Today we release the next chapter in the Quantify Me series: Metacritic. Having done an analysis of the CSDb first (CSDb: Quantify Me) in July 2010 and then Mobygames (Mobygames: Quantify Me) at the end of December 2012, the attention has turned to the games listed at Metacritic. This one turned out to big a big analysis, collecting data almost non-stop from the Metacritic website between the 25th of August 2013 and the 10th of September 2013. Then cleaning of the database and actual analyses took another lengthy period of time, as this needed to be done late in the evenings, as much as possible. Finally the first chapter of this endeavor is here. The conclusion of this 30 page paper (which you can get here as PDF) is as follows:

The data at Metacritic leaves much to be desired and seems to be heavily biased. When critic scores do not comply with user scores in the majority of cases, which has been shown in this paper, and the selection of critics is seemingly under no formal control, the validity and accuracy of the data is low. Caution is necessary when using Metacritic information to guide your own decision to buy or not buy a game. Until there is more transparency on how this process takes place at Metacritic, more transparency on the flow of funding from which sources and the observed biases are removed, the database is of limited use for the end-users.

Let’s take a look at Week 34 at our lovely forum.What have they been up to? Click on “more” for the full article.

2D/3D models

• luke9511 wonders if there any updates regarding a Noesis plugin for Star Wars The Old Republic.
• MrMoonKr presents his 010 Editor binary template for Age of Wulin models, but still can’t get the animation right.
• TaylorMouse thanks chrrox for pointing out RAF Manager for League of Legends, he is not completely happy with it, but Wobble is.
• kasake had a problem for loading HELENA_FACE.TMC from Ninja Gaiden 3 (NG3) / Dead or Alive 5 (DOA5) in Noesis, and Darko offered a solution.
• Abyssinian really looks for our help to get the models from Dragon ball: Ultimate Tenkaichi out, who can drop in?
• feareffectinferno needed help in extraction from [PS1] Fear Effect .WAD files, solved it, but is now stuck with .RMD files.
• DarkSSJShinji in all naughtiness wonders if anyone has the Rumble Roses XX Nude Mod?
• cra0 asks for help reversing Secret Agent Clank [PS2/PSP] [.cooked files].
• AceAngel needs to know which Granny2 library Divinity – Dragon Commander is using, Demonsangel offers a hand.
• fil1969 needs the blender script for Call of Juarez 2 model files, though dragbody says DX Ripper works fine.
• elenadg doesn’t seem to get howfie‘s instructions on models from [PS3] Atelier Escha & Logy – Alchemists of the Dusk Sky.
• 1jn14r joined the forum to ask if anyone succeeded in extracting the TM2 files from an img archive for Dark Cloud models.
• If you are looking to get into a real discussion on Dead or Alive series formats and tools, click to read up on b0ny and Darko‘s in-depth aid to help kasake and Protocol X27 along the way as they stumble into page 37 of that thread!
• Regarding The Witcher 2 Models, “n00b” logansan25 dropped in to ask for assistance in exporting models to 3dmax.

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Taking data from MobyGames I have analyzed their information on games released since 1977 on many platforms in an attempt to make some historical sense of it all in a descriptive way. It is entitled MobyGames: Quantify Me. A brief quantitative analysis of the gaming era according to MobyGames. Below is the Abstract plus some key figures, but you are encouraged to read the full article here: MobyGames: Quantify Me 2012. Enjoy the read!

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I’ve completed the transition of the tools that were posted at the Tools Blog to the new custom field template. We now list 45 member-created game-mod tools, many of them custom created in response to visitor requests. I am positive this is just the tip of the iceberg, and there are many more tools posted throughout. We must list them all at the Tools Blog! Check also this post for a How-To.

The second mod in our theme was released. Now you will find the six politician game figures in Counterstrike 1.6. Simply use the new models in the package to pose as lookalikes of the Dutch party leaders, or fight them in endless rounds of the game. Created by onelove1210 from the Game Research Forum.
Go here to download the models. Click here to see a short example video. And then some more screenshots:

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As of a week ago, we are accepting donations through PayPal from beneficiaries that offer kind help to support our Game Discussion Forum that aims to discuss games and mods that maximize the playability and longetivity of gamer’s favourite pass-times. Those that are already registered at the Game Discussion Forum are not required to donate, it’s their own choice. However, to be offered an active account as a new user, we would humbly ask to donate a small sum. As a return favour we will grant you the possibility to register and post. To do so, go to http://forum.xentax.com/ucp.php?mode=donate. First complete the donation, then click on return to go on with the forum registration.

Check this out: http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidthier/2012/05/31/korean-government-raids-blizzard-offices-over-diablo-3-launch/

It is an interesting case. But a just cause. If you’ve bought the game, but are unable to play it due to the dramatic way Blizzard organised their servers (and still!), you should be getting a refund. You don’t pay your good money just so that Blizzard can take it without delivering.

The Korean approach is long due, and this will hopefully be followed in other countries as well. Blizzard are an arrogant, incompetent and greedy organization that are only interested in profits with unstable releases of tired old games. Time to take the money back they stole from the gamers. So that they will think twice about releasing a new product completely unprepared.

Blizzard, you fanbase is diminishing by the hour. Sure, there will be enough gamers to continue to con, but the law just might be on our side. And then your conduct will be punished. Your annual conferences are aptly named BlizzCon. To con.

We warned that Diablo 3 would not launch well (technically) in the post about the failed beta stress test. We (and many others) were right. The launch was a technical joke, with Blizzard seemingly having gained nothing from the stress test, and lost a good part of their fan base. (Though they sold 6.3 million copies, which is a great success. Times $60 = $378.000.000).  The crappy technical launch, the DRM, the lag on single player, the online need to play even the single player campaign, the extremely short and linear main campaign (undoubtfully to quickly start selling “add on quests” in the mold of WoW, dragging even more money out of gamers as the game itself is already ludicrously priced), the numerous errors preventing play, tired gameplay, lost save games, stolen and hacked accounts, etc etc have proven that Blizzard’s only intend must have been to make quick money, even if they took 12 years to create it (and still they were not prepared). Here’s a small collection of posts surrounding the “epic fail” of the once innovative Blizzard. Take heed that reviewers still rave about the game, and cannot find fault with it, though metacritic users have en masse punished Blizzard for their conduct.

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Due to a crash of a couple of hard disks at our host, we’ve been down for a few days. This should be fixed now as you read this message.

You might have been tricked by Blizzard to attempt a login to give a beta version of Diablo III a go and see if the servers hold. In reality, the “Stress Test” worked. It worked swift and dramatically. A huge number of innocent gamers were not allowed to log in, because of server overload and fail on Blizzard’s side. Ah yes, this is what they promised:

From Friday, April 20 at 12:01 p.m. PDT (noon), until Monday, April 23 at 10:00 a.m. PDT you’ll be able to log in, team up with friends, and play each of the five heroic classes to level 13 as you fight to save the world from the impending demonic invasion.

Nothing like that. You have thousands of players not being able to login at all, or getting various errors not rendering the game playable. See also the hot thread at Battle.net. As it stands, Blizzard has not kept their end of the bargain. They haven’t got their server act straight, and they recruited a huge number of testers, free of charge, that normally would get paid for the trouble they are put through. As one poster of the aforementioned hot thread said, the situation surrounding this failure of Blizzard is :

Blizzard’s arrogance mixed with fanboy fanaticism.

We can but hope that Blizzard’s arrogance is dealt with swiftly, and fiercely, by lower sales. Their conduct is an insult to gamers.

[EDIT]The servers are reachable after two days of not being reachable. As the beta test ends on Monday, and if the servers continue to allow people in today, there will have been 1 out of 3 days that gamers could actually run the game when the test is completed.

[EDIT2]Nope. Keep getting error 30006: Time out today. So that means the third day is lost as well.

[EDIT3]And finally error 3004. It will be best to just wait and leave the game on the shelves when it comes out. FAIL complete.

[EDIT4]Was able to play it to the end. Got in, and decided to stick with it. Nice game. But nothing we haven’t seen done better since Diablo 2. Torchlight 2 anyone?