What Would Matt Do

This is our example today: " Is the Console War Good for Gaming?" on a site called Game World Network.

Here's two things you can do to really bother me when you're writing articles. One, come up with a half assed not well thought out point. Two, do it on a site that is more adds than article. Lets cover each of these points seperately.

Point #1:

I'm sure our good author, Seleeke Flingai, believes what he's saying… Here's his point, summed pretty nicely:

The console war brings with it great competition, which has created some of the best consoles around. But the console war has also had its share of casualties - some of which were some of the best consoles around. And that is why I think the console war, despite all of its good intentions, is not good for gaming.

So, if I'm reading this correctly, he doesn't like it that some companies don't make it when they compete… Ok, that's an interesting point of view. Except that it's completely silly. What does he want? Not to have companies compete? To nominate one company and let them be the only console maker? Competition is good. We get better consoles because of it. We get better games because of it and we getter prices because of it (can anyone say Wii?). Sure, some companies and consoles fall by the way side, but that's the beauty of competition, the strong survive. Duh.

Point #2:

Did you see that site? It's about 20 words of article and the rest is ads and links and junk. Who thinks that's a good idea? Is the plan for me to accidentally click on a link that will make them money? If the title of the article hadn't been so ludicrous in the first place, I wouldn't have even bothered past the first page. This is a note to ALL websites that think you'll make money if you your ad to content ration is about 90% ad, 10% content, STOP IT! Really. Or, just add some blink tags and be done with it. For the love of all.

What Would Matt Do: Give the designer of the site a fine and sit down poor Seleeke and explain the nature of competition to him.

As I sit here reading Marvel Civil War (and trying to figure out which order I should be reading this in not to spoil myself…screw Marvel on that point), I'm thinking I should be posting about the following:

This is how a friend has re-imagined the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles™. You can read the post on why. I mucho impressed and thought I'd share.

Oh, and don't tell anyone, but he made a wallpaper version of Donatello. It's on my laptop at work right now…so when ever I lock my computer, Mr. Scary Eyes is staring at everyone. It brings a bit of joy to me day. And for that, I thank Ray, for he is a man among men. Or at the least, an animal lover among men. And apparently I'm not the only one .

What Would Matt Do: Pass it around. It's both really good art and really interesting statement about our childhood. I'm in love with the turtle. 

(as seen on /.) 

I must say, I'm pretty surprised any console developer is going to allow indie development on their system. But, if it was going to be any of them, it had to be Microsoft since they have really working towards Vista becoming the next gaming setup. I think Microsoft is doing this one thing right… The PC and the console don't have to be competitors. There is more than enough game business in a bajillion dollar (and growing) industry to go around to all parties that want to be effort in. And to some that don't.

But all of that aside, this is incredibly cool. Why? Because it will foster games that may not be the same cookie cutter games we get these days. We won't get another sports games because they are already done better than any guy in his garage can. Well, maybe the graphics would be better at the big houses. But we're going to get all kinds of new games. Maybe we'll get text adventure hybrids (something along the lines of choose your own adventure), we'll most definitely get mimics of the classics (frogger, pac man, pong, tetris, etc)… but after is the key. We might get something new, something different, something that doesn't require the artists by the boatload to make. Something both fun and different. Maybe.

At the worst, we'll get to have fun playing with our XBox in a whole different way.

What Would Matt Do: Love it! So very much. Well, maybe not quite that much strange guy in the corner…ewww. 

Well, for one, they are closing. Well, more or less morphing. Into what you ask? A game ranking site.

I know, you were just thinking, “boy, we really could use another game rankings site. I mean those other guys just don’t put numbers together like I like.”

Funny thing is, they don’t, you probably just didn’t realize it. How do I know this? Well, Metafuture has posted some data they will be using to create their new review numbers. If you notice, IGN numbers are skewed very high and towards whole numbers. If you take that into account instead of just taking their given number, it will change the review. Now take that theory and the same thing with other big sites and magazine scores. Why, you might actually have a useful service.

From Mr. Gallant’s fingers to your eyes:

Metafuture will improve the service that sites like GameRankings provide. Put a better way, we will create the service that those sites attempt to provide. First of all, we’ll cut down on the number of review outlets. There’s no need to have a huge number of reviews for a game to provide a useful aggregated score. Magazines and the top websites will be just fine.

Second comes the funny part. Games will still get an average score from all contributing reviews. But a site’s contribution to that average will depend on that site’s own individual normal curve— with the immediate left and right of the bell’s tip signifying three stars on a scale of one to five. Watch the drama as the biggest sweethearts see their 8.4 score for Gun and Car IV get pegged as three stars.

It sounds like it might work. And might be useful.

What Would Matt Do: Pay attention. Gallant is a funny man with smarts behind him and this could be a useful service compared to previous offerings.