The Digital Pulse 05.28.07: The Beta Backlash
Posted by Joshua Richey on 05.28.2007
Wait, are people really complaining about the graphics in a freaking beta?
Yeah, so this edition of The Digital Pulse is a bit late… wanna fight about it? Been a pretty hectic week at work, plus I turned 23 in the last week. I'd like to brag about how drunk I got and how many crazy things that I did on my birthday… but I'm still not sure if that stuff is acceptable at 23. Is it? Getting publically intoxicated and making an ass of yourself is still ‘okay' to do at that age right? I mean, it's not like I'm 24. Someone needs to let me know how this works.
The response that the Halo 3 beta has generated since its release just over a week ago has been very intriguing to me. I guess what amuses me is the sheer amount of differing opinions on the beta. Some gamers are in love with it, while others find it to be very disappointing. It continues to amaze me that 2,000 people can play the same game, watch the same movie, or read the same book and in the end you'll get 2,000 completely different opinions.
It appears that the largest complaint amongst gamers about the Halo 3 beta is that the graphics are "bad". It's really a ridiculous thing to say. I mean, c'mon, look at it… you lose any and all credibility if you were to say that the graphics are bad. It's just pure idiocy to say something like that. When you translate these people's drivel, you find that what they mean is that that Halo 3 doesn't look all that much better than Halo 2; which may or may not be true. This is a beta, and we're still not sure if this is how the final game will look. But even if Halo 3 looks like this beta that we've been given, I won't be disappointed. The last time I checked, Halo 2 was a pretty damn good looking game; by far one of the best looking on the Xbox.
But for those dumbasses who think this – and for those that like to base their opinions off of those said dumbasses – here is a great video that GameTrailers put together that shows the obvious differences in graphics.
Now, another complaint that the beta's critics have to offer up is that this doesn't feel all that different than Halo 2's multiplayer. Again, I don't want to resort to petty name-calling… but seriously, what in the hell is wrong with these people? The last time that I checked, Halo 2 was the best multiplayer experience available on a console.... am I wrong? It's the most popular and the most played multiplayer game out there. Why? Not because of its popularity, but because it's good… damn good. So why would Bungie re-invent anything with the multiplayer? The levels are larger, the weapons are enhanced, and the experience has been heightened in every way imaginable.
In the time that I've spent with the Halo 3 beta, I've been nothing but impressed with how great the multiplayer is. As good as Halo 2's was – this is by far better. It looks better, it runs smoother, and it's just the absolute most fun that I've had with my 360 in a while. Bungie has gone through this time and fixed some of the problems that we had with Halo 2's multiplayer. For example, the plasma sword hasn't been toned down as far as destruction goes – but it does now ware down the more and more that you use it. They've also added cool new guns like the flamethrower, the Spartan laser, and the impressive bubble shield.
Yes, I am in love with the Halo 3 beta. Don't for a second mistake me for being a Halo fanboy either. Up until this point, I've thought that the Halo franchise was one of the most overrated franchises in this industry. I didn't go into Halo 3's beta wanting to like it or not like it – but once I did, I couldn't help but to be impressed.
It's also a great sign for how the game is shaping up when people are forced to bitch about the graphics in a beta version of a game. It's a real good sign. If we've learned anything in life thus far, we know that one thing is definite: no matter what happens in life… no matter how big or small… there will always be people there to bitch and complain about it. In regards to Halo 3, most of these critics are fanboys of other franchises or consoles and want nothing more than to see Halo fall flat on its face. To those people I say this: grow up, get a life, and go back to playing all 2 of your decent Wii games.
QUICKIE:Nope. No quickie for you this week. The only decent thing that I've played recently is the Halo 3 beta, and as you just read above… I kind of liked it. I am looking forward to playing Command and Conquer 3 though; I'm just not sure I can fit a game like that into my busy schedule right now.
EYE CANDY: I have a couple of videos to share with you this week. First, it's the awesome new trailer for Splinter Cell: Conviction. I doubt that Ubisoft is going to come right out and say ‘yeah, we basically wanted to turn Sam Fischer into Jason Bourne', but that's pretty much what they've done. Hey, I'm not here to judge. I love the Bourne Identity movies. It appears that in Splinter Cell: Conviction, there will be less on an emphasis on using stealth. It's big change for the franchise, but with these cool environment animations that they've got going on in the in-game footage, I can't wait.
Fast Food Nation & Freakanomics
I made a trip out to Borders the other night (which completely kicks Barnes & Nobles ass BTW) and picked up a couple of books that I'd like to in turn recommend to you. First we have a book called Fast Food Nation. I've been trying to stop my habit of going to fast food joints for a few months now. I'm not fat or out-of-shape or anything, it's just a nasty habit that I've been trying to break myself from. I can't cook, and I'm often so busy that the convenience of fast food is just too much to withstand. Then I was recommended to Fast Food Nation.
Needless to say, I've not eaten fast food since I've started it. But I suppose that Amazon can describe it better than I…
On any given day, one out of four Americans opts for a quick and cheap meal at a fast-food restaurant, without giving either its speed or its thriftiness a second thought. Fast food is so ubiquitous that it now seems as American, and harmless, as apple pie. But the industry's drive for consolidation, homogenization, and speed has radically transformed America's diet, landscape, economy, and workforce, often in insidiously destructive ways. Eric Schlosser, an award-winning journalist, opens his ambitious and ultimately devastating exposé with an introduction to the iconoclasts and high school dropouts, such as Harlan Sanders and the McDonald brothers, who first applied the principles of a factory assembly line to a commercial kitchen. Quickly, however, he moves behind the counter with the overworked and underpaid teenage workers, onto the factory farms where the potatoes and beef are grown, and into the slaughterhouses run by giant meatpacking corporations. Schlosser wants you to know why those French fries taste so good (with a visit to the world's largest flavor company) and "what really lurks between those sesame-seed buns." Eater beware: forget your concerns about cholesterol, there is--literally--feces in your meat.
The second book was a book called Freakonomics. I've only read a little of it here and there thus far, but I can't wait until I finish Fast Food Nation so that I can start on this book. It's so compelling. Here's some more of Amazon…
Economics is not widely considered to be one of the sexier sciences. The annual Nobel Prize winner in that field never receives as much publicity as his or her compatriots in peace, literature, or physics. But if such slights are based on the notion that economics is dull, or that economists are concerned only with finance itself, Steven D. Levitt will change some minds. In Freakonomics (written with Stephen J. Dubner), Levitt argues that many apparent mysteries of everyday life don't need to be so mysterious: they could be illuminated and made even more fascinating by asking the right questions and drawing connections. For example, Levitt traces the drop in violent crime rates to a drop in violent criminals and, digging further, to the Roe v. Wade decision that preempted the existence of some people who would be born to poverty and hardship. Elsewhere, by analyzing data gathered from inner-city Chicago drug-dealing gangs, Levitt outlines a corporate structure much like McDonald's, where the top bosses make great money while scores of underlings make something below minimum wage. And in a section that may alarm or relieve worried parents, Levitt argues that parenting methods don't really matter much and that a backyard swimming pool is much more dangerous than a gun. These enlightening chapters are separated by effusive passages from Dubner's 2003 profile of Levitt in The New York Times Magazine, which led to the book being written. In a book filled with bold logic, such back-patting veers Freakonomics, however briefly, away from what Levitt actually has to say. Although maybe there's a good economic reason for that too, and we're just not getting it yet.
In closing...
In closing, I would just like to thank everyone for taking the time to read me. I don't mean to go all sentimental on you, but I've now been writing for this website for a year now. It's a pretty big deal to me. We (writers) don't get paid for this, and it's a lot bigger commitment to write a weekly article than you'd think. But Ashish has provided us with a pretty big stage to work on our craft; which means the world to aspiring writers like myself.
So in the last year, I've managed to piss off a lot of Nintendo fanboys, EA, the creator of Battlebots, Bill Sindelair, and Jack Thompson... just think about what the next year has in store!
