Monday, November 20, 2006
Lunch with Tom - Dirty scalpers and Wii surprise
I hung out in a PlayStation 3 line last Thursday. I kept thinking about the upcoming system's launch. The PS3 costs $600 and the must have games aren't even coming out until next year. Why would anyone in their right mind wait outside, in the freezing cold, for a system that is currently vastly inferior to the X360? So I purchased a little "Reporter's Notebook" from Walgreen's and went to interview the poor saps waiting outside my local Best Buy. There are such lame people out here.
Because I am a master reporter I went to the front of the line. I wanted to talk to the most hardcore guy there. Unfortunately, Vernon Hill's law dictates that only softcore people can wait in line. The police department issued an artificially lame 24-hour limit to people willing to wait outside for a chance at a PS3. The front of the line had only been occupied for 12 hours when I arrived on the scene. I was thankful not to be engulfed with the smell of dirty geek, but I wanted little more insanity from my interviewee. Needless to say, I have no idea how to conduct an interview. After talking to the man in front for almost ten minutes, I finally found out that he was not actually a gamer at all. He plays games on PC sometimes but hasn't even played a console since the Super NES was the newest hot toy. My crest had fallen. I wanted to mock the people in line for their poor choice. I wanted to shove the fact that, while Resistance may be fun, they can get an X360 and Gears of War for cheaper without having to camp outside. I wanted to make people doubt this whole launch thing. Sadly, this guy was just in it for the money. Which made me even angrier. He couldn't name one launch title. He didn't care about the Wii because there was no money in selling that cheap and plentiful sucker. He knows what money tastes like and he knew the power of the PlayStation name.
I hate that scalpers were waiting outside for a PlayStation 3 while real video game fans, people who would love to play through Resistance and Genji, were left with nothing this weekend. Is that not the lamest thing in the world? At least the bottom has already fallen out on these eBay auctions. You could have sold your PS3 for more than $2,000 Friday morning, but with scalpers around the country trying to milk Americans from every cent they can, the demand has fallen sharply. Obviously, there are enough gamers in America to eat up 300,000 systems for $600. But there aren't nearly as many people willing to spend $2,000 on the same system. And the scalpers are finding out the hard way that the X360 and Wii are legit.
After I was done talking to this greedy shmuck who was technically the third person in line, I went looking for someone who was buying the system to play games on. I called out "Hey, is there anyone here who is not going to eBay this thing?" No one answered. I went up the line and asked people. They all said they wanted the money. Every single person had stupid dollar signs flashing in their eyes. After all the hard work and money Sony poured into the PlayStation 3, people thought it was their place to profit from it. How does that make sense at all? Greedy bastards.
Eventually, I found a group of high school kids, twenty people from the front of the line, who were actually excited about the prospect of a new video game system. Well, one kid was. The other five people he was with were planning on doing unmentionable things with their new system. Greedy bastards. But this one kid, Andrew K, was willing to talk about his unhealthy obsession with the PS3. This was my point after all, to find someone who was willing to sacrifice food and sleep to get this system at launch. I assumed a whole mess of gamers would be in line, but I would settle for one guy who liked playing video games more than rolling in singles. So why would someone wait outside in near freezing weather? Metal Gear Solid 4 and Motorstorm. Really? You're waiting in line for a game that isn't coming out until next November? You're waiting in line to buy a $600 console even though MGS4 may come out on the X360 as well? And Motorstorm? A dirt racing tech demo that isn't coming out until March? He knew he was going to buy the system at some point, Andrew said, so he was just going to jump on it right out of the gate. Games be damned, that system would be his.
How about Resistance? Andrew was going to get Resistance, but only because there wasn't anything else to buy. He didn't really care about the forty player online or the alternate history story. He just wanted something to play on his ultra expensive new toy. If push came to shove and eBay prices were soaring, he admitted that his PS3 would be shipped anywhere in the world if the price is right. These loyalists aren't even loyal.
I left after that. I could talk to 10,000 people and get the same two answers repeated over and over. Dirty scalpers were the main group purchasing the PS3. A few people were getting it because they were kind of curious about Resistance. If Sony is losing money on every system sold and no one is buying games...
Sadly, I have talked for far too long about the PS3 launch. There's no time left for me to talk about the Wii! I'll give you a few mercy sentences though. Zelda is great. Wii Sports is really fun. But I spent almost four hours yesterday playing Viva Pinata. Is Zelda overrated you ask? Is Wii Sports just a gimmick? Nope, they are both the real deal. But Viva Pinata is just so engrossing; I cannot pry myself away from it. I finally have a Fizzlebear in my garden with an Elephantilla lurking outside. I assumed my garden would be closed for the winter while I dove into Zelda. Shockingly, VP is good enough to distract me from what may be the greatest game of all time. Say what you want about MS blowing their early lead and only getting two games out this holiday. They have been able to hold the attention of a diehard Nintendo fan at the launch of a new system. After playing Viva Pinata and Zelda yesterday, I am actually more excited about the future of Rare than whatever is going to be on the Wii in the coming year. I did not think I would be saying that one day after the Wii released.
Because I am a master reporter I went to the front of the line. I wanted to talk to the most hardcore guy there. Unfortunately, Vernon Hill's law dictates that only softcore people can wait in line. The police department issued an artificially lame 24-hour limit to people willing to wait outside for a chance at a PS3. The front of the line had only been occupied for 12 hours when I arrived on the scene. I was thankful not to be engulfed with the smell of dirty geek, but I wanted little more insanity from my interviewee. Needless to say, I have no idea how to conduct an interview. After talking to the man in front for almost ten minutes, I finally found out that he was not actually a gamer at all. He plays games on PC sometimes but hasn't even played a console since the Super NES was the newest hot toy. My crest had fallen. I wanted to mock the people in line for their poor choice. I wanted to shove the fact that, while Resistance may be fun, they can get an X360 and Gears of War for cheaper without having to camp outside. I wanted to make people doubt this whole launch thing. Sadly, this guy was just in it for the money. Which made me even angrier. He couldn't name one launch title. He didn't care about the Wii because there was no money in selling that cheap and plentiful sucker. He knows what money tastes like and he knew the power of the PlayStation name.
I hate that scalpers were waiting outside for a PlayStation 3 while real video game fans, people who would love to play through Resistance and Genji, were left with nothing this weekend. Is that not the lamest thing in the world? At least the bottom has already fallen out on these eBay auctions. You could have sold your PS3 for more than $2,000 Friday morning, but with scalpers around the country trying to milk Americans from every cent they can, the demand has fallen sharply. Obviously, there are enough gamers in America to eat up 300,000 systems for $600. But there aren't nearly as many people willing to spend $2,000 on the same system. And the scalpers are finding out the hard way that the X360 and Wii are legit.
After I was done talking to this greedy shmuck who was technically the third person in line, I went looking for someone who was buying the system to play games on. I called out "Hey, is there anyone here who is not going to eBay this thing?" No one answered. I went up the line and asked people. They all said they wanted the money. Every single person had stupid dollar signs flashing in their eyes. After all the hard work and money Sony poured into the PlayStation 3, people thought it was their place to profit from it. How does that make sense at all? Greedy bastards.
Eventually, I found a group of high school kids, twenty people from the front of the line, who were actually excited about the prospect of a new video game system. Well, one kid was. The other five people he was with were planning on doing unmentionable things with their new system. Greedy bastards. But this one kid, Andrew K, was willing to talk about his unhealthy obsession with the PS3. This was my point after all, to find someone who was willing to sacrifice food and sleep to get this system at launch. I assumed a whole mess of gamers would be in line, but I would settle for one guy who liked playing video games more than rolling in singles. So why would someone wait outside in near freezing weather? Metal Gear Solid 4 and Motorstorm. Really? You're waiting in line for a game that isn't coming out until next November? You're waiting in line to buy a $600 console even though MGS4 may come out on the X360 as well? And Motorstorm? A dirt racing tech demo that isn't coming out until March? He knew he was going to buy the system at some point, Andrew said, so he was just going to jump on it right out of the gate. Games be damned, that system would be his.
How about Resistance? Andrew was going to get Resistance, but only because there wasn't anything else to buy. He didn't really care about the forty player online or the alternate history story. He just wanted something to play on his ultra expensive new toy. If push came to shove and eBay prices were soaring, he admitted that his PS3 would be shipped anywhere in the world if the price is right. These loyalists aren't even loyal.
I left after that. I could talk to 10,000 people and get the same two answers repeated over and over. Dirty scalpers were the main group purchasing the PS3. A few people were getting it because they were kind of curious about Resistance. If Sony is losing money on every system sold and no one is buying games...
Sadly, I have talked for far too long about the PS3 launch. There's no time left for me to talk about the Wii! I'll give you a few mercy sentences though. Zelda is great. Wii Sports is really fun. But I spent almost four hours yesterday playing Viva Pinata. Is Zelda overrated you ask? Is Wii Sports just a gimmick? Nope, they are both the real deal. But Viva Pinata is just so engrossing; I cannot pry myself away from it. I finally have a Fizzlebear in my garden with an Elephantilla lurking outside. I assumed my garden would be closed for the winter while I dove into Zelda. Shockingly, VP is good enough to distract me from what may be the greatest game of all time. Say what you want about MS blowing their early lead and only getting two games out this holiday. They have been able to hold the attention of a diehard Nintendo fan at the launch of a new system. After playing Viva Pinata and Zelda yesterday, I am actually more excited about the future of Rare than whatever is going to be on the Wii in the coming year. I did not think I would be saying that one day after the Wii released.
// posted by Tom @ 12:05 PM 
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