eq2 summit

If you come here regularly, you are probably wondering what's up with EQ2 in some capacity.

We had some peeps out here for a summit, and I got to meet some new faces and see some familiar friends like Kendricke, RadarX and Coyote.

I had a pretty interesting conversation with a guy from our boards named Tebos who carries the torch for our hardware forums and I also had a good talk with some podcast peeps.

Getting to meet the players of our game might be the most fun and rewarding aspect of my job. While I just love making content for a game I love, I really like to meet the players and get to know them. They are just like me, big fans of gaming. They are my people!

I don't know where I'm going with this. It's just nice to know that there are people out there that are as passionate about gaming as I am. I am not all consumed by gaming, but it is an important part of my life being a hobby and a job for me. I try my best to let these players know that I am no different than they are, just a little lucky when I sent my resume in.

The Nintendo Wii Conspiracy

Did you think I was going to let Nintendo off on this blog? Think again!

All is not the land of wine and roses in Nintendland and so many would lead you to believe. I know your grandma and uncle are enamored with Wii Sports, and you are probably giddy that the family is actually approving of video game use for the first time in your life, but I can't help but be the bad guy and point out the issues I've had since I got my Wii.

First off, I haven't relayed the tale of my coming to get one.

I did the all nighter line wait at a Target store to get mine. I was number 17 in line. By the time they opened the doors I was number 32 in line. So many people were there to scalp systems, that they had family members showing up in pajamas to get in line in front of me, and all of the suckers behind me. This is not a lie! It was unbelieveable.

Well that day, is the beginning of my fatal mistake. I only bought one Wii remote, because it was hard enough to convince my wife to let me get the system in the first place having just bought a PS3. Throwing in another 30 bucks for a remote, and 20 for a nunchuck was just not gonna happen.

Silly Silly Steve. Oh, how naive I was!

I haven't seen another remote control for the Wii since that fateful day. Not until today that is, because my wife got Wii Play for me, which came with one. It doesn't really count though, because it's still not a wiimote from off of the shelf. I mean, why would they have those?

Store after store I have searched since November for a stinking CONTROLLER for the game system I already own. Sure, they have classic controllers and nunchucks, both of which are completely freakin' useless without a wiimote to connect to it. Tell me how that works!

Sure, all of the big Nintendo fans are attributing the shortage to the shortage of systems. But how can that be? They made one per system? Why would they do that? Why would they have more extra controllers than remotes? It MAKES NO SENSE!

It all makes sense though now that Wii Play is here. We have to buy up stock of their crappy demo game with a "bonus" controller inside. Believe me when I tell you that it is not more than a demo disk. The games are poor at best.

So, what's the Conspiracy?

I don't know, it's just a catchy title.

But seriously. So many people on various websites are quick to take a dump on the PS3 when you can even find a Wii in any stores, or at the very least the accessories that are made for the system. No component cables and no remotes. What is the point of this?

Since when did the fact that a company can actually manufacture enough systems to get on the shelves equal that the system is a failure? I don't see how PS3 having a million plus systems in people's homes equates a failure. Nintendo's success is measured on the fact that you can't get it anywhere? What is this? Bizarro world? Not being able to buy something is a BAD THING. Maybe I'm crazy, but when I go to the store to buy something, I like for it to be on the shelf. I generally don't get a big kick out of going to store after store for months on end just to find something as a controller for my game system. In fact. It pisses me off!

Lets talk about the Wii now. The novelty of being tired every time I play is starting to wear thin. The lack of any resolution beyond that of 480p is very apparent on my plasma screen tv, and the game library that I do have has relatively second rate graphics, with Zelda being the exception.

The most fun I've had with the system is the virtual console. For example, I had some friends over and we passed the controller (the only one I have) over and over trying to communally beat Super Mario Brothers. Good times. SMB actually looks better on the Wii than I've ever seen it before, which is kinda nice.

Other than that, I don't care about the weather channel. Making Miis is fun. The Voting thing is worthless, and the Opera browser is kinda sorta neat.

The browser is pretty good compared to most game system browsers but the awful resolution of the Wii really shows when you try to read text on any website.

Now we get to the boggling friend matching features. Trying to connect myself to a friend through my Wii is like pulling teeth. For some reason, I can never seem to get it correctly set up. Either you use their email or try using a friend code. WHICH IS IT? Why do I have to learn a freaking 16 digit code that means nothing to me in order to try to connect to someone? The margin for error here is great. I screw this up all the time. # of friends I have with wiis are at least 10. # of friends i've successfully negotiated friendship connections with my system is 3. Why is this so hard? It's nuts. Its univerally frustrating. I don't know anyone who doesn't feel this way.

And I'm spent.

Microsoft XBox360 Service

If you should stumble upon this blog, please heed this missive before you buy an Xbox360. Buy the warranty in the store, or find a store to purchase your system that has a liberal return policy.

Attempting to get your system fixed once it breaks will be a nightmare, trust me. If you don't trust me, trust the countless others on messageboards around the world or on famous gaming blog sites like Kotaku, Evilavatar, or Joystick. You will find hundreds of horror stories about the customer service and the poor quality of the Xbox360.

Spare yourself what I am going through for example. My 360 broke sometime last summer, I didn't want to pay the 150 dollars to repair my unit because of the poor 90 day warranty that Microsoft had so I just held on to the system wondering what I was going to do about it. December 22, I heard that they changed their warranty policy to a year to try and cover the multitudes of broken systems that probably are pouring in along with all of the complaints of their customers. So, I decide to go ahead and try to fix it.

First they get my address wrong and send the box I need to send the machine back to them in to someone elses house. After some phone calls, I got it delivered to my work. A day later I ship it out, wait 2 weeks without ever hearing whether or not it arrived, got fixed, or anything. I eventually had to call them, found out they were shipping my machine to the wrong address and had to call UPS again and have them ship it to my work again to make sure someone didn't just steal my 400 dollar game system.

I get the system, bring it home, hook it up, and it crashes after 10 minutes of use. No game playing, just looking through the new TV options in the browser menus. Over and over it crashes. They send me a defective machine.

So I call them, they send me a new box, I send it back out, and now two weeks have gone by without a word. I check the support page on their website and it says I have no repairs pending. I email their customer service, and they say the can't tell me about repairs by email. What the hell is email customer service for then? So, right now 2 weeks have gone by, I don't know if they got my system, if they fixed it, or if it is heading back to me. No clue. Their email customer service couldn't tell me any of this, and now I have to call during business hours to find out what the fuck is going on.

Don't bother with Microsoft Customer Service. You will only be pissed off like I am and thousands of others. Buy the EB games warranty or whatever warranty you can get so you can just take it to the store, because it WILL break.

All of these people who go around talking smack on websites saying that customers like myself are lying about our problems are horribly deluded and will fall off of their high horses all the more painfully when they are put through this as well. Its not a matter of if your 360 will fail, it is a matter of when.

For the record, the only game system to ever fail me in the past was a PS2. It died after about 3 years of use, and actually worked pretty well, but I let a friend mess around with it's guts, because he thought he could give it a cleaning and dropped a screwdriver on the board and fried it with the power on (yeah i know, stupid).

Of the current gen systems, my Wii has crashed once on me. My PS3 has never crashed on me even once.

All of this is coming from a guy that has worked in the game industry for close to 13 years. I've worked on ALOT of game systems. I've never seen hardware fail as much as the 360. Had I still worked at Midway, I probably would come across bricked systems as part of my daily routine of supervising the QA department. I am curious about this actually, I might ask the guy in charge of inventory over there, but generally dev systems are different than what you and I play at home.

I'm do disappointed by this. I love the system, its games, and especially its online connectivity via xbox live. It's too bad that this house that looks so great from the outside is made of cards.