Crysis 3 Official Trailer Released: Is Your PC Ready?

After numerous leaks of the game last week, EA has officially released the trailer for Crysis 3. It is the third installment of the high-tech military shooter franchise and the second set in New York City, though now it is a lush rainforest among the ruins of the once great city. From the trailer, the bow seems like the weapon of choice.

The game is set to release in Q2 2013 for the PC, Xbox 360 and PS3. Having played parts of the first two in the series, Crysis has never wowed me in the gameplay. Certainly it is visually stunning which clearly the series is known for and appears Crysis 3 is continuing. We’ll see if anything changes.

PC gamers, you’ve got another beast coming soon to test your rig. 🙂

Official Site Link

Your Mom Hates It = Good Marketing?

In many industries the opinion of moms are held to a high standard; being a stamp of approval in terms of use and quality. However, video games are not one such industry.  With the existence of the organizations like Mothers Against Videogame Addiction and Violence, you get the sense that many moms disapprove of this activity. EA finds this disapproval to be the perfect focus of the marketing campaign for their newest game, Dead Space 2.  As you can tell from the title, death is a central theme of the game as you fight off endless hordes of mutated space zombies determined to kill you. To promote the game, EA gathered moms into a room and showed them clips of the game to capture their priceless and horrified expressions.  Selected footage became the advertisement you see below with the slogan: “It’s revolting. It’s violent. It’s everything you love in a game. And your mom’s going to hate it.”

There have been mix reviews on this marketing campaign with critics complaining that this advertisement reinforces stereotypes of females being  scared easily and not being gamers when many do exist.  I personally was amused by this marketing approach and find this criticism to be somewhat unfounded.  Arguably all mainstream media is based on some form of stereotype from genders roles to how people of certain appearance should behave. The Old Spice ‘How Your Man Should Smell’ campaign did something similar using very masculine stereotypes in a comedic fashion and was well received by the public. It may have been a bit exploitative, but as a target consumer of EA products I thought it was clever and in good humor.  Although mom gamers may be common now, 10 years ago this was not the case when the majority of the adult gamers today, EA target market, may have started or had been playing games. I am sure in many cases their moms were not the most supportive person of such activity. My mom sure wasn’t. So I saw this ad having a funny nostalgia factor to it meant to resonate with individuals like me to a time in the past when not everybody and their grandma is playing games as it is now. I say take this ad for its assumed intention being how hilarious the reaction of moms, and people in general, can be with certain things. That is an key reason why YouTube exist.

What are your thoughts? How did you perceive the advertisement?