Yeah, I know, games live and die by hype and buzz, but enough already! Is it just me, or is anyone else sick of seeing Tribes 2 and Serious Sam screenshots? I remember back before the Diablo II release, and I felt like I had already finished playing the game. I'm curious what the Q23 crowd thinks about this.

- Alan

Tribes 2 has been overloaded with screens like no other game I've seen. I just don't even look at this point, so the game will be pretty fresh. Honestly, I can't even tell you what the weapons or vehicles are in the game. Then again, I'm pretty resistant to previews. I just don't look at many.

I like what 3DO is doing with HOMM3. It's due out in 6-8 months and they haven't even announced it yet. It will ramp up with coverage, but they're timing it so that our appetite will be whetted just before the game appears, not 18 months before it appears.

OTOH, some people argue that it's never too early to start promoting a game to raise awareness. Because gamers seem to love previews so much, it's hard not to give them what they want.

"I like what 3DO is doing with HOMM3. It's due out in 6-8 months and they haven't even announced it yet. It will ramp up with coverage, but they're timing it so that our appetite will be whetted just before the game appears, not 18 months before it appears."

On the other hand, maybe that's because 3DO just fired the development team. :-/

You're sure that the Might and Magic games are unaffected by the recent layoffs?

The screenshot phenomenon is a direct result of game companies sending out builds of their games. Obviously the Tribes 2 shot of the day is also Sierra getting wacky, but Serious Sam shots are due to a demo being released and an alpha that's floating around. It's easy content to generate, and readers click on them.

I think it's pointless to complain about them, though. If you don't want to see them, don't look at them. And if you're seeing too much coverage, then QUIT READING SO MANY GAME SITES.

If I were doing PR (god help us all), I'd control all art assets. I'd send out 3-4 screens when the game is announced, go into quiet mode, or allow interviews and such but release no more art. Then toward the end of development, I'd release a few dozen screens from select areas that don't give away much of the game.

I'll tell you something, you get a completely different game experience when you avoid previews. I never paid any attention to Alice previews, and when I reviewed the game I was consistently surprised by the environments. It was great... the surprise, not the game.

I have no idea about the recent layoffs. I never said anything about who was laid off or what will be affected. I would think they would have sense enough to not touch dev teams for products in development, though, unless they wanted to kill the product entirely.

In fact, outside of Fatbabies, I haven't even seen another story about it other than on fuckedcompany.com.

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Quote:

In fact, outside of Fatbabies, I haven't even seen another story about it other than on fuckedcompany.com.

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Fuckedcompany is the focus of a lot of anger from people who missed out on the dot com riches and are jealous, those who got in with options but got caught in the collapse, and those who have been laid off. Anger tends to be ugly.

The dot coms also didn't help themselves with some inane business plans that are easy to make fun of and more than a little smugness and arrogance on their part when things were going good.

Fuckedcompany is the best source for rumors about troubled dot coms, though.

>Fuckedcompany is the best source for rumors about troubled dot coms, though.

Absolutely - and it has a better accuracy record than fatbabies.