would lead another classic console showdown. With superb first and third party games evenly separated between the two platforms, this would had sparked a fan boy war that would had been worse than anything we had even seen.
•  Sony, seen that both the Saturn and the CD based Nintendo 64 were too far ahead for them to enter the competition, would had then began working on the PlayStation concept in complete secrecy, preparing for a later release (1998-1999), but it would had kept the CD format instead of jumping into DVD territory because the technology would had been too expensive to put on a console at the time. Also the machine itself would had been as powerful as a Dreamcast so this would mark a time of success for Sony as everybody would had been very impressed with their machine. Making the console market stand at a virtual tie before Nintendo and Sega unveiled their new consoles.

Because with disc media, size matters!

(2002 - 2006)

• After a long battle without a clear winner, Nintendo and Sega would had moved to release their new consoles which would had toppled the PlayStation in terms of power. Sega would had jumped to the DVD format while Nintendo would still had gone to the mini-disc because of fears of piracy and both consoles would had been released approximately in the 2002 to 2003 time span. 
• The battle would had been fierce and Microsoft would had come up with the original Xbox a lot earlier than they really did (2002), but would had been kept at a very distant third place followed only by the PlayStation who's original lifespan was at its end. 
• At the end of that generation, the battle would had been won by Sega (mostly because of the difference in disc format) with Nintendo learning its lesson and Microsoft gearing up for a second try while Sony who played the waiting game on that generation, would be ready to release the PlayStation 2 in the year 2007. 

War...War never changes...

(2007 to the present day)

From here on, there would had been a 4 way death match with all major companies having a console at once. This one would have Nintendo with a slight lead, with Sega and Sony almost tied at the second position while Microsoft stands at a 4th place and would be already showing signs of dropping out of the console race and sticking to PC gaming instead (quite possibly having a Steam like store or even making a partnership with Valve). At our present day, we would probably be seen the great presentation of the new Nintendo, Sega and Sony machines, with so much hype that we would be counting the days until the event.

To wrap things up:

Alternate universes... Sparking our imaginations like always.

Effects of this alternate universe on our present time:

• The tight competition would had left so little space for error, that companies would not had the chance to experiment into new audiences meaning that the casual gaming movement that the Wii started would not had happened at the gigantic scale it did on real life.
• Console gaming technology would not be as advanced as it is now so the PC gaming platform would be far ahead of consoles in terms of power, which would make gaming PCs to be even more popular than they already are.
• The indie gaming scene would be something that would be almost exclusive to the PC platform, with Microsoft and Valve at front.
• Formats like Blu-ray and HD-DVD would be something relatively new for consoles at the present time, but with the arrival of the digital game age, the use of physical media would not be as favored as it is now.
• Game exclusives would still be something that happened very often, while the multi-platform trend would be held back by the intense battle that the companies would be having to bring the best games into their platform.
• We would see a bigger number of localized games reaching our shores because the Japanese style of making games would had never lost its focus so American and Japanese types of games would still be separate things instead of one trying to imitate the other.
• The motion-controlled gaming craze would had never happened and we would be more inclined towards virtual reality and VR headsets a lot more early than we currently are.
• All major companies would had been forced to create at least twice the quantity of first party games while keeping their classic heavy hitters from becoming dormant. This because the market would had not become complacent, so companies would had felt pressured to outdo themselves at every chance they got.
• Much of the franchises we in reality see as dead or missing in action, would be pretty much alive and kicking.

Now imagine for a moment that this little alternate universe is real. Do you think that gaming would be better or worse? I leave that judgement call on your hands.

Are we complaining too much about this generation of consoles?

Any gamer that surfs the web often, has to be familiar with the intense criticism that the new generation of consoles (PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Wii U) has received. There are many supposed arguments that seem to support the idea that this generation of consoles is not as good as the companies want you to believe. From my point of view and after reading a lot of these comments and rants I can say that we are not been realistic enough into what new consoles are and the things that consoles in the past have showed us. In order to prove it, I am going to take the most heard/read complaints out there and throw some light at them with facts.

Poor guy... His game was one of the most praised games of 2013, yet "Wii U doesn't have good games".

1) The new consoles have no good games.

This is basically the strongest complaint about the current generation, but at the same time is the weirdest one. This is because on the surface it looks like there is a "lack of games" while in reality we have more games since the launch of each new console than we had on previous generations by the same amount of time. First of all we are failing to consider "indie" games as part of the console library. I know many of these games can be found on networks like Steam or Origin, but guess what? Not everybody has a gaming PC and some gaming setups are still not based on the living room where a setup for full gaming is more convenient than an hybrid console-PC one.

Also for all 3 of the current generation consoles, we have seen games from different genres (counting indie and not indie). There's action, horror, puzzle, adventure, first person shooters, platformers, survival horror, action-rpg and even combination of genres into one. If things are like this, then how can people say there are no games when there is clearly stuff to play? If we go back 2 generations to the past, there was no digital game thing and we basically had to make ends meet very few retail games (often one of them was a killer app, while most of the otthers were not that great). So now we have more choices, but it seems that we have become so spoiled that if it isn't a AAA super-hyped cutting edge game apparently it doesn't count. Well, I leave that for you to judge, but talking about spoiled brings us to our next complaint to break.

If you sold your old console and went straight for the new ones, I have news for you...

2) The new consoles are been dragged down by the old ones.

Once again another thing from the past we seem to have forgotten. Throughout almost every generation the passing platform sticks around for a while before the new one sets in (except in the case of consoles that have died too soon like the transition from Sega Saturn to the Dreamcast). On this generation we have 2 consoles whose hearts are till beating and those are the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. These ones are still receiving love from the game companies for one reason and that reason is that they have a BIGGER established fan-base.

Lets be honest folks. The PS3 and Xbox 360 have an established user base that is still gigantic, while none of the newer consoles has touched the 10 million mark by themselves yet. If you have a game company, you will most likely target the biggest market around and up until now and it isn't the new generation. We all know that the previous generation will eventually get cold and die, but they still have at least one more year on their lifespan and because the Wii U is the only console with a solid backward compatibility feature, the PS3 and Xbox 360 will live on for a little while longer.

Do the math! Now not with bits but frames per second and resolution numbers.

3) The game is not 60fps and 1080p or does not feature a breakthrough on graphics? Well it's not next-gen then!

If this generation has something in common with the one from the early 90's, is the obsession with numbers. Back in the day it used to be all about bits. 8 bits, 16 bits, 64 bits, OH MY GOD 128 bits! Now it's more like the frame rate and resolution of games. It is understandable to ask for the highest resolution possible because nobody ever buys a good HDTV or monitor to see a game that looks like Bubsy 3D on enhance mode, but at the same time asking for the full maximum quality AND frame rate on every game regardless of how the game itself is, looks kind of selfish and unrealistic.

Not all games are the same, and while linear adventures are easier to develop and easier to make them look pretty, sandbox games for example, force developers to use their resources as efficient as possible to create giant worlds in the best way they can. Not also this is very taxing on the developers, but also on the consoles themselves which were not meant to be competing with high end PCs in terms of power (unless you wanted to spend 800+ dollars on a game console (for an example check the price tags for all the Steam box machines). Also the graphical jump on this generation will not be as big as we believed like the jump from SNES and Sega Genesis to the PS ONE, Nintendo 64 and Saturn. It is something a little more subtle which will get better with time, but not as a giant leap as some people expect. Some games may look a little "photo-realistic", but it will not be that much and it will be based mostly on graphical tricks just like Nintendo did with Mario 64 to amaze us back in the day.

Do these games deserve to be called "AA"? 

4) Huh? That is not a AAA game!

This one is caused by the debate on how a AAA game should be. On this generation of consoles, games like Infamous: Second Son and Titanfall, took the heat for not been "AAA enough". Now here is the thing. Both games featured advanced graphics graphics, good gameplay and an enjoyable interaction between player and game. Now that we looked as those characteristics then what else do they need to be considered AAA? I've even read people classifying those games as AA and I just had to laugh. AA? Wow, what's next then, A and a half? Whatever happened with games just been games and not classified by how much money the company spent on them.

This kind of thinking may happen because we got too accustomed to cinematic showcases in games rather than the gameplay itself. It is like we are asking the developers to drop content in favor of exposition. So what if the game doesn't have a thousand cutscenes and cinematic style parts showing off how much the company spent on it? What we should worry about is what happens when we are finally able to use our game pads and move the character around. Of course this doesn't mean that games should be blank and devoid of any type of exposure, but that should NOT be what sets the bar on quality over a videogame.

The elephant in the room that nobody seems to care about...

5) I wont support any new console until I see it flourish!

This one can be pretty much considered a fallacy of thought. It is a vicious spiral that can severely damage any platform (think of the PS VITA and Wii U). Let's see, you won't support the platform because it doesn't have any games (see complaint #1), but the gaming companies will not release their games on the platform until enough people buy it. So if neither of the two parties involved yield, the console suffers as the result.

The case of the PS VITA and Wii U shows this perfectly. When both systems launched, everybody was like "wow, it is a cool machine, but I wont support it until they show the heavy hitters". That alone was a set back to the consoles themselves as they had horrible sale numbers and third party companies were like "huh... How about no?" Right now, the PS VITA is slowly gaining speed, but it is because Japanese companies yielded first, released good games and got good profits. Now these games are been released on other countries and we will get to enjoy them, but not because of ourselves, so thank the Japanese people for that. As for the Wii U, they are trying to bring interest to their console with the games they are and will be announcing before and during this year E3 event, but third party companies are still not convinced that the console will make a comeback. If regardless of all their effort the console fails, it will be a shame because it is a good machine and there ARE games for it, you just have to look, just like with the Wii.

Hype and more hype, but if the companies deliver, our wallets will cry...

To wrap things up:

At the end of this argument we need to get a few things into our heads:

• New consoles start with limited libraries that pick up as time passes and the console defines its place in the market. 
• Most previous consoles will not magically die off (because of the lack of backward compatibility) so they will still get support and games for them that will not necessarily be released on the newer ones.
• Superb frame rate and resolution is something awesome to have, but it does not define the full quality of a game.
• AAA games are more than cinematic showcases so give those new games a chance.
• If you don't support a platform on it's infancy, you are creating a cycle that may damage the platform which could mean that you will never see the games you want on it, because the game companies see no profit on it.
• We need to learn to look for games like we used to in the past, with an open and unbiased mind. Doing that will makes us find good games that we would probably ignore or miss if we didn't searched enough.

So at the end of the road, this new generation is really next-gen, but it needs time to fully develop and we need to stop ranting and have some faith. E3 is coming soon and things look bright for all of the 3 competing platforms so sit tight, enjoy the ride...Just play and have fun.