Columns

Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Building a Successful Call of Duty Clone in Three Steps

call-of-duty-mw3-midnight-launchThe most successful video game on the market right now is the Call of Duty series. Say what you will about the game’s lack of innovation and utter disregard for the single-player campaign, this is the most commercially successful game on the market. The last couple of years have seen gross sales of over $1 billion and units sold well in excess of 10 million.

As such, you could understand why everybody is looking to CoD for cues for their upcoming efforts. Just look at the new all-brown colour palette and gritty art style of Dead Rising 3 and EA turning Battlefield into an annual franchise. The thing is that Call of Duty’s success isn’t about how it looks or how often it comes out. It may come as a shock but there’s a simple but largely undiscovered formula that makes CoD a massive success.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Level Ups and Level Downs for E3 2013

e3-2013-bannerThe dust is starting to settle on the 2013 edition of the Electronic Entertainment Expo, also known as E3, and we’re starting to gear up for the five-month run to the launch of Microsoft and Sony’s next-gen consoles.

Normally, you’d get a winners and losers of E3 column but all except the most delusional of fan boys can agree that Sony was the big winner, Microsoft was the big loser and Nintendo didn’t win but they didn’t lose any of their growing positive momentum.

Instead, I’m going to look at E3 2013 and score the goings on at the big show with Levels Up or Levels Down. Yeah, it’s not an original gimmick but what is nowadays on the internet.

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5 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Microsoft Has Lost the Console War Before It Started

xbox-one-logo-bannerThe Microsoft keynote event at E3 is about to begin and it doesn’t really matter. Over the last few weeks, Microsoft has repeatedly shot itself in the foot when promoting their upcoming Xbox One. They think that they can do no wrong with their next-gen console but the reality is that the can do nothing right.

Microsoft is walking into E3 thinking that they’re Justin Bieber, they’re on top of the world and full of swagger. They are Justin Bieber but everyone sees them as Justin Bieber, self-important douche, with a bit of Amanda Bynes’ delusional separation from reality.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Five Dream E3 Announcements for the Xbox One

xbox-one-console-bannerHaving written my dream announcements list for the PlayStation 4’s keynote at E3, I thought that it would only be fair to give Microsoft’s new console equal time with their own list of dream announcements for the Xbox One.

Now, I’m not an Xbox guy. I’ve never owned either of the Xbox consoles but at one point considered getting the Xbone before the official unveil. However, that unveiling had nothing that appealed to me. So for my dream announcements for the X1, I’ll try to balance between dream announcements for those firmly in Xbox’s camp and those still not sold in the Xbox One.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Five Dream E3 Announcements for the PlayStation 4

playstation-4-announcement-bannerSure, I could sit here and wax business about what I think Sony will announce for the PlayStation 4 because it will make sense from a business perspective. And as interesting as I like analyzing the business implications of the actions of the video game industry, I love to loosen up my tie, roll up my sleeves and just game.

So rather than go through the rumour mill for the five most likely announcements that Sony will make at its big E3 press event, here are the five announcements that I most want Sony to make for the PlayStation 4.

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3 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Nintendo, Let’s Plays and the Power of Free Marketing

nintendo-youtube-ad-revenueNintendo has always had this reputation as a friendly sort of company. Their big anchor franchises aren’t M-rated shooters but family-friendly adventure and platformer games that appeal to all ages. Nintendo of America boss Reggie Fils-Aime’s public appearances show him as a charismatic and knowledgeable leader of the video game industry. They’re the little underdog up against the power of conglomerates like Sony and Microsoft.

Yet, Nintendo has been on the back foot lately. The terrible results of the Wii U launch has put Nintendo on the back foot and now they’re trying anything to reverse course. Unfortunately, their latest move has struck a nerve with gamers online. Nintendo is targeting “let’s play” videos on YouTube and making copyright claims so they can scoop the ad revenue from the videos.

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2 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Console Wars: The Xbox One’s Failure to Launch is a Marketing Failure

playstation-4-vs-xbox-one-controllersHaving had a few days to digest the two very different launch events for Sony’s PlayStation 4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One, I’ve come to a realization. As much as people don’t seem to like the Xbox launch, it wasn’t a failure in and of itself. In fact, I believe that Microsoft successfully accomplished what it set out to do.

The Xbox One and PlayStation Four both play video games. However, if you were to watch the two launch events, I’d understand if you were a little confused by that statement. While the PlayStation 4’s launch emphasised how it plays games and how it augments that with the social networking and sharing features, the Xbox spent comparatively little time talking about the games.

The difference in the launches was an example of how the console manufacturers are positioning their next-gen consoles in the market.

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6 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

I’m Tired of Reboots, Remakes and Reimaginings: The Onset of Gamer Fatigue

generic-modern-military-shooter-coverI think I’ve finally snapped. I checked the gaming headlines the other day to find out that Bethesda was doing a “reimagined” Wolfenstein game set in a version of the 1960s where the Nazis won World War II and ruled the world. I’ve played a bit of Wolfenstein 3D  and was thought it okay but I didn’t particularly care much about it even though it’s the grand-daddy of modern first-person shooters (well, pre-console revolution FPSs).

Yet, when I heard about the upcoming Wolfenstein: The New Order, I snapped (or the blogger facsimile there of). As this console generation has slowly ground on, the influx of new intellectual properties being developed seems to have almost stopped. What new multi-platform IPs do we have to look forward to this year? Fuse, Remember Me and Watch Dogs? That’s it?!

It’s tough for me, and I’d imagine many gamers, to be excited about the near future of gaming when there is so little to be excited about. We’re stuck with publishers giving us a series of franchise reboots, remakes, reimaginings and sequels to put some money in their pockets. Quite frankly, it’s wearing me out.

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2 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns

Have Attack Ads Outlived Their Welcome?

harper-vs-trudeauA funny little poll came out late last week. It was the first national poll conducted after the Liberals selected Justin Trudeau as their new party leader. Oddly enough, the results of the poll showed that the Liberal Party holds a seven point lead over the governing Conservatives.

While there are plenty of explanations that one could attribute to the reason for the swing in polling numbers, my theory is that it comes down to the Conservative response to Trudeau’s election. Rather than promote themselves, the Conservatives have gone back to the well with attack ads about Trudeau’s inexperience and past statements. Could this mean that their old attack ad strategy might not be working anymore?

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2 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Building the Perfect Star Trek Game

star-trek-picard-facepalmStar Trek: The Video Game by Digital Extremes seems to have launched as an unmitigated disaster. There are numerous bugs and glitches. The co-op AI appears to be somewhere between moronic and suicidal. If you’re playing on PC, online co-op doesn’t work. Basically, if you didn’t know that Paramount delayed release to promote with Star Trek: Into Darkness, you would swear it was rushed to co-promote it.

If the game’s failure wasn’t bad enough, the PR buzzwords Paramount and Digital Extremes threw out didn’t help either. They called it the most authentic Star Trek experience in a video game. While that might be true for the action-packed vision of Star Trek that J.J. Abrams is bringing to the screen, that’s not true of the Star Trek that damn near every Star Trek fan grew up with.

Despite the very shaky track record of licensed games, it is possible to make a great Star Trek game in the rebooted universe while staying true to Star Trek series and movies that we all know and love.

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