Well, well, well, an interesting week in the news, so let's get to it.
Lawsuit filed against Gearbox/Sega on Colonial Marines
Saw the story that a class-action lawsuit has been filed against Gearbox Software and Sega about the release of recent stinkbomb Aliens:Colonial Marines. According to the lawsuit, the demos shown at E3 and elsewhere gave a misleading picture of the final product, and that Sega embargoed reviews of the game past release date so that gamers wouldn't know that it's a stinkbomb.
While I personally think that Gearbox and Sega took a well-deserved kicking for a bad game, I'm going to say that this is the very picture of a nuisance class-action lawsuit. Basically, they (and by they, I mean the plaintiff's lawyers) are hoping that the companies would rather accept a quick payout (with most of it going to the plaintiff's lawyers, natch), rather then fight a losing PR Battle.
What Gearbox and Sega did was wrong, but newsflash: Two wrongs don't make a right.
Kickstarter moves inexorably forward
Two bits of information this week, as the Chris Roberts game Star Citizen hit 9 million in pre-release fan funding. This, along with private funding, is going to be funding an ambitious effort that promises over 100 star systems, a tablet companion app, and a free mission pack for every player. It looks like the backer-alpha will be this winter.
Also, 8bitmind favorite Shadowrun Returns is oh so close to release, they ended their backer order phase, and moved to Steam for the remainder of the pre-release phase (which is scheduled to end in June with the game's release).
Nice to see the crowd funding bandwagon is proceeding further.
EA/Wii U spat means no Madden, or NCAA
Man, it's not easy to find a side to like in this little spat, is there? EA Sports titles don't sell well on Nintendo,which is sad, because you have to think the Wii U controller would be ACE for this kind of thing, but if rumors are true, the reason why EA is not releasing their sports games on Nintendo is that EA wants Nintendo to rely heavily on their Steam-competitor service, Origin (with preferred product placement, etcetera), and Nintendo, who never wants to give anyone else a single bit of control over their hardware or software, said no dice, so EA turned around and said "Fine, no EA Sports sellers for you"
As I said, it's not easy to pick a side in this battle.
New Engine for New Release of Call of Duty: Ghosts
Call of Duty had been using the same game engine (with some tweaks each year) for the Call of Duty series since 2005.. so it's no surprise that the next Call of Duty game (which will release on current gen systems on November 5th, and next-generation systems at an undisclosed date), will have a new engine. But I have to call out Activision for a bit of tomfoolery (there's a great word, isn't it?) in their announcement:
This new engine is "coming from the developer who started it all, Infinity Ward".
They're counting on short gamer memories.. sorry, I still remember.
You mean the developer that you bought, and then immediately started looking for ways to withold earned bonuses? The developer that you bought and then sued? The developer you bought and then tried to illegaly break into their computers? The developer you bought that then saw all the main talent leave for a new startup after the above?
Activision may have the name Infinity Ward, but that's all they have, and shame on Activision for trying to pass off the shell of IW as the real thing.
And Finally, Rogue Employee installs BitCoin software on eSports client.
Saw this story about how a rogue employee at ESEA, one of the larger eSports Leagues out there.. enabled a BitCoin client on the eSports software, causing a spike in CPU and GPU usage, as temperatures soared to nearly 90 degrees Celsius. (here's a hint, the boiling point of WATER is 100). He made off with about $3,300 in the digital currency before this was discovered, the employee was found and disciplinary action is forthcoming. The disciplinary action should be two words. "You're fired" and three more words "Referred for prosecution)
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