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[2/15/07] GameTap(.com)


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»» Digg It!

 

So I decided I was going to give the GameTap service a spin. It was only a dollar (for 1 month trial) so I figured why not, it will probably suck, but at least I'll get to play some Silent Hill 3 (I've never played the PC version).

 

Well it did suck...HARD!

 

The first thing to see when you launch GameTap is this stupid AOL-like login screen. What is it doing? Who knows... But it can randomly take forever for almost no reason. Most of the time it doesn't take that long, but it's still really annoying to look at. After it goes through those three steps, it sits there saying logging in for awhile.

 

loading.png

 

Finally GameTap launches and you're greeted with this loud annoying spinning ball video that I guess is supposed to be a bunch of TV screens. I wont even include a screenshot because I'm already sick of looking at it.

 

Then you're greeted with the main screen of the most bloated interface of anything I've ever seen ever. Sure you can make it run NOT fullscreen, which I guess helps, but it's still really annoying and stupid to use. Oh and it has all these retarded sound effects and animations.

 

mainscreen.png

 

First we will go to My Gametap. Its basically your options screen, The favorites list is just like your favorite games, i guess your supposed to add the games you play the most to it. The downloaded tab shows all the games you have downloaded, and you can delete them here. The leaderboards...are leaderboards. The Challenge games menu. Oh heres a fun part, Its the online play part of GameTap. You know, The thing NO ONE IS PLAYING. Theres never anyone to play on the games you want to play, I played a guy in bubble bobble and it lagged and barely worked, its just stupid, dont bother. The account settings is basically your billing and stuff.

 

mygametap.png

 

Next is the games, you click through them, its pretty straightforward, those options at the top you can click on, same with the orange boxes which change according to which category you clicked up top.

 

games.png

 

When you click on a game you get a little info screen like this

 

gamedetails.png

 

Oh and notice those three circles in the bottom left, You can only have 3 things downloading at once...lame.

 

This is by FAR the S-H-I-T-T-I-E-S-T part of gametap, GameTapTV

 

gametaptv.png

 

Every show on it sucks, They are supposed to be funny but its all flocking retarded, its not entertaining, its boring, and it just made me mad watching the shows, none of them are even shows, they are like a minute long if that. They have music videos of bands that suck, stupid interviews with stupid people. Its like if you thought G4 was bad, you should really check this out, this is SO MUCH WORSE than G4, it makes G4 look like the best crap on TV you've ever seen.

 

But how are the games? you ask. They suck. First of all, 90% of the games on here, you can play perfectly in an emulator FOR FREE. How do they play in gametap? barely. They stutter and look like crap, the emulation is just horrible. Anything not run in an emulator (like the PC games), well good luck. I downloading a handful and the only a couple of them even work, I tried them on multiple PCs, it just sucks. They made both of my PCs crash, and because of some stupid security measure it locks out CTRL+ALT+DEL. So your basically flocked, and you cant use your computer, i had to hard reset my computer trying to play these games so many times i lost count. Its flocking awful, i dont know how they get away with it. I started using a 3rd party task manager and thank god that worked. (All the games run from some non existent emulated X:/ network drive i found that out at least)

 

Oh yeah and then theres that top bar, You can login to AIM, the two people gets you into that crappy multiplayer thing, and its pretty obvious what the rest of the buttons do.

 

In short... It's not worth it.... Anything on here thats decent you can get in an emulator at a far better quality, and most of the decent PC games don't even work. Flock this seriously. Here's a screenshot of my favorite part of the whole gametap experience.

 

gametapyc4.th.png

i should have asked him for my flocking dollar back.

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Unfortunately, Im an avid Myst fan and am forced to go through GameTap to play Myst Online: Uru Live, which, coincidentally, launched today.

 

Fortunately (I guess?), since Im in Australia, I can play Myst Online by paying the fee, but since GameTap isnt offered here, MO is all I get. I have to pay the same, but dont get access to those other games. Which blows and all, but I guess it doesnt blow all that badly.

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Very passionate review.

 

I always thought GameTap was garbage and this review confirms it. :thumbsup1:

And all for one dollar :D

Well, for the first month it's $1 (which you can cancel). Then it's $10/month after that.

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Very passionate review.

 

I always thought GameTap was garbage and this review confirms it. :D

And all for one dollar :thumbsup1:

Well, for the first month it's $1 (which you can cancel). Then it's $10/month after that.

Ouch. That's a lot for such garbage service :thumbsup1:

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Yeah, i forgot to mention something else too, You see all those windows where it says "buffering" and the space ghost one, It makes you watch commercials the whole way through. Most of them are commercials for the service your already paying for! like their stupid shows and stuff. But i did get a couple commercials for random websites and stuff. and they play when you download stuff too.

 

And yeah i used to love MYST games, but i stopped playing after MYST 3, i didnt really like the idea of the whole online thing very much, its more mysterious on your own.

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