Sleepy Gamer

So you’ve bought yourself a PS3 or XBox 360.  But you have it hooked up to that old 19″ Sony Trinitron television that was handed down from your brother’s girlfriend.  The yellow, white, and red cables are plugged into your tv and you say to yourself, “What’s the big deal?  The graphics look just as good as my PS2.”  Hate to break it to you, but it’s time for a new television.  Here are some general tips and guidelines that you should look into when buying a tv.

Plasma or LCD

Any of these television types would be fine for gaming.  They provide excellent picture quality, and both of which are pretty affordable now.  There are lots of misconceptions that plasmas don’t last as long as LCDs, or that burn-in is a rampant problem with the plasmas.  It’s true that first generation plasmas were plagued with these problems, but the latest plasmas have implemented ways to get around that issue.  Current plasmas and LCD televisions are rated with a lifespan of about 60,000 hours, and a lot of plasmas have built in screen savers that help prevent burn-ins that may occur.  So you’ll be fine going either way.

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While PC gaming has enjoyed smaller downloadable games for just about as long as the Internet has been around, the console space has only just begun to embrace this concept.  The incredible ease of obtaining digitally distributed content along with the rising cost of game development for AAA titles has carved out a nice niche for independent developers to showcase their wares.

Sony has proved that downloadable games can offer large, retail game-sized experiences (see Warhawk , GT 5 Prologue and the upcoming Ratchet & Clank: Quest For Booty), however, the space is primarily inhabited by more casual “pick up and play” games.  Titles like Geometry Wars Retro Evolved or Super Stardust HD are extremely addictive twin stick shooter gems, but they’re also great games to play for 10 to 15 mins, while you wait for your buddy to join you online.  In a way, they’re really more like palette cleansers that can be loaded up quickly while you’re in between game sessions.  These games also don’t require individual discs, which means you can turn on your console and then decide what you want to play, possibly after you’re glanced at your friend’s list.  And since they tend to be smaller, less complicated games, you’re more apt to find a local multiplayer game everyone can join in on.  Rather than entice your friends to come over and play Halo 3 or Madden, you can boot up N+ or Calling All Cars! to bring out some good old fashioned couch rivalries.

Creating these smaller bite-sized games also means you can charge less and still turn a decent profit because the development times are drastically lower.  Independent development studios like thatgamecompany or NinjaBee would have probably never existed or at least might not have been as successful had it not been for the smaller canvas and digital distribution.  Rather than deal with one of the incredibly massive multi-national publishers, Xbox Live Arcade, Playstaion Network, and Wiiware, offer direct channels for consumers to buy their products.  Since a lower cost of development means lower investment risk, developers are given more freedom to innovate.  The single-man production of Everyday Shooter is a great example of a game that seems unlikely to have ever existed on a console 5 years ago.  Such is the potential for this brand new medium.
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Just wanted to take this time to welcome you to the site.  Obviously, it’s a work in progress, but what site isn’t these days, right?  Above all else, we’re just gamers who love to talk gaming.  So if you love gaming, stick around.. we’ve got plenty more to share!  Feel free to leave us any comments or constructive compliments.