| Set On Stun |

I’ve been lucky enough to have a few conversations with some game industry watchers about Project Natal and the reactions to it range from, “it’s a gimmick” to “it will revolutionize gaming”.  However, under the surface lurks the visage of Microsoft’s un-stated strategy.

Project Natal could become the means of content creation on the Xbox 360.

It’s very clear that Microsoft is turning the Xbox 360 into a primary device for consumers. We can update our Twitter & Facebook profiles from the console, we can stream Netflix’s digital library at will, we can listen to our playlists on Last.fm and we can enter a virtual world to play classic arcade games.

The underlying theme is that the Xbox Live platform is a strong social network for gamers to consume media that we want.  However, what’s lacked in the platform has been something that’s inherent in all web and mobile based social networks, content sharing.

One of the core things that changed the web into the social web is the ability for browsers to run native applications through the browser and allow the user to participate, modify and share those applications as they interact with it.  The social participatory network that social media sites have mastered have given us all a platform to share the things we love, hate and do to a wide variety of groups.  Twitter is, for the most part, public.  Facebook is experimenting with different ways of balancing personal privacy with our desire to distribute information.

The second aspect of social media collaboration as it’s evolved has been the advent of real-time updates.  Search giant Google has integrated Twitter streams into its search results page:

Click to embigulate

With the social web combined with the real-time web, there has to be a way to consume media in written, audio or video form, there needs to be a way to share that media with another person in your network and there needs to be a way to modify that media in some form.  Traditionally, the modification of media is comments, ratings or tagging. Lastly, there needs to be a way to create new media, let it reside on a social platform where your network can consume, share and modify it.

Natal fills that gap for Xbox Live. It is a way to modify existing media, it will be able to create new media.

Once that media is created, Microsoft’s Xbox Live has already been looking for ways to spread that media to your network, they’ve been collecting data on how Xbox Live users are actually using Last.fm, Facebook and Twitter and presumably, adding a method that’s more intuitive to share your created content via the Natal update.

Another thing to consider is that Apple has dominated the Zune in usability, user penetration and more importantly, the application distribution and development potential.

With Natal, Microsoft has a unique way for developers to create motion specific applications that can be downloaded from the store, played with and the result of that media consumption and creation will need to be shared with your networks.  If I were to create a really cool picture using “Natal Paint”, I should be able to send that picture to my email, to Twitter, to Facebook.  I should be able to make that creation my background image, the ways for Natal to inspire unique user generated creations is absolutely limitless.

That distribution capability is now being tested.  While some, including my partner Shawn has called Microsoft “drunk” or “stupid” when new features come out that only go half way, I think that this is just the foundation for Xbox Live, in combination with Natal, to explode in the ability to create content and then distribute it.

If I were to be able to link my YouTube account to Xbox Live, I could record my motions in video, apply some paint techniques to add some style, upload it to YouTube and Facebook, promote it with Twitter, then Microsoft would have been successful in creating a fully functional social network out of the browser, away from the computer and in front of all the media we belong to.

The integration of Xbox Live into the Zune is just one more way to spread that content. If I’m right, I think that all of the seemingly random and strange things Microsoft has been doing with Xbox Live lately has been a carefully coordinated test-bed to truly launch Natal as a content creation mechanism supported by a network that will share it with the browser based web.

Apparently, Set on Stun and every other blog on the planet has been writing (and writhing) furiously about the Apple iPad announcement.  In the past few days, my partner Shawn and I have produced a few of those articles as well.

While I’m hesitant to add yet another article in the current cacophony of critical and complimentary yet credible connoisseurs of computing culture, I feel that I have yet to put my finger on why I simultaneously love and hate the Apple iPad.  I hate it because of what it is, yet I love it for what it could potentially be.

Why I Love the Apple iPad:

As my friend, mentor and former boss Thom Kozik noted in a past article, about my skepticism towards the Apple iPad, the revolution of the iPhone was not in the technology, the same could be said (and is being said) about the iPad.  He makes the point that

There’s an old adage in product design & marketing that the mass market will never recognize they need and thus will not demand, truly innovative products. I would challenge anyone to argue that they would have specified in some 2006 survey or focus group that what they *really* wanted was the kind of capabilities/functionality an iPhone user takes for granted (nay, is *addicted to*) on a daily basis. Design by committee doesn’t work here.

He goes on to describe the nearly imperceptible learning curve and its ability to “just work”.  In a sense, he described the brilliance of the Apple strategy.  They make products that they control to give people technology that fits the way they consume media (games, blogs, the internet, music, movies and more).  With the nit-picking of the iPad due to its lack of GPS, media outlets, Adobe Flash capabilities and many more, I realized that in my mind, I am looking at this device with the perception of a media creator.  I create things all day long, analyses, spreadsheets, articles and more.  I sit at my PC and I think, I work and I create.  With those lenses, I have judged the iPad and found it wanting.

However, after a brief IM with Thom and reading his response, I took a look at how I use my badly damaged iPhone and realized that the things I create with my iPhone is minimal.  The emails, texts, tweets and updates are minimal.  However, the media that I consume compared to what I create is staggering.

I sent 12 emails via my phone yesterday, read 12 blog posts, viewed 20 pictures, played 6 games, listened to music for 7 hours and watched over 10 videos.  The iPad would allow me to do that, and more (multitasking aside).

The iPad as a Media Consumption Product is Amazing.

As a content consumption device, it has flaws, but what I think Apple has figured out is not just what people consume on a mobile device, but how they consume media on that device.  The iPad version 1 will always be a test, it will find out what works and what doesn’t.  Patches will be added to update and upgrade the firmware, apps will be created to supplement and work around some of the idiosyncrasies.  Don’t even start talking to me about hating the iPad because of the “walled garden”  each gaming console is itself a walled garden.  I agree in principle, but the reality is that every popular manufacturer of content consumption (games, ebooks, music and movies) have some level of that baked into their process.

Why I Hate the Apple iPad

Simply put, for me, it’s superfluous.  I have consoles, both mobile and static… I have an iPhone, I have a laptop and the iPad is just one more piece of beautiful technology that doesn’t replace any of these items, doesn’t really do anything that these things do significantly better and has some drawbacks that I just don’t have to live with in the context of my current digitally mobile life.  I hate it because I’m attracted to it.  I want it… I want to play games, experience what I’m sure will be a new way to perceive and experience games.

That’s the crux.  All I see now is potential, the iPad is a platform that has a beautiful, yet flawed architecture that holds an incredible potential.  I can see that potential and I can see how Apple has designed this product to be iterative, to blend in with digitally mobile lifestyle and I can see how good it can be.

bring on the bleak

So how do you get your fans the 411 on some hot new stuff that follows one of your most successful titles ever? Twitter.

Enter Bethesda Software and their intentions to promote the followup to Fallout 3 — Fallout New Vegas. @bethblog has posted this tweet on their page

“Keep your eyes peeled for new stuff on #FalloutNewVegas tomorrow!  — about 9 hours ago from TweetDeck”

The last time we heard about this game was last April.  This is not a direct sequel but features the city of Las Vegas in a fallout that predates the original Fallout (1997).  The notion of using Twitter to beef this new title that we’ll probably see sometime this year, is very smart.

1. Direct contact with your core audience

2. Immediate intel that can be updated in seconds.

3. Instant customer response to the posted information.

While many may scoff at the superficiality of Twitter in the proper application it becomes a powerful tool. For Bethesda with their three different  Twitter accounts it’s becomes a promotional hype steamroller that will get fans excited even if they weren’t excited yesterday.  From the looks of it, some might posit that could be the beginning of some sort of mega marketing blitz to follow in the success of their  Fallout 3 campaign and well, they may just be right. There is one thing for certain, the immediacy of Twitter makes promoting a new game release really easy.   Take notes publishers — Ride the wave of social media and use it to your advantage whenever you can.

This sucks to report.  Earlier last year, Crispy Gamer bought the gaming social media site GamerDNA for a bunch of money, it had also raised over $8 million dollars as well last year.

As VentureBeat reports, once you raise that much money, the investors expect a strong return on that investment.  While details are unclear at the moment, what’s known is that all of the editorial staff at Crispy Gamer have been laid off and it’s CEO, Chris Heldman has resigned in protest.

Personally, I really enjoyed Crispy Gamer, it’s ethos didn’t allow any advertising money from game companies and it strove to give independent analysis on the game industry free from influence.

Once I started reading Crispy Gamer, I found its unique insight and the personality of the writers to be a refreshing change from most gaming editorials.  While I’m not one to say they were better than others, what was clear was that their passion, intelligence and independence really showed through.  They were able to become a clear voice for gamers in a short time with their excellent features, writers and analysis.

While it’s unclear as to what’s going to happen with GamerDNA, Crispy Gamer is still live, but it’s no longer being updated.

Hopefully, something good will come from these ashes, but that may come much later.

I’m sure some people will come along and question the wisdom of spending that much money to acquire GamerDNA at a time when money is tight across the industry, but from a consumer perspective, Crispy Gamer kept its integrity, kept its reviews worth reading and had the guts to call out influential players in the gaming industry.

Update: In my previous entry, I’d made the association that they’d raised the $8 million to buy GamerDNA, that was not the case.

Check this out if you want.  It’s very slow, very boring and the exact same game as any Mafia War, FarmVille Facebook game you’ve ever played.

A friend of mine sent me an invite to play this game, and my first thought was, “you’ve gotta be shitting me, is this an app to promote the same Dante’s Inferno game from EA that got second place on my Worst Video Game Marketing Campaigns of 2009?”

Yes.  Yes it is.  Despite the slowness of the game, despite the fact that it’s a clone of other popular games on Facebook, the only thing that shocked me about this is that they actually made it.  I mean, if you’re gonna piss me off, do so in a way that doesn’t bore me to tears.  Even the UI, which seems to be created with the elegance of a crowbar is fitted to promote in the most visible way the upcoming game.  I guess subtlety is not in Visceral/ EA’s vocabulary.

Click to embiggefy

Before I sound like I’m picking on Dante’s Inferno, I want to say that they’re doing the right things, they’re creating a bit of controversy, they’re making marketing campaigns based upon the content of the game, they’re expertly using the language of the story and of the game to communicate to its potential customers.  All of those things, they’re spot on.

Unfortunately, the execution of these efforts are just wrong.  From the #EAFail grope a booth babe contest, to this Facebook application.  Yes, they should be on Facebook, yes they should be leveraging social media.  Unfortunately, this effort is so slipshod and devoid of any real thought that it almost pains me to say that I miss them pissing me off.

If you’re going to offend me, do so intelligently, not by copying what EVERY OTHER FACEBOOK GAME IS DOING.

Dante’s Inferno marketing, once controversial and offensive has entered into the bland and “meh” category.