The periBorg OreCommander: Vibrate your way to gamer nirvana
At last! Now I will finally be able to beat the computer at Track and Field!
Gaming
Post-GDC Rant
Games * Design * Art * Culture – This is getting lots of linkage around the game-o-sphere but it’s worth repeating yet again.
How many of you were at the Microsoft keynote?
I don’t know about you, but it made MY FLESH CRAWL. The HD Era. Bigger. Louder. More photorealistic 3D. Teams of hundreds. And big bux to be made.
While it didn’t make MY FLESH CRAWL, when I read the Microsoft speech, I thought the same thing echoed here. I don’t want to have to buy a new TV just so I can enjoy the next generation of consoles. I still think there’s a lot of life left in the current generation of machines. The PS2 might be on its last leg but it’s still getting quality games this late in its life (see: Katamari Damacy). After playing Resident Evil 4, it is evident that there’s A LOT of muscle left in that little cube. But that’s not the point of Greg’s rant.
We really don’t need whiz-bang graphics and Dolby 92.3 sound. We need games that are fun and engaging. Game developers, under the current video game publishing conditions, aren’t free to develop such innovation. Instead we get rehash after rehash. As a Nintendophile, I can’t say Nintendo is exempt from this criticism. It remains to be seen if Mario 128 can bring new innovation. But the points made here valid and somewhat hard to swallow. Even though he backs off his inital Iwata spanking, it was still pretty harsh.
Go read the whole thing. While it does seem like a lot of talk and not as much in the way forward, it may be the catalyst that gets the ball rolling.
Nintendo and the Revolution
Hopefully everyone’s already seen, read, and digested RFA’s interview over at 1up.com. Definitely some good stuff, but the most important quote I gleaned was:
RFA: … The whole Internet gaming piece, we missed the boat on GameCube. We won’t miss the boat in the future.
1UP: So is this an admission that you should have supported it more heavily?
RFA: (laughs) You know what? This is Reggie Fils-Aime, a year with the company, who wasn’t around when those decisions were made. I can tell you, as a consumer, I miss it on GameCube.
At first I toed the company line, thinking online console gaming wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Then I played Halo 2 on Live and my eyes were opened. It was love at first sight. But that love slowly became a mild infatuation because of game after game playing with immature (yeah, I said it) gamers, kids, trash-clowns, whatever you want to call them, playing Halo 2. In principle, I am converted to online gaming. I think Microsoft has done a wonderful job in bringing the vision to the masses. Unfortunately, online gaming still has a way to go. For one thing, it needs to grow up. I agree, for the most part, with fenegi at Video Fenky:
One thing Nintendo does have right this generation: Online gaming really is pointless. Since everyone is a shithead, you only play with people you know, and can’t you (usually) do that around the couch in real life anyway?
– fenegi (Video-fenky)
The interview at 1up is great, but like thousands of others, I was looking forward to Iwata’s keynote speech at GDC. Everyone knew he was going to drop a bombs on all gamers (and it turns out, non-gamers, too).
As soon as I saw Kotaku (I’m listening to the podcast as I type this. This guy is a genius.) had any tidbit about Iwata’s speech I read it right away. Brian summed up what he had recounted:
I’ve got to go breath in a paper bag for a minute before I pass out.
I, too, was swooning. Revolution was going to be backwards compatible with my beloved Gamecube collection? DS and Revolution online? I wanted to rush home and blog all about it. I decided to let my mind mull it over for a while. Thoughts of online Animal Crossing or NCAA 2006 were daydreams. But are they? I’m not ready to make any predictions or rash judgements. I’m going to sit back and watch this develop. For now, just go and download the podcast.
AFK Gamer and collaborative blogging
Foton over at AFK Gamer is considering a really cool idea for those of us in video game blogging (actually, for anyone who loves gaming). You can read about it here, but the gist of it is:
One weekend, a collaborative blog. Anyone that pre-registers can post. It’s an orgy of gaming in whatever game you choose. The objective is … a stream of conciousness on your gaming experiences for the weekend.
I think this good be pretty cool. As I said over at his site, it would be great to see what the other gamers out there think. Hopefully everyone who participated would be mature and civil, no lame fanboy ranting and bashing. Meaningful dialogue, funny anecdotes, good ideas and constructive criticism would be cool to see.
If you’re interested, leave a message over at his site and we’ll see where this goes.
GameCube and the Reggie-lution
GameCube: The Nintendo Minute: Vol. 6: Quotes like this give us Nintendophiles such hope:
And finally, in speaking directly on what Sony and Microsoft did well — Sony launched aggressively with a strong third-party line-up, and Microsoft nurtured community with its Xbox Live service.
That is from The Leader of The Reggie-lution, Fils-Aime, a Nintendo VP (and VIP). We get these glimpses, and we hope.
Oh, how we hope.
Some thoughts
After spending most of the week playing with WordPress, I’m finally able to do some real blogging.
I’ve been playing two games this week – Halo 2 and Animal Crossing. Guess which one I’m playing with my two-year-old? She loves when I catch fish and always cracks up when I get an old shoe or a tin can. “You have to go to the dump, daddy!” She didn’t particularly like me getting stung by the bees I rudely awoke by shaking their tree. “What’s wrong with his eye?” There has been some recent mentions of Animal Crossing lately: there’s the kid that proposed to his girlfriend via Animal Crossing’s in-game mail service. How cute. Jane at Game Girl Advance mentions playing AC with the animals asking her about how her ex-boyfriend was doing. Freaky.
It is weird how our Animal Crossing town, “pooptown” (I know, how original), continued down its virtual path even though my wife and I hadn’t played for over seven months. There were a couple pooptowners who hadn’t talked to my wife’s character for almost two years. But they happily lived their lives, oblivous to our abscence. Didn’t anyone send out a search party? Wasn’t anyone worried that tony and bella hadn’t been heard of in months? And the police officers? Don’t go there. Those lazy bums didn’t seem to notice were gone. But that creepy fat guy in the station still follows us around like a hawk.
Though the weapons are supposed to be more balanced than in the first, they invariably end up feeling rather impotent and bland, and the weapons that most teams scramble over each other to get at are the sword and the rocket launcher, leaving those unequipped or unwilling to use them with no truly effective countermeasure (ie. a powerful, universally distributed mid-range rifle, etc.).
This is so true. I played on Live last night with some friends and it continually dawned on me that I was always looking for the rocket launcher/energy sword/shot gun. As soon as I spawned I knew exactly where I could go to upgrade my SMG. 7hr33 refers to the “the chaotic hail of bullets” (or bullet spam, if you will). So true. A fire-fight usually becomes a “I hope I pulled the triggers first”. Nothing is more frustrating that getting your bullet spam on with someone and a third party enters the fray and picks up the scraps. That’s not skill, that’s luck. One thing Halo taught me was patience. Take your time, pick your shots, go for the head, ease on back if you’re losing the upper-hand. One thing Halo 2 is teaching me is to run and find other people fighting with each other so I can have some easy pickings. Strategy and skill has been dumbed down in Halo 2, which is unfortunate, because it was done so well in Halo.
And I am really becoming disenchanted with Halo 2 on Live. It’s the same frigging three games, over and over. Assualt on Burial Mounds, Team Slayer on Coagulation, one flag CTF on Zanzibar. It’s becoming less and less fun. It’s still good for an occasional Rumble Pit, but unless I’m playing with friends, I doubt I’ll be playing on Live as much as I used to.
Playing the single player missions are still enjoyable, I’m having fun. I still think Halo 2 is a great game, don’t get me wrong, it’s just not a great game.
New Kids on my Block, Part #3 (BlogExplosion-style)
When I first started buttonmashing.com (I still can’t decide if I should capitalize the “B” and “M” in the name) I was looking for ways to attract visitors, so I signed up for an account on BlogExplosion (< -- my referral link, if you're interested in joining). Basically, BlogExplosion is a click exchange - you read my page and I'll read yours (for 30 seconds). I still use it occasionally, but they have a good directory of blogs, broken down by categories. I spent some time going through the list of gaming blogs and came across a few that I was unaware of and I thought I might as well share the game blogging goodness. 
SpaceWorld looks like a blog I can relate to — he seems to love Nintendo, is a Conservative, and loves video games. That’s the trifecta for me!
I’ve been meaning to use my Bloglines to do a better job of organizing the blogs I read and one of the categories I want to add is one of “industry people”. I just found one of the first one’s I add: 3rd World Game Designer. Besides my fascination with all things Asian, this blog is a great read. Definitely one I look forward to having on the list!
Another Nintendo-phile, 4 Color Rebellion is heavy on the Nintendo side of gaming but has a great looking site, replete with reviews and great commentary.
I love watching the MMOG community through the eyes of the players. AFK Gamer is definitely my favorite, but Cabbage looks like he also will keep me updated on goings-on in other MMOGs. Great.
(On a side note, I noticed I was recently linked to by roXatopia as a “MMOG” gamer. Since I have played my share of MMOGs, I guess I qualify for that title but I haven’t played one regularly since I quit Neocron. Nevertheless, I appreciate the linkage, and I have been eyeing Guild Wars for a long time, so I may once again join the ranks of the MMOGs.)
We here here at buttonmashing.com are without borders, and yet we don’t have a ton of international flavor here. So with that in mind, we will be reading Geemusentaa for a Aussie point of view. And don’t ask, what the name means, just read the blog.
That raps up another edition of the New Kids. I hope you enjoy!
GameCube: RE4 the Best Seller in January
“Capcom’s M-rated scare-fest debuted in Japan a couple of weeks ago and has sold an additional 180,000 in the region since, according to overseas data. Combined with US numbers, the game is already set to topple the 500,000 mark on a global level.”
This is great news. Rewarding a fantastic game with good sales its the best way to ensure top-notch talent is rewarded for their top-notch work. I am hoping this means more of Leon S. Kennedy. While those numbers aren’t in the GTA/Halo 2-osphere, they are pretty dang respectable.
Midway Arcade Treasures 3 – Screen shots on WORTHPLAYING
My top 3 arcade games of all time are Smash TV, Super Off Road, and Galaga. It is blasphemy to think a console could ever recreate the thrill of playing Galaga, so I avoid all “remakes” of that game. But both Smash TV and Super Off Road are easily translated to the TV screen, so when I heard Midway Arcade Treasures would have SmashTV as one of its games, I was immediately sold. I owned it the day it came out and me and my brother-in-law played the heck out of SmashTV. I wasn’t too keen on Midway Arcade Treasures 2 (although I may pick up a used copy) but when Arcade Treasures 3 was announced, I noticed Super Off Road on the list. Once again, I am sold. I must play Super Off Road. It’s like my destiny and stuff.
For your viewing pleasure, here are a few screen shots of Arcade Treasures 3, along with a nice little trailer. After watching the trailer, I’m pretty pumped to get some Super Off Road action in. None of that 3D off-road rubbish.
Tales of a Scorched Earth: World of Warcraft big in Europe
I still have an internal struggle about joining in on the fun of WoW. But for right now, I think I agree with gatmog, at Tales of a Scorched Earth. He says:
“Due to its level of accessibility and favourable conditions for short game sessions, I plan on getting into World of Warcraft eventually. However at this time I’m finding it more beneficial to observe this growing community from the outside.”
Same here.