The Bill's Now Playing Video Game Thread (Now with Bames)

[Wang Mandu]

Following Prey 2’s impressive showing at E3 2011, Bethesda, pleased with the team’s work, promised Human Head a development extension of six months to one year – all the time it needed to populate the mostly complete game world with missions, polish what rough edges remained, and ship Prey 2 in 2012 as planned. “That’s when Bethesda decided to play hardball and buy the studio,” said one source familiar with the situation. Another person close to Bethesda and Human Head shared a similar story.

In the following months, a source claimed, "Bethesda denied further funding of the project, and started failing milestones,” asking for changes and fixes without following through on its previous promise to give the team more time. The promise, however, was not inked on the contract, so Bethesda had no legal obligation to fulfill it. In addition, a source said, Bethesda was likely concerned with the "dated planning, tools, and techniques" Human Head was using. Meanwhile, the contract didn’t give the creative team any leverage: Prey 2 was the only game Human Head was legally allowed to develop on its own until the agreement expired -- to fill time and keep the lights on, the studio supported the development BioShock Infinite and Defiance. If it were to ever release, the team needed more cash and time to meet the rising demands to adjust Prey 2, which "needed a lot of work" and was "lackluster" from the publisher's perspective.

Conflict erupted – Human Head asked Bethesda to provide additional time and money, while Bethesda asked Human Head to meet the criteria agreed upon by their existing agreement. At this point, Bethesda "thought they could bully [Human Head] into a corner,” a source said, and the publisher made a move to buy Human Head. “It was one of few studios that could work with and improve id Technology. They wanted to buy us at a sweet price,” but the developer denied the buyout[/b]. Human Head didn't want to permanently marry itself to a publisher that was "bleeding Human Head dry." This would limit the studio's ability to work on its own creative endeavors down the line, potentially with other publishers.

In November 2011, in a play to keep Bethesda from purchasing Human Head, and as a result of the contract dispute, development stopped. One source called it a strike. In the following months, Bethesda and Human Head communicated sporadically, “but the conversation was very one sided. The studio made reasonable offers, but nothing came to fruition. Nothing moved in 2012.”

Bethesda appeared to wait out Human Head. The contractual agreement between the two eventually came to term, Bethesda got its game back without spending any more money, and Human Head went on its way – the team is currently working with a new publisher on another open-world game.

Gutted. Might be time to only pirate Bethesda games...

[storm shadow]

Hotline: Miami

Game of the century, can't wait for the Vita re-release so I can buy it again.

I'm so gay for this game that I thought seriously about buying this for a hot minute
http://www.insertcoinclothing.com/jackets/jacket.html

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

[Wang Mandu]

Hotline: Miami

Game of the century, can't wait for the Vita re-release so I can buy it again.

I've been meaning to playthrough it in one sitting but haven't had the time. Hopefully soon.

[storm shadow]

“The game will probably still be excellent,” said Hayter on Twitter. “Like New Coke!”

ZING

I haven't followed this scandal that closely, but as an MGS fanboi I can comfortably say that--provided this isn't all some elaborate viral marketing ruse--recasting Snake is the gayest thing Kojima has ever done.

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

A statement that is not made lightly.

[delmuerte]

Yeah, this whole drama with Prey 2 is pretty much the biggest gaming bummer of recent times. That was THE game I was most looking forward to last year/this year. http://www.aliennoire.com says that the same studio that did Dishonoured is taking over and scrapping all the work Human Head did thus far. Yikes.

Following Prey 2’s impressive showing at E3 2011, Bethesda, pleased with the team’s work, promised Human Head a development extension of six months to one year – all the time it needed to populate the mostly complete game world with missions, polish what rough edges remained, and ship Prey 2 in 2012 as planned. “That’s when Bethesda decided to play hardball and buy the studio,” said one source familiar with the situation. Another person close to Bethesda and Human Head shared a similar story.

In the following months, a source claimed, "Bethesda denied further funding of the project, and started failing milestones,” asking for changes and fixes without following through on its previous promise to give the team more time. The promise, however, was not inked on the contract, so Bethesda had no legal obligation to fulfill it. In addition, a source said, Bethesda was likely concerned with the "dated planning, tools, and techniques" Human Head was using. Meanwhile, the contract didn’t give the creative team any leverage: Prey 2 was the only game Human Head was legally allowed to develop on its own until the agreement expired -- to fill time and keep the lights on, the studio supported the development BioShock Infinite and Defiance. If it were to ever release, the team needed more cash and time to meet the rising demands to adjust Prey 2, which "needed a lot of work" and was "lackluster" from the publisher's perspective.

Conflict erupted – Human Head asked Bethesda to provide additional time and money, while Bethesda asked Human Head to meet the criteria agreed upon by their existing agreement. At this point, Bethesda "thought they could bully [Human Head] into a corner,” a source said, and the publisher made a move to buy Human Head. “It was one of few studios that could work with and improve id Technology. They wanted to buy us at a sweet price,” but the developer denied the buyout[/b]. Human Head didn't want to permanently marry itself to a publisher that was "bleeding Human Head dry." This would limit the studio's ability to work on its own creative endeavors down the line, potentially with other publishers.

In November 2011, in a play to keep Bethesda from purchasing Human Head, and as a result of the contract dispute, development stopped. One source called it a strike. In the following months, Bethesda and Human Head communicated sporadically, “but the conversation was very one sided. The studio made reasonable offers, but nothing came to fruition. Nothing moved in 2012.”

Bethesda appeared to wait out Human Head. The contractual agreement between the two eventually came to term, Bethesda got its game back without spending any more money, and Human Head went on its way – the team is currently working with a new publisher on another open-world game.

Gutted. Might be time to only pirate Bethesda games...

[spacehamster]

GT6 gameplay. Looks more like 5.2 to me. Somebody really needs to go to Polyphony's offices and give all of them a wedgie. WTF.

[guardianoftheblind]

couple of things:

first, i red box'd metro. gonna zip through hit in a few days. can't wait

second, whichever new console i end up choosing, i don't know if i'll buy one for quite some time. there's seriously so much more gaming to be dont on this generation. GTA 5, BF4, dark souls 2, destiny, arkham origins, watch dogs, nhl 14, splinter cell, evil within, etc. and with all of the problems gen1 console tend to have, i think i'll wait

[kickpuncher]

donwloading all the Ace Attorney games right now

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

does that make me gay?

[electronichamz]

Castlevania: Lord of Shadows coming to Steam on August 27th? I will allow this

[copstache]

donwloading all the Ace Attorney games right now

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

does that make me gay?

no way dude. except for the lame pixel hunting bullshit, they're one of the closest things we have to classic adventure games

[Comrade Slinky]

Gay would be buying the new animal crossing game.

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

I have every intention of going gay.

[Spooky Apparition]

http://news.xbox.com/2013/06/license

"Share access to your games with everyone inside your home: Your friends and family, your guests and acquaintances get unlimited access to all of your games. Anyone can play your games on your console--regardless of whether you are logged in or their relationship to you."

so it's a "feature" that anyone (even if they're not a family member!!) can sit down at your console and play a game you've bought?

"Third party publishers may opt in or out of supporting game resale and may set up business terms or transfer fees with retailers [...] third party publishers can enable you to give games to friends. Loaning or renting games won’t be available at launch, but we are exploring the possibilities with our partners."

and i'm pretty sure sony is going to do the exact same shit since some decisions are left up to third parties. if sony doesn't pull this crap they're going to destroy the xbone, but i have little hope of that. might be PC time. yeah there's PC DRM, but i guaran-fucking-tee microsoft will never have anything like steam sales, etc. bah. the only good thing that could come of this crap is some third party publishers could decide to forego all this bullshit, do things like they've always been done and generate some goodwill among gamers

[valgalder]

I'm even more glad I don't give a shit about modern gaming, because if I was, reading all this Xbox One shit would be absolutely infuriating. It's all a gigantic fuck you to the consumer.

[riley-o]

and i'm pretty sure sony is going to do the exact same shit

YOU DON'T SAY THAT ABOUT THE PLAYSTATION WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE

[Necrometer]

"Share access to your games with everyone inside your home: Your friends and family, your guests and acquaintances get unlimited access to all of your games. Anyone can play your games on your console--regardless of whether you are logged in or their relationship to you."

even home invaders

I don't which is more likely for that last "their relationship to you" clause - was it dribbled out thoughtlessly by some unpaid intern, or did it undergo a half dozen edits as the top minds in marketing crafted it into the flawless piece of absurdirty it is...? either way, I love it

[Gunther]

donwloading all the Ace Attorney games right now

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

does that make me gay?

The only lame part about this is you're just now doing it and you should actually own the games. All of them. Besides that dumb edgeworth one. Best games ever.

My Phoenix Wright troll was my favorite part about the old board and I'm sad that it's gone.

[valgalder]

pathetic thing is even if there is a huge internet backlash, there are still more than enough numb skulls that will support this thing blindly no matter what, only perpetuating this kind of bullshit from here on out.

[spacehamster]

This is some seriously fascinating corporate delusion here. I'm really curious to see how Sony responds. Given the price on Amazon for the PS4 at the moment, if they pull the same bullshit, I'm just buying a new GPU for my PC and sitting this one out.

[copstache]

The funny thing is that nobody would care if you could get older games for cheap. I can't loan out or sell my pc copy of bulletstorm- on the other hand I paid $2 for it.

[spacehamster]

Sony has been the absolute king of "well, we can't do anything if third-party publishers want to fuck you in the ass" these last few years, so I guess that's something to be worried about. But I really can't be bothered to speculate much. Like most of us, I have a gynormous backlog and I won't stop using my 360 and my PS3 anytime soon anyway, so I'm totally fine with just saying wait and see and not paying much attention to these piecemeal announcements.

[Wang Mandu]

Yeah, this whole drama with Prey 2 is pretty much the biggest gaming bummer of recent times. That was THE game I was most looking forward to last year/this year. http://www.aliennoire.com says that the same studio that did Dishonoured is taking over and scrapping all the work Human Head did thus far. Yikes.

And it sounds like they dont even want to work on it. If it ever comes out, it will probably suck.

[Wang Mandu]

Like most of us, I have a gynormous backlog and I won't stop using my 360 and my PS3 anytime soon anyway,

Yep. Hopefully selling my 360 soon after finally finishing Red Dead Redemption 3 years later. I will be holding onto my PS3 for at least 5-6 more months. Backlogue + The Last of Us + GTA V (unless I can stay strong and hold out for the 2014 PC release).

[Wang Mandu]

I haven't followed this scandal that closely, but as an MGS fanboi I can comfortably say that--provided this isn't all some elaborate viral marketing ruse--recasting Snake is the gayest thing Kojima has ever done.

I believe it's Big Boss in MGS V and Solid Snake and/or all Snakes were done by David Hayter. But they had Hayter voice both Big Boss and Solid Snake for some retarded twist reason but Solid Snake is a clone of Big Boss's saliva or .....my head is starting to hurt. Kiefer's voice is too distinctive for a video game. All I'm going to be picturing is Jack Bauer cosplaying as Liquid/Solid/Mullet Snake and hoping he'll start screaming and torturing people.

But hey, at least it isn't Nolan North or that Bioshock Infinite / The Last of Us guy aka Nu-Nolan North.



Day 1.

[Spooky Apparition]

The funny thing is that nobody would care if you could get older games for cheap. I can't loan out or sell my pc copy of bulletstorm- on the other hand I paid $2 for it.

yeah. aside from all the weird kinect quasi-spying/data mining stuff, this is the shittiest part about all this news. during last summer's steam sale i got left 4 dead 2 + expansions, amnesia, limbo, bastion and dear esther for $17. meanwhile, over on xbox live, MLB2k12 (to name one shitty game that has already been made useless since the '13 version is out) is still 30 goddamn dollars.

don't get me wrong, reee brothers and sisters. if sony doesn't pull this crap i'll be all over the PS4, but it just seems like a long shot. this is what some publishers have been begging for, and MS has already positioned these choices as, "hey hey hey, we're just letting the publishers decide!" i'm sure sony is worried about alienating those companies, but maybe, just maybe they've got some smart people who are aware of how pissed off this is making even people who were planning on getting the new xbox.

i guess we'll know in a few days what sony's planning on doing, but i think right now would be a REALLY good time for some steambox news

[guardianoftheblind]

i would totally go all in for the xbox one (or ps4), if they had online distribution like steam and had ridiculous sales, but i still see them counting brick and mortar stores into their profit margins or whatever, and i still think it'll be a way off to when i can download BF4 to my system for $17.99

i hope i'm wrong