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May 26, 2009: wallet threat level yellow
Infamous comes out this week. I had hoped to post an interview with one of the developers from Sucker Punch today, but I got stood up. Sony later informed me that an interview wasn't appropriate considering last week's coverage of the game here and specifically here. So rather than reading my conversation with designer Nate Fox about how they came up with the various powers, what lessons they were able to carry over from their excellent Sly Cooper games, and what they're thinking about for DLC, I can only leave you with a middling recommendation that it's pretty good as an open-world action game.
Also, I recommend you make back-up plans next time Sony offers to meet you somewhere. Or at least don't say anything bad about them.
Then there's Fuel, which looks to me like a latest-gen Smuggler's Run, which makes me all tingly. Then I played an early build of Fuel about a month ago. It has an open world so open the PR folks are comparing it to the size of small countries like Luxembourg, Bhutan, and Cyrodiil. It also seems to have a nifty caRPG vibe, although the caRPGing bit was disabled in my build. However, the actual driving was flat-out pants. If you don't know what "pants" means, ask some British people. I hope the driving is just some sort of placeholder thing in an early build. But it certainly made it a lot easier to wait for the full game, which comes out this week.
UPDATE: I've just been told by one of my interns that the release date for Fuel has been pushed back to late next week. I'm chuffed about this news, because it will give the developers time to make the driving model less pants.
By Ben Abraham at 5:32 AM ON 05/26/09
What the hell?! Sony decide they want to take their bat and ball and go home just because you pointed out ten-or-so crap things about Infamous (don't care - NOT going to spell it in that ridiculous manner)...?
And here I thought publishers were shamed out of pulling this kind of BS on respectable journalists after Gerstmann gate... Sony, you just lost a little bit more of my ever dwindling respect.
By nine at 6:01 AM ON 05/26/09
Hell yeah dude! Stick it to the sony man! I'm quite happy to miss an interview with an (admittedlt awesome) suckerpuncher if it reflects you having these things called "journalistic integrity" and so forth.
Keep on calling it as you see it!
By the way, I get really annoyed at all this talk about the size of the man in FUEL. There is ONE metric you should use, and that is: "how many minutes does it take to get from the very top to the very bottom?". Distance figures are meaningless in a video game, for all we know they made each car 1km long and that 100k map is a lot smaller than we thought...
By Krasny at 6:15 AM ON 05/26/09
[quote]Noun/Adj. Nonsense, rubbish, bad. From the standard British English of pants, meaning underwear; also a variation on 'knickers'. E.g."The first half was pants but I stayed until the end and it was actually a great film." [1990s]
Exclam. An exclamation of annoyance or frustration. From the noun, (above).[/quote]
By Krasny at 6:18 AM ON 05/26/09
"Pants" is derived from the Greek "Pantos", meaning "less then that was expected".
See also "Bollocks".
By obonicus at 7:00 AM ON 05/26/09
Cancelling with no warning is a shitty move, no doubt, but is this otherwise surprising?
Gaming journalists are slaves to access. The whole industry only exists because publishers allow it.
By Mihos at 7:34 AM ON 05/26/09
Well, if you think about it... its like you went on your MySpace and called some chick a fat, ugly whore. Then you are supprised when she doesn't show up to go to the Hannah Montana concert with you.
I honestly doubt I would have showed up either. What good could have come from it.
By Rrroberto at 8:06 AM ON 05/26/09
Actually, it's nothing like that at all.
By Bob at 8:26 AM ON 05/26/09
Good for Sony. Next time think before you make such stupid articles filled with lies just to get hits.
By fishboy at 8:26 AM ON 05/26/09
Guess it serves you right for making "Top 10" articles, they're terrible.
The sooner people stop making them the better.
By salwon at 8:37 AM ON 05/26/09
Yes, how dare you write articles where you state slightly negative opinions about games. Next time if you make two top 10 lists, make them, "The Top Ten Awesome Things" and "The Top Ten Even AWESOMER Things!"
This bullshit "you can't say anything bad about our games, even if you immediately follow it up with good things" mentality needs to stop, and is a serious challenge for the medium going forward. Maybe an interview with the developers would've shed some light on their thought process on the things you didn't like, possibly convincing others that they're not problems, and maybe even changing your mind. But no, Sony wants to be babies about it, and the SDF is already out to defend them. Good show all around, everybody.
By Aeon221 at 8:59 AM ON 05/26/09
This is just tastycakes! Om nom nom nom delicious.
No, but seriously, I think this epic rampage of a thread to be might seriously have a shot at knocking down Killzone 2.
By Truman Capote's ghost at 9:09 AM ON 05/26/09
I didn't like either Infamous or Capote, as I feel that they were too harshly critical of my lifestyle and message.
I am, however, looking forward to the new film Up, which I plan on seeing in 3D.
By Joshua at 9:42 AM ON 05/26/09
The funny thing is that Tom's "top 10 bad things" list wasn't even really 10 things. More like 6 or 7 at most - depending on how much of an annoyance the messenger bag thing is, I guess. And he followed that up with at least 9 genuinely good things about the game. Sony is dumb.
By Boo Hoo at 10:02 AM ON 05/26/09
Tom begged everyone over at his other message board (QT3) to come here and "Digg" the top ten bad things.
The tom troll got trump trolled by Sony. LOL
By Woo Hoo at 11:10 AM ON 05/26/09
How much of a fanboy do you have to be to make up some random nonsense to justify bad behaviour from a multinational company?
By Boo Hoo at 12:47 PM ON 05/26/09
http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showpost.php?p=1740124&postcount=1
My Bad, it was another "review", still, a shill is a shill is a shill.
By Steiner at 1:22 PM ON 05/26/09
Mihos: using the MySpace analogy more accurately, it's as if Tom posted that a girl's latest profile picture has a soft focus and why is she wearing that unflattering pantsuit. Then when he arranges a meeting with her (in her pantsuit) to try to take a better picture for her profile, she cancels and takes Tom off her "friend list".
Hmm, let's not use MySpace for analogies anymore...
Boo Hoo: just the fact that you would post a desperate, and false, comment shows that you are in fact the angry Troll you speak of. Boo Hoo the Troll...go find a baby board to cry your pitiful tears on.
Nice job Tom for standing up to the big man. If they had any faith in their own game, they would have kept the date with you.
By CaldeDan at 1:39 PM ON 05/26/09
Just admit you were wrong, Boo Hoo.
By Hypocee at 2:12 PM ON 05/26/09
Is a volunteer shill still a shill? I'd say he's probably shillier still.
Nine, previous interviews have stated that it takes about 2-3 hours in the fastest road cars (150MPH?) to go from corner to corner, which seems pretty equivalent to the five hours at 70MPH it takes to corner-cross the lower peninsula of Michigan.
That said, the Guinness record is so much bullshit. I mean, just off the top of my head, Elite anyone?
By al thor at 2:42 PM ON 05/26/09
you asked for it mate.
your useless articles designed only to get hits has finally bite you in the ass. if you cant take your 'job' seriously then no one will. better luck trolling some other game next time. fool
By mn at 4:37 PM ON 05/26/09
Yes. How dare you "troll" a game with such outRAGEous comments like "The powers in Infamous are spectacular." and "I liked the game."
Also, I can't remember where -- it was in some other asinine comment thread on some other weblog -- but someone started to use the word "shrill" to describe people that use the conversational shit-dumping that is the "shill" accusation. It's almost on Godwin's Law level of inanity, even if it is the slightly more sophisticated form of the F-bomb (fanboy).
Chick's Law?
By NT_ at 4:57 PM ON 05/26/09
I'm going to retweet this article, because Sony is once again showing their (under)pants. However, Mr. Chick, given your reputation, you would have a more arguable position if you swore off "Top 10 Lists" entirely.
*Bonus points will be awarded for publicly disowning "SyFy".
By Tortoise at 1:37 AM ON 05/27/09
You ought to refuse to cover Sucker Punch games in any way from now on. Whenever someone asks you about a Sucker Punch product or bit of news then mention casually that they are dead to you.
By elem at 12:35 PM ON 05/27/09
Dear PS3-only owners (Bob, Boo Hoo, et al.),
If the PS3 steals second place from the 360, will you tone down the zealotry? 'Cause I think that could happen, and I'm all about you guys toning down the crazy.
P.S. Great White Hope number four shot down!
But really, who's counting anymore?
By spaswaag at 5:14 PM ON 05/27/09
Well, this seems really appropriate
http://www.ukresistance.co.uk/2009/05/momentous-sony-moment.html
spaswaag:
Well, this seems really appropriate htt...More »