Late Night Consoling
Argh, I'm so conflicted. With Madden NFL 2005 just around the corner, what does a multi-console owner and Madden fan do? Does he go with the Xbox version since most his buds only play over Xbox Live or does he pick up the PS2-only Collector's Edition and relish all the nostalgic goodies? I think this decision is going to come down to the wire for me. In the mean time, I'll check out the first review of Madden, courtesy of IGN. I'll save you the trouble of browsing through seven pages; highlight the blank space to see who wins this year's digital pigskin trophy! Madden beats 2K5. Shocker!
| EA Rolls out EA Sports Premium Pass EA announced today they are offering a new free service to Madden users called the EA Sports Premium Pass presented by Dodge. Premium Pass, for use on both the PS2 and Xbox, is a online set of tools to enhance the online experience; things such as personalized career pages, highlighted text in your user name, early registration for Madden Challenge, members only medals, and a whole bunch more. The catch is, however, you must supply EA with a credit card number. If you don't, the service will cost $19.95 over PayPal. This clearly shows that this will not always be a free feature and we can expect to start paying for advance online features for future EA titles. |
| Surgery Fun Coming to DS New details have emerged surrounding the previously announced Caduceus from Atlus. Now fully titled as Caduceus: Surgical Operation, the game will be, according to Atlus, a "sci-fi surgery action game." Gamers will make use of the stylus to do things such as cut open patients to remove deadly parasites. Not only that, but players will make use of the voice recognition of the DS to calm or encourage the patient. Although there is no word on a US release, it will hit Japan in spring 2005. |
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| New Shining Force Game Being Planned The nosey staff of GameSpot peeked into the online diary of a SEGA public relations representative, Tadashi Takezaki, and found an interesting nugget of information; a new Shining Force title is in the works. "The new history of the Shining Force series is going to start today. We've started a project for the next-next-next title (fourth release). I'll work hard as the head in charge of overseeing the series and make sure the series is released consistently, so that fans can enjoy it for a long time." |
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| Silent Hill 4 Preorder Bonus Eager gamers that preorder Konami's fourth installment of the Silent Hill series, Silent Hill 4: The Room, will be treated to a soundtrack of the game. The disc will contain 20 tracks, 13 of which are exclusive to the United States, as well as some special remixes. |
| Misc. Q&As/Features 1up interviews portable gaming pioneer R.J. Mical. GameSpot talks with Cory Ledesma, associate producer of WWE SmackDown! vs. Raw. Game Informer speaks with Chip Lange of EA about the additions to the EA Sports Nation. |
| Misc. Media/Previews | |
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| More shots of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Ghosthunter, and Jak 3 are available at GameSpot. GamerFeed works up a sweat in this preview of Dance Dance Revolution Extreme. GameSpy dishes us a preview of Gradius V (so does Game Informer). |
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| IGN gives us a new trailer for Killer 7. GameSpy divulges everything they know about Metroid Prime 2 Echoes. |
| Previews of Tron 2.0: Killer App (GBA) and Elder Scrolls Travels: Shadowkey (NG) and can be found at GameSpot. They also have impressions of Pocket Kingdom (NG). GameSpy treats us to shots of the new Fire Emblem (GBA) adventure and plenty of images of Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories (GBA). |
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| EuroGamer gives us first impressions of Winning Eleven 8 (PS2, Xbox). GameSpot has screens of Get On Da Mic (PS2, Xbox). GamerFeed previews the radical gameplay shift of Mega Man X Command Mission (PS2, Xbox). 1up takes a swing at Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2005 (PS2, Xbox, GCN). New screens of The Punisher (PS2, Xbox) and videos of Burnout 3: Takedown (PS2, Xbox, GCN) are at IGN. GameSpy previews Spyro: A Hero's Tail (PS2, Xbox, GCN), has images of Fight Club (PS2, Xbox), and chest-passes shots of NBA Street V3 (PS2, Xbox, GCN). |
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K1Bond007
replyMadden beats NFL2K5 my ass. Their review is messed up. Not to say one game or the other is better, but the reviews say this:
NFL2K5
Presentation - 10
Graphics - 9
Sound - 9
Gameplay - 9
Lasting Appeal - 10
Overall 9.4
Madden 2005
Presentation - 9
Graphics - 8
Sound - 7
Gameplay - 9
Lasting Appeal - 10
Overall: 9.5
Wait wait.. so ESPN has better Presentation, Graphics, and Sound and ties Madden in Gameplay and Lasting Appeal and yet Madden is better? Come on... and it's not like people weren't going to make a comparison between the two games and their reviews so frankly IGN was either just sloppy as all hell here or they're biased (gasp).-
Well, the final score is not cummulative or anything like that and it may of been reviewed by different people.
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I hate that. Its common sense to think that the final score is a cumulative score. Words cannot even describe how illogical it is to think otherwise.
Huge pet peeve of mine on video game reviews, when sites do this & then justify it with saying the final score isn't a cumulative. (Not saying Alec did this, because he didn't. Rather, IGN did)-
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Then don't rate the game using a "segmented" system - give it a single score & be done with it. That's essential what you're saying - the sum of the parts isn't equal to the overall experience, so rate what matters most & forget the rest. Its misleading, poor journalism & confusing.
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Let me just say that an IGN review is pretty much meaningless on just about every level and that goes for most nearly any game. No offense but I also hate when people say Madden or ESPN is the "winner". The "winner" is a subjective choice. I prefer ESPN myself. That doesn't make it the "winner". Nor does an IGN review make Madden the "winner".
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There's a lot of people out there that are only going to buy one game, so they need places to tell them who the winner is. Of course, it's totally subjective, but since they're looked at as authoritative sources, people expect them to make those hard decisions for them.
But yes, otherwise, I agree with you.-
Well if they're looking at IGN to make their choice for them, they are in a world of trouble imo. They should try places like operationsports.com or digitalsports.com. Places where people actually play them both and can give you more information and the advantages and disadvantages of each one. Saying which one is "better" strikes me as comparing apples and oranges though. They both are quite different experiences. It would be akin to saying who's the winner between Doom 3 and Half-Life 2. They are both first person shooters of course but they are different experiences.
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Then don't give ESPN 9 then!
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That doesn't make too much sense. ESPN has good gameplay so we gave it a 9 and it deserves this score. Madden has "better" gameplay than ESPN, but not quite a 10 so we gave it a 9? That doesn't say anything. Why not at least give it a number like 9.5 or something to show that it's better.
Heres the thing that gets me... both give it a 9 and perhaps the gameplay in Madden is a little better... ESPN still has audio, graphics and presentation and presentation is a large part of what makes ESPN so good.
So I seriously don't understand the score.
It's subjective I understand this, but the review is skewed to make Madden look better than ESPN, when the numbers just don't add up in it's favor.-
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I like what I like largely due to reviews. I can't like a game that I'd probably never play if it weren't for a few good reviews. That's how I go. There are some games that come out that I just say, "hey that looks good I want that", but most of the time it's "I'm not too sure whats so and so say?".
This is the point of the thread. Not you like what you like. Huge difference.
So in this thread, I care.
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Who the hell gives a shit who reviews what. They are normal people like the rest of us. Their opinion dont mean shit one way or the other. If you have a game and you like it thats fine. Dont need to justify your virtual penis. I like sports games, but guess what ... they are more of the same shit anyways.
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Madden will probably be much better then NFL2k5 this year. Even though both reviews give high scores for gameplay NFL2k5 is super arcadish. It feels like MADDEN did a few years ago. And if the player movement of NCAA 2005 is any indication of how MADDEN player movement is going to be . . . well then see ya NFL 2k5 you are nothing more then a enjoyable arcady style football game.
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While i don't know if they might have changed it for this year, but Madden has always seemed more arcadish to me. Defense certainly seems better in 2k5 to me. Of course the zone defense generally sucks, but i've never seen a football game with a decent zone ai.
ESPN is certainly not perfect, and it really could've used another 3 weeks of bug testing and fixing, but for me i've had more fun with it then i did with Madden last year. I'll rent Madden, but if there hasn't been a major change i'll probably stick with ESPN.
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interesting. If you add an arbitrary value to a game's score total before division by five, let's call it "the number of beers it takes to arrive at this score" you find out something pretty useful.
In the case of ESPN, 47/5 = 9.4 so you need 0 beers to achieve that score.
In the case of Madden, (43 + 4.5) / 5 = 9.5 so you need 4.5 beers before those individual scores somehow equates to the final rating.
Or it could be how many millions in advertising dollars each game gave IGN, rounded down. Or the Fanboy Factor.
Whatever the case, the score got swung by exactly the amount it needed to push the Madden score over ESPN.
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