Bean

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Blizzard and Activision have announced a merger between the two companies. Activision is putting in 1 billion, and Blizzard double that. Activisions CEO will be taking the reigns of Activision Blizzard.

And there it goes, the last bastion of quality PC gaming is gone. What pisses me off about this is that Blizzard has always been dedicated to PC gaming, and releasing a quality product as opposed to mass releases of various titles. Take Starcraft 2 for example. Although we know virtually nothing of the quality of this game, we know that it took them YEARS to even announce a sequel. Why? Because Blizzard makes sure a product meets their standards before they release.

Activision however (Craptivision...) is more like EA lite. They seem to run with the mentality of "If we release enough games, eventually one of them will be really good".

You think Warcraft 3 didn't live up to the hype? Wait till we see what this new corporate orgy does to some of the greatest PC gaming franchises of all time. Warcraft, Starcraft, Diablo... these are some MAJOR franchises even if they are old ones. For an example of what I'm talking about, look at Westwood. Command and Conquer were one of the only franchises that rivaled the Blizzard RTS games. We get the original C&C, the expansions, Red Alert, and of course one of the best RTS games of all time, Red Alert 2.

Enter EA.... what do we get? Generals.... A gane that not only had nothing to do with ANY of the established storylines in the franchise, but was a completley different style of RTS altogether. The game mechanics were dumbed down, the plotlines were made a little more "friendly" to the masses etc...

Well I can see the same thing happening here already. Mark my words, this does not bode well for PC gamers.

__________________
"I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity. I know nothing."

--James T. Kirk

Stag

Nice rant...and agreed

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"I want to do a motorboat on Shatner's manboobs" - Sam Cogley

iamspenagain

Generals was a decent game. It shouldn't have been called Command & Conquer, though.

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If I could, I would marry a Magnum bar.

Bean

Well that's just my point. When these big gaming companies like EA and Activision buy out the little guys, they're doing it for the wrong reasons. They don't look at it as buying up very capable and proven talent, they look at it as buying a reputation.

Generals is a perfect example. You're right, it was a pretty decent game. But it had nothing to do with C&C. The problem is though, had EA released it under a different name, it wouldn't have sold like it did, maybe wouldn't even have been that sucessful.

To me, Blizzard was the last of the little guys that could hold their own. And Activision swoops in and the water is gonna get murky.

I know I'm not saying anything that your average 13 year old doesn't realize about marketing and "buying reputation" through name brands, but it just pisses me off to no end when it comes to PC gaming.

__________________
"I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity. I know nothing."

--James T. Kirk

iamspenagain

Well, there's always Bungie, recently separated from Microsoft (a supercorporation doing the right thing?) and the always-high-quality Ubisoft.

__________________
If I could, I would marry a Magnum bar.

Bean

I hadn't considered Bungie.. have they done anything besides Halo anyways?

Ubisoft I've never been keen on. They release some good stuff for sure, but to me they've always used the EA tactic of "beta testing" by releasing too early, and then patching. First run buyers get screwed.

__________________
"I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity. I know nothing."

--James T. Kirk

iamspenagain

Bungie did...uhh...Marathon and the Myth series, but their future regarding non-Halo games is unknown. I'd imagine they won't branch very far from Halo, I get the impression their operation is pretty small.

Halo Wars, the new Halo RTS, isn't even a Bungie game, it'll be released by Ensemble Studios, which created Age of Empires. I'm not sure why Bungie hasn't been given a role in the project, I bet they're not too busy right now.

Re: Ubisoft, I think their games have become too complex to develop, refine to near-perfection, then release in a timely manner. The environments in the Advanced Warfighter series (which, sadly, I can't play because of old hardware) are absolutely SPECTACULAR, the best I've ever seen. Not finding bugs in those kinds of games is mildly forgivable, aside from some of the more glaring ones which, I admit, are annoyingly present.

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If I could, I would marry a Magnum bar.

Bean

Bungie isn't working on Halo wars?? Wow.. that suprises the hell outta me. That's one of the few games coming up that I'm willing to fork out for an upgrade just to play.

__________________
"I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity. I know nothing."

--James T. Kirk

iamspenagain

Nope, but if Microsoft has started treating Ensemble like they treated Bungie, with a great deal of respect for the studio's creative rights and very little infringement on the development process, Halo Wars should still be a great game. It certainly looks cool as all fuck.

On a side note, it's absolutely shocking to me that Microsoft let Bungie return to being a company in its own right. They still hold a minority share in the studio, but that's hardly total ownership. It actually seems like Microsoft is starting to want quality products dominate the market, instead of corporate behemoth-made crap. I think even Vista was at least an attempt to make something quality, even if, to this point, it has largely failed. I'd say it was competition-driven, except for the aforementioned release of Bungie.

Fascinating.

__________________
If I could, I would marry a Magnum bar.

Bean

Well, I'm as suprised as you that Microsoft let Bungie go.. Perhaps it's just a "test" to see if Bungie can produce anything besides Halo. If so, I'd say it wouldn't be long before Microsoft scoops them back up again. It could also be an early attempt at getting around the MS = Evil thinking of most people these days. They're still making money off Bungie, but nobody cares cause it's not MS.

Or maybe I just like conspiracy thinking...

__________________
"I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity. I know nothing."

--James T. Kirk