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Devil May Cry 4 is looking to be one of the best games of 2006, but is it really important enough to get your panties in a bind?
At Defunct Games we like to root for the underdog and stand up for the little guy, but that doesn't mean we always understand (or agree) with what the little guy does. If the internet has done anything it's given everyday people hundreds more ways of feeling like a victim, and worse yet, allowed those same people to tell others how they feel. That's the problem with aligning yourself with the little guy, from time to time their sob story becomes so intolerable that even we have to take a step back and plug our ears.
Lately the little guy has been crying a lot about the injustices in the world, so much so that I'm starting to get a headache just from thinking about it. Perhaps the most egregious cry came when Capcom decided to take their long running Devil May Cry series and turn it into a multi-platform game. Suddenly all of the Sony fanboys got up in arms about how terrible this was, spouting out rhetoric as if it was the end of the world. Overnight people put together a petition trying to get Capcom to reconsider, as if a few
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A lot of important things have happened because of protests, but somehow I don't think Capcom really cares if a few thousand people cry about Devil May Cry 4!
thousand American Sony owners would have what it takes to change Capcom of Japan's mind. But the petition was waged and all I could do is sit here and shake my head. I understand the passion, but where are these people's priorities?
Had this been a simple petition simply expressing their disappointment that would have been one thing, but as most emotional fanboys go about things, this petition turned into something so over-the-top that I have a hard time not saying anything. Petitions are fine, but how do you expect to be taken seriously when the entire crux of your letter seems to be rooted in hyperactive hyperbole?
The petition starts: "We (the people that have signed this petition) feel very left out in your decision to make Devil May Cry 4 a Multi-Platform
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I'm sorry, but Devil May Cry 4? Really??
title, and hereby agree to boycott your sale of Capcom affiliated games." They feel left out? The PlayStation 3 is still getting Devil May Cry 4 and since when has a video game customer felt like they had a right to be clued in to some major decision? It's not like Sony should feel obligated to get the input from the 100 million PlayStation 2 owners before they announce some sequel or sports game, who are these people to be angry about not being involved in a major business announcement?
The petition continues: "For years we have enjoyed games, we have reaped the benefits of your committment to Sony. We find it absolutely demoralizing for not only the gamers, but also Sony itself." I'm sure it has been said before, but Capcom doesn't owe Sony anything. While it's true that the PlayStation 2 was a good home for Devil May Cry and Onimusha, that doesn't mean that the PlayStation 3 is entitled to keep these franchises. Capcom is a third
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Devil May Cry 4 is not the only Capcom game to go multiplatform, don't these people remember Resident Evil 4?
party; they have every right to take their games where ever they feel they can make the most money. If they don't make money off of Devil May Cry 4 then what's the point in making it in the first place? For a group so in love with Devil May Cry they sure don't seem to care about Capcom's financial situation, which is one of the biggest reasons I can't get behind this movement.
But there's something else that sticks in my mind about what they are saying, they seem to be attaching human emotions to major video game corporations. They seem to think that by turning Devil May Cry 4 into a multiplatform experience that Capcom is essentially "demoralizing" Sony. While fans of the series will no doubt see this as a
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You can demoralize your girlfriend all you want, but how dare you demoralize Sony?!?
major blow, in the grand scheme of things this is just not very important. Let's face it, Devil May Cry is a good series, but it's not exactly one of the top selling franchises on the PlayStation 2. The loss of a Grand Theft Auto exclusive is demoralizing, losing Devil May Cry 4 is just a minor paper cut. I doubt that Sony is all that broken up about the loss of Devil May Cry 4, there are just bigger issues for them to address.
It seems pretty clear that the people signing this petition are more hurt than anything; they feel betrayed by Capcom and don't see any other way of getting their point across. But let's not lose focus here, Capcom didn't cancel Devil May Cry 4 on the PlayStation 3, they simply announced that it would also hit the Xbox 360. How selfish do
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I can understand being upset about losing Grand Theft Auto IV as an exclusive, but Devil May Cry 4?
you have to be to not want others to enjoy a video game, in a perfect world everybody (no matter what system they own) should be able to have fun with your favorite game. Why limit the experience to just you and people like you? Why boycott a game that is still coming out on your console of choice? Why care enough about the Devil May Cry series to create a petition? You really have to ask yourself if you're so selfish that you don't want Capcom to make back its investment and get this (hopefully) brilliant game to as many people as possible.
But behind the horrible spelling errors and outlandish hyperbole maybe these Devil May Cry fans have a point. Perhaps it's not about this one game, but rather the larger movement of third party companies that seem to
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Maybe the PlayStation 3's aren't selling because they're in a box or there's that secret agent looking dude not letting people near them!
be switching from single system exclusives to offering their newest games on as many systems as they can support at one time. Sure these petitioners went about it in the wrong way, but is their frustration and sadness warranted?
To many Devil May Cry 4 is just one game, but to the person that bought a $600 PlayStation 3 it represents more than just a $60 action game. Devil May Cry 4 was one of the last games that was supposed to be a PS3 exclusive, one of those major titles that Sony fans could point to as a reason to own the system. Yet here we are mere months away from the release of the game and Capcom flips the script on everybody, all of a sudden the PlayStation 3 is just one of the consoles that will get the game. After the loss of Ace Combat, Assassin's Creed, and Virtua Fighter 5, PS3 owners have a genuine concern that they may have backed the wrong console.
It's not like generation's in the past where most gamers could own most (if not all) of the major consoles. This time around game players have to choose sides, the price of entry is so high that it's practically breeding a
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These days the naked Sega Saturn girl is fully clothed and hawking E.D. pills!
new type of fanboy. Fans of the PlayStation 2 bought into Sony's next generation console for the sole reason that it would offer sequels and updates to some of their favorite franchises, yet slowly but surely it seems like those games are either moving to the Xbox 360 or hitting both at (or around) the same time. PlayStation 3 owners have a right to be worried, part of the promise of the system was that they would be playing all of these exclusive games, yet so far things have not worked out that way.
But the real reason to be worried is because this could set a troubling precedent. Sega Saturn owners already know what these Devil May Cry fans are going through. Back in the mid-1990s the Saturn looked like the place to be for exclusive sequels, yet after only a year or two many of the biggest third party games started to make the leap from the Saturn to the PlayStation. This, along with Sega's money woes, led to the downfall of the Saturn. These Sega
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Devil May Cry is a solid action series, but isn't there a better way of going about doing these things?
fans discovered the harsh burn that went along with watching your favorite games and franchises switch to another platform, giving people less of a reason to buy into their console of choice.
If this trend continues for the PlayStation 3 then it's conceivable that Sony's next generation console could suffer. If you could spend $200 - $300 less and get roughly the same catalog of games then why would you buy the PlayStation 3? It seems pretty clear that this is the worry that these Sony fanboys have; they don't want their $600 investment to turn into the next Sega Saturn, Dreamcast or TurboGrafx-16.
This is a legitimate concern, something that these Sony fans should be spending their time thinking about. The problem is that instead of explaining this worry in a reasoned way, the people that created this petition are taking the easy way out and crying about it. If you were to tell me that by losing Devil May Cry, Grand Theft Auto, Ace Combat and other popular PlayStation mainstays could potentially keep people from buying the PlayStation 3 (and in turn could keep the PlayStation 3 from becoming a major success) then I would say that you have a point and might even agree with you. But when you suggest that when Devil May Cry goes to multiplatform it "demoralizes" Sony, I say that you're absolutely crazy and that you need to suck it up and move on with your life. It's the difference between us and them, they cry over becoming a victim while we are able to express our true feelings. The petitioners have a point, unfortunately it's turned into nothing more than a laughing matter when they use hyperbole and threats.