End of the Week Wrap-Up: Battlefield 3 Moments Edition

Posted By: Dave Bast In: Console News, Gaming News, PC, Xbox 360 On: 26 Oct

I tend to be of the opinion that Battlefield 3 videos are more entertaining than CoD videos. It has nothing to do with my preference as a player and sometimes quality commentary can really spice up a CoD video, but generally speaking I find Battlefield videos to be much more interesting. Maybe it’s the vehicles, there’s nothing like watching a few wannabe Mavericks pilot the game’s jets as if their real-lives depended on it. Or perhaps it’s the many different ways players have figured out how to blow stuff up using well driven vehicles and some C4. Most likely it has something to do with the freedom the game gives players, allowing them to come up with their own strategies. I mean who doesn’t appreciate someone taking out a helicopter with a buggy packed in C4?

I’ve seen some Battlefield 3 videos in my day, but this one seems to capture the game’s destructive freedom, giving it a kind of movie-like feel. The game is a lot prettier and a lot less hectic when you add in all of the camera angles and editing. Robert Stoneman has taken what would be a bunch of already impressive Battlefield 3 snippets and edited them in a way to seem like scenes from a Hollywood action movie. There are epic dog fights, wild explosions, and even tanks shooting down helicopters. I know playing the game doesn’t look like this, but the fact that someone can go in and make all look this great afterwards is the next best thing right?

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While large publishers and developers are doing their best to thwart any and all forms of internet piracy, there are some it seems that don’t see it as an issue. In fact, in one case, some are even giving those who downloaded the game illegally some tech support. In a Reddit post today someone linked a picture of Hotline Miami dev Jonatan Soderstrom heading over to the game’s torrent to offer some friendly tech support. He also went so far as to make sure the torrent is updated as soon as the game’s next patch it out. Maybe he lost a few bucks in sales, but he may have just gained a couple of customers in the process.

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For a long time the only games that could unseat a Call of Duty game from the top spot on Xbox Live was a different CoD game, but not today. It seems that MW3 has been unseated, not from another CoD, Battlefield 3, or even the new Medal of Honor. No, the top spot was snagged by the 360 version of Minecraft. It seems that not only has Notch and Mojang taken over the PC with their block building phenomenon, but have also conquered the 360 as well. As of last month they were up to 4 million sales for the console, with many coming back to play patch after patch. It’s almost sure to be dethroned once again when Black Ops II is released, but maybe, just maybe, this shows that console gamers aren’t just all about modern shooters and excessive violence.

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I haven’t played a skating game since Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2, that’s a long time ago. The problem I found as the skateboarding genre progressed is that many titles either didn’t have enough skating or didn’t do it well enough. Sometimes all of the tricks in the world won’t save you from a sketchy physics system. HelixSnake has uploaded a video of his favorite physics glitches from Skate 3 and I have to say its way more funny than I thought it would be. It seems that with a keen eye and attention to detail, they were able to recreate some really bad glitches in the game’s physics system. It’s still the best Skate 3 video I’ve ever seen, so that’s a plus. Source: Reddit

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There was some drama in the industry this week but it didn’t come from a developer. No, this week’s drama came from a piece in Eurogamer which talked about the fine line between being a real journalist and an accidental PR lackey. The PA Report did an excellent breakdown of the whole event, but it all pretty much boils down to whether or not game journalists should accept gifts or swag while continuing to write about certain companies. It’s a no-brainer that they shouldn’t, but a surprising number of people took to defending those “reporters” who would post about a game in order to potentially win a PS3. Eventually the author of the Eurogamer piece had to resign over the piece, with neither him nor Eurogamer backing down from the original story. It’s a real shame that someone lost their job over this, no matter the details of how it happened. You don’t get that many enemies that quick unless you are on to something.

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According to Joystiq, GameStop has begun to offer services specifically aimed at children in an effort to stem their losses caused by digital distribution. This is yet another move from GameStop to diversify their business away from simply selling games. It was only a few weeks ago the company started talking about selling vintage games as a way to keep their physical locations relevant in an industry that has all but gone digital. By gearing GameStop towards kids they will be offering more in the way of gaming accessories for games like Skylanders and Angry Birds. I wasn’t going to head over to GameStop any time soon, but if they start selling foam Minecraft pickaxes…