Clementine will remember...

Back in 2012 when I finished playing the final chapter of Telltale Game's The Walking Dead I was an emotional wreck by the end. I know I wasn't alone judging by the critical acclaim the game received and the volume of articles dedicated to Lee and Clementine's final scene together. This was one of the best story lines I've ever seen in my 30 years of gaming and it's one that still resonates. I frequently find myself mentally revisiting the game and the decisions I made while playing it well over a year later.

This week I finally bought Season 2 of the game after some significant delay in my decisison-making process. Sony's PSN deal of the week meant that the game was under £6 so it was too good a deal to pass up.

There were a couple of reasons (other than price!) why I have been holding back from buying and playing Season 2, despite having bought the 400 Days DLC. The main reason is that Telltale were keen to continue on from the decisions each player made in Season 1, and that due to a twist of fate, my final game save from that season was erased accidentally.

This meant that in order for my decisions to have any legacy in Season 2, I'd have to play the final chapter of Season 1 over again. In order for my gaming experience of distress and sorrow to be optimal, I'd need to revisit the traumatic Season 1 finale again. However, there's no guarantee that the decisions I'd make this time around would perfectly match my second play through.

This inability to guarantee the original trauma could be repeated was off-putting in some ways. Other than not really wanting to revisit around 3 hours worth of gameplay just to be able to play Season 2 (time is precious since becoming a father!), the fact that I might not make the exact same decisions that left me so emotionally bereft the first time around also stood in the way.

I needn't have let this nagging doubt paralyse me as much as it did. As I loaded up Season 2 and the game scanned for my missing save file, I was confronted with a  message that suggested that the gaps would be filled by the game rather than my decisions. This forced me to revisit the final chapter of Season 1 again - and I'm glad I did. I took this opportunity to changes some of the decisions I initially took first time around - in order to see how little or great an impact they had on the game experience. For example, my initial play through saw me take Lee's arm off in homage to Rick in the graphic novels. This time, however, I kept the arm and it allowed for a very minor modification to the gameplay. I also saved Clementine from the trauma of finishing Lee off.

Ultimately, the decision tree forces the player along the pre-scripted narrative path with only minor adjustments. Even though I know what was coming, I still felt the heart-wrenching impact of my decisions and now I'm content enough to know that my actions as Lee will have some legacy for Clementine.

And yes, I did choke back a few wet ones. Again.

Why did Microsoft borrow Sony's PS3 playbook for the XBox One?

Having spent a few minutes pouring through my RSS feed reader and various social networks it seems like E3 is the place where Microsoft seem to have compounded the problems they started with their awful reveal event back in May.

Back then, not only did they drive the point home that the XBone was going to be a home entertainment system but they issued some rather bizzare messages about the system's (in) ability to play used games - something which forced them into addressing with a series of follow-up announcements. Meanwhile, Sony just sat back and did, well, very little. All it had to do was not repeat what Microsoft was doing.

The overall feeling many gamers were left with was one of confusion and bewilderment, but we all expected that E3 would be the place were the real battle for the next generation of games consoles would be fought. And it seems like Sony may have won the first round.

Microsoft's new console appears to be coming in as a home entertainment system that hooks up to your cable TV box, replete with some potentially limiting Digital Rights Management (DRM) software, a camera that wants to watch you and spy on you 24/7 (except in Germany where this is illegal). It must be connected to the internet once every 24 hours even if you want to play single-player games (to check with the DRM software - you're not a thief are you?), and will not let you trade in your physical copies of video games once you've decided you never want to play them again. It's not backwards compatible either.

All this for a price of $499/€499/£429 - it looks like Europe and the UK just got shafted on the price as $499 currently exchanges at £320. £109 for import and tax differences seems steep.

No doubt Microsoft has a variable pricing strategy planned, where they will be able to partner up with companies like Sky, Virgin or BT in order to sell the machine for less than that as long as a subscription is taken out. Or at least you'd hope they have something like this planned. Judging by the awful way in which they've handled their reveals to date, you can't be sure.

This just doesn't seem to be the Microsoft I expected. I figured that the strong performance of the Xbox in the US and the UK would mean that they were going to convert a lot more Sony gamers to their cause with their new machine. I for one was expecting to be converted. However, now I'm not so sure.

Given that the Windows phone, the Windows tablet market and the Windows 8 sales have all been very disappointing, you'd have thought they'd go out all guns blazing in order to secure the next generation of gamers to their cause. But instead, they look like they are going to fight an uphill battle.

Sony's new PS4 console is likely to launch around the same time, will pack as big a tech punch as its rival (if not bigger with that GDDR5 RAM), will retail for £349, isn't region locked, will allow games to be swapped or sold, and has lots of indie developers on board. It's also not backwards compatible either, but there are indications that PS3 games will be available via their Gaikai streaming service. Oh, and its 500 GB hard drive can be swapped out and upgraded anytime. The amazing PS+ service also carries over from PS3 to PS4.


It just seems like Microsoft have borrowed from the playbook that informed the original Sony PS3 launch: announce the machine late and at a price point way in excess of its competitor, whilst focussing on it as a media centre rather than a games machine.

This time around Microsoft are going to be competing with a rival that has a very similar hardware configuration. Last time around, the PS3 was notoriously more tricky to develop games on due to its custom Cell CPU and memory management. Microsoft also had a year head start on its rival. It has no such luxury this time around.

This time, Sony has attracted the smaller PC developers to their cause, emphasising the similarity of their (slightly) more powerful machine. It's also managed to convince bigger developers that anything a PC can do, the PS4 can do - and easily from a developers standpoint.

I was planning on switching to Microsoft's platform at the start of the year. Now, I'm not so sure.

Unexplained PSN credit card charges

When the PSN was hacked I was a little nonchalant about the whole thing, mainly because I was out the country for 2 weeks so didn't feel the impact of missing the service, and also because my bank accounts and credit card had been cancelled due to unrelated suspicious activity.  Ha!  On top of this, it was announced by Sony that the card details were supposedly protected/encrypted.

So, when there were online rumours of cards being sold on the darknets I chalked most of this up to fear, uncertainty and doubt.  I never spent much time going through my credit card charges either.  Until today.  I have one card setup for PSN purchases which gets used for nothing else, so it's pretty easy to see any unusual behaviour.  For the last couple of months, the balance has not decreased much despite over-payments so I looked at the digital receipts sent to my email account.  That was when I discovered the charges.

The charges

Thank you for your purchase with PlayStation(R)Network.
You will find a copy of your purchase details below and a link to the terms which apply to your purchase. Please print these off and keep in a safe place for future reference.
Online ID: robbo1337
Name: rob jewitt
Order Number: 218X2019X0
Date Purchased: 03/04/2011 @ 06:21 PM
Total Amount: £9.99
Item / Service Details Unit of Price
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
IP9100-NPIA09003_00-CC000000WITHFREE-EPGB Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity™ (Premium 30-day Subscription £9.99) £9.99
(Next Renewal Date: 03/05/2011 @ 06:10 PM)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total Amount: £9.99
Current Wallet Amount: £0.00

This receipt clearly shows a charge of £9.99 for Sony's Qriocity music streaming service (think Spotify for Sony products).  I checked back another month and found an email dated 4/3/2011 much the same as the one above - another charge for the Qriocity service.  And it's there again on the 1/2/2011. 

Now, I've never knowingly signed up for a recurrent music streaming service.  I did install the Qriocity application when it first launched on the 2/1/2011 - I have an email saying as much.  However, I must not have noticed the terms and conditions which stipulated that they'd charge you and keep on charging you for the service.  A service I have never used past the first day.  A service that costs double that of its rivals' basic services (eg Spotfiy, Napster, We7, etc) or equal to their premium services without any of the benefit of being able to synch tracks to my iPhone or keep some audio files for good.  I'll be making use of these cancellation instructions at the earliest possible opportunity.

It turns out that it wasn't hackers who ripped me off.  No.  

It was Sony.

PSN is back up. Kinda...

In case you were sleeping (European readers!), Sony announced that they are bringing the Playstation Network back on line across a number of regions today.  This isn't expected to be the full network up and running but it is expected to be the multiplayer functionality.  If you want to check out the full blog posts then you can: click here and here.  You can also watch a video from Kazuo Hirai below explaining the situation.

You can prepare for the switch on by going over to the PS3 site and downloading the new 3.61 firmware to your computer and transferring it over to your PS3 via USB.  In my experience this process tends to be a lot faster than downloading it direct to your PS3.  Get it here.  Once you have it you need to  ensure you have a USB drive with around 200 mb of spare space that is formatted as FAT32.  Create a folder called PS3 then a subfolder called UPDATE and put the newly downloaded file in there, eg:

USB/PS3/UPDATE/PS3UPDAT.PUP

Head on over to the System Update option on the Settings field (va the XMB) and update the system via the USB storage device.  This should take about 45 seconds.  And that's it.  You can try signing in to PSN network to change your password but, currently, it appears to be still undergoing maintenance in the UK as I type.  There are instructions for how to change your PSN network password here.

Digital Distribution Dilemmas

Is digital distribution coming of age or are there barriers preventing customers from embracing the advantages of cloud-based distribution? We look at the recent example of Mass Effect 2 for PS3 and questions who really stands to gain.


(Image: Derringdos, 2010, Flickr, CC)

There has been plenty of hype and excitement within the gaming press over the past few weeks regarding the release of critically lauded Mass Effect 2 for Sony Playstation 3.  This game has been out for quite some time on Xbox 360 and PC as it was released back in January 2010 and the game received high praise at the time, with Metacritic scores in the high 90% area.

I've seen several sites refer to the PS3 version of the game as either the definitive or the most complete version of the game, mainly due to the bundling of the Downloadable Content (DLC) that followed the original releases onto the PS3's Blu-ray disk. You can find a list of what DLC appears where and at what cost from this table.  Not all of the game's DLC is bundled onto the Blu-ray; that would be a missed opportunity for additional revenue.  However, what is genuinely surprising about the PS3 release is the cost of digital distribution.

Purchase options

If you wanted to go out an buy the game today you'd have a number of different options.  You could walk into your local high street game store or supermarket and hand over your cash.  The advantage here is you'd be able to play the game as soon as you got home, although you may be a hostage to price if there are few competitive stores in your locality.  You could hunt the game down online using a service like Gamestracker to find the best UK price and have it delivered to your door.  The advantage here is price (£35.86 delivered via ShopTo), but the disadvantage is the delay in getting the game in your machine.  The other option involves you downloading the game direct from the Sony PSN store direct to your machine.  The game is currently retailing at £47.99 on the network and I'd guess it would take a while to download for many folk.

For the record it's worth noting that the RRP for the game is £49.99, so the PSN store comes in at £2 cheaper.

Price disconnect

The price difference between the direct download and the ShopTo next day delivery is pretty marked at £12.13 in price.  Somehow, I can't see this direct download being a bargain purchase, especially when you could purchase much of the game's DLC with that difference as you can see from the image below:

I haven't been able to confirm this yet, but the Cerberus Pack DLC shown above comes in at £11.99.  What I'm finding a little confusing is whether this DLC is unique content or if it's the material included on the Blu-ray itself, especially as it seems to include material that reviews have hinted at as being included for free (eg the Mass Effect comic, the Zaeed character, etc).  If this is the case, the digital download strategy is one which seeks to make the most money off the PSN purchaser.


Digital Downloads

On this evidence I can't see myself ever opting to pay for the digital download format over the Blu-ray original - there's just too much doubt and not enough clarity from the PSN store regarding what you are getting for the increased price.  This has not gone unnoticed by the gaming press.  What could possibly justify the inflated price?  There's no dick, box, or manual costs. There are no transport costs bumping up the price to the consumer. OK, there may be bandwidth and storage costs incurred but it's not as if the PSN is hosting 50 copies of the game package.  Perhaps there is a licensing deal in place which prevents the PSN version from undercutting the RRP by a certain amount.  If that is the case, how is that money divided up?  We can see from the image below how that cost is divided up in the physical world.

Straight away we can exclude £6 of costs for returns as very few digital downloads will be returned. A game disk may be returned if it was damaged or faulty, thus becoming useless.  This same item will have already incurred marginal distribution costs in order for it to get to the shop shelves, and a return will need to be sent back to the publisher.  The figure of £3.50 per game per distribution seems excessive when there are no confines of physical shelf space.  I'd like to see more info on how digital distribution deals work.

For consumers, there is also no chance of selling on the digital copy if you tire of the game, and there's definitely no benefit to those interested in video game nostalgia - I can't see anyone pulling the game out after a decade and musing on the wonders of digital files.  That file certainly won't make it to eBay...

If Sony and others like them are serious about digital distribution then they really need to sweeten the deal, otherwise people will continue to flock to those environmentally unfriendly shiny disk formats.