At the ever-fun Broken Toys, long-time MMO observer Scott 'Lum The Mad' Jennings is discussing community relations, as sparked by an Aeropause article which claims: "The World of Warcraft forums are a good place to go if you’re feeling pretty good about life, and you decide you need that attitude adjusted."

Jennings notes that: "Stardock and Penny Arcade (huh? When was Tycho’s last patch?) are held up as paragons of successful community management, mainly from getting rid of the middle man." He then goes on to basically suggest that comparing the most rabid MMO-playing fan to the kind of relatively relaxed people who play games via TotalGaming.net or read comics at Penny Arcade is probably gently unfair - something we tend to agree with.

He concludes: "MMOs are special. MMO communities are special. They require a special, deft hybrid form of public relations, rapid response, and disinterested ombudsman. That is what an online community relations team SHOULD be. Whether or not it is in practice can be an issue. But if you feel that your game isn’t giving you enough feedback on what you find important, it isn’t because community relations is an inherently bad idea; it’s because that team specifically is falling down on its job."

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Handy media-ish news site Xboxyde has just posted a heap of screenshots from Mutant Storm Empire, the Xbox 360 Live Arcade sequel to one of our favorite games of the past few months, PomPom's Mutant Storm Reloaded - and oh my, it's salivatin' time.

The pictures clearly show scrolling levels (as opposed to the single-screen mayhem of Mutant Storm Reloaded), as well as simultaneous multiplayer (likely/hopefully across Xbox Live!), and there are all kinds of weird beasties such as octopi, fish, and gigantic spaceship turret madness crazies sprawled all over the place - yay! As commenters note, it has elements of PomPom's previous PC title Space Tripper in it too.

Looks like the pics originated in the PomPom Games official forum, where staffer Mike links to hi-res screens, explaining: "Theres a bunch of shots in this directory. Alot of em are in the current 360gamer mag. Some of them are a bit old tho, so certain beasties and stuff have change. Still, its close enough! " Yes, it is - this may be our most-awaited X360 title of the year, now, cos we're weird like that.

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Many thanks to all who entered our recent competition to win Metal Gear Saga Vol. 1 on DVD - and thanks again to Konami for providing the DVDs for us to give away! We had a record amount of entries (way over 100!), and the following people have emerged victorious:

Alex Bailey, Brett Dunst, Edmond Tran, Jesse Farrell, Justin Tremont, Michael Teague, Pheener, Ryan Schreyer, Steven Randolph, Tyler Rowe

For those wondering what the actual answer was (hopefully, you used your memory to find it, rather than a Google trawl - good news is that only one person actually got it wrong!):

"Q: In Konami's original Metal Gear Solid, what CODEC frequency is used to contact Meryl Silverburgh?
A: 140.15"

This explains why Frank's hint for the original question was 'back of the case!', of course, since, as Wikipedia explains: "Early in the game, the Codec frequency for Meryl (140.15) can only be found on the back of the game's box or jewel case. This was initially commissioned in an effort to curb piracy, as without contacting Meryl, the player cannot progress in the game. However, this trick could be side-tracked (possibly for those who lost their case) by calling Campbell via Codec five times in a row (or by doing it the slow way and running through each possible frequency until she answers)."

Also mentioned, and something I didn't know, actually: "This puzzle is not original to Metal Gear Solid however, as its predecessor Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake on the MSX2 also required the player to look behind the game's packaging [EDIT: FrankC says it's a sekrit code in the manual and Wikipedia is WRONG WRONG!] when Campbell changes frequency number." Congrats again to the winners!

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

One of our favorite avuncular game journos, Paul Hyman, has a conducted a HollywoodReporter.com interview with Digital Chocolate's Trip Hawkins, who is notable, of course, as the EA founder and 3DO's big bad daddy, and the piece starts with a hilarious interchange about Bing Gordon's status as EA 'co-founder'.

Hawkins notes, not unvitriocally: "Just a quick aside ... there's been some confusion these last few years because (chief creative officer) Bing Gordon over at EA has taken to publicly calling himself the co-founder of EA. That seems to have confused people. I'm the founder -- period, end of story. Bing was the seventh employee that we hired and he started working for EA about six months after I incorporated it. So he was a little late to be a co-founder and to create the illusion now that we founded the company together."

We seem to remember that Hawkins has written in to Gamasutra before to correct stories along these lines, and am amused to see him still at it. Away from this sideshow, his views on mobile gaming are pretty interesting too - he's very anti-license, and claims: "Games need to be designed for cell phones, not converted from other platforms", also noting: "By the time those brands map over to a mobile phone, so much is lost in the translation. Do you think the gamer is going to continue to buy mobile games when all they get is second-rate versions of what the brands are supposed to be about?"

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

A truly gargantuan, random post on Matt 'Fort90' Hawkins' weblog clues us in to a YouTube video featuring all the Fist Of The North Star endings - very neat for those who haven't seen much of the Arc System Works 2D arcade fighter.

Arc, of course, are the chaps behind the Guilty Gear series, thus 'Hokuto No Ken', as it's known in Japan, has some seriously lush 2D art, and this compilation of finishing moves is a delight to behold, even if it isn't announced for any home systems (we're dreaming of an Xbox 360 online-playable release alongside Senko No Ronde Rev. X - at least, in our 'people care about Microsoft in Japan' dreams!)

Anyhow, Matt has some fun commentary on the fatalities: "Truth be told, most are lame, but a few are funny, like one where you just basically rip the clothes off a woman, another where you play a woman who tries to shoot something with a crossbow but ends up hitting the opponent in the face (for some Dick Cheney action), along with a weird Sears portrait studio-esque floating head in the background, and the final one where I think someone decided to jump off a cliff and slit his wrist at the same time. Plus the over-dramatic music adds to the funny."

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Posted by at 7:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)

Sister site Serious Games Source posted such an odd story yesterday that we felt we had to pass it on - the announcement of a cricket-based AIDS awareness cellphone game for India.

It's explained: "The report noted that one of the games, Demons XI and Safety XI, is a “cricket-based game involving balls in the form of condoms, faithful partners, information on HIV and the symbolic AIDS red ribbon.” In order to win the game, a player must avoid “googlies and doosra balls - unsafe sex, infected blood transfusions, infected syringes and the company of bad friends.”"

So: "'The games will educate mobile subscribers and create awareness while reducing stigma and discrimination,' noted Hilmi Quraishi, ZMQ's chief technology officer. Other similarly themed games released by ZMQ include Ribbon Chase, Messenger, and Quiz with Babu." AIDS is indeed a major problem in India, so it's good to see someone trying to do something about it, but packaging AIDS and cricket makes us boggle a lot. Still, good for them - no weirder than Puyo Puyo and AIDS, right?

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If it's 4pm in Bangkok, it must be time for a GameTap update on GSW, and since this one involved Richard 'Lord British' Garriott, whose medieval tunics are the talk of any party at which he arrives (and again, isn't really covered too much elsewhere), we must relate it in some detail!

We briefly noted the upcoming Ultima Week on the site, but now it is upon us, uhoh. It's explained: "To celebrate and honor this amazing series of titles, GameTap is giving serious ‘props’ by hosting ‘Ultima Week.’ As a special treat for GameTap subscribers, Ultima’s creator Richard “Lord British” Garriott will be adding his own personal touch to many of the activities taking place on GameTap including:

- A “Tapped In” documentary on Richard Garriott and the Ultima Franchise
- An exclusive tour of his castle, including a look at the bones in the basement and his crossbow collection
- Each time a subscriber loads an Ultima game, Richard will provide a personal introduction about that specific title
- The latest trailer for Tabula Rasa, the... MMO game being developed by Richard Garriott and NCSoft, with an exclusive behind the scenes sneak peek at the game in development.
- Then in July, Richard will occupy the hot seat and go a round with everyone’s favorite ghost host on Space Ghost Coast to Coast

Oh, and just to confirm - the featured games available for play are: "Ultima™ 1, Ultima™ II - The Revenge of the Enchantress, Ultima™ III - Exodus, Ultima™ IV - Quest of the Avatar, Ultima™ V - Warriors of Destiny." No titles in the series later than Ultima V just yet, but I'm sure (ok, not _sure_) if everyone is good, the weird spinoffs and later sequels may eventually make it to the GameTap summer wonderland, yay. Anyhow, there's the scoop.

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A few weeks ago, we spotted one of the video entries in Cool Hunting's '8-Bit' series, profiling bleeptastic music creators who often use Game Boy and NES consoles to create their goodness.

Well, the concluding part of the video series has recently been posted, in which they "discuss the sampling processes of artists who re-imagine the possibilities of lo-fi technology", talking to Mike Rosenthal, Experimental Music Curator at the NYC performance space 'The Tank', and Montgomery Knott, director of MonkeytownHQ.

The previous entries (selectable on the menu on the left) are one-on-one artist interviews, with a recent highlight including a chat with Mark DeNardo, who "incorporates electronic sequences from both his Gameboy and PSP into deeply soulful and original folk songs" - he also talks about his music for the Gamma Bros game, which we recently covered. Also interviewed are Bit Shifter, noteNdo, and Nullsleep!

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, if Game Tunnel was a lady, we think it'd be a really comely, intelligent lady, because its end of month indie game round-ups are _just that good_. And the latest round-up, for June 2006 is no exception.

This time, the coveted 'Game Of The Month' goes to the long, long-delayed Wild Earth, for which GT editor Russell Carroll explains: "I've been waiting for Wild Earth since it won the 'Game of the Year' at the 2003 IGF... Playing as a photo-journalist in the beautiful African landscape is a lot of fun for my scientific senses. Players will learn as they play watching their photos turn into the images used in the magazine stories created within the game. This game is a such wonderful simulation that it seems a shame that it is often compared to Pokemon Snap." Sounds neat, though Mike Hommel comments that "the FPS gameplay is too complex for the broad market this should be for."

Also getting a Gold Award is the oft-GSW discussed Armadillo Run, for which Carroll comments: "If you miss out on this one due to the screenshots not looking that pretty you don't deserve the chance to play it. This physics sim is a blast with lots of options to make your own contraptions." However, more than one of the reviewers question whether it's a real armadillo in the game or just "a basketball". Clearly, it's an armadillo, because games never lie to us.

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, whaddya know? GameSetWatch has a brand new sibling, in the form of user-submitted game news site Gamerbytes, which 'soft launched' today, whatever 'soft launched' means.

Anyhow, it's "a new community site designed to link you to the best game related stories and content on the web", or so it says on the tin - and it has a cute dog logo, and basically, you can submit any video game-related story you like, and then your peers will vote it up and down. Right now, it only takes 2 votes to get onto the front page, so if you want to post your own stories to the site and you have a willing friend, please feel welcome to start gaming the system immediately!

And yes, we know you've probably seen this idea somewhere before (the site is based on the Pligg code, incidentally!), but that doesn't mean to say we can't attract a different set of people for a game-specific version of these 'power to the people' Web-centric sites. Also, the logo has a dog in it! So go poke at it a bit and submit some neat stuff, quick.

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As we reported yesterday, relayed on from the Canadian newswires, the wondrous news debuted that "Nintendo of Canada and Canstruction [are] to build world's largest metal Super Mario in Dundas Square" in Toronto.

Wha? It's explained: "On June 29 Nintendo of Canada and Canstruction invite you to experience the world's largest Super Mario structure made entirely of canned goods. Come see this charitable event and unique tribute to Super Mario in recognition of Nintendo DS game New Super Mario Bros. becoming the fastest-selling video game in Canada."

Well, GSW reader Duane Brown actually bothered to turn up and take a couple of pictures of the wondrous canned Mario (thanks!), and we present them above and below! We can just about make out that the pipe is made of coffee, and Mario's braces of canned tuna - we leave it to you to figure out the rest.

Of course, we'd like to point out that this is _real_ investigative journalism at work here - we're waiting for our Pulitzer! Where is it?!

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

We still love Vintage Computing's 'Hacksterpiece Theater' segments, and the latest one is up now, discussing the absolutely excellent NES ROM hack Luigi's Coin Quest from DahrkDaiz.

It's explained: "Shortly after completing his 2004 magnum opus, Mario Adventure, DahrkDaiz got straight to work on a totally new hack of Super Mario Bros. 3 which would feature Luigi in the starring role, eschewing the usual Mario vehicle cliché. Luigi’s Coin Quest, as it would be titled, would have numerous similarities with his previous SMB3 hack, but would greatly improve upon them. Over the next eight months, only one world of this epic project would be finished. And yet, despite being incomplete, the resulting work is one of the most sophisticated and highly playable examples of sheer technical mastery in the field of NES game hacking that the gaming world has never seen".

What's more: "The object of Luigi’s Coin Quest is to find a special coin in each level. Every stage has at least one rounded switch block that looks similar to the “!” switch blocks in Super Mario World. Hitting this switch will reveal the coin somewhere in the level, which you then have to find and collect to end the stage. The original idea for the game’s structure was that “boss fights” with the Koopa Kids would end each world. You’d then enter a warp pipe in the overworld — completing another extended transitional level in the process — and when you came out, you’d be at a new world map with new levels." Neeeet!

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[The 'Game Rag Slapdown' is an exclusive bi-weekly Thursday feature written by The Game Rag's Nathan Smart that's always video game related, sometimes funny ha ha, but mostly funny hee hee (and sometimes funny, period). This week, Nathan Smart apologizes on behalf of the entire video game community for its role in this year's E3 over-attendance debacle.]

I keep having to tell people about my trip to E3 and with each telling I am asked if it was as fun as it sounds. Of course, I say that it wasn't - just like every other person that has gone to E3 has told me. It really stinks to have to admit that they are right because I imagined E3 as video game utopia.

The main reason everyone says it stinks is because of the sheer amount of people. I like people and so that didn't seem like an issue - that is, until I started my 3-day-wait-in-line experience at the LA Convention Center. I'm no stranger to waiting in line (I mean, I live about an hour away from Cedar Point) but my feet have never hurt more.

I was always angry at the "big guys" for being mad that the "little guys" got to go to E3 - but now I understand their anger. I am one of these little guys - people that don't really make a living writing about games or people that make a living writing about video games but still suck at it. I really do feel sorry for the main guys and I'm here to apologize on behalf of all my little brothers and sisters.

Nothing says "I'm sorry" like the phrase "I'm sorry" so here you go:

I'm sorry.

Now, with the apology out of the way, let's get to the people who I'm speaking for:

-Kid whose business parents got her in
-Japanese person whose fashion sense got him in
-NGage Booth
-Bloggy Bloggerton and his Video Game Round-Up Gang (all 20 of them)
-Family Guy fan who snuck into meet Adam West and quote pop culture reference after pop culture reference after pop culture reference after unfunny script joke
-Guy recording phone message from Charles Martinet
-Charles Martinet
-WoW fan who just couldn't wait to add 5 more minutes to his 100 hours of play time
-GameSetWatch columnist

Again, we're all very sorry that we ruin your E3 experience every year. We hope that you will forgive us and allow us some time to adjust to our E3-less future. We may relapse and show up next year.

[Nathan Smart is a fake news writer for The Game Rag and really enjoys the benefits of it (no facts, no research, no real interviews). He also does Bobby McFerrin versions of indie rock songs with his one man group Indie Blockedappella. He thinks things are funny.]

Posted by nathansmart at 9:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Haven't linked to Postman's Shoot The Core shmup page for a good while, so is great to see he has a new weblog post about 'Shooter Making For Dummies', presumably endangering himself with possible lawsuits from the 'For Dummies' book guys, haw.

He notes: "Luckily there are a handful of shmup level editors that can make creating levels in shmups easy enough for simpletons like us to tackle it. These SLE's are few and far between, but I feel that creators who took the time to release such tools to the public should be acknowledged", and goes on to discuss tools such as Dezaemon Construction Kit ("These spanned many consoles from Super Nintendo to Sega Saturn, however were never released in the US. Therefore creating a game can be very difficult without understanding what exactly is going on".)

But he reveals: "My favorite of the bunch, and the only one I've spend some actual time with making levels, Galactic Gladiator Level Editor. After reading some simple directions, the GGLE makes it very easy for you to make some killer scenarios for the Gladiator game." Hey, fun DIY shmup action for all!

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On the cavernous morass that is NeoGAF, one of the commenters has revealed a new website that he's been working on - the intriguing VGCharts.org, which attempts to compile worldwide game sales data into one place, and is doing a pretty neat job (for North America and Japan, at least).

Now, Japanese charts have always been publically disclosed by Media Create, as far as we know, so being able to easily list the top 10 for 15th October 1995 in Japan (Tokimeki Memorial: Forever With You is number one, FWIW!) is insanely awesome.

However, it's slightly unclear where the U.S. monthly charts (such as this one for January 2005) are coming from. If it's a fresh-compiled source, then there should be no problems, but if it's in any way related to the annoyingly proprietary NPD Group data, then it's not clear how long the site will be up. Which is most irksome, cos having good, trackable sales data for the game biz in a public place would be a giant boon for all. Go go VGCharts!

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So, we've previously covered the extremely cultish PC dojin title Cave Story, as produced by Daisuke 'Pixel' Amaya.

Well, now a bunch of remix-loving fans have created a double album of Cave Story music remixes based on Pixel's original songs for the game, and ending up with 22 music tracks plus a bonus track, a result of which the Cave Story LJ fanlisting reveals that Pixel commented: "Each track thrilled me and made me smile, and every one of them impressed me. Are these professionals? I'm so glad now that I made that game. ... I feel very fortunate." Hurray!

There's plenty of love on the official forums, too, though if you don't dig OCRemix-style guitars and synths VG mixxy styles, this may not be your cup of tea, but some dig it a lot: "These tracks are awesome, and have totally rekindled my love for Cave Story. I clearly have some favorites, mostly due to the fact that some of the originals are better than others, but in terms of quality of mixing, all of you did a fantastic job." [Via Indygamer.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of the few GSW semi-obsessions (along with Gizmondo and Gametap) is innovative ARG-totin' firm 4orty 2wo Entertainment, so we're pleased to note a new ARGN.com news story announcing their latest project, an IM-centered puzzle game promoting the Johnny Depp-tastic Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.

ARGN explains: "Dead Man's Tale has led us to raise the Jolly Roger and lose ourselves in the world of Billy Bones, through the magic of Microsoft's Windows Live Messenger software. A promotion for the upcoming movie Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, the IM-based game allows you to add Billy as a friend, and starting a conversation with the skeletal character moves you further into the story with text scripts and fun games and puzzles that load within the messenger window."

What's more, they've now uncovered an article at ad site Adotas confirming the webgame/IM hybrid, which sounds like fascinating stuff: "Live Messenger allows users to play a game or open an activity in one window while having a conversation in another, creating a relationship between the activity and conversation. In Dead Man’s Tale, one aspect utilizing this feature allows players to man the ship and beat enemies with cannon fire. One player assumes the role of the lookout while a second controls the cannon, all while being at their own separate computers. Other puzzles actually pit players against each other."

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

A reminder, in case you missed last week's pretty darn deranged announcement, courtesy of Frank, which revealed our latest excellent GameSetCompetition, thanks to our friends at Konami and Kojima Productions, we're gonna repeat it, along with the deadline:

"Would YOU like to own a brand new, slightly bloodstained copy of Metal Gear Saga: Volume 1 on DVD? Of course you would! Here's how. Simply answer the following bit of videogame trivia:

In Konami's original Metal Gear Solid, what CODEC frequency is used to contact Meryl Silverburgh? (hint: back of the case!)

Please send your answers to editors@gamesetwatch.com any time before Friday, June 30th at 12 noon PST. There will be ten winners randomly picked from the correct answers, the judges' decision is final, so don't give me no guff. You wouldn't want Secret Agent Ai Ai knocking on your door, now would you?"

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Don't say we don't bring you all the big stories here at GSW. The latest, as released over the Canadian newswires, is that "Nintendo of Canada and Canstruction to build world's largest metal Super Mario in Dundas Square" in Toronto.

Wha? It's explained: "On June 29 Nintendo of Canada and Canstruction invite you to experience the world's largest Super Mario structure made entirely of canned goods. Come see this charitable event and unique tribute to Super Mario in recognition of Nintendo DS game New Super Mario Bros. becoming the fastest-selling video game in Canada."

But wait, there's more: "Consisting of more than 4,000 cans, weighing 2,600 lbs and reaching close to 10-feet high, the Super Mario structure will contain cans specifically selected for their colour to best replicate the Nintendo video game icon, as designed by Canstruction architects. All food used in the structure will be donated to the Daily Bread Food Bank." Whoa, and check out the Canstruction event winners from 2005 - Jaws and the tornado are awesome! Toronto-ites, please go take pics and mail them to us!

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over at Wired News, they've added a fun article about the rise of online gaming in India, discussing how perhaps China isn't the only place to look for in order to see a video game boom.

Though it also includes a horrific typo in one of the first paragraphs: "Those leading the charge aren't shy to admit that the elephant has a dragon in its sites", the article frames overall game growth in terms of competitive gaming: "Tangible progress will be marked by the first Indian participation in the Electronic Sports World Cup, which kicks off June 30 in Paris. Earlier this month, 162 regional qualifiers from nine Indian cities came to New Delhi -- including 8-year-old Rohan Karir, a TrackMania prodigy -- to compete for 10 tickets to Paris and a shot at some of the $400,000 ESWC prize money."

It goes on to note: "According to a report released last month by the San Francisco consulting firm Pearl Research, which focuses on gaming trends in Asia, the Indian online games market will exceed $200 million in 2010... "India is basically where China was in 2001," says Allison Luong, Pearl's managing director. "That's when China's games market started to develop and an online games culture started to form."" It's still small potatoes, but hey, it's interesting potatoes.

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Compilation Catalog' is a regular biweekly analysis of retro remakes and compilations old and new. This entry's subject is Sega Ages 2500 Vol. 20: Space Harrier II - Space Harrier Complete Collection, released in 2005 for the Playstation 2.]

The first iteration of Sega's current series of retro remakes weren't exactly warmly received. The results of a partnership with budget-development specialists D3 Publisher, the remakes produced by the joint publishing effort 3D AGES under the Sega Ages 2500 series ranged from somewhat presentable to downright ugly, with gameplay that was sometimes robust and enjoyable and other times absolutely reprehensible. In 2005, Sega rebooted Sega Ages 2500 with a new focus on faithful ports and emulations of classics coupled with presentation that represents the cream of the retro-compilation crop. One of the first franchises to receive the new treatment was Space Harrier, in Space Harrier II: Space Harrier Complete Collection.

Welcome to the Fantasy Zone

The original Space Harrier has already received its own entry in the Sega Ages 2500 series (which can also be found in Sega Classics Collection), so in this volume, it's Space Harrier II (the Genesis sequel) that nominally has the limelight. But really, it's almost as if Sega's using Space Harrier II as a minor excuse to release a perfect port of the original Space Harrier on this particular collection, as an apology for the first, coolly-received remake. And perfect it is: it's just as fast and smooth as the original groundbreaking rail-shooter, with no glitches or inaccuracies in its conversion.

It's easy to see why the game is so well-loved to this day, with its blinding speed and classic tunes, and it holds up extremely well (even if you don't care for scaling sprites - shame on you!) And for only the second time ever, Space Harrier supports analog control. The original arcade game sported a full-sized aircraft-style joystick that allowed for precise control and aiming, but no console version of the game since - aside from the Sega Ages version that was released for the Saturn - has supported anything but digital D-pad controls. Here, Space Harrier supports the analog sticks present on the Dual Shock and Dual Shock 2 controllers, as well as two of Hori's USB flight sticks (break out your limited-edition copies of Ace Combat 5!).

Also accounted for here are the Sega Master System and Game Gear conversions of the arcade game. Both of these are as limited as you might imagine, given the 8-bit hardware they run on. Both struggle along valiantly at roughly half or quarter the speed of the original and are full of messily-converted graphics and sparse level layouts. have tunes that are pretty faithful to the original's soundtrack, though those in the Game Gear version sound a good deal fresher. To access the Game Gear version of the game, by the way, hold right on the D-pad while the cursor's on the version-select option in the game-select menu.

Get Ready

Space Harrier II, originally meant to display the young Genesis's muscle in comparison with arcade hardware of the time, doesn't hold up nearly as well today as its older brother. It carries forward Space Harrier's famous infinite horizon well enough, but as the Genesis had no built-in scaling hardware, all the scaling here is faked. Each of the game's objects was captured at several different levels of zoom and stored in ROM for display at given intervals, giving a mild - but very choppy - simulation of scaling.

Choppy as well is the Harrier's movements: moving him across the screen makes him jump between a set of fixed positions, instead of having him move smoothly as in the original game. All of this makes the game seem as if it's running at about fifteen frames per second or so. Naturally, this isn't the best state for any aspiring action game to be in, let alone the descendant of one as speedy as Space Harrier. That, coupled with the comparatively lackluster soundtrack and level designs, leave this one feeling fairly uninspired.

Ouch!

The third headlining title here is Space Harrier 3D, a Master System game that made use of a rather dodgy-looking pair of goggles that had lens-shutter mechanism that, coupled with a flickery game display, created a 3D effect. That potentially headache-inducing mechanism isn't available here (thankfully?), because it simply wouldn't make much sense to include it, given the current selection of 3D-compatible goggles for PS2. Rather, this version of Space Harrier 3D has a mode that uses the old red/blue 3D effect instead.

You'll have to break out the scissors and glue if you don't already have a pair of those cardboard goggles, though. Packaged in with the game is a little envelope that contains sheets of red and blue cellophane, along with a pattern and instructions for cutting out and assembling a pair of 3D glasses. Thankfully, for those of us who don't want to go through the trouble, there's an option to switch off the 3D mode entirely. (And it's worth noting that there's a hidden mode that replicates the original's flickering, as well as an option that lets you use the same glasses you'd use to view stereogram images. Just hold right on the control pad while on the "3D Type" option.)

Of course, stripping away the gimmick leaves you with an original Space Harrier sequel that's not much more advanced than the original Master System Space Harrier. It's competent for the hardware, though, even if it's inherited the Genesis version's choppy player movement. And what's with the TIE Fighters? An extra bonus for fans of the US version, though, is emulated support for the FM-synthesis module that was only released for the Japanese Sega Mark III system. Anybody who's only heard the original Master System version's reedy tones will be in for a treat.

You're Doing Great

And since presentation is the name of the game here, no effort has been spared in making each version of each game present here as faithful as possible. The emulation (or conversion, whichever the case) is absolutely rock-solid in each case, and all of the original options and cheats for the old games are present. There's a gallery for each game with sound effects, music, and printed material included. The original Space Harrier has its promotional flyers, while the other games have their cover art and manuals - from both the Japanese and overseas versions of the games - scanned at a quality so crystal-clear and a resolution so huge that you can zoom in and read every word. Space Harrier's gallery also includes an expert superplay of the game, along with the option for the player to record and play back play sessions.

There's no lack of video options available: each game can be displayed in an interlaced and scaled mode, in progressive-scan, or pixel-perfect in its native resolution (termed '240p' here). This latter option is something that's missing from nearly every major retro-compilation that's released these days, and the lack of it leaves the vast majority of all those classics looking blurry, shimmery, and limp. Such is not the case here. And in the game's manual, there are interviews with and comments (all in Japanese, of course) from Japanese journalists and members of the original Space Harrier development team, including Yu Suzuki.

This package, along with the even-more-excellent Gunstar Heroes Treasure Box, represents the standard that all retro-compilations should be measured by. Even though there are "only" five games present here for your (roughly) $25, this package shows that care and respect for classics like Space Harrier and how they're presented can go a long way, even in the face of the ever-decreasing, technology-driven perceived value of games like these.

[Trevor Wilson is a web developer and amateur game developer who indulges his unhealthy obsession with obscure, strange, and unique video games over at his weblog, namako team.]

Posted by trevorw at 8:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Former GSW blogger Tony Walsh has some excellent new information about space-based MMO Eve Online holding a large-scale video/audio streaming event to showcase some in-world tournaments taking place next month.

Walsh explains: "CCP, maker of the popular, massively multiplayer sci-fi game EVE Online, has announced that it will be broadcasting live audio and video programs across the `net from its offices between July 14 and 23, 2006. The broadcast coincides with a planned tournament, allowing viewers to see and hear all 95 matches with commentary. A high and low quality video stream will be provided, as well as an audio-only stream for those who prefer it."

He also notes: "Planned features include a tour of the CCP offices, information about the company's in-house magazine (which pays writers with in-game cash), and live interviews with CCP developers." CCP have been one of the most pro-active MMO firms in terms of stimulating in-game community, especially since they've managed to keep with one gigantic shard for in-game world use, and this looks like another good community-building event from them.

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Former Marketwatch founder and current Chinese MMO don Bill Bishop continues to blog pointedly about the Chinese game market, and his latest post relays the interesting information that "Kingsoft has hired away Xu Bo, lead designer of Fantasy Westward Journey, and several core members of his development team."

Of course, this is partly interesting because most of us have no idea which MMOs are big in China (yes, apart from WoW!), but apparently, Netease's Fantasy Westward Journey and its sequel are two of the largest, numbering in the high hundreds of thousands of simultaneous users (!), and powering a lot of Chinese firm Netease's growth.

Bishop adds: "I'm not sure how much this matters for Netease long-term. I doubt this new Kingsoft game will be ready before 2008, and Fantasy Westward Journey shows no signs of slowing down (think Lineage and NCSoft and you realize Netease could live for years on just this one game). Netease does appear to be having issues with its long-awaited 3D game Tianxia." Again, somewhat over our heads, but fascinating just for the on-the-ground insight.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thanks to a post over at FiringSquad, we get to find out what the folks behind the lofty but ultimately a bit clunky Advent Rising (particularly the Mustard brothers!) have been doing since they left previous company GlyphX Games.

Apparently: "The game is called Empire and its universe will actually be revealed first in a novel of the same name by noted science fiction author Orson Scott Card. The novel, due for release in late Novemeber, takes place in the near future with a second American Civil War raging. FiringSquad contacted Chair Entertainment for more info on the game and a represenative told us that the Empire game will be an Unreal Engine 3 first person shooter and that the Empire universe is their creation. Orson Scott Card elected to write the novel based on Chair's ideas and will have a large hand in developing the storyline for the game."

More than that, we were very surprised to note that a comic book based on Advent Rising is still being produced, even after the game flopped and helped contribute to the near-downfall of publisher Majesco. The final issue of the 5-part miniseries looks like it's just been released, though. Anyone check it out?

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Apparently twistedly 'inspired' by sister site Gamasutra's game postmortems, a new site Gawd's Museum of Dissected Games, has been set up to take games apart from a hacker perspective - a 'postmortem' by dissection via an unrelated party!

The first of these is for John Carmack and John Romero's PC shareware platformer Dangerous Dave 2, for which it's explained: "If you have never played dave2, you may think that this is yet another platformer in the favor of Command Keen; well, if you have played it, you know it’s closer to the Doom frenchise. Master Tom Hall designed this game for Softdisk’s Gamer’s Edge disk right after leaving Softdisk and founding id. With Adrian Carmack on the graphics, the game featured so much gore (for pixelated graphics, of course) that some of it had to be removed."

Thus, 'Gawd' explains how he took the game's files apart to extract all of the sprite data, even including the programs he used to do so, and concluding: "As I mentioned earlier, I am passionate about making a new Dave episode. There are actually 7 other Dangerous Dave games, but nobody speaks of them. I am talking about a game that is featuring Dave’s cold personality, with Metal Slug-like levels and Castlevania-like bosses, and of course Paul Robertson’s mighty Pirate Baby’s Cabana Battle Street Fighter 2006-like body count and blood-sprinklers." Woo, blood-sprinklers!

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Always nice to see mainstream media coverage of video game industry notables, esp. outside the U.S., and there's a nice Korea Herald profile of Phantagram's Sang-youn Lee just posted which does exactly that.

The surprisingly honest piece explains what happened to Phantagram after the first Kingdom Under Fire title came out - which was pretty messy: "Through venture capital and corporate investments, the company's management was taken over by CJ, one of the country's conglomerates. The takeover did not bear fruit; instead, the company was in disarray. Then, Kim Taek-jin, CEO of NCsoft, stepped in and bought the company, but Lee revealed of that deal: "I was so naive. Kim just wanted us to help make Lineage III. He offered very good compensations including stocks to me, but I felt I was cheated. So I gave up the NCsoft stocks worth tens of billions of won and left out."

It also reveals how Phantagram came back from the dead: "When Lee walked out of NCsoft in late 2003 and tried to rebuild Phantagram which was in tatters, he had a place to depend on - Blueside. When NCsoft took over the company, there were around 200 Phantagram employees, but many of Lee's core developers quit when the company was merged into NCsoft and formed a new company, Blueside... Now, Phantagram draws up a broad blueprint for game development and directs the entire process. Blueside takes care of actual development through former Phantagram engineers. Such efficient cooperative work system has helped develop [Xbox 360 title Ninety-Nine Nights] in a short period of time, Lee said." A very neat history of the man and the company.

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Those lovable chaps at the 'Seconds Out, Round One!' weblog Kotaku have spotted a Mystery Science Theater clip from the PlayStation Underground disc posted on YouTube - here's the direct YouTube link, for those who want to see 'related videos', etc.

Kotakblogger Brian Ashcraft notes: "Host Mike and 'bots Crow and Tom Servo snark on shoddy TV spots and shoddier graphics. My favorite exchange: 'Like Crash Bandicoot and Jet Mato.' 'It's Moto. Jet Mato is your laxative!" Also worth noting that this encoding emanated from the MST3K Digital Archive Project, who apparently rescue all kinds of extra shows nowadays (uhh, Let's Bowl?!)

Anyhow, MST3K is certainly a semi-obsession of ours, so go check out the Satellite News website, go buy some of the Rhino-packaged MST3K box sets (they were surprisingly cheap last time we checked!), and then kick back with this neat little obscurity, which also includes a bunch of 'behind the scene' footage from the show at the end of the clip.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Poking around some ill-reached corner of the Internet, we spotted, via RoushiMSX's LiveJournal, that new (&free!) graphic/text adventure Trilby's Notes has debuted, from the same folks at Fully Ramblomatic who've made a bunch of the top freeware adventure games of the past couple of years - and that's right, you read it correctly, 'graphics/text adventure'!

RoushiMSX's full post on the game explains: "Trilby's Notes is out! The game is a direct sequel to 5 Days a Stranger and an interquel between 5DaS and 7 Days a Skeptic, so make sure you brush up before you play it :) The parser interface is a nice throwback to the classic adventure games from Sierra and the writing is flat out fantastic. Thus far the graphics have been among the best Yahtzee has done yet, with some really nice looking backgrounds and pretty good animation."

The creator, the great Yahtzee himself, explains re: the text bit: "Don't hit me. I made it use a text parser for several reasons: (A) because the game is presented as Trilby's written account of the event, so typing commands feels like you're typing up the document or something, (B) as an homage to the AGI and SCI0 Sierra games of yesteryear, and (C) because I've never done a text parser game with AGS before. I had my testers try out the parser exhaustively so hopefully it's somewhat intuitive."

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Parallax Memories' is a regular weekly column by Matthew Williamson, profiling classic '16-bit' games from the Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, and other seminal '90s systems. This week's column profiles SEGA’s locked-on: Sonic & Knuckles.]

More Than Just Blast Processing

Last week was Sonic the Hedgehog’s 15th Birthday. You all knew that though, right? Well, I guess that makes it late for a party, but let’s have one anyways! The original Sonic the Hedgehog was released for the Genesis in June 1991; its star was to be the mascot for the new Sega, and he ascended to the status of pop icon. Since I’ve already talked about how one of the initial designs for Sonic ended up, and I assume that most of you already know the original game with passionate familiarity (if not the original will be released for the GBA later this year), I’m skipping ahead a bit.

In the winter of 1994, no longer a child, I was purchasing my own games, but money was pretty tight. I heavily debated which game would be worth the most for my money. I was bombarded with television advertisements for a game that promised to give me not only one game, but also allow you to attach other game cartridges which would expand their play as well: Sonic & Knuckles. Initially I was going to hold off for Christmas and hope to get it from a loving family member, but I caved in—I must be weak against advertising or have a soft spot for midgets.

Locked On

Back then, I was not as knowledgeable in games, so I didn’t know what went into the creation of Sonic & Knuckles. I just knew that I could play as that flying ... what was he? Oh yeah, an echidna. Initially, Sonic the Hedgehog 3 was to be twice as long as it was when released. To get a game out on schedule, the second half of Sonic 3 was cut out, and the first half was polished into a final product. The other half was then completed and also turned into a standalone game, Sonic & Knuckles, released with lock-on technology. The top of the Sonic & Knuckles cartridge would lift open and you could then “lock-on” the Sonic 3 cartridge on top to create the complete game.

When the two games were combined, and upon completion of Sonic 3, you move right into the levels on the Sonic & Knuckles cartridge. The rivals become friends and team up to stop the real enemy: Dr. Robotnik. As further evidence, the stage select shows inaccessible levels in Sonic 3 that were later included in S&K, and if you look at the sound test you can even listen to music from those levels. With the two games locked together, the vision is finally completed and many new things can be found, including mini-games, more bosses, side stories, more saves, additional music, changed icons, new forms, and more emeralds.

Blue Bonus

As I said, the lock-on technology promised more than just one game; you could now also play as Knuckles in Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (which was bundled in with many Genesis systems and is probably one of the most common games for the system). Unlike Sonic 3, however, Sonic 2 was not initially designed for use with the red spiky-haired mammal. This makes many parts more difficult, if not exceptionally frustrating. Still, the ability to completely explore every inch of a game that I thought I knew inside out made up for this.

Curious as I was, and even though it was not mentioned anywhere, I figured I would attempt to play Sonic the Hedgehog 1 using lock-on technology. It didn’t work, but I was treated to one of the mini-games from Sonic & Knuckles: the blue-sphere game. Sonic 1 will allow you to play though all 134,217,728 possible random combinations of the blue-sphere game if you have the mental capacity to do so. Experimenting with other games leads only to single blue-sphere levels.

The only negative thing about Sonic & Knuckles was that it was the first purchase of a Genesis game I made which had a cardboard box. Sonic and Knuckles gave me much more than any game had previously offered from a single purchase, and because of this, no Sonic game released since has been anywhere near as important to me. Hopefully Sonic Team can deliver sometime in the future, but so far they have been largely unsuccessful.

(EDITOR'S NOTE: As you might remember us recently reporting, Turner's GameTap service for PC just added officially licensed versions of Sega's Sonic The Hedgehog, Sonic 2, and Sonic 3 with the lock-on technology, if you want to see what MattW is talking about in this column without digging out your Genesis. UPDATE: Commenter JohnH points out: "Sonic Mega Collection has included games that account for all the "lock-on" configurations, including using Sonic 1 to play Blue Sphere, so that's probably the best way to experience them, since Mega Collection is the same price as two months of Gametap.' Good man!)

[Matthew Williamson is the creator of The Gamer’s Quarter, an independent videogame magazine focusing on first person writing. His work has been featured on MTV.com, 1up.com, Chatterbox Radio, and the Fatpixels Radio Podcast.]

Posted by Matthew Williamson at 8:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Once again, AtariAge comes up trumps, with a new post revealing that issue #6 of Atari Jaguar-related zine Jagwired is now available in PDF form.

The official Jagwired site explains: "Jagwire Magazine will be printed every 2 - 3 months and will cover the Atari Jaguar and Lynx gaming platforms. The magazine will have all the latest news, game tips and cheats, event coverage, reader feedback, new game and hardware coverage, interviews, and stories from fellow game collectors."

Looks like the download site for the PDF is a bit slow, but Jagwired itself is a fun 45-page zine trawl through Jaguar fandom, including some amazing custom-molded Jaguar cart casings - it's noted: "No two cartridges are the same as each one is hand made; the production rate is a massive 3 a day maximum! Each cart is then allowed to harden a further 3 days whilst on a former of its opposite half, to make sure the fit is perfect."

What's more: "Some games naturally lend themselves to a specific color scheme – Doom for example Orange and red, Iron Soldier Blue, Alien v Predator Purple, and Bubsy Yellow are just some that have been suggested. But in the end, the only limit is your imagination!" There are also some neat pics of a purple sparkly Jaguar cart case (hah!) - fanboy overload.

Posted by Simon Carless at 6:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We've previously discussed San Jose's ZeroOne art/interactive festival a couple of times, and now Alice at the Wonderland blog points out a Second Life-related art exhibit being shown as part of the event.

More specifically, the 'New West' themed exhibit will be shown at the San Jose Museum Of Art (we've been there, it's nice!) from August 7th to 13th. Here's the portentous-ish concept beyond the show: "The theme “New West” is highlights ISEA06’s location in San Jose, and both celebrates and critiques the western United States as a symbol of the pioneering spirit in design and technological innovation. Second Life, a player-created “metaverse,” or open-ended persistent online virtual world, is very much like a “new west,” with equal measures of innovation, resourcefulness, chaos, experimentation, lawlessness, and entrepreneurialism."

Like the New West, huh? So it's a bit like Deadwood, only with more girly goth raver costumes - oh, and the brothels have more furries and adult babies in them? Pshaw. Oh, which reminds us, we grabbed someone to write our Second Life column (the very Scottish-Canadian Mathew Kumar, who you may have seen writing for Eurogamer recently), so watch out for his missives from the 'New West' in the near future. And no, we're not going to stop using that bloody cornfield picture, either.

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, we thought it was time we resurrected the GameSetQ feature ("a daily question to be answered by GameSetWatch readers in the comments of this lovable weblog, and in some way related to the day's gaming issues"), because we were thinking about Xbox Live Arcade, and retro game remakes, and, well...

One of the things we like the best about XBLA for Xbox 360 are the retro remakes that you can pick up for $5 or so, from Smash TV to Gauntlet and beyond - the Wikipedia Xbox Live Arcade page has a full list of the upcoming ones, as announced at E3, though God knows when they're actually arriving. They include, from Midway, Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, Paperboy, Defender, Cyberball, Root Beer Tapper; and from Namco, Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Rally-X, Dig Dug, Galaga; from Sega, Sonic The Hedgehog; from Konami, Contra, Super Contra, Frogger, Time Pilot, Scramble, Track & Field. Phew, that's a lot! But.. it's not enough for us! The question is:

"If you could pick any arcade game to appear on Xbox Live Arcade for the $5 download price, what would it be? It needs to be an original (non-licensed) title, because otherwise everyone will pick Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara, and that's never going to happen."

Answers below - and if we get enough people voting for the same games, we can set up an online petition and then Microsoft are SURE to take notice, because all online petitions ever made are guaranteed to be successful! We know it!

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)

So, you guys like a little nerdcore hiphop, right? It's that geeky, often game-referencing melange of high pitched (generally white) voices and staccato (generally beepy and/or ironic) beats, and the Rhyme Torrents website has posted the freely distributable 4xCD Nerdcore Hip-Hop compilation album, including a bunch of those game-related tracks.

We actually asked Jason Gortician, who compiled the excellent compilation, to rank his favorite video game-referencing songs, and it went like this: "1. The Posse Track [.MP3 link]. It has several game-related verses, including Ham-STAR's Final Fantasy run-down, and ZeroBitRate's verse dedicated to his FPS skills and how he's going to win at GenCom. Plus it's 16 minutes long with 13 MCs, and I managed to work the VIC-20, Amiga 600 and BeOS into my verse. ; )"

Next up: "2. "The Last Fantasy" [.MP3] by Benjamin Bear. This is about his brother-in-law dissolving his marriage due to his wife's deep involvement with Final Fantasy XI. A true story, more or less, and equal parts 'street' and 'geek'. Clever, that."

Finally: "3. "Lo-Fi AllStars" by MechP. It seems the NES is the game system of choice for many nerdcore hip-hop heads. I suspect this is generational. MechP astounds by making a track that is old school in feel and spirit, by invoking misty-eyed nostalgia over this much-beloved system while at the same time giving the nod to hip-hop's origins."

Also, we love Jason, cos he compiled us links to the game-related material: "To save you the trouble, allowing you to cut right to the chase, here are what I think are most of the game-related tracks: Disc 1: White Warrior, Interlude
Zombie Panic, Legendary Rhymes, The Last Fantasy, RPG, Emulation Station... Disc 2: Kung-Fu Is My Mom, Penny Arcade, Lo-Fi All-Stars... Disc 3: Black Market OC Remix (the last verse, mainly. Boffo), Joystickin'... Disc 4: WoW, Arkanoid, Saving Throw, Nerdcore For Life." We here at GSW say - please to download and spread and tell all.

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So, one of 1UP's newest employees, Luke Smith, who handles news for them, has been causing all kinds of media havoc with his post on Square Enix's hilarious embargo attempts on the already Japanese-released Valkyrie Profile 2.

He was man enough to paste the entire email from the Squeenix crazies, which explained: "The following areas are embargoed until the corresponding dates: * 6.23.2006 - Dipan, Dipan Castle, Royal Underground Path, Kythena Plains, Coriander, Sedberg Mountain Runes, Turgen Mine, Vilnore; * 6.30.2006 - Ancient Forest, Audola Temple on the Lake, Kalstad, Surts Volcano Caverns", and so on.

Of course, you just know that the Japanese game media (where posting mag scans can get you convicted in court, last we heard!) would follow this type of thing slavishly, but Smith is right to comment of this particular request: "Information that exists in the public domain cannot, should not and most importantly won't be relegated to silence. Ultimately doing so flies in the face of the very people you and your company need (especially with VP2) to attract -- gamers."

Arguably even more interesting is another recent blog post by Agent Smith, this one discussing why: ""No Comment" is PR's attempt to brush of the pursuit of information -- which, more than rewriting press releases, should be the onus of responsibility for News Editors". He then goes on to explain how he played hardball with one particular Q&A in which "the developer had [only] answered three or four of the questions from a 20+ question list we sent over". It's pleasing to see a world where the journalists exercise a little control over the PR people, not vice versa, and where people care enough about news to make a stand. Let's keep it up, hip hip!

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

[Our Blazing Destiny is a new weekly comic by Jonathan "Persona" Kim about our society, cultural postdialectic theory, and video games. And monsters you pocket and then send out to die on the battlefield.]

Well, here's the latest piece of obtuseness from our regular Monday GameSetComic. This time, weekly cartoonist Persona explains: "This comic isn't about anything at all, really." And hey - it isn't!

[Jonathan "Persona" Kim is sometimes a character animation student at the California Institute of the Arts, other times a ninja illustrator, but in his heart, a true comic artist looking for his destiny in the sea of stars. His path on the torrid road of comics include a quarterly manga on The Gamer's Quarter and his website on the internet drawing hub Mechafetus.com. He'll also be attending Anime Expo this year at the Artist Alley selling a doujinshi about Haruhi Suzumiya and Phoenix Wright! Strange!]

Posted by persona at 2:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

The ever-indispensible AtariAge has updated, revealing that a set of new issues of vintage computer programming/game mag Compute! are online, thanks to AtariMagazines.com curator Kevin Savetz.

Not just scanned pages, apparently, "the full text of 21 additional issues of Compute! magazine have been put online. This includes the magazine's first issue (Fall 1979), several issues from the period 1981 through 1983, and then others from 1989 through 1990. Compute! was published from 1979 through September 1994, covering every major computer platform (including Atari computers) until it became a PC-only publication in May 1988. Thus far, the full text of 44 issues of Compute! is available at AtariMagazines.com."

Even better, I did a follow-up email to check with Kevin, since he says on his site that he "has received permission from the magazines' publishers to make the material available on the Internet for free", and it certainly seems like he really asked the rights-holders and they said yes (he's a little vague about this so that they don't get lots of people bothering them) - so it's great to see authorized online resources like this.

[Heck, anything that has Player-Missile Graphics with the ATARI Personal Computer System by Chris Crawford, reprinted from the January 1981 issue, is good with us! Also great: Are Computers A Home Appliance? by Fred D'lanazio, from 1984. Go poke around some!]

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Over at former Shiny co-founder David Perry's site, he's posted a fun Q&A with Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon about getting into the video game industry.

Boon has advice on talking to your mother (yes, _your_ mother!) on why games is a good career: "I would probably try to educate her on the fact that the videogame business is an industry that is bigger than the movie business. I'm guessing that your mother still thinks that videogames are kids-stuff and doesn't take a career in games too serious. I'd probably draw some comparisons in terms of revenue generated by big game titles (GTA) that made more money than most movies ever did."

He also discusses his first ever interview: "I clearly remember my first interview at Williams Electronics in 1986. A guy named Bill Pfutzenreuter was asking me what games I liked playing and I said "Defender, Robotron, Missile Command, Joust". His response was "oh yea, I programmed Joust. I really though he was joking and said "get outta here" and he said "no, really, I did." I was floored as that was the first time I was talking to someone who had made such an impact on what I wanted to do for a living. I still have a hard time with the idea of someone thinking of me in that way." Fatality-ality-ality!

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (11)

A while ago, we were pretty obsessed with gorgeously physics-enhanced PC Breakout variant BreakQuest, so it's great to see that Fun-Motion has put up an interview with BreakQuest creator Fèlix Casablancas.

He explains of the concept behind the title: "I always liked breakout games, but I wanted one were you could feel in control so I thought about it and got the idea that a physics engine plus ‘advanced’ geometry (spline like bumper) would do it. There are too many breakout games out there so without this innovation I wouldn’t have done another one."

Again, there's some interesting comments regarding Felix's next game, which also reveals that BreakQuest was perhaps just a little hardcore for casual game portals: "You’re right, the next game is a color-matching game, but the matching rules and the board are different than anything you’ve seen (at least I haven’t seen anything like that), think portals will like this one better than BreakQuest. After this one is made I think I’ll get back to arcade games, probably with physics. About a BreakQuest sequel, maybe in the long term but don’t really know."

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[’Free Play’ is a new, regular weekly column by Ancil Anthropy about freely downloadable video games, and the people who make them. This week’s column profiles excellent Japanese 'doujin' PC Flash game website babarageo.]

The first thing you see when you visit babarageo is a game—a tiny shooting game, just fifty pixels tall. Move the ship with your mouse, dodge bullets, left click to fire, shoot enemies. At 1000 points the image below the game will change to something different. Maybe it’ll look like a screen from Dig Dug. Maybe if you click the cherries, your tiny ship will get a new weapon.

This game serves as the banner of doujin developer babara’s website. In a small way it’s every game on the site: simple gameplay, charming pixels, and nods to older games that reward the player who picks up on them. And it’s in Flash, seamlessly integrated into babara’s frontpage.

Kill ghosts, challenge skeletons

babara’s influences are reflected in the population of babarageo - tiny tributes to Dragon Quest, Wizardry, Game & Watch-style LCD games. My friend Tim W. pointed out Great Kung Fu G on his blog—less a remake than a reinvention of Irem’s Jackie Chan title Kung Fu Master. In babara’s Flash version, enemies march toward the player to be swatted away by left-click combos, and dragon-headed bosses announce themselves with haughty laughter before striding onto the screen.

A less scoring-oriented title is Xenoraider, a kind of abridged Legend of Zelda. Xeno fights monsters, rescues fairies, and fetches items for bearded elders in a quest for a lost princess. Our hero swings a huge sword, but enemies do no damage—an acknowledgement that in contemporary Zelda games battles exist more to pace the game than challenge the player. Xenoraider’s solution is elusive.

Thousands of battleships

Other games take advantage of the fact that they’re on the internet — Dezao stars a tiny figure in a red cap who runs and jumps, collects coins and avoids enemies. The coins, enemies and pits are all positioned by visitors to the site: the game includes an editor which allows anyone to design a stage and add it to the game. There isn’t much room for fancy design in an auto-scrolling game with three lanes and only three objects, though. But Dezao wasn’t babara’s last experiment with user-created content.

Boschvos is a manic shooter to which anyone can contribute an enemy space fortress, bristling with lasers and cannons to fire at the player. The game currently boasts a fleet of over 350,000 user-made warships. Poking through them (the database seems glitchy—you may have to hold RIGHT until you reach playable stages) reveals gunboats shaped like boats and moons and Doraemon. I found a laser-armed fish that made me think of Darius. Other battleships are composed of a single weaponless tile, floating in space. And others are rigged to explode at a single shot.

The surprising part is that they’re all very playable. I don’t think I’ve encountered a design that seemed impossible to beat. And of course you can browse and skip through the entire fleet with the arrow keys. There are incentives for destroying enemy ships, though-though the ship you start with can’t pick up power-ups, victories unlock additional ships that can, each equipped with a different weapon.

Finally, be sure to check out...

...Robodome, a game of hefty robot combat that’s mostly about manuevering your stodgy bot to get a shot at your opponent.

[Ancil Anthropy is a game developer and space invader. She fills dessgeega.com with lots of good stuff and writes for a bunch of places, including The Gamer’s Quarter and The Independent Gaming Source.]

Posted by dessgeega at 2:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

The relatively unknown to us deadOtaku blog, devoted to "covering esoteric extremities of Japanese popular culture", recently added an excellent multipage overview of the Bandai Wonderswan handheld, and we dig it.

As the intro explains: "In a time when few dared to challenge Nintendo's Pokemon-fueled dominance of the handheld console market, Bandai released a challenger to Nintendo's throne: Wonderswan. It was affordable, had a wide range of titles and supported by Bandai's own extensive anime-licenses and looked like it might have a chance competing against the Nintendo Game Boy despite it being a difficult uphill battle."

But it's the succinct software profiles that are particularly good, such as the ever-droolworthy Judgement Silversword ("Inspired by the classic shooter Radiant Silvergun, Judgement SIlversword was the last game to be released on the Wonderswan. Originally developed as an amateur game using the Wonderswan development WonderWitch, Judgement Silversword was later released as an professional game... [it] is perhaps the most rare and sought after game on the Wonderswan, still fetching prices of over $100 on eBay.") [Via Wonderswan.co.uk]

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Intrepid Wired News columnist Chris Kohler has marauded his way across to Tokyo, where he's blogging furiously and visually on game-related matters, and there's already some fun stuff up there - for one, a tip on the 'Best Video Game Store In Japan', apparently Mandarake Galaxy.

Kohler notes: "Besides being great for finding extremely rare games at very reasonable prices -- this is where I got a 64DD and all the launch games for about $250; note that I said "reasonable", not "cheap" -- Mandarake Galaxy also had some of the lowest prices and best availability of more recent games." Also revealed: "The soundtrack recording to Super Mario Bros., on a 45. Very few things make me as holy-cow as this did." Woot!

Also fun - an Xbox 360-related blog post in which it's noted of the general lack of enthusiasm for the hardware in Japan: "What this store did to advertise the fact that they had an Xbox 360 in stock was to take the original faded-ass display box for the Xbox and slap a label on it saying that they had Xbox 360s in the back." Youch.

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over at We Make Money Not Art, they have a really fun post documenting an experimental music artgame named Rehearsal Joypads, and based around Bemani-style music game concepts.

The post explains: "In Rehearsal Joypads, the usual controller interface of video game controllers has been replaced by that of a musical instrument. Intended as a product to help learn a specific skill needed to play a real instrument, they have been designed as motivational aids for beginner musicians facing the problems associated with not practicing enough."

It continues: "Rules of the accompanying video game: play your part correctly (as dictated by the coloured lines scrolling past), and the brass band stays in time and together; play it wrong and they drop their instruments, walking off in disgust. By playing the game repeatedly, the fledgling musician could get the fundamental patterns for scales, arpeggios and so on 'into the fingers' before playing the same thing on their real instrument." Neat, but obviously Guitar Hero-esque, too - looks like Trombone Hero is already up and running, then!

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Actually, we think this has been out for a little bit, but thanks to The2Bears, we just spotted it - a multi-game homebrew DS title called 'No Place To Hide', which has even been updated to use local WiFi despite being entirely fan-coded - impressive!

The official 'About Page', which subtitles the game '10 mini-games for scorers', explains somewhat non-English-ly of the title: "Avoid all objects/characters to do the best time!
In the 5th game, you will touch the "ship" for avoid asteroids! In the 6th game, you will move jesus for avoid arrows.In the last level, you should use keys to move the boat and avoid helicopters :p"

Wait, Jesus _and_ helicopters in the same game? We're sold! And as The2Bears notes, the game "...is a great little package of 10 mini games for the Nintendo DS. It even has a shmup-like dodging game. With wifi working as well it shows the continuing improvement of the DS Homebrew scene."

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's been a tiny bit late being announced, but it's delightful to see that QuakeCon 2006 has finally been announced, after "some unexpected issues locking in the dates and location".

But, it's revealed: "Don’t worry, we’re still bringing you another kick-ass QuakeCon event, and it’s already right around the corner - August 3 – 6 in Dallas, TX at the Hilton Anatole Hotel in their Trinity Exhibition Center... With about 1,800 BYOC spots, QuakeCon 2006 will be a bit more exclusive than it has been the last couple of years, but we hope people will enjoy the more personal touch this year." Highlights include: "...high-stakes tournaments, workshops, exhibitors, the BYOC Area, parties, and the public’s first chance to play Enemy Territory: Quake Wars."

We also noted (linked from the comments) an interview with QuakeCon tournament director Nate, who reveals of the 'fun' _not_ to be had at QuakeCon, in terms of the least fun (volunteer!) positions: "SECURITY! The security crew, BY FAR, has the most thankless job at the event. They spend hours upon hours on their feet, checking bags, protecting areas, and keeping us all safe. Do they get thanked? Nope - they get yelled at by drunks at the door." And inebriated FPS players are far worse than soused MMO geeks!

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Continuing on from the discussion on Chuck Klosterman's game criticism article, there's actually a good, detailed piece by veteran journalist John Scalzi, discussing the ever-complex issue of games, criticism, and game criticism.

Lots of good points here, but here's just one: "The current generation of video game reviewers are primarily reviewers, not critics. Which is to say that the reviews are aimed at telling readers whether a game's play is worth shelling out $50 for, and not about the cultural and aesthetic context of the game and why it is significant in that regard."

However, he continues: "This is not a problem. Reviewing tends to be thought of as the idiot cousin of criticism, but as someone who has done both, I reject this interpretation, because it's jackass stupid. Reviewing a game with an eye toward its playability, the enjoyment it gives to the consumer, and its simple overall fun factor is entirely valid." Yes! Smart!

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Back to the wry world of importers NCSX, and the most interesting game listed in one of this week's main updates is Nou ni Kaikan: Aha Taiken for PSP from Sega, an obviously Brain Age-inspired piece of 'spot the difference' fun.

It's explained: "Sega teamed up with Kenichiro Mogi from the Sony Computer Science Research Lab to create a brain game which focuses on photographs and the differences in them. Professor Mogi is a specialist in brain science who's research centers on the relationship between the physical brain and the perception of the mind. For example, one may be prompted to stare at a photograph and then another photograph that's nearly identical to the first one. Point out the very subtle difference in the second photograph and prove that your brain power generates enough electricity to power a hamster wheel."

In fact, there's a whole heap of Where's Waldo type challenges hanging out in the UMD: "The software includes over a 100 exercises and over 4000 crisp photos which feature disparate themes and locations for a wide variety of subject matter to test perception." Wonder if Sega will bring this one to the States? We're guessing yes.

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Randomly stumbling around the Web, we found a fun scan of a Sega Dreamcast brochure over at X-Cult, which looks like it dates from around 2000, and includes a number of unreleased Dreamcast titles left over at the end of the console's lifetime.

Particularly notable are three titles from Ripcord Games, which was, surprisingly, the entertainment software label of Panasonic Interactive Media (and publisher of Postal, even!) until a management buyout in 1999, but ended up going belly-up without publishing any of its Dreamcast titles.

These titles (here's a press release from the time) included Legend/Quest Of The Blade Masters, Spec Ops MOUT, and Gorkamorka, which was a racing title based on the Warhammer 40,000 boardgaming title - but none of them actually made it out. Oddly enough, Gorkamorka was based on the Jeff Gordon Racing game engine, though - weird - I remember a co-worker getting a PC Beta version of it because he was an insane Warhammer fan, and it was... alright.

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

['Game Mag Weaseling' is a weekly column by Kevin Gifford which documents the history of video game magazines, from their birth in the early '80s to the current day.]

PSE, aka PSE2 aka PlayStation Extreme aka PSExtreme aka Dimension PS-X, was in constant publication for over a decade and yet nobody's ever heard of it. When I worked at Ziff Davis Media, it regularly came in the mail and became the butt of neverending jokes -- it was tabloid-shaped, it was incredibly thin, it was written and designed as if the editors of GameFan grew up and got lazy and disillusioned. I was quizzical on how the magazine could possibly be profitable, but was assured it had something to do with its parent, Dimension Publishing, producing strategy guides and somehow getting PSE thrown on the EB Games magazine racks as part of Brady Games' distribution. Or something.

I thought the magazine had petered out sometime early last year once they lost the tabloid format. Imagine my surprise, then, when I was poking around the bookshelves at ADV Films (site of my day job) and found issues as recent as May 2006. Apparently we had a complimentary subscription, and apparently PSE was still putting out issue after 40-page issue, complete with real ads from real game companies. But who could possibly have been reading? The magazine had no website (it was last updated in 2004 before disappearing), it had no advertising at all -- heck, issues beyond summer 2005 don't even seem to include any method of subscribing to the magazine.

Russ Perry, an Illinois collector and the only person I know with a better magazine collection than mine, lists the most recent edition in his possession as December 2005, and I know there's no way he would have missed the 2006 issues unless he was actually unable to resubscribe. This suggests to me that most of the very last issues were sent almost exclusively to PSE's "comp list" of game developers, publishers, and potential advertisers, such as ADV Films. It also suggests that they lasted until May 2006 mainly so they could fulfill outstanding subscriptions -- i.e., their subscriber base was so pathetically miniscule that no other magazine was interested in buying it out. Just a theory, though.

   

The first incarnation of PSE was Dimension PS-X, which launched with the November 1995 issue and became the first monthly magazine in the States exclusively devoted to the PlayStation. It changed its name to PSExtreme in Issue 4 after Sendai, publishers of rival magazine P.S.X. (which was first on the stands with a one-off in late summer 1995), complained about the similar title. Greg Off, a member of GameFan's charter staff, was the editor-in-chief.

The original Dimension PS-X was an extremely hardcore-oriented mag that owed much of its look to the GameFan of the time. It even recruited ex-GameFan alum Kei Kuboki to head its import section, titled "Impact" and taking up a good quarter of the mag at times. Kei left pretty quickly, but the renamed PSExtreme continued along similar lines and had its pinnacle from 1997 to 1998, when every issue was over 100 pages and the mag easily outclassed Ziff Davis Media's P.S.X. The tables began to turn with the launch of Future's PSM and Ziff's Official PlayStation Magazine in 1997 -- PSExtreme's low-budget GameFan design was beginning to look hokey and outdated, and its rivals' more refined look held more appeal with the mass audience that began to buy PlayStation consoles in droves. Dimension kept going, however, helped by a deal with Prima that had them producing dozens of strategy guides for the publisher. (They also published Nintendo 64 mag Q64 for several issues.)

PSExtreme relaunched in October 2000 as PSE2: The Player's Guide To The World Of Playstation, a massive-looking mag with a cheap $3.99 cover price and a page dimension set similar to Rolling Stone's. Things didn't really change in the editorial department, however, and the expanded page width mainly resulted in enormous blocks of wombly wibbling text occupying the center of every page. Things continued in this fashion until January 2005, when PSE2's page size was reduced to more normal dimensions. It was at this point when I thought they folded (especially after editor Zach Meston left to join Atlus and Greg Off and Tim Lindquist went to head up Hardcore Gamer magazine), but I was wrong -- they relaunched again in April 2005 by redesigning the logo and dropping the "2" from their name.

   

May 2006, displayed above, is the final issue. Editor-in-chief Mark Androvich told me in an email that the June/July issue was completed and ready for printing when the plug was pulled. (At least one ex-staffer is currently suing for back pay.)

Its mere existence is truly strange. Almost nobody I know was aware that PSE2 existed by the time it became PSE. It was off all known magazine shelves, although it apparently got more distribution in corner groceries and other such non-traditional areas. As mentioned, it had no website nor any name recognition amongst gamers. So why did it last another 13 issues? Was it just so editor-in-chief Androvich would have something to do when not busy with his party rental service? Who was paying the printing bills?

Regardless, PSE, whose circulation must have been in the very low thousands toward the end, has become the toughest mainstream game mag to assemble a complete collection of. Why? Well, very few people bought it after 1999 or so, and arguably for good reason, as its approach to coverage by 2006 wasn't very well suited for the gaming audience or for the print medium it used. (That, and it had a lot of flubs -- the May issue's review of Ice Age 2 is illustrated with screenshots from Sonic Riders.)

[Kevin Gifford breeds ferrets and runs Magweasel, a site for collectors and fans of old video-game and computer magazines. He owns enough magazines to smother himself with should the need arise, and his secret fantasy is for someone flush with game-publisher stock options to give him a monthly stipend so he can spend a year researching their full history and finishing the site. In his "off" time he is an editor at Newtype USA magazine.]

Posted by Kevin Gifford at 5:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We realize that, especially if you're busy and frivolous and don't care so much for some of the straight business news we run on big sister site Gamasutra, you may not have spotted every interesting feature we ran this week. Thus, we'll round up the neat stuff regularly, starting... now!

- A recent interview with Chris Crawford had the veteran game designer ranting and raving about the state of video games, so we asked our audience of game professionals what they thought - and the responses, including comments from employees of Obsidian, Harmonix, Crystal Dynamics and more, were pretty darn interesting.

- Published in edited form in the June/July issue of Game Developer, Gamasutra managed to get the full, extended 8,000 word (!) postmortem for Quantic Dream's pretty darn interesting console title Indigo Prophecy/Fahrenheit, as described by creator David Cage. So go check it out now.

- We're still running reports from the recent Sex In Games Conference, and the latest is a look at how adult games get distributed. Peter Payne from J-List is esp. fun rounding up the kinds of Japanese adult titles: "Payne explained how he has expanded his catalogue to cover: fetish titles like Let’s Meow Meow! (furry / cat-girl game), transformation games (no, not robots, but titles like the X-Change series where boys are mysteriously changed into females and have to complete tasks such as sexual conquests in order to transform back to a male and retain the hand of their girlfriend), Yaoi (boy-on-boy games – which are particularly popular with females) and general bishoujo (pretty girl) / romance games."

There's also plenty of other stuff, for example - a chat with Square's Kosei Ito about mobile Final Fantasy titles, an interview with Capcom Mobile, mentioning a Western-developed Phoenix Wright for cellphones, and bunch of interesting columns, including commentary from Steve Palley and Jim Rossignol. Go poke 'em, now!

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over at Videoludica, they've added a game profile for a pretty darn interesting hybrid serious game, explaining: "Outbreak is a new game project, a part of the Serious Games initiative, that hopes to bring critical, real-world issues into a high-quality, fun game on the commercial game market. It is being designed by Angel Inokon, a Masters Student within the Learning Design and Technology program at the Stanford School of Education, and Jeff Bowman, a first-year student at the University of California, Berkeley, pursuing a B.A. in Computer Science."

Matteo Bitanti has constructed a page quoting from the official game website, and explaining: "In the next 5-10 years the H5N1 virus (Avian Flu) will mutate and threaten millions of lives across the globe. Ironically, the first lives claimed to the virus will be the young and the healthy. American young adults, especially, must be mentally prepared to survive for up to 18 months hunkered down in quarantine in hopes of escaping a virus that kills 50% of its victims. Employing the right strategies today, could mean survival tomorrow."

Thus: "Outbreak is a computer game in development that puts you in charge of responding to the virus at every level. Every family, every city, and every nation will rely on your decisions." There's plenty more info on the official Outbreak site - particularly good is a video PowerPoint presentation explaining the concepts behind the thought-provoking title.

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The totally great Life Meter Comics has added a new entry to its LJ blog, and it's pure serendipidity - an amazing Mario character montage by artist Dan Schoening.

Dan writes: "Basically the piece was inspired by my artist friend Tim Kelly. He suggested I do a line up of Mario characters. Instead, I decided to make it more pin up like, and throw in as many characters that I enjoyed from the Mario series into it. The art itself was also a test in a new more fluid style, as I normally have a more angular feel to my work."

[Oh, and before we forget, Life Meter has a mini comic currently in production, and as they mention: "Guys, this mini has 90% NEW MATERIAL NOT CURRENTLY ON THE SITE. There's some Life Meter favorites (like Bannister right on the cover, there) and lots of new faces (like Natasha Allegri on the back)." Looks like you can pick it up at Comic Con and other small-press events in the U.S. this year.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 6:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So, you may or may not have spotted that LA developer Legacy Interactive has launched a new casual games site, "...including the most popular games from all the major developers and publishers. In addition, Legacy is selling its own downloadable games, including the inaugural episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent, as well as the perennial family favorites, Zoo Vet and The Apprentice."

[This is probably a good point to mention that Legacy once made us print a correction in Game Developer magazine, which was fair in that the columnist writing the story for us called the ER game in question by its pre-production name - but hilariously _something_ in that we had to put that the game's real name was not just ER, but ER: The Game Based On The Hit TV Series. Well, we're GameSetWatch: The Blog Based On The Hit RSS Feed, so there.]

Anyhow, after this lengthy digression, we note that Legacy has set up a casual games blog called 'Games For Grownups', which has a couple of posts notable for being written by real casual game aficianados. We particularly like the one called 'Mahjong As Metaphor', and written by 'Princess Fly', who 'works third shift at the Harley Davidson Vehicle Operations Plant in Pennsylvania as an inspector'.

She (and we're presuming there's no JT LeRoy-ing going on here) comments of playing casual Mahjong PC games: "I love clearing the screen. It makes me feel the same way I do when my list has check marks next to every item. Another way I can relate to this game is peeling back the many layers of my person. I feel the older I get the more I learn about my inner self. Each set of tiles that leaves the screen is another mystery solved or another task completed." Y'know, this is kinda cool.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Back to the semi-crazed 3DO Interactive Multiplayer blog, where the latest game to receive attention is the 3DO version of 'all-time classic' 3D CD-ROM adventure Myst, and boy - attention it receives!

Let's try this on for size: "Good grief - this game is boring. Dull. Dull to be fair is something of understatement. Myst is equivalent to a thousand years spent watching paint fester and peel from a wall. You see, to watch paint dry, perhaps, would instill a sense of anticipation, of hope, of interest, something Myst fails to achieve on an epic scale. God spent two billion years watching the Earth cool-down before he started making worms and cardboard and stuff - which must have been two billion years well spent compared to playing Myst for 5 minutes."

The conclusion on Myst, which some 'gamers of a certain age' seem to adore, is that it pales in comparison to other poor 3DO game: "In summary - If you want to be bored, listless, aimless and wander about picking up pointless items and wishing your time away - I suggest you go to place of employment. There is no action. No guns. No aliens. No half naked women. No C-Class actors. No monsters. No animation. No jelly fish. No nothing. And the graphics have dated badly."

So, what do you guys think? Did Myst actually have a certain mythos, charm, and certitude that made it alluring, or was it always just a gimmicky use of CD-ROM technology that led into dark, random puzzle-based dulling dead ends? Answers on a postcard (or in the comments), please!

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

We already reported on GameTap's newest updates, including a bunch of content for Sonic's 15th anniversary celebration, huzzah! But now they've put out a press release with more info, revealing, crazily enough, that they're debuting a bunch of games for the Sega SG-1000, the largely Japan-only cart system that debuted in 1983.

GameTap particularly references this because Sonic creator Yuji Naka's first game, Girl's Garden, is included as part of the first set of SG-1000 games, but here's the full list, taken from the overall GameTap game list, just for your edification: Borderline, Flipper, Girl's Garden, N-Sub, Pacar, Safari Hunting, Star Jacker.

The release also clarifies our previous confusion over Lock-On and Sonic 1, commenting: "Sonic’s birthday wouldn’t be complete without three new lock-on SEGA Genesis titles: “Sonic The Hedgehog and Knuckles,” “Knuckles the Echidna in Sonic the Hedgehog 2”, and “Sonic 3 - Sonic The Hedgehog & Knuckles."" [EDIT: We just checked, and there _is_ a Sonic 1 and Knuckles 'Blue Sphere' mini-game combination available on GameTap, sorry for previous confusion. Obviously, the other two combos just allow you to play Sonic 2 and Sonic 3 with Knuckles and the extra enhancements.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I was discussing the phenomenon of very specific, incredibly well-researched game information projects with FrankC the other day (MobyGames is obviously the best multi-platform solution, but many other projects drill down into specialized areas), and brought up the 'Hall Of Light' Amiga game database, which you may not be aware of, but is... well, crazily detailed.

If you check out the top 99 most-viewed games of recent, you'll get an idea of the kind of insane database/scan info available for all Commodore Amiga titles - for example, Shadow Of The Beast II, that classic Psygnosis parallax side-scroller, has everything from hi-res box scans to in-game maps and beyond, and all spectacularly cross-referenced - here's Psygnosis' publisher page, for example.

So, whether you want to know about Speedball 2 (mm, Bitmap Brothers!), or even The Great Giana Sister (mm, completely banned classic Mario ripoff!), there's something for all Amiga fans at HOL - and I find myself wishing that they'd bring their insane detailing to bear on other platforms, too - though sites like Lemon for Commodore 64 do a pretty kickass job for their particular computers.

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Remember when we gave away some way cool Death Jr. swag? Yeah. Those were good times. I think of them often. And then remember how later on we gave out a brand new VGPocket 50, the only portable game system to ever let you play such mind-blowing classics as Mr. Onion and Pop the Lop anywhere you want to?

I bet you were compelled to say "man, that GameSetWatch got the GOODS." And you would be right, we did got the goods. But it was only one goods, and everyone knows that more goods is more good. So this time we got more. Ten of them, in fact. But it wasn't easy.

We sent our special operative monkey (or is it ape? we often mix up the two) Ai Ai on a top secret solo sneaking mission to locate and acquire ten copies of Metal Gear Saga: Volume 1, the way awesome documentary DVD that Konami released as a preorder bonus for Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence [And, of course, many thanks to Konami for providing them to us - buy their games! Now!]. The DVD is fun to watch, but more importantly, it goes for about $20 on eBay, and I need to eat.

Our orangutan operative easily located the secret underground base of one Jeremiah C. Penguin, a bloated hoarder of rare videogame merchandise, who had acquired so many copies of Metal Gear Saga: Volume 1 that he built a moderate cabin out of them. Always one for the direct approach, Ai Ai knocked on his door.

Jeremiah is never happy to entertain visitors.

But I am not here to be entertained, thought Ai Ai.

Drunk with power, Ai Ai hopped on top of Jeremiah's roof, and started preaching a sermon for some strange chimpanzee religion, for which he was both the sole proprietor and member. Jeremiah was furious!

"Hey, get down from my roof, you crazy hominoidea!" said Jeremiah, shaking his greasy fin at the air. And that's just what Ai Ai did.

But Ai Ai only knows how to do things violently, and soon Jeremiah's rare and valuable collection came crashing down on him. All in a day's work, thought Ai Ai, stereotypically, before securing all ten copies of Metal Gear Saga: Volume 1 and bringing them back to GameSetWatch HQ.

Turns out we're not legally allowed to sell these things so, hey, you guys want them? Would YOU like to own a brand new, slightly bloodstained copy of Metal Gear Saga: Volume 1 on DVD? Of course you would! Here's how. Simply answer the following bit of videogame trivia:

In Konami's original Metal Gear Solid, what CODEC frequency is used to contact Meryl Silverburgh? (hint: back of the case!)

Please send your answers to editors@gamesetwatch.com any time before Friday, June 30th at 12 noon PST. There will be ten winners randomly picked from the correct answers, the judges' decision is final, so don't give me no guff. You wouldn't want Secret Agent Ai Ai knocking on your door, now would you?

Posted by Frank Cifaldi at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, you may have seen the news, as reprinted on sister site Gamasutra, that Sega's lovable mascot Sonic The Hedgehog has turned 15, and has incidentally "sold more than 44 million units worldwide" in the process.

But in the initial story, we described Sonic as an 'azure rodent speedster', and Josiah Colborn wrote in to rage: "...in the recent Gamasutra news story by Jason Dobson about Sonic the Hedgehog's 15th anniversary, Sonic is referred to as a famous "rodent". Rodents are characterized by their large, flat incisors, built for gnawing. Hedgehogs do not have those."

He continues: "In addition, all rodents belong to the Order "Rodentia". Hedgehogs belong to the order "Insectivora", along with shrews and moles (which are also not rodents). This is a forgivable mistake, as even www.dictionary.com lists them as rodents, with Princeton apparently backing them up." But... our journalistic reputation is ruined!

And then Josiah rages on: "People frequently refer to Diddy Kong as a chimpanzee. For the record, chimpanzees are apes, not monkeys, which do not have tails. Diddy Kong does have a tail, yet the misinformation perpetuates! I know, I'm ridiculous, but don't be surprised when I'm equally infuriated that the Geico mascot is referred to as an "Amphibian", when he is clearly a reptile." You tell 'em!

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Posted by at 8:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

The nice guys at Chronic Logic sent us an email to announce a free competition version of Bridge Builder, their fun PC physics-based construction game, and a new competition in association with ATI - and the full details follow below!

"Chronic Logic has released a FREE contest version of their award winning Bridge Construction Set (BCS) video game.  This special contest release allows new users to experience some of the excitement that comes with owning Bridge Construction Set.  It also gives both current owners as well as those looking to try out Bridge Construction Set the opportunity to win some great prizes.  The contest is hosted by bridgebuilder-game.com, an excellent fan site with a very active community.  To participate in the bridge building contest and get in on the prizes, just download one of the free contest versions of the Bridge Construction Set and read the contest rules. Chronic Logic has made the free contest versions available for Windows, OSX, and Linux to make sure that all users can participate.  All valid entries will have a chance to win a free Chronic Logic Game, and the cheapest bridge in each category will win themselves a brand new ATI card.

If you already own Bridge Construction Set you can just grab the contest level, and begin your building.  The full version of BCS can be purchased for $19.95 directly from Chronic Logic. The contest ends at 10 p.m. GMT on Sunday, July 9th, at which time all entries will be tested and the results will be announce within the next few days." Neat!

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The always wonderful Wonderland blog (which was mentioned in Entertainment Weekly recently, congrats Alice!) has managed to spot a fun story about a UK soccer fan applying for a soccer management job, and citing his experience playing the Football Manager video game as his main qualification.

According to the application letter: "My Football Manager 2005 experience has included league, Cup and European experience and has allowed me to become an expert in work permits, scouting, tactics, and man management." And really, it is a good question - since poker players go from playing online poker to winning the World Series of Poker, why can't armchair coaches do the same?

Even better, in this case, the Chairman of the real-life soccer club in question, Middlesbrough, replied, commenting: "Quite frankly we were of the opinion that your tenure with us would have been short lived, as your undoubted talent would result in one of the big European clubs seeking your services." That showed him!

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Trusty RPG site RPGamer has lots of information on new Namco Bandai RPG Trusty Bell: Chopin's Dream for Xbox 360, which, wait for it, "takes place in a dream world dreamt by no other than the famous composer Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849) himself, three hours before his early death in a hospital."

Apparently, and this is all pretty damn surreal: "In this dream, Chopin meets a young girl named Polka and a 16-year-old boy Allegretto. Polka, whose death is drawing near, lives with her mother in a village called Tenuto... Considering the identity of the key character, it comes as no surprise that music has a special emphasis in the game. In the Japanese version, famous actor Leo Morimoto will provide narration, and Russian pianist Stanislav Bunin will perform Chopin's original piano scores." Wow, 50 Cent, eat your heart out.

Also noted by the site, which seems to have images from the game also archived, tut tut: "The overall musical composition will be the work of Motoi Sakuraba, who is well-known for his production for the Tales series... The game is under development at tri-Crescendo, the same studio that has contributed to such titles as Radiata Stories, Star Ocean and Valkyrie Profile." Fortunately, being for the Xbox 360 in Japan, commercial considerations do not apply (guffaw!)

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Well, we hate to ignore a good catfight, so here it is - Kotaku and IGN, smashing and burning like a prissy Frankenstein on a screaming acid bender. OK, so we have to explain the history for this? Nah, we'll let Kotaku do it.

Joel Johnson says: "IGN's Nintendo correspondent Matt Casamassina claimed on his official blog that he was moving on to cover 360 and PS3 games—a shocking revelation from a man who has made a career in the enthusiast press by wholeheartedly devoting his coverage to a single company. Then, in a half-assed retcon, Casamassina claimed to have left his computer on while on vacation, obliquely placing the blame for the announcement on the Algonquin Roundtable of IGN's own group-home editorial staff."

But now, IGN's Tal Blevins claims that Kotaku are the idiots here, clarifying in the comments: "I wasn't busting on the original story at all. I just find it ironic that, after finding out it was false, the author of the original story posted another "news" piece where he (a) called Matt an "ass," (b) insulted the publication he worked for, then (c) called into question the credibility of the publication when the information was taken from a blog post and not the site itself." Um... yeah!

You know what, both of you guys? You're stinking the whole place up here. In fact, someone sent the thread around the entire office as an example of how the rowdier elements of game journalism continue to make everyone else look a tad unprofessional. Still, in a world where game developers aren't glamorous, don't sleep with kiss-and-tell tabloid hussies, and don't often crash their Ferraris on the PCH, this is about as much US Weekly-style excitement as we get round here. We bet four quatloos on the huffy alt.weblog!

[UPDATE: Kyle over at Video Game Media Watch has a detailed post on what we are now hilariously calling KotakIGN-Gate, including a number of comments from Kotaku and even Joystiq editors, existing together in some kind of delicate pre-apocalyptic stasis.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 6:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (12)

The excellent physics-based game Armadillo Run has been covered a couple of times here and on sister site Gamasutra - firstly, an initial mention, and then we had a postmortem of the game on Gamasutra - and now, Fun-Motion has an interview with Armadillo Run's Peter Stock.

Stock explains of the game's inspiration: "I thought that I could create something unique by taking the concept of construction (Bridge Builder was essentially the simulation of a static structure) and adding some dynamics (which was what made Stair Dismount so great). During my university course, a student implemented a physics simulation of a ‘marble run’ for their third year project, which I also drew some inspiration from."

He then reveals what he's thinking about next: "Having said that, I do have a couple of ideas for my next project - one is another physics game based around liquid, the other’s a music-based (Bemani-style) game with elements of traditional platform gameplay. These ideas might change - the early part of development is more about exploring and refining ideas than actually making a game for me. I’m looking forward to trying out some new things and seeing what happens." Oo, Bemani platformer, please!

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Here's another interesting but entirely random press release we got a copy of the other day, and it's about game preservation, yay:

"Computer games have commonly been thought of as entirely disposable objects, but a Victoria University researcher says that they are in fact an important part of New Zealand's visual cultural history. Dr Melanie Swalwell, a Lecturer in the School of English, Film, Theatre, & Media Studies, has published her research findings in a unique form in the online journal Vectors: Journal of Culture and Technology in a Dynamic Vernacular."

Unfortunately, we've found that the 'part game and part exploration' is entirely confusing, but apparently, you can "hear excerpts from interviews, see photographs taken during the course of her research, and access historic advertising, news stories and photographs from the "Golden Age" of New Zealand videogaming."

Particularly interesting, though: "Due in part to strict import licensing restrictions which made it difficult to import videogames in the early years, people designed and built their own systems, locally. Consoles like the Sportronic, the Fountain Programmable Video System, and the entirely New Zealand-made arcade game "Malzak", are unique internationally. These were home-grown creations, New Zealand's answer to Atari, if you like." Dude, Malzak! Excellent. Here's another URL to access the exhibit, and here's the original release.

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Game Ads A-Go-Go' is a bi-weekly column by Vintage Computing and Gaming's RedWolf that showcases good, bad, strange, funny, and interesting classic video game-related advertisements, most of which are taken from his massive classic game magazine collection.]

After my last column's flirt with actially being funny, I though I'd set back all the progress I've made and go back to presenting ads in a more traditional fashion (i.e. accompanying them with completely nonsensical commentary). I'll likely be doing this until I can cook up another presentation gimmick. Anyhow, this week it's all about animals: what they eat, what they wear, how they live. And it turns out they live inside video game ads. Let's check 'em out.

Never Give Your Penis to an Alligator

Let's face it: joysticks and alligators don't mix. That's why I keep my alligators and joysticks in separate piles (in quantities of fifteen to twenty) at least five meters apart. If somehow these two base alchemical ingredients combine, out pops a magical wrestle-happy native islander boy with greased hair. And trust me, if you collect more than a few of those, it's a big pain in the ass because you need to keep them in yet another pile (quanitiy ten to fifteen) at least twenty meters away from the first two piles -- lest you find yourself with another reaction that results in plastic half-eaten watermelons named Dave.

Gorillas in the Box

Let's face it: gorillas eat people. That's why scientists at ASCIIWARE have developed a new tiny gorilla that is simply too small to devour humans. Animal behaviorists (likely bitter about their low wages) have specially trained these apes to lean on random objects and make loud mechanical tractor noises with their lips while you're trying to play Donkey Kong. They're a real marvel of modern science. The only question is: how do they fit such tiny gorillas in such a huge box?

They Called them "Chimplights"

Let's face it: before the invention of the Light Boy, we all had to keep these things around. And by "things," you know exactly what I mean -- I'm talkin' chimps. Chimps are horrible cooks and they get highly aggressive and ornery past the age of three. But before 1991, they were absolutely necessary for Game Boy illumination. So imagine my surprise when one day, while strolling on the grounds of my ranch (and coincidentally wandering past a large pile of used chimps), I received a Priority Alpha telegram from Vic himself (that's "Mr. Tokai" to you) telling me that he had developed cutting-edge chimp replacement technology. Having such faith in Vic and all his endeavors (as I always do), I immediately let Bulumbo go. I've been chimp-free ever since, and I feel like a new man. Thanks, Vic. You're a pal.

[RedWolf is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Vintage Computing and Gaming, a regularly updated "blogazine" that covers collecting, playing, and hacking vintage computing and gaming devices. He has been collecting vintage computers and game systems for over 13 years.]

Posted by Benj Edwards at 9:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Cheating by using third-party programs and bots has always been a problem in MMOs, and it's fascinating to note that, while nobody pays much attention anymore, EA's Ultima Online has announced that it will be introducing PunkBuster anti-cheat technology into the game this July.

The official website phrases it thusly: "Player cheating is a serious problem inside Ultima Online, as it is with all online role-playing games. It hurts the economy, gives players an unfair advantage in PvP, and puts honest players at a disadvantage when it comes to competing for resources, spawns and treasure. It’s no wonder the use of cheat programs is the number one complaint to customer service. We hope to greatly reduce the use of cheat programs through the use of PunkBuster, the most recognized name in cheat protection. Used in virtually all triple-A shooters, Ultima Online will be one of the first MMOs to use PunkBuster technology." [Looks like there are some Korean MMOs also using the tech, including War Rock and Knight Online.]

This has obviously come under fire from anyone who's actually still playing UO, since, well, they're the kind of anti-progress types who are still playing UO (kidding, mostly, guys!), so there are plenty of concessions: "We will provide at least one shard to play on that will not require PunkBuster. Non-PunkBuster servers will be barred from using the character transfer service." Interestingly, as well: "PunkBuster will only take screenshots of the Ultima Online game screen itself" - but it does screenshot. So... good thing, or downright Orwellian? [Via Zen Of Design.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, we were hanging out at the D3 Publisher of America website, trying to work out what excuse they had now for not bringing Zombie Vs. Ambulance out in the States, when we noticed what may be the overlooked quirksome gem of E3 - Dead Head Fred for PSP.

Being produced by Vicious Cycle Software, the game has a teaser trailer up on YouTube that explains the premise fairly well - it's, uhm, an original IP film noir about a guy who had his head removed. Play Magazine (hey, who knew they had a half-decent website nowadays?) has a good E3 preview of the game, explaining: "Taking place in an alternate 1940's inspired universe, you take up the role of Fred Neuman, a private detective who was murdered and then used as part of a bizarre scientific experiment."

But wait, there's more, according to Play: "As Fred battles a variety of monsters, mutants, and ghouls, he can used the severed heads of some of his fallen foes to replace his own, giving him a variety of new ability and powers. For example, one of the heads I got to check out was a zombie head, which can suck in various things, expanding as it fills with said content." So... it's out in early 2007 exclusively for PSP, and who knows, may be a Stubbs-ian exercise in whimsy? Watch out for it.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Of course, at GSW/Gamasutra we get odd emails from time to time linking to strange pages. One of the most notable recently was linking to the Peripheral Vision Psychosis and EverQuest website. Which explains MMO addiction in, well - we'll let the page explain things.

Apparently, EverCrack and other MMOs aren't addictive because of the leveling: "There is no secret script in the programming that causes addiction even though apparent addiction does occur... The psychotic element we see manifested and which appears to be addiction in those playing the Sony™ game Everquest™ is caused by a quirk of human physiology. When humans habituate or dismiss notice of a moving object in our peripheral vision, our brain loses the ability to complete the reflex, which should normally occur. A subliminal portion of your vision field drives peripheral Vision Reflexes."

So, in this case, the relentless MMO playing was caused by? An aquarium in the same room as an MMO player profiled on 48 Hours, apparently: "When [EverQuest player] Tommy Stein turned off the room lights to prevent glare on the monitor and left the aquarium light on, the fish or other pets in the tank would be detectable by reflected light. While peripheral vision reflexes only happen when we are approached from behind anything moving in one direction in the tank must eventually go back in the other."

To fix, this, I think the author is suggesting that we build small cubicles for everyone where they can't see anything out of the corner of their eye: "This sounds like science fiction but if you work in a cubicle you sit inside one solution engineers devised to prevent injury due to this quirk of physiology. You, therefore, are protected without ever knowing that the protection or problem exists. Commercially designed office partitioning also includes this protection." So there. Stop looking at us weird.

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Well, what we've been doing all day (and mashing our brains up in the process), is launching the 2007 Independent Games Festival website, which we run here at the CMP Game Group, with a new design and new info on the competition! Check the website for more, but here's what's new:

- the IGF Main Competition, a resounding success in 2006, has received a few minor tweaks (slight category name changes, a demo is mandatory to enter the Audience Award if a finalist), but continues with the $20,000 Seumas McNally Grand Prize, and multiple $2,500 awards for innovative design, audio, technical, art, and best web game. We're really looking forward to entries, and the deadline this year is September 8, 2006 at 11:59pm PDT.

- the IGF Mod Competition, a big hit in its first year, is going even more freeform this year, and allowing mods from any game to compete - from Thief to Half-Life 2 to Oblivion to The Sims and beyond, all mods are eligible. From the entrants, we will pick Best Singleplayer FPS Mod, Best Multiplayer FPS Mod, Best RPG Mod, and Best 'Other' Mod finalists (each a $500 prize), and those winners will show at the 2007 GDC, competing for an overall $5,000 Best Mod prize. Deadline for entrants is October 13, 2006 at 11:59pm PDT.

- the IGF Student Showcase, which continues to be one of the most hotly contested parts of the Festival, continues to honor the ten Student Showcase Winners with $500 travel stipends and an opportunity to show their game at GDC 2007. But we're also adding a $2,500 Best Student Game award, honoring the absolute best student game submitted to the IGF this year. Deadline for entrants this year is November 10, 2006 at 11.59pm PDT.

"In addition to all this, we're pleased to announce that all Independent Games Festival finalists will also be playable in the IGF Pavilion at GDC from March 7-9, 2007, alongside an IGF/indie gaming-themed day of lectures and roundtables on March 6, new for 2007 to help coalesce the IGF community - more information on this will be released at a later date." So there you go... looking forward to another great year.

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of our favorite quirky journalism sites, Gelf Magazine, has popped up with an interview with cult leader Rael, "the 59-year old French prophet formerly known as Claude Vorilhon."

You may have particularly heard of the Raelians in relation to human cloning (though Rael comments: "The press conference which Dr. Boisselier gave in Miami when the baby Eve announcement was made, we were not even present. Nobody was representing the Raëlian movement"). But in this case, it's the video game-related aspect of the interview - Rael's love of PC racing sim Live For Speed.

Rael explains: "Yes, we have our own [in-game racing] team [in Live For Speed]. It's not sponsored, it's our own team. Some members who love racing cars and me. You know, I was a pro racer before and I quit racecar driving five years ago. But I still race on Live For Speed with our friends and I enjoy it."

Later, he raves to the interviewer: "You can download Live For Speed from the website in England and it's something like forty dollars. You just need a good wheel and pedal and here you are. It's really the real thing. You only miss the g-force. But it's much more comfortable." So, if you're looking for loony co-racers, here's a great first stop! [Via Kotaku.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sometimes we remember to cover non-video game stuff, when it's interesting - and in this case, OgreCave has commented on unfortunate layoffs at WizKids, the card/CCG game firm.

The OgreCavers note: "According to the press release, this "brought about a tough decision to have a reduction in force." No details are released yet about who will be leaving the company, or what specifically brought on the reorganization. The company stated that "These steps are necessary for the long term health of WizKids, and will allow us to focus on our core Brands of Battlestar Galactica, HeroClix, HorrorClix, MechWarrior and Pirates.""

WizKids was founded by Jordan Weisman, of course, who also founded FASA and 4orty 2wo Entertainment, and whom we mentioned recently, and one commenter even claims that "Accounts are that Jordan has indeed left the company as part of this reorg/"reduction in force"", but there's no official confirmation of this - WizKids is owned by Topps, the trading card company, nowadays, for those keeping count.

[Talking of which, there was a totally great article in The New Yorker the other week about how Topps are trying to revitalize Bazooka Joe, the chewing gum great: "Joe, who began life fifty-three years ago as a crewcut boy with an eye patch, sprouted a few inches. His blond hair grew out and became fashionably tousled. He kept the eye patch but started wearing his cap backward... To keep him company, Topps artists developed five new sidekicks, including an excitable German named Wolfgang Spreckels."]

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The ever-interesting Jesper Juul says that he's "working on an article about the most disrespected and despised game genre there is. That’s right, matching tile games." And to go with it, he's drawn up a fascinating flowchart of the genre's evolution.

He explains: "For that, I am looking at tracing the innovations and developments of the last 20 or so years. The following tree is an attempt at illustrating the lineages of gameplay innovations from roughly Tetris to Chuzzle. For each game you can see the year of publication plus the innovations of that game listed with a “+” to the side. Arrows mean “family resemblance and probably inspiration” - I will not attempt to verify that a specific game designer was inspired by a specific other game."

However, he knows enough to know that he probably doesn't know everything, hence: "Question: Am I missing a game that contributed to the history of matching tile games? Do you find the connections plausible?" For us, not having Sega's Columns on there is probably a notable omission, though we're never really sure where in the lineage it came, and whether most of the '90s block puzzle games were borrowing from Tetris instead. Anyone else?

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The borderline scabrous Noooz has collected the video-related gems from new videocast MightyJustice, showcasing a plethora of wacky Australians shouting at the screen and reviewing games at the same time.

Particularly singled out is the video review of the original PS1 version of Ridge Racer, described thusly: "JubeiSaotome reviews his favorite racing game of all time, it's ridge racer RIIIIIDGE RACER!!" So, yes, there's a little Kaz Hirai sarcasm in here, along with high school humor galore. Please don't put any more games in your pants, though. Please?

There's a plenty of other game reviews up, along with the shocking admission: "I'd like to thank Game Life for being my inspiration!!! One day I can be a famous video game reviewer!!" When GameLife inspires the world's youngsters to go out and wreak video havoc, isn't it time to send in the National Guard?

Posted by Simon Carless at 6:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

1UP's ever-lovin' Jane Pinckard has posted a good thinkpiece reflecting on a recent Esquire column by Chuck Klosterman which asks: "There is no Lester Bangs of video games. Why?"

Klosterman, as can be seen, isn't really a video game guy, so it isn't necessary his fault that he doesn't know about a lot of the great, progressive game journalism going on outside the GamePro-s of this world. Pinckard is also right to note: "Maybe there is no Lester Bangs of videogames because there's no Lester Bangs of ANY medium. Not anymore."

However, Pinckard goes further regarding the whole 'NGJ' issue: "The problem is, no one really cares for the stuff beyond a small group of like-minded folks who are mainly writers and developers. Gamers, for the most part, don't care to read about how a game makes you feel. Without an audience, fine writers who style themselves critics languish unread on blogs or in tiny niche websites."

Wait, which one of the above are we, again? Damn! Oh, and one other point - a lot of writers that become legends are feared and rejected, even by a lot of the mainstream media, in their everyday careers. Seriously - read Hunter Thompson's colected letters and check out how much material he didn't get published. So... the stars of today may not be the stars of tomorrow? [And nope, not really sure why Hung is here either. His name was just alliterative, I think, plus he personifies how things can be popular despite their, uhm, quality.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

We get a bunch of interesting emails to sister site Gamasutra that we don't have room for, and here's a prime example - a tipoff from Bay Area developer Fantasy Lab on its new game engine for PC/next-gen consoles.

There's some neat stuff here, primarily demo images/videos on real-time global illumination in the engine, of which it's explained: "For simplicity and flexibility we use a new technique in the Fantasy Engine that allows us to compute global illumination on the fly. The system is simple to use since any surface in a scene can be a light source for, reflect light onto, or shadow any surface in the scene, including itself." And it looks hawt.

Also neat is the section on Subdivision Surfaces with Displacement Mapping, showing how a 500,000 polygon model is created with just 1,700 polygons, plus, uhh, subdivisions and displacement mapping, like it says on the tin. Does Unreal Engine 3 have all of the above? We're a little hazy on the technical specifics at any given time - all we know is that the accompanying movies are real pretty.

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You can credit Matt Gallant's Metafuture blog for finding his alleged proof that 'videogames are art', a hilarious YouTube game vid starring wrestler The Undertaker.

Basically, just watch it - that's as easy as it gets. But if you'd like some background - at least our lame-o interpretation - the movie seems to have been created using the Create-A-Wrestler mode for WWE Smackdown vs. RAW 2006 for PS2, by the look of it.

In addition, the wrestler that The Undertaker is actually using the mocap for is WWE Diva Christy Hemme - check out a real-life entrance of hers for a comparison - as you can hear, and the Wikipedia entry confirms, Hemme's entrance music is The Hives' 'Walk Idiot Walk'. So does that make The Undertaker an idiot? There, we've over-analyzed this enough!

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Seems like everyone's launching something today, and the folks at The Gamer's Quarter (headed by GSW columnist Matt Williamson!) didn't want to be left out - thus, they've "...just finished our sixth issue, featuring mobile games musings, E3 impressions and reflections, interviews with videogame pioneers, and plenty of other stories."

The PDF of Issue 6 is now available for download, but it's noted: "...for the full mobile experience -- print copies can be purchased at our online store! Pre-orders will be shipped in late July (with free bookmarks!)" We've seen the bookmarks, and one of them has a GameSetWatch quotation on it, so we highly recommend them in a reacharound type stylee, haw.

As for what's in it - too much to mention here, including jovial E3 cartoons, features on the N-Gage and 'Pacing In Video Games', among others! But a particular highlight is 'Mechanical Donkeys', a profile of M.U.L.E by John Szczepaniak, talking to all the surviving major players in the creation of the early '80s classic, and, as he notes: "Not only do they cover the making of M.U.L.E., but they also speak about the early days of Electronic Arts, and of the development atmosphere of the early 1980s." This is the best issue so far, and speaks volumes to the evolution of intelligent, non-pretentious game journalism online.

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Dude, it's gigantic! The folks at former dot.bomb and current limpalong TheGlobe.com (but also home to our favorite-ish U.S. game mag, Computer Games Magazine, who are presumably doing the editorial for this mag/site!), have announced the launch of the Massive Magazine website.

This comes ahead of the print publication's launch in September, and, though the site itself is a little clunky, there's already some fun content up - not sure if it's reprinted from the MMO sections of CGMag or commissioned from scratch. For example, a piece on leaving your in-game character from Mark Crump is lots of fun, and Kelly Wand's feature on 'Let Freedom Grind' is also tres entertaining.

Discussing RuneScape and its ilk, Wand's feature notes: "Free online games produced by maverick programmers on shoestring budgets have peppered the Internet since its earliest days. The surprise is that people are still playing the same ones now they were five years ago, despite the ceaseless deluge of shinier fare. Their modest system requirements and learning curves can be easily downloaded and played at work, but even esthetically, certain titles stick in the pleasure gland longer than you’d expect from a crowd that proudly wears its jadedness on its sleeve." In other words, the grind is a sickness that knows no graphical boundaries, hurray!

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The latest issue of The Escapist has just debuted, and we'll let 'em introduce it: "Thirty-eight percent of all game players are women. Perhaps that’s why our first discussion on gender and games was so popular, and why we’ve decided to bring you the sequel. The Escapist takes another look at the landscape of women in games in issue 50: “Girl Power 2.”"

Sorry, whenever we think of 'Girl Power' (and we referenced it before), we think of Daisy from Spaced doing that unfortunate Spice Girls thing in a job interview, but this issue, as always, has some readable in-depth journalism on a perfectly valid topic, sometimes lacking in today's game journalism biz when an 'OMG X360!' post will get just as many (or more) page views than a well-considered feature.

Here's the full line-up: "Feature contributor John Walker questions if games are really as inaccessible to women as everyone seems to think in “Asexuality Actually.” N. Evan Van Zelfden talks to developer Denise Fulton about her career in the game industry in “Meet Denise Fulton.” In “The Truth about Little Girls” Bonnie Ruberg returns to discuss the lack of presence of young girls in video games. And Justin McElroy looks at the legacy of Sierra Entertainment and its prominent female staff in “Women at the Pinnacle.”"

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over at PressTheButtons, the excellent MattG has dug up some good info on the PSP's upcoming UMD movie/TV releases, revealing that, even as the UMD releases dry up, the BBC is coming through with a bunch of new titles in the U.S., including the awesome Christopher Eccleston-lead revival of sci-fi classic Dr. Who - as well as The Office and Little Britain, both great shows.

Matt notes: "I don't understand why the BBC is offering these UMD sets. How large is the demographic crossover between PSP owners and fans of BBC programming in the United States? The BBC can't say that the industry (and the market) didn't warn them if these releases gather dust on store shelves at a $27.95/each price point." But we're somewhat excited by the BBC offerings - but would be MUCH more if Dr. Who had been released in a first season box set, like Family Guy was - a Video Business article on the decline of UMD notes that retailer Hastings "...singled out 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment’s Family Guy titles as a particularly hot seller recently."

Well, the TVShowsOnDVD story that fingered these new BBC UMDs in the first place also notes of a new Family Guy instalment in September: "You can expect a 4-disc release consisting of all of the third season episodes (21 of them, including "When You Wish Upon A Weinstein") - and bonus material (including featurettes, commentary tracks, and trailers) - that were on the "Volume 2" DVD release! Price shown is $49.98 SRP in the USA." With the first and second Family Guy seasons only $36 at some retailers for a 5 UMD set, this is the kind of UMD package we _care_ about. Do more!

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Parallax Memories' is a regular weekly column by Matthew Williamson, profiling classic '16-bit' games from the Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, and other seminal '90s systems. This week's column profiles SEGA’s: Continue Japanese info book.]

FOR MEGA DRIVERS CUSTOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As an introduction to this little side story I just want to make it perfectly clear that I have almost no knowledge of Japanese besides recognizing the occasional kana or the characters for Save and Load. Knowing this (though I wish I could change it at times) I recently went ahead and purchased the Mega Drive Encyclopedia. It was pretty expensive and I could not find any kind of information on the book outside of the store that I was getting it from, so I just dove in and bought.

---

Visual Shock!

The book itself comes in a nice black box with gold letters on the front identifying it as “16-BIT.” On top of that there is an interesting sticker attached to the plastic wrap that gives me either a distinct sense of excitement or the idea that someone was getting paid per punctuation mark.

Turning the box over reveals an interesting item: a Genesis gashapon (capsule toy). Specifically, it is not a Mega Drive, and even the strange box sticker brings this to your attention. The box is about 2” thick, and unfortunately the plastic container that holds the gashapon in place takes up a good inch of that space.

The dimensions of the book are approximately 8” high by 5” wide and it has a nice thin dust cover protecting it. On the book itself (under the dust cover) is an artistic picture of the Mega Drive, printed on the corners of the book as though it is shining through shadows. The paper stock of the book is high quality and a good weight. The words are all very clear and the color is perfect without any bleeding or blurring.

Sound Shock!

The Encyclopedia is divided into three main parts. These parts start at the time of each of the three main Mega Drive releases: The Mega Drive, the Mega CD, and the 32X. The book is further divided by year starting in 1988 and ending in 1996. Each year is also noted with a black and white pictures from what I assume are important pieces of Japanese contemporary history.

There are reviews for 554 Japanese-released Mega Drive games for the consoles and accessories. They are broken up anywhere from one to three per page. At the end of each part of the book is a new interview with important people who worked with the Mega Drive. The only person who I recognized was Rieko Kodama of Phantasy Star fame. I am happy to report that many of the game highlighted in this column were made into one-page review items.

Speed Shock!

But what this all boils down to is disappointment. To clarify, my disappointment is in the fact that I don’t understand the language. This is a fantastic set for Mega Drive fans. It’s comprehensive and has many new interviews and features with interesting facts that may have been previously unknown. The layout is spartan and gorgeous, and the love of the system can be seen on every page.

There are no cover shots for most of the games and even titles that were once in English were converted to kanji and kana; this makes it exceptionally difficult for me to learn of new titles I may have missed out on (my initial reason for the purchase) . So while it may not have been a smart purchase for me, I know that someone is going to get a lot of value from this.

[Matthew Williamson is the creator of The Gamer’s Quarter, an independent videogame magazine focusing on first person writing. His work has been featured on MTV.com, 1up.com, Chatterbox Radio, and the Fatpixels Radio Podcast.]

Posted by Matthew Williamson at 6:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

After we posted a delighted article about their previous thrift store exploits, also picked up by a few other outlets, we're pleased to see that The New Gamer's motley crew have started their 2006 'drunksaling' campaign in Chicago.

It's explained: "Unitdaisy and I were so inspired by the (now defunct) drunkgamers.com's garagesaling adventures that we decided to follow their example and searched about Chicago, scrounging for games and, when we were done, forced others to relive our experience. For those unfamiliar with the term drunksaling, it's simple: It's kamikaze garagesaling for video games! The following excursion took place on June 3rd, 2006."

And a doozy this first exploration for 2K6 was, including a bizarre faux-gothy estate sale, a mauled coconut monkey ("Who stabbed you in the chest and stole your sweet, sweet life fluid?"), oh, and actually some video games too, including a stand-up Joust cabinet (NOT bought, how dare you guys?), and some Sega Pico games ("The Sega fanboy in me says 'Buy, buy, buy!' whereas the part of me with a glimmer of sense says 'You'll only stuff it in the closet.'). Dude... but that's what closets are for!

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ilya Vedrashko's In-Game Advertising weblog has posted a nicely illustrated look at American Apparel's store opening in 'virtual world' Second Life, amusingly (and sarcastically) described as "the second biggest news of the week after Bill Gates' retirement".

One point made by a lot of virtual world watchers is that many big corporations are moving into Second Life for PR reasons (it looks cool!) rather than real-life CPM-style advertising (there aren't that many people in SL at any given point), and a Forbes story on the move is likely exactly the desired result they're looking for.

It's explained: "The initial fashion selection will offer 20 styles of American Apparel’s signature logo-free casual wear: basic T-shirts, tank tops, undergarments and swimwear. Second Life residents may be privy to real-world promotions and discounts from American Apparel, and the marketing tactic may boost actual sales with a link to the online store, the company said." However many people actually check it out, it does seem like good PR - and the GSW Second Life correspondent is just getting set up, so we'll see how they like it, too, in due course!

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

A bunch of UK sites including British Gaming Blog have picked this up and run with it, but Future Publishing's licensing site has revealed a new UK-centric Nintendo magazine, NGamer, billed as "the UK's first unofficial magazine to focus on Nintendo Wii", and replacing/rebranding the existing unofficial mag NGC.

Even though NGC's circulation was, well, pretty tiny ['14,000 (ABC: Jan-Dec 2005)'], apparently Future thinks it can still make money by pricing it at UKP5 ($9.20) with a DVD of game videos packed into every issue. Of course, it's also pointed out: "NGamer compliments perfectly with the Official Nintendo Magazine, published by Future in the UK, France and Italy." This was after ONM in the United Kingdom was wrested away from EMAP, which was a shame, cos it was getting increasingly avant and wacky!

So yep, two Nintendo magazines from the same company in the UK - when the only one in the U.S. now is run by Nintendo! As the British Gaming folks note: "it’s taking a different focus to ONM which has to stick a bit to Nintendo in the UK. NGamer will cover more Japanese stuff, with previews and reviews of import games." But they also comment skeptically: "It does have a DVD with every issue… but it’s gonna need new, good content which you can’t get on YouTube. Which is just about every video on the net." Sometimes it's easier to check stuff out on your TV, though.

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Since, as far as we can work out, the folks at GameTap aren't listing the schedule of cool stuff they're releasing on their public website anywhere (uh?), we're gonna continue to run stories with the upcoming updates to the darn cool 'all you can eat' PC gaming subscription site, as received in newsletters/PR. This time, it's the latter end of June digging up a little Sonic and official confirmation of the much-rumored Ultima.

The listing goes as follows: "6/22 - Sonic Week: The furry blue hedgehog with an attitude turns 15 this year and we're celebrating his birthday by debuting three unique Sonic titles featuring SEGA's "Lock-On" technology. Revisit Sonic 1, 2, and 3 playing as Knuckles the Echidna and access new areas, bonus levels, and special powers that weren't available before." Lock-On versions? Totally neat idea - see the Wikipedia Sonic & Knuckles entry for more info - though we didn't think Sonic 1 worked with it?

But 6/29 brings the big fun, in our opinions: "Ultima Week: Adventure and Role Players rejoice! We've got the ultimate in Ultima™. First play the games, starting with Lord British's classic original Ultima through Ultima VI: The False Prophet, then learn about the creator behind the series, Richard Garriott, A.K.A. "Lord British" on Tapped In." There's enough RPG goodness in there to sink a battleship.

[Oh, also: "6/22 - Puyo Puyo: Sonic Week continues with Sonic Team's addictive Puyo Puyo. Move over Columns. Step aside Bust-A-Move. There's a new puzzler in town!" Puyo Puyo is always good for a puzzle, so we approve. Plus, unrelated to this, there's some new sweepstakes where you can win lotsa stuff for playing GameTap.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over at blog PixelSumo, they've got a video link to a lecture by Josh Randall, Creative Director of Harmonix Music, on the excellent subject ‘Interactive Music for the Masses’ - and he should know, having directed Guitar Hero!

The full info on the talk, which happened at the Cybersonica 06 Festival at The Science Museum in London, explains: "Josh Randall will discuss his experience at Harmonix Music, from the company’s origins as a funky interactive music startup, to its growth into North America’s leading music game studio... He’ll look at some of the pitfalls of designing interactive music products for a mass audience and describe lessons learned from over 6 years of music game development."

What's more, in the lecture, which is hosted at PlayStation.com, Randall discusses "...the role of creative expression within the game space, and how new interfaces and controllers are changing the way we interact with our music and TV’s. Music gaming is bringing more and more people together every day, so what is the social impact of these games?"

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

[Our Blazing Destiny is a new weekly comic by Jonathan "Persona" Kim about our society, cultural postdialectic theory, and video games. And classic style Sonic the Hedgehog.]

Here's another Persona-skewed look at the gaming world - in his own words: "This comic is about consumerism and how one can forget their responsibilities when they do not curb their desires.

...I wonder what game Sonic is playing."

[Jonathan "Persona" Kim is sometimes a character animation student at the California Institute of the Arts, other times a ninja illustrator, but in his heart, a true comic artist looking for his destiny in the sea of stars. His path on the torrid road of comics include a quarterly manga on The Gamer's Quarter and his website on the internet drawing hub Mechafetus.com. He'll also be attending Anime Expo this year at the Artist Alley selling a new doujinshi full of game-parodies and random nonsense. Come out and see him!]

Posted by persona at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The latest issue of Game Developer magazine, the sister print publication to Gamasutra.com, created by many of the GameSetWatch authors, and the leading U.S. trade publication for the video game industry, is in the process of shipping to subscribers and is available from the Game Developer Digital service in both subscription and a new single-issue formats.

The cover feature for the June/July 2006 issue is an exclusive postmortem for Quantic Dream's critically acclaimed Indigo Prophecy, with exclusive art, described as follows: "On paper, pushing for increased emotion, original play concepts, and new methods of storytelling all in the same game sounds like the ravings of a madman. Indigo Prophecy may not have hit all of these points perfectly, but it has blazed a trail of innovation, and raised the bar for the integration of story and gameplay." It continues: "In this postmortem, David Cage tackles everything from narrative to digital puppetry, and tells us why changing publishers can save your game." An extended version of this feature will appear on sister site Gamasutra in the future.

In addition, the magazine features an in-depth 'State Of The Industry: In-Game Advertising' report, noting that advertising in games is a burgeoning way to add revenue to games, closely tied to licensing, but quickly growing beyond that age-old practice. In this industry overview, Paul Hyman discusses the major players and how they plan to put ads into your games.

Finally, a technical feature focuses on the fact that the next generation of consoles all sport more RAM and better processing power, but the optical drives reading your discs may not keep up as you would expect. In this feature, Neversoft's lead programmer Brad Bulkley offers tips and tricks for streaming your way to a seamless game world. The issue is rounded out by regular news, code, art, audio, and design columns, as well as a 'Best of E3' round-up, product reviews and game art features.

Worldwide paper-based subscriptions to Game Developer magazine are currently available at the official magazine website, and the new Game Developer Digital version of the issue is also now available, with the site offering six months and a year's subscriptions, alongside access to back issues, all for a reduced price. There is now also an opportunity to buy the digital version of June/July 2006's magazine as a single issue. Newsstand copies of the magazine will also shortly be available at North American outlets including Barnes & Noble and other specialty bookstores.

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Oddly enough, we touched upon the problem of bootleg video games a couple of times in the past week (bootleg DS titles, rare PC engine games), and the Neo Geo community is another place where bootleg carts are particularly common, especially for the Neo Geo MVS arcade cartridges.

Thus, the guys at Neo-Geo.com have set up an entire forum named 'Boot Or No Boot?', and set up to help people decide whether their beloved Metal Slug MVS cart is an original or tragically knocked off - and yes, also so people can make horrific Deal Or No Deal Photoshops!

There's also a fun, exceptionally fanboy thread on why people get upset with MVS to AES conversions - for those not in the know, some people will pick up the MVS arcade version of a rare game (much cheaper!) and transplant the guts into an AES home cart. Note the somewhat hilarious words from Amano Jacu: "Conversions were an ancient ritual performed by a tribe of primitive, wild AES fanatics. Some say they are still alive, hiding somewhere and offering carts as a sacrifice to the Neo Gods."

Posted by Simon Carless at 6:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Another place worth checking in at from time to time, the chaps at the Speed Demos Archive have come up trumps again with an excellent speed run of Sony's ubercult ICO.

The entire game is completed in 1 hour and 45 minutes (!) by Kevin Juang, with him commenting: "This run is about 12 minutes faster than the previous "world record" Japanese time. I could probably save 1-2 minutes if I wanted to redo this. At first, I didn't think this could even reach 1:55, so it's pretty funny that this run beats that even after including the credits and ending. Especially since being relatively linear, you wouldn't think there would be many ways to save time in ICO."

There's also plenty of scary OCD-style chatter: "One thing that I tested for about 45 minutes to an hour, was the effect of jumping. Despite my first intuition, I am pretty sure that in fact, jumping and running take exactly the same amount of time. If there is a difference, it is too minute to notice after even 30 second stretches. However, there are some reasons to jump for speed." Yes, kids, this man played just this game for 3 months straight - please provide medal of looniness.

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wandering back to the always excellent Atari Age, we note that the recent Midwest Classic game convention has spawned a whole plethora of new retro game carts being sold at the Atari Age store, including unofficial conversions and remakes galore.

One of the neater titles is Conquest Of Mars for the Atari 2600, "an accurate translation to the Atari 2600 of a popular Atari 8-bit computer title. Destroy the Martian rebellion by descending through the six caverns of Mars to activate the main energy reactors and escape to the surface before they blow up!"

But also _very_ cool is Wolfenstein VCS: The Next Mission, based on the classic Nazi-bustin' series in theme, but actually a hack of Atari 2600 game Venture: "Return to the halls of dreaded WOLFENSTEIN. All new enemies, rooms and floorplans await you in this upgraded version of the original Wolfenstein VCS. Badder, Brighter and more Deadly! Do you dare brave the depths of Wolfenstein VCS:The Next Mission?"

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Dan Marshall, the UK-based creator of intriguing indie game Gibbage, has just updated his weblog with some fun ramblings about 'games on the telly', as he put it, noting extremely relevantly: "This is something I know about: I work in TV and I make games on the side."

He goes on to note: "The trouble with video games as a spectator sport is that it’ll never work: they’re designed as interactive entertainment, and as such make extraordinarily dull viewing. I stopped watching GamesMaster when they stopped screening stuff about games, and just had a couple of kids playing each other on some arcade machine you’ve never heard of and struggled to commentate over the top about combos."

Interestingly, Dan's solution? "In theory, a decent TV show about gaming is a no-brainer. Games generate brilliant, fiery discussions, and that’s what’s needed. As far as I’m concerned, the ideal game show would be akin to a late-night BBC2 Arts show: just a bunch of well-versed and witty people sitting around a table chewing over the latest news and releases." He then references Edge's recent article "with Simon Pegg, Charlie Brooker, Peter Serafinowicz and Graham Linehan sitting in a pub talking about games" as a good example of what might work great on TV - and I agree, it would, though perhaps not with the beloved 'yoof' audience?

[Also, we liked Dan's comments on a recent, particularly, uhm, trolltastic Gamasutra Soapbox on girls and games from an UCLA professor, in which he noted:" it may as well be a lesson in how to write an entire article without really having any hard evidence to base it on whatsoever." Yay!]

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Alice over at the Wonderland blog has spotted a new artgame exhibit called XBlocks, which she describes as "art meets donkeykong" and is further explained on its official website.

It's noted: "xBlocks is a convergence between video games & sculpture — liberating play from the screen. It is a mixed reality installation inspired by traditional platform games of the late 1980s such as Super Mario Brothers or Pitfall."

But wait, there's more: " Using standard game controllers, two opposing players must help their characters navigate in and around a three dimensional maze. The real challenge comes, not from traditional game mechanics but rather from moving with your character as he sprints around corners and jumps between the installation’s two play surfaces." More real-life games like this, please.

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Though we wish it had some kinda of RSS feed, we love reading import store NCSX's new arrivals info, because they stock some wacky stuff and their writing is seriously witty at the same time.

So, of course there's weird Japanese merchandise this week (Band Bros instruments gashapon, anyone?), but our main focus is on the new PSP title Airport Hero Narita, which is, yes, an air traffic control sim for Sony's portable.

We like NCS's description so much we'll excerpt in full here: "In the 1999 movie, Pushing Tin, Billy Bob Thornton and John Cusack played dueling air traffic controllers. Cusack's Nick Falzone fueled conflict against Thornton's half-Choctaw Russell Bell. Despite their battles and bouts of inner turmoil, both had the ability to visualize 3D airspace and guide streams of planes to and fro without having them crash into each other."

It continues: "Airport Hero Narita is sort of like Pushing Tin except the scope of your responsibilities go far beyond what the two cowboys had control over. In addition to keeping a watchful eye on all of the air traffic around Narita Airport in Tokyo, players also direct planes to start their descent, prepare to land, taxi to a runway, depart, and maintain speed/altitude. Due to the critical decisions that are heaped upon the player's shoulders, one must keep track of all the planes and spatial dimensions around Narita airport to avoid any dangerous situations that might lead to disastrous consequences."

So, another characteristically Japanese game in the vein of Densha De Go! - neat. It often intrigues me that titles with such likely limited appeal are released in Japan. But with slightly higher game prices (in some cases), much lower game developer salaries (or so we've heard anecdotally), different distribution conditions (no high level of entry into the big chains, necessarily), and highly stratified niches of 'extreme' fans happy to snap up 10-20,000 copies of games on very specific subjects, it seems like the conditions are there to allow indie console titles with more stable long-term prospects - having more forgiving concept/game submission processes also helps (ahem, SCEA).

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The rather fine British Gaming Blog has an in-depth article on the homebrew PSP emulation scene, specifically related to classic PC games.

Some of the titles referenced, for those who have the correct OS and know what to do, include the classic Duke Nukem 3D ("The PSP port plays well with a good framerate and comprehensive controls; there is no support for the numerous expansion packs, however"), and Quake 2 ("The PSP port is still a beta and has some issues with control and sound, but the team are still working hard at getting it to be one of the most impressive PSP homebrew titles out there.")

The piece ends with some wished-for titles: "Some titles that need to be ported? I’m not a homebrew developer for the PSP, so I have no idea about limitations and feasibility but I’d love to see the classic Grand Theft Auto series, 3D Realm’s First Person Ninja Assassiner; Shadow Warrior, Rube Goldberg Machine based puzzle game; The Incredible Machine and non-SCUMM based but extremely cool Discworld adventure game series." Any other preferences?

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

You may have heard of UK media group Blast Theory from their 2005 Game Developers Choice 'Maverick' award for their multimedia ARG-like games such as Uncle Roy All Around You.

Well, now artblog We Make Money Not Art has posted info on Blast Theory's latest project, a game called Day Of The Figurines which is being run at this year's Sonar festival in Barcelona.

It's explained: "The game, set in a fictional gloomy town, unfolds over the three days of the Barcelona festival, each day representing an hour in the life of the town that shifts from the mundane to the cataclysmic." What's more: "The centrepiece of the game is a 3.5 x 5 meter model town – at the Centre de Cultura Comtemporània de Barcelona - created using pop up metal buildings, overlaid with computer graphics... Once there, you register, choose your figurine, give it a name, personalize it (kind of shoes it wears, favourite place when it was a kid, name, nickname) and your character is placed into the model town."

As for feedback: "Throughout the day, you get text messages from the game asking where you'd like to go in the town or how the figurine should react to the people it encounters and to some rather unpleasant situations." This seems to be multimedia game art that's actually compelling, as opposed to, uhh, artwank. Is artwank in the dictionary yet?

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, obviously, Digg is getting to be a fairly big site for citizen-voted journalism - the Digg gaming section is one of the most read 'blogs' around. So naturally, there's going to be other people getting in on that racket.

One of the most high-profile is now the Netscape.com beta, part of AOL, which is in the hands of Weblogs Inc's Jason Calacanis - who has been blogging about launch coverage in some kind of information frenzy.

Part of the multi-subject beta from AOL (which also owns major gaming blog Joystiq) is a Netscape.com videogames channel, sparsely populated right now, but likely to fill out in the near future. We heard there may be a few more specifically game-focused efforts along these lines soon, too - should be interesting.

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You might've noticed that the ultra-rare PC Engine arcade card game Ginga Fukei Densetsu Sapphire has been turning up on ebay at reasonable prices recently. The real deal quite often fetches upwards of $400, so these fakes can be rather enticing. Here's an example of one.

Luckily, the fellow who runs superpcenginegrafx.com has put together a rather extensive guide to determining what's real and what's false. Apparently these (rather high quality!) bootlegs were made through the Swiss company care4data, and are easiest to tell from the real deal by the fact that the tear strip goes across the middle of the logo, rather than much lower, where it'd usually be. This is a seriously detailed report. There are six pages of info here (navigate at the bottom), from manual scans to disc images.

So now you know - one wonders if this will reduce the value of the original as well? Thanks to SignOfZeta for finding this, and Justin Cheer of superpcenginefx.com for putting the whole thing together. [Cross-posted from Brandon's IC, which also has a follow-up post with more PC Engine-related obscure neatness from the same site.]

Posted by bsheffield at 10:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Game Mag Weaseling' is a weekly column by Kevin Gifford which documents the history of video game magazines, from their birth in the early '80s to the current day.]

With the popularity of my field guide to US mags last week, it's been decided to make coverage of modern mags a regular feature on my little column. Most discussion of mags on the net tends to dwell on how obsolete they are and how uninformed and completely inferior the writing staff is. I think that's largely a bum rap.

Click through for the full guide to July's U.S. video game magazines...

Sure, not every magazine on the stand today is a pristine work of fine art, but things are a lot better than a few years ago -- most staffs have realized their readership is net savvy, so now they go less for the "reference guide to everything" approach and more for, you know, something you might actually like to read and keep on the shelf. I want to show people how well (or, as the case may be, unwell) they're succeeding with this.

For starters, I'm going to cover everything on the newsstand as of today, June 17, 2006 -- the day which will be known across the world as the day the U.S. tied Italy in the World Cup, proving we're good at things besides barbecues and dying of heart disease. I'm skipping out on Computer Gaming World and Game Informer since the latest issues I have were a while ago; I'll touch on them (and any other stragglers) in future columns.

Electronic Gaming Monthly July 2006

Most mags have their first issues after E3 coming out this month, and EGM launches off by interviewing the three top PR guys from each console maker -- Kaz Hirai of Sony, Reggie the Stare of Nintendo, and Shane Kim of Microsoft. This is followed with their annual post-E3 Opinionated Preview Guide, which takes 80 or so games from the floor and asks the simple question "How was it?" to all of them. The answers to this question still wade a bit into generic preview prose, but it's still the most readable of the month's E3 preview blowouts. (They also get top marks for not filling their pages with random booth photographs.)

The cover story this month is Call of Duty 3, which wasn't public at E3 and therefore counts as a super-hotsclusive for EGM. As any long-time Game Informer readers know (and as the EGM editors admit in their podcast this week), military games are about the most boring thing you can put on a magazine cover. They all look exactly the same.

Recommended: Listen to the podcast with EGM in hand and goggle as executive editor Shane Bettenhausen defends Sony's E3 performance with all his might. Also, read the two-page spread on the hilarious history of the Gizmondo, complete with a "car crash" design theme.

Top quote: "I counted the polygons -- Metroid [on Wii] only had 30,000. Lame!"

Official PlayStation Magazine July 2006

OPM's E3 coverage includes its own Kaz interview, as well as a two-page spread on the PS3's controller that spins the "Wii ripoff" argument and actually does a pretty decent job at it, discussing how well it worked with Warhawk at the show. The editors also get dev reactions from 6 or 7 industry dignitaries (including Kojima) and spread the cost/controller/online debate over a few pages of editorial coverage. Other main features include a long, multi-page interview with Tetsuya Mizuguchi and the annual OPM Power 20 list of influential industry folks, including names like Phil Harrison, Tim Sweeney, the Wii controller, and (in a bit of a longshot) Steven Spielberg.

Recommended: Greg Sewart's slamming of the PS2 version of Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter. OPM's got a podcast too, by the way.

Disc: Kind of zzzz. Cars leads and Urban Chaos and Pac-Man World Rally follows. Older demos on the disc include Namco's Kill.Switch, which still gets my vote as one of this generation's most obscure classics.

PC Gamer July 2006

I love big, huge anniversary features. PC Gamer agrees with me here, I reckon, because I think they just did one of these two years ago for their 10th anniversary. This iteration has tons of little box-outs filled with trivia over the past 149 issues, which ranges from the silly to the downright humorous. (They also finally admit that famous gamer-wife Stevie Case is probably not "the next game god," as they predicted in 2000. As a form of apology, they also printed a "Next Game Gods" comic that was cut from the original 2000 issue. It's great.)

PC Gamer divides its bread-and-butter game coverage into genre, with previews, reviews, and even features getting divided into the shooter, strategy, roleplaying, or "The Gamut" (i.e. "Misc") section.

Recommended: The "Five Legendary RPGs" mini-feature. Actually, there's a lot of hardcore mini-features in PC Gamer these days. It's funny, but throwaway features like these work a lot better in print than online for some reason. I think it's because retro-features online tend to be overwritten and drag on forever (I'm extremely guilty of this), making it hard to get through all of it.

PSM July 2006

The top cover feature is on MGS: Portable Ops, with lots of MGS4 in subsequent pages. (The feature talks extensively about Hideo Kojima, and what he wants to do with the series and so forth, but the actual interview with Kojima is small and mostly PR-speak as he isn't revealing much about MGS4 right now. It's not bad, but in retrospect, I probably would've approached the interview from a different angle.)

This issue was produced before E3, so the other previews don't have a great deal of meat behind them.

Recommended: 4-page feature on the history of controllers, with a long interview with Logitech marketing guy Ruben Mookerjee. Sounds stupid, but their massive chart of controllers over the years (with pix) is lots of fun -- it's neat to watch the progression of all the world's joysticks in the space of a single spread.

Look out for: PSM's revised website, currently (ostensibly) under construction. The old one was badly neglected, so hopefully there'll be something new in the redesign.

Offical Xbox Magazine July 2006

This issue isn't post-E3 either, so it's pretty similar to PSM above -- mostly previews that aren't much news to anyone right now.

The cover story is a straightforward treatment of F.E.A.R., but my favorite bit is the feature on Live achievements, which have proven to be more addictive and successful than Microsoft could've possibly imagined. Bits include quotes from devs on how they come up with the things and interviews with three nerds who "boast" over 30,000 points.

Another top feature: The 20 Best Xbox Games You Never Bought. Includes Psychonauts and Play coverboy Voodoo Vince, but sadly no Whiplash. Funnily, a lot of games from the 2003 holiday season are included -- those couple months were definitely the best and worst of times for the ol' box.

Disc: Tomb Raider: Legend (a little late, no?), MotoGP 06, and a Live version of Battlefield 2.

Computer Games July/August 2006

I found an issue! I found an issue! And it had a superb editorial in it from EIC Steve Bauman about how the "new media" of online game sites couldn't exist without the "old media" giving it things to talk about. I'm sure webloggers around the world will be aghast and rail against it on their sites, assuming they are as lucky as I am and can find a copy of the magazine.

Putting CG and GamePro next to each other, it's remarkable how similar they look designwise these days. I can attest that CG is a much, much, much better read, or at least that they use longer words that challenge the mind to a greater extent.

Top Art: A quote from an ex-EA exec mentioning masturbation includes a picture of the guy from classic Commodore 64 beating-off sim Stroker. They don't make games like that anymore, sadly.

Nintendo Power July 2006

I may start to sound like a broken record here, but I want to repeat that Nintendo Power is not just totally readable these days, but actually a damn fun mag to read -- they've arguably got the most well-written "random" features of any US mag. The previews tend to avoid boilerplate text, too, and the look is so clean that you'd hardly believe this mag exists if you just time-traveled in from 1990.

Of course, only Nintendo Power would be doing a 5-page preview feature on Tomb Raider: Legend by this point, so I suppose the more things change...

Play July 2006

Best known as "that one PS3 game with the really bad pre-E3 screenshots", Untold Legends looks pretty darn good in this issue, as you'd expect from Play. Though it's perhaps no coincidence that the concept art is usually printed a lot larger than the screens...

Play's E3 wrapup is pretty pedestrian, consisting mostly of lists and previews.

Top bit: Interviews with Takashi Tezuka (a postmortem on New SMB) and the creators of the new PSP Earthworm Jim. Fun read, considering you'd have to be a...well, a Dave Halverson to remember the original very well these days.

Hardcore Gamer Volume 2 Issue 1

I'm tempted to just say "Aw hell, just go read it on the site", but man if this isn't my favorite cover of the month. The combination of Terry Wolfinger drawing Lego figures and the promise of "360 luvin'/PS3 luvin'/Wii luvin'" along the site warms every possible cockle of my heart simultaneously.

It's never spelled out for you, but HCG's E3 report is by company and appears to be ranked -- #1 is Nintendo, #2 Microsoft, #20 NIS America, and so on. Kind of a neat touch, I think.

Top bit: Retro feature on Golvellius, one of the Sega Master System's top saving graces.

Tips & Tricks July 2006

Oh my, this cover.

GamePro July 2006

All right -- this is a little complicated, so pay attention.

This is the first issue of the Best Buy edition of GamePro. The only difference is a Best Buy-only cover and a spread on the inside with coupons and a little boilerplate game coverage. Otherwise it appears to be unchanged.

The idea here is that you go to your local Best Buy electronics store, pick up an issue of this, buy a subscription for $20, then save lots of money over the next 12 months with all the great coupons you'll be getting. In that aspect, it's kind of like a version of Game Informer or GMR for Best Buy stores. However, you can't buy an individual issue of this "Level-2" edition -- you have to buy a 12-issue subscription for $20, and that's what the UPC code on the mag rings you up for. Of course, this begs the question of why on earth you would buy this when real GamePro subscriptions are cheaper, but I suppose I'm not a high-powered electronics store executive and I'm not understanding the full picture here.

Anyway, the main feature this month is a long bit on Super Dragon Ball Z. I think every DBZ game Atari has ever released has gotten a cover story in GamePro. (The cover of this mag would be Super DBZ, but since this is the Level-2 edition, you get Reggie Bush representin' south San Diego with his cheeks instead. I'm not sure which would be a better cover.

Recommended (I suppose): There's a feature on EA's NCAA football game written by the guy who was starting center for Cal in 2001 and 2002. Well, English was one of his majors, so I guess he's qualified to write for a video game mag well enough, but...

One-off of the Moment

CPU (Computer Power User) has a special on the Xbox 360 on stands this summer at Walmart and other places. It's actually pretty massive, at 160 pages and no ads, and it has everything from a potted history of video games to a bit on online gaming that includes "screenshots" taken by pointing a camera at the screen. Nearly every single game and accessory is reviewed, though, so it's far from useless.

[Kevin Gifford breeds ferrets and runs Magweasel, a site for collectors and fans of old video-game and computer magazines. He owns enough magazines to smother himself with should the need arise, and his secret fantasy is for someone flush with game-publisher stock options to give him a monthly stipend so he can spend a year researching their full history and finishing the site. In his "off" time he is an editor at Newtype USA magazine.]

Posted by Kevin Gifford at 6:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

As you know, we do try to cover alternate reality games (ARGs) here on GSW, and one of the most notable firms in the area (if not _the_ pioneers) are 4orty 2two Entertainment, as headed by Jordan Weisman of FASA/WizKids fame.

Anyway, we didn't understand properly, until we read the press release, abouta new book called 'Cathy's Book: If Found Call 650-266-8233' being published this October, and created by 42's Sean Stewart and Jordan Weisman, with a promotional tie-in to CoverGirl cosmetics.

The press release explains: ""Cathy's Book ... " is the story of a teen girl who decides to investigate the mysterious disappearance of her boyfriend. She documents her investigation in a journal, filled with her notes, sketches and pieces of evidence. An immersive experience, the book is filled with clues and the reader can follow where they lead, including phone and web elements."

So this is an book featuring some ARG elements for teen girls that you actually pay to buy ($17.95 for the hardcover) - a really interesting attempt to reach a new market from the folks who did The Beast and the resoundingly successful I Love Bees.

[Oh, and we just noticed that a New York Times article on the book helped spawn an attack against the commercial placement in it, which led to a defensive press release from Perseus explaining: "The authors then came to us with the idea of extending the main character's journey (and the reader's experience) from not only the book and fictional websites but onto the real websites of CoverGirl and BeingGirl.com... No money was paid for product placement." Fun!]

Posted by Simon Carless at 3:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Massachusetts-based 'entertainment production company' Cecropia has been doing some interesting work for a while now, heavily (and just about solely!) covered by sister site Gamasutra - see the 'Fluttering Off The Beaten path' profile and an Ernest Adams column on the subject.

Ernest Adams describes the project best: "[Cecropia is] making a coin-op game about emotion, controlled by the earliest of videogame input devices, a single knob. They call their game a "filmgame." It's an animated cartoon built by highly experienced ex-Disney animators, still working with pencil and paper in the traditional manner. The characters aren't gawky mo-capped 3D models whose polygons are showing; they're beautifully drawn 2D people whose feelings and state of mind are visible in every frame - true personality animation. They're charming, tough, sexy, aggressive, sweet, goofy, and just plain fun to watch."

Well, now they've added a trailer for 'The Act' to their website, and it's really neat stuff, showcasing a 'old-time movies' visual style that almost feels like Humphrey Bogart meets Harold Lloyd, and some great-looking hand drawn animation. It's truly unconventional, and we really hope there's a place in the market for this alternative thinking - wonder how it'll play? Dragon's Lair++? [Via Cartoon Brew.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The folks at Grand Text Auto have linked to a mini-article in The Economist about game AI which features them talking about Facade, but even more interesting, for us, is a hint about the game Steven Spielberg is making at Electronic Arts with design veteran Doug Church.

Neil Young, general manager of EA Los Angeles, is quoted toward the end of the article, and notes: "Tellingly, Doug Church of Electronic Arts, who gave the keynote speech at last year's AIIDE conference, recently started work on a game with Steven Spielberg where “the focus is on building an emotive relationship at a story level and a gameplay level between the player and another character,” says Mr Young."

So, is this going to be anything like ICO's compelling human relationships, as recently explored by Katherine Isbister in a fascinating book extract on sister site Gamasutra: "In ICO, the player-character (the young boy carrying the stick) finds a trapped princess very early on in game play. From this moment forward, the player takes care of her. The princess (Yorda), is not really able to defend herself and is not as agile as the player-character. She must be led by the hand to ensure that she tags along, and she needs help over obstacles. When the player ­battles the shadows that threaten her, she will stay close by (within social distance)"? That would be interesting indeed.

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The newish VH1 Game Break blog has a suitably descriptive entry on a new 'gaming reality show' launched by the folks at IDG's Games.net - and it's the first interesting video doc about games we've seen done for online, actually.

As the VH1 folks explain: "In the online reality show called “Creating Kaos,” David goes up against the Goliath “World Of Warcraft” for dominance of the MMORPG space. You’ll meet Damian Grow, a two-day-a-week doorman and “full time CEO,” who only has enough money to buy chips and Chinese food to eat. Legendary game maker John Romero bets Damian can’t do make his game a big seller. Meanwhile, one of the designers lost his family because of his all-consuming compulsion for creating "Kaos.""

The game, incidentally, is Kaos War - Rise Of The Fallen, and we're particularly ticked by the fact that the related GamePro article has Games.net video producer Wendy Chan commenting: "People have already started comparing John Romero to [American Idol judge] Simon Cowell." Only with added robot frogs, right?

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Relatively little known consumer game site GameSide has announced the first issue of its 'art in games' PDF magazine, 'The Art Of Gaming', devoted to Metal Slug.

Basically comprised of a review/appreciation of SNK's 2D game series, along with fan art of various, sometimes horrid qualities (we do like Ze Liu's 3D model of a Metal Slug, pictured here, though!), this is fun to flip through swiftly, though people used to the more avant nature of PDF mags like The Gamer's Quarter will probably be a bit less impressed with the fanboy (or, in this case, fangirl) nature of the 20-page mag.

Then again, what other mag would have an interview with non game-related DeviantArtist Captain Fry for no apparent reason, in which he admittedly displays some nice taste in fave game art ("Street Fighter III: Third Strike probably exhibits some of the finest character animation I’ve ever seen in a video game (and a mention must go to Guilty Gear X for daring to venture into hi-res 2D and succeeding well) and any Metal Slug would follow a close second to this")?

[Still, Captain Fry has some very weird, possibly libellous pastiche art of his biology teacher on his DeviantArt page, so there. Is Metal Slug _your_ favorite pixel art ever? Inquiring minds, etc... we nominate Bucky O'Hare because we're being obtuse. And not because we're remotely furry, got it?]

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over at Troy Goodfellow's Portico weblog, he's posted an interesting interview with Xavi Rubio about Hyperborea's upcoming PC ancient naval wargame Galley Battles.

Discussing why ancient naval warfare is more complex than you might think, Rubio explains: "Galley warfare was, on a microscale, similar to the aerial duels of the 1st World War. Individual galleys try to maneuver in order to make a good position to ram the enemy without being rammed. Boarding techniques are more rough, but the fact is that you need to create superiority points where you have more ships than the enemy on local zones, in order to break the opponent's formation and make his morale sink."

Again, it's neat that the game industry has so many niches and sub-niches that someone can think about developing a game like Gallery Battles and still expect to make (a little!) cash off it, in this case, via Shrapnel Games publishing it - Rubio notes: "As the game has been focused on a "niche" sector of the market, we know that we won't get millionaire sells, but we are sure that there exists an audience insterested on this kind of game. In fact, the existence of several publishers of this kind of indie games is the proof." The game's screenshots are a bit basic, sure, but let's hope that the gameplay is effective.

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So, we're continuing to have lots of fun with our weekly GSW columnists, the latest of which is, of course, Jiji's new 'Compilation Catalog' bi-weekly column, an "analysis of retro remakes and compilations old and new". And, actually, this is a good point to say thank you to _all_ our columnists for the amazing job they're doing in posting regular, kickass material about video games.

As we expand further, we're looking for a couple of new helpers, so I'm going to explain what we're looking for, and let's see if anyone can help out. Please contact us at editors@gamesetwatch.com if you think you're interested in either of these mini-jobs.

- We think Second Life is, honestly, really interesting as a 'virtual world' where a whole lot of weird/odd things happen. So we'd like a SL correspondent to write for GameSetWatch, for weekly (or more often, if you're having fun!) explorations of what's happening in the world, from the bizarre through the sleazy to the plain lame. We were thinking that it might be cool to have a relative newbie document starting from scratch in SL, though - a lot of the Second Life reportage right now is from veterans, but explaining things in a more basic fashion (with screenshots) might be a good way to get a fresh perspective. [Payment for this will be in the form of trade-based things like Game Developer magazine subscriptions and suchlike, at least until GSW gets a bigger readerbase. Send a couple of examples of your work.]

- We'd like to do something unconventional with physical object publishing related to games. Trying to be a little vague here, but if you're a talented graphics designer and you've designed CD covers and cases before, and you're also familiar with mastering and printing a _small_ amount of CD-ROMs (through an external manufacturer), and love indie games, then we have this idea we'd like to act on. Ideally, you should also be able to handle physical fulfillment for a small amount of CDs (ie have time during the day to mail stuff off.) Oh, and you get part creative control of the project (yes, you can be Peter Saville!). [Payment - you get part of any revenue made on the project (likely to be relatively small, but should pay for expenses, etc). Send some examples of your graphic design and a quick description of what CD printing you've done before, if any - I'm thinking this would suit someone who's done low-printing indie music label work before.]

So, there you go. As you may know, GSW is really a labor of love for us, so if anyone wants to hop on board, now's the time to speak up!

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Looks like Paramount is still doing the heavy 'viral marketing' thing for Nacho Libre, which opens, what, today? But this is actually quite fun - they managed to collar Jack Black to ask him what his favorite arcade/home video game is [.MOV].

Turns out he likes Scramble, but there's a certain classic ColecoVision title that he's particularly enamored of. The soundbite itself is only 36 seconds, so we've just given away most of it, heh.

There's also a little movie of him playing Project Gotham Racing 3 over Xbox Live and talking in a very Jack Black-like way. And if you were the person who commented last time we featured Jack throwing his DS around - yes, the videos will probably still be boring this time.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was just reading this in my physical copy of Edge, but apparently now it's also posted on Edge Online, yay - a good, unrelentingly honest feature on game testing called 'A Bug's Life'.

The article starts by pointing out: "Anyone with any experience of the QA process will deny the slightest resemblance between testing a game and playing one for pleasure: finding bugs is unmistakably work, and, by common consensus, very dull and repetitive work at that. On top of this, pay is often poor, job security frail, working conditions extreme and recognition hard to come by."

In addition, it used to be that testing was one of the best ways to get hired as a designer or assistant producer, and this article suggests that may not even be true any more: "For all that testing experience is still a common CV footnote, it’s increasingly just that: a footnote, a summer job done during one of the university courses that are squeezing out the opportunities for graduates of the games industry’s unofficial vocational school. “I don’t actually think that QA is such a good route into the industry anymore,” warns [Arthur Parsons, an executive designer at Travellers’ Tales].“

So... all a bit depressing, then? All I can say, having worked in the game industry developing titles that were then forced through the QA wringer, is that good testers are worth their weight in gold.

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Posted by at 8:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

RedWolf's extremely entertaining Hacksterpiece Theater column, "devoted to fun, odd, and interesting retro game hacks", is continuing with a look at some more early DahrkDaiz hacks, in this case Pac Man III and Mega Man Challenge.

Both are neat, but Pac Man III is the most fun: "DahrkDaiz designed 32 new levels for a wide-eyed Pac-Man to chomp his way through. Some of them are on the traditional side of things (ho-hum square-ish), while some are quite devious (invisible walls!). Never one to just modify a few tiles and walk away, DD had to provide a completely new feature or two."

What's there? "In this case, he provided a new way to play the levels: on the title screen, you can select either “Linear” play, which takes you through the boards in sequential order, or “Random” play, in which (surprise!) you play the boards in a random order. DD also added a pellet counter in the upper-right portion of the screen which keeps track of how many pellets you have left to eat before completing the board." Awesome stuff, again!

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, who says bathroom humor is dead? Certainly not Codemasters and its Funsta.com casual game subsidiary, who are mailing us about, wait for it, a poop-related Donkey Kong pastiche.

Here's the sullied email in question: "I'm reaching out to you on behalf of M80 and Ignited Minds regarding the launch of an online game called Donkey Pong And The Adventures Of Rimdiana Jones. Have you heard of it? If not, it is the first from The Turds collection of roguish comedic characters born from the best of toilet humour."

We actually got sent a lovely poster as a promotional consideration for The Turds, who are apparently some kind of pop culture phenmenon in oxygen-starved parts of the world - also on the site is, uhm, 'Bogger' (yes, Frogger!), and forthcoming very soon is Poobert (ahem, Q-Bert), and amazingly, Dung Beetle Rally - the first game to star dung beetles since Schadenfreude's seminal 'Dung Ho!'. We have no words. But we must scream!

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

MMO egghead blog Terra Nova has a very interesting post on a new lawsuit named Bragg v. Linden Lab over virtual world Second Life, in which it's claimed that Linden "made unauthorized charges on pltf. credit cards, breached an auction contract by allowing the land to auction, accepting payment, and then suspending pltf's account."

However, it's explained of the furore: "It appears from these news reports that Bragg figured how to tweak the URLs for Second Life land actions so that certain plots ("sims") that were on the standby queue could be brought up for auction early and bought at a lower price (about $300 compared to about $1000). According to BNA, after Second Life learned of the sales, it froze Bragg's accounts, cleared the sims of his structures, and re-auctioned the property." So... probably not a groundbreaking virtual land case, and more a EULA sidestep?

[Not lawsuit-related, but very SL-pertinent: we also spotted a whole different thread at Slashdot Games which has some very interesting insight on creating within Second Life from a self-described veteran developer, who claims the SL technology is getting pretty creaky at this stage: "The scripting language is interesting, fun, and somewhat well thought out. If you could use it to write someting that ran locally, you might be able to have something semi decent. but... After it goes thru the server system and out over the net intermixed with all that SL data using Linden Lab's lazy update protocol, you feel lucky to get things to work at all, ending up with everything a primitive compromise."]

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We've been eagerly awaiting the release of Gitaroo Man Live! (the PS2 rhythm game from Inis, the Ouendan folks!) for the PSP, as you can see from a recent GSW post on the subject. Well, the guys frmo Siliconera have reviewed the PSP import version of the game, and all sounds wonderful.

Spencer Yip notes: "The new tracks are the highlight of Gitaroo Man Live since everything else has already been done in the PS2 version. The new songs have a lot to live up to since Gitaroo Man’s soundtrack is one of the best original video game soundtracks to date. Metal Header is the first new song you’ll be able to play. The song has fast lyrics and a happy punk rock feel to it. Also this song has English vocals."

But wait, there's more: "Metal Header has Kira and Gitaroo Man battle a purple robot who turned their back up musicians (comprised of people dressed in panda, rabbit and monkey suits) into bats. Toda Passion is an awesome addition to Gitaroo Man. The song has an island beat to it with bongo beats mixed in. In this stage Puma, U1 and Kira are chasing a cat that is flying in a spaceship. If you’re digging the new songs or any of the other tracks in the game you can freely play them in jukebox mode. It’s the same thing as having a Gitaroo Man CD in your discman." Oo!

So basically, great stuff, and: "Koei announced that they will be publishing this under the name Gitaroo Man Lives! in North America for a fourth quarter release." The world is saved!

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[NOTE: GameSetWatch asked AlistairW of the excellent Little Mathletics weblog to come on board as a co-editor and conduct a number of interviews with diverse personalities exclusively for GSW - from dojin authors to game industry figures. The third in his regular series talks to the folks at John Gillotte about the homebrew DS version of Quake.]

John Gillotte began work on a Nintendo DS port of Quake in late January. The project is far from finished, but it's certainly an interesting look at what can be done in terms of homebrew content for the DS. We spoke to John about the project, and the inner workings of the DS.

What inspired you to attempt to port Quake to the DS?

I got a Nintendo DS at launch so it came with one of those Metroid Hunter demos. I was totally convinced then that it could run Quake and more importantly that it could be fun. I come from the school of thought that the keyboard and mouse is the only way to play a FPS and I know I’m not the only one. Playing the Metroid demo was the first time I played a FPS on a console and wasn’t entirely frustrated with the lack of precision control.
Quake is a great game and I wanted to play it on the DS. So I waited around for a while figuring someone would be adventurous enough to do it. No one did so I gave myself two weeks to put my hands on it and get some results and it worked out.

What made you think it could run Quake? I would assume that the DS would be quite different from a PC in terms of architecture.

Metroid Hunters is on the same order as Quake, at a quick glance I could tell that polycount, texture complexity were about the same. If the DS could pull that off for Metroid, it could run Quake.
Yes, it’s true the architecture is very different but the Quake source code is largely very portable C code. So you could compile it for just about anything that has a C compiler. However it’s not the DS’s processor, ram, or even video cards that differs the most from a computer it’s the ROM cartridges.
Until recently desktop computers didn’t use solid state devices for storage, and by that I mean USB Flash drives. So traditionally computers have RAM which is super fast, and hard drives which are super slow. With that in mind that is how the Quake was designed, to load what it needed all the time and cache what it needed sometimes to minimize the need to use the hard drive. Quake for the computer needed at the very least 8mb of RAM to run, about 2mb for the program code its variables, and the remaining 6mb for the heap which is for loading levels, models, textures, sounds, and additional program data. So with the DS and its 4mb of RAM still requires the 2mb of RAM for program code and its variables, leaving only 2mb for the heap. So the DS is far from having enough RAM to load Quake in the way it did for the computer. Luckily the ROM cartridges are somewhere between RAM and hard drives for speed. So cache turn around is a lot faster and it’s ok to rely on reading something from the RAM cartridge, such as things that are used infrequently or are relatively small in data size per frame such as sound data.

Where do you start with something like this?

I got the source code to GLQuake and looked at it for a few hours to make sure it was feasible. From there I hacked and slashed until I could get it to compile for the DS. From there it was baby steps all the way. Bringing one thing online at a time.

What are you finding easy to work with in the DS hardware?

I’m finding the DS hardware is pretty fast, I am impressed with that aspect of it. The small amount of memory it has is troublesome.

Because the DS only has 4mb of RAM?

Yeah but not just the RAM, the DS only has 4megs of RAM and 512k of texture memory.

What are you finding difficult?

Debugging is probably the single most difficult part though, which wouldn’t be a problem if I had the official devkit hardware. I think that is probably the concentration for the next bit of work I do on it. I’ll take to find or make some nice debugging solutions for it, so I can find errors faster and get statistics. Which will pay off in the long run and for other people’s projects as well I’m sure.

Are there many shortcuts you’re having to take?

Well in the short-term, tons, but that’s somewhat irreverent because I just haven’t gotten to those issues yet. In the long-term, only a few things. Dynamic lighting, it looks like it’s going to be impossible to stick with the original light maps. It’s going to have to change to vertex lighting because of the limited texture memory. The only other one I can think of right now is music. I doubt it would be possible to play the mp3s from the original NIN sound track for a variety of reasons. Perhaps mods or MIDIs might be implemented at some point. I’ll try my best to see what options there are for the music though.

What sort of support for mods are you planning on implementing, and how easy do you think it will be for people to create their own mods?

I don’t plan on implementing any mods but it supports the mods made from back then: Team Fortress, CTF, Action Quake, and a bunch more. The difficulty might be easier than it was originally because there are more tools to choose from.

Has the process of finding out about the DS hardware simply been one of trial and error?

No, not really. I’m using the Devkitpro package for the Nintendo DS. There are good examples lots of documentation and there it’s quite a bit of knowledge in the forums on how to do DS programming. DS scene is newer and isn’t as mature as the GBA scene but it is pretty good and in the coming years will be much more knowledgeable.

Have you made any great discoveries doing this?

No, I don't think I have. I haven't done too much exploration into the DS hardware yet. People have already looked into doing extensions that are very much like OpenGL, which has been good enough up until this point into the project. Most of my exploration has been into the Quake engine trying to figure out how every little bit of that works. Actually that is far less documented than programming for the DS. To be honest there isn't much one could ask for in terms of hardware support for the DS, the guys who have made the programming libraries for it have done a great job.

What equipment are you using for the development?

Only consumer products are what I have access too, including the Nintendo DS a total of about 250 dollars in equipment. So that is a good thing for anyone interested in doing something similar. In specific I have a Supercard SD, 1gig SD card, a passme2 device and of course a Nintendo DS which I happened to flash the firmware with the Flashme.

What’s restrictive about the firmware that you would need to flash it?

Until a few weeks ago it was difficult to boot homebrew from the GBA without doing it. Now there is a new class of devices called “Nopass” which now allow for not needing to flash the firmware anymore.

You’ve mentioned that you’re particularly impressed with John Carmack’s work on the game - what do you like about his coding?

When you account for when Quake was released and the computers it was designed to run on the function of the Quake’s engine is amazing. Say you were to make a list of all of its technology and features it is very impressive, the Quake virtual machine, its own memory manager and so on. However the actual source code is fairly messy and often regarded as spaghetti code. For example using global variables as function parameters is done countless times. Sometimes the naming of objects in the code seems arbitrary. I will say however given its flaws it’s certainly no less of an honor to work with it.

How easy is the WiFi going to be to set up?

I know everyone is concerned with it because they want to death match but it will be one of the easier parts of port. The overall difficulty should be pretty low, that’s because all of the hard work was done for me being someone already made the TCP/IP stack. I plan on doing some WiFi stuff with it soon but initially for debugging then networked game play.

What kinds of people are you looking for to help with the game?

Right now programmers that can hit the ground running, the Quake source code is big and there is no documentation that I could find. I need people who know what they are doing and can figure things out on their own and that need minimal amounts of help.
I have had a lot of people contact me because they want to do art work. I think that is great, but honestly at the moment I don’t need much in terms of art. I’m working with a complete game already that doesn’t need much or any filler art. Perhaps after DSQuake is more mature I could help people get together to make a mod for Quake, maybe even a total conversion. I know a lot of people want to just get their hands on some project and build their portfolio for the game industry and I totally support that.

What kind of time schedule do you have in mind for the release of this?

Honestly I can’t say. No earlier than several months from now unless I get some serious help. It’s really in its infancy.

Posted by alistairw at 1:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We've previously covered the iconoclastic ramblings of veteran UK game journalist Stuart Campbell, and this time he's outdone himself - a lengthy harangue on Sensible Soccer 2006 in which he calls the title "an unfinished, bug-riddled game that's clearly been released at least three months before it was ready, purely in order that it could be in the shops on the first day of the World Cup."

Interestingly, he particular attacks Eurogamer's 9/10 review of the game, claiming: "And the odd thing about the 3,000-word review isn't that it likes the game a lot more than anyone else seems to (there's nothing wrong with that, and if there was then this reviewer would be in a lot of trouble), but that it doesn't take so much as one sentence to passingly address any of even Sensible Soccer 2006's most glaringly obvious problems, omissions, bugs, errors and issues."

So, what? "The most strikingly apparent is the moronic level of the computer opposition. ("The CPU AI is, for the most part, ideally pitched to caters [sic] for every skill level" - EG review). The CPU players are, in fact, absolutely catastrophically dim. Goalkeepers will hurl themselves 20 feet (or, in fact, magically teleport themselves 20 feet, but more on that later) in order to turn a shot that's clearly going five yards wide back across their own goal and/or out of play for a corner, yet will stand dumbly and watch a ball sitting stationary on their six-yard line for 10 seconds while a forward runs half the length of the pitch to smash it past them into the net."

Now, Campbell is certainly a fan of the controversial, having memorably written pro-piracy articles and all kinds of 'against the grain' rants in the past, but he _did_ work for Sensible Software for a while in the '90s, and some of his comments seem, well, not entirely crazy. Anyone played the game and can comment? Or are you all watching the England match?

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

[The 'Game Rag Slapdown' is an exclusive bi-weekly Thursday feature written by The Game Rag's Nathan Smart that's always video game related, sometimes funny ha ha, but mostly funny hee hee (and sometimes funny, period). This week, Nathan Smart and his non-video game playing friend discuss the week's news, in a very special, podcast edition of The 'Game Rag Slapdown.']

I decided this week to do something I've always wanted to do and that's record a podcast with my friend Zachariah. He's a really funny guy and someone who I really like to write with. I couldn't think of anything in particular to podcast about but then I remembered an idea I had a long time ago - a podcast with a video game expert and a comedian. I guess, when you think about it, it's sort of like Loveline except without the incest and fetish.

So, here's this week's edition of the Game Rag Slapdown in podcast form:

DOWNLOAD

A couple of corrections:

-Christian Slater was not in K-9 - that is correct. BUT, he was in a movie called Kuffs (another dog movie) and that is where the confusion was.
-Ellen Pompeo is on Grey's Anatomy.
-Rachel Bilson is on The O.C.

[Nathan Smart is a fake news writer for The Game Rag and really enjoys the benefits of it (no facts, no research, no real interviews). He also does Bobby McFerrin versions of indie rock songs with his one man group Indie Blockedappella. He thinks things are funny.]

Posted by nathansmart at 9:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

OK, we're, like, totally lying, but Wired News' Chris Kohler did indeed post a fun photo-essay about getting Final Fantasy III for Famicom working on his U.S. NES in which he tries to choke himself with pungent NES case smoke.

He explains: "When I said I'd pretty much come up empty on previous thrift-store runs, I forgot that I found a beat-up old copy of the Famicom game Final Fantasy III at a Goodwill for $4. The perfect guinea pig for my experiment, as it's not exactly rare and not in good shape, either. Could I run it on my NES?"

The answer is yes, if there are amusing Ouendan-style cries for help involved, and the following PSA is heavily involved in the whole ether-soaked mess: "Game|Life Safety Tip: If you are going to hold a small piece of plastic in your hand while you set it on fire with a cigarette lighter, make sure to do it on the roof of your apartment building. This will make sure that the acrid black smoke that ensues will dissipate into the atmosphere instead of into your face, and also ensures that your screams of pain will carry farther."

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Intriguing game ludologist Matteo Bittanti has posted a version of his essay 'From GunPlay to GunPorn' online at the Videoludica website, and it certainly charts some fun territory.

The academic paper starts with the quote: ""Happiness is a warm gun (Happiness bang, bang, shoot, shoot) Happiness is a warm gun, mama (Happiness bang, bang, shoot, shoot)" from The Beatles, and then notes: "What is a first-person shooter? It is a digital application, originally created for recreational purposes, resulting from the interaction of four major components: computer, film, television, and military technology, with the latter informing the previous three."

The full paper continues: "In this paper, I intend to examine how a recent first person shooter, Criterion's BLACK (2006) articulates these different components", and there's even a related video presentation [WMV link], along with the full PDF version, to explain more, albeit in a fairly ludological fashion.

[And, to make it clear, it was Criterion's Jeremy Chubb who first coined the phrase 'gun porn' when talking about Black - we heard him get all excited about it an EA preview day a few months back. So in this case, it was the game's makers devising the eyebrow-raising 'unique selling phrase', not the media. British people get overexcited by guns, btw.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We've randomly picked the winner of our VG Pocket 50-game edition in the latest GameSetCompetition, so congrats to the alien cyborg (we can only presume!) named Nerox91.

Martian madman Nerox91 will now be teleporting to his local starcade to play happily with the VGPocket, which works as both a handheld with 2-inch color TFT screen, and (when plugged into a TV!) as a 'TV game'. Also, if you were wondering what the answer was, here we go:

"What year was the Game Boy Pocket released In?
a) 1991 b) 1996 c) 2001"

Yes, yes, Wikipedia is your friend! This isn't the last GameSetCompetition, either - sometime in the near future, we'll be debuting a nice new one thanks to our friends at Konami, yay.

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We spotted this a little while ago, but ex-GSW editor TonyW has done a great job at writing it up: "The PR folks from Canada's Fuel Games let me know that Dead Man's Hand, their latest advergame, has been launched in support of the TV series Deadwood. The series [is] a mud-spattered, gin-soaked view of life and death in an American frontier camp."

Tony concludes of the game: "Dead Man's Hand draws players into the world of the TV show with complimentary activities such as gamblin' and drinkin' and shootin'--it's an example of game-based advertising that's low on the crass and high on the class."

But, as he also mentions, probably the most interesting thing about it is that it uses the Virtools web plug-in, a relatively little used web browser extension which nonetheless can create impressive 3D in a browser, and is also used for a few 2D casual games like several of Flashbang Studios' titles. It's not a top tier Unreal Engine contender, but if you can wrestle it into submission, it seems to make good stuff.

[OFFTOPIC: On the Virtools engine front, here's actually a student competition to make (non-web browser) Virtools engine games right now, rather bizarrely themed around Shiny's Dave Perry, and called "David Perry's Best Video Game Weapon Ever!" But how do we get a 'David Perry - Recommended' "personal stamp of approval", darn it?]

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

According to a report by Chinese Nintendo DS fan site YYJoy, the first bootlegged Nintendo DS games have made their way into the black market. And if eBay's history with the Game Boy Advance is an indicator, these things are going to be duping potentially honest gamers very soon.

Unfortunately, eBay has no real safeguards in place for bootlegged games, so the only protection you have is to educate yourself on the tell-tale signs of counterfeit crap. As a public service announcement, and thanks to photos provided by YYJoy, we're here to help!

First, let's take a look at the front of one of these counterfeits. Now, despite what you may think, Nintendo's manufacturing partners do not use Epson inkjet printers set on "medium" quality to produce DS labels, and they don't apply the labels by hand. So if you see a DS cartridge label that looks like this at your local Gamestop, immediately grab the geek behind the counter by his shirt collar and slam his face into the counter. This will increase his tension meter. If this goes up far enough, you can extort him for money in the name of Don Vito Corleone.

Perhaps the finer points of image reproduction elude you, something typically caused by damage to either the eyes or the brain. In that case, another sure sign of a counterfeit DS game is the numbered code on the bottom of the label. SZGD-20011-A888 is not a Nintendo DS product number. Nintendo DS numbers begin with NTR (a leftover from when the DS was code-named 'Nitro') and end with a region specific acronym, either USA, JAP or EUR. If you come across a Nintendo DS cartridge with a code number like the one pictured, sneak behind the counter and press the O button gently to use CQC and grab the store clerk from behind. Don't press too hard, or you will slice his throat and make a mess.

Not enough? Let's look at the back:

On the left is a dirty horrible counterfeit videogame that may fund The Terrorists(tm), and on the right is a red-blooded apple pie lovin' American Nintendo DS game. Most noticeable is that the metallic pins on the fake are black. This is because counterfeiters use black magic, and have black hearts. Also take note that the Nintendo copyright text, though reproduced exactly, is perfectly centered vertically. In a true Nintendo DS game, the text is slightly above center. If you see a Nintendo DS game in a store with perfectly centered copyright text, open the command prompt and type /report. This will automatically report your find to Nintendo's anti-piracy ninjas, who will take care of the rest.

In addition to being dirty and awful and taking money away from the industry we love, counterfeit video games have a nasty habit of being defective. Remember, these things are cheaply manufactured and meant to be sold quickly, so if your battery decides to die on the day before you take your Nintendog to the state finals, well, it's your fault for buying a counterfeit. We don't seriously expect to see these things popping up at brick and mortar stores any time soon, but as my genuine "NINTONDO" version of Super Mario 2 will attest to, it could happen, and it probably will.

Posted by Frank Cifaldi at 5:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (13)

We got a note from the crazy folks at The ILL Clan reading: "Popular internet gaming news comedy cartoon comes to Upright Citizen's Brigade Theater for a Special Live Performance." And that's just what they're doing, invading New York!

Further explanation follows: "The ILL Clan are bringing the show to the Upright Citizen's Brigade Theater for a live show, performed in real-time. That means the characters will be controlled by the voice actors like 3D virtual puppets, and will be able to interact with the live audience and guest, singer/songwriter, Jonathan Coulton."

Here's the actual location/time, for you NY gamers: "Tra5hTa1k LIVE, Thursday, June 29th, 7pm; Upright Citizens Brigade Theater, 307 W 26th St - $5 (cheap)... Seating is limited-for reservations, please call: 212 366 9176." We previously covered ILL Clan's Tra5hTa1k (for this is what this is!) a few weeks back.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We only cover the most important, vital, and breaking news here, hence a new PRWeb (doh!) press release on Kinyo's Giant Enemy Crab Song and Ridge Racer Remix songs being featured on Spike TV's Game Head show in the near future.

The former is, of course, based around the demo of Genji 2 that took place at Sony's E3 press conference - infamously 'based on famous battles that actually took place in ancient Japan', but also featuring, uhm, giant crabs. C'mon, you've seen the giant crab fever already on GSW (yes, with some extra Kaz Hirai 'Riiiidge Racer' meme-age, too) - now apparently, we get terrible techno remixes. Oh, and a NewGrounds Flash movie called 'Giant Enemy Crab Battle', naturally.

So, this phenomenon has all the early signs of a horrific meme - we're now waiting for 'Giant Crab: The Musical', featuring such classic dance numbers as 'Attack Its Weak Points!', and tragic ballads such as 'It's Not Easy Being A Giant Enemy Crab In Feudal Japan'. Oh dear.

Posted by Simon Carless at 11:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's extremely pleasant to see the Wall Street Journal publishing an editorial praising video games - and even somewhat eyebrow-raising? But nonetheless, a piece named 'The Brain Workout' by Brian Anderson does exactly that.

Anderson references the anti-game lobby, and then notes eloquently: "New media have always met with suspicion: As The Economist editorialized a while back, a "neophobic" tendency dates from antiquity, with Plato's argument in the "Phaedrus" that the relatively newfangled medium of writing corrupted the memory-building powers of oral culture. Of course sometimes the new is bad. Yet the critics of video games are not only conjuring up a threat where none exists; they're ignoring the positive moral lessons and cognitive benefits that many of today's sophisticated games offer."

Also notable: "Most violent games put the player in a familiar hero's role, notes Judge Richard Posner in a 2001 Seventh Circuit appeals-court decision overturning an Indianapolis anti-video-game ordinance. "Self-defense, protection of others, dread of the 'undead,' fighting against overwhelming odds--these are the age-old themes of literature, and ones particularly appealing to the young," Mr. Posner observes." Overall, an excellent editorial that makes us happy that more people in the mainstream media 'get it'. [Via NeoGAF.]

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Compilation Catalog' is a biweekly analysis of retro remakes and compilations old and new. This entry's subject is Space Invaders Pocket, released in Japan in 2005 for the PSP.]

The PSP has proved to be fertile territory for retro-collections, beginning right with its Japanese launch (with Darkstalkers Chronicle: The Chaos Tower). Taito was quick to follow up with repackaged versions of its own efforts, beginning with the Japan-only Space Invaders Pocket. Not to be confused with the later PSP remake Space Invaders Galaxy Beat (by Marvelous Entertainment), SI Pocket includes emulations and ports of eight of the venerable series' iterations, though it's debatable whether several of the titles are really unique entries.

Space Invaders' Background

If you're familiar with console or arcade video games at all, you probably know what's going on here: neatly-arranged rows of alien invaders march across and down the screen (with that inexorable TROMP, TROMP cadence) toward Earth, while the player controls a single ship on the surface that fires back up at them. Space Invaders created a genre and was singlehandedly responsible for arcades' explosion of popularity around the world. The original Space Invaders is present here in its Black & White, Cellophane, Upright, and Color versions, each of which applied slightly different presentations to exactly the same game. SI Cellophane (1978) literally used strips of colored cellophane superimposed on the monitor to lend the illusion of color to the graphics of the original SI Black & White (1978). SI Upright (1978), which moved the game into an upright cabinet from the original's "marquee"-style tabletop cabinet, turned the player's ship and the shelters green and placed a static background of a planet behind the action.

Invadin' The '70s And '80s

Space Invaders Color (again, 1978) was the first time the game was released in full color, though the trick the developers used to turn each row of enemies a certain color looks an awful lot like the bands of cellophane used earlier, as a given row on the screen always turns the objects inside it the same color. Space Invaders Part II (1980) gives the illusion of being a true sequel, but it really just added a new type of UFO, made some invaders split into two when hit, and caused UFOs in stages past the first to drop invader reinforcements.

Return of the Invaders (1985) was the first proper sequel the series received, and it really pulled out all the stops. Developed by (but not credited to) those masters of the bizarre at UPL, it took the basic single-screen shooty formula and added detailed full-color graphics, varied enemy formations and movements, intricate and truly alien invader designs, and new gameplay mechanics. For instance, the ever-present shelters that the player can duck behind now have a tiny murder-hole that can be opened up by a few shots from the player's cannon, while the rest of the shelter stays intact (until it takes enough damage to self-destruct). Plus, by destroying all but a single type of enemy on a stage, the player can trigger a "challenging stage" in which the remaining invaders combine into a large boss enemy that rains destruction on the player and can be destroyed for a tasty score bonus.

When hit, some enemies fly off into space and arc gradually toward the ground, and the close to the ground these are shot, the higher the bonus the player receives. Return is more difficulty and much tricksier than its predecessors, too, especially with a certain enemy whose core is its only vulnerable point - hitting it elsewhere will cause the player's shot to be reflected back after a cleverly-timed pause. With its looping and pulsating enemy formations, spacey-sounding music, and higher rate of fire, Return retains a much fresher, dynamic feel than the stodgy-to-some original does, these days.

Invadin' The '90s!

Majestic Twelve: The Space Invaders Part IV (1990) mixed things up again, adding powerups, new bonus stages and enemies, and a new level branching level flow reminiscent of Darius, Taito's other popular shooting series. In fact, much of Majestic Twelve's look and presentation should feel familiar to anyone who's played other Taito games from the era, as it shared programmers, artists, and composers with several Darius games and the cult-classic shooter Metal Black. As in Return, there are many and varied new types of invaders, and each stage in the game has its own indigenous and nicely-animated invaders (and bosses).

The powerups new to this game include one that adds a faster rate of fire, one that stops the marching of the invaders momentarily, and one that summons the series' traditional shelters (which aren't present initially in this game). Plus, there are several powerups that grant super-powerful weapons that can destroy many invaders at a time and are activated with a second fire button. Between stages, the player encounters the amusing "Cattle Mutilation" bonus stages, in which the player defends a green pasture full of unwitting cows against flying saucers bent on abducting them. Majestic Twelve does go a bit easier on the player than previous Invaders, and the powerups make it one of the more forgiving games in the series. It's also pleasing to the eye, even today, despite the typically washed-out color palette its hardware sported.

The last game in the package is the most colorful of the all: Akkanvader (1995), better known in the US as "Space Invaders '95: The Attack of the Lunar Loonies" is bright and well-animated with sprites that are gigantic when compared with the rest of the series. It's truly a "cute-'em-up," and with its wacky-cartoony style, large cast of playable characters, and the way it lampoons series conventions, it is to Space Invaders as Konami's Parodius is to Gradius. Guest-starring here are two Silver Hawk ships from the Darius series, Sayo from the Pocky & Rocky games and a friend, a stray cat and dog, and two sentient, uh, dollops of excrement, one pink and one blue.

As in Majestic Twelve there are powerups to be collected, and a new charge shot has been added. But Akkanvader moves beyond the single-screen nature of the rest of the series and is a true vertically-scrolling shooter, with proper level layouts and bosses. And even though it was released eleven years ago (and counting), it's as fresh and attractive as any modern 2D game, and a fitting send-off to the series' original run in arcades.

Overall Emulation Impressions?

Each game included in this collection is pixel-perfect in its presentation. The games up to and including Return of the Invaders seem to be emulated, as they retain their coin-operated nature (press the PSP's select button to drop in more credits). Majestic Twelve and Akkanvader lack an explicit credit-feeding button leading one to believe that they were ported instead of emulated. As Return, Majestic Twelve, and Akkanvader are all vertically-oriented games with lengthwise resolutions that exceed the PSP's vertical resolution, they can be viewed in either cropped or rotated modes. The rotated (or "tate") mode in each game can be activated by pressing L and R together. With one's left thumb on the control pad at the bottom of a left-rotated PSP and one's right thumb on the X button at the top, this is not an altogether uncomfortable arrangement, and allows the entire original picture in each of these games to be viewed as it was intended.

Each game has an options menu for setting difficulty, scores for play extends, number of lives, and so forth, and in the front-end menu there's a brief description of each game (in Japanese, of course). The first of each pair (!) of loading screens features a rotating selection of silly illustrations of the titular Invaders involved in everyday activities like singing karaoke, heading off to work, playing arcade games, and so on.

There are some technical problems with the collection, however. When starting any given game from the main menu, a player can expect to sit through various loading screens that last fifteen seconds or more (Akkanvader takes a full thirty seconds). And returning to the main menu can take just as long, giving you double the wait when switching games. This is a relatively early PSP release, and there was indeed much hubbub about the long loading in UMD-based games back then, but this is a little ridiculous. Plus, Akkanvader sports some heavy slowdown when compared with the original, and it pauses for a half-second to several seconds whenever the background music changes (as it seems to be streamed off the UMD).

Conclusion

Most fans of the original would surely be content with a single, definitive version of the original game (Color, perhaps), so for how much longer will Taito continue to repackage all of those revisions of the original as distinct games? And while Return of the Invaders is an eternal classic in this writer's view (and Majestic Twelve very nearly reaches that level), and while the excellent Akkanvader has only recently made it home outside of this collection (in Taito Legends 2 and Taito Memories 2), it's debatable whether this package is worth its roughly-$50 asking price.

[Trevor Wilson is a web developer who indulges his unhealthy obsession with obscure, strange, and unique video games over at his weblog, namako team.]

Posted by trevorw at 4:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The still excellent TIGSource has posted a story about odd-looking PC indie title Gothic Blocks, in which "you guide a character going by the name of Ionesco who must reach the highest altitude possible in ninety seconds."

Apparently, the game was made using the Torque 2D engine, and is "similar to Free Lunch Design’s Icy Tower" - which we also haven't played, though we heartily support any game made by a developer called Free Lunch Design!

As for strategy to do well in the title: "A combination of mouse and keyboard controls can be used. Tap the left mouse button to jump and right click to freeze the ferries. Your avatar will always move towards the mouse cursor. The jump action is only allowed when you’re standing on solid ground or a frozen ferry." This game sounds... odd.

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It appears that it's that time of week again when a new issue of The Escapist Magazine appears, and this time, it goes like this: "There’s no denying China’s eminent presence in the video game industry. How is this existence making an impact? The Escapist takes a look at China’s involvement in the video game industry in issue 49: “New China.”"

From the blurb they sent us: "Feature contributor Thomas Wilburn discusses how piracy is the engine behind China’s economy in “How China Cheats at the Video Game Industry.” In “China Game, China Brain” Simon Abramovitch compares the human brain to game companies as systems of connected elements. And Allen Varney returns with a look at the state of the Chinese online gaming market and how it will soon be number one in “Red Blindness.”"

All of these articles look good - but we particularly enjoy Wilburn's piece, starting: "Standing on the top floor of a large, mall-like shopping center in downtown Xi'an, there was no way for me to know that the shrink-wrapped King of Fighters collection was an illegal copy."

Posted by Simon Carless at 8:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[NOTE: GameSetWatch asked AlistairW of the excellent Little Mathletics weblog to come on board as a co-editor and conduct a number of interviews with diverse personalities exclusively for GSW - from dojin authors to game industry figures. The second in his regular series talks to the folks at Telltale Games about Sam, Max, and more.]

In 1987, Steve Purcell published the first Sam & Max comic, Monkeys Violating the Heavenly Temple. The story of a six foot anthropomorphic dog named Sam and his "hyperkinetic rabbity thing" friend Max, they hit the spotlight in 1993 in the LucasArts game Sam & Max Hit The Road, then went on to Fox Kids' The Adventures of Sam & Max: Freelance Police in 1997. LucasArts announced Freelance Police, a sequel to Hit The Road, in 2002, but the title was cancelled in March 2004.

Shortly after that, in June, Telltale Games was founded by a number of those who had worked on Freelance Police, including proucer Dan Connors, who became Telltale's CEO. After four games in the past two years - Telltale Texas Hold'em, CSI: 3 Dimensions of Murder and the episodic Bone licenced games Out from Boneville and The Great Cow Race - Telltale annouced a new Sam & Max game for Q3 this year, the trailer for which debuted at E3, and can currently be seen on their web site.

As well as getting a chance to discuss the game with Dan Connors, we also passed a few questions the way of senior designer Dave Grossman, another ex-LucasArts employee, whose design credits include Day of the Tentacle.

What's the history of Telltale?

Dan Connors: Telltale was founded in June 2004 by Kevin Bruner, Troy Molander, and myself. We all met at LucasArts where we worked together for years. We left LucasArts in order to start a company building games based on great stories and specializing in dramatic content. Since that time we have funded the company, launched four products. We will be launching the first season of Sam & Max games on GameTap this fall.

Did the working relationship between Steve Purcell and Telltale begin at LucasArts?

Dan Connors: I met Steve originally when we were working on Sam & Max Hit the Road, but we worked much more closely on Freelance Police.

Why have you gone with GameTap for the distribution of the game?

Dan Connors: Because GameTap has a very similar vision to Telltale’s as far as what the future of gaming can be. Turner has been very successful in creating networks and they are putting a lot of resources into ensuring GameTap is a success. From a content standpoint, they've been great to work with because they trust us to create a great product.

Why are you using an episodic method of release for your games?

Dan Connors: For one thing, we're building a company, not a product. When you build a company you need to think about emerging opportunities. There have been many examples of developers not being able to make it because they didn’t control their own destinies. In order to be great Telltale needs to innovate. Being a leader in episodic game production and distribution creates more opportunities for us.

Does this make it easier to listen to feedback from fans and critics?

Dan Connors: Definitely. We consider ourselves an online company, and having a community is very important to us. Having a tight feedback loop with them is critical.

Why are the episodes shorter than those for the Bone games?

Dan Connors: Because they will be coming out on a much tighter schedule.

Does it feel like there's a lot of pressure to get this right?

Dan Connors: If we want to succeed, we have to live up to the expectations of our fans. The pressure is a good thing because it forces us to prove ourselves. That will end up bringing out the best in everyone. I'm more concerned about narrow expectations of what Telltale "should be" or games we "should make." Telltale needs to take chances and try new things to thrive.

What can people expect from the games, interface-wise?

Dave Grossman: Interface-wise, expect a wise interface – guffaw, guffaw, oh, I couldn’t resist, though I’m sure we’re all wishing I did. The games use an intuitive and fairly minimal point-and-click style interface, with an inventory and a few other whistles to support things like driving Sam and Max’s extremely cool car, shooting, and other mayhem. Cranium required, but for the most part you can leave your reflexes at the door.

How heavily is Steve Purcell involved in the project?

Dave Grossman: As these things go, pretty heavily. We email quite a bit about the story and the art, and Steve makes time to come in for some of the story and design meetings, which is extraordinary as I know how busy he is with other projects. He doesn’t just rubber-stamp things; he comes with a lot of concrete ideas of his own. It may not seem like much as I describe it, but so far I’d say he’s been more involved than the creators of any of the other licenses I’ve ever worked on.

On a similar subject, who is writing the storyline?

Dave Grossman: Brendan Ferguson [co-designer on the game and yet another ex-LucasArts employee] and I are doing that, but Steve does have a lot of input. And we’re glad to have it, because Steve’s peculiar sense of humor is the foundation on which Sam & Max is built. (I’ve discovered that trying to channel Steve while writing is really, really fun.)

Who is the game aimed at? Judging from various comments from fans, there seems to be some concern that the game will be aimed at too general an audience to satisfy "hardcore" fans.

Dave Grossman: We do want to be able to attract a mainstream audience, but we don’t want to disappoint loyal Sam & Max fans, either, so the games aim somewhere in the middle (now I know how politicians feel). They won’t have quite the baffling tangle of brain-squeezing challenges that the old, large-scale graphic adventures did – they are simply too small to be that complicated – but they’ll be trickier and stranger than, for example, The Great Cow Race.

Posted by alistairw at 5:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So, GSW was at the 2006 Webby Awards at the Cipriani in New York last night, since sister site Gamasutra ended up winning the 'Games-Related' Webby, yay.

Other nominees in our category were CNET Networks' GameSpot (which picked up the audience-voted People's Voice Award, and who we chatted to during the ceremony), encyclopedic game site MobyGames, IGN Entertainment's GameSpy, and review aggregation site Metacritic. We also ran into the guys from MiniClip.com, who won the People's Voice award for Games for their free webgame site, and were very nice Brits, and one of whom actually reads GSW (hi!).

As you may know, your speeches are limited to just five words if you win a Webby - host Rob Corddry of The Daily Show warned winners that an on-stage attendant would kick them in the balls once for every word they went over! In fact, the full list of 5-word speeches are now up on the site - Gamasutra's is listed as 'heart plus science equals games' - hah, it was actually: 'ART plus science equals games'. But we like their version better, maybe?

But heck, forget about the boring webgeeks who won awards - the highlights were Gorillaz accepting for Artist Of The Year in bizarre puppet form (Murdock and 3D appeared sitting on a balcony like The Muppets' Statler & Waldorf and rambling incoherently in conversation with Corddry.) And then, Prince turned up to get his Lifetime Achievement Award for selling albums online ahead of almost anyone, played a song about being independent and digital (and diminutive and salacious!), and then threw his guitar over his head and walked off stage. Dude. Prince. GSW took some pictures of the 'Purple Rain' guy and the Gorillaz chaps, if you want to see.

Anyhow, we were delighted to win (first time ever, after Gamasutra was nominated way back in 2000 or so!), and we promise to continue to kick ass with Gama, GSW, Game Developer, and all our properties in the near/far future. Also, we saw Prince!

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

A final reminder for today's noon PST competition deadline - we're giving away a crazed pink handheld with a whole bunch of built-in retro-styled games - the VG Pocket 50-game edition!

As you can see from the official website, the VGPocket series works as both a handheld with 2-inch color TFT screen, and (when plugged into a TV!) as a 'TV game', runs on included batteries, and includes a whole bunch of custom-created NES/SNES-style 2D games, with titles as varied as 'Street Racing' (looks a bit like Spy Hunter), 'Table Ball' (looks a bit like Shufflepuck Cafe), Pool Pro (hey, it's pool!), and, uhh, 'Pop The Lop'. Whatever the hell that is. Oh, and 'Road Works', which is a bit Pipemania-y!

So, thanks to the VGPocket guys, we can give away one Retro Classic version of the VGPocket handheld, if you can answer the following multiple-choice, and not terribly difficult question relating to another handheld with 'Pocket' in the title:

"What year was the Game Boy Pocket released In?
a) 1991 b) 1996 c) 2001"

Please send your answers to editors@gamesetwatch.com any time before Tuesday, June 13th at 12 noon PST. There will be only one winner randomly picked from the correct answers, the judges' decision is final, and that's that. Have fun!

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

['Parallax Memories' is a regular weekly column by Matthew Williamson, profiling classic '16-bit' games from the Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, and other seminal '90s systems. This week's column profiles TNN/NHK SC’s 1994 bizarre platformer for the Super Famicom: Umihara Kawase]

Hook

Umihara Kawase is one of the most surreal games that I have ever played. In case you haven't had the pleasure, it's a platforming, grappling-hooking, fishing, action rubber band simulation game. That sounds confusing, though, so just visualize a grappling hook game in which your grappling hook is a fishing lure attached to a rubber fishing line.

The game itself takes place inside of the dream-like world of Umihara Kawase, the name of the main character as well as the game. The name is made up of four kanji: sea (umi), belly (hara), river (kawa), back (se). It is an old fishing proverb that means "sea fish are fat in the belly; river fish are fat in the back." So, now you get the pun, maybe.

Line

The subtitle of Umihara Kawase is, roughly, Rubbering Action Game. With her rubber fishing line and hooked lure Umihara can either catch fish or hook onto walls, platforms, pistons, and treadmills. While it may sound rather plebian, rest assured that this is not your father's fishing.

The creatures all walk around with two legs and range from coelacanths to eels. You can hook them from any angle, and they are rendered momentarily unconscious while you reel them in (how this small girl can fit fish twice her size into her backpack I will never know).

Everything you can do with your hook and line you can do in the first level of the game; you gain no more items or abilities. What you do gain is knowledge from brief visual tutorials before the first levels. They show how to appropriately dodge enemies while hooking them in, swing down from ledges, use momentum, and many other useful actions that you'll probably discount when you first encounter them but become essential as the game progresses.

As you get more accustomed to the level design and enemy placement it’s easy to notice things hidden in the earlier levels. These were put there for master fishermen who know how to get in and out of sticky situations. (Sophomoric, overdone pun removed for my and your sanity. - Ed.) Little ledges just off the edge of the screen, seemingly unreachable, hold extra lives (backpacks). When you first start playing, while you have the abilities to reach these areas, you don't have the experience or skill – but then, when you first start playing you don't really need the extra lives as much either. Each of these little challenges is a puzzle unto itself, and the choice to wager your current life for the payoff of a one-up is entirely yours to make, but be aware that it's quite possible you'll acquire the backpack only to find yourself stuck on a platform with no obvious way off.

And Sinker

The game, like pretty much every good platforming and puzzle game, is one-hundred percent about its level design. Where's that fish heading? How do I get over there? How will I get off of there? Hey, might that be a special warp door? Are my thumbs physically capable of employing this strategy? Sometimes, though, the game breaks this purity, and spawns a fish where you're about to land or too close to another. Unfortunately even if you have your plan of attack routed about as perfectly as it can be the game will occasionally throw a wrench in the gears by randomly spawning fish either into an area that you are about to land on or swing into, or just too close to another enemy to be caught in the remaining time.

Bland, digitized photo backgrounds aside, the game is delightful. From all the silly little details of the walking fish, to the way that Umihara winds her reel and the red and white of the fishing line. It’s difficult to get into, but once the initially steep learning curve is overcome you can really begin to enjoy it. The game received a sequel for the PSone titled Umihara Kawase: Shun. If we're lucky, one of our other guys here at GameSetWatch will take on that one - but for now, if you've got a Super Famicom handy, give Umihara Kawase a try.

[Matthew Williamson is the creator of The Gamer’s Quarter, an independent videogame magazine focusing on first person writing. His work has been featured on MTV.com, 1up.com, Chatterbox Radio, and the Fatpixels Radio Podcast.]

Posted by Matthew Williamson at 7:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

The most excellent (Wyld Stallions rule?) Kyle Orland of VGMWatch fame sends over a note of a new game-related podcast from the NPR, and it sounds pretty neat.

Orland explains: "Thought that the GameSetWatch readers might be interested that National Public Radio is getting behind gaming in a big way with a new podcast, Press Start. It's not the usual NPR style, rather three gamers (myself included) talking informally about gaming culture and issues for 15 minutes every other week. The first episode -- about games as art -- just launched yesterday."

Look out for more updates, no doubt - in the meantime, check out Kyle's report on the sheer amount of Toyotas at E3 - amusing, considering our recent story about the Evo fighting game tournament that's also sponsored by the Toyota kidz. They sure get around, eh?

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Over at one of the Chicago Times' weblogs, there's an interesting piece named 'Sunday Lunch With Larry Hodgson', picking the brains of the Incredible Technologies exec and 'Golden Tee Golf' creator.

People often forget how financially successful the title is - arcades aren't very well in the U.S., but a hell of a lot of bars have Golden Tee machines - and the article notes: "Larry spent his days working at his restaurant kitchen job and then coming home to play with his computer -- remember the Commodore 64? -- until all hours... But, Hodgson says, "I think she kind of got it," when, a couple of years after he took that "day job" with Arlington Heights-based Incredible Technologies, then a small-time developer of video game software for other coin-op manufacturers."

It's revealed: "The company is now an industry leader, with more than 100,000 Golden Tee machines in play around the world." In fact, it's so popular that GameSpot is reporting a special 'home arcade' version of Golden Tee being rolled out right now. In some ways, it's the epitome of 'casual gaming' writ large. With beer and hot wings.

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you haven't been keeping up with the Evo arcade fighting game series, you might be interested to know that, according to a post on Shoryuken.com, the world finals are due to take place at the Red Rock Casino, Resort, and Spa in Las Vegas, Nevada, from August 18th-20th.

Interestingly, this year's competition is sponsored by Toyota and their Yaris car, showing the increasing corporate interest in game competitions, and the prize structure reveals a hefty $65,000+ in prizes, divided up into many parts among the finalists.

FYI, the games being competed with this year are Capcom Vs. SNK 2, Marvel Vs. Capcom 2, Tekken 5, Street Fighter III, Dead Or Alive 4, Guilty Gear XX Slash, and two extras - Hyper Street Fighter 2 and, bizarrely enough, Mario Kart DS. So, lots of fighting and a little karting, then!

Posted by Simon Carless at 10:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Neeto import game blog Siliconera has some excellent Wii-related game cameo news for us, and it relates to our old friend Albatross18.

Firstly, what we know: "Super Swing Golf Pangya, coming out for the Nintendo Wii, was originally developed by Ntreev Soft for the PC. Tecmo quickly snapped up the publishing rights and added in Wiimote support so players can use the controller as a golf club."

But now, what we didn't know: "Since this is a Tecmo game you’ve got to expect some of their mascots in the game right? Players will be able to unlock special costumes to dress up their characters like the Dead or Alive icon Kasumi." Though commenter 'the_importer' notes: "believe that TECMO stated that you actually unlock the actual character, not a costume. So we’d actually be playing with an SD version of Kasumi-chan." Even better for the otaku?

[UPDATE: Game Science's Jonnyram posts in the comments to handily clarify: "The interview with the developer says that it is just a Kasumi costume for one of the Pangya characters. I don't believe any of the popular Tecmo characters will make cameo appearances themselves, though I expect a wide array of costumes will be in the final game." So there!]

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Co-editor FrankC of Lost Levels fame was kind enough to point out a rather fun eBay game ephemera auction, for classic Nintendo Fun Club newsletters.

Though the person auctioning is a little heavy on the hyperbole: "Before any video game web site, before any video game magazine, there was the Nintendo Fun Club! Formed in 1987 the fun club was the magazine precursor to the Nintendo Power magazine", he goes on to note: "Up for auction are the ORIGINAL and COMPLETE volume 1, number 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 issues, welcome letter, and two packets detailing the current and planned future Nintendo Entertainment System games."

It's cool stuff, especially the Zelda issue, but bidding is currently stalled at just 1c - maybe because, in one of the issues: "Word search game has two (of 10) words circled". Uhoh - couldn't he work out any the rest? In the meantime, we wait patiently for bids, oh yes.

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over at the Gameology blog, which we hadn't entirely spotted before, there's a review of Ian Bogost's new book, named 'Unit Operations: An Approach to Videogame Criticism'.

One note of caution is sounded to start with: "Bogost does spend a good deal of his time summarizing the material to which his approach is responding, but a reader not familiar with some of the dominant conversations in literary theory (in particular) may find portions of the text daunting." We've flicked through the book briefly and concur - it's dense stuff!

But overall, it's suggested by reviewer Zach Whalen: "Whether you're serious about studying, creating, or playing video games, this book not only has something valuable to contribute to your understanding, it has the potential to radically reformulate the intellectual terms on which you relate to video games." If you can understand it, that is, heh.

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

[Our Blazing Destiny is a weekly comic by Jonathan "Persona" Kim about our society, cultural postdialectic theory, and video games. And sometimes about hedgehogs that run really, really fast.]

This time round, here's our special Persona explanation of what the heck is going on below: "This comic centers on the wonderful history of Sonic's aural representation. Ever since his first yelps of synthesized asphyxiated pain, Sonic has developed his voice and his appearances for the modern world, showing off his heroism with such choice phrases as 'NOT MY DAY!!', 'LET'S GET 'EM!', 'THAT WAS TIGHT!', and my favorite: 'HEY GUY!!'"

"Following this evolutionary path, my dream for the next Sonic game is to just have Sonic constantly screaming at me in pure Engrish jibberish as he run into walls and consequently clip through the floor to a watery grave. 'OK!' "

[Jonathan "Persona" Kim is sometimes a character animation student at the California Institute of the Arts, other times a ninja illustrator, but in his heart, a true comic artist looking for his destiny in the sea of stars. His path on the torrid road of comics include a quarterly manga on The Gamer's Quarter and his website on the internet drawing hub Mechafetus.com. He'll also be attending Anime Expo this year at the Artist Alley selling a new doujinshi full of game-parodies and random nonsense. Come out and see him!]

Posted by persona at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Every now and again, another sports star wins an event and credits a video game for helping them. This particularly happens in the world of motorsports, and at the weekend, NASCAR's Denny Hamlin credited use of video games in helping him win the major Nextel Cup race in Philadelphia.

Here's what the AP says: "Rookie Denny Hamlin never turned a lap at Pocono Raceway before this weekend. Well, not in reality, anyway. So for his first career Nextel Cup win, the 25-year-old owes some credit to the makers of his video game. "They got every tree on the site, everything's mapped out perfect," Hamlin said yesterday after winning the Pocono 500. "Visually, I know where my letoff points are.""

Presumably, he's talking about EA's NASCAR '06: Total Team Control, in which you can: "Radio to teammates for assistance, while managing on-track partnerships, or take the wheel of a teammate's car in the middle of a race to fend off rivals." And also win NASCAR races in real life!

Posted by Simon Carless at 6:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Over at PressTheButtons, there are lots of details on a press release we also got sent on Friday, but didn't have a chance to follow up on (doh!) - yep, Nintendopoly!

As is explained: "That's right; USAopoly has been granted the license from Hasbro and Nintendo to create a Nintendo-centric Monopoly board game. Get ready to "play" as iconic items such as Mario's iconic hat, Donkey Kong's famous barrel, the familiar Koopa Troopa shell, a majestic Hylian shield, Link's heavy metal boots, and the classic original NES controller all recreated as pewter tokens."

Blogger MattG notes: "This sounds like a great idea and will surely sell plenty of units. As someone who doesn't own any incarnation of the Monopoly board game, I know I'd buy this. Well, if I knew enough people interested in playing on a regular basis. While this is all well and good, let me ask the obvious question: where's the video game version?" Where, indeed! Click through for lots of pics of the playing pieces.

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The inimatable Jeremy Parish has updated his 1UP blog with a Retronauts entry on the Zaxxon series, of all things, but he actually weaves a compelling web around the story of the franchise - from the 1982 arcade original to the 32X 'Zaxxon's Motherbase 2000' (which is actually up on GameTap, we seem to recall!)

Parish raves of the original: "Zaxxon was completely amazing. In 1982, I mean. In an era where Mattel was selling Intellivision's solid-white stick figures as "life-like graphics," Zaxxon was a bold leap into 3D. Of course, Sega would later whip up Super Scaler technology for really impressive 3D, but amidst Pac-Man Fever the isometric perspective of this space shooter was good enough."

But he's limp on the 32X follow-up (and rightly so!), noting: "If you're really jonesing for a Zaxxon clone, Isolated Warrior for NES and Viewpoint for Neo Geo kinda sort have a similar feel. But in the end, there's really just one Zaxxon." Oh, and: "Coda: The fact that Sega and D3 haven't remade Zaxxon for their Sega 3D Ages series is almost criminal... although given the abysmal quality of the 3D Ages series, it's probably the lesser of two crimes."

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Though this title came out some time ago, Somari @ #ic pointed out that there's the opening movie to Japanese PC hentai title Akihabara Otaku School (very vaguely NSFW) up on YouTube.

We mainly link because the Frontwing-developed title, which came out in 2003, has got a _ridiculously_ catchy theme tune arranged by Blasterhead, who is one of our favorite Japanese chiptune musicians - actually, we released his 'Killbots EP', which is entirely done on Game Boy with Little Sound DJ, on our net.label Monotonik.

But the whole opening CG is actually really slick (geeky 'otaku' converging on the Japanese game shopping district Akihabara in trains to hang out with girls and interact with them, most likely in very NSFW ways, though the NSFW-ness isn't really touched on in the intro!) - so... it's fun, and worth checking. Nice fake shooter at the start of the movie, too.

Posted by Simon Carless at 4:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

So, we noticed the folks at The New Gamer commenting on our write-up of the insane Nintendo garage sale find, but in the process, they mentioned: "we are actually planning on starting up the whole game saling report again, and even have the seeds planted for the first thrift-based article of the new year. Until then, our "drunksaling" archives are still available."

So, it turns out the archive is of Chicago thrift/garage sale game hunts, originally inspired by the DrunkGamers site, hence the name, and it's lots and lots of fun to look through - for example, this article from last summer, with tres amusant comments like: "The following sale was ..terribly ambitious, including horribily worn scales selling for $40. Overpriced? Certainly. Did they care? Apparently not."

There are also wholesome lessons derived from each visit, for example: "Lesson of the week: Assemble a list of the games you already own, and make sure to note the condition. This will save you the trouble of buying duplicates, or passing up games you thought you owned but don't actually already own. Case in point: the acquisition of Starfox, a game of which I now own two copies of." So basically, this is almost as much fun as actually going! Looking forward to this year's batch...

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

["I often import games from abroad and play them. On such occasions, my imagination is sometimes stimulated more as I don't understand the language.” – Fumito Ueda, creator of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. 'The Gaijin Restoration' is a weekly examination of underappreciated Eastern games that never cross to Western shores. This week's title is Gunslinger Girl Vol. 2 for the PlayStation 2 released in Japan in 2004.]

Violent Tymes
On November 23rd, 2004, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility revealed their list of the WORST VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES for 2004. Talk about making my job easy; we were ramping up for Cinematech: Nocturnal Emissions (under a different project name at the time) and compiling our own lists of the most violent, depraved, weird and FMV-full games we could think of. Their list ended up being laughable at best and sorely in need of a proof reader. There were games not released yet, games from 2001, and a lone end quote hanging out with San Andreas, no doubt in coercion to go out for some Hot CoCo. The creme de la stupid was the inclusion of Gunslinger Girls 2.

First off, such a game does not exist. Gunslinger Girl exists as Vol. 1, 2 and 3. A small caveat, but still. Also, this game was only released in Japan, based on an anime series that ran in 2003-04 in Japan, and as far as Wikipedia can tell me, was released on DVD in the States in late 2004. This makes me think someone on the ICCR has a kid ankles deep in some sinister torrenting scheme. (To be fair, the ICCR later re-edited their list, leaving the initial lampooned paper as a sort of rough draft.)

So, of course when I recieved Gunslinger Girl Vol. 2, I hoped for heaps of gore, with villains brained, and hopefully, girls hurling guns at rabid okapis, with a bravado and accuracy that screams: "We don't need no freakin' bullets!" Alas, we get a piecemeal shooter on flexi-rails that's as violent and sexy as a sad-sack 12 year old, sweaty yet turgid, trying to sneak into a PG-13 movie.

In Medio Tutissimus Ibis
Gunslinger Girls Vol. 2 starts out with you playing a 14 year old school girl in a lengthy tutorial, followed by another, briefer, tutorial. There are also a few tutorials in between. The gameplay, boiled down to roots and ash, consists of taking cover, reloading, aiming and shooting as an endless army of henchmen as you track down the bosses. Occasionally you shoot thrown grenades or dull scenery that may reveal power-ups. The triangle button and a nudge of the analog stick act as a sort of super-aim, draining a bit from your concentration bar as the aiming reticle snaps onto an enemy, so you can unleash a flurry of iron slugs into his trunk.

This super-aim is the scoring prodigy of the engine, allowing you to dance around several enemies and rack up a sort of combo. The problem is juggling triangle to circle (to shoot) to X (to reload) doesn't have the finger chemistry it should. More importantly, the lock-on feels cheap, when manual shooting is also easy (but carries the weight of challenge) and you can then shoot people in the freaking head, which is much more cathartic. Except the gunshots remind of anemic cult members at the outhouse: strained.

Past the tutorials lay two episodes with 3 sections apiece. Part one has you on Knight Boat right out The Simpsons, chasing down, what I can only assume, is an evil, gorgeous albino girl, through the canals of Venice. A final confrontation places us both on motorboats exchanging shots, instead of the saliva that I may or may not have hoped for. The next level has you chasing a stranger on a train, ending in a shoot out with some dudes on motorcycles right out of Shadow Hearts. And that's all you get.

The End of the Middle

O.K. to be fair, the game has a bit of charisma and replayability, as well as a DVD with four or five episodes of the show, Region 2 encoded. There are a variety of guns to unlock, either through high scores, or killing specific enemies, and what you unlock on one volume can be played in the others, giving the series a bit of a .Hack feel.

As for the charm, when running from one area to another, obviously late for class, you often find yourself under fire with no cover. ROLLING will flash near the score and you can quickly dab the shoot button to do a rolling dive and perhaps flash some scandalous Fruit of the Looms. You can also smash square if you have enough concentration to go into super concentration mode and peg every enemy on the screen. Just don't forget to duck and reload afterwards. Still, the game punishes you in end of mission report cards for using super concentration, but also castigates you for not feathering the triangle button enough.

So, this is a PG-13 experience all around. Maybe if it bundled all three volumes together, sans the anime, maybe it would feel like a game. Or maybe it just needs a GunCon 2 or a Wii re-haul.

[Ryan Stevens is the associate producer on the various Cinematech shows on G4TV, which showcases many of the games written about here. He's been known to do the collaborative blog thing at That's Plenty.]

Posted by ryans at 9:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

One of the more cultish figures in the Japanese video game is Mother/Earthbound co-creator Shigesato Itoi, but interestingly, he's not just a game maker - PingMag has a new interview with him that focuses on his advertising, design, and vegetable (!) businesses.

Itoi explains of himself: "I do a lot of things, but I would say my job title is still copywriter. I’ve been involved with advertising copy for a long time, and been a creative director in my later years. More recently, I work as a producer, a planner, or an organizer." Looks like games (we linked to a skeptical review of Mother 3 on GSW a few weeks back) really are a small part of his circle of interest.

In fact, the interview particularly focuses on T-1 World Cup t-shirt series Itoi is curating, explaining: "I just wanted to invent something between art work and mass production, such as the craft goods in Japan... The world feels like it’s heading to become a place where there is only “things to be used and then thrown away,” or “things impossible to get.”... So I thought about normal T-shirts, that are not so special that they go on display at a museum, but that people look after." An admirable concept!

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Though it's on the Neologasm DS blog and not actually DS-related, there's an excellent post up there illuminating some of the less-known modes of Parappa The Rapper 2 for PS2.

It's explained: "The game has a freestyling algorithm that scores you on extra presses you insert into the pattern. As long as your presses are in time and complicated enough, you can score extra points." But even more so: "The really awesome part, though, is multiplayer. You don't just play the levels competitively, but you play one line from a level over and over in a virtual rap battle of oneupsmanship, taking turns freestyling more complicated patterns until the game declares a winner."

An interview with Parappa visual creator Rodney Greenblat we did for Gamasutra last year detailed why Parappa was in some ways a bit of a disappointment: "I think there was going to be a way to edit the animated vignettes, to mess-up, play backwards or forwards, or re-order the segments because it's all live, not pre-rendered. He was trying figure it out and ran out of time, and I think he got really frustrated with all that."

But it's still darn neat, and actually an under-rated game, in our opinion (SNIP the CUT!), so the attached movie showing some slightly drunken Parappa 2 multiplayer is good to check out if you haven't seen it before.

Posted by Simon Carless at 2:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

['Game Mag Weaseling' is a weekly column by Kevin Gifford which documents the history of video game magazines, from their birth in the early '80s to the current day.]

Since I have about 100,000 words' worth of text to edit this weekend, I thought I would lay off from typing so much and instead just show off my magazine room for a bit.

      

The first two pics cover the dedicated video-game magazines, while the third pic covers the computer magazine section.

These pics were taken back in December, and the magazine collection has grown a fair bit since then, taking on large-scale collections of such illustrious tomes as EGM and Edge, and the end result of it is that the shelves have gotten a lot fuller and I need to reshelve and reorder everything again. Ah well. That, and the ferrets keep on pulling mags off the bottom shelves.

One special note I wanted to make is that Weekly Famitsu, the largest and most well-known console game magazine in Japan published its 20th-anniversary issue last week. The editorial team tends to treat their "birthday" issues pretty seriously, and this one was no exception -- it came with a booklet of all the major "cross reviews" (the review format that they invented in 1987 and EGM liberally borrowed a few years later) from their first era of publication, with further booklets due in later issues.

I am not so mad as to have a subscription to Famitsu these days (and, to be honest, my magazine-collecting budget is at an all-time low right now), but I thought I would commemorate this milestone with a shot of one of my favorite possessions -- issue one of Famicom Tsushin (Famitsu's progenitor), alongside the miniature edition they gave away with issue 800 a couple years back. (I also included a pic of the first issue of Gamest, another 80s game mag that concentrated primarily on arcade games. I'll get to that mag later.)

Like Nintendo Power up until a few issues ago, there is more that is the same with Famitsu between its inaugural and current issues than there is different. There's the worrying amount of strategy, the busy and constantly eye-catching visual design, and arguably the most "paid off" coverage in all of game mag-dom. You could argue that it's really not their fault, though -- since Japanese copyright law dictates that publishers have to get permission for pretty much everything they publish about a game from its creators, mags over there are pretty much forced to have extremely cozy relationships with game makers. (It's the same way with Newtype USA, actually. Since we're technically a Japanese magazine, we're required to get copyright permissions for every bit of visual art in every issue of the mag -- none of this "Oh, yeah, go ahead and take whatever screenshots you want" stuff. It certainly tests your organizational abilities.)

[Kevin Gifford breeds ferrets and runs Magweasel, a site for collectors and fans of old video-game and computer magazines. He owns enough magazines to smother himself with should the need arise, and his secret fantasy is for someone flush with game-publisher stock options to give him a monthly stipend so he can spend a year researching their full history and finishing the site. In his "off" time he is an editor at Newtype USA magazine.]

Posted by Kevin Gifford at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So sure, it's not the 'video game' flavor of games, but Slashdot Games has an informative post on the U.S. Google Puzzle Championship, in which brain-based conundrums are the order of theday.

As is explained: "Registration is open until June 15 for the 2006 Google U.S. Puzzle Championship, to be held Saturday, June 17, 2006—it's 25 or so mind-bending pencil-and-paper puzzles that you have 2-1/2 very short hours to solve. The USPC is a qualifying test to choose 2 members for the U.S. team at the 2006 World Puzzle Championship to be held in Borovets, Bulgaria in October."

But wait - there's more! "For a mild taste of the puzzles try the 2006 Practice Test (as has been noted here in the past, if you can't get the Practice Test open you should probably give the real thing a pass!)." Nope, we couldn't get that far, so we're officially dumb. No spoilers in the comments, too (as if!)

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm sure all of you have been keeping up with Weird Al Yankovic's career, right? Right? Well, for reasons of RSS oversubscribage, GSW has, and it turns out he's released a new parody song, 'You're Pitiful', which apes James Blunt's ubiquitous 'You"re Beautiful' in, well... Al-like style!

The track (which fans think is being left off Al's upcoming album because somebody won't give permission!) starts off, after a good gag about the weird 'pre-vocal' intro : "My life is brilliant, Your life’s a joke, You’re just pathetic, You’re always broke... Your homemade Star Trek uniform really ain’t impressing me, You’re suffering from delusions of adequacy."

But wait, there's some GSW relevance here! Nearing the climax of the song, Al spits the following: "You're half-undressed, eating chips off your chest... while you're playing Halo 2, no one's classier than you." Bungie, what do you think of _that_, huh? Though the game did just reach 500 million online games played, so there are certainly plenty of pitiful, appropriately self-deprecating fans out there. Now, back to balancing the chips on our chest...

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We got news from the folks at Ziff Davis that: "The 1UP Show's summer season has officially begun as of 10 minutes ago" - this was last night, mind you, that's how breaking news we are. But you can go check out the summery-themed videocast yourself, and we're mainly posting this so we can quote the frankly hilarious PR email.

Apparently: "The Summer Break episodes begin with an original new tongue-in-cheek Beach Boys-esque theme song composed by co-producer Jane Pinckard, featuring 70s-retro-style freeze frames of the various 1UP Network staff teams leaping through a sunlit park in San Francisco." What follows is "summer travelogue and outdoor zaniness", apparently! [Also, we noticed that the guys from CGW are too sedentary to jump around quite so much in the intro pics!]

But kidding aside, here's the line-up for the new show, which still seems to be one of the most watchable online video game type things online, so there: " Liberty City Stories got ported from PSP to PS2 this week, and John and Greg explain to Joe why this is a good thing. Ryan's been obsessed with Half-Life 2: Episode 1... Patrick checks out PLAY!: A Videogame Symphony over in Chicago and gets to interview Nobuo Uematsu of Final Fantasy fame, Silent Hill composer Akira Yamaoka, and Bungie composer Marty O'Donnell...Jane tags along with Dana and Sharkey to check out an early build of Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom." Watch and learn!

Posted by Simon Carless at 1:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We like Jiji's Namako Team blog (so much, in fact, that he's starting a regular column at GSW on retro compilations soon!), and right now on it, he's released his regular OCD monthly update on D3 Publisher's Japanese weird-ass games.

Particularly interesting: "The only non-PS2 game in this update, the DS version of The Kanshikikan (or The Investigator) has been released to a warm reception. Developed by D3 stalwarts Tomcat System, the original game involves CSI-style forensic investigation in an adventure-game framework and was published as part of the Simple 2000 series, and this new version has added puzzles that use the stylus to good effect. This looks like a prime candidate for US release, either by D3 America themselves or somebody like Atlus, so let's hope somebody takes a chance on it. ITmedia and GAME Watch have previews."

But also of note: "The Earth Defense Force Tactics (out July 27) has been getting lots of attention lately. Rakuten posted screenshots and the cover art, the official site is up and ITmedia posted a preview. The strategy maps use an overhead 2D view, and the game resembles other hex-based military strategy games like Nectaris and Daisenryaku quite a bit." Amazing round-up, as per usual.

Posted by Simon Carless at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you read GamersWithJobs over the past few months, you'd know that there was an excellent article series, 'The Retail Games', written by Elysium on his experiences as an EB Games manager. Well, now there's a follow-up piece named 'If You Can't Join 'Em, Beat 'Em'.

Elysium notes: "Since posting my original three-part series on The Retail Game, I have received voluminous correspondence in formats digital from people who were left with no shortage of comments and questions... Most common among the messages have been inquiries from would-be entrepreneurs who want to play David and Goliath against the established purveyors of video-gaming accoutrements if, in this particular case, David were an asthmatic, if plucky, gamer and Goliath were an angry, noxious planet hurtling at superluminal speeds toward that gamer."

However, he also comments: "So, you want to start a small video-game retail location, and you want some advice. * Don’t do it! – No kidding, if you have the start-up money, the time, the freedom, and the desire to start your own business, pick something better like independent tech-support or prostitution. The number of hurdles in your way when starting any new business, particularly if it’s your first attempt at entrepreneurship is staggering and unpredictable, but when you consider the multiplicity of additional difficulties involved in staring a gaming retail outlet, you’d be better off dumping your money into Amway or Quixtar." Hah, honest advice that's sassy too, we love it.

Posted by Simon Carless at 5:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Lawrence Wright, aka NFGMan, has been enlivening the fan community for a few years now with his idiosyncratic stylings, and now he's gone and co-produced a book, named 'Character Design For Mobile Devices', which is available for pre-order from the various Amazons, and is published by neat design imprint Rotovision.

Wright comments: "The book focuses on sprites and character design, and portable game devices from the GameBoy to modern mobile phones. It's stuffed full of sprite histories, developer commentary and interviews, a history of mobile game platforms, some pixel tutorials and more exciting stuff besides." Oh, and we happen to know that GSW co-editor Brandon of IC fame helped wrangle a bunch of the content, if that helps your buying decision.

Some of the artists profiled are as follows: "There's an interview with Michael McWhertor, creator of Marios 64, and Sato Takayoshi who ported Sexy Parodius to the Sega Saturn. Army of Trolls, eboy, Jan Halfar, and Chris Hildenbrand - who creates graphics for over 20 games a year - are also featured."

Also, for developers: "Glu Mobile, Jadestone, Game Loft, Capybara and Blue Label Games graciously contributed images, stories, anecdotes and fascinating info about their development methods. The book is jammed with images from their cutting edge games, as well as past releases and several secret looks at unannounced and unreleased titles." Fun!

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So we made it back alive from the Game Advertising Summit, and have posted a couple of extra write-ups over at sister site Gamasutra, but here's some random highlights that we're far too tired to write up properly, but you might dig.

- If you ever get a chance to see EA Chicago's Kudo Tsunoda talk, do it! He's a hilarious natural public speaker, and his riffing on how EA got 'The King' from Burger King into Fight Night Round 3 (complete with disparaging comments about hardcore gamer forum weenies who, in his mind, whine overly about the product placement) was pretty darn hilarious. He also mentioned that EA Chicago is working on a next-gen version of the Def Jam wrestling games in which there's lots of licensed clothes and bling, and you can get virtual clothing in-game, and then click a button to order those same exact clothes in real life - whoa.

- Nielsen VP Emily Della Maggiora had some really interesting new stats she's researched on in-game ads per platform - in particular, when asked if they felt games were more realistic with real ads placed in them, 29.7% of Xbox 360 owners strongly agreed, vs. just 14.3% of PS2 owners and just 11.4% of PC owners. Even more so, an insane 50% of Xbox 360 owners said that real ads make them more interested in the game, versus just 29.9% for Xbox and less than that for PS2. This may be down to the amount of hardcore gamers and/or the amount of suitable sports and racing titles on X360 right now, of course, but it's still impressive in showing acceptance for _relevant_ in-game product placement/ads.

- The publishing panel that I moderated (featuring Activision, THQ, and Midway reps) was enlivened by the last-minute addition of Julie Shumaker, EA's in-game ad czar, who had some interesting comments on the current well-integrated 'static' product placement in games. If you go with static ads that are woven into the game, this tends to work much better in terms of authenticity, but of course, you don't know how many copies the game is going to sell when you sign the contract.

Shumaker noted that all EA's product placement deals have minimum shipment amounts, and they've only failed to reach those once in 5 years, but also noted that the minimum ship for last year's Need For Speed was stipulated at 3 million units across all SKUs, but the game actually shipped 11 million - great for the advertisers, but hardly the best financial deal for EA, since they're giving away all those extra eyeballs for 'free'. Woops.

Posted by Simon Carless at 7:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

For those wondering why updates will be a little bit slow today, that's because we're at the GDC Focus On Game Advertising Conference in San Francisco (both reporting on for Gamasutra, and moderating a panel), thus... you won't see so many wacky NES garage sales posts!

Nonetheless, the Microsoft keynote, as covered on Gamasutra, is actually pretty neat - Microsoft's Kevin Browne commented that the company's wholly owned Massive Inc. subsidiary is "reaching out to Sony and reaching out to Nintendo" to help get a standard for in-game ads, and commented that completely different ad serving technology would simply not work, he believed: "We're going to hold ourselves back."

So, in other words, Microsoft wants to set the standard, which could be a big deal for making in-game ads more prevalent (and relevant). Oh, and in other news, Frank is at the Sex In Games Conference, so were he to post, it'd probably be much more 'perky'. But also NSFW, so there! More later..

Posted by Simon Carless at 12:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)