Chris Kohler over at Wired has compiled a list of the games and franchises that used to be exclusive to Sony, but are now making their way onto other platforms. There has been quite a bit of debate on what losing exclusivity spells for Sony, without much consensus. Are developers losing confidence in the PS3? Do they want to reach as wide an audience as possible? Is the industry going all homogeneous on us? I’m of the opinion that this is all fairly innocuous, but it’s worth considering whether individual consoles will lose their identity, so to speak, when their hallmark games appear everywhere at once.
1up has a story about one Michael Gallagher, who recently took over Doug Lowenstein’s position as president of the Entertainment Software Association. Where Lowenstein tended to refrain from making any waves in the arena of policy until after he resigned, Gallagher has at least a stated desire to move the ESA deeper into the legislative process, the better to safeguard your hobby, my dear. He wants to ESA more connected at the federal level of government, which I’ve got a few misgivings about, seeing as how these game policy decisions really ought to be made at the state level. Or, hell, the parental level.
Can you imagine what the brainstorming session at Sony marketing must look like? "Let’s inflame race relations!" caw the suits. "Let’s slaughter a goat!" And then, from the corner, a mousey little girl in thick glasses says, "Can we tap somehow into the public’s love of great literature?" And, eventually, they do.
I mentioned an interview last week with Telltale Games regarding their decotion to the episodic release model, but GameSetWatch brings us an honest-to-god video on the topic, featuring Dave Grossman and Kevin Bruner telling their tales. The video comes from the Independent Games Summit, which took place earlier this year, but which most of us probably didn’t attend. It’s good stuff, if you can take a lecture on your Tuesday. Go here.
Finally today, a little news to crush your spirit: No online multiplayer for Metroid Prime 3. Not a huge shocker, really, but kind of disapponting nonetheless, with so few online capable Wii games coming out, much less high-profile ones.