Tag: Videogames

Yasumi Matsuno Leaving Level-5

My morning started off with the depressing news that Yasumi Matsuno is leaving Level-5 and taking a long break from game development. Matsuno is one of my favorite game directors/developers of all time. He dazzled RPG fans with his excellent Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre games before being handed the keys to the big car — Final Fantasy XII. As many of you know, FFXII’s development cycle was disastrous and took a huge toll on Matsuno’s health. I had high hopes that Matsuno would revive his career at Level-5, but his return to glory has taken a detour. Here’s the (translated) word from Gematsu:

I’m sorry to report, but due to personal reasons, next month I’ll be retiring from Level-5. Having finished production of 3DSWare domestically and in North America and Europe, it’s at a good point time-wise for me to retire.

Even though it was for a short period of time, I was able to work hard without any gross mistakes. I am extremely grateful for the gift of genial teaching I received from everyone. Over and over again, thank you so much. I plan on taking a break for a while. I’m very thankful to have your support from now on.

Well…that just sucks. While I hope Matsuno can find some peace and happiness, I selfishly want him to dazzle me once more with an epic RPG. I’m just going to sit here and vape while I patiently wait for another Matsuno classic. *pout*

Source

Karateka Remake Available on XBLA

Karateka is now available through Xbox Live Arcade. This is an updated version of a classic game made by one of the industry’s true living legends — Jordan Mechner. The game is a boy-rescues-girl tale filled with martial arts combat. I fondly remember playing the original on my Commodore 64 and was struck by its simple, yet effective, storytelling. At the time, I thought videogames were about bouncing balls off of bricks, shooting alien invaders, and gobbling up ghosts. I had no idea games could tell stories!

The remake’s art was headed by Jeff Matsuda, a longtime Marvel Comics penciller known for his runs on Wolverine, X-Men, Generation X, X-Factor, and Avengers. It has a cool, cartoonish look that retains some design elements of the original work.

Karateka costs 800 MS points, which I believe is $10 to normal humans.

I’m psyched to play a modern version of the game. Mechner is awesome and I’m looking forward to his fresh take on one of his classics. Any of you guys and dolls intrigued by Karateka?

Green Throttle Wants Your Phone To Be Your Console

Bay Area company Green Throttle Games aims to combine the portability and power of mobile phones with a full-on console experience. The company was formed by executives with experience at RedOctane, Nokia, Palm, and more. How Green Throttle works is that you connect your phone to your television and connect a Bluetooth controller — dubbed Atlas — to your phone. It will have first-party games that take full advantage of the setup, while also offering tools to help third-party developers make their games compatible  with the controller. There will also be an Android app that will help users find games that are compatible with Green Throttle.

Leading the way is CEO and co-founder Charles Huang. He was COO and co-founder of RedOctane, famous for the Guitar Hero games. Huang is accompanied by president & COO Matt Crowley, who has product experience with Nokia, Palm, and Philips Electronics. Rounding out the team is vice president & CTO Karl Townsend, one of the founders of Handspring with experience at HP and Palm. As you can see, the company has experience in both gaming and mobile. Huang helped create one of the biggest videogame crazes in the last decade, while his COO and CTO understand the mobile space and working with mobile developers.

The early reactions to Green Throttle have been interesting. Some pundits think it has a big advantage over the competing Ouya system in that a separate box isn’t required. Some believe that Green Throttle’s first-party games are the make-or-break feature of the system. Technology and convenience will only get you so far. Systems like Green Throttle and Ouya need great games in order to thrive.

What are your thoughts on Green Throttle. Are you interested in the product? Do you think it will succeed? Please let me know in the comments section!

GameStop VP Guilty of Embezzling $2-Million

Former Gamestop vice president of corporate communications and public affairs Chris Olivera was a bad boy. For some reason, in addition to being the company’s #1 flack, he also processed invoices from vendors. Olivera has plead guilty to using his paperwork prowess to siphon money — $2-million!!! — to a dummy LLC. Here’s the scoop from the Dallas Observer:

The scheme was simple. According to a federal indictment filed yesterday afternoon, Olivera sent regular payments from Gamestop to Cloud Communications, LLC, a Nevada-based corporation with offices in Las Vegas, Lake Tahoe and Canada. The company, and its supposed representative, Jennifer Miller, existed only on the papers Olivera had filed with the Nevada secretary of state.

This went on for nearly two years, from July 2009 through April 2011.

Wow. This is like Enron / JP Morgan / Bank Melli-type crazy. While executive scumbaggery doesn’t surprise me, I naively thought that the videogame business wouldn’t suffer from a scandal like this for at least another decade. That’s totally me romanticizing the gaming business. I should know better. How about you? Any of you surprised by the Gamestop embezzling scandal?

Source via GI Biz

Coffee Talk #536: Games and Pro-Wrestling on Sports Television

Yes, you’re getting two Coffee Talk columns today, which makes this…Double Bonus Monday!!!

On a recent episode of ESPN’s Around the Horn, host Tony Reali talked about how the Philadelphia Seventy-Sixers’ “Big Bella” t-shirt canon resembled the spread gun from Contra. This prompted the show’s Michael Smith to recite the famous extra-lives code from the game. It was awesome seeing videogames being treated reverently by adults on mainstream television.

During ESPN’s pre-game show for the Los Angeles Lakers vs. the Los Angeles Clippers, host Michael Wilbon was talking about…more

Welcome to Coffee Talk! Let’s start off the day by discussing whatever is on your (nerd chic) mind. Every morning I’ll kick off a discussion and I’m counting on you to participate in it. If you’re not feelin’ my topic, feel free to start a chat with your fellow readers and see where it takes you. Whether you’re talking about videogames, T-Mobile’s amazing $30 plan, dreaming of Lanikai Beach, or coconut sugar, Coffee Talk is the place to do it.

Yes, you’re getting two Coffee Talk columns today, which makes this…Double Bonus Monday!!!

On a recent episode of ESPN’s Around the Horn, host Tony Reali talked about how the Philadelphia Seventy-Sixers’ “Big Bella” t-shirt canon resembled the spread gun from Contra. This prompted the show’s Michael Smith to recite the famous extra-lives code from the game. It was awesome seeing videogames being treated reverently by adults on mainstream television.

During ESPN’s pre-game show for the Los Angeles Lakers vs. the Los Angeles Clippers, host Michael Wilbon was talking about the storied history of Madison Square Garden. He mentioned events like Ali vs. Frazier I and John F. Kennedy’s birthday taking place at the “world’s most famous arena.” The show’s Bill Simmons — my favorite sports columnist of all time — mentioned that Hulk Hogan vs. The Iron Sheik should be mentioned along with those events, saying that it was one of the biggest matches in pro-wrestling history. Loved it.

When I first started writing about videogames in the ’90s, they were still considered geeky and nerdy. Back then, some people viewed pro-wrestling a “hick” thing. The WWE Attitude Era and the Monday night wars with WCW helped pro-wrestling achieve mainstream status, while the Sony PlayStation made videogames cool. Of course it helps that people like Reali, Smith, and Simmons — people that grew up with videogames and pro-wrestling — now have “adult” jobs. Watching those mentions on ESPN made me appreciate how far these forms of entertainment have come.

That said, the battle isn’t over yet. While many young adults and middle-age people have grown-up jobs in the private sector, there are older people in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives that are out of touch. They still view pro-wrestling and games in a negative light. The good news is that I’m sure that won’t be the case ten years from now.

Anyway, it was nice to see the progress of two of my favorite hobbies realized on ESPN programming.

What are some instances you’ve seen of pro-wrestling and games being taken seriously by mainstream television? Kindly leave some examples in the comments section.

This Week’s Videogame Releases

It’s a huge week for the gaming business with Microsoft’s launch of Halo 4 leading the way. It will surely be one of the biggest releases of 2012. Are you buying it? Racing fans get a pair of goodies with LittleBigPlanet Karting and NASCAR The Game: Inside Line. Do you miss fighting alongside Goku and the gang? Then pick up Dragon Ball Z Budokai HD Collection and raise your power level to over 9,000. Not into shooting, racing, or fighting? How about some farming with Harvest Moon: A New Beginning? As a tactical-RPG mark, I have high hopes for Ragnarok Tactics (hopefully I can find my PSP). Lastly, if you’re looking for the most bang for your buck then you should consider Mass Effect Trilogy and Saints Row The Third: The Full Package.

Any of you picking up new games this week?

Kevin Dent vs. The Hip Hop Gamer: More Shots Fired

Kevin Dent’s assault on Gerard “The Hip Hop Gamer” Williams continues. Everyone have their popcorn? This time around, Dent says that Williams’ work as a rapper and performer for videogame publishers conflicts with his role as a journalist. He implies that Williams is paid for promoting videogames, while running a web site that critiques them. Here’s an excerpt from his latest blog:

The guy could be the Mozart of rap and I am not discounting his lyrics! I am not saying that he is a bad rapper, I am saying that he is in receipt of income from these publishers.

Well he has a …. Well apparently a track- and YET as a journalist, he promotes the title…. Hello, conflict of interest? Well no, not unless he got the Money :D

The big question is whether Williams is paid by publishers or not. I have no idea if that’s the case. If it is, then I understand Dent’s point. If not, things are more nebulous.

For my part, when I was writing award-winning scripts for games, I didn’t review them. It would have been a conflict of interest and nobody would have trusted me to be objective since I was responsible for a small part of those games. Having a song featured in a game or performing at a promotional event for a game isn’t quite the same thing, but there’s involvement there that would cause people to question objectivity.

How do you feel about the issue? Do you think it’s a problem that The Hip Hop Gamer performs for videogame publishers and reviews games sold by those publishers? Or do you trust him to be objective? Perhaps you don’t care at all. Leave a comment and let me know (please!).

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Coffee Talk #535: Make Your Own WWE 13 DLC!

Last week, RPadholic N8R was kind enough to list the upcoming DLC for WWE 13. The list got me thinking, and suddenly I thought up of my own dream DLC packs. It was a fun exercise, though I imagined too many drug-related packs (The Drug Traffickers, led by Jeff Hardy) and way too many packs based on dead pro-wrestlers. Today I’m going to list four of the DLC packs that I came up with and I’d love to see ones from you. In the immortal words of Michael Wilbon, “Let’s do it!”

WWE Diva Playboy Spectacular
Sable — The first high-profile Diva to go nude in Playboy.
Torrie Wilson — The muscular girl next door.
Ashley Masaro — Surprisingly good spread.
Maryse Ouellet — Technically she was in the magazine before her WWE days, but wow…you need to Google these…more

Welcome to Coffee Talk! Let’s start off the day by discussing whatever is on your (nerd chic) mind. Every morning I’ll kick off a discussion and I’m counting on you to participate in it. If you’re not feelin’ my topic, feel free to start a chat with your fellow readers and see where it takes you. Whether you’re talking about videogames, the magic of NOALOX, hugging a piece of consumer electronics goodbye, or crushing on Rashida Jones, Coffee Talk is the place to do it.

Last week, RPadholic N8R was kind enough to list the upcoming DLC for WWE 13. The list got me thinking, and suddenly I thought up of my own dream DLC packs. It was a fun exercise, though I imagined too many drug-related packs (The Drug Traffickers, led by Jeff Hardy) and way too many packs based on dead pro-wrestlers. Today I’m going to list four of the DLC packs that I came up with and I’d love to see ones from you. In the immortal words of Michael Wilbon, “Let’s do it!”

WWE Diva Playboy Spectacular
Sable — The first high-profile Diva to go nude in Playboy.
Torrie Wilson — The muscular girl next door.
Ashley Masaro — Surprisingly good spread.
Maryse Ouellet — Technically she was in the magazine before her WWE days, but wow…you need to Google these.

Sex-Tape Sultans
Chyna — She’s an adult-film star now, but she made tons of waves with “1 Night in Chyna.”
Sean “1-2-3 Kid” Waltman — Chyna’s costar.
Hulk Hogan — Caught on film sleeping with his best friend’s ex-wife.

The Dog Pound
Junkyard Dog — JYD was awesome.
“Mad Dog” Vachon — A total bad ass, even though his real name was Maurice and he was 5′ 7″.
“The Road Dog” Jesse James — Oh, you didn’t know?!?
“The Dog-Faced Gremlin” Rick Steiner — A total suplex machine in the NWA/WCW days.

Figure-Four Phenoms
“The Nature Boy” Ric Flair — The signature hold of the best pro-wrestler of all time.
“The Nature Boy” Buddy Rogers — Often cited as the inventor of the “figure-four grapevine.”
Greg “The Hammer” Valentine — For many WWF fans that didn’t watch NWA, he was the master of the figure-four.
Jeff Jarrett — Every group needs a bitch.

Those are just four of the DLC packs that I imagined. I’m sure that you could come up with better ones, so give it a go! Please use the comments section to list the WWE 13 DLC packs of your dreams.

Kevin Dent vs. The Hip Hop Gamer (Shots Fired!)

This is a total insider thing, but it’s thoroughly entertaining and I wanted to make sure you read it all. In a recent blog post, gaming-industry veteran Kevin Dent called out controversial journalist Gerard Williams, also known as The Hip Hop Gamer. Here’s an excerpt:

Allow me to explain a dirty little secret; no one in the industry actually believes that Hip Hop Gamer is in any way important. We tolerate him as though someone would laugh and roll their eyes at any child that pretends to carry a big stick.

The giveaway was when Penny Arcade Report wrote a piece about Fake Twitter Followers, I was genuinely shocked that Hip Hop Gamer had 75% fake followers.

Obviously these guys were wrong, this was a guy whose raps were in Twisted Metal, there is no way a journalist who had gotten money from a publisher to appear in video games deserved to be assaulted like this. He is obviously independent.

To be honest, I like both of these guys, but also understand why a lot of people have problems with them. I consider Kevin a friend (even though he’s a dick for not listing me as one of his “heroes in the video game journalism space”). He’s smart and charming — one of my favorite people in gaming to have a drink with while discussing nerd matters. I’m proud to defend him when some of my industry friends question what he’s done. That said, he can be an overzealous troll on Twitter. Some of his Twitter attacks have made me wince. I can only imagine how his detractors perceive his tirades. He’s also somewhat secretive and doesn’t boast about what he actually does, which causes some people to question why he rubs elbows with so many important people. He’s like a Marvel mutant — some people fear and hate him because they don’t understand him.

I like Gerard too. He’s fun to chat with and I admire how many people he reaches as The Hip Hop Gamer. With limited resources, Gerard has built a large audience for his character and I respect the hell out of that. He has a unique voice in an industry full of angry nerds that bore the crap out of me. (For the record, I’m a happy nerd that sometimes suffers from depression.) I’m proud to defend him when some of my industry friends question what he’s done. That said, I think he has an identity problem. To me, The Hip Hop Gamer is a great entertainer. Gerard sees himself as a “serious videogame journalist” (a concept I still struggle with). Writers that consider themselves serious videogame journalists (even ones that aren’t actually journalists, flippant or otherwise) are offended by this. I understand why these people have problems with Gerard comparing himself to them. To me, it’s like saying both Tom Brokaw and Jon Stewart are serious broadcast journalists. That’s just not the case. One is a great newsman, while the other is a fantastic entertainer.

While I like both of these guys, I hope they go at it. Hell, I’d love to film it! It would be like watching two of my favorite pro-wrestlers have a match. I’m not rooting for either of them. I just want a good show. How about it boys?

Source

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

If all goes as planned, I’ll be picking up my copy of WWE 13 from my friend at THQ tomorrow. I’m really excited to play this game. For a while, I was really worried about the series. I mean, how do you top the award-winning writing in Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 and 2011?!? One of the few ways to top those epic tales is to take actual storylines — with actual WWE television footage! — from the “Attude Era” and use them in an interactive way. They also got some guy named Paul Heyman to help out with the storylines. In addition to being one of the sharpest and most innovative thinkers in the pro-wrestling business, he’s almost as good a writer as those guys from SmackDown vs Raw 2010 and 2011! Almost.

How about you? What’s on your weekend playlist?