Is Single-Player Gaming Dead?

Believe it or not there was a time when gaming wasn't as social of an event as it was today. Lots of games were single-player experiences and that's the way we liked it. We jumped into a world, spent hours there, and didn't feel socially irresponsible after doing so. If you were itching for social gaming, you went to an arcade, and it would satisfy every multiplayer itch you could possibly have. But those days are long gone, arcades are all but vanquished from the West, and solo gamers are looked down upon. Kotaku's Michael McWhertor has an interesting article about it.

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There is some cause for concern for the solo-only player. Massively successful games like Infinity Ward's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Valve's Left 4 Dead offered shorter campaign modes in favor of a more robust multiplayer feature set. And StarCraft fans may be more than perturbed about the late release of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, already sliced into three campaigns, largely due to delays with Battle.net, Blizzard's multiplayer service.

If more publishers and developers follow suit in shifting more focus to multiplayer, will the lone wolf suffer?

The addition of multiplayer to games that have relied on their single player strengths is done for a number of reasons, the most obvious of which is that the game buying public has simply come to expect it as a series sequelizes and evolves. It's an oft-demanded feature from the community, even in series that tend to be strictly single-player.

Personally I don't expect games to be multiplayer, and sometimes I really don't want it! But the gaming atmosphere has changed drastically over the last twenty years, could multiplayer games now be considered the norm?
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Nintendo's "Kind-Code"...Game Killer or Killer Game?

Not too long ago, Nintendo revealed a new mode in their upcoming Wii game New Super Mario Bros. that would essentially guide novice players through a level they found too hard. Immediately the gaming world exploded, cried foul, rioted, and lambasted Nintendo with the greatest of insults. And perhaps rightfully so. The idea that there was an option in a game that essentially played the game for me would make some gaming vets believe that the video game developer has catered so wholly to the casual crowd that they don't even care about making the player finish on their own. A game killer indeed, right?

Well new information has come up, some that sheds more light on the new mode. Officially called the "Super Guide", the mode only comes into effect when a player dies 8 times in a level. The mode will use Luigi to show the player how to get past a difficult portion of the game, allowing the player to pick up at any time and continue playing. Lastly, one can choose whether or not to enable the game mode. Not so terrible, right? It gets even more not...terrible. Sources say that the inclusion of the "helper" mode gives Nintendo the ability to make New Super Mario Bros. for the Wii even more difficult than usual! Since the lowest skilled players are already taken care of by the system, Nintendo can make the rest of the game as hardcore as they'd like, ensuring that the "core" gamers won't be left out in the cold. On the contrary, they will be more challenged than ever before in a Mario game. Cool beans, eh? Check out the video to see the game in action:

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Uncharted 2...What's the Big Deal?

Metacritic gives it an astounding 97%.

Adam Sessler, host of G4's X-Play, calls it "the best single player experience I have ever played".

Bold words. For the past few days the gaming world has been abuzz with reviews pouring in from all the most trusted sites for this Playstation 3 exclusive, and they've all been stellar. I don't know about you, but stuff like this generally makes me skeptical. No game is perfect, not even the oft praised Ocarina of Time, and I want to know what reviewers didn't like about the game. For example, Michael McWhertor of Kotaku fame said that the multiplayer was fun, but not genre defining, which doesn't sound perfect to me. What's more, from all the reviews I've been reading, the single-player is still as linear as the first, and I was almost sure this was an age when open world "sandboxes" reigned supreme. Obviously Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is, like its predecessor, trying to bring a cinematic flair to a genre that's probably been needing one for a long time. Blockbuster movies are not "choose-your-adventure", they're linear rollercoasters that are meant to keep you guessing. From what we've seen, Uncharted 2 follows this movie example quite a bit, with co-op added to the mix:
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You have to admit, that looks like fun. That looks like stupid fun. I guess I'll just have to wait and see for myself if the hype is justified or not.

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PS3 "Real Triggers"

I'm not sure if everyone else has already seen and purchased these, but I've only recently been turned on to them and they're great. IGN has a review on the peripherals here. Basically, there are a lot of people out there who want a PS3 but have a problem with the controller's triggers. And that's understandable, while certain games feel fine with the "marshmallow" triggers, other games, like shooters, don't seem so hot. But now there's a new peripheral called the "real triggers" that allows PS3 owners to transform their old duddy triggers into hot FPS fraggin' ones! Observe!:


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Warfare Comes Home

Back in 2005 I was a Battlefield 2 fiend. I thought there was nothing greater than getting a squad with five of my friends, hijacking a tank and barreling through the Pakistani desert, recklessly swerving past enemy land mines,emptying clips and grenades at pursuing vehicles. It was pure fun. But it had one major flaw; there was no story to it, no single-player of any kind. There was once a time when war games belonged almost exclusively to those small fraternity of PC gamers who had rigs powerful enough to run them. At that time, cinematics wasn't at the forefront of game design and a war game that was entirely multiplayer was seen as a norm of the industry.
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But things have changed. When consoles once again took center stage in the video gaming world, suddenly there was a much wider audience exposed to these types of games, and the jump in technology allowed developers to create truly cinematic masterpieces that could rival Hollywood. And in recent history, one of the gaming franchises that have managed to garner critical and commercial acclaim for its story AND multiplayer was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. Thankfully, a sequel was planned, is in the works, and has a BRAND NEW TRAILER! Observe:


Amazing stuff isn't it? The entire online world is buzzing with the intensity of the new trailer, and who could blame them? If looks could kill, half of the people on the Internet would be dead from the beauty of this beast. Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 is slated for release on November 10th, only a month away! And it's available for PC, Xbox 360, and Playstation 3! But what about those of us who loved the Battlefield series? Have we been cast aside, relics of a bygone era, destined to abandon those wonderfully entertaining multiplayer war games of yesteryear? Of course not! Battlefield Bad Company 2 may be coming out much later than Modern Warfare 2 (March of 2010), but that doesn't mean it still won't kick ass. Check out this awesome trailer showcasing the frantic action you can expect next year!:

Destructable environments? Air strikes? A bevy of vehicles at my disposal? Count me in. Warfare has finally come home, and it's looking brilliant!
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Gender and Video Games

I used to love G.I. Joe action figures as a kid. My father, new to the United States, felt it was a great way to get me to appreciate this wonderful country by emulating those who defended it. Many hours were spent creating war strategies; making forts behind mounds of sand and mapping covert operations around ant hills. Feeding Cobra to my dog. Sigh. When I was young, G.I. Joe toys used to look like this:

And now they look like this:

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See a difference? Growing up in an increasingly cynical youth culture, I've heard the old adage about the portrayal of women in the media a lot. I've heard about the model photos, the "sex sells" ads, and of course, how video games continue to perpetuate an unrealistic standard of beauty. And I'm not saying I disagree. I mean, not to pick on them, but Platinum Games' new heroine Bayonetta, is a butt-kicking scenester, complete with thick rimmed black glasses, pale skin, a beauty mark...and a suit made out of her own hair. Her design was very intentional, and the undeniable sexuality of her character is far from accidental. All the way down to her butt. Yeah.

But guys see a lot of images in gaming too. There was a time when long eared archers who didn't wear pants were the norm, whereas now, with the aide of the Unreal 3 engine, the likes of Marcus Fenix riddle the gaming universe. Doesn't look good does it?
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But here's the facts: I'm a young twenty-something who will never EVER look like Marcus Fenix. My girlfriend does NOT look like Bayonetta (or Lara Croft for that matter), and I don't expect her to ever do so. And from what I can from all the relationships I know of, there just aren't many women out there who expect guys to look like Fenix (or to have guns with chainsaws on it). Yet we can all play these games, full of these images, and not have it affect our realistic expectations of beauty. And Gears of War 2 was all kinds of fun. I mean, if you play games right now you're not automatically a sexist right?
Right?

Let the GAMES (and toys) Begin! (again)

As you can see, I haven't posted here in a VERY long time. I couldn't decide what I wanted to do with the site, so I took some time off from it to figure it out. So now I'm back, with lots of new offers, free stuff, and all the gaming and toy news I can think of. You never know what I'll find so be sure to stick around!

And first up on our menu:

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Beatles Rock Band! Everyone's talking about it, everyone loves it, and Ringo Starr has finally become a popular Beatle! I kid, everyone loves Ringo. And everyone knows when you're smacking those Rock Band drums, trying to emulate Ringo's solo from Get Back, you'll fall for him too. Check out this video of someone doing just that!

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