Welcome to Beyond Co-Op, a weekly piece that talks about industry stories that may or may not be related to co-op gaming.
The stories for this week:
- Playstation Move Shown off at GDC
- OnLive Pricing and Launch Announced
- Modern Warfare 2 and Bad Company 2 Maps on March 30
- Rock Band 3 and Rock Band Green Day Announced
- God of War III and Pokemon This Week
Playstation Move Shown off at GDC
Sony showed off their motion control system at GDC this past week. What was once called the Arc is now called the Playstation Move. It is apparent from the logo that Arc was the desired name, but Sony must have gotten into a name argument with someone over it and instead named it Move. This will probably go down as one of the stupidest names ever for a peripheral, but news is that the other names being bandied about were even worse.
In my mind if this was a last minute decision maybe Sony should have held off until E3 to show this off. Most of the press didn’t seem very gung ho on the system and many argued how much of a direct rip-off it is of the Wii controls. They did announce that SOCOM 4 would be able to use this new system, but then we also heard some games were being developed where you would have to have two of the “orb” controllers. We also heard the other controller isn’t motion sensitive at all and both controllers along with possibly a game would be packaged together for “under $100” with no word of how much an extra controller would cost for those games that need two “orb” ones as noted above.
I’m not sure what is going through Sony’s mind on this. It could very well be that their arrogance is showing again, although I would hope at this point they realize they are no longer #1 in this game anymore and aren’t even #2. At this point I would say Natal from Microsoft will have a better chance of penetrating the market than the Move. Why? Because Natal is doing something different from the Wii whereas Sony has decided to copy it verbatim hoping people will jump on. None of the games look very exciting and they’re even bold enough to have a game made up of a bunch of min-games relating to sports. Luckily games will supposedly still have regular controller options as well, but you have to wonder if one company puts time into the Move capabilities how well that would translate to regular controls. I could be selling the Move short, but I’m simply not impressed at this point and they better bring a better game to E3 or this peripheral may be going nowhere when it releases in fall.
Source: Colony of Gamers
OnLive Pricing and Launch Announced
Trying to beat Sony on the stupidity scale is OnLive, who announced their pricing and launch date. It will go live on June 17th, which happens to be the last day of E3, in the lower 48 states. This of course means Alaska and Hawaii are left out to dry, but maybe that’s good news in this case. You will have to pay $14.95 per month to get access to the OnLive system through your PC or Mac. The bad news? Well, you have to pay for the games you play as well and there is no price as of yet on that. There was word that some newer games such as the new Prince of Persia game would be available on it from the beginning. There will supposedly be rental options as well, but as talked about we have no clue on prices. If they are sold at regular price or at a light discount this service is going to be dead on arrival (DOA). Who would pay $14.95 per month AND have to buy the game in order to play? Why not save your money and buy a more powerful computer to play the same said games? You won’t have to fight with latency or the fact that once you drop the service you lose the game you paid money for.
Source: Colony of Gamers
Modern Warfare 2 and Bad Company 2 Maps on March 30
Do you suffer from “mapathy”? That’s the question Activision asked when they announced the new Modern Warfare 2 Stimulus Package, a map pack releasing on March 30 exclusive on 360. No word on the price of this download as of yet. Then the day after EA announces that they will be curing “mapathy” by unloading a free map pack for Battlefield: Bad Company 2 on the same day. Yes, the battle continues between the two games. Now, BC2’s maps aren’t really new, but they are unlocking a gameplay type in two maps already out, so technically it is “new”.
Source: Colony of Gamers
Rock Band 3 and Rock Band Green Day Announced
I remember when people bitched about how many Guitar Hero games were coming out last year. Now two new Rock Band games have been announced and supposedly there are more in the cooker related to bands. Rock Band Green Day is due on June 8th. It has been long rumored and I’m surprised it has taken this long to get the full information. Along with this Harmonix announced Rock Band 3 with no details other than it will be coming this holiday season. I think this is a huge risk at this point in time as I feel rhythm games are already beyond their zenith, but I could be very wrong.
Source: Colony of Gamers
God of War III and Pokemon This Week
I expect that Pokemon will win the overall sales when it releases on Sunday, but God of War III might finally be that true “killer app” that Sony has been looking for. Problem is that supposedly the PS3 is still in short supply out there and I wonder if there will be a ramping up of available systems come Tuesday. Now, neither PS2 God of War game reached the sales of, say, a Halo game, but this is the type of game that should sell systems given the early reviews on it.
I know I’ll be playing God of War III, but then again I’m not a new PS3 owner or anything. Should be interesting.
Source: me