Letting Out Some Steam

Written by Ryan Smotherman on August 29, 2001

Letting Out Some Steam: These people better get some УRyan InsuranceФ. Cause they're asking for a beating.

Few things really bother me in this crazy real life world of ours, I guess I'm what you'd call a very laid back person. Like anyone I'll occasionally beat down a younger sibling if they annoy me too much, or tell Arthur to Уshut the hell upФ if he's bothering me, but other than that I'm pretty relaxed. But when it comes to things in the videogame world, I get aggravated fairly easily; I guess it just goes to show the passion that I have for the industry. The majority of the time it's because a person or company does something that's hard to comprehend, mainly due to the sheer ignorance or the uncaring attitude of the situation. Not to worry, I'm about to explain all about it in greater detail. Over the past few months these things have been building up inside of me, and it's due time to Уlet of some steamФ baby! By the way, you might want to stand back.

First off, I'm starting this by complaining about a couple УbiggerФ gaming sites. That's right, just cause they're all high and mighty doesn't mean I'm going to stand down any, I'm just pointing out the ever so obvious facts. What am I so pissed about you ask? It's this new whole paying for extra features fad. It works like this, pay a monthly, in return you get exclusive articles, features, and/or movies that no one else has access to, but the members of course. We can almost certainly thank Daily Radar (and our slowing economy) for all this, they showed everyone that when you pay your writers there is a good chance you'll go bankrupt, though I certainly wouldn't mind a paycheck every month. The two sites that abuse this feature the most are IGN and GamerWeb respectively, nothing against these two high quality, well done sites, but it's just ridiculous. For as long as I've been on the internet I've never had to pay a monthly fee (besides my ISP bill of course) to get the gaming information that I wanted, and it's not going to start anytime soon. Granted the prices are very reasonable, and I'm sure the content that you pay for is well worth it, but it just doesn't seem right, and in the long run it'll end of turning a lot of gamers away. But then again, I do like these two sites very much, so if they want to take advantage of these fools just to stay in business, then so be it. Just don't plan on me signing up anytime soon (unless they get they're hands on some super exclusive Sega stuff).

What's next on my agenda? Ahh yes, in celebration of the release of the X-Box and Gamecube in the coming months, I'd like to talk a second about bundles. Yes, those wonderful package deals that everyone loves, note the sarcasm. If you're curious to what I'm blabbing on about, I'll explain. A lot to these gaming websites out there have these bundle deals, in which to actually purchase a gaming console you have to also purchase a bunch of crap that you normally wouldn't buy. This can either include a set amount of games, peripherals, or even hardware warranties. Why don't they just sell us the system by itself Ryan? Haha, that'd be way too easy now wouldn't it, and plus, when you buy these extra items you don't need, the companies' bank account grows. It's all about the Benjamins, remember? One bundle that really drove me over the edge was during the recent release of the Game Boy Advance. A certain company (I'm not naming any games here, let's just say they're very popular) had some GBA bundles, in order to own the latest in handheld technology you had to also purchase two games, a light adapter, a plug, and some other bits and pieces you probably wouldn't even consider buying in the first place. When did making people buy extra junk just to own the latest console become the new thing anyways? Just like me, I know other people are feed up with this, so if I am these sites I'd change my ways very soon. Or we'll boycott you! WellЕ maybe notЕ we'll just pout a whole, whole lot.

Okay, now lets move on to some Sega related topics, after all, this is УSegaФ Target. Here's a popular subject from the past 8 months. What's the deal with Sega and that little peripheral known as the Dreamcast Broadband Adapter? How could you possibly go wrong with this? A very easy to install, high performance alternative to the super laggy 56k modem that came boxed in with your Dreamcast. Here is how you can go wrong, you don't support the freakin' device. I am one of those lucky people with a broadband connection, so of course I purchased this relatively expensive ($60) add-on in hopes to play all my online Dreamcast games with no hit in speed. Well, it didn't quite work out that way. It was actually doomed from the start when Phantasy Star Online, the main reason I purchased it, didn't support it. This to me made no sense, for two reasons, it was Sega's biggest online project to date, and plus the Japanese version supported it with no problems whatsoever. You would think that they'd want to get as many people playing the game as they can, apparently not. That's okay though, I remedied this problem with a pirated copy of the Japanese version and some tweaking, take that SEGA! I still wuv oo though.

However, after PSO I did still have high hopes for the device. The next month saw the release of Daytona USA with a much talked about online racing mode. Yeah, a racing mode with no Broadband Adapter support! After that things still haven't gotten much better. The main games that support the device are first-person-shooters such as Unreal Tournament, Quake III, and Outtrigger (none of which I care for). Addtionally, the future isn't bright for the little peripheral that could either, support still seems to be at an all time low, and with Sega abandoning the system soon, it's even worse. I'm just a little irritated that Sega never gave the adapter the attention it deserved, especially with it's high price tag. Things turned out well for me though, turns out the device is pretty darn rare, I fetched about $130 for it on Ebay. Once again, take that Sega!
Ryan- 2, Sega- 0

Okay, enough broadband bashing, let's move on. I believe someone was going for a record here recently. That record is for the stupidest movie license ever, and they seem to have succeeded with Crazy Taxi: The Movie. What a bunch of bull, don't get me wrong though, I am one of the biggest fans of the Crazy Taxi videogames, but turning it into a movie is the last thing I'd do. Furthermore, I have nothing against the whole turn a game into a movie thing, when you switch that around is when it gets bad (asides from a few obvious examples). But you shouldn't take a very non-story driven game and turn it into a movie, and the words УCrazy TaxiФ and Уgreat plotФ don't belong in the same sentence together (besides this one). Let us check out a few examples of failed videogame movies. Super Mario Brothers, Street Fighter, and Mortal Kombat II: Annihilation (the first one was actually pretty decent) are all examples of popular games-to-movie conversions where the games themselves had barely a hint of any actual plot.

One movie that sorta broke this law was the recent Final Fantasy movie, the games are driven by their amazingly complex and emotional stories, but the movie fell flat on its face with a fairly lackluster one. Hopefully I'm wrong here though, if director Richard Donnor and company can give this movie an actual plot and at the same time stay truthful to the games, then I'll be a happy, happy man. But I personally don't see it happening. C'mon Donnor, make me eat these words!

I got one more thing to talk about then you can go about on your merry way, praise the Lord! I'll actually end it on a happy note so you don't think I'm such an УevilФ man (o, but I amЕmuhahahaЕ). Instead of bitching and moaning about all the 3rd parties that abandoned the Dreamcast and cancelled countless potential blockbusters (*cough* Half-Life*cough*) like I've done a million times before, I'm here to congratulate all the companies who stuck around till the end and made the Dreamcast's final months a joy to behold. So Capcom, Ubi Soft, Crave, Activision, Infogrames, and anyone one else that I happened to miss, we Dreamcast owners thank you from the bottom of our hearts. O, and we can't forget the greatest gaming company of all time can we? SEGA, thanks for these amazing games that just keep coming out month after month, you've stuck by your word and supported the Dreamcast to your very fullest.

Okay, I'm done. Wow, I feel much better.