411 Games Fact or Fiction 06.23.08: Metal Gear Solid 4's Target Audience, Boom Blox's Low Sales, The Next Alone in the Dark, Call of Duty As A Sci-Fi Game, and More!

Posted by Tommy Coloma on 06.23.2008

411's Jordan Williams and Jacob Lopez give us their thoughts on whether the "final" game in a series like Metal Gear Solid 4 should cater only to long-time fans, Boom Blox's failure to sell despite its critical acclaim, the chances of success for the next Alone in the Dark, Mega Man's further fall into obscurity, and the idea that the PSP is only around because of piracy in this edition of Fact or Fiction Games.

Welcome to another edition of Fact or Fiction. This week Jordan Williams and Jacob Lopez got together to discuss some of the weeks most important video game news and issues. Before we get started, let's take a look at what these two writers do here at 411mania -

Jordan currently writes Working Title for the Games section. In his latest column, he presented the Workies Halftime Awards with which he honored games that came out in the first half of the year. Check it out to see some of the games that will probably be lost in the suffle at the end of the year.

Jacob currently helps out with the news section.

Let's go -


1. A "final" sequel like Metal Gear Solid 4 should first and foremost cater to long-time fans.

Jordan Williams: Fact

As much as I want to say fiction to this, as no game should exclude a potential player, I think that this is a pretty big fact. It's like the movies - someone who's never watched Star Trek or Star Wars isn't going to jump into the 6th movie and expect everything to be explained to them at the start. In the same way, players who jump into "final" sequels like MGS4 shouldn't expect the game to do them any favors. Odds are if you are picking this game up on a whim, you had enough interest to at least pick up or read up on the old games. MGS isn't something you can just hop into and understand. Hell, there's people that have played the first three games and still don't get it. Point being, a finale rewards those who've stuck with it the whole time, not those who've decided to show up late to the party... and that's A-OK with me.

Jacob Lopez: Fact

To an extent. Most of the people who have not played an MGS game are probably not going be on the lookout for part 4. Even so, Konami was cool enough to re-release 1-3 as a bundle, and anyone who missed out or suddenly becomes interested in the series can easily catch up.

Also, the keywords here are "first and foremost," meaning that the idea is not to totally forget any potential newcomers, but to give them the Metal Gear experience, while at the same time delivering the gameplay and closure that longtime fans need after sticking with a franchise (and its characters) for the last ten years. If the game is well-made and fun, and has the core elements that make a Metal Gear game a Metal Gear game, fans new and old will come to play and have an enjoyable experience. Some may even play this one first, and then hop on back to the older titles after becoming interested.

Score: 1 for 1


2. Gamers should be concerned about Boom Blox's low sales numbers.

Jordan Williams: Fiction

Only because gamers themselves aren't really concerned about low numbers of new IPs. It's a shame that a third-party game that is actually working well for the Wii is getting largely ignored, but if anything, that just shows how much Nintendo has stacked the deck against itself when it comes to third party developers. It's almost like Wii owners have been burned so much by bad third-party games that they just ignore them completely and wait for whatever comes out with Nintendo's stamp of approval. Gamers shouldn't be concerned with the low sales of Boom Blox. I think that developers should be concerned about the lack of trust gamers have in them.

Jacob Lopez: Fact

This just shows how difficult it is for a third party publisher to release anything even mildly successful for the Wii. Perhaps EA figured that slapping Spielberg's name on the box would be enough to drive sales. What they forgot to do was get who they were trying to sell it to and tell them just what the game is about. Some people still have no idea. Now, if fellow gamers don't know how Boom Blox works, how will mom and dad?

If you look back at games like Raving Rabbids, you may remember some TV spots and lots of weird videos on the Internet showing these crazy bastards causing a ruckus. Even if people didn't know that the title is about mini-games, Raving Rabbids got their attention through its weird TV spots. Sometimes we even forget it is a Rayman game. Hype it up, and you will get some sales.

Score: 1 for 2


3. You are looking forward to the next Alone in the Dark.

Jordan Williams: Fact

But barely. I've sort of had a falling out with the whole Survival Horror/Mystery genre, but I am liking what I see here. I think ever since RE made the jump to more of an action game rather than horror people have been kind of starved for that old-school "HOLY SHIT THIS IS CREEPY" vibe and while Condemned 2 filled the gap well, I think Alone in the Dark and the new Silent Hill will continue fillin' it up until it's considered manly again to play these games in the dark with surround sound.

Jacob Lopez: Fact

I actually enjoy seeing a new take on an old series. It worked well with Metal Gear and it worked well with Ninja Gaiden. The Bionic Commando games don't seem to be shaping up to be all that bad either. While I am not expecting "Game of the Year" material, I can only speak for myself when I say it is really fun to play a modern game based on something I enjoyed as a kid.

I also believe that Alone in the Dark will give us that good ol' "creepy" vibe that we get from Silent Hill and the first few Resident Evil games. Scary is not always creepy, but creepy is almost always scary.

Score: 2 for 3



4. Rumor has it that Call of Duty 6 will go sci-fi. You hope that the rumor is true.

Jacob Lopez: Fiction

Games like Call of Duty (and Medal of Honor) have always been a series better known for being your more "realistic" FPS, whether leading your squad through a historic WWII battlefield or running through a modern-day Middle Eastern country, you can count on CoD to keep it pretty damn believable.

Besides, even if Infinity and Activision did decide to head in this direction, they would be setting themselves up against a game like Halo, which is already one of the games I turn to when craving that science fiction fix.

Keep in mind though - a future setting and a sci-fi setting can be two very different things.

Jordan Williams: Fiction

I agree 100%. Although the FPS genre is becoming more stacked than a fat chick with a boob job, the FUTURISTIC FPS genre is even worse. Call of Duty carved out its niche into gaming history by sticking its roots in the past and in the present. Jumping to the future will really just seem like a retread of Gears of Halozone HazeShift. With almost every flavor of our "future" already made, I think CoD should go ahead and stay with the times.

Score: 3 for 4


5. Five minutes ago, you did not know two things - that a game called Mega Man Star Force 2 Zerker X Saurian and Mega Man Star Force 2 Zerker X Ninja exist and that they are coming out this week.

Jacob Lopez: Fact

While I always liked the Mega Man series on the NES, I have to say that I have really fallen out of the loop with that one. It's not that they are bad games. It's just that there are so many of them (many of which branch off into their own series) that it has become too much of a chore to keep up with the brand as a whole. While I don't mind spin-offs, I have to say that Mega Man has just gotten ridiculous. In fact, someone over at Capcom's blog site doesn't even seem to know how many Mega Man games there are.

Jordan Williams: Fiction

I actually DID know these games existed. I was actually the one who reviewed the last MMSF for this site and have been an avid (see: sucker) Mega Man fan for a long LONG time now. With that said, I agree that Mega Man is getting downright SILLY with the amount of crossovers, remakes, spin-offs, and relaunches but SOMEONE is still buying them outside of the Bob and George community.

Score: 3 for 5


6. The only reason the PSP is doing well right is because of how easy it is to pirate its games.

Jacob Lopez: Fact

Well, not only that so much as modding/hacking their system. I know quite a few PSP owners who have set up their systems to play old PSX games and even old NES games rather than playing the system with the games it was intended (by Sony) to run. I think I see and hear a lot more about that than about anyone buying or even pirating actual PSP titles. The problem has gotten so big for Sony that even they even sent out that spiteful questionnaire a few months back.

I think part of the problem lies with SCEA themselves (I can only speak for the US market, because the damn thing seems to be dominating in Japan month after month). There are times that I find myself asking - "do they even know what the hell they are trying to market this thing as? Is it a movie player, a music player, or a gaming machine?" I am not trying to shoot them down for that, but these are just questions you have to ask yourself when selling a product. The DS, on the other hand, has a very clear, very simple objective - play games. That's it. One complaint I heard was that the PSP tried too hard to recreate the console experience on a handheld, while the DS, for the most part, kept things short and to the point.

Jordan Williams: Fact

The PSP is the best handheld on the market today, and it owes all of its credit to hackers. The DS is the best gaming handheld today and it owes all of its credit to its games. Now the PSP has some great games, but it's very hard to find someone who has a PSP and ONLY uses it to play PSP games and watch UMDs. Odds are if they have it the first thing they did was mod that badboy to play every game that's come out in the last 20 years and then mod it to do whatever its master wishes. The DS has a bit of a pirating problem but it's possible to never actually pay a red cent for a PSP game and this is a problem that I think Sony should address. But, I don't think they ever will because if they do they will effectively kill the biggest selling point of the PSP.

Score: 3 for 6



And we have a final score of 3 for 6. Don't forget to join us next time for more Fact or Fiction!

Now, we were all just sent to different time periods because the time machine we used was powered by an imitation diamond instead of a real one. If we can figure out how to get hourselves back to the present, we'll be back next week.