Interviewing Gamers

[lolmynamewastaken]

1.In terms of your first consoles and games, how and when did you first get into gaming as a hobby?
erm my ex baby sitter had an N64 so she and i used to play Golden eye while we were waiting for my parents to turn up. my brother then purchased a playstation and when i was older i asked my parents to buy me a playstation 2 a while after it was released.
2. Would you say you had any favourite games, or series?
i've got to admit, i am a massive halo fan boy, but there are better games. i think the first inFAMOUS would be one of my favourite games of this generation and the second one makes it my favourite series...
3. Any genres you tend to prefer playing?
i tend to stick to FPSs with some RPGs and driving games thrown in there. im also a fan of casual games (not that anyone thats played them has any choice about being a fan/addict to some of them.)
4. Regarding platforms, which do you own? Of those, what do you play most and why?
so i have a playstation 2, old school xbox, playstation 3 and a computer that will play games if its in a good mood. out of those im currently in a playstation 3 phase, but give it a week and i will have probably switched to PC again
5. What do you think of the PC as a gaming machine?
i think that in many ways it is superior to consoles, but that it is also slightly too complicated and too quickly out dated to be worth a major investment especially considering how few PC exclusives there now are.
6. Finally, with the imminent release of Battlefield 3 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, there's a lot of debate amongst the online FPS crowd as to which is better. Where do you stand on this?
im not a fan of MP really, and modern warefare 3 is more likely to have the best single player experience, so im going for that. its a win by default though, im not really a massive CoD fan.

My name is Gary, im male, i'm a countryside management student in Wales, and gaming is my only hobby that can be done while its raining (being in the UK, that means its pretty much all i ever do)

 

[xdropkicknickx]

1. In terms of your first consoles and games, how and when did you first get into gaming as a hobby?

As cliche as this may sound, I don't remember a time without video games. My earliest memories of playing video games were old windows games like that one hovercraft game I've been searching for for years and this chill fighting game where you were monsters fighting in the sewer (can't remember that one either). My first console was a Sega Genesis, I never did like Nintendo, plus every other kid in the world had one (I was a hipster out of the womb), so my first true experience with gaming as a hobby was my Playstation 1.

2. Would you say you had any favourite games, or series?

Absolutely. The sonic games on the Genesis were the greatest things I had ever experienced as a young boy, and as I got older I got into Gran Turismo and Final Fantasy, the latter of which was something of an obsession until FFXI (I was waning with X and X-2, though the boobs made the latter one OK). Honorable mention goes to Einhander and Tomba, both of which I played until i could literally tell you every thing that happened in order. Today my favorite games are still from the PS1 days, only because they remind me of my childhood. Bioshock, Mirror's Edge, and Borderlands are the only games that do much for me in terms of modern-day games

3. Any genres you tend to prefer playing?

Racing games always draw my attention, although I have no idea why. Side-scrollers are a classic for me, and RPG's are an obvious favorite considering my love of Final Fantasy. FPS' are good too, always good for "pick up and play"

4. Regarding platforms, which do you own? Of those, what do you play most and why?

Sega Genesis, PS1&2, X360, just recently bought an N64 so I could play Harvest Moon and Pokemon Snap, and my computer. My PS2 gets the most use because of its backwards compatibility with PS1 games, but my 360 is a close second. Was always too cheap to get a PS3, but now I really have no excuse not to have one.

5. What do you think of the PC as a gaming machine?

Far superior to consoles though I personally don't care to upgrade my computer in order to play games, I'd rather just use my consoles (pure laziness)

6. Finally, with the imminent release of Battlefield 3 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, there's a lot of debate amongst the online FPS crowd as to which is better. Where do you stand on this?

Battlefield 3. I was one of those AK-74u with rapid fire and skills set to Marathon Pro, Lightweight Pro, and Sleight of Hand Pro that would go 30-40 and 0 on many occasions. I hated that. Yeah I could have gone for a different set up, but why the hell would I when I'm doing so well with that set up? (Yes, I'm talking about CoD Black Ops, I guess that's not really a fair comparison to MW3, is it?) I guess I just remember how much fun I had with Battlefield 1942 and figure they'll do an equally fantastic job on the third installment.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

1. In terms of your first consoles and games, how and when did you first get into gaming as a hobby?
Originally, we just had a PC at home, and I never had any contact at all with the console world. Occasionally we got some games, but mostly only things like several Lego games. In fact, the best thing I can remember from my pre-console days was Croc 2, and I'm not sure that holds up very well to modern me...Who cares, it's nostalgia.

During my fifth-grade school camp, my mother thought that with everyone else having a handheld game console, she might as well get me one, and since she thought the Game Boy Advance would be obsolete soon, she got me a Nintendo DS. It didn't have many games with it at the time, but soon one would grow into a collection of several more, including some titles I really had to hunt for.

2. Would you say you had any favourite games, or series?
Favourite game right now is The World Ends With You, for Nintendo DS. It's not without faults, sure, but it certainly has a lot less than some games I've played. Favourite series, probably Mario simply on how dependable he is. Sure, there's not a lot of innovation, but it does what it knows how to do, and it does those things well every time.

3. Any genres you tend to prefer playing?
Single-player focused games mostly, so RPGs, platformers and the occasional sandbox take up most of my gaming space. For the same reasons, I tend to avoid sports simulators, first person shooters and MMOs. One last little thing: I don't really know why, but I prefer the JRPG style to the WRPG, unlike pretty much everyone else on the Internet.

4. Regarding platforms, which do you own? Of those, what do you play most and why?
I own a PC, a Wii and a Nintendo DS, which gets the most use due to being portable. I also have a 3DS, but I'm waiting for some decent games to come out on it. After the DS, I usually use my PC a lot more, and get most of my games from Steam. If I find a title in a proper store, electronics or dedicated gaming, that's cheap and I want badly, I'll get it there.

5. What do you think of the PC as a gaming machine?
One word springs right to my mind: flexibility. Aside from the questionably legal practice of using the PC to emulate other consoles, usually much older ones that they don't sell games for any more, it's possible to buy or build a PC in a lot of price ranges, and while a lot of games these days require a pretty badass 'rig' to run even on the lowest settings, it's still possible to find some older games or indie titles that'll run on your not-so-hot PC, but be plenty of fun anyway.

(And those games tend to be less expensive than the 'blockbusters' like Call of Duty to boot.)

6. Finally, with the imminent release of Battlefield 3 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, there's a lot of debate amongst the online FPS crowd as to which is better. Where do you stand on this?
EA shot themselves pretty hard in the foot with marketing Battlefield 3 to PC gamers. DICE said that the PC is the focus point of the series, then EA goes and gets rid of the in-game server browser and dedicated servers. But only for the PC version. Then it says you have to use Origin, which is basically some totally arbitrary competition to Steam. And in the end, going into the digital distribution market directly against Steam is like going into the handheld market directly against Nintendo: you're going to lose, hands-down.

Factor in EA's frequent, childish insults and the fact that Call of Duty already has a larger established fanbase on the consoles that EA seems to be favouring now, and I'd say it's a foregone victory for Modern Warfare 3. I'm not actually going to buy either of them myself, though: I didn't play it a lot, but if MW3 is enough like MW1 (only with a worse single-player campaign), I'm just not interested.

Name: James (from Australia and thought you meant New South Wales with the magazine location, even though I don't live there)
Age: 16
Gender: M
Alias: I've used several, but my most common one is 'NerfedFalcon'.