Gadgets Blog » Video Games

In was but a wee one when the original “Tron” came out in 1982, but I was mesmerized by the amazing graphics and cool special effects. It has action and light cycles, and it involved computers, something not many movies were doing at that time.

Almost 30 years later, a much-anticipated follow-up movie premieres today, and the video game Tron: Evolution is already in stories. It got me thinking about when “Tron” first came out and the arcade game that was developed to follow the movie. I frequented a lot of arcades back then, and that game got me hooked far more than Donkey Kong or Pac Man.

Perhaps the most fun about it was that it was four games in one. It wasn’t just the same game over and over again with maybe a new terrain or faster enemies; there were four completely different games. While that may pale in comparison to the Mario Party and Carnival Games of today, back then, it was unheard of.

Everybody had their favorite game, and the one that they couldn’t stand but played anyway because it was the only way to beat the game. The arcade game featured black lights and fluorescent lights, and it just looked amazing on the arcade floor.

You have to remember that arcades of the ’80s were nothing like the arcades of today. They were loud and dark and filled to the brim with people. For teens and younger, the arcade was the only place to go and play for cheap. All you needed was a few dollars in quarters.

This holiday season many children will open up a new PlayStation 3, Wii and X-box 360 with Kinect and play the most graphically amazing games created, using everything from handheld devices to their own body as controllers.

I have been gaming for more than 25 years, so I remember the early days of Atari and Nintendo. For this reason, I thought I would take a look back at the technology of the past so that we can appreciate the technology of the present.

Atari: Who remembers using a screwdriver to connect the Atari to the television? This was before the days of the red, white and yellow A/V inputs. I still remember sitting on my parents’ bed playing Breakout for hours. The sound effects consisted of beep followed by a boop and then another beep. Whew, those were some crazy times. Space Invaders, Combat and a plethora of other classic games that anyone over 30 remembers. The graphics consisted of various block forms, and the controllers had one button.

8-bit machines: I like to call this the golden age of gaming. Nintendo debuted the Nintendo Entertainment System along with a little Italian Plumber named Mario bent on saving Princess Toadstool from the clutches of the evil Bowser. Some of you might also remember Robbie the Robot, who you could control to play a game called Gyroscope. Yeah, nobody else does either.

It’s difficult to talk about a new video game release these days without mentioning a sequel. In the current generation of consoles, developers have seen the stakes of their successful titles raised to new heights. The immense costs of creating a game with the current standards of graphics, gameplay and content have placed pressure on developers to deliver revenues to their companies. As a result, many of 2010’s biggest titles were sequels in successful franchises. Call of Duty: Black Ops is no different, but it boasts perhaps the most difficult challenge: filling the shoes of the hottest-selling video game of all time.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is the spiritual predecessor to Black Ops, and it was a divisive title in the gaming community. Utilizing current-events politics and contemporary weaponry, the title weaved a fiction dealing with global conflict, putting the player in charge of defending the United States from invasion. It was a great release with multiplayer, bringing users back to the title again and again. But it wasn’t perfect. The writing in MW2 served as a major downside, as the plot of the game relied too heavily on Hollywood-style melodrama and cheap tricks on the player, typically involving the “death” of the user in a cinematic cut scene.

Where I live there were once at least a dozen video stores nearby ranging from mom and pop to the big chains like Blockbuster and Family Video. Growing up, I remember my father and I heading out to the video store to rent the latest releases in both video games and movies.

Many of these stores are gone now and walls once covered floor to ceiling with movies are now bare. Only a few posters remain from movies long past their prime. Their sales tax and income streams gone from small towns already hit hard by unemployment and a sluggish economy. What killed these stores? Was it the economic downturn? Poor business management? It was the inevitable march of progress that is the Internet.

When Hulu first came about and I was able to watch The Simpsons and Family Guy without the little ones hearing, I thought that was cool, and there were even some movies that I never heard of that I could watch. When Netflix first started mailing DVDs that you could reserve online, I thought it was a fad and no one would want to wait 24 hours when the video store was down the block. When Redbox put stations outside of local supermarkets offering $1 new movies, I thought interesting concept, but not for me.

“Argh, me matey. Would you be wantin’ buy a game from a pirate like me?” Probably not. In fact, game, movie and video pirates don’t’ have eye patches, parrots and or a peg leg. I wish they did, it would make catching them so much easier. They would just kind of…hop.

Most pirates wear polos and jeans sitting in back alley stores and huddling deep in the seats of movie theaters with a video camera strapped to their popcorn pail. Those are the professional pirates that make millions of dollars each year and cause movie theater prices to skyrocket. These are the ones you hear about on the news when they get caught with 10,000 bootleg copies of Howard the Duck.

The other pirates are just like you and me. The ones that find websites that allow them download movies for free, steal the latest version of Photoshop and bootleg Aerosmith’s greatest hits. They come from all walks of life and every income level. They don’t see the harm in what they are doing and think “What’s one movie.”

I have spent hours of my life rescuing various princesses from a multitude of bad guys in my decades as a video game junkie. I plunked my quarters in Pacman, jumped over barrels in Donkey Kong and died countless times only to be brought back at the last save point.

Recently, I began reading about the creation of PC gaming in 3D. At first I was excited, because I am a man and we get excited at shiny buttons and flashing lights, but then I started thinking about my kids. I’m a parent, I do that.

There was a time when video games were pretty much tame. I stomped on a throng of koopas in Super Mario Brothers, and yet to need therapy for it. The graphics were bad, the memory was low and there wasn’t much they could do other than run, jump and shoot.

The electronic distribution model has seen some remarkable growth over the last several years, thanks in no small part to the advent of high speed Internet. With a growing availability of a quick net speed, the Aughts (or whatever you’d like to call the 2000s) were a transforming time for retail. Fast forward to present day and a number of companies succeed in an electronic distribution model. iTunes brings us music, NetFlix brings us movies, and Amazon brings us books all with a simple download. In this same vein, Steam brings us video games.

Steam is a quickly-growing service that takes this distribution of gaming and makes it an entirely-online endeavor. Developed by video game company Valve, who are responsible for gaming classics like Half-Life and Left 4 Dead, the service provides a means for gamers to peruse an extensive library of games from both major and independent developers. The games can then be purchased over the internet, then downloaded to your home computer. You don’t need a net connection to play them, they instead become your own, able to travel with you from computer to computer.

Some days, it must be hard to be number one. Undoubtedly Rockstar Games, developers of the critically-acclaimed Grand Theft Auto series, feels the continual pressure that goes hand in hand with their past success. While the company has several different studios spread throughout the United States, each is expected to put forth a quality product worthy of the Rockstar brand name. Rockstar San Diego, the studio behind Red Dead Redemption, hadn’t previously attempted a game of this magnitude. Known primarily for the Midnight Club street racing games, something along the lines of the newest Rockstar title had never come from the jewel of the west coast.

Red Dead Redemption, however, is a triumph of a video game, one of the best available on this generation of consoles. While comparisons with GTA are perhaps inevitable, the originality and atmosphere of the Wild West are present within Red Dead Redemption in an all-encompassing sandbox. Never before has the western genre played out so well in a video game. You play as a rugged and gun-toting cowboy, returning to the West for reasons that aren’t clear in the game’s steadily-paced opening act. While some might fault the title for starting a bit slow, this patient story telling brings out the true star of the game: the vivid world itself.

With the modern era of game consoles, it seems that great innovation and technology unfortunately comes with increases in price as well. While all three systems, the Nintendo Wii, the Xbox 360, and the Playstation 3, have become more affordable as they’ve become older, there has sadly been no corresponding drop in price for the games. A brand new Xbox 360 or Playstation 3 game can cost $60, which is a serious chunk of change (especially for me, being a college student and whatnot). Wii owners are graced with a slightly lower price tag, but even $40 can be expensive for a brand new title. Luckily, today we’ll seek out some great video games available for less than $20, and also include some strategies for finding games on the cheap.

Mass Effect for the Xbox 360 (Rated M for Mature).
This science fiction action game is getting a sequel next week, but that doesn’t mean that the original isn’t still entertaining. Mass Effect combines numerous gaming elements into an engaging complete package. The game has exciting shooting action, space exploration, and a deep involved storyline that is determined largely by the player’s actions. If you’re a role-playing fan, this title will offer hours of action on many diverse and hostile planets. It’s also a great example of how to find games for under $20. If a sequel has come out recently, or is in the works, the original title will often be available for significantly less than its successor. Just because a game is older doesn’t mean it’s less fun to play. After all, other titles like BioShock and Assassin’s Creed thrilled audiences to the point they triggered sequels!

MLB: The Bigs for the Playstation 3 (Rated E for Everyone).
With sports games, there sometimes are minimal improvements from year to year. A classic example is the storied Madden NFL franchise from EA sports. The games look and feel very similar to each other in consecutive years. If you can live without up-to-date rosters, older sports games are often inexpensive compared to their newer brethren. Or, as is the case with MLB: The Bigs, look for sports games that are slightly outside the normal scope of sports titles. Here, the developers took a steroids-be-damned approach to the game, with fast-paced and accessible pitching and batting, oftentimes with bursts of fire errupting from the bats and balls. The result is a game that remains engaging compared to other, simulation type baseball games. For similar alternative sporting games, check out Blitz: The League or Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground.

Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures for the Nintendo Wii (Rated E for Everyone).
While it may seem like a bizarre combination of ideas, the Lego video game series has had some great titles, with the familiar Lego characters enacting all types of familiar adventures in their block-constructed world. The original Lego Indiana Jones title is made less expensive by having a successful sequel out on the market, but this old-school title is a lot of fun for all ages. The quirky level designs and bright colors make this a great game for kids, but gamers of any age will appreciate the recreation of the classic Indiana Jones films. A final great tip is to look for undiscovered, quirky games like this Lego title. These more “underground” games oftentimes fall in price before titles from larger publishers. Other great games like this are Viva Pinata! and titles from the Katamari Damacy series.

Despite the positive vibes being sent out by the Federal Reserve for some time now, the level of consumer confidence in the economy still hasn’t quite returned to normal. This has impacted the economics of distribution in several ways, two of which have had a significant impact on how people shop for video games.

The first major difficulty confronting the distributor is a change in consumer preference in shopping. During this recession, consumers have favored shopping at larger big-box stores such as Wal-Mart and Target. If you’re looking for more information, take a glance at this article from Business Week. A store with a greater number of products on the shelf is able to take serious losses in one field, in this case the Nintendo Wii, while still recovering that money from other products it sells. This type of behavior only adds to the preconceived notion that big-box stores will have less expensive products in the first place. Stores that are perceived as “specialty,” “boutique,” or “high-end” have suffered the most during the recession.

The second repercussion, and perhaps the more critical, involves the nature of video games to begin with. When money gets tight, the first thing consumers do is cut down on unnecessary expenses. This is, of course, devastating for a market that is entirely based around a luxury product. A person simply doesn’t need video games to get by (well, except for this guy, of course), and this has had repercussions in all aspects of the market, not just on the distribution side. Even in November, when Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was released, the industry still suffered losses as a whole.

The question becomes: what is the future of video game distribution?