Monday, October 26, 2009

'Massive momentum' may be ebbing for music video games

Article by Mike Snider

This article talks about the success of Guitar Hero 5 and The Beatles: Rock Band. The article provides interesting information in regards to the sales of these video games.

There are good facts and figures presented such as how many copies have been sold versus how many were expected to be sold. The article also discusses other games such as DJ Hero and Band Hero and Snider does a good job of providing the information of when the games will be released and the prices of the games. I'm not left questioning the hard facts but the explanations of the games are not very clear. However, since the other games are not the main point, it's OK.

Snider also focuses on the popularity of music based video games. I think this is very important and he could have done a better job tying in how music based games are so popular due to the increased technology we have today. For the "tech beat" he could have discusses more how interactive games can be now and the realistic aspects of real life music in these games.

I do not like he used statistics from a USA Today blog's poll. He points out that it is "an unscientific poll" yet I feel that omitting the reference would give the article more legitimacy.

Lastly, while some of the quotes are valuable, the use of a game player quote at the very end of the story was misused. I feel like the quote came out of nowhere and that the source was very random. Snider could have incorporated quotes from Johnson earlier into the story or ended his story on a stronger note than Johnson's one quote.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/gaming/2009-10-26-video-games-sales_N.htm

That's all for now folks
Posted by at

5 comments:

  1. B.ShakeyOctober 28, 2009 at 12:51 PM

    I'm wiht you. Down with anecdotal evidence..the enemy of truth and fact

    ReplyDelete
  2. JessieyOctober 28, 2009 at 2:03 PM

    Good criticism. I definitely think the article would have been enhanced if he had explained some of the new technologies that have made these games so popular, possibly even talking about things in the future to come.

    Without the player quote, how would you have closed the article?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Beat CritiqueOctober 28, 2009 at 2:49 PM

    Thanks for the comment Jessiey.

    I think I would have closed the article with looking toward the future in regards to selling these games this holiday season and how the sales will be impacted. Or end with the dates of Band Hero and Lego Rock Band coming out in November (instead of stating it earlier in the article).

    He could have also ended the article with an abrupt ending, but I personally feel that the quote was a poor choice and something else could have been better.

    ReplyDelete
  4. JessieyOctober 30, 2009 at 10:46 AM

    I agree!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Tom MichaelsOctober 30, 2009 at 4:09 PM

    I think the fundamental shift in all gaming is that the telphone or PDA will become the dominant platform for 30-40% of the games..this is drawing off lots of gaming revenu in teh traditionla space. Wait til Apple says to Guitar Hero.."I've got an app for that"!! The cell phone/PDSA is EVERYTHING for the immeidate future

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)