Gamesplode'

What the hell did they do to Gamespot? The massive gaming media site has just gone through another redesign, and once again I dissaprove. For one, it is far too.. narrow. Maybe it is the high resolution my monitor runs on, but everything seems to be crammed into one long and slim vertical column. It takes quite a lot of scrolling just to get to the bottom of the page.

Also, it takes disorganization to the next level. Everything seems cluttered and happenstance, and most of the items on the main page don't seem to have any worth to them. Let's see, we have a section for "latest and greatest", right above the section for "featured previews", which are of course for other latest and greatest games. We have "new releases" and "new tech"... then "most recent updates", and a random string of screenshots. What if you just want to read something? A review or a feature? Good luck.

I rarely ever went to Gamespot for anything other than their news ticker (which I always checked through Gamefaqs anyways), but this doesn't give me any reason to change my habits. In fact, I might not even do that much now that their news section has been messed up (clicking a link doesn't actually take you to the article in question, but instead to the main news hub so you can search for it... fun).

To continue this rant, I am getting a little tired of all the gaming sites trying cram as much useless junk onto each page as possible. Every game released or in development has a vault of screens, videos, repetitive previews and developer diaries that no one reads. You can know everything about a game before you even get your grubby paws on it! But if you're looking for actual writing, maybe a review or an opinion piece, good luck; it is there, but you'll probably have to dig through scores of links for video content featuring shy and awkward editors trying to do TV.
Then you have the constant push to display the opinions of the "community", AKA the slathering fanboys who will give a game a zero score simply because it isn't on their favorite system. I can do an entire post on this tripe, so I'll stop it there.



In other news, everyone who has played Dead or Alive 3 may agree that the game plays nearly identical to its predecessor, which itself had some problems to sort out. Yet the game looked like a dream and was filled with beautiful babes, and as a result became a showpiece for the Xbox system and a million seller. It was at the right place at the right time I guess.

With DOA 4 Team Ninja doesn't have the same luxury. It looks grand, but not enough to really make people's heads spin. What are they going to do to continue the series' arguably undeserved popularity? Put a Halo character into the game. Who it is we don't know, but if putting Link into Soul Calibur 2 is any indication, this alone will make the game a smash hit. Now if only the gameplay is worked on a little bit more.