The Holmberg forgot he has a wedding he’ll be out of town for tomorrow, so these notes will be short.

Thanks for playing bingo, Gaerma, Rokwynd, and WilliamPall!  We’ll be contacting you all with some gifts soon.

We then talk about E3 a lot, even though we’re all tired of talking about E3.

Current-gen consoles received pledges of support, but not a lot of air time.

The PC was strangely absent from the E3 news.

The portable scene is tempting, but it’s hard to overcome the piles of dust sitting on the hosts’ current portables.

Microsoft’s XBone offerings are intriguing, but not anywhere near intriguing enough to make any of the hosts look past the consoles other issues or $500 price tag.

Nintendo showed off a lot of games that will no doubt be a lot of fun, but are any of them enough to make a Wii U purchase worthwhile?

Sony slapped Microsoft around, and won gamer minds and hearts by maintaining the status quo.

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Despite Alex’s attempts, we avoid talking about Metal Gear V until we get through an entirely new section on the show.

You Might Wanna Know: (Stuff we just found out about, and maybe you want to know about too.)

• How Long to Beat: For those who need to know how much entertainment their dollar buys.
• Rain: Have we talked about Rain?  Because games like this are why I’ll likely end up with a PS4.
• Spy Party: The paid beta has finally launched.
• State of Decay: Open-world zombie game with trust mechanics and permanent character death.
• Select Your Hero: Art!

Short News:

• Konami’s Pre-E3 Not-Really-A-Press-Conference Online Streaming Event
  • Kiefer Sutherland will be the voice of Snake in MGSV.
  • Dracula is the main character of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2.
  • Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 gets a new engine.
  • And that’s it.  Maybe there’ll be more at the Big 3′s conferences?
• Microsoft lays out all the information about how the XBone will work:
  • You can lend your games to a friend.  Once.
  • You can give your games away.  Once.
  • You can only sell your games to approved retailers.
  • Publishers get to make the decision if you even get to sell your game.
  • The XBone has to validate your games daily if you’re at home.
  • The XBone will validate your games hourly if you’re elsewhere.

Games:

• Read more »

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Compared to last year’s E3, 2013 should be a real barn burner for news.  We’re getting the game part of Microsoft’s new living room device.  Sony’s planning to bring the noise and remind everyone about the PS4.  Nintendo’s backed out of the usual E3 game, but they’ve still got plenty of E3-week content to share with the world.  And the rest of the gaming industry has girded its loins for the second-biggest event in the year (sorry E3, but I think the title goes to PAX).

Here at The Way of the Game, we usually host a show where we talk about our predictions for E3, but we’ve decided to do something a little bit different this year.  With everything that’s happening, we’ve got a big list o’ predictions, from the already-confirmed to the pie-in-the-sky.  It’s too much, in fact, to do any sort of justice in an hour-long podcast.  Instead, we’re going to post the list here, and then we’re going to invite you to play E3 Bingo with us.  Sure, other sites do this, but who says we can’t get in on the fun?

Even better, what we’ll do is send you a randomized bingo card that you can play along on.  We’ve got more predictions than fit on a card, so everybody should get a unique card they can play along on.  Let us know that you want to play in the comments, on Twitter, via email, whatever, and we’ll set you up.

Read more »

Sam’s back from moving!  But he won’t be joining Jonathan at Gen Con this year.  Sad face.

Gaerma is the grand winner (and only entrant) of the Don’t Starve giveaway.

Sam gives us his take on the XBone, and it’s not terribly positive, although Alex has some new feelings about it.

Molyneux’s “social experiment,” Curiosity, has finished, there’s a winner, and the winner will be a god (for a while).

Sam may still be unpacking, but he’s got 5 of his 6 consoles unpacked and set up.

Alex makes inconsiderate comparisons when talking about Knytt Underground.

Jonathan makes similar, but more appropriate, comparisons for Stealth Bastard Deluxe.

Next week we’ll stop revisiting topics that one or another host missed out on!

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We basically skip the usual format this week to talk about the reveal of the Xbox One.

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Eador: Masters of the Broken World will keep you busy for a very long time. That’s not to say the gameplay is bogged down by clumsy GUI problems or that it proceeds at a snail’s pace. Rather, it gives you a series of randomly generated miniature fantasy worlds to conquer, and the worlds are rich with challenge and opportunity.
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So I’m rewatching the Xbox One reveal video for a few reasons.

First, I was covering the event for work, but while that was happening, there were a million of other things going on like the recovery from the Oklahoma tornado, so my attention was split a few dozen ways. I want to make sure I didn’t miss anything.

Secondly, I want to make sure to have a good recording so we can splice cuts into the upcoming show #170.

Last, but perhaps most importantly, I want to confirm there were as few games showcased as I remember.
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In this episode, Jonathan’s finally finished Bioshock Infinite and he has stuff to say.

Before that, though, Sam tells us about his new internet service, and Alex tells us about previews of XCOM: The Bureau.

Sam is actually still playing Uncharted 2, rather than having finished it like I might’ve written in the show notes last week.  He has, though, completed Candy Box, and has also played his first Zynga game, What’s the Phrase?

Alex is in the beta for Card Hunter, and it’s exactly what he thought it was going to be and that’s great news.  He’s also been playing Monaco, and so long as you don’t mind throwing stealth out the window, you’ll have a great time playing it with friends.

All Jonathan talks about this week is Bioshock Infinite, and he doesn’t have particularly good things to say about it.  This isn’t because the game is particularly bad, but more because the media surrounding the game made it out to be something far greater than it really is.

The Holmberg’s official rating for Bioshock Infinite: Rent it.

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Business: Tell us what you’re hungry for in the comments or on Twitter or wherever else, and you could win a copy of Don’t Starve on Steam.

News: EA gets exclusive rights to the Star Wars license from Disney.  Gamers everywhere weep.

Games:  Jonathan fell down the rabbit holes that are Frog Fractions and Candy Box.  Both are free browser games that explore the history of gaming through utter randomness.  Sam has beaten Uncharted 2: Electric Boogaloo, and he likes that they fixed some stuff, but dislikes quite a bit more.  Alex has played next to nothing this week.

Topic:  Microsoft will be giving us details of their next console on May 21st, so we thought we’d talk a bit about what we expect to see and what we want to see.  We derail at the start talking about how we’re not likely to even want the next Xbox, but we eventually get back on track and pretend to be interested.  Cable TV integration, social gaming, the future of Xbox Live; what do you think we’re going to see?

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Better show notes will be forthcoming.  For now, know that we talked about A Valley Without Wind, Fish Out of Water, Disgaea 4, Eador: Masters of the Broken World, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, and what we think about cloning video games.

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