Developed by 2D Boy, a two-person team, World of Goo is a puzzle game with a simple mechanic—assembling minimal physics-simulated structures so your Goo-balls can exit the level, Lemmings-style. More than this, it has great production values (made with open source software!) and a lot of heart. If you’re in need of some fun, we encourage you to check out the demo.

Don’t just take our word for it. The critics totally dig the full game.

When you’re ready to take the plunge, you can purchase it on Steam (which we also like), or from WiiWare. ((I may go the Wii route over Christmas because I like waggle controls and it seems to be a bit more reasonably priced than the PC version ($15 vs. $20)))

Read More...

I didn’t want to dwell on DRM anymore, but after responding to a comment on Tuesday’s post, I felt the need to play devil’s advocate—to prove that we’re not just idealists, but seriously thinking about this stuff.

My original suggestion was to remove all protection, embrace the effects of copying and change the pay structure. Ideally, the net result would be fewer pirates, thus more revenue. But maybe that’s just as radical as putting DRM on everything—who knows if it would really work?

The truth is: this stuff is still evolving. There isn’t a perfect model of DRM out there that works in the best interests of both the publisher and the user.

However, rather than be defeatist, I’d like to share with you one that does a fairly decent job by taking the middle path.

Read More...

Do Nothing

When we last left off, I suggested that the solution was to do nothing. What does that mean, exactly?

What I’m saying is, forget about copy protection entirely.

DRM costs far more than it protects. It doesn’t prevent piracy—pirates are going to break it anyway. What it does is hurt paying customers, who should be cherished at all costs. After all, these are the people who are actually giving publishers money when they can get something for free. Why make things hard on the good guys? All it does is make them into the bad guys.

Yeah, sure, you say. No copy protection is just asking for people to pirate my game. How will I make any money?

Read More...

The Situation

Piracy is the biggest problem facing PC games. Publishers claim it’s so bad that it threatens the very existence of the platform. Since it’s so easy to copy games, it’s no longer profitable to develop for the PC.

To help stave the flow of lost sales, many newer games come with DRM (Digital Rights Management), a kind of software lock designed to prevent unauthorized copying. It sounds okay in theory. I mean, we can generally agree that companies have a right to protect themselves.

But that’s where the game publishers have gone overboard—putting their rights above their customer’s. And so, instead of profiting as they should be, they’ve created a storm of controversy and actually made things much worse for everyone involved.

Read More...

At this year's disappointing E3 convention, just about the only buzz from the Nintendo keynote was the announcement of the Wii MotionPlus. It's a gyroscope module that plugs into the base of the Wiimote which is supposed to give it 1:1 responsiveness. In other words, the players' motions in 3D space are duplicated in realtime on the screen.

But wait-- doesn't it do this already?

Not exactly. Most people don't realize that the current Wiimote, which uses a combination of an infrared camera and a three-axis accelerometer, is actually not that accurate at translating players' motions. Instead, the Wii relies heavily on software to interpret the data and implement the player's intentions. As anyone who owns a Wii can attest, it's not always very good at this.

Current Wii games, like Red Steel, here, rely on pointing and relatively simple motions. This offers a fair illusion of responsiveness, but is far from the 1:1 accuracy that the MotionPlus promises.

So now, nearly two years into the Wii's product cycle, Nintendo is up to it's old tricks-- with a new twist, perhaps. Sell the Wii as the cheapest next gen platform, then make people buy extra peripherals to get a fully-functional system.

It's an interesting strategy, really. Pirates may be able to make copies of the new Wii Sports, but what about the hardware it requires?