PixlBit

So I’ve got this goat.  I have no idea where he came from, he just appeared in my house one day, in a closet to be precise.  I came home from work and heard a chewing, scratching noise from said closet, so I grabbed a baseball bat, opened the door and there he was.  He had what looked like a big yellow glowing flea collar on his neck and he was soaking wet.  If you think that’s weird, just you wait. 

Sometimes it talks, and it makes pretty accurate predictions on the future.

Now this goat was actually missing for quite some time.  There was actually an… altercation between him and one of my ex-girlfriends and he was banned from the house.  He wandered off into the woods for about 5 years, but a couple of months ago, about 4 years removed from the girlfriend fiasco, he returned, and last night, he started talking again.

I call him Goatstradamus, and these are his predictions for our electronic future.

The Boxes of joy shall face awkward transitions

Overtaken by spiders and forced silence their pride

The no longer competitive, no longer relevant

Soon face obscurity and minimization

Ah, the new console generation.  This sounds to me like Goatstradamus thinks this will be the transitional generation, kind of like the PS1 / N64 era, only instead of switching from sprites to polygons, we’ll be switching from physical to streaming content.  Usually, the goat uses spiders as an internet reference.  A packet of information flying around kind of reminds him of spiders running on webs.  I think the “no longer competitive” bit means that, part way through this coming generation, system side processing will start to become obsolete, putting an end to the ‘most powerful console’ debate.  Once that happens, the bulky systems of the present will be replaced by ‘minimized’ receiving devices. 

The sword dripped island remains behind

Held off by the spiders of the new generation

Keeping to their circular mirrors and chained to their own might

Their minds shackled to their restrictive means

The “Sword dripped island” is clearly a reference to Japan, as their lore dictates the island was formed by dripping metal from a molten sword.  It sounds like Goatstradamus believes that the west will lead the charge into the digital era.  It’s no surprise really, given that the Xbox has superior support to the PS3, and Nintendo apparently still hasn’t wrapped its head around the internet in general.  Honestly, with a few exceptions, it seems like Japan has only just now gotten used to developing in HD, and now faces the additional challenge of streaming content and digital distribution.  Sony may have part of this nailed down, and will likely get on board eventually, but there will be some transitional lag when it comes to broad support.  It’s probable that Sony’s hardware will again be superior, meaning leaning on client side processing won’t be all doom and gloom for them, but it will take time for them to embrace cloud processing full force.

This will, however, eventually have a dynamic impact on presentation.  Server, or cloud processing means the content that can be streamed could be beyond what the hardware alone is capable of producing.  This gives designers a blank check for system requirements, as long as their producers can foot the bill for whatever hardware is required to process the game on their side.  Sticking to the client side processing only will force them to operate under the console’s restrictions.

 

The Ko-Tec embraces the spiders, and gives them keys

The spiders deliver keys and return with paper

The Ko-Tec shall loose his shit, locking vision in pieces

His slaves, weeping, empty their purse

Ah, Bobby Kotick.  This is a dream come true for this man.  He’s already expressed his interest in forcing people to pay extra in order to complete a game, and this eventual switch to pure digital probably has him pissing himself with anticipation.  It’s only a matter of time before Activision begins releasing their content digitally, and then you can expect the madness to begin.  Think of it this way:  Imagine if the original Super Mario Brothers was released today, and was published digitally by Activision.  Now they might give you world 1 for free, but as soon as your reach Bowser, bam, end of demo.  You want to keep playing?  That will be 5 bucks please.  Say you pay your 5 bucks, battle Bowser and win. Now you get to explore world 2, but as soon as you reach the castle, BAM! 5 bucks please.  This would continue until you managed to beat the game, but by that time you’ll have forked over 40 bucks to Activision to play the complete package!  You can understand why people would be a little upset about that! 

The creators embrace the Ko-Tec

And chain the creative down

No longer will one work be one, but many

And the voiced decry, but all will embrace

This builds off the previous quatrain, stating that eventually the creators (producers) seeing Bobby’s McDuck-esque pile of money, will follow Activision’s example, breaking up their content and forcing the creative (designers) to make their content segmented to appeal to their new marketing strategy.  This will cause outcry from many people for both the forced drain on their wallets and the compartmentalizing of the experience, but despite this, we will all be forced to eventually embrace the new digital distribution future.

The splintered future is not all darkness

For the creative now must re-create each piece

Each shard must stand on its own merit

Or it will fail, and destroy the creative

 This is, again, a continuation of the previous thought, but this time showing the other side of the coin.  Now that designers are forced to splinter their content, each segment of the content has to stand on its own creatively.  Each part must add some new bait in order to keep the cash flowing.  Should a demo fail to grab any attention, or should one part of the overall experience fall flat, the project will be canned, and possibly, if Activision keeps to its current practices, the developer shuttered as well.  This practice forces innovation and creativity into each and every part of the overall experience, which could be beneficial in the long run.

Well that’s all for now.  I’d love to update you on my gaming status and what I’m currently enjoying / annoyed by in the industry, what I’m playing, stuff like that, but Goatstradamus has found his way into the trash again and is currently reducing the amount of money I’ll be getting from my soda can deposits, so if you’ll excuse me, I need to take my furry prophet outside for a bit.  Enjoy!