Grinds My Gears: Console Lag

You know what really grinds my gears? Lag on consoles. Lag is an inevitable part of video games, especially when playing over the Internet or perhaps on a sub-par computer. However, why do some games lag on consoles? I mean seriously, yeah they might have a lot of textures to load, but when developing a game for a console, there is only one hardware requirement to meet. There should be no reason for there to ever be any lag on consoles when it’s being played offline. Yeah games need to load, but when they interrupt crucial gameplay that’s when it hurts the worst. I recently noticed this while playing Skate 2; Skate features an open world, however, I never really noticed lag until recently and frequently in the same spots. This might seem like not too big of a deal as it lasts for under a second or so, but when it interrupts the flow of the game and causes the player to fail a trick then it really messes with the feel of the game. So developers need to make sure that games pushed out for consoles are able to really flow seamlessly if they are going to advertise it as such. And that is what really grinds my gears. What do you think? Do you ever run into lag while playing on consoles, and what do you think about it?

Grinds My Gears: Casual Gamers

You know what really grinds my gears? Casual gamers. Casual gamers have ruined video games. This is nothing new and something all hardcore gamers should have a strong opinion about. Yes, casual gaming has brought video games into the mainstream and taken it more away from the view that video games are bad and only for weird closet dwelling nerds. However, this mainstream integration of video games has become a cash cow for developers. Casual gamers don’t seem to buy for quality or what a game can provide, they just buy for what they know. Casual gamers don’t research games, they don’t know what makes a game great because they don’t care. They want something simple and with something they know.

Which is why developers love pushing out movie games and other classic character games that already have the branded image that casual gamers look for. These games are easy to make as they are all basically the same. From Shrek to Kung Fu Panda, they are all the same basic platform games just with different character models. Even though these games are all pretty much terrible and all pretty much the exact same, they still sell like crazy. This has caused developers to focus more on those casual games and put less effort into AAA titles.

It is easy to see that casual gamers are much different than hardcore gamers, there is a lot of passion in video games and if you would like to see an example of such passion then meet FPS Doug, it’s super funny and rather true, but usually not this extreme. Check the video out here. [Warning: Explicit language] Many hardcore gamers hate casual gamers not just for their purchasing habits, but also their gameplay tactics. Playing Halo or any other AAA title with all serious gamers that are in it to win it can be serious fun, and can have great competition that brings video games alive. However, when a noob or casual gamer comes and plays it can ruin the whole experience through their lack of skill or care to win. Luckily that is why games use ranking systems to help place gamers with gamers of their own skill level, but it’s never perfect and always lets in a few mistakes. Casual gamers can be a lot of fun to play with, but they need to learn what hardcore gaming is and what their casual gaming does to it and learn from it. No one wins when you buy horrible movie games so don’t, and casual gaming in general needs to learn to be separate from hardcore gaming and they need to progress on their own. And that is what really grinds my gears.

What do you think casual gaming vs hardcore gaming? Let me know in the comments!

What Really Grinds My Gears: Xbox Live Account Migration

You know what really grinds my gears? Xbox live account migration. I currently rotate my xbox live account between three xbox 360s, averaging at least one migration a day. I have to migrate my account if I want my stats recorded or if we need multiple gold accounts, for whatever reason. Each time you migrate your account you have to plug-in your gamertag, email address, and password, and five minutes after that you are able to use your account. I was forced to create a shorter email address to cut the time and brain energy it took to punch out my account info. I seriously think Microsoft needs to look into a better way of handling xbox live accounts. If I own multiple xbox 360s, then I should be able to play on all of them under the same account. I shouldn’t have to migrate them every single time. I realize that by only allowing one xbox to have an account at a time it makes sure only one person can be on at a time, but this could be easily fixed. I think Microsoft should allow users to register their xbox 360s to their gamertag and that gamertag would always be allowed to play with that gamertag. They could turn off xbox live capabilities to the second version of the gamertag until the first one had logged off.

Also, when plugging in my account information, why are there no macro buttons for ‘@hotmail.com’ or ‘@live.com’? There are only so many options for a Live account, why can they not make it easier to migrate an account by only requiring plugging in the unique username, followed by a macro button that takes care of the rest. I understand that I am in an extreme minority when it comes to this as few people own multiple xbox 360s and have probably never heard of the migration process. But why do I have to suffer? I’ve paid by dues, just fix migration. And that is what really grinds my gears.

Does any of this really grind your gears? Or do you have problems with another part of Xbox Live, let me know in the comments!