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If you haven’t read this piece on Polygon on the origins and rise of the Twitch streaming service, you owe it to yourself to give it a spin.

Developers are now using Twitch to show their games to the public before they’re completed. Publishers are using Twitch as a marketing tool to speak directly to consumers, and users are creating their own form of entertainment and breathing new life into games that launched years ago.

Twitch is a certified phenomenon, and it’s doing a great job making inroads into allowing just about anyone to broadcast their gameplay. I stream on Twitch sometimes, and you can find my channel here.

It was a great service before, and that’s only being augmented by recent increases in its accessibility.

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TechCrunch seems to know what’s up with whatever Amazon is supposed to be making to enter the games market:

Amazon is readying a game console/set top box of its own, and we’ve learned from multiple sources familiar with the device that the Lab126-produced gadget will have a form factor similar to the Chromecast, or in other words it’ll be a stick or dongle as opposed to something like the Apple TV. In addition, one source claims it should have support for streaming full PC game titles, and as such might be able to compete with consoles including the Xbox and PlayStation, instead of just Android-powered living room game devices.

This thing keeps getting weirder and weirder. (And worse and worse.) First it’s an Ouya-like thing, which was a recipe for failure. Now it’s a Chromecast-style HDMI dongle that streams games to your TV like OnLive:

These streaming efforts will be more akin to the remote game service offered by OnLive, than to the local streaming that Nvidia offers through its Shield Android gaming console and Nvidia-powered gaming PCs. The titles, which are said to be top-tier games, will be streamed from Amazon’s services at 30fps (which is comparable to most online video) according to our source.

Um… OK. So that’s 30fps, plus (on a great internet connection) at least 50ms of latency for controller input, assuming a very generous 25ms ping to the server, and then the data has to travel there and back.

Is there actually a market for this? I’ll give the streaming thing a try if PlayStation Now ends up being something that Plus members get for free, but at least for me, I’m not interested in anything where I’m not running things locally. Input lag would drive me nuts.

Amazon should stick to the business it knows and does best: selling you things that it then ships to your door.

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IDW is having a bit of a publisher sale on Comixology right now, with some initial titles for a couple of good lines available as part of the sale. It runs through tomorrow.

The first collected volumes of a few things like G.I. Joe’s newer run are available, but the real pick for me is either the first volume of TMNT classic or (especially) the first volume of Transformers: More than Meets the Eye, which I picked up a while back on a friend’s recommendation and have been enjoying quite a bit.

I’d encourage you to give it a look and see what you can find; the sale is almost 50% off in some cases.

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Todd Bishop for GeekWire:

Julie Larson-Green, the former Windows executive who most recently led Microsoft hardware development as the top executive in the company’s Devices and Studios Group, is moving to a new role in the company’s Applications and Services Group.

[…]

Her role leading the company’s Devices & Studios Group will be filled by Stephen Elop, the Nokia executive who is rejoining Microsoft as part of the Redmond company’s $7.2 billion acquisition of Nokia’s devices and services business.

Oh boy. I’m trying hard to imagine a world where this is a good idea. Remember that Elop was the one who during the CEO search was saying that he would spin off the Xbox division—the only thing at Microsoft that’s really trying to innovate in services—away from Microsoft itself.

Nokia’s hardware approach has been a disaster for some time now and I’m not too thrilled about that track record coming to Xbox, which is a brand I love quite a bit. On the other hand, this has the potential to give the “Windows Mobile should be a fork of Android” idea a bit of an internal push, which would be great to see.

The article goes on to quote an internal email that was sent as part of this transition from Larson-Green. Some choice quotes:

As you will read in the notes below from Qi and Satya, I’ve accepted a new challenge, leading the My Life & Work team in ASG and serving as the Chief Experience Officer (CXO).

This appears to be an actual team and position name. I have no joke that is better than the real thing.

I want to thank each and every one of you for welcoming me and supporting me as the leader of Devices & Studios over the past 7 months.

7 months is hardly enough time to grasp the relationships in a team as big as that has to be, let alone effectively drive them to innovate. I’d love to be wrong here, but that kind of short executive tenure with a group doesn’t sound fun.

Our opportunity to grow as a world-class devices and experiences company is greater than ever, and I have every belief that as One Microsoft we’re on the right path. The addition of Nokia Devices & Services into the DnS family will add tremendous scale, talent and opportunity for our future.

And it will probably add a tremendously enjoyable turf war that is not likely to make any products better.

You are all in great hands with Stephen and already we’ve shared a lot with him and his LT from Nokia regarding all of the fantastic people, teams and products in DnS. I also know many of you are looking forward to welcoming the Nokia team and working more closely with them.

By which is meant, “I know none of you are really thrilled about an entirely new team merging with yours, but you should probably start coping now.”

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Ben Kuchera in an opinion piece for Polygon with the current frontrunner for Dumbest Idea of 2014:

If a game running in 1080p at 60 fps is the ideal for gaming, the console that can get each game the closest to that ideal on a consistent basis it clearly the winner, right?

The PlayStation 4 seems to have a clear advantage in this regard, with ports being displayed at 1080p more often than we see on the Xbox One. Even Sony’s hardware has to juggle a number of variables before a game can be displayed at that mighty resolution, and most games aren’t running close to 60 fps once they get there.

Even Infamous: Second Son, one of the showcases of the PlayStation 4, runs at 30 fps. There is some question about the final resolution of Titanfall, but you can be sure it won’t be running at 1080p. Here’s an idea that could help with the arguing, or at least put more power in the hands of gamers: Give us a choice between performance and visuals.

A few things:

  1. The mass market doesn’t care about this stuff. THEY DON’T. It is the exclusive domain of internet forum whiners and “hardcore gaming” morons.
  2. It’s antithetical to the nature of consoles. I do most of my playing on consoles specifically because I don’t want to mess with these kinds of things.
  3. Decisions, not options.

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Ron Amadeo for Ars Technica:

The agreement places a company-wide ban on Android forks, saying OEMs are forbidden from taking “any actions that may cause or result in the fragmentation of Android” and specifically disallows distributing or encouraging a third party to distribute “a software development kit derived from Android.” Google has full control over the countries its apps are released in and distribution methods used to distribute the apps. This allows Google to restrict its apps to the Play Store and will keep them out of competing stores like Amazon and Samsung. Google also stipulates that the Google apps must be distributed free of charge, and they cannot be modified, reverse engineered, or used to make a derivative work, and ads are not allowed to be placed in, on, or around Google’s apps.

But Android is “open.”

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Jeremy Parish, writing for USgamer, on why Super Metroid is one of the greatest games of all time:

The single most important thing Super Metroid did, however, was to respect the player. That may seem an obvious feature — so essential a consideration as to not be a proper feature, in fact — but respect for the player is something in short supply in video games. Super Metroid’s trust in you permeates the game, manifesting in every possible facet of the adventure.

Super Metroid has no hand-holding; it guides players to play the proper way, but it never strongarms them. It gives adventurers the freedom to learn, but also the freedom to fail, to get lost. It reveals its working in subtle ways; for instance, players might never realize that the Super Missile can knock enemies loose from walls on their own, but you’re forced to use them for the first time to open a door near where a couple of monsters are hidden along the ceiling. That explosion, required to progress further, dislodges them. If you don’t grasp this secondary function of your new weapon, it’s not the game’s fault; it’s because you didn’t pay attention when it was giving you its discreet lesson.

It’s a great read, and if you have never played Super Metroid, you owe it to yourself to track down a copy or purchase it on the eShop for Wii or Wii U. If you want to read more about the game, Jeremy is also currently going through it on his blog, 2 Dimensions, here.

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Patrick Klepek for Giant Bomb:

Words are powerful, and people should be responsible for them. When we characterize threats as “idle,” we remove the individual from the equation. It’s victim blaming. It’s hard to imagine how Nguyen is to blame here.

So much of the horrible stuff that happens on the internet doesn’t boil down to any particular form of hate or ignorance or whatever.

It’s just that at some point we collectively decided we didn’t want to take the time to treat each other like fellow human beings.

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Double-fisted goodness from the Playstation Blog:

The holidays are here, and we’re happy to be launching Pinball Arcade on PS4 tomorrow! We’ve been working hard all year on remastering and relighting the classic pinball tables in our game to take advantage of the PS4′s power. And you’re getting a table on PS4 for free.

and:

Minecraft: PlayStation 3 Edition will be available to download from PSN on December 17th in North America. Minecraft: PlayStation 4 Edition and Minecraft: PS Vita Edition are also being developed, but we don’t have release dates yet. Expect them sometime next year.

Both are of course great games and worth your money, especially if you haven’t tried either yet.