Something for everyone

As the console wars rage on, more and more previously unwilling souls are being forced to pick a side. One isn't necessarily better than the other, the warlords beckon. That's up to you which one you throw your support behind.

One of the biggest deciding factors for "teh true winnah" in the console wars is the quality of first and third party exclusive games. Some of you might not know this, but big triple-A releases such as Devil May Cry 4 and Assassin's Creed were originally slated to show up only on the Playstation 3. Microsoft, on the other hand, has not lost any exclusives. It'll be safe to say that even 4-5 years from now, we won't see ports of Halo 3 or Gears of War coming to the Playstation 3. Now, that's not necessarily fanboy baiting. Microsoft has always managed to pimp their products with ruthless efficiency that one would expect from a company made up of diminutive bespectacled white men. Case in point: how many people that purchased a computer between January of 2007 and now actually want to use Vista over XP?

So, to reiterate, that's not fanboy baiting. If anything, the decreasing amount of exclusive games for respective platforms only serves to emphasize the growing costs of video game production, now that we've entered the age of HD gaming. An easy way to fix the aforementioned problem with exclusive games?

That's easy; completely get rid of the concept of third-party exclusivity.

We live in an age of excess and choice. Go into an Wal-Mart or Target on a Saturday afternoon and behold the spectacle that is the human tragedy, with heifer after heifer struggling to push their carts down aisles upon aisles of economy-sized products littered with screaming children and unresponsive dead-eyed parents. But the key point is that no matter your choice of mega-market, be it Wal-Mart or Target, you'll still find the same spoiled children and irresponsible parents, just pushing different color carts.

So, let's analogize for a second here (huh, huh, anal) and draw the obvious comparisons. Economy-sized products? The games both platforms offer. The screaming children? The screaming children. That buys these games and bitch about exclusivitiy. Wal-Mart and Target? Xbox 360 and PS3, respectively, or PS3 and Xbox 360, respectively. It doesn't matter. There may be different in-store brands for products such as tissue paper or maybe fabric softener, but they both get A to B. After this year's jawbreaking yawnfest of E3, it's pretty evident true creativity and innovation doesn't matter. Sony is trying to copy Xbox 360, Xbox 360 is trying to bite the Wii (huh huh), and Nintendo still doesn't get it.

Don't get on my dick about, "derrr cell processor" or "grahhh 5 million pixels a second" and all that other shit that, at the end of the day, matters about as much as the bird shit that I seemingly have to wash off my car week in and week out. I've played both versions of Devil May Cry 4 and GTA IV, and guess what? They're the same damn thing.

Enough with the crying about exclusivity. Let's all enjoy our third-party games together like the fat fucking adults we should be.

I love Kotaku posters

Taken from Kotaku:

When asked by a Swedish publication which Xbox 360 exclusive title he'd like to see come to the PS3 instead, Sony Computer Entertainment head Kaz Hirai responded that he'd rather take a bullet in the head than have to choose.

First comment comes from reader Datheron:

"Maybe he'd reconsider if they held a gun with a freaking chainsaw on the barrel to his head.

Lulz.

Fabula Nova CRYstalis

Earlier this week, it was announced at the end of the Microsoft E3 press conference that Final Fantasy XIII would no longer be exclusive to PS3. The internets, as expected, imploded, collapsed upon itself three times, and fucked itself in the ass while banging its head to Disturbed.

I've been doing what any spectator who does things on the internet for, as put so succinctly by others, the lulz; that is, massive trolling. The posters on Kotaku are level-headed enough where their expressions of regret are mostly directed at what this means for the future of the PS3, a console they really would like to see do just as well as the 360. You read that, and you think to yourself, "yeah, huh... I wonder how Sony's taking all of this."

But then, something magical happens when you go onto Google and type "Final fantasy xiii petition." Something wonderful and unique, yet quaintly nostalgic, bringing one to recall the ugly and frankly embarassing turn of events that transpired on the internets when it was announced that Devil May Cry 4 would be making its way to the 360 as well.

There's talk of (take your pick): selling out, disrespecting fans, and every third signature insists on calling Square-Enix out for its corporate greed. Somewhere along the way, there's mentions of Xbox 360 owners being "unable to appreciate Final Fantasy" and how they're just happy that Sony lost an exclusive. I can see where all of this is coming from, and I get it. Really, I do. You dropped half a year's allowance on a machine that allows you to live out your weaboo fantasies, and you need some kind of justification that the decision you made was correct. Pathetic, really. But I get it.

Fanboys, please do not paint in your little Final Fantasy VII AMV-creating minds an idealistic picture of Square-Enix as a non-profit organization that taps a mystical well of game creating faeries who, driven by their love of this strange creature known as man, only wish to bring the best to their fanbase. The name of the company itself, a merger of the two biggest effeminate chopping-block wielding galguy RPG makers in Japan, should be telltale enough. Square Enix is dedicated to pleasing as many of their fans as possible, because moving more units and having more fans equals more skrilla. At the end of the day, Square Enix does not give two flying shits about you, and that's the truth.

So, faced with this unbearable fact about the game industry, what should you, as a consumer avid about his (or hers.... maybe) love for games, do with that hard-earned/begged cash? Easy. You buy the games that warrant a purchase. If Final Fantasy XIII is a game that falls under this category, then by all means purchase that game and enjoy it as much as you can. No one has lost Final Fantasy XIII. If anything, the only thing PS3 fanboys have lost is a smug sense of self-satisfaction that provides them with supposed ammunition on the NeoGAF boards. Making fun of 360 owners for not being able to play a game that they supposedly "wouldn't appreciate in the first place." Which makes your argument moot. Huh.

And while we're addressing a cold, hard fact, let's address a more hypothetical but all-too-possible scenario. If Microsoft decided to port Halo 3 or Gears of War to the PS3, either game would fail hard, because PS3 fanboys would decline to buy the game simply out of spite. If fanboys are allowed to make generalizations, then so am I. I'm currently an Xbox 360 owner who previously owned and loved the hell out of his PS2, and I'm finding difficulty in justifying a purchase of PS3. I also own a Wii, DS, and PSP *gasp* If I bought products based solely on loyalty, I'd probably be broke. I think Square Enix is entitled to operate on the same logic as well, too. If you're as big a fan of Square Enix as you claim to be, wouldn't you want to see the company thrive in hopes of seeing more original IPs in the future? Kind of a whole "if you love it, set it free" thing. You figure it out.

So, stop crying Sony fanboys. Look on the bright side; at least now you have really funny, condescending jokes to make, like "I wonder how many discs they'll have to cram that game onto for the 360? Like 3? Possibly 4? *guffaw*

Excellent, quality stuff. Keep up you're good work.