Comments on: Guiding Light

By: The Rook

The Rook — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 19:48:01 +0000

I never bothered with guides much, there’s this thing called the internet for that. And people’s personal experiences sometimes are more valuable that what the guides print.

Can’t say I’ve seen a collector’s edition guide thou. And I will always consider the special edition, depending what extras come with it and the price difference.

I’m just not one for books. Maybe if I see a really nice one, I’ll change my mind.

By: Lorna

Lorna — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 16:05:12 +0000

I used to love the big box games, dante76 but they would damage so easily and swallow shelf space…looked damn good though!

By: MarkuzR

MarkuzR — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:55:08 +0000

Personally speaking, I’d rather fork out the money for a lavish item even if it IS useless (and I don’t mean the Wii) and you could matt encapsulate and spot varnish a dog shit and I’d buy it. I remember selling my Omen Trilogy VHS set on eBay many years ago and spent more time discussing the matt encapsulation and blood red foiling than anything else.

Fable II guide was purely wank fodder though and had absolutely no purpose in terms of helping anyone along… much like the menu system of the game itself really. Beautiful packaging though, daaaaamn! If I had the choice of a bog standard version that helped, or a gorgeous package that left you guessing I’d go for the gorgeous packaging… as long as it was wipe clean, just in case.

I’m with Ben on the Star Wars guide… I’d buy that. Just as long as it doesn’t come with c3PO as I couldn’t put up with all his twaddle!

By: dante76

dante76 — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:49:50 +0000

I think the limited editions are more of a hark back to the old packaging of the PC days, before slipcase packaging and cds. A standard release of Ultima: Pagen included cloth map, gold coin, guide book and others. F19 Stealth Fighter had keyboard layouts, 200 page booklet on airplanes, whilst Frontier 2, had a essay on the theory of interspace travel and quantum mechanics.

Whilst I don’t mourn the gigantic boxes they came in, its good to see a slow return to unnecessary but beautiful paraphernalia.

By: Ben

Ben — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 12:55:31 +0000

Nice post Lorna :)

I have a bit of a soft spot for guides, although not bought one in what seems like a lifetime.

I think probably the best guide I’ve picked up was for Final Fantasy X, not only does it look fantastic, but the way its laid out just works brilliantly. The Pokemon guides (yes I went there) were awesome back in the day, detailed lists of various bits and bobs, it was like a glossy Excel spreadsheet without the anoying paper clip – my version had stickers that you could put onto each individual Pokemon’s page once you had “captured” it, great stuff.

Talking of art books, I’ve not seen the Fable 2 one myself, but if you like that sort of thing then any of the World of Warcraft ones will have you dribbling like a baby.

I picked up a copy of the “Art of Half Life 2″ back when the game was first released, back when it was the big phenominal game pushing PC tech to its limits, it’s aged since then obviously, but the art book still looks fantastic.

I want my Star Wars: The Old Republic guide to come as a life size R2-D2 that projects pages via its blue 3D output display…well, one can dream.

By: Lorna

Lorna — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 12:26:43 +0000

Thanks :) And you’re damn right the crumbs were photoshopped on there! Sticky fingers will be removed with scissors!

By: Darach

Darach — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:05:47 +0000

:D Ohh, you’ve got some really nice stuff there, L.

And I’m really impressed with the way you photoshopped those chocolate muffin/cake crumbs onto your Fallout 3 Guide. :)

You did, ermm, photoshop them, right?

:D Also, I would like to proclaim my love for all things Piggyback <3 :)