In his twitter profile he lists himself as the Creative Director at Microsoft. Therefore his twitter presence is a representation of Microsoft. If he didn't want to be perceived that way, and just wanted to share his random opinions anonymously, he could have chosen a different twitter handle.

Thanks for the info - it looked like it was going for a kind of Earthbound-ish feel to me, too. I never finished Mother3, so I'll probably try and finish that before I give Dragon Fantasy a go.

NO, it was public because it was on a public twitter feed. Twitter is a broadcast medium and anything you say on it is by default a public statement.

The hatred and resentment being heaped on this guy, and by extension, Microsoft, is absolutely appropriate, but he shouldn't lose his job over this, shouldn't apologize, and Microsoft doesn't need to apologize on his behalf. Why? because they aren't changing their positions, they aren't taking responsibility for what…

Is it better than any of the Dragon Quests, old Final Fantasies, Phantasy Stars, or other seminal JRPGs from the era it is aping? If not, does it offer anything that these older games don't which would make the experience worthwhile? I'm asking because you seem to be the only one here who has actually played it and…

There are two issues here: one is the inherent problem of shoehorning FPS mechanics into a story-driven game which might have been better suited to another approach, or at least a more varied and believable set of mechanics. The other issue comes down to stylistic choices about how the violence itself is depicted.

I dunno but a lot of people bought more than one xbox360 due to their breaking down and I think those replacement purchases still counted towards their "install base", so maybe in this instance the cat analogy works?

Off-topic but I just wanted to thank you Kirk for resisting the urge to type the phrase "begs the question", opting instead for the much classier "raises the question." Thanks.

100% onboard here. This is the whole reason I have *never* played any of the Diablo games or its clones for any length of time. Even if keyboard and mouse is more precise, it feels idiotic to play in that way. I want to feel as though I am controlling my character directly, rather than setting waypoints and giving…

Agreed. The characters look great, and I guess the backgrounds look pretty good too, on their own. But they look like they come from completely different universes and when you put them together it's really jarring and ugly. They need to either 3d-ify the character models ala NSMB, or else completely retexture all the…

IV is mostly orange with a little bit of blue, things in the distance are blurred.

100% onboard with this. Nothing to add, just responding because I have no idea how to promote a comment otherwise.

Yes, it is "just" a controller. Control is the most important part of any game, or almost any software for that matter. If the interface is clumsy or unresponsive, it doesn't matter how good any of the other aspects are.

I liked the Mako a lot actually. Anyway it was way better than the lame busywork "mining" in ME2

Thanks, Kirk. I'll take a look at these.

Kirk, how did you arrive at your decision to confer special status to rape apart from other types of violence? Is there a specific line of reasoning to this or is it a gut-level reaction on your part? I know many people have this reaction and it's something I've never understood. I'm not expecting you to provide a…