Quote: "I've had problems with wireless controllers and those USB charger cables, they don't seem to register as controllers like that. I use a fully wired 360 controller, which IMO is the best option. For one thing you don't have to worry about batteries, but buying one for the PC means you also have a handy spare controller for when your batteries do run out and can't quickly be replaced."
I have a Wired and Wireless Xbox 360 controller connected to my PC, and honestly barely used my Wireless one for actually playing games; not due to any issues like battery life (have battery packs for all my wireless controllers and a recharge station) given they can last a minimum of 24hours of continous gaming (on AA batteries like Energizer or Duracell M3 you're looking at closer to 60 hours) which honestly is more than enough given well like most of you I'm sure, I work a 40hour week. Gaming for me is basically Monday / Thursday (days I'm off) or 11pm - Whenever I fall asleep or want to do something else.
So realistically that's more than enough for what I'd say is the adverage gamer like myself; as the controllers can last nearly a week of normal gameplaying on a single charge. It's also not as if they require ridiculous charging time either, given the Plug'n'Play Charger does it within 3hours where-as the Charge Station does it in less.
That all said there are serious advantages to using the Wired controller. Firstly, it's a USB device designed to be standardly recognised as a 5 Axis, 10 Button with POV Hat controller. So you can install it on any OS as a default USB controller.
Second and most importantly is it responds quicker. I'm not sure why this is, but there is actually a very practical test you can do to prove the advantage the Wired gives you performance over the Wireless. If any of you have Forza Motorsport 2, make a split-screen game on Nurbering (sp?) and take identical cars on it.
Now drag race them to the first corner. You'll notice whoever is using the wired controller will not only be able to shift quicker but accelerate quicker as well. Won't be noticeable at first, but they very quickly pull ahead quite noticably before that first chicane.
When you're playing stuff like Portal, you also notice that the controls just feel more responsive on the whole. Now this to me makes it a great advantage when playing anything.
Quote: "There's a difference between "challenge" and "bad gameplay". A lot of those games were just bad, but we look at them with rose-coloured glasses because we were kids back then and it was exciting. Back then limited memory constraints often forced the games to be more difficult (i.e. no saves, constantly respawning enemies, etc.)"
Couldn't agree more. A game being challenging is quite different to poor gameplay/design. Arcade games of old were designed often on purpose to be ridiculously difficult because when you die, you pump in more coins to make it to the end.
When it came to the home consoles while the reasoning is different, the end result is the same. The game you're playing is extremely short in all, but you've just spent $60 on it... you'd feel really cheated if you spent $60 and the game was done in say an hour.
As such as a form of artificially extended the amount of gameplay, developers just make it sadistically difficult. Some gamers seem to believe in order for a game to be a game it has to basically kill you constantly until you get your timing down to an artform in order to complete it.
This is back in a day when you completed a game you were really heralded amongst your friends as "the man". Thing is your adverage gamer gets the same game, gets so far before getting stuck and just gives up; never to complete it cause it's "too hard". Then proclaims the game bad because of it, and to a degree they're right it is bad because it's basically punishing the play for their shortfall of being too damn short.
You look back though and think about it, you'll see I'm right.
The games that offered far less content; in-terms of levels, variety, gameplay, etc... were brutally difficult, while those that offered abundances of such things were fairly easy.
Another way to look at it is this way, games now are getting more and more complex storylines and slowly turning into an artform of their own. I really, really like the story in Dead Space; as it was quite well written and in-depth, a bit like the one in Aliens. Made it extremely enjoyable, now the game alright isn't exactly epically long; but gives the gamer a good 10hours of gameplay which imo is pretty much just right. As it's long enough to get attached but not so long that you feel it was just padded out.
Now if that game had the difficulty that Resident Evil 1 had, I would've done what I did with RE1; got about quarter of the way through... died constantly and given up. Resident Evil 1 is brutally difficult because it is easily possible to complete it within a matter of 3 hours even without knowing what to do or where to go. With the ramped but difficulty though, the game generally takes people a good 10 hours to complete.
That's a huge padding made simply by cheap-deaths and over-powered enemies.
If it hadn't been for my friend who helping my by telling me, which enemies to just ignore and which ones needed to be killed... I doubt I ever would've completed it.
Alright so with Resident Evil I'm not exactly going to get an epic storyline that has be on the edge of my seat wondering what'll happen next like Dead Space; but that's kinda my point.
Dead Space is as difficult as it needs to be so that you'll die a few times, but constant checkpoints and save points mean you never really feel that it's just too much damn work to get back to where you were... and as such while not taking away from the challenge of completing it, you have that insentive to keep going and are rewarded with more story that unravels quite nicely from the tapestry it is.
A difficult game is cool, sometimes brutally difficult games are just so you can be like "HA! I can do it while others can't" but realistically I prefer how Bionic Commando Rearmed and Mirror's Edge go about providing that for gamers...
The single player (and in the case of BCR, co-operative) storymode is fun while offering a bit of a challenge, while the challenge levels just range from a good laugh to "You've got to be ****ing me! No ****ing way that's possible you developer *******!"
That to me is a damn good way of going about catering for everyone, after all what's the point in a story if only a handful of people will ever see it all?
But that said those who play games purely for the accomplishments (and nowadays achievements) probably don't care a game even has a story... after all it's about the challenge, rather than the experience, right? That imo is a bit of a sad view, because you don't watch movies or television programs simply for the challenge of understanding the storyline or making it through it without falling asleep... you watch then to be entertained by a good story.
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