The Last Of Us, Is It Worth Its Salt?

Let me start out by saying that The Last Of Us (a game about a zombie outbreak) is no perfect game, but the story, and how each part of the story is laid out makes this game close to being perfect. The game has it's faults, one of them being the game mechanics, where Joel sometimes feels like a stiff moving board walking about the screen. But the story is so engaging that, even this fault becomes more of an after thought, and starts feeling more like a mannerism of Joel's (and sometimes other characters) then a fault in the game. Which again speaks to how good this game really is. The next fault I have with the game is more of a personal one, which is the language. Now you can say "hey, the game does warn you about the strong language" but it's not that I particularly mind bad/strong language it's just sometimes they use it so overtly and so frequently that it feels a little too much or sometimes that it is something cool for a fourteen year old to do (which, in my opinion its not). But leave those two faults behind and what The Last Of Us offers you is something special. A game you can't walk away from once you've started.

Now developer Naughty Dog has a way of designing their games to always make you feel like you're apart of the story, and that you really have something at stake with their character's. I don't know many games that after you're done playing them for the day, your still thinking about them and the predicaments you left your character in. In fact the top five games that I can think of 3 of them belong to Naughty Dog's Uncharted series, one of them to The Last Of Us, and the last one belongs to Quantic Dream's Heavy Rain and am not listing those in any particular order. But it does speak volumes on how much they put in to their character development that I feel like a character's life hinges on me making the right decision. In the case of The Last Of Us, do I have enough material to get Joel and Ellie out alive. 

Most games in this past decade have been really big on automatically regenerating your playable character's health. Some say it is a way of rewarding players for taking risk, I on the other hand feel like there are ways of rewarding risk takers while penalizing foolish gameplay. I can get into a whole thing about how most games don't usually get it right on how to balance how quickly a character rejuvenating, especial in response to the NPC's/COM's player who don't usually have the same magically regeneration power as the playable character. But The Last Of Us does not take a automatic regeneration approach to their game. If you hurt your character Joel then your responsible for fixing him. For a survivor game (and to be honest any game no matter what genre) this is key in making every decision have weight to it. But The Last Of Us takes it one step farther by saying not only are your responsible for your character health but you have to find the items to heal him, and it won't be a quick fix, encouraging players to not heal themselves in dangers situation because it will take time to bandage yourself up. The Last of Us doesn't only take that approach with Joel's health, but it also does it with its weapons, requiring you to find your own bullets, make your own molotov, shiv and anything else you use. It makes every item you find in the game whether laying on the ground or on a corpse important. Add the engaging story that keeps diving home the point that humanity is on its last leg and you hold the hope for humanities future and you will start to see why this game is special and a must play.

We haven't even gotten to the graphics of the game or the sound. Both push the PS3 past anything we have ever seen. The lighting effect, and even the sound of a leaf  hitting the ground is spot on. There is no frame or sound that pulls you out of the game, The graphics and sound surrounding this game only serve to push you farther into the game. Hearing the sound of a clicker (which is a type of zombie) makes your heartbeat increase a uptake. There are times when you have to remind yourself its just a game, and that is just because Naughty Dog's design and sound team poured there hearts into this game. And they deserve due credit. So when you buy this game, which if own a PS3 you literally have to, take time to pay attention to the names rolling down the final credits. 

Below is a video of my first impressions of The Last Of Us, and I can truly say it pales in comparison to what this whole game has to offer.In the comment box feel free to let me know how you felt about the last of us. And if you would want a let's Play/Walkthrough/Tips for the game

EA Being Dragged Through The Mud

Well it is ruff out here for EA, especial after a second class action lawsuit against them has been officially filed. Now I want to say that I feel bad for them, but that would not be completely true. As a gamer I have had it to about here, with developers and publishers releasing games that are not finish. Its about time this become a issue not just for gamers, but for those developers and publishers too, and there bottom line seems like a good place to start. I mention in a previous article called EA Turning Into Cancer For Developers, how I use to love EA, and how I would like to like them in the future. But EA has to go back to believing that gaming is a art, and there is no way you let a artist release a unfinished piece, so why release a unfinished game. Ubisoft got it right when they said in a interview that they would never release an unfinished Assassin's Creed game, not even to uphold a "annual release date" you can find that article here. Now you see that is what I am talking about, a game developer/publisher caring more about the quality of a game over a release date. EA already has a large fan base from all of there different franchises, and the way you grow a base is by of course periodically releasing a updated version of your game. But also by the quality, and undated functionally you put into your updated release. At first I thought EA was getting it when they pulled there NBA Live franchise, deciding to take it back to the labs to refine it,you know make it into a product worth playing. But then four years later, all I can think is did they just release a rehashed version of the NBA Live 10 game (the one they were afraid to release due to how horrible it was) with a updated roster.

I don't just want to pick on just EA, There are several gaming publishers, and developers who have release games that weren't completely finished. There was Bethesda's Skyrim, a game I really enjoy playing but it was patched up like a holey grail. There was Fable 3, Fallout: New Vegas,Dragon Age 2, Grand Thief Auto 5 and those are just a few. I know EA is thinking why is everyone picking on us, we were not the first or last company to release a blatantly unfinished game. But I say, "that is true" which is way a partly feel bad for EA, since they shouldn't be the only one's holding the bag on this. But because of the big publicity other gaming companies will think twice, no three times before they even think about release a unfinished game.

YouTube Wrecking Gamers Careers (Did We Just Get Scroogle?)

With YouTube taking down gamers video game footage, I have to wonder if we just got scroogled. YouTube's auto bots, have been taking down gamers video game footage due to copyrights issues, issues that most game developers don't even want to claim. Let's play videos, walkthroughs, and hints and tips videos all help sale video games. When I'm interested in a game but I'm still on the fence, I watch let's play videos or walkthroughs. They help me closed the deal on if I'm either going to get the game or if I'm going to wait til later to pick it up, if at all. It is a great way for gamers to be honest about their options of a game while allowing other gamers to see the game. Its almost like free press for game developers, except for the YouTubers who receive money for having commercials on their videos. Which is YouTube's big gripe, gamers making a profit off of showing their gameplay and it coming back, in the frame of a lawsuit, to bait YouTube in the butt. Great game companies like Ubisoft, Capcom, Blizzard, Deep Silver, and others have rallied around their gamers, but I don't see how they are going to keep that up since there is no way for them to keep reinstating every YouTuber's claim, there is just too many. Many YouTubers livelihood depend on ad revenues and +boogie2988 made a great video explaining that and telling off other YouTubers for being insensitive to that point. I understand YouTube's point of view, they have several law suits against them from the music industry for YouTubers making money off of music videos, and this is there way of preventing it from happening with the gaming industry. But it is not the same thing. Someone uploading a music video and basically pirating a music artist work is different then videogame commentary, in which you have to create content on top of content( game footage) , plus edit the video, and if they want to grow your audience then the commentary has to be original on top of everything else. YouTube what I'm trying to say is stop scroogling gameplay videos and find a way to fix your new copyright policy. Right now it is impossible for any up and coming game review, or let's play character to come out. I know bigger characters like +LevelCapGaming, +AngryJoeShow , +Matimi0 and others already have a base audience that will continually coming back, to watch anything that they put up, even vlog, while YouTube finds a way to calm down there auto bots and this ID content algorithm (and I'm not saying that those personalities above are not going through hardships either) But bigger channels unusually have some contacts within the industry, so at least some of there video contact can get un-flagged a little quicker then someone else who knows no one. Google/YouTube I know you can fix this, or make a better policy so user's videos aren't being taken over by anyone who wants to turn in a claim, to claim it.

Is 500GB of Hard Drive Space For Next-Gen Consoles (Xbox One, PlayStation 4) Enough?

For anyone who has a current generation console (PS3,Xbox 360), 500GB of hard drive space sounds like a lot. Most gamers are content with their present 80GB of hard drive space. But few have considered that the next generation console's games would eat there present console's hard drive space for breakfast. No wait breakfast is too big of a meal, let me rephrase, the next-gen console's games would eat your present console's hard drive space for brunch. Yeah brunch sounds more accurate. A PS4 game like Knack takes 37GB of  hard drive space when it is all said and done. Call of Duty: ghost takes up somewhere in the 45GB range. So when it all said and done, you might have maybe 12 games saved on your Next-Generation console. But that would only be the case if you had all 500GB of space to dictate to only your games. A part of any hard drive spaces goes to the system's operating system. So for the Xbox One you have 362GB of usable hard drive space, which equals about 8 games that you can have saved on your system. For the PlayStation 4 you have 408GB of usable hard drive space, which is a little better than the Xbox One, but it only equals about 9 games that you can have saved on your console. I think hardcore games can max out that much of available hard drive space in 6 months to a year, with causal players not far behind. In the beginning it might not be that hard to manage you available space but through the lifetime of your console, it is going to suck to only have 8 to 9 of your favorite games saved on your console. which will bring gamers to the inevitable, switching out their stock hard drives for a bigger one. while I talk about why the PlayStation 4 is special to women games in this link here , it is because of how easy it is for anyone (tech skills or not) to do the dirty deed of switching out the hard drive. For the Xbox One I know it is a lot more difficult and not so initiative, but if you want more information on how to get to the hard drive on the Xbox One checkout  this link here, it will take you to Geek.com where they go over some of hardships of getting to that elusive hard drive on the Xbox One. Now with the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 increasing digital game sales by 25% in only a month, this issues of hard drive space really needs to start getting some attention. You don't want to wait too long to switch out your hard drive because of the data you will lose, but you don't want to switch it out too early because it will void your warranty. I'm hoping that game developers can find a better way of utilizing the power that is available on both the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 without killing my hard drive space in the future. And that Xbox's One and PlayStation's 4 figure out ways to use cloud computing to alleviate some of the crazy amount of hard drive space next-gen-games require.

Who Thought the Share Button Would Be Big

How many times have you been playing a game on your console and you do something unbelievable and there is no one there to see it. There is no one there to recognize your skills or see your incredible fluke. With Sony’s share button on the PS4 controller all that has gone away. There has been over 800K videos of broadcast gameplay since the PS4 launched last month and over 20 million minutes of live streamed gameplay.  All this is according to VG 24/7. In the past it uses to be a pain in the butt to upload quality video’s to YouTube. Not many people wanted to spend the money for equipment, mics, video editors and etc. to post videos online. Yet we all felt like we had a little +LevelCapGaming  (a YouTube users who posts awesome gameplay videos online) in us. The share button has enable us to share our skills with tutorials, and how to’s, as well as boast about how good we are. I don’t know how many times I’ve yelled at my TV screen “Did You Just Not See That” and then thought oh right, there is no one here. I think even Sony is surprised that the Share button success, with Sony's Worldwide Studios president Shuhei Yoshida expressing how the share button “surpassed his wildest of expectations”. I've been thinking this for a while but  the “power to the gamers” slogan should really go to Sony PS4 campaign since it really has been empowering there gamers to share more and explore more, and to play more.

Borderlands 2 Free for PlayStation Plus Members

Today Borderlands 2 will be free for PlayStation Plus members. This is a great deal seeing as Borderlands 2 is one of the best games of 2012 and it offers a lot of loot, guns, and co-op fun. I have a full review here, where I tell you the good and the bad about Borderlands 2.I can tell you it has never been better to be a PlayStation plus member. Sony has been giving away some awesome titles of late. And not just any title but titles that gamers actually want to play. When I first heard that PlayStation Plus was going to be giving away games I thought it would be for older titles that already have better counterpart on the market or for some unheard of title that has already become irrelevant. But Sony is not holding back at all, they are giving away A list games, on top of the discounts for poplar games and 3GB of online data storage.  

EA Turning Into Cancer For Developers

EA (Electronic Art) was founded in 1982 and when I was a kid, I use to love seeing the EA badge on a game or hearing the " EA it's in the game" slogan. In fact I use to sing the slogan for everything even for things that weren't game related. Like shooting my sock into the sock drawer, "it was in the game". To Keep it simple EA use to produce and publish some awesome games. Old Medal of Honors like Allied Assault, the more older versions of Madden, Mass Effect 2, Need for Speed. But Lately when I see the EA badge on a game, my heart drops a little because "EA its in the game" has turned into "EA its for the money". Its like quality control has gone out the window for quicker release dates. Especial if the previous game was a hit. EA was founded on recognizing gaming as a art form hence their name Electronic Art (EA). But the way that EA has been pushing unfinished games out into the market makes me think that there new version of art is like a mobile phone app, something that needs to be updated weekly. Here are a couple of rules that I wished developers and publishers lived by number 1 not selling me a broken game, number 2 not having day one updates the size of half the game. Number 3 not selling me DLC that should have already been apart of the original game. Those are the three simple rules that gamers need both game dev's and publishers to follow. We are trusting these companies with are money before we even play the game especial when we buy the DLC bundle like packages since we have no idea what type of actual content is going to be on them besides a few screen shoots, that right there is us trusting you not to screw us over. On a rudimentary level we are expecting our games to work. And not some of the features on the back of the box but all of them. (I'm talking to you Rock Stars with that recent GTA5 online multi-player debacle). But I'm also talking about games like Battlefield 4, whose online issues are keeping gamers who purchased that type of game for only one reason, the online multi-player. EA's recent stock drop should be that wake-up call to get themselves together and produce and publish art, and not unrecognizable crap. Here's hoping that one day (and hopeful one day soon) I will be able to fall back in love with "it's in the game".