Gaming Tuesday- 2011

Hello! Since this is the first Gaming Tuesday of 2011 it is really good to do two things. First is to discuss expectations for the the upcoming year and secondly to make changes to the format of this post for the new year.

Last year I did weekly updates on my achievements. I came to realize that those were largely self-important bullshit and have decided to stop them. As something to remember those by, here's a visual representation of my donation to the Harry Potter Alliance as a result of my weekly achievement goals:



I will continue to set challenges, but they will be slightly different in nature. Instead of every week having a challenge about overall gamerscore, I will give more specific challenges and they won't necessarily be every week. For example if a new game comes out, I may set it for a certain amount of gamerscore from that game in the first week its out. It won't always be about achievement points. We'll see how this progresses throughout 2011. The charity I will be donating to this year will be the This Star Won't Go Out Foundation.

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So here is the first challenge I'm going to issue myself. This is also kinda of a trial run for this new system.

Challenge: Score 100 points in a game of NCAA Football 11 using the National Champion Auburn Tigers. If I fail to score 100 points in a game, I will donate a quarter for ever point I am short from my best scoring game.

Conditions: All-American Difficulty, 5 Minute Quarters, Opponent has no worse than a B+ Defense, Cannot use QB #2(Cam Newton), Must be the Away team, Default Auburn Playbooks

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2011 Gaming Expectations

We're still in a slow period for gaming releases after a frantic period in late 2010. That will soon pick up, but the four titles I'm most anticipating are not slated until later in the year. Those games are Alice: Madness Returns, Modern Warfare 3, Gears of War 3 and Mortal Kombat.

Another game I'm really curious about is Madden 12. I thought Madden 11 was virtually unplayable. It was unrealistic and incredibly frustrating and a step in the wrong direction. However it did receive critical praise. I'm hoping it will actually be improved this year.

I'm also wondering about motion gaming in 2011. Will it remain just a niche in gaming or will it become a larger force? I'm hoping Niche. I can't imagine Kinectimals having that much sticking power.

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Gamecrush.com

Zaxy.com's Tara went 'undercover' into the world of Gamecrush.com and here's the article about her experience. Gamecrush is a website where one can pay to play video games with a 'playdate'
over web-cam. Obviously the 'playdates' are largely female and the site users are mostly males. As you might have expected, this site isn't in reality entirely about the gaming. In fact it seems to be a pretense for a cam site.

To be fair, not all the play dates are stripping instead of playing games nor are all the users just there to see some tits. However that does seem to be pretty prevalent on that site even though it is against the terms and conditions. Although, it does seem that there is very little enforcement on the site.

I don't want to go anymore in depth about the site. The Zaxy article does a very good job of that and this article from Pixelated Geek goes in-depth. However I do want to address the question that keeps coming up about this site. That is: Why do guys feel the need to use that site?

I have no desire to use Gamecrush at all. I don't see the point in either sense. I like to game with my friends over Xbox Live; not with a stranger over web cam. In the other sense, I would rather keep my porn and my gaming* separate.

I'm as socially awkward as anyone and left to my own devices my face-to-face interactions with girls would be pretty rare. I mean I say I'm socially awkward, which is very true, but put me around an attractive girl and it's increased significantly. That is unless we've been friends for a long time.

I have only been in a party with a girl two times on Xbox Live and have only one woman on my friend's list. I would love it if I gamed girls more often, but I really feel Gamecrush is demeaning to both parties involved. It also really shouldn't be necessary for guys who want to game with girls. There are plenty of female gamers out there, which leads to my final plea.

Guys need to stop being such douchebags on Xbox Live, generally, but specifically when there are girls around. I'd imagine there are a lot more female gamers out there than we know, because they never plug in their mics to avoid being told to, 'make me a sammich' or 'send me a topless pic to prove you're not just a little boy.' Just because your anonymous and want to prove how much of a man you are to a bunch of male strangers doesn't give you the right to treat another person like that.

Thanks for reading and please comment.

-Michael

*Full Disclosure: I certainly do find certain female characters in games very sexy.