Saturday, April 2, 2016

Gold vs Plus

As most of you know I am a gamer, I may TALK about gaming casually but I go back to the 2600. I'm to gaming as most millennials are to smart phones, I saw the slow progress that was I mean to be fair at the time awesome but now is like, "wow I payed for that crap" to the constant *fireworks fireworks* and the *majestic horns* triple A releases, the independent releases and some of the overhyped stuff. As most of you heard in the Atari days it is thanks to Nintendo that we have these type of rankings. Back in the day Atari just let you make games for their system, they didn't really rate the titles so you might think you Atari sucked if you parents(honestly though lets not JUST blame the parents, some of us went to the story with 20 bucks worth of paper, grass cutting, leaf raking money and wanted the most bang for our buck too) found the "grab box" and just grabbed you a handful of cheap games to go with your system. Nintendo invented the "official seal" which meant that somebody at Nintendo reviewed the games, decided if they were up to Nintendo's quality requirements and then let them be released. And because of that it became a theme, third party games and peripherals still existed(because when it became hard to just make crap software folks went to making crappy hardware) but if the system you were playing with didn't seem to make it an OFFICIAL PERIPHERAL/SOFTWARE RELEASE you steered away unless you just liked burning money.

How is this like phones some of you youngins might be asking, remember how back in the day nobody sold crap for Apple but the apple store or major retailers with the Apple seal on it? Yeah same thing, logitech and everybody else makes stuff for Apple now, they just know what level of quality they have to put into it. Yes you can still find cheap junk, but you fully understand it is cheap junk and admit that you may just be lighting your money on fire. Back to gaming, does that mean "cheap games" disappeared, no. I mean if you wait long enough even triple A games get slashed to under 30 bucks, or if they turn out to be bombs 25 or less but now we have a different method to delivering games:Digitally. When most gaming companies say digital what they means is you download it, no physical copy just whatever is on you gaming machine. Be it a PS3 or PS4, an Xbox 360 or an Xbox one, and while I don't own a Wii anymore or a WiiU Eikichi says they also have an online store so as you can see digital is here to stay. The benefits of digital of course are that
since they don't have to create a PHYSICAL copy of the game they don't have to shell out xyz bucks for physical dvd's or blu rays(360 games were still on DVD as were Nintendo games, PS3, PS4, and Xbone are on blu ray) they companies CAN give them to you at a SLIGHTLY lower price. I said can usually the triple A games are still full price, yes there is the benefit of being able to get it immediately... Pause

You do it all the time. Why stop now? Nintendo has great games and a nice online experience.-Eikichi Kitsune
 So yeah that just happened, I got a text message saying I am a gaming snob obviously from Eikichi. Look I owned a Wii, it was kind of fun it just wasn't my thing(that and I kinda lost it in the Big D, old folks know what I'm talking about). And the WiiU just looks clunky to me, there I said it the system isn't as powerful as anything else "current Gen"(it's been over 2 years people the all blu ray class is current gen) and honestly I prefer to play people online in my skivvies(TMI but you know honest).

Unpause... say at midnight on release day, or if you keep your prepaid cards loaded(hey everybody gets hacked prepaid cards/prepaid money on the systems that you can buy at your local convenience store is where it's at in my book) as soon as you decide that you want to invest the money in said game has it's benefits. Yes all systems have limited space, Xbox allows you to expand your HD by buying external drives to keep your games on(buy a fresh one kiddies otherwise you lose all your data cause it has to be formatted) and Playstation is working on it, no seriously I heard that you can copy your hard drive you just can't extend it YET without buying a whole new one.

Playstation Plus/PS+

For 17.99 a quarter 49.99 a year you can get access to Playstation Plus, this is the only way to play games online with a PS4 and the only way to get extra games or  content for free on PS3. They sometimes give out like supply bundles for various games you may already own or that they might have given you for free previously in a PS+ release. Now some complain that you don't get a lot of triple A titles this way(major titles Say a Watchdogs, Assassin's Creed, Street Fighter V) just some indy releases. Which is true for the PS4, you get a few triple A ps3 titles off PS+ I know I got Arkham City, Crysis 3, and NBA 2k14 I think that way. It also allows you to download games on you PS Vita(if you happen to own one, I don't Nintendo still makes the best handhelds I am waiting for someone else to catch up. Yes I have gotten Gray hairs in that time) from the PS Store main interface. If you have the Playstation app you can also download games to your appropriate console(which the Xbox app also allows) and if you have it set up in sleep mode will be waiting for you when you get home.

Games with Gold

For 24.99 a quarter or 59.99 a year plus tax(in some venues) you can get Xbox live gold. Now yes When Microsoft originally came out with the Xbox they allowed you to purchase a disc with either 3 months or a year subscription to Xbox live, a headset, and what was about to be a gaming revolution. It's always been 9.99 a month to 60 bucks a year and for that year you get what I feel is the better online experienceX-box one and X-box 360these are the headsets that Microsoft gives you, I don't have the original one for the first X-box but yeah it looked similar. The headset tends to be similar in color to your machine(When I bought my original white xbox 360 I got a white headset that matched the controller) has a mute feature, and a swiveling boom mic it's supposed to let you switch which ear you want to hear it from but meh. I would have done that for the playstation unit buuut I can't find it, it was a single ear type like they used to give you for cellphones before they switched to the stereo headset. Yes both system give you wired mics that go into your headset, the Xbox mic just feels better. You also know that EVERYONE with an Xbox and XBOX LIVE has a headset, they may choose not to use it but this comes in the box with the gaming system. Just like PS+ if you use the same user name on PS3 and PS4 one subscription keeps THAT username online same with Xbox with the bonus of Xbox allowing anybody who uses the same machine to be able to get online without having to own x amount of separate xbox live gold subscriptions. And as I said earlier you do get triple A games when the majority of their run is done, I have season one of Killer Instinct, the basics of DoA, Sunset Overdrive will be free on the 16th of April, even though I doubt I'm gonna play it I went ahead and downloaded Lords of the Fallen. A free game is a free game.


Now it's not like last generation where it was up to the software developer to decide if there would be online content, every system has online gaming INCLUDING NINTENDO(By the way, the guy who got ran off the road a few weeks ago by somebody in Mario Kart, that was Eikichi's son. He's 4, and I guess he didn't like you riding up on him like that bwahahaha) so everybody has some sort of online mode, it may not be an online vs mode but a lot of games have online Co-op so that you and a friend can parade around in a game and beat it together.  There has been talk of Crossplay but who knows as usual fan boys will be fan boys, pretense of "the most trolls are on your network, no your network" will be heard. As someone who has played on both networks, trolls are everywhere it just depends on what match and what time of day you are playing, even PC gamers have troll issues, learn to ban and block and move on.

So about these Triple A games

Like I said Xbox does give you Triple A games MONTHS or YEARS after their initial release, some of them are games that didn't perform as well so that Microsoft can get you to buy the micro transaction stuff, but it's not like Sony doesn't charge you as well. It's kind of hilarious when I hear people complain about micro transactions when they are here to stay, yes Microsoft brought them to the table first with the 360, with the games on arcade as well as some of the content you could buy, but so what? If I want an extra skin, characters before I earned them, or some flashy new weapon before everybody else got it and I had the dough to shell out for it it was my prerogative right, right. Sony gives them out on PS3, which is okay but I wouldn't mind a few triple A's years after their release if I didn't already buy/play them when they first came out. It may happen in the future as Sony continue to taper off it's PS3 releases(not to rain on them because Xbox is also tapering down 360 releases) there are a lot of PS4 exclusives that aren't SONY exclusives (IE don't show up on PS3 and PS4) but that's fine, sooner or later we all have to upgrade do it when you are ready. Most of us do it when there are games we want, personally I say twitch, ustream, and youtube gaming are your friends don't just buy a game outright watch other people play it, or get a gamefly membership. Try before you buy or watch people playing it to see if folks of VARIOUS SKILL LEVELS(don't just watch the folks with 100+ viewers play a game watch various folks) are having fun in a game you aren't sure about.

Before it was everybody had a demo, now it's watching gamers stream their games. Demo's took many forms in the past if you subscribe to Sony's magazine you would get a disk with a few new games on it, and I think within 6 months of a new platform release you had to have to new console or else "no demos for you." it's been years I really don't remember anymore, I haven't subscribed to a gaming magazine in at least 8 years, maybe a decade especially not a console specific one. Now demos are either on the disc with other games(if they come from the same developer) or else available digitally. I mean digital is cool except for you know space issues inside the console you are either gonna have 500 gb or 1 TB depending on when you got your console(as I said Microsoft lets you extend your space to an exterior HD) even thought now all games save a good portion of themselves onto your internal HD.

What do I mean XBL is better than PSN

Look I know what I said and XBL is my preference, first off more people have mics on Xbox live, second the gamers on Xbox seem to know that they will be banned, muted, or bounced. Now yes, that could be any system and yes I actually bought better headsets for both networks(what I like to hear what my team mates are saying) but a lot of folks ain trying to buy extra peripherals I mean Controllers are like 70 bucks this cycle, so I can see people not wanting to spend a dime on Gaming headsets. I mean you can get gaming headsets of all levels depending on how immersive you need to be(I ain spending more than 100 bucks on a headset, yall 250+ folks I bow my heads to you cause I just like to game it ain a JO{job, you know the saying J O B I just cut it short}) and if you want chat and game sound through the headset they can handle it. Some of the more expensive headsets also have exterior sound controls(I don't need all that) but again that's if you are willing to shell out extra dough since the PSN headset given with the console is so crappy I understand people deciding not to use it. Now since mics are optional getting an all mic match is more common on Xbox then Playstation but of course part of it is peoples play styles, the other part is how many curse words, music blasting, and weird noise matches people want to have because mic or no some people just love doing that while gaming. They think it gives them an advantage I guess, surprisingly more of my friends are active on Xbox live than they are on PSN but hey we all game differently.

As everyone knows I came back to Xbox live at the end of the year I took a 5 year hiatus when my 360 died, plus I was waiting for games I really wanted to play. Now some folks would have just bought a new Xbox, I wanted a blu ray player so of course I got a ps3, now that the world is almost all digital though it's a nice feature to have but no longer a necessity. I enjoy gaming on both platforms but XBL does seem to be a better medium for me at the moment for online multiplayer. I have a few digital games, on both systems but for NOW I am still a gaming dinosaur who prefers his physical copy. Jump in with your opinions on online gaming, how you feel about Games with Gold vs PS plus triple A gaming wise as well as where you feel you find the most trolls. As always comments are open and you can always feel free to say what ya thinking.


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