April 9 - April 13

Section: 

I hope you like Paper Mario.

There are, my friend, four new games to choose from this week, and that's counting Pet Vet 3D as a game, which I think may be some kind of criminal offense. Never is it so easy to choose a Game of the Week as when there is simply an uncontested default choice. I realize The Ship, which admittedly had potential, might be the prefered option of a few of you, but Super Paper Mario for the Wii is really the only game on the list worth even mentioning this week. I almost feel bad, because there're plenty of weeks when Super Paper Mario would have been the GotW anyway, so beating up a feeble field of four feels, frankly, felonious. Sorry, sometimes alliteration just takes over.

IMAGE(http://www.gametab.com/images/ss/wii/6427/box.jpg)

And if you thought there wasn't anything good in video games, wait til you see how much nothing is on DVD. Wait let me look again. Hmmm, there's a Mel Gibson collection. You like Mel, right? More here.

PC:
Ship, The (04/09)
Whirlwind Over Vietnam (04/09)
Pet Vet 3D: Wild Animal Hospital (04/09)

WII:
Super Paper Mario (04/09)

Comments

That's a sad little list.

More 7-day fun with my backlog and online Gears it is!

I want Super Paper Mario so bad; but I vowed not to not buy any more games until I finish one (thus keeping my number of unfinished games at a constant level).

Didn't The Ship come out like, a year ago? I haven't played that since I lived in this house!

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Didn't The Ship come out like, a year ago? I haven't played that since I lived in this house!

Defcon came out in the past couple of weeks in box form too. Perhaps Steam isn't quite living up to expectations, or a last gasp at getting a few more sales?

Defcon came out in the past couple of weeks in box form too. Perhaps Steam isn't quite living up to expectations, or a last gasp at getting a few more sales?

I'd say more of the latter.

Super Paper Mario, here I come!

Hemidal wrote:
Fedaykin98 wrote:

Didn't The Ship come out like, a year ago? I haven't played that since I lived in this house!

Defcon came out in the past couple of weeks in box form too. Perhaps Steam isn't quite living up to expectations, or a last gasp at getting a few more sales?

Seems like there will always (or for a long, long time) be people who don't use digital distribution. Makes sense that they'd try to hit that market eventually.

My Paper Mario pre-order is locked in! This one looks like more of a platformer, which suits me fine.

Like I have time left now Guitar Hero II has arrived. Hah!

I'm drooling over Paper Mario. Going to pick it up on Tuesday and have fun with it. I'm supposed to get my 360 this week too. So a good week for gaming.

No games for 360, PS3 or the old PS2? I'm really surprised. Isn't this a many-billion industry or something?

I could probably be up for a night of The Ship sometime, if anyone's interested. I would assume it's somewhat patched up by now.

Perhaps Steam isn't quite living up to expectations, or a last gasp at getting a few more sales?

Why would that keep anyone from also trying to reach out to the retail market? People seem to forget that physical distribution is still where most of the money is being made at this point. Steam is a nice way for smaller developers to get the word out, but it's still handy to have additional options. The profit margins are smaller, but you'll be able to sell to people who probably would have completely ignored a game otherwise.

Excellent. Now, maybe I can play some The Ship with real people and not just bots!

I'd be up for a Ship night too. Super Paper Mario is the perfect title to spend the last two of my four days off locked to.

Spunior wrote:

Why would that keep anyone from also trying to reach out to the retail market? People seem to forget that physical distribution is still where most of the money is being made at this point. Steam is a nice way for smaller developers to get the word out, but it's still handy to have additional options. The profit margins are smaller, but you'll be able to sell to people who probably would have completely ignored a game otherwise.

I would agree with you if there wasn't such a large gap between the releases. If you want to maximize exposure, you hit everything at once. If you think one method is going to work, and it doesn't, you go for the alternative. So, indy titles get released first on Steam, and then go retail. Did they need the initial revenue from Steam sales in order to pay for the packing, marketing, etc...?

We're seeing the reverse with Steam on titles from less "independent" developers. Games whose shelf life has expired are now put to pasture on Steam, where you can purchase them on a whim instead of stumbling across them on the discount shelf at Wal-Mart or Target.

Also, I'd like to clarify that I like Steam. I bought HL2, Dangerous Waters, The Ship, Defcon, Rag Doll Kung-Fu and possibly another couple of titles. I even bought HL2: ep 1 at Circuit City because of the price, took the code and entered it into Steam and downloaded. I'd like to see it succeed, but I think if indy titles are releasing there first and then several months later are showing up on retail shelves either the made so much money on Steam that they can afford to put it out there for everyone else to pick it up, or Steam wasn't quite as lucrative as they thought it would be. Given that Defcon is $30 retail, I think its the latter.

Hemidal wrote:
Spunior wrote:

Why would that keep anyone from also trying to reach out to the retail market? People seem to forget that physical distribution is still where most of the money is being made at this point. Steam is a nice way for smaller developers to get the word out, but it's still handy to have additional options. The profit margins are smaller, but you'll be able to sell to people who probably would have completely ignored a game otherwise.

I would agree with you if there wasn't such a large gap between the releases. If you want to maximize exposure, you hit everything at once. If you think one method is going to work, and it doesn't, you go for the alternative. So, indy titles get released first on Steam, and then go retail. Did they need the initial revenue from Steam sales in order to pay for the packing, marketing, etc...?

We're seeing the reverse with Steam on titles from less "independent" developers. Games whose shelf life has expired are now put to pasture on Steam, where you can purchase them on a whim instead of stumbling across them on the discount shelf at Wal-Mart or Target.

Also, I'd like to clarify that I like Steam. I bought HL2, Dangerous Waters, The Ship, Defcon, Rag Doll Kung-Fu and possibly another couple of titles. I even bought HL2: ep 1 at Circuit City because of the price, took the code and entered it into Steam and downloaded. I'd like to see it succeed, but I think if indy titles are releasing there first and then several months later are showing up on retail shelves either the made so much money on Steam that they can afford to put it out there for everyone else to pick it up, or Steam wasn't quite as lucrative as they thought it would be. Given that Defcon is $30 retail, I think its the latter.

Given how relatively new digital distribution is and the current state of the PC market I'd be shocked to hear anything but surprise at how well Steam is doing from people at Valve... especially given their overall cost structure.