Recent Comments:
Joyswag: Resident Evil 5 Red Xbox 360 Elite Bundle {Joystiq}
Mar 11th 2009 4:24PM Play Peggle. On Any Device.
Study links violent video games and physically aggressive behavior {Joystiq}
Nov 4th 2008 2:51PM Immediately subtracting marks for using statistics provided by the Institute on Media and the Family and various 'killographic' references. But then, I don't know if anyone noticed, but this study was authored by the Director of Research at the IoMatF, Doug Gentile....which automatically causes me to question the study's objectivity, especially as Gentile doesn't mention that in the footnotes when saying that the Institute had no relation to the report. A group that is at odds with the PTA looses a little notch on the 'fair-dealer' scale, IMHO.
They appear to have employed an odd methodology, here. Different sample sizes, different group age distributions, different interview length periods and different testing methodologies are all present, making you wonder why they weren't consistent in their approach.
The US kids were asked to list three games versus the Japanese kids being asked for eight. The third group was asked for genre, and the scientists assigned violence scores to the genres, as opposed to the other two groups, who assigned violence scores themselves. The aggression measurements were similarly different, with the Japanese study asking about specific violent behaviors in the previous month while the US study was 'an index of teacher, peer and self-reports'. Control was made for gender and pre-existing violence, but NOT for pre-existing HVGV exposure. It should be noted that they talk about the definition of aggression, then proceed to ignore it when doing the test and only examining violent aggression, for some reason.
Finally, quoting US youth violence numbers (without reflecting on the rise of video games and the continued lowering of youth violence numbers) seems specious. Further, the fact that they don't address the issue of Japanese youth violence statistics (presumably because they refute the study's hypothesis) is noteworthy. It's been a few years since I took a statistics class, but those df values seem a tad high...but honestly, I couldn't say with anything resembling certainty.
What I can say is this is a report from a group that I don't place a lot of faith in and that doesn't seem to have formulated a very good study. That it was placed in Pediatrics, a minimum peer-reviewed publication, is sort of telling as well (as were their previous studies). It also appears that other researchers have begun criticizing the study's flaws, as well. There's that Peer Reviewed part coming into play:
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/eletters/122/5/e1067
EA: 'There will be a Mercenaries 3' {Joystiq}
Nov 4th 2008 8:39AM Unbalanced final mission?
You mean because you thought it was too easy? Because it certainly wasn't hard.
Fanswag: Dead Space Launch Week Giveaway #2 [update] {Joystiq Xbox}
Oct 16th 2008 9:11AM Death.
Death Death Death Death Deathy Death.
The fear of just STOPPING. FOREVER.
Sony: No price cuts this holiday season {Joystiq}
Oct 8th 2008 11:47AM Sony can't AFFORD to cut prices. That's why they just change the internal hardware and bundle things with it. They've already posted massive losses in the development and sales of the PS3. Bluray's victory has been mostly Pyrrhic for Sony, as consumers simply aren't adopting Bluray with any great speed.
The simple fact is that the Wii has won, regardless of the desires of the hardcore. It leads in every market and has penetrated pop culture in a way that the other two consoles have not. The lie that the Wii has no good games only is true if you assume that the everyone owns at least one other console in addition to the Wii. The Force Unleashed, for example, owes 15% of it's sales to the Wii. Someone with two consoles would get the PS3/360 version, but the Wii has it...something that was NOT the case in the old Dreamcast days, when you would see games kept much more exclusive.
Sony's sales have remained steady because many of the Wii60 owners have been back-filling their catalog. In the US, the 360 has literally sold twice as many units as the PS3. The trick is that the Wii has been perennially constrained...and I suspect that during the Holiday season, Wii sales will ramp up accordingly (by design on Ninty's part). The 360 has managed to break the Nintendo price barrier...and that may make them a serious contender this holiday.
The PS3 needs an edge...and hardcore games alone isn't going to do it. The Bluray player has accounted for a lot of the PS3's sales in the US...but LBP alone will not salvage the mess that that is their sales position. LBP's selling point is that it's a truly unique exclusive, which is good. But Sony has to fit the juggernauts of Wii Fit and Gears of War 2, which have market penetration. They have to fight the synergy of Netflix and the appeal of WiiWare and XBLA. The PS3 store is a ghost town, comparatively. Synergy with other Sony products is great, but they need a Grand Slam, not a single. Depending on the long tail is a recipe for third place, IMHO.
iN DEMAND confirms MOJO HD cancellation {Engadget HD}
Oct 8th 2008 8:22AM Since I switched to FIOS, the only thing I missed from Comcast was Three Sheets on MOJO. Most of MOJO's content was lame, especially after they dropped all the INHD1/2 content.
Three Sheets was pretty darned popular, though, and will probably find a home on some place like the Travel Channel or Spike. It's a little too racy for Food Network (and this show ON Food Network feels like weak sauce comparatively).
Counting Rupees: Bust Blox {Joystiq}
Jun 20th 2008 8:24AM Quick quiz: how many copies did Carnival Games sell in it's first month? If you said 48,000 copies, you'd be right. Second quiz: how many copies did Carnival Games end up selling? If you said it sold over A MILLION COPIES, then Gold Star for you.
Those who say they haven't seen Boom Blox ads clearly don't watch Cartoon Network, Jetix or similar stations. They also seem to confuse 'advertising where adults will see it' and 'a game I can play with my kids' as meaning something different than what Spielberg meant. A single 25 year-old guy not seeing an ad for it is hardly the same thing as a 40 year-old mom or dad seeing it when watching Chowder or Flapjack with their kids.
Boom Blox will most likely benefit from the Long Tail, like many Nintendo first party titles. The Long Tail is what gave Zak and Wiki its 300K sales numbers, which is what EA's boss essentially said. The expectations of analysts don't count as much as the expectations of the publisher.
Puzo's son sues Paramount for Godfather game money {Joystiq}
Jun 19th 2008 4:27PM Um, should that read 1972? Puzo was hardly unknown by the time of Godfather III.
Boom Blox a bust at retail, sells only 60k units {Joystiq}
Jun 16th 2008 2:21PM It's been marketed...just not to you. I've been seeing Boom Blox ads in constant rotation when I watch TV with my kids. And the ads have only picked up in recent weeks, probably in an effort to get sales to pick up. I'll be interested in June's numbers more than May's, since they've advertised more this month than last.
Boom Blox a bust at retail, sells only 60k units {Joystiq}
Jun 16th 2008 2:12PM Good Point. That's how two Resident Evil games, two Sonic games, Carnival Games, Guitar Hero III, Raving Rabbids and Red Steel all got to be in the million-seller category. For having Mario in them. Oh wait, only Mario and Sonic at the Olympics actually did that.
The Wii has 22 million-seller titles. Of those, 8 are third party. Of those 8, Mario is in exactly one. Of the Wii's First party million-sellers, 8 of those don't feature Mario at all. I would argue that SSBM should count, even though it features Mario on the cast.
Either way, it's demonstrably wrong that 3rd party titles sell on the Wii and that only Mario sells.
