Good thing EA advertises Bad Company 2 with gameplay videos

I've never been fond of EA but I feel sorry for them so I will try out Bad Company on Steam for half price when that happens.

But where do you draw the line between a game made for advertising and a game made for playing? Even a game like Gears of War, the sales were slow and steady so you can't say that most people didn't know what they were getting themselves into.

Yep think I tried to mention that somewhere in the post.  As budgets get larget, quick success is what these publishers are looking for so advertising shock value is a good way to get a big opening week or openingmonth such as Prototype was able to get.  But after that the game never did anything on the charts.  But I think they could do better by making a product that sells itself by being commonly picked up by new customers on the system or after well-establishing the brand through quality such as a Halo or Call of Duty or Mario.  Don't have to always take this "next big thing" route or "we got the same as the other brands" strategy because it doesn't have a long-term strategy.

Well yea I thought I had the quote right until you pointed it out and noticed it was backwards haha.  Well it happens. 

But it does seem a formula they have taken on and there are many games that seem to be adapting it.  Just recently with Dante's Inferno and Aliens vs. Predator.  Dante's Inferno with the shock value of the gore and what you can do in the game along with the name itself.  Aliens vs. Predator with the brands of the movie letting that sell the game when once you actually play it's nowhere near as good as the old PC ones.  But yea as you said they make great trailers and great marketing commercials, but they don't make for great games.  I mean when used properly, cinematic action can be wonderful (RE4 or God of War for example) but if the parts you play through are dull and unexciting then why pay $60 or $50 for something you could see in a movie. 

I'm not so against sequels or even using old ideas.  Even gimmicks are fine.  It's just they need to be used effectively in the game or a sequel needs to be worthwhile.  Just using the brand alone isn't going to cut it and we noticed that with the "casual" games on the Wii as the sequels to top selling Wii games were flopping because they were name brand sequels not actual ones.  Same thing happens in the rest of the market, just we haven't caught on yet. 

Actually its worse than that. The reason why graphics are being focused on this generation is that its easier to market than gameplay. Its hard to market 4 player split screen games with lower graphics because if you consider all the different media sites, they look a lot worse than a game without. It takes a pretty awesome developer to wow people with graphics whilst still compromising those graphics for gameplay. This is the reason why my most respected shooter developers this generation are Infinity Ward, Bungie, Epic in that order.

Im really disapointed that most people on this site don't seem to understand the basic fundamentals of gameplay which are important. So many top rated games fail at basic gameplay and yet score highly for 'story' or 'graphics'. So many games simply aren't actually that engaging on a level that once you've seen the gimmick you'll want to immediately play through again. Its my belief that a game should only be reviewed from the perspective of 'I've finished the game, do I want to play it again.'

The best reviewed games are still the best sellers - that is a trend which is pretty much set in stone. It's very rare that a companies has made something 'crap' but sold it via marketing with no substance to back it up.

The only difference between 1990 and 2010 is that the industry has come a long way, marketings change. It's no longer two kids playing Zelda cause thats all video games appeal to, appeal has branched out and thus so has how games are marketed. If you think in the 90's games weren't marketed in such a way so that people were 'tricked' into buying trash you're just not old enough to remember, nothing has changed there.

I found it odd you praised Nintendo's strategy too - It's the one that frustrates me most. All I ever see if how celebrities play the Wii - the adverts don't focus on the game so much as how CrAzY it is playing it. Nintendo make the quality to back it up, but it's that strategy that to me is truly 'lying' most to the consumer; and is already being put into practise by companies without products the same quality as Nintendo.

A very great read, and I definitely agree. Aside from the Wii, I'm seeing some PS3 exclusive games having great legs as well.

You hit the nail on the head. I wish I could write more but I got a crisis to handle............

A very good editorial.