TheMightyEthan

Yeah, the real reason I posted that was the news about the Wii U games.

Yeah, I used "utility" more broadly than is common, some of what I said was really more applicable to cable companies, local telephone, etc, rather than traditional utilities.

We do have lots of government-enforced local monopolies, but in general they tend to be for utilities in smaller towns where there wouldn't be enough business if they had to compete. So like a city government will say to a cable company "if you will come to our town and provide cable service, we won't let any other cable companies compete with you" because the alternative is not having any cable at all. Usually those kinds of deals have requirements like the company granted the monopoly has to provide service to everyone within the city limits, can't charge a certain amount above cost, etc to ensure they don't abuse the monopoly.

I hate it when companies do something I want, like release a game in NA, or on PC or whatever, but then hobble it with stupid shit like that.

Apparently Nintendo, on the other hand, is working on getting their shit together: http://www.joystiq.com/2012/04/26/wii-u-retail-games-will-be-sold-digitally-at-launch/ It's kind of amusing that MS, the first to really have a viable online console experience, is now falling behind Nintendo, who has pretty much had the most half-assed online services possible.

I don't know about other countries, but in the US monopolies themselves aren't illegal, just anti-competitive practices (price fixing, selling at a loss to drive smaller competitors out of business, etc).

Always turn off motion blur.

Yeah, Saturday mornings in the US, episode 4 won't be out for 2 more days. Glad that spoiler tag wasn't much of a spoiler, cause I thought you were talking about episode 3.

Yeah, I mean, from a business perspective it makes total sense if you can sell it that way, but you don't just come out and fucking say it. And that bit Jack quoted just shows a complete disconnect from reality. I just, I don't even know anymore. Though I guess it does kind of blow away the rumors that the 720 won't have any physical media, unless MS is planning to completely rethink this strategy (which the statements would not seem to support).

I flipping hated it in Uncharted.

Cams are always less popular than direct film copies. If someone would rather watch a cam that wait a week to see it in the theater then odds are they were going to pirate it anyway, regardless of release date. Though I will say that I saw a cam of The Simpsons movie that was so good I thought it had been made with one of those film-digitizer machines until someone stood up in the middle of the movie.

How did anyone ever get notified of class action lawsuits before the internet? Cause me, my sisters and my cousins all would have qualified for those gloves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOZPGt0Gflg Couple dev interviews about the design philosophies behind the game. Pretty interesting.

Couldn't find an appropriate topic for this, so I decided to make one: http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/microsoft-resists-simultaneous-digital-and-retail-xbox-360-releases/095084 All I really have to say is

I would consider buying a guide for Pokemon not for the game walkthrough but for the type charts and Pokedex and stuff. I cannot keep that shit straight in my head.

lol, I don't remember the glove lawsuit. I actually did end up getting myself a leather biker-style glove (the kind that only covers the palm, leaves the fingers free) for that game.

Hell yes it did. I remember getting blisters from using my palm to rotate that stick as fast as I could.

Goddamnit, what is this, Bizarro World? It's supposed to be Europe getting fucked over on release dates, not the US.

The stick on the N64 controller was pretty shitty too. Overall though that controller, and the system itself, was a fucking tank.

Do you mean strongest as in physically strongest, or best character?

Yeah, when I think of Linux I think of "OSes I'd put on an htpc"

Sorry, I was just trying to help clarify what Yant's point was, I myself am all in favor of any kind of space development.

The last game I bought from them was Okami. Before that it was Dino Crisis 2. Apparently Capcom doesn't often make games I'm interested in.