Dhruin
I mean that m$ development goals are to develop as many games asap for the console and the console with the exception of about 6 months at time of new hardware release will always be a weaker platform than the PC.
While I wont get to see ME for 2 years, what I have seen looks great for the console.
I did notice from what little I have seen in the videos, the full range of facial expressions seems less than say even Bloodlines, which is 3 years old.
"You're also putting all the blame for not pursuing cheaper games entirely on the publishers"
Not really, what I am saying is that they have been offering tons of money to PC developers to make console games, which takes away from PC games being developed since m$ decided to lose 5 billion in the first 5 years and has in the last couple of years increased it since they are getting big enough fast enough, of course crappy hardware doesn't help.
I really don't know about Bioware anymore, they maybe too big to do little titles, might be easier for them to fund new and smaller indie studio like CD Projeckt.
Your right, for me it;s so hard to tell who the hell Bioware is anymore, they have been under m$ development mentality and money train for so long now, I hope they still remember their strong roots.
Oh I agree all the emphasis on "always the best graphics" is bad news and that would be worthy of a whole article and thread of discussions.
"I also don't recall a golden age of MS publishing prior to the Xbox."
True, I was mostly refering to what they are doing, not they stopped doing something great to persue this stratigy.
However if they would have focused equally on PC and Console, they wouldn't have stabbed themselves in the back by damaging their main money maker the PC industry to create a new department.
Sony had sold tons of PS games because they had some good quality titles and it coexisted with PC, i.e. PC was the fastest growing entertainment sector in the late 90's inspite of PS existing, but m$ made consoles at the expense of and instead of supporting the PC industry sought to undermine it.
"I think your M$ stuff is overly simplistic and ignores everything else."
You might be right, I think of it as focusing on m$, not ignoring other factors.
I see other problems but when you have huge effect factor like m$, it can sometimes be hard to see something clearly without knowing m$'s level of involvement and influence, since it runs very deeply.
"but saying "that's the way it was advertised at least at one time" makes it sound like that has changed"
Well then it was just my poor wording, I meant to say;
"I recall it being PC only at one time, but don't currently know if that's still the case, but I am currently betting it will be multiplatform."