{"id":147,"date":"2005-06-02T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2005-06-02T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/?p=147"},"modified":"2006-08-19T20:12:48","modified_gmt":"2006-08-20T00:12:48","slug":"yet-another-reason-not-to-get-cable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/2005\/06\/02\/yet-another-reason-not-to-get-cable\/","title":{"rendered":"Yet another reason not to get cable"},"content":{"rendered":"

This year’s E3 Game Critics Awards<\/a> will be televised on the testosterone fueled Spike TV<\/a>. Given that these awards are being judged by industry experts, I hope there will be a little more class and maturity than has been on display at Spike TV’s annual game awards orgy, which usually has more rappers and B-movie actors than people actually connected to the industry. Given my lack of cable TV these days, I’ll catch the recap later.<\/p>\n

Taking a quick glance at the judges<\/a> for this event, I find it surprising that so many non-gaming publications have judges on the panel. Maxim Magazine? Rolling Stone? Time Magazine? CNN\/Money? (On a side note, why are games usually put in the business or tech sections instead of the entertainment section?) No sign of my occasional platform, Computer Gaming Magazine though both of its rival US mags are represented. The big three game review sites are there, and so is Gamesdomain, once my favorite of them all. Some very capable judges on are the panel. Greg Kasavin, Marc Saltzman, Jeff Green – three of my favorite writers right there.<\/p>\n

Zero women. ZERO. Why does this continually surprise me…<\/p>\n

On to the games themselves. Well, the strategy and PC stuff.<\/p>\n

The strategy category is all PC Games. While PC zealots might like to trumpet the continuing dominance of our favorite platform in this genre, the failure of game developers to find a way to make strategy work on the console might have serious ramifications for the health of the genre.<\/p>\n

The titles are the usual suspects.<\/p>\n

Age of Empires III<\/b> (Ensemble Studios\/Microsof<\/i>t)
\nCivilization IV<\/b> (Firaxis Games\/2K Games<\/i>)
\nCompany of Heroes<\/b> (Relic\/THQ<\/i>)
\nRise of Nations: Rise of Legends<\/b> (Big Huge Games\/Microsoft<\/i>)
\nStar Wars<\/i> Empire At War<\/b> (Petroglyph Games\/LucasArts<\/i>)<\/p>\n

Spore <\/i>was nominated in the simulation category, though it could fit here just as easily. It’s also a nominee for Best of Show, and it has to be the odds on favorite even though it is up against one of the three new consoles.<\/p>\n

The strategy nominees are not an interesting bunch, sadly. I am looking forward to all of them, but only one of the five is not a franchise title. Company of Heroes<\/i> looks like Combat Mission<\/i> in real time, and could be the sleeper hit of the year. But most of the gaming press over the next twelve months will go to the new games from LucasArts and the three giants of strategy gaming – Meier, Reynolds and Shelley. Though Rise of Legends<\/i> is, to me, probably the most interesting title on the list, Age of Empires III<\/i> or Empire at War<\/i> are probably the favorites. Both have more finished at this point and Empire<\/i> can cruise on the goodwill generated by a not-crappy movie.<\/p>\n

Age of Empires III<\/i> is also nominated for best PC Game, but is up against Spore<\/i>. Even though we don’t know all that much about Spore<\/i> at this point, the post-E3 buzz is so strong that it will be a major upset if it loses. And, if it does, Battlefield 2<\/i> or Prey<\/i> are more likely winners than AoE<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Previous strategy winners do provide an interesting perspective on the genre.<\/p>\n

2004 – Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth<\/i> (EA)
\n2003 – Rome: Total War<\/i> (Creative Assembly\/Activision)
\n2002 – Command and Conquer: Generals<\/i> (EA)
\n2001 – Age of Mythology<\/i> (Ensemble\/Microsoft)
\n2000 – Black and White<\/i> (Lionhead\/EA) – Best of Show, Best PC Game, Best Original<\/b>
\n1999 – Homeworld<\/i> (Relic\/Sierra)
\n1998 – Homeworld<\/i> (Relic\/Sierra) RTS
\n1998 – Alpha Centauri <\/i>(Firaxis\/EA) TBS<\/p>\n

First, there have been no turn based winners since they had a turn based specific award in 1998.
\nSecond, there is no vaporware here, though the E3 awards have often been criticized for giving awards to games that are nowhere near finished. ((Both Homeworld <\/i>and Black and White<\/i> did win some sort of award in two consecutive years, but neither missed a release date by more than a year.)<\/p>\n

Third, there are no games here that could be called bad or misfires. Black and White<\/i> wasn’t the triumph that people expected, but wasn’t terrible either. There are none of the “Say what?” moments that you see in other genres or awards. (<\/i>the yet unreleased Team Fortress 2<\/i>, Sims Online<\/i>, Majestic<\/i>, Auto Modellista<\/i>).<\/p>\n

This third point is easy to explain. Strategy games are harder to sell based on flash, glamor or licenses. People come to the strategy genre with a certain set of expectations and these expectations are probably harder to overcome than in other genres. Age of Empires III<\/i> still needs to look like Age of Empires<\/i>, Company of Heroes<\/i> has to convey the impression of war. Tech demos only get you so far in this field. As impressed as people are by graphics, even the most pixel happy observer wants a little more from a strategy game.<\/p>\n

I could not go to E3 this year, so if any of you readers were there, please pipe in with your observations. Do the nominees surprise anyone? What happened to 1C Games, the Russian company that had eight billion games on display? Any pet projects not here?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This year’s E3 Game Critics Awards will be televised on the testosterone fueled Spike TV. Given that these awards are being judged by industry experts, I hope there will be a little more class and maturity than has been on display at Spike TV’s annual game awards orgy, which usually has more rappers and B-movie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5GFeQ-2n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flashofsteel.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}