WRUP: What Are You Playing This Weekend ?

Having finished Persona 3 last week, I'm now on Persona 4 ! And i'm really, really enjoying it. I like the pacing, the daily mini-stories, the relationships, and most of all, the characters. One thing's for sure, I'll never forget that little "Everyday's great at your Junes !" Aside from Persona, I was tired of having no space on my PS3 so I went and purchased the new 500GB model with 1 year of PS+. Time to download ! I installed it all this Thursday and I got everything I couldn't get from my past Playstation Plus subscriptions. SF4: Arcade Edition, Payday: The Heist, Ratchet & Clank 4, Quantum Conundrum, Guardians of Middle-Earth, Retro City Rampage, Dungeon Defenders, and King of Rage XIII. Also, a friend of mine let me borrow Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Wii) and Ico/Shadow of the Colossus and Rayman Origins. I will proooobably not be able to play all of those games this weekend, but this is what I'm going to play for the next few weeks.

VG OST Pick Of The Week: Diablo II - Caves

A regular in my phone's music player rotation, Diablo II had such an amazing soundtrack. The guy went on to score Torchlight II and that game had great music as well. I think this one is my favorite among the D2 tracks, with Tristram.

Greg Zeschuk on leaving Bioware - "The fire wasn't there".

Greg Zeschuk made the news this week after an interview on Polygon, explaining some of his reasoning for leaving Bioware, along with Ray Muzyka, whom he spent over 15 to 20 years working with and co-founded the company.

There are excerpts from the interview I personally found interesting.

While the studio, now a subsidiary of EA, thrived, Zeschuk began to feel his passion for gaming wane.

"I just wasn't as into it as I was originally," he said.

"Everything's a factor," Zeschuk tells me. "There's nothing that's not a factor, but there's no single one thing. I think the best way I can describe is: Do the same thing for twenty years and it's very, very intense. It's very high pressure. It's very high stress. It's challenging. It's sometimes rewarding and sometimes it's not. And you just get tired of it after awhile. That is probably the easiest way to for me to describe it. Sometimes you just need to change things.

"One of the few things I find kind of funny is the responses of the fans, because they sort of respond that they are kind of mad at us for leaving because they think we owe them more games. You know it's sad I wish I could deliver on that, but I don't think I would be as good as I was in that space historically. Like I said, the fire wasn't there."

Emphasis mine. Is it me or it's a funny coincidence this happened some time after getting bought by EA ? I know it's a common thing on the Internet to hate EA for everything, but in this case, the "the fire wasn't there" comment really seems to drive that point across.

WRUP: What Are You Playing This Weekend ?

Lanarchy: I'm still not done with Persona 3, I think it'll take quite some time to finish. I heard it can take up to 100 hours. Damn. I also started The Walking Dead series recently. When they released the first episode as a free download on Xbox Live, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to play what so many gaming websites declared as their Game Of The Year. And I'm glad I did. That game...I won't spoil anything, but there are very hard decisions to make, and sometimes, you're like "NO ! No no no this did not happen !" And you go online to see if there's any way to reverse what just happened, and nope. Nope. It did happen. I will play Episode 5 this weekend, the conclusion. I fear what I am going to experience. I know it'll be heartbreaking.

VG OST Pick Of The Week: World of Warcraft - Howling Fjord

I remember that day. I had received an email from Blizzard, saying I was invited to the Wrath of the Lich King Beta. I double checked to be sure it was actually a legit invite, and it was. I was so excited. Remember, this was back in Burning Crusade, when WoW had so much potential. I couldn't wait to discover the new zones, the new talents, new skills, and everything else. My guild was so jealous. They thought I got it because I was the guild leader. Maybe, maybe not. But I remember... I decided to sleep early, so I could wake up a few minutes before the beta server came online.

I woke up, and as expected, I could log in a few minutes later. I took the boat to Howling Fjord, and then this music started playing. I will never forget. I spent hours leveling, and discovering the dungeons with other people playing on the test server. It was just.... so amazing.

Easily, one of my best WoW moments.

WRUP: What Are You Playing This Weekend ?

Lanarchy: Now that I've finished both Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword, I'll answer last week's question as to which one I preferred. I will have to say Twilight Princess. Skyward was better in terms of gameplay and dungeon design, but Twilight was actually in Hyrule (Skyward wasn't) and I cannot forget the amazing Midna. Her duo with Link was one of the best in the history of gaming, plus Twilight's gameplay wasn't bad by any means. Just Skyward's was a tad better due to the Motion Plus controls. Now that that's answered, this weekend I'll be playing Persona 3 (image above) and Street Fighter IV. Probably some Borderlands 2 as well. And yes, Persona 3, a PS2 game. I had never played the Persona series but a friend of mine really recommended them, she was like "OMG YOU NEED TO PLAY THIS OMG" and I'm glad I did. I'm enjoying it lots so far. The characters are so interesting and likable. I'm probably going to place this series into my Top 10 RPG Series. It's that good, and I haven't even played Persona 4 yet.

Andre: I had a crazy week. Can you believe that on Thursday, I didn't even have time to play any game...? The next few weeks will bring lots of changes as well and it might lead to a blackhole on my writing for GBV during this period. This weekend, we are receiving a bunch of friends to play poker... yeah Analog Poker if I may call it that. No remotes, real cards. Despite my rebellious week against video games, I'll still play some PS3 for sure. Dust 514 is on the map as well as some NBA Jam.

VG OST Pick Of The Week: Parasite Eve - Intro (Primal Eyes)

Mitochondria Eve. Chrysler Building. Melissa Pearce. If you remember those 3, you played Parasite Eve. One of the best RPGs from Squaresoft, Parasite Eve was released in 1998 for Playstation. It was a departure from the usual Japanese fantasy fare, instead opting for a more modern America setting. It was amazing, and this intro soundtrack still gets played at least once a week on my playlist. The 1:00 part still gives me chills to this day. Also, the box came with a demo for a little game called... XenoGears.

WRUP: What Are You Playing This Weekend ?

Lanarchy: After completing Twilight Princess early this week, I'm now on Skyward Sword. I am not sure which will be my favorite between the two, as I have a lot of fun with Skyward, but Twilight was absolutely wonderful and Midna is, in my opinion, the greatest Zelda character ever made. We will see when I'm done with Skyward. I'll probably answer that question next week. If I manage to complete Skyward Sword, I'll probably fire up Borderlands 2 and/or continue my Persona 3 adventures.

Andre: This weekend will be pretty busy, my son starts his dance class and we get the family coming on Saturday. I might have some time to play some games (read here: I'll find some time to play some games). On my beloved PS3, I'll get a little multiplayer action on Max Payne 3, a franchise I like very much. I'll also go build up some funds in Dust 514 and spend time trying to make good combat vehicles with that hard-earned cash. On the PS Vita, I'll continue building levels in Little Big Planet and I'll probably play a bit of MGS3 as well every night before going to sleep.  Finally, I might watch an episode or two of The Walking Dead.

VG OST Pick Of The Week: Super Metroid - Prologue Theme

The first time I played Super Metroid, I was completely blown away. For many reasons. First, it had VOICE ! Who can ever forget "The Metroid is in captivity. The Galaxy is at peace". Also, it was the first 24Mb SNES cartridge ! Hearing this track for the first time was captivating. Then the intro. Oh man. Creepy. Then you fight some sort of boss, he leaves, and everything starts exploding everywhere, the base will self-destruct and you must haul ass out of there ! This game will forever be a classic and some 20 years later, it is still very much playable. A truly timeless masterpiece.

Nintendo's Fire Emblem Awakening DLC: Gamers Are Divided

I knew this day would come the minute Nintendo started to mingle with DLC. That didn't take long. You see, Nintendo's Fire Emblem: Awakening was released in Japan on April 19th, 2012. Between that and the upcoming US launch on February 14th, they released a few DLC missions, again in Japan only. Those missions will be sold as DLC for the American audience, and this raised a lot of eyebrows. Gamers are currently divided on this situation.

On one side, some are saying that Nintendo does not owe anyone anything, that businesses are made to make money, that the Japanese had to pay so it would not be fair to them if we got it all for free, that regardless of whenever the game was released in Japan, it cost resources to create this content and we should pay for this and that the main game itself is well worth the 40$ price tag.

On the other side, some are saying that if the game now includes all of these added missions, they should come with the cartridge (similar to "If it's ready, it should be on the disk" recent DLC controversies with Mass Effect 3 and Street Fighter X Tekken). Also that most GOTY editions of games released in the past always come with the full DLC included, especially on Steam. Then there's also the fact that if the DLC advances the main storyline, the game is incomplete without them. The thought for this camp isn't that Nintendo shouldn't get paid for the additional content, it's that the content should be included with the game, and not sold separate.

What side are you on ?