GeneralGames.ca

What does the future hold for Xbox Live?

Recently Microsoft discontinued Xbox Live service for original Xbox consoles and games. There was commentary that the discontinuation would allow the service to evolve ‘new features and experiences that fully harness the community’ with ‘unprecedented flexibility for future features.’ So now, of course, the speculation follows as to what the future of Xbox Live could hold. In fact this speculation can be extended beyond Xbox Live to other online gaming networks and we can attempt to project the trajectory for the industry.

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How is the average consumer supposed to keep up?

It’s been the same scene every year since marketers figured out people buy more things around Christmas; countless game companies with countless games flood the market in an almost insane war to be the next big thing during shopping’s prime time. Last year we saw something new happen, publishers pushed their wares forward to this spring in an effort to maybe snag more spotlight later in the quarter. However, this wasn’t a unique idea and now instead of a busy holiday season and a nice casual release calendar for the spring/summer we’re faced with a holiday season that lasts from October to June.

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Apparently I'm not alone in my quest to abolish rating systems

Last week I posted a conversation article about numerical review scores and my disposition towards them. There were some interesting comments left, but no real dissension. It seems that I’m not alone in my dislike of review scales, almost everyone agrees they’re terrible.
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Rationality is friend to neither reviewer nor reader

Much more than any other medium, video games are a very personalized experience. Unless you’re reading a classic Choose Your Own Adventure book, your experience will be nearly identical to everyone else’ in any traditional media. However, for all the unique experiences that video games provide for their users we seem to get more and more tied up in the concept of grading systems and sorting our content by numerical notions of quality. While this may be fine for an at-a-glance recommendation for a film or book, it is infinitely more impossible to understand the nature of a video game by the same methods.

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