411 Games Fact or Fiction 07.23.07: The Push for Casual Games, Emotion Engineless PS3s, Next-gen Turok, Unreal Tournament III, and More!

Posted by Tommy Coloma on 07.23.2007

411's Damian Sarcuni and Owain Brimfield tell us what they think about the increasing proliferation of casual games, the necessity of the Emotion Engine, Turok on the 360 and PS3, Peter Moore's departure, Capcom's new fighting game, and Unreal Tournament III in this edition of Fact or Fiction Games!

Welcome to another edition of Fact or Fiction. This week Damian Sarcuni and Owain J. Brimfield return to give us their opinions on some of today's most important issues.

Every Monday Damian brings us Angry Gaming, the column where he takes a look at the "nuances and features of all your favorite video games." This week he takes a look at the ins and outs of co-op play. He also does reviews, the latest being one for Transformers: Autobots for the Nintedo DS. In addition, he writes 411 MMA Smacktalk and 411mania's Bodog Fight for the MMA section.

Owain J. Brimfield writes The Wonder Years, "the column where all gamers of a certain age come to wallow in 16-bit nostalgia." The latest one focuses on Micro Machines: Turbo Tournament for the Genesis and SNES. Like Damian, he does double duty at 411mania by writing DVD reviews from the Movies section. His latest is for the second season of Extras.

Let's go -


1. Hardcore gamers should not be worried about the industry's recent push for more casual games.

Damian Sarcuni: Fact

Listen up all you hardcore game heads out there, I don't know where this whole hardcore/casual stand off came from but it's a bunch of crap created out of thin air by the industry to generate some form of hype. I simply don't understand how all of the sudden Nintendo is getting called out for making casual games. "Nintendo only cares about Pokemon and Mario and little kids games!" they cry. To these fools I put this question: you bought four generations of Nintendo consoles for the Metroid franchise? Get over yourselves! I haven't seen a single shred of evidence that any of the big three have switched up their development strategies at all. Stop buying into the needless hype.

Owain J. Brimfield: Fact

There will always be games that cater to the so-called 'hardcore' audience, and always games that cater to the so-called 'casual' audience - and like Damian I'm not entirely convinced the split exists. I enjoy obscure Japanese RPGs just as much as I enjoy Brain Training, so which label should be affixed to me? It's just an easy soundbite for the gaming media. A good game is a good game, and will appeal to people who like good games. And isn't that all of us?

Score: 1 for 1


2. Those who are on the fence about purchasing a PS3 should get one now while they still have Emotion Engines. 100% PS1/PS2 backwards compatibility is a necessity.

Damian Sarcuni: Fiction

Sorry to get away from the point of the question but the cold hard reality is that those who are on the fence about the PS3 should avoid it altogether. Sony may have come out swinging on the software end, but if it's hardware we are talking about the PS3 has done too little, too late. The cheaper and smarter alternative is to just buy an Xbox 360 and keep your PS2.

Owain J. Brimfield: Fiction

Gotta agree on this one. Backwards compatibility is barely an issue, as everyone who wants to play PS2 games can pick up the console itself for the price of a new PS3 game. While I don't quite concur that those who are on the fence won't be converted (I've been playing on the console a reasonable amount recently, despite initially pouring vast buckets of scorn on Sony), what's needed to encourage buyers is either a vast price drop or an explosion in Blu-ray uptake by the media industry.

Score: 2 for 2


3. A next-gen first person shooter that features dinosaurs... Yes, Turok for the Xbox 360 and PS3 is going to be sweet.

Damian Sarcuni: Fiction

Oh lordy, did you ever pick the wrong 411 writer for this one. I HATE Turok. I can't find a single redeeming feature in the entire franchise ever since those god awful Nintendo 64 controls were forced upon my poor little left handed frame. While I'm sure the environments will look far better than they did in the past, at best the game will be a rehash of the previous Turok games. Turok sucks and that will never change.

Owain J. Brimfield: Fact

Damian, how can you hate the franchise that spawned the Cerebral Bore? Aside from not catering to embittered southpaws, the first few Turok games were genuinely good and although the series has lost its way somewhat, the next-gen consoles are the perfect platform for a new outing, as the dinosaurs and environments can finally attain the scale they should always have had. Just as long as they shy away from the notoriously poorly-implemented jumping sections.

Score: 2 for 3



4. Peter Moore's move from Microsoft to EA is not a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

Owain J. Brimfield: Fact

I think that in the gaming industry there are very few figures who make an indelible impression on the company they work for to the point that moving to another would prove to be a big deal. Peter Moore isn't one of them. EA Sports seems to have gotten past the malaise into which it sunk at the turn of the decade, and while a fresh acquisiton is always encouraging news I doubt Moore will significantly affect their business model. However, what will be interesting is seeing whether he continues his apparent favouring of the Wii over the PS3 - we all remember his remarks that a gamer could buy a 360 and a Wii for the price of a Playstation. Now that he isn't working for one of the 'big three,' he may end up having to revise his opinions somewhat.

Damian Sarcuni: Fact

Moore didn't exactly move over to a direct competitor of Microsoft, so there's no real news story here in my opinion. Had he gone over to SCEA, things would be a lot different. Microsoft wasn't even known for sports franchises, so you can't say that Moore was frustrated with the limitations of their development studio, like comparing the teams that made Diablo with those who made Dungeon Siege. I think this was just the biggest item on a slow news day, but in the grand scheme it doesn't mean much.

Score: 3 for 4


5. It has been revealed that Capcom's new 2D fighting game will be based around Sengoku Basara (Devil Kings) characters. That's good since we didn't need another Street Fighter game.

Owain J. Brimfield: Fact

There's really no excuse to trot out Street Fighter again - I've lost count of the number of iterations in that series, and it lost its magic a while ago. Devil Kings could prove to be a decent source of material, even if it wasn't a fantastic game, and Capcom's beat 'em ups are never less than solid. If they can find a way to incorporate Azure Dragon's six-sword attacks, this could be a blast. Having said that, it will be interesting to see how much of a market it finds outside of Japan, as to whether this could be a potential cash-cow of a franchise.

Damian Sarcuni: Fiction

You say Devil Kings, I say Darkstalkers. In my eyes there is always a reason for another Street Fighter game; primarily to get it RIGHT for a change. I just don't see enough deviation in the Devil Kings series to bank an entire 2D lineage on. The Street Fighter Alpha (Zero) games and sales of their anniversary collections proved that fans are still interested in the SF characters and exploring their histories. The Devil Kings franchise will have a much harder time grabbing anyone's attention, and I think Capcom made the wrong move here.

Score: 3 for 5


6. Unreal Tournament III on the PS3 will allow users to upload and use maps, skins, and mods that have been created on a PC. Despite being a popular feature for computer gamers, console owners will not be very interested in such things.

Owain J. Brimfield: Fiction

Community content is still a novelty for the current generation of console owners, and it's going to be interesting to see what happens a little further down the line when the market is properly saturated. At the moment though, it's a great source of potential, and there's no reason to think the facility won't be welcomed. It's never a bad thing to have additional downloadable content; not only does it give you extra bang for your buck, it's bound to encourage online play and cross-branding between the PC and console markets. It's tempting to play on the stereotype of PC gamers being the kind of uber-geeks who spend their days locked away modding and customising their games, but I don't think there's much of a stigma there any more. For the time being at least, this is a valuable way forward for the games industry - let's see how it develops.

Damian Sarcuni: Fact

But I think that instead of console owners, we should have just said "Xbox 360 owners". Microsoft has the benefit of controlling the Windows OS with a fist of steel, so they can offer far more user friendly PC/Console features than Sony can. Gamers are clearly interested in this, otherwise the big 3 wouldn't have made such a push to unite PC's and consoles in the first place. I think we'll see alot more integrated features as time goes on, but Unreal Tournament 3 is just the trial run for Sony that Shadowrun was for Microsoft.

Score: 3 for 6



We have a final score of 3 for 6. Join us next Friday for more Fact or Fiction, or prepare to get chased by the Bungeling Empire.