Saturday Soapbox: The Madness of Release Date Congestion

By Tom Bramwell Published 12 November, 2011

It's Viva Pinata vs. Gears of War all over again!

This week marked the fifth anniversary of the release of one of my favourite Xbox 360 games ever made.

Viva Pinata was a cute and cuddly game where you planted seeds in a garden and then looked after the friendly animals who popped in to investigate the trees and plants that grew from them. There were 60 varieties to attract, each more delightful than the last, and as their ranks swelled you could sacrifice some to attract other, more exotic species in their place.

Of course, this week also marked the fifth anniversary of the emergence of another famous Xbox 360 series.

Epic Games' original Gears of War was one of the first really, really massive exclusives published by Microsoft Game Studios during the early years of what we all used to call The Console War. Gears was also wonderful, although in very different ways to Viva Pinata: at its core were these fantastic medium-distance gun battles fought from behind scattered blocks of cover, which gave its combat an intimacy and intensity absent from any other shooter at the time.

Multiple big games are released at the same time as one another every year, of course - hardly an amazing observation to make in the same week both Modern Warfare 3 and Skyrim are finally made available to the public - and sometimes it makes you wonder why. After all, the world heavyweight champion of obvious conclusions to draw about this phenomena is that one game must detract from the potential success and popularity of the other.

Let's look at these examples, then. First of all, my beloved Viva Pinata. Surely launching it in the same week as Gears of War resulted in it selling fewer copies than it would have done otherwise? This is certainly what my younger self thought five years ago as I raved and howled in exasperation at Microsoft's apparently amazing feat of self-immolation in the face of potential success.

With hindsight though, while the release timing may not have given Viva Pinata much of a chance among the core gaming crowd, not many of the console's existing audience were likely to find it appealing in the first place. Microsoft invested in Viva Pinata - and indeed in Rare - partly because it wanted to attract a more diverse audience to Xbox 360 than simply young males between 18 and 34. It is still attempting to do this today using Kinect (and with apparently diminishing success, to judge by the horrendous sales figures of Dance Central 2).

You don't have to look at half a dozen Chart Track annual reports on sales of video games in the UK (although I have) to realise that the vast majority of sales occur in Q4 and that, of the many weekly slots available in which to launch new games, the Fridays at the start of November are the best of the lot.

With that in mind, Microsoft certainly didn't send Viva Pinata out to die, as I imagine I wrote at the time. It may even have wanted it to stand as great a chance as possible of catching the attention of people casually shopping for video games at the peak of the shopping season. And with little potential overlap with Gears of War sales, why not give it that opportunity? Who knows - maybe young dads buying Gears would pick it up as well for the kids.

(Perhaps Microsoft felt differently in hindsight, but you also can't fault the platform holder for persistence: it released a second Viva Pinata game, Trouble in Paradise, in a slightly earlier September slot two years later, and even commissioned a Nintendo DS version as well, and a spin-off party game, before apparently cutting its losses and giving up on the series.)

So to Modern Warfare 3 and Skyrim. Do we imagine that they will be negatively impacted by the proximity of their releases? In my case, definitely not. Modern Warfare 3 will probably sell close to two million copies in the UK during its first six days on sale, while Skyrim will accumulate around 200,000 sales here before next Monday. That's roughly what they would have done anyway.

There certainly are a number of gamers who will want both, and I betcha any money that Activision and Bethesda's market research tells them that the group who fall into the intersection of that particular Venn diagram - the vesica pisces, according to Wikipedia - are also the people who are predisposed to purchase more than one game in the same week when the necessity presents itself.

With all that said, those hunting for genuine travesties of scheduling will probably want to keep an eye on the fortunes of this week's Xbox Live Arcade release, Fusion: Genesis. It's the product of Starfire Studios, who are coincidentally comprised of former staff at Rare, and I honestly don't know whether punching it out onto Xbox Live at the same time millions of people around the world are playing Modern Warfare 3 online is a good way of driving people's attention to it or a good way of driving people's money away from it.

Time will presumably tell, as it has with Viva Pinata and Gears of War, but I guess if there's a point to this column it's that, when it comes to ramming stuff down the throats of gamers in seemingly absurd circumstances, sometimes there's more to the madness than meets the eye.

(And if there's a secret point to this column, it's that you should all make up for your mistake five years ago and go forth to purchase Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise, which is available via Games on Demand on Xbox Live Marketplace. Quackberries forever!)

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (53) Latest comment 6 months ago

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  • King_of_Hyrule #1 6 months ago

    "the vast majority of sales occur in Q4 and that, of the many weekly slots available in which to launch new games, the Fridays at the start of November are the best of the lot."

    Because that's when all the good games are released, I also bought a lot more games in the past weeks then I usually do, but only because there were so many good releases, not because I have the natural urge to buy games in november.
    Corelation ≠ Causality, and I know I bought some games in spring that I wouldn't even notice if they were released today.

  • L0cky #2 6 months ago

    "And if there's a secret point to this column, it's that you should all make up for your mistake five years ago and go forth to purchase Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise, which is available via Games on Demand on Xbox Live Marketplace."

    You know, I might just do that.

  • King_of_Hyrule #3 6 months ago

    I think the (not so secret) point of this column is that Tom will use any excuse to write about Viva Piñata :)

  • AMagicalCone #4 6 months ago

    I bought viva piata around the time I got my 360, loved every minute of it, shame there won't be another!

  • DDevil #5 6 months ago

    I think Tom probably draws Piñatas on the cover of his homework diary.

  • SheffAl #6 6 months ago

    I think it does have an impact on sales. I would never buy two games at once as i would only play one at any given time. Prices of games devalue so may as well play one then get the other later when the price has dropped.

  • siro #7 6 months ago

    Viva Pinata. I should never have bought it. Reminds me of the week I really wanted to play Dead Space but couldn't as my wife suddenly got hooked to the xbox for a full week. Never happened before, never happened again, that's how good it is.

  • Piccadillio #8 6 months ago

    This whole end-of-year is so crowded that I won't even be buying Skyward Sword any time soon, so I worry about the amazing-looking Rayman: Origins getting lost in the crowd. Has there ever been a release window with so much quality stuffed in it as this one?

  • subjectxen #9 6 months ago

    If you think this week was congested, take a look at next week.

  • RodHull #10 6 months ago

    Viva Pinata probably would have sold more to its target audience of younglings if it wasn't so darned tricksy to manage all your scrapping Pinatas. My then 7 year old niece tried it and whilst she loved the pretty colours and adorable characters, once the game started to introduce fighting Raisants and Buzzlegums she lost interest. Trouble in Paradise introduced an easy mode but it was perhaps too little to late for it to become the blockbuster franchise it deserved.

  • Phantom_Dynamite #11 6 months ago

    Is it sad that I want another Viva Pinata soooo bad, It was such a rich game and very tricky to keep a well managed garden.

  • oupe #12 6 months ago

    Let's see, in the last two months I wanted to buy:
    - The Witcher 2
    - Catherine
    - Skyrim
    - Forza 4
    - Dark Souls
    - El Shaddai

    The sheer number of games I want to play confuses me and the accompanying costs scare me. I always end up buying games from XBLA.

    Edit: There are also browser games, 3ds and iphone games to be played but I just don't have the time.
    Edited by oupe at 12/11/11 @ 10:57

  • Doncommie #13 6 months ago

    This year is totally insane. Within about a month and a bit they have released/are going to release:

    - Batman Arkham Asylum
    - Battlefield 3
    - Gears Of War 3
    - Modern Warfare 3
    - Rage
    - Skyrim
    - Saints Row 3
    - Zelda Skyward Sword

    You might skip a couple of those but it's a crazy amount of major releases.
    Edited by Doncommie at 12/11/11 @ 11:46

  • peterfll #14 6 months ago

    Never mind about that Tom, what we want to know is; did you have a nice meal out with the girlfriend the other night, and would you recommend the 5 course menu?

  • Toothball #15 6 months ago

    A few weeks ago I wandered into Game intending to buy a game on my way back from work. I had ordered it on Amazon, but for some reason they didn't seem to have received whatever shipment they'd arranged.

    As I entered the store I was amused to see the staff had dressed up as villains from Batman. Harley and Two-Face were working the shop floor, while Riddler and Joker were behind the counter. There was a big pile of Arkham City just behind the counter.

    I asked for Dance Central 2.

    According to the Joker, it was the first copy he'd sold all day. The rest of his sales had been Batman and Football Manager. He went on to admit that he hadn't realised that DC2 was out that week until they'd received their shipment of them on preceding Monday. I'd only found out about it myself the week before that.

    I'd imagine there's some contention when lots of games release on the same day, although for others the choice was already clear before any money changes hands. In other cases though, I think publicity might have a bigger affect on sales. A lot of those early Gears of War sales presumably resulted from Microsoft pushing it heavily at E3 and the like, and while Viva Pinata was usually in the show reels, it was a lot further down the list. Dance Central 2 did get some pretty high profile coverage at this year's E3, but since then it was nearly silent until the game reached the shelves.

    I tend to go for the alternative choice when there's several games out on the same day, although in the case of next week I was entirely unable to choose between Skyward Sword and Mario 3D. Somehow I'm going to have to fit those into my gaming schedule. I might even have to leave Cave Story and Professor Layton for a while, which would be a shame.

  • Stoatboy #16 6 months ago

    @RodHull: As much as I loved Viva Pinata (and I bloody adored it - first and only 1000-pointer for me), it was largely an awful game from the outset. Far too hectic. The constant barrage of messages, videos, achievements and whatnot whilst pinata were fighting and being killed by sours at the start was dreadful, when all you wanted to do was work out how to play the bloody game. It was only after the videos and early cheevos dried up, and you started getting rid of the sours and other enemies that it became the game it should have been from the start.

    Also, Quackberries are ace (looking inside a house full of them is one of my favourite moments of this generation), but Macaraccoons win by a nose for me. Silliest things in the game, and never fail to make me smile. A must for every garden.

  • RedSparrows #17 6 months ago

    I really liked Viva Pinata. It wasn't that well made in places (design decisions could be a bit odd), but it was so nice and fun most of the time.

    Fusion Genesis, problems and all, deserved a clearer run.

  • Eraysor #18 6 months ago

    I really want Assassin's Creed on Tuesday but I literally have no time to play it. My backlog is looking ridiculous: RAGE, Batman, Sonic Generations, Dark Souls, BF3, MW3 and now Skyrim too. Oddly, the only game I've finished in the last month is Ace Combat: Assault Horizon (which I thought was absolutely brilliant).

    EDIT: And I bought both Viva Pinatas at launch. Both were a bit too clunky for me to finish (the trap mechanic in TiP was particularly annoying), but it's definitely one of the prettiest and most atmospheric game series I've ever played.
    Edited by Eraysor at 12/11/11 @ 13:44

  • Mister-Wario #19 6 months ago

    I STILL think Viva Pinata is one the best-looking games I've ever seen. I love the game, but I just sort of hit a wall with it: I didn't know what else I had to do to level up after a certain point. But it's well worth checking out: I probably didn't give it enough attention to progress.

    In a way, I'm not too concerned it didn't get more sequels. I mean, two games, a portable offering and a party game is probably enough. That said, if a lack of attention meant we get more Call of Dutys and less Banjo-Kazooies, that's sad.

  • Schmoke-n-a-pancake #20 6 months ago

    @Doncommie Arkham City, not Asylum.

    And that list is the tip of the iceberg. Add:

    -Uncharted 3
    -Assassin's Creed Revelations
    -Super Mario 3D Land
    -Mario Kart 7
    -Ico/SotC HD

    And I'm probably miss a whole load too.

  • brokenkey #21 6 months ago

    So Trouble in Paradise is a better game than the original? If I was going to pick up one, which would it be?

  • Stoatboy #22 6 months ago

    @brokenkey: I'd definitely go with TIP. I don't think there's anything missing from the first game, and there's a whole bunch of new stuff on top. Some of the new critters are very nice too. The only issue I remember is that it's harder to turn some of the bad guys off, and they're not the game's strongest point.

  • Ironic_War_Criminal #23 6 months ago

    @Stoatboy The only issue I remember is that it's harder to turn some of the bad guys off, and they're not the game's strongest point.

    Actually it's easier since every time you un-sour a pinata, you can prevent sour versions from coming in the garden while Pester's minions can be taken care of by certain pinata's. I believe you need a Roario to get rid of Pester himself, but the game has some pretty funny solutions to getting rid of them.

    TIP and Nuts and Bolts were pretty much proof that Rare still had it before Microsoft gutted what was left of it. What a shame.

  • nickthegun #24 6 months ago

    There are three or four games that I would have bought day one at any other time of the year but, as it stands, they have been put on 'the list' to get for peanuts in the new year.

  • RedSparrows #25 6 months ago

    @Ironic_War_Criminal Nuts & Bolts was largely brilliant. Really enjoyed it.

  • Mister-Wario #26 6 months ago

    @RedSparrows Yeah, me too. I thought it was a wonderful idea. How many true "build your own vehicle" games do we have like that?

  • Killerbee #27 6 months ago

    There are definitely too many games being released this Autumn. I've not had a chance to play Dark Souls anything like as much as I want to and I have BF3, MW3 and Uncharted 3 all demanding my attention. Assassin's Creed Revelations actually arrived today (it's good but very similar to Brotherhood so far) and Zelda is due soon. Skyrim would have been a day one purchase at any other time of year but I just don't have time to play it and since it's a single player game, it's perhaps an easier decision to delay it for a bit. Batman has gone the same way - again to much regret.

    Okay that means I'll never be short of a good game to play in 2012, but is this really healthy for the games industry? I don't really think so.

  • UKGN_Zoidberg #28 6 months ago

    Why would I want to buy VP off Xbox Live when I can pick up a boxed copy for less than a fiver?

    If I didn't still own it that is :)

  • Mister-Wario #29 6 months ago

    @UKGN_Zoidberg to show some support for the game. Although it's probably too late now.

  • Ironic_War_Criminal #30 6 months ago

    @RedSparrows

    Nuts & Bolts was legitimately one of the most fun and imaginative games this gen. I won't pretend it doesn't have it's issues but it was brilliant at what it did and it's fun to see what silly contraptions you could come up with.

    It pisses me off something fierce that Rare did something wonderfully imaginative and fun and still got shit on by the wider general community because it was not a platformer which was ironic because the "hardcore" were yelling at Rare to do something innovative for years. Hypocrisy, eh?

  • Der_tolle_Emil #31 6 months ago

    I pretty much managed this year's congested November release schedule. Mainly because too many publisher don't really get what I value in (console) gaming anymore. BF3 would have been great but I'm not going near Origin, Activision managed to scare me off MW3 because up to this day I don't know how many season passes I have to buy to actually get the content that I am interested in, Skyrim will probably be a bug riddled mess like other Bethesda titles and only work a couple of months down the line when all the patches are released.

    This is where Nintendo comes in. Popped in Skyward Sword on Friday and am now about 15 hours in. So far no bugs, no restarting because of a patch, no "insert your credit card here to continue".

    I never had a problem getting more than one game if I really wanted both. I also got both Viva Pinata and Gears of War back then and I am very glad that I did. If both games are good I am more than happy to pay for them. It's sad though that these days (for me personally) it's not just the quality of the game anymore but whatever crazy things the publisher has come up with to get the game out in time. Game prices go down so fast these days that I really don't know if putting up with tons of patches and other stupid things is worth it when I very well know that the same game will be released as a budget release a few months down the line anyway, this time with all the DLC and patches so that it finally works out of the box.

    That is what makes me think twice before getting two games in the same week.

  • ManWithNoTan #32 6 months ago

    I've got my hands full with skyrim, then skyward sword, then mw3 when the price drops and now I've got to get viva sodding pinata. What you're doing is the opposite of help.
    Edited by ManWithNoTan at 13/11/11 @ 12:43

  • Ror1984 #33 6 months ago

    So far this month I've bought Uncharted 3, DoDonPachi Resurrection and Halo Anniversary, and in Sept I bought the Gears 3 LE. I've had to cancel my Zelda and Skyrim orders, so I'll be picking them up around Christmas for some festive SP adventuring.

    I do get excited for the end-of-year rush, but then I realise that it just means that I'll be so busy with this years games that ones that come out early next year just end up getting put back - I only played Dead Space 2 a couple of months ago, for instance. In a sense, it's good for me as a consumer, as prices drop so quickly (I picked up DS2 for £22 less than three weeks after it launched!), but now I have a shelf full of games I picked up on the cheap that I may never get around to playing; I picked up Nier for £8 months ago and haven't even touched it.

    I also have FFXIII-2 and Mass Effect 3 LEs pre-ordered for early next year, so everything will probably get dropped for those two, putting me further back!

    I need to win the lottery to have all the time and money for all these games :D

  • riz23 #34 6 months ago

    It feels like something is wrong with pricing, release schedules and maybe even game length. All of us here are avid gamers, we are surely the core market to buy all these AA and AAA games but it seems few of us can actually do so. Even if we can afford them, we don't have the time to play them. So many of us wait for price reductions and play November releases in the new year. This can't be good for publishers. I want cheaper games spread across the fiscal year. That way I might buy them all on release which helps publishers hit quarterly financial targets and helps me enjoy and finish all the games I want. Games are not just gifts, they are entertainment goods adult buy for themselves. Remember Skyrim is for life not just for Christmas!

  • Dave #35 6 months ago

    Maybe slightly offtopic, but something that came to mind immediately after reading this: I really don't understand why Nintendo would release Skyward Sword on the Wii when:
    1. The life of the Wii seems to be pretty over, it's on its last legs;
    1. They announced the Wii-U which will be released next year;
    2. Having a Zelda launch title will certainly mean a good start for the Wii-U, which means a fast growing installed base, which means more publishers will get interested, which means more games.
    So why release it on the Wii?! Was it so long in development that it would cost to much to port to the Wii-U? Are they desperately trying to extend the life of the Wii?

  • cloudskipa #36 6 months ago

    I bought Viva Pinata TIP and from what I played it was a superbly original game. However I've never put some serious time into it as I've always been distracted by other games. I really must make an effort to play this properly, another under appreciated Rare gem.

  • ZippyNL #37 6 months ago

    "the world heavyweight champion of obvious conclusions to draw about this phenomena"
    Phenomena is the plural, it's phenomenon.

    Sorry, one my pet peeves.

  • gjgjg #38 6 months ago

    Well, if they were released during a quieter period, I would have by now bought: BM:AC, GoW3, Forza 4, Zelda OoT 3D & SS, AC:R, Pes12, Fifa12, MW3, Mario 3DS, Rage... even Skyrim! But I just had to limit myself to NBA2k12, Batf3, Ico / SoC HD, Deus Ex, Unchar.3 and Dark Souls is still kicking my ass... and I never finished Witcher 2 :(

    Publishers, check the competition's release schedule next year! We are not loaded!

    http://thechive.com/2011/08/29/20-first-world-problems-20-photos/

  • orangpelupa #39 6 months ago

    IMO the publishers need to spread their releases....
    this end of 2011 and early 2012 is crazy. Too many games..

    i wonder how the reviewe managed to play all that games without loosing sleeps....

  • killuminati2911 #40 6 months ago

    My personal view is that the VG market is still seen as teh toy market from when we were kids (i.e 25+ years ago in my case).

    I think that the publishers still see Chrstmas period as the favoured period to sell videogames like it was a market only for kids ( that's my analogy to toys), wich is drastically changed in the last years.
    As an adult I can afford to buy some games in every period of the year and even if at Christmas I have a little bit more disposable income, is likely that part of it will be spent in others' presents or major expenses that at the end, leave me the same amount of money to spend on VG. But the time is still more or less the same to play ;)

    That's why I see not really convenient to crowd the market in 2 months just targeting the parents/kids group that will surely spend more money, but in the end losing those more steady buyers during the year. Some of them will be forced to skip some games release, that would instead be a first day purchase in other months, and rely on price drop or second hand.

  • Vivid #41 6 months ago

    @Stoatboy

    I found the start of TIP a chuffing nightmare too. One which I couldn't get beyond. I used to have the same problem with the Melville novel Moby Dick (Stop sniggering at the back!) and now it's one of my favourite novels. Perhaps I ought to have another bash at TIP?

    I seem to recall being traumatised at having to feed some of my critters to others as well, my wife loves rabbits and so the image of me raising them as food for other animals really didn't impress her. I'm going to grab the demo and see if I can cope with it now.

  • Ryze #42 6 months ago

    I'd say that Dance Central 2 hasn't sold loads because:

    1 - The previous game only released A YEAR AGO.

    I'm sure that the previous owners aren't dance masters at all available songs.

    2 - 'Normal people' have NO IDEA that Dance Central 2 was being released.

    It's just appeared - they don't watch release schedules, and I don't recall seeing any promotion of the release date over the past 3 months.

    No surprise at all. The same with the 'flopped' Guitar Hero games. Everyone owns one - they didn't suddenly hate the games - they al;ready have one in their homes.
    Edited by Ryze at 14/11/11 @ 09:37

  • Vortex808 #43 6 months ago

    "Microsoft invested in Viva Pinata - and indeed in Rare - partly because it wanted to attract a more diverse audience to Xbox 360 than simply young males between 18 and 34."


    Oh dear God. I am now far beyond that desired age range. Although 5 years ago I was still in it by a little bit.
    Edited by Vortex808 at 14/11/11 @ 09:34

  • henro_ben #44 6 months ago

    The trouble for me is it's not just the expense of having to buy X number of new games in a short space of time, it's the fact I just don't have time to play them in the run up to Christmas.

    There's loads of games coming out that aren't on my 'must buy' list but would be at another time of the year i.e. in the summer.

    I can see their reasons for releasing at this time of year, I just wish they wouldn't!

  • Peregrin #45 6 months ago

    I think you're missing the point, which is Christmas.

  • metalangel #46 6 months ago

    Anyone dusting off TIP after reading this: if you don't already know, you can block Professor Pester by building a wall by the Tower of Sour, so when he comes down he gets stuck and either sits there grunting forever or gives up and leaves.

    His inclusion (along with the Ruffians and Sours) half-ruins the game. It's enough of a fight making things eat their damned romance/resident requirements without invincible characters bursting through the garden smashing everything open. The more casual audience they were supposedly going for was infuriated by this... hell, I'm no slouch and it pissed me off too.

    (for what it's worth, got my 360 five years ago too... we watched the VP preview video that was included on the hard drive and Mrs Metal declared THAT was her Christmas present, please! I didn't get Gears for another six months or so)

  • PlugMonkey #47 6 months ago

    @Peregrin

    I, like a lot of gamers, the vast majority in fact, am a grown up. When I had a Megadrive, christmas was an important focus as far as adding to my game collection was concerned. Now, it isn't. I rarely, if ever, get a game for christmas. Why would I want to wait until the end of December to play a game that came out at the beginning of November? I'm 33! It'll be too late by then. I'll have just bought the damn thing.

    This season I have bought Dark Souls and Skyrim. And that's it. There will be no more. Deus Ex, Uncharted, Batman, Zelda etc etc will just have to wait. I won't be getting any of them for Christmas, as the issue is that I don't have the time to play them, not that I don't have the money to buy them.

    The whole thing just seems to be an ass-backward hangover from when videogames were children's toys.

  • Oceadge #48 6 months ago

    I have stupidly bought a lot of games recently often tempted by pre-order bonuses etc. I have barely played any:

    El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron - 1 hr
    Rage - 1 hr
    Forza Motorsport 4 - 0.5 hr
    Ace Combat: Assault Horizon - 0 hr
    Deus Ex: Human Revolution - 4 hr
    Ico & Shadow of the Colossus Collection HD - 2 hr
    Gears of War 3 - 1 hr
    The Gunstringer - 0.5 hr
    Dark Souls - 3 hr
    Sonic Generations - 0.5 hr
    Batman: Arkham City - 10 hr
    The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim - 10 hr

    That's not to mention a few 3DS games, many iOS games and loads of games in recent Steam sales.

    Only Skyrim and possibly Arkham City will get a look in before the end of the year.

    Games that I would have bough/would buy if there weren't so many releases: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, Super Mario 3D, Starfox 64 3D, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, InFamous 2, Driver San Francisco, Battlefield 3, Payday: The Heist, Rayman Origins.

    Too many games.

  • stu9898 #49 6 months ago

    Viva Pinata & VP TIP are absolute 360 gems. They were only ever going to appeal to a small percentage of 360 owners, but never mistaken this game as being one for kids, its a very challenging game.

    I have lost faith in my Kinect puchase these days but it would be a great Kinect enabled game but optional for the controller.

    If only Rare would go back to this and forget Wii Sports series, oh sorry I mean't Kinect Sports..:)

  • Kew1Melon #50 6 months ago

    Viva Pinata... what a game!

  • Stoatboy #51 6 months ago

    @Vivid. Give it another go if you can. It genuinely calms down until YOU feel in control, rather than the game. Prof. Pester is the one thing you can't eliminate, but the fence trick apparently works or having a rhino or dragon in your garden does the job for the most part.

    I started off feeling a little reluctant to sacrifice pinata, but that wore off. They're all expendable (so easy to replace). I ended up with a zebra factory in order to get Roarios. And there was an achievement in the first game that was easiest to get if you got a critter in the very centre of your garden and clubbed it to death with your shovel. Not my proudest moment.

    FWIW, I read Moby Dick fairly recently and also found it very hard going at the start, and loved it by the end. The passage about how ace dolphins are, and how much joy they bring to sailors, and how everyone gathers to watch them swim alongside the boat, and then how much oil you can get out of a dead one is an absolute belter.

  • KingOfTheC #52 6 months ago

    VP was amazing, I absolutely loved every second of it (it is also one of my only 1000 gamer points games, along with Oblivion)

    I didn't understand the second one though, because it was the exact same game again with barely any changes - I got bored of it after a few hours because, well, I'd already 1000-pointed the first one!!!

  • orakio #53 6 months ago

    right then, Just ordered VP for a steal on PC. I hope it won't dissapoint... I'll hold you all responsible if it does!
    Edited by orakio at 14/11/11 @ 20:21