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Ask Massively: Ridiculing e-sports is bad for MMOs
I don't love e-sports. I've never really been a fan. I used to enjoy spectating Guild Wars matches, but only in short bursts. Truth is, I prefer playing in PvP to watching it. I feel that way about real sports too; the ones I like, I'd rather play than watch. (Except tennis. I have no idea why, but I could watch that all day.) And if the MMORPG community's comments are any judge, I am not alone in my indifference to e-sports. Actually, "indifference" is probably too tame a word; some MMO gamers are outright hostile to e-sports, be those e-sports jammed into proper MMORPGs or waaaaay out on the fringes of the online gamosphere. That hostile ridicule of e-sports, however, degrades online gaming, our corner of it as much as anyone's.
The Tattered Notebook: It's OK if EverQuest Next is a niche game
I'd like to open today's column with my favorite quote from SOE's EverQuest Next reveal: "Enough is enough. Enough of the same game already. It's time to get some new ideas into the genre." Now, you would think that this sort of unambiguous mission statement would be picked up on and understood by everyone who has even a passing interest in EverQuest Next. After all, the quote rolled off franchise director Dave Georgeson's tongue during the first two minutes of the EQN reveal speech. And if it wasn't clear from that opening monologue that EQN isn't going to be your daddy's combat lobby, the rest of the reveals that focused largely on the game world, the building tools, and a wee bit of the ol' ultraviolence should have been the second clue.
AMD details Elite Mobility and mainstream APUs, we run early tests (hands-on)
AMD has been willing to tease its 2013 ultra-mobile APU (accelerated processing unit) strategy through PCs like the Acer Aspire V5, but today it's spilling the beans in earnest. The headliner for many is the company's just-shipping Elite Mobility line, or Temash: the A4 and A6 designs are built for tablets, like Hondo was, but their Jaguar-based system-on-chip designs should be faster in both CPU and graphics power without a hit to battery life. AMD estimates that the Radeon HD 8280G video core in an Elite Mobility A6 is about five times faster than a Clover Trail-based Atom and twice as fast as Hondo, but lasts about 45 percent longer on battery than an Intel Core i3. And that's while untethered -- that Turbo Dock feature is still in place to boost speeds by over 30 percent when a dock is around for extra cooling. The E1, E2, A4 and A6 mainstream APUs based on Kabini, meanwhile, are all about tackling the Pentium and Core i3 chips that go into entry-level laptops. AMD reckons that the dual-core (E-series) and quad-core (A-series) parts are up to 88 percent faster overall than their ancestors, and can even punch above their weight class: the E1's Radeon HD 8000-level graphics are up to 66 percent faster than those of a much thirstier, Trinity-era A4 chip. Battery life is a specialty as well, with up to 10 hours when idle and 9 hours of web use. That's typically 2 to 3 hours more than Kabini's Brazos ancestor could manage. AMD wasn't specific on when these mainstream APUs would first ship when we were briefed, but we had the opportunity to benchmark an A4-based reference laptop. Read on past the break for the scores and some early impressions. %Gallery-189169% %Gallery-189171%
The Astronauts and Ethan Carter steer away from 'mammoth-sized' games
The Astronauts are working on an eerie, macabre, non-combat game called The Vanishing of Ethan Carter, and while we're still not sure exactly what it is, one thing is certain – it's not AAA. After founding People Can Fly, working on Bulletstorm and Gears of War, and leaving to start an indie studio, designer Adrian Chmielarz says AAA games have lost their appeal."We're no longer excited by mammoth-sized games," Chmielarz tells Games Industry International. "We're still very interested in high quality, but now and in the future we want to focus on smaller projects."The Vanishing of Ethan Carter will involve death and murder, but won't feature any shooting. It's a game of discovery, similar to Dear Esther, but with more corpses, as Chmielarz describes. Horror is thriving on the indie scene, he says, and he hopes Ethan Carter shows that video games can offer a broader range of experiences. But if no one understands this approach and the game bombs, The Astronauts may need to come back to Earth."If we don't slip, we'll have just enough money for this first project, and then it's sink or float," Chmielarz says. "Kickstarter was tempting, sure, whether we like it or not it's a great marketing tool and gives your project that extra visibility boost. But we think that Kickstarter should only be used by those studios for which there's just no other way without losing their freedom. We're just old-fashioned this way."The Vanishing of Ethan Carter is due out on PC this year.
LG's IPS monitors head downmarket with 2D-only IPS4 series launching soon
While LCD monitors with in-plane switching technology were once decidedly settled at the high end, LG apparently thinks its time for everyone to have one and is launching its mainstream IPS4 line. Executive VP JJ Lee says the aim is for IPS monitors to become "ubiquitous in every room", bringing better color reproduction, picture quality and wide viewing angles with them. So far we know they're slotting in just below the 3D-capable models shown off at CES, but there's nothing mentioned in the press release (included after the break along with another pic) about prices, sizes, specs or model numbers. If you're in the market however, expect to find out more soon since they will roll out to Asia first in May, followed by Europe and North America in "the coming weeks".
World of Darkness creative director talks design and the MMO mainstream
A new interview at Gamasutra posits that CCP is gunning for mainstream success with its upcoming World of Darkness MMO. The EVE Online developer has cornered what's left of the hardcore sandbox market, so now it's looking to marry EVE's emergent gameplay with more familiar MMO staples. "The way to drag people in will be traditional themepark-style PvE play. Once players get into the setting, they'll see the appeal of the sandbox play," says WoD creative director Reynir Hardarson. Despite the concessions to mainstream accessibility, EVE's influence on World of Darkness will be more than superficial. "The live-action roleplayers of the Vampire the Masquerade tabletop game play this way," Hardarson explains. "It's really about politics and power plays." Why don't more MMO developers try their hand at sandbox mechanics? Hardarson says designing for emergent play is difficult because you can't test it. It's worth it, though, because MMOs that hand-hold and limit players to a linear path miss the point. "I'm not a five-year-old. If I want to go in the cave and I want to die, that's my problem," Hardarson says.
Toshiba Satellite P855 glasses-free 3D laptop hands-on (video)
Remember that glasses-free 3D Qosmio F750 (aka F755 in the US) gaming laptop we saw last year? We're not sure how many of them Toshiba has sold, but the company's PR folks tell us they've been popular enough to justify a further 15.6-inch glasses-free model -- a Satellite P855, which will have a more mainstream target audience. We're looking at exactly the same lenticular technology, which uses a webcam to adjust the 3D effect to the user's head movements, and which delivers effective results if you sit relatively still and give your eyes a chance to adapt. This time, however, the effect is delivered within a textured aluminum chassis that will likely appeal to a wider audience than the red-styled garishness of the Qosmio. The price tag has yet to be disclosed, but that should also be more appealing, since the Satellite range starts at £599 ($940). The P855 won't arrive until Q2 and Toshiba wasn't ready to reveal any concrete specs concerning the processor or graphics, other than saying this laptop is aimed at mainstream 3D gaming as well as Blu-Ray consumption. We asked about memory and storage too, but with no success -- all we could glean is that there are four USB 3.0 ports, HDMI out, Intel WiDi for direct WiFi beaming of 1080 video to a bigger screen, plus Harmon Kardon speakers. C'mon Tosh, give us Ivy Bridge paired with a 28nm Kepler GPU and make the world happy. (Hands-on video right after the break.)%Gallery-149783%
Acer TimelineX AS5830TG-6402 review
When Acer unveiled its first Timeline laptops in 2009, these slim numbers felt like a revelation. Imagine: thin notebooks rated to last hours and hours on a charge and priced well under a grand! Fast-forward two years and that proposition seems a bit quaint, doesn't it? Pretty much every PC maker has been working on slimming down their wares and extending battery life with -- shall we say? -- mixed results. Still, Acer has kept on keeping, and its latest TimelineX laptops carry the torch as thin, long-lasting and inexpensive. As always, the company released Timelines in assorted screen sizes, ranging from 13.3 to 15.6 inches. We took a look at the 15-incher, the $800 AS5830, which promises to last up to nine hours unplugged and also packs a discrete graphics card – a feature many of its competitors have been skipping. But are impressive battery life and a relatively trim physique enough to make this notebook stand out in a crowded field of inexpensive, good-enough laptops? Let's see. %Gallery-131151%
Lenovo nearly doubles net profits in Q1 earnings report, not so certain about 'mainstream' Ultrabooks by end of year
Lenovo's enjoying a bright and sunny Thursday in Hong Kong today, where the company has just unveiled a Q1 2011 / 2012 earnings report that's full of rosy news. According to the report, Lenovo's revenues jumped to $5.92 billion during the fiscal quarter, representing a 15 percent increase over last year's figures, while net profits nearly doubled to $108 million (compared to $54.9 million last year). Global PC sales, meanwhile, nudged upward 23 percent -- even at a time when most other manufacturers are seeing relatively sluggish growth. During an earnings conference call this morning, COO Rory Read provided a little insight into his company's approach to the growing Ultrabook sector, while hinting at future price reductions. Speaking to reporters, Reed assured that Lenovo would "invest in innovation to be a leader" in the Ultrabook market, adding that prices for its MacBook Air competitors may reach "mainstream" (sub-$1,000) levels by 2012: "I wouldn't say by the end of the year necessarily but...that's definitely going to happen." Head past the break for Lenovo's financial summary, along with the full PR. [Original photo by Cory Grenier]
NVIDIA sends GeForce GTX 550 Ti into the $150 graphics card wars
It wasn't that long ago that we were commending ATI on the stellar regularity of its product launches while NVIDIA was floundering, yet now the roles are reversed and we're seeing NVIDIA flesh out its second generation of Fermi products with the midrange GeForce GTX 550 Ti presented today. Its biggest attraction is a $150 price tag, but it makes a major concession in order to reach that pricing plateau -- there are only 192 CUDA cores inside it, equal to the previous-gen GTS 450, but less than the celebrated GTX 460. NVIDIA tries to ameliorate that shortage of parallel processing units by running the ones it has at an aggressive 1800MHz allied to a 900MHz graphics clock speed, and it also throws in a gigabyte of RAM running at an effective rate of 4GHz. That too is constrained somewhat, however, by a 192-bit interface, rather than the wider 256-bit affair on its bigger brother GTX 560 Ti. What all these specs boil down is some decent performance, but few recommendations from reviewers -- mostly due to the abundance of compelling alternatives at nearby price points. Hit up the links below for more. Read - AnandTech Read - Tech Report Read - Guru3D Read - PC Perspective Read - techPowerUp! Read - Hexus
Ask Massively: Massively is one of those multiple-robot Transformers edition
The technical term depends on how much of a fan you are and whether or not you want to be a jerk. The only term that has been officially used with any regularity is "combiner," which describes nicely what's going on but isn't terribly evocative. "Gestalt" is always a popular fan term, but it's also clearly the sort of term that bored 20-year-old psych student comes up with when talking about a cartoon online instead of doing homework. You know what? Let's just say we're a supergroup, like Asia. That's easier. So while you're queueing up "Heat of the Moment" and cursing me for getting that song stuck in your head for the next four days, it's time for Ask Massively, which this week features questions about the staff's opinions on games past, present, and future. Fun for everyone! And of course, you can send in your question to ask@massively.com, or you can just leave it in the comment field.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti: second-generation Fermi for the $250 mainstream
Ah, NVIDIA, how far you've come. This time last year we were all wondering if your first Fermi GPUs would operate successfully without a nuclear reactor in our backyards, yet today you're introducing a successor to one of the best value-for-money GPUs the PC gaming world has seen in ages. Yes, the GTX 560 Ti has mighty big shoes to fill, but it's off to a good start with 384 CUDA cores running at 1645MHz, 1GB of GDDR5 RAM running at an effective rate of 4GHz, and an 822MHz graphics clock -- each one a clear and pronounced upgrade over its GTX 460 predecessor. You'll have to check out the reviews below for a detailed breakdown of what those numbers will mean on a game-by-game basis, but there's another way in which this new card is proving its impact already. ATI AMD has (conveniently) chosen to cut the prices of its Radeon HD 6870 and HD 6950 cards today, while also outing an HD 6950 with just 1GB of onboard memory to serve as a direct competitor to NVIDIA's latest. Competition, ladies and gentlemen, it's an awesome thing. Read - HardOCP Read - Tech Report Read - PC Perspective Read - techPowerUp! Read - AnandTech Read - Bit-tech Read - TechSpot Read - TweakTown Read - Hot Hardware
The Daily Grind: Do MMOs belong in the mainstream?
Age of Conan on The Big Bang Theory. Second Life on The Office. World of Warcraft on South Park. The Guild transforming into an internet phenomenon. The Simpsons and FoxTrot creating parodies of virtual worlds. It seems as though everywhere we turn, MMORPGs are toeing the line between niche and mainstream, especially thanks to the whirlwind of WoW. As MMOs become less of a fringe activity and more accepted in popular culture, I have to ask -- is that a good thing? After all, geeks are highly protective of their territory, often seeing themselves as the faithful guardians of That Which Society Rejected. To suddenly see that pastime become accepted and embraced by the crowd may prove disorienting -- and even disturbing. So do MMOs belong in the mainstream? As they become more widespread, is there something essential that's being lost in the translation? Are the faithful guardians resentful of MMO devs who may cater to the casual crowd over them? Is there a risk of overexposure and backlash? Won't somebody please think of the children?
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 465 rounds up mostly positive reviews
Well, it's not quite June 1, but the GeForce GTX 465 reviews have come flooding out all the same. The official specs are exactly as a recent leak indicated: 352 CUDA cores running at 1,215MHz, a 607MHz graphics clock, and 1GB of GDDR5 memory operating at a 3.2GHz effective rate and exploiting a 256 bit-wide interface. With an MSRP of $279.99, this Fermi-lite GPU scored plenty of admiration for the value it offers, with one reviewer going so far as to call it "quite possibly the most powerful DirectX 11 graphics card for under $300." Others weren't so enthusiastic, citing the far cheaper HD 5830 from ATI as a better choice, but it's true enough that the next best GPU, the HD 5850, tends to be at least $30 more expensive than the 465, depending on brand. You'll want to delve into the game benchmark numbers in order to make up your mind about which card might make for the best bit, but be warned that NVIDIA's 465 retains the GTX tradition of ravenous power consumption -- something to consider if you're rolling along with an old school 400W PSU in your rig. Read - Hot Hardware Read - PC Perspective Read - TweakTown Read - Legit Reviews Read - Tom's Hardware Read - Guru 3D Read - techPowerUp
'Sex Box' exposé might be the greatest news report of all time
digg_url = 'http://www.joystiq.com/2010/02/02/sex-box-expose-might-be-the-greatest-news-report-of-all-time/'; Well, we know one up-and-coming reporter who's well on her way to Pulitzer City. Posted just after the jump is one of the most hard-hitting news reports on the dangers of online gaming we've seen in years. Oh, sorry -- did we say "hard-hitting?" We meant "sensationalized, irrational, unresearched, and absolutely hilarious." We get those two phrases mixed up with surprising frequency. If we were only allowed to give you one piece of advice in our lifetime, it would be that you should watch the video posted after the jump. If we could give you two pieces of advice, they would be to watch the video, and never, ever let a reporter into your house. For any reason. Ever. Ever. [Via Kotaku]
Robin Williams plays Call of Duty, named his daughter Zelda (guess why!)
Though we may not be steadfast watchers of Jimmy Fallon's late night talkshow, we have to give the man credit for once again bringing the world of gaming into his decidedly non-gaming television show. While Robin Williams guested on Fallon's show this week, he asked the hairy-handed comedian about his gaming habits – some of which we've covered in the past – and found out that not only does the man play his fair share of Call of Duty, but he also named his daughter "Zelda" after ... well, the Princess Zelda. "My daughter is named after a video game ... Zelda, Princess Zelda. I don't call her Princess Zelda ... only occasionally ... but she's named after Zelda." So forget about your LaBeoufs and your Dushkus – Robin Williams is holding it down hardcore and old-school for all of Hollywood.
French police avert school shooting, 13-year-old boy apprehended
According to a report from The Times, French authorities have prevented a school shooting by arresting a 13-year-old boy before he could exact revenge on his teachers for poor marks. Raymond Yeddou, a senior state official in Beauvais, is quoted as saying, "He left his home with a loaded shotgun and 25 cartridges. He went in the direction of the school where, according to his statement, he intended to kill all his teachers." The boy now faces charges of attempted murder. As GamePolitics notes, several reports -- including the one from The Times, which boasts the headline, "Computer games fan 'planned school massacre'" -- have drawn a connection between the presumably foiled attack and the young boy's hobbies. Piggybacking on word of the boy playing World of Warcraft and other games until "one or two in the morning," the mainstream media has once again attempted to trace unusual, outcast criminal behavior to a culturally entrenched and widespread hobby. Unless you plan to thoroughly investigate the complex impetus for a planned school shooting, the only use in linking a young boy to video games is to remind us what year we're in. Protip, media: It's 2009. And you're still doing it. [Via GamePolitics]
AMD Tigris and Congo mobile platforms focus on multimedia, longer battery life
Stop the presses! AMD has kept to its roadmap. Alright, start the presses up again. The Tigris laptop platform, announced today, is all set to become AMD's "mainstream" weapon of choice, with the centrally touted features being full 1080p, DirectX 10.1 support and offloading video encoding to the Radeon HD 4200 GPU. Add in the new 45nm dual core Caspian CPUs, with speeds ranging up to 2.6GHz, and the result is a substantial 42 percent improvement in multimedia performance to go along with 25 percent longer battery life. Alas, that'll still only net you an hour and 55 minutes of "active use" and just under five hours in idle, according to AMD. The Congo, offering the same HD video and DX10.1 support, does a little better at two hours 26 minutes of utility, thanks to its HD 3200 and dual core Neo chips inside. That'll hardly trouble Intel's CULV range of marathon runners, but then Intel's processors don't pack quite as much grunt. AMD's own Pat Moorehead got to test drive laptops based on the two new platforms and was enraptured by their raw, snarling power. Of course, he would be. The majority of OEMs have signed up for this party, with models expected to arrive in time for the release of Windows 7. [Via TG Daily] Read - Tigris processors Read - Pat Moorehead tests Tigris laptop Read - Congo features Read - Pat Moorehead tests Congo laptop
Activision-Blizzard and their financial future
Barron's has a long article up about Blizzard's corporate overlords at Activision-Blizzard, and as is usual with most pieces of Activision news, people will probably see in it what they want to see. Those who think Bobby Kotick is just a money-grubbing exploiter will find more fuel for their firey fanboy rage: apparently he's a follower of Las Vegas casino entrepreneur Steve Wynn, and is modeling some of Activision-Blizzard's business plan off of that guy, Shareholders, however, will probably be thrilled. In terms of a purely financial sense, Activision-Blizzard is apparently one of the shinest futures around, with Kotick bragging that videogames will eclipse film and TV in terms of moneymaking in just a few years.From our perspective, as longtime fans and players of Blizzard's games, the most interesting thing I see here is that Barron's makes no distinction at all between Activision and Blizzard any more -- the Activision-Blizzard company, according to the article, is equally responsible for both the Starcraft and Transformers franchises. Obviously, as gamers, we see a huge distinction between those two: one is a classic, storied, much-loved videogame series, and the other is a cash-in on a license that's panned everywhere but the box office. But for the financial guys, they're just both properties of Activision-Blizzard. That's not to say that our Blizzard is entirely lost (anyone who was at BlizzCon last week knows that's not true), but it is a sign that the merger is no longer news. From an outsider perspective, Guitar Hero and World of Warcraft are just two cash cows from the same company.
Sesame Street gives gaming the thumbs up
Thanks to the recent shift in video games towards introducing more movement in control, our favorite pastime has just gotten the thumbs up from the Joan Ganz Clooney Center at Sesame Workshop, which wrote, "Well-designed digital games show significant potential to promote children's growth and healthy development. They can foster skills and knowledge that help children with academic learning, as well as habits which contribute to better health."We're happy that The House That Big Bird Built approves. In turn, we'd like to remind everyone that reading is totally horse apples and completely F.P.O. (that's "For Poindexters Only"). So there.
