Planet Sillicon

Score too low

By blog on Sep. 18, 2009.

I don’t just play any game, most of the time, I tend to play ones that have been rated very highly by my peers and professional reviewers. When a game scores below a certain point, it’s almost certain I won’t play it.

So yeah, don’t have as much time for gaming as I used to, which is why I haven’t been playing LOTRO so much. That’s a little sad, because I think it’s a great game, but there it is. I’m still interested in MMOs though, so when Champions Online was coming up, I thought I may drop in and give it a go.

But then I saw the review today on IGN… 7.6 from them, but the reader review average is 6.7. Now, I usually don’t play games that got under 8.5, so this means that Champions Online is completely and totally out, unless they put out an expansion that dramatically alters the score for the overall game, I won’t be playing it.

The reader reviews are really interesting, actually. They seem to swing between scores of 3.5 through to 5, which basically talk about how buggy the game is, repetitive, animations aren’t working, skills aren’t working, and powers have already been nerfed. Then you have those who are rating this game around 8 to 9 saying it’s fun, especially once you’ve a few friends to quest with.

I have to say, though, that a quick look over of the reviews with the low scores, and the reviews with the high scores, that the low score reviews are better written and more in-depth, whereas the high score reviews are a little superficial and you sort of get the impression these people would be happy playing any game.

So, from what I’ve read, this game sounds unfinished, and it really doesn’t look all that good, either. Server downtime seems to be a big issue, which I find hugely frustrating when you’re paying for a subscription.

All in all, from what the reviewer on IGN said, I’m sort of surprised they reviewed this game as highly as they did.

Mobile TV not a big thing?

By admin on Mar. 26, 2009.

Mobile Wire reports that TV will be subscribed on mobile devices by 472m subscribers by 2013, according to Cantab Wireless.

Which is a pretty optimistic outlook, really, when you think about the viewing habits likely to be involved with mobiles.

Firstly, content makers are going to have to set up different streaming quality of production according to what device it will be watched upon – there’s little point encoding the same level of quality into a tiny mobile device screen as a HDTV.

But will people really subscribe to TV channels on mobile?

I don’t think so – people use mobile devices on the move, and this means for the majority of instances, mobiles are probably going to be used to view and share video clips, rather than stream longer programming.

The danger is that the world of mobiles is being dangerously hyped – half a billion TV subscribers by 2013? Probably not. Here’s hoping everyone focuses more on the emerging realities, than get caught up in pipe dreams.