The BIG G's Game Industry Blog

Video Game Movie Review: Postal

2008-11-23T17:35:00.000-08:00

Anyone who said that this movie was funny is either a liar or someone who saw a different film and got confused. This film is extremely far from funny. In fact, it can barely be considered a film. Uwe Boll has mistaken offensive content for humor, so tried to pile as much offensive content into this motion picture as possible.

I'm not one who get offended easily. In fact, many may say I have a sick sense of humor. However, despite this, Postal was utterly unenjoyable and completely terrible. Although it's supposed to have a somewhat coherent story, it actually feels more like a sketch comedy show. There are many random scenes that would ordinarily hit the cutting room floor due to their peripheral involvement to the actual story, but they are supposed to be funny, so they remain in this horrid mess. For example, the beginning is the completely random (but oft hated) scene where the pilots on the ill fated flight that crashed in the world trade center are arguing about how many virgins they will receive in heaven in reward for their unspeakably evil act.

If you expect me to be outraged by that, I'm not. Maybe I'm callous or perhaps it stems from me being fortunate enough not to know anyone hurt in the attack. I think humor is an appropriate coping mechanism for people to deal with the terrible atrocities that happen our world. Obviously, you don't want to crack jokes too soon out of respect for the grieving, but I'm of the opinion that it's been long enough that it's acceptable fodder for comedic material. However, I didn't find this the least bit funny. It was just people arguing about the numerical value of virgins that they'd receive for like 10 minutes. Perhaps it could have made a good 30 second joke for a stand up comedian, but in Postal, it was long, drawn out and just plain boring.

Long, drawn out and just plain boring could be used to describe the rest of the film. Unfortunately, that was one of the better written jokes in the movie. The rest could barely be considered jokes. Most of the film was just the tasteless things that Postal is known for. One of the funniest things in the film (but still wasn't funny) was one of those aforementioned random sketch things where the Postal Dude goes into a job interview, and they are cruel to him. Unfortunately, that joke was done and much much better by Monty Python many years before. Otherwise, it's mostly tasteless supposedly shocking stuff that is supposed to be amusing.

In another one of the more bearable scenes, Uwe Boll shows up wearing lederhosen and talking about how he finances his movies with Nazi gold when Vince Desi, CEO of Running With Scissors (the company that makes the Postal Games), reveals that he was in the Krotchy (a popular phallic toy used as a plot device in the movie) suit and tackles Uwe screaming about how he was ruining the Postal movie. Perhaps Vince didn't realize how terrible the movie was going to end up, so that ended up being more humorous than perhaps intended.

I felt particularly bad for Dave Foley because he was in this film. He's a funny guy, but he couldn't do anything with the terrible material he was working with. Zach Ward was actually the star, but his career has been going downhill since A Christmas Story, so it's not shocking he ended up in this stinker. Plus, Zach Ward was in Bloodrayne 2, so he knew what he was getting himself into.

One would think given how unintentionally funny Uwe's previous movies were, he could make something even funnier if he tried, but he failed miserably. It was a somber, mirthless evening when my friends and I watched this film. I guess that goes to show that other genres can become comedies when they are done poorly, but a bad comedy is just terrible. Having seen all of Uwe's video game adaptations to date (and Seed as well), this is by far the worst.

Production Values: 5.0 – It seems like money was actually spent on this film. It was wasted, but it didn't look like it was done with no money.

Story: 9.5 – There is very little of a consistent story. Perhaps that's because Uwe can't craft one since this is the first of his video game movies he's written himself. He also wrote Seed, as I described in my previous post was terrible but not nearly as bad.

Action: 7.0 – There’s some gunfights, but since you hate every character with the fury of a thousand suns, it's difficult to enjoy it.

Faithfulness to the video game source: 4.0 – I think this was somewhat accurate to the brand of "humor" that the Postal games have. They never struck me as particularly funny. Two turds have been awarded for the stupid, random sketches that had nothing to do with the plot. The other two are because it didn't have Gary Coleman in it, who is featured prominently in the Postal games. They had Vern Troyer, but I'm sick of him.

Laughs: 10.0 – (Less turds means funnier) I don't think I cracked a smile during the film nor did my friends watching it with me.

Total Turds: 9.5 – Uwe's worst, which makes it the worst video game adaptation movie ever. Nothing else seems to be in the same league as this. Hell, Super Mario Bros. looks like Oscar material compared to this pile of excrement. The only reason I didn't give this 10 turds is because I want to reserve that number should Uwe make a worse film.

Non-Video Game Movie Review: Uwe Boll's Seed

2008-11-23T13:22:00.000-08:00

I promised to review Uwe Boll's non-video game offerings, and here is my first! Eventually, I'll get around to reviewing his earlier offerings, but here are my thoughts on his most recent non-video game offering.

Seed was such a waste of time that I’m not sure I want to waste your time reading about how terrible it was. So, if you aren’t dying of boredom, know that it was terrible and you should avoid it at all costs. If you have absolutely nothing better to do (and might I suggest randomly following a bunch of links on Wikipedia? It’s a great way to kill time. If you are having trouble, I’ll start you out. Here’s a link about the Platypus. It’s a fascinating animal. Click the link! You won’t be disappointed. Platypii aren’t for you? Well, are you familiar with the Sonic Hedgehog protein? No? Well follow this link.)

Geez. You really are determined to find out more about Seed. Well, Seed was written, directed and produced by Uwe Boll. Although my standards were low, I was really amazed at how crappy this film was. I’ve seen probably hundreds of slasher films, and this is one of the worst. (However, it is better than The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, which is probably the worst film I’ve ever seen. That at least is somewhat humorous.) The film is about a serial killer named Sam Seed, who is ridiculously good at not getting caught since he was able to kill over 666 victims. According to wikipedia's link on serial killers, the most proven victims is 218, so 666 seems really far fetched. There are some killers with a possible victim count of around 600, but they all lived a long time ago before we made advances in criminal investigations.

Unlike many of his films, it actually is somewhat coherent. It’s confused, muddled and downright bad, but there is a narrative arc. As well, it seems like he was making an attempt to raise a moral dilemma, but the execution was so poor that it’s hard to draw any sort of meaning from this crapfest. Basically the story follows a police officer who captures Seed, and then is faced with a “terrible choice” of whether to follow the rules or bend them to make sure Seed gets what he deserves. Apparently the prison's electric chair is faulty, and when they try to execute Seed, it doesn't kill him. Wherever they live has a crazy law that if you survive three electrocution attempts, you are allowed to go free. So the police officer is faced with the intense moral dilemma of burying him alive or risking a third attempt on the chair after the first two. Unfortunately, this premise is terribly flawed. They already told everyone he was dead after the second attempt, so they are already breaking the rules by lying. One would think that initial choice would have liberated them to kill him as they saw fit, but for some dumb reason they feel bound that they have to either declare him dead, or give him round 3 with the chair. They could have injected him with poison, strangled him, shot him, smothered him, or any other method to extinguish the small flame of human life remaining in his battered body. The cop made the choice to bury him alive, and of course Seed escapes and starts to kill everyone and tries to get revenge on the cop.

Now, although that sounds extraordinarily generic and rather stupid, Boll tries really hard to make this film “art”. There are dream sequences and flashbacks, all poorly executed, so they confuse rather than enlighten. As well, it seems that he was trying copy Lars von Trier's unique style of camera work. Unfortunately, he doesn't have the talent or vision to pull it out. Instead, it feels like the cameraman is zooming in and out like he has a nervous twitch had their finger on the zoom buttons on a home camcorder. In fact, maybe the entire film was filmed on camcorders because the camera movement was rough and distracting. Maybe Uwe didn’t want to pay for a steadicam and someone who can operate one?

The editing was terrible. I don’t really envy the editor because if it were me, I would have cut it down to probably 15 minutes maximum. Every scene is drawn out and boring. While this can sometimes be effective in horror like Takashi Miike’s fantastic Audition, it was painful here. Miike deliberately made the movie slow in order to build up to the ending. Boll doesn’t have enough mastery of the art form to do anything like that. Shots are always awkwardly long or short. Normally editing doesn't stand out because when done right, it's not intrusive. As well, I was under the impression that it's not too difficult to do average editing, but it was exceptionally poor. Perhaps again this was Uwe's attempt to do something artsy, but it failed due to lack of talent.

Surprisingly, the end isn’t your typical Hollywood ending, but it is stupid and poorly written similar to the rest of the film. The amazing part is I actually do have something nice to say. Child actress, Jodelle Ferland, was quite good. She was the little girl in Silent Hill, Tideland, and unfortunately Bloodrayne 2: Deliverance. It’s sad she really didn’t get a chance to shine because her scenes were all bogged down with sloppy editing, directing and writing.

I've wasted enough words on this terrible film. So, lemme skip right to the ratings.

Production Values: 7.0 – The film reeks of low budget. The poor camera work might have been attributed to not being able to afford a steadicam or a steadicam operator. The gratuitous gore was pretty poorly done.

Story: 6.5 – Far from good, but a bit better than your typical Uwe fare.

Action: 8.5 – There was little. Uwe seemed to be going for a dramatic thriller, but he failed miserably.

Laughs: 9.0 – There was nothing particularly funny about it. The only way I was able to laugh was when I was thinking about how misguided Uwe was when trying to create this film.

Total Turds: 7.0 – As I started off this article, Seed is a huge waste of time. I figured it might be a mistake to watch it, but I figured I'd take one for the team. Avoid this one unless someone has a gun to your head.

Random Rant of the Day: If You Can Get a Gender Change, Why Can’t I Get an Ethnicity Change?

2008-09-27T00:31:00.000-07:00

*Disclaimer!* This really has nothing to do with games, but I thought this rant would be interesting to some people. As well, these are my opinions and my opinion only. They in no way represent the opinion of anyone else living or dead, real or fictional.

So, working in the game industry, you sometimes run into people who have had their sex changed. Dani Berry, the creator of M.U.L.E., a cult favourite of many old school gamers, who unfortunately died before his (her?) time, had sex reassignment surgery. (Interestingly, she (he?) wrote a recommendation to people interested in getting a sex change to NOT do it.) Now, one might argue that sex is determined at birth. People with genetic problems aside, men and women come in all shapes and sizes, but the thing that separates them at the earliest level is whether he has an X and a Y chromosome or she has two X chromosomes. Sexual organs are formed based on the genetic makeup of the original cell. Regardless of your opinions on how to define someone’s sexuality, presently, there is no way for someone to change their genetic makeup although I think in the future it could be possible. (I only mention this so I can claim I’m a futurist. Apparently to be a futurist, all you have to do is speculate about the future.) Now, many people feel that sexuality is determined by what you feel like you are not by your genetic makeup or whether your sexual organs were something you were born with.

Now, I like the idea that you are free to change something about yourself that doesn’t really “fit” with your personality or identity or however you want to qualify it. My real question is why doesn’t this apply to other things? I want to get my ethnicity changed! Now, perhaps you think that’s silly, but I don’t think you’re in a position to judge because you’ve never been a British person trapped in an American body!

Now, I’m sure you are asking, “How does he know that he’s a British person trapped in an American person’s body?” or perhaps, “You’re stupid! That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard!” Oh yeah, Mr. (or Mrs.) Smartypants? That second thing wasn’t even a question!!! So maybe you should stop judging and start listening to my tale of woe.

I haven’t always known that I’m a British person trapped in an American body. I had a fairly normal childhood. Some things that stood out were my fascination with knights, castles and the feudal period of England. Some of my favorite toys were Britains! (Britians are a line of toy soldiers) Coincidence? Perhaps. I did reports for school on castles and medieval weaponry. I can’t remember any other students doing that.

I’ve felt confused, misunderstood and depressed for a large portion of my life. Some of the things in which I’ve been able to find solace are the music of the Beatles and the Bee Gees as well as the comedy stylings of Monty Python. Now, you may argue that that everyone likes the Beatles, the Bee Gees and Monty Python. To that I respond, “Patience, mate!” (You see what I did there? British people say mate! Well, so do people in Australian, New Zealand and South Africa, but I’m totally British. There’s no doubt in my mind.)

My whole life was turned upside down when I returned for the first time to my motherland, England. Everything finally made sense! The feelings of confusion melted away in the cold London fog! I finally felt like I fit in! As well, I discovered the wonders of the BBC. I was hanging out in the lounge of the London Hotel, basking in the pleasantry of being in Great Britain when I noticed something on the television! It was quite possibly the greatest thing I had ever seen! I wasn’t sure what it was, but I knew it was fantastic. I was desperately trying to focus every ounce of my concentration to hear the magical words that came out of that small tinny speaker as loud obnoxious American tourists prattled on and on with their typical lack of courtesy. I later realized by the fact that the well dressed protagonist was riding in a flying police box that I was watching the legendary Doctor Who.

It was so amazing that I quickly became so addicted to it that I watched all four seasons with explosive rapidity back in the states after I finished crunching. I became so hard up for Doctor Who that I watched Torchwood, which is like the X-Files with more sex and even the Sarah Jane Chronicles, which is like the tween version of Doctor Who. (When I first heard tween, I had assumed that it was a portmanteau of twenty and teen, so I assumed it was meant people in their late teens and early twenties. Apparently, it’s a portmanteau of between and teen, so I was incorrect. Maybe British people don’t use that slang and that’s why I was unaware of it. Also, I’m totally British because I use big words like portmanteau) The Sarah Jane Chronicles is on CBBC for Pete’s sake! How embarrassing is it that I’m watching CBBC? (For those of you who aren’t British, CBBC is short for Children’s BBC and BBC is short for British Broadcasting Corporation)

Now, I SUPPOSE one might argue that I’m not British just because I’m so addicted to Doctor Who that I think heroin is going to be easier to give up. Well, if you were British, you’d know that Doctor Who is an important part of British Culture. He’s an ICON of England! He's quintessentially British! Besides, it doesn’t just end there! Right now, I almost exclusively listen to British IDM. I end up importing records from England quite frequently because the good stuff isn’t available here. I listen to the quality BBC Radio programs over the internet! I absolutely love fish and chips! (What you stupid Americans call french fries [or even stupider Americans call freedom fries] are actually chips) I played rugby in college! How many Americans do you know that play rugby? I don’t care at all for American Football. (Real football is what our friends across the pond call Soccer) I had terribly crooked teeth before I foolishly got braces! I own a red coat! Hell, red is my favourite colour! You can deny it all you want, but it’s obvious that I’m a British person trapped in an America body.

Anyway, it is my understanding that people who get their genders changed are legally recognized as the other gender (and someone can correct me if I’m wrong). So, why can’t I change my ethnicity? Now, someone daffy Americans might argue, “Why don’t you move to England and become a British citizen?” That wouldn’t make me ethnically British. That would just make my nationality British. I want to be of British descent, not some mixture of a bunch of boring races simmered in the melting pot of America for several generations! Wherever I go, I want to still be British regardless of my citizenship! It is my dream to be knighted! All of these require being born in the greatest of all nations, Great Britain.

So, my question is, if people can change their gender, how do I legally change my ethnicity? I’m not picky. I’m fine being a British person born in America, although it’d be ideal if I could get England to issue me a birth certificate showing that I was born to a long line of fine English folk. Perhaps I could be from Cornwall? It sounds like a nice place. Anyway, I think it’s an injustice that I have to continue being a British person trapped in an American body when women trapped in men’s bodies have no problems changing their gender! Hell, men trapped in women’s bodies can even keep their sex organs and still be recognized as a man! There should be no problem for me to become of British ancestry! I don’t even need any surgery or hormones! If anyone has any ideas on how I can change my ethnicity to match my identity, please leave a message.

Video Game Movie Review: Hitman

2008-07-10T23:51:00.000-07:00

The first thing to note about Hitman is that it is not directed, produced or written by Uwe Boll. So, it’s not a low budget poorly executed pile of crap. That doesn’t mean it’s good, and Hitman is far from good. In fact, I might even go as far to say it’s bad. It’s really hard to say what the movie is about because it has a very small amount of plot. Now, I would say that it is difficult to make a good film about a hitman, but the Bourne movies were good, so one might expect Hitman to be decent. One would be wrong though.

Hitman begins with shots of "The Organization" raising kids with barcodes on their heads and presumably training them to be killers. Agent 47, the protagonist, is introduced. He is a snappy dresser and a mass murder. In the beginning of the movie, they actually tried to give him a little bit of character. Some woman was trying to hit on him in a bar, and she asked him his name. He got awkward and scared and ran away. They didn’t really follow up with any sort of characterization until later in the movie where he again was scared of a woman. I thought that was an interesting idea – an action hero who is intimidated by women because all he knows is killing. Unfortunately, that was about the only thing that was interesting in the film.

Besides these small glimpses into character, everything about the movie was completely cliché. Agent 47 is an amoral hitman who apparently isn’t burdened with a conscience or any sort of personality. He only does anything slightly resembling the right thing because he was framed. There was another really clichéd character, the prostitute with a heart of gold. Well, at least I assumed she had a heart of gold, but she didn’t really do anything good. There might have been something about how she was driven into prostitution because of something bad that made her a sympathetic character. I don’t remember what it was though.

Obviously they weren’t trying to make Schindler’s List, so you are probably waiting for me to stop complaining about the terrible plot and start commenting on the action. Well, the action wasn’t bad, but nothing new or interesting. I think it’s adequate, but there’s really nothing about it worth recommending. They had obligatory fight scenes and shooting, but it was very average. The fact that there was nothing interesting or appealing about the characters or the story really makes the action less appealing. Certainly there are plenty of movies that make up for terrible plots with completely over the top fight sequences (like Die Hard with a Vengeance), but this is not one of those movies.

Production Values: 4.0 – Certainly not an Uwe Boll shoestring budget, but it’s not a summer blockbuster.

Story: 6.5 – It was quite bad, but not in the same league as Uwe Boll. Honestly, it’s not much worse that typical Hollywood action schlock.

Action: 4.0 – There was some, but it wasn’t really noteworthy.

Faithfulness to the video game source: 5.0 – I haven’t played the games, but they didn’t seem to have much of a plot either. They have some of the same elements, but the video games seemed to actually have more of a plot!

Laughs: 5.0 – I did find some of it funny, but I had to really work to find it funny.

Total Turds: 5.0 - I only saw the movie a month ago, and I’m really scratching my head to remember anything about it. There was nothing really memorable about it, but it wasn’t quite as terrible as most video game adaptations. Stay clear unless the alternative is watching an Uwe Boll film.

Video Game Move Review: In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale

2008-07-01T23:34:00.000-07:00

I had the fortune to spend some time over Memorial Day weekend with my sister. Unlike me, my sister doesn’t really keep up with movies, so when we go to the video store to rent something, she judges it solely based on the cover. This lack of research came in handy recently because she grabbed "In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale", and suggested we rented it. My jaw dropped open because I saw this as an opportunity to see this game based movie with one of my favorite people without bribing her or having to apologize profusely afterwards. I thought perhaps this was some kind of trick, so I asked, "Are you sure?" It was no trick! She responded, "Yes. Why?" "Oh no!" I thought. I may have blown my chance! I had to back track over my colossal fumble, "Umm... Errr.. No reason!" She knew something was up, so she said, "Well, maybe we’ll keep looking." Unfortunately for her, we found nothing else, so we picked it up!

On the way home, she asked me what the deal was with "In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale". I explained to her the story of Uwe Boll and how terrible his previous films were, but I mentioned (and unfortunately not believably) that perhaps she would enjoy this film. However what I said was more than enough to sap out all of her interest in seeing this film. So, we had to go back and rent "The Number 23", which I warned her got really bad reviews. She wanted to see it anyway, perhaps because of its classy cover. We watched 23 first and the reviews prove correct – it was no good.

Now, although "In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege" got overwhelmingly negative scores, I think the Montreal Film Journal hit the nail on the head:

Fuck "The Lord Of The Rings", this is how it's done.

Unfortunately for Uwe Boll, the next line is "Naw, I'm just fucking with you, this movie is a major piece of crap." It continues with a very insightful review that fairly paints a picture of how crappy the film is. You should definitely read that review. In fact, it almost saves me the trouble of writing a review myself, but it’s a bit too short and doesn’t describe the juicy details like I’m sure my audience is interested in, which at this point, I believe is just my dad (Hi dad!). The Big G’s website isn’t quite as popular after I got bored with pissing off Nintendo’s fanboys. I still am let down with the Wii, so perhaps I should go back to that. Although I do enjoy pissing off Uwe Boll, and hopefully, he will someday challenge me to a boxing match. Maybe I should start training, so I don’t end up like Lowtax.

So, now that you know the movie is terrible, let me take a step back and tell you why. The story revolves around a farmer named... Well, Farmer. Now, I thought this was the stupidest name they could have come up with. Perhaps in response to this criticism, they decided to justify it by explaining that Farmer the farmer feels that people should be known by what they do. With a terrible explanation like that, I think they were better off not explaining it. If everyone adopted his philosophy, it would get confusing to have half the villagers known as Farmer as well as it would make it difficult to have multiple jobs or to switch them. Obviously the screenwriters didn’t really think that through very well. Actually, I don’t think they thought anything through well, which was part of the problem.

So, this farmer named Farmer has a wife who he loves but won’t say it and a son who actually has a name, so I guess he wasn’t really forcing his stupid naming philosophy on his child. Ray Liotta plays the evil wizard Gallian, and he’s sleeping with Muriella, played by Leelee Sobieski. This was particularly disturbing because Ray Liotta looks like he’s 60 and Leelee looks like she’s 16, so it’s like she’s having relations with her grandpa. Apparently he was sleeping with her to steal her magical powers. Or because she was 16 and the daughter of his arch-nemesis magus Merick, a loyal servant of King Konreid, played by an extremely disinterested Burt Reynolds. Probably a little of column A and a little of column B. Completing out the all star cast, Ron Perlman played Norick, a sort of father figure for Farmer, and Matthew Lillard, the world’s most talented actor plays Duke Fallow, the king’s nephew who is scheming to become king while boozing and womanizing and doing an amazing job acting.

One might wonder how Uwe Boll gets all these big name actors to do his films. For Pete’s sake, he got academy award winning Sir Ben Kingsley to be in Bloodrayne. When asked this question, Ben Kingsley had this to say in his defense: "I don't know whether to be upset or flattered by that question," read his response. "To be honest, I have always wanted to play a vampire, with the teeth and the long black cape. Let's say that my motives were somewhat immature for doing it."

I have also heard that Uwe Boll’s production schedules are so short that he is able to give actors a decent sum of money for an extremely small amount of work. This is consistent with the special features of Bloodrayne 2, which said that they were actually writing the screenplay on set because they had a ridiculous short schedule. This is also consistent with Anthony Bourdain’s experience playing a small part in Far Cry, where Uwe gives him the expert direction "Something like whatever". Also, after his first take, Uwe offers the criticism, "You came very fast back to life", but rather than reshooting, Uwe decides to just edit out Anthony’s reanimation creating a rather sloppy action scene.

Hell, if you watch Bloodrayne, it looks as though Billy Zane’s scenes were shot after the film was already finished and written in just to have another actor in the movie. He interacts only one other character and doesn’t actually do anything. Any decent director would have left those scenes on the cutting room floor, but this is Uwe Boll we are talking about. He probably thought all the Billy Zane fans would see the movie for him. I didn’t realize Billy Zane had fans, but I think Uwe Boll sees movies as an equation. X stars + Y special effects shots = Z profit.
Unfortunately, he doesn’t realize that even a small amount of talent is required to pull off something that is at least palatable by the general movie going public. Hell, it doesn’t seem like their standards are very high given the incredible success of Indy 4 and how mediocre it was! So, it seems that Uwe just doesn’t care about the artistic aspects and that shines through in this film. One might have previously attributed his previous films poor quality to the shoestring budgets that he had to create them, but somehow for "In the Name of the King", he was able to raise 60 or 70 million. Unfortunately, it seems that he just is a sloppy filmmaker.

As the Montreal Film Journal points out, it’s difficult to say whose performance is the worst. Everyone’s performances are so stiff and terrible I feel like I’m watching the Polar Express with real actors this time. (Any movie that can make Tom Hanks creepy is doing something very very wrong) Jason Statham delivers his usual emotionless supposed bad ass style, but unfortunately it doesn’t work so hot when he’s supposed to be a loving father and a dutiful husband. Burt Reynolds looked distant and bored the entire film. I think I caught his eyes wandering in order to check a clock in a few of the scenes. Hell, I could go through every actor and talk about how horrible their performance was, but they really didn’t have much to work with. Their characters were all worthless and should have been cut. Muriella really doesn’t do anything the entire movie besides get boned by someone old enough to be her grandpa. But, they constantly follow her hoping that some facet about her would interest you enough in the character to care about her. They failed. There were tons of other characters and plot points that I imagine you were supposed to care about, but everything was so amateur that it completely missed the mark.

Matthew Lillard is one of my least favorite actors, so I was rather pleased that he hasn’t been in any movies since Wing Commander. (I should review that soon. I considered taking my own life when watching Wing Commander.) Curiously enough, his performance was actually pretty decent in SLC Punk. I have trouble reconciling that with the fact that every other character he plays is extremely obnoxious, but perhaps he has just been typecast as the friend that is really annoying, but you have to hang out with him because you’ve known him for so long, and you’d feel a little bad if you stopped hanging out with him because he’d have no friends – or that’s what you tell yourself. You’re not so sure. Perhaps you’d be cool with him having no friends, but his mom is friends with your mom, so a lot of questions would be raised if you just stopped seeing him all together. He’s not that annoying. Well, all your friends think so, but you’ve known him for so long... Uh, what was I talking about? Oh yeah, Matthew Lillard was terrible in this movie. Here’s what the Montreal Film Journal has to say:

Now, Matthew Lillard is working really hard to not only be the worst he's ever been, but the worst any actor has ever been! As the King's treacherous nephew,he comes off like an obnoxious frat guy in an inept school play, talking in a ridiculous nondescript accent. It's hard to believe that there could be an even shittier performance in one film, but Ray Liotta was up to the challenge! You have to see it to believe it, the star of "Goodfellas" looking like a cross between Saruman and Liberace, hamming it up like he's playing the villain in an episode of "Mighty Morphing Power Rangers", going as far as doing a stupid evil laugh ("Mwa ha ha ha ha!")... I think we have a winner! Or should I say loser?

Although their description of Matthew Lillard’s performance seems spot on, I have to disagree with their assessment that Ray Liotta’s performance was bad. I imagine that ridiculous over the top caricature is exactly what Uwe Boll was going for, and Ray Liotta nailed it! He seemed like he was enjoying playing the stereotypical cookie cutter pure evil over the top villain, and I think he was probably the only person having fun during the two weeks they spent slapping together this crapfest. At least his ridiculous character provided a small island of humor in the otherwise mind numbingly boring ocean of this film. I’m sticking with Matthew Lillard as the worst actor in the film.

Maybe someone would be able to ignore the nonsensical plot and terrible characters for the action scenes, but not me. The action seemed forced, tedious and far from exciting. Perhaps someone who likes tasteless and pointless action can enjoy it, but when you hope all the characters die horrible deaths, it may ruin the suspense and excitement that a good filmmaker would be trying to create. Plus, Uwe Boll is far from a good filmmaker, so who knows if he was even trying to create excitement. My sister was so bored she started surfing the web and was just looking at random people’s myspace pages and laughing at how lame they are.

Now, one of the reasons I didn’t see this in its theatrical run was because I had heard they cut 30 minutes out for the US version. I was hoping the DVD would be the definitive director’s cut version. Unfortunately, it was only the 127 minute theatrical cut. Maybe they had half an hour of deleted scenes on the DVD. I wasn’t very motivated to check after completing the film and not being the least bit entertained despite loving B movies. Another thing is that this movie was PG-13, which removed the typical crutches Uwe uses to make his movies watchable – over the top gore and nudity. I think without those, it really shows that he is utterly talentless. Well, scratch that. He is very talented at raising money for movies. He managed to get 60-70 million for this stinker – probably by pitching it by saying "it’s like Lord of the Rings"!

Anyway, I can’t bring myself to devote any more words reviewing this piece of crap, so it’s time for the ratings!

Production Values: 2.0 – The 70 million went somewhere. I’m not quite sure where, but the production values aren’t bad.

Story: 8.0 – I can’t really quite place what was so terrible about it, but it was incredibly dull and extremely difficult to not only try to care about the characters, but to continue watching

Action: 4.0 – There’s plenty of action. I just had trouble caring about anything in this stinker.

Faithfulness to the video game source: 6.0 – There was Krug, Ehb, and the protagonist was a farmer (although he wasn’t named farmer in the game because that’s just plain stupid).

Laughs: 8.0 – (Less turds means funnier) Unfortunately except for Ray Liotta’s horrible overacting, this movie wasn’t funny. It was just painful.

Total Turds: 7.5 – It’s difficult to find anything to like about this film. It’s not quite as appallingly awful as Uwe’s other films, but unfortunately, that makes it a lot less funny.

PS. Look forward to me reviewing Uwe Boll’s non-video game based movies, which he always mentions when responding to criticism. Somehow he thinks that they can’t call him a bad director just because he did a terrible job directing the video game based films. You have to be intimately familiar with the full body of his work to criticize him. I plan on becoming just that! (My Hitman review is coming next though.)

Video Game Move Review: Resident Evil: Extinction

2008-05-22T18:41:00.000-07:00

Before there was Uwe Boll, there was Paul W.S. Anderson – not to be confused with the auteur Paul T. Anderson who created such amazing films as Punch Drunk Love and There Will Be Blood. No, Paul W.S. Anderson is the guy who brought us such lackluster video game movies as Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil. He was the guy it was cool to hate for making bad video game movies before Uwe Boll made Paul W.S. Anderson’s films look like classics. Paul W.S. Anderson also directed and wrote the abysmal Alien vs. Predator, which I didn’t think was possible to screw up, but boy, did he ever. (Alien vs. Predator: Requiem isn’t as good as an Alien vs. Predator movie should be, but was leagues ahead of the first) He did not direct Resident Evil: Apocalypse and Resident Evil: Extinction, but he did produce and write them.

Anyway, Resident Evil: Extinction sucked pretty badly. Firstly, let me say I didn’t much care for the first Resident Evil movie. The second one was watchable, but mostly because it was laughably bad. This one is by far the worst of the bunch. This movie is amazingly unoriginal. One would suspect that wouldn’t be a bad thing from a movie based on a video game, but this movie seemed to have been based on the crapfest Waterworld. Yes, you read that correctly. While watching this film, I was constantly reminded of the parallels between this script and Waterworld. It took place in a post apocalyptic world where fuel is a precious commodity and convoys of people roam around in search of safe haven. Instead of the Mariner, we have Alice who somehow managed to develop psychic powers since the last movie thus alienating her more from the rest of the human race just like everyone’s favorite fishman. Instead of water, we have a barren desert. Instead of the Deacon, we have some rogue umbrella scientist who spends his spare time cloning Alice and slaughtering them in an intricate system of traps for no apparent reason. Instead of dry land, they are trying to go to Alaska, which they think is not infected just because Alice finds some dead guy’s journal talking about Alaska.

So, the entire time, I felt like I was watching Waterworld over again, which is not a good feeling to say the least. A large part of the movie was spent on the relationships between a boring band of survivors led by Claire Redfield, one of the few links this movie has to the video games. All in all, there were not that many action scenes, most weren’t any good and the plot was terrible. Hopefully you won’t mind me ruining a plot point towards the end. They decide to go to Alaska in helicopter from the Vegas area. In the scene before, they were worried about running out of fuel… I would guess anyone with an ounce of sense would know that helicopters are going to get a significantly worse mile per gallon than a car because it takes a crap ton of energy to fight gravity… As well, and perhaps this is less common knowledge, but you can’t just fill a helicopter up with automobile gas. I reckon helicopter fuel is going to be a hell of a lot harder to come by in the post apocalyptic vision from the creative mind that brought you AVP.

Anyway, it’s time for the turd rankings! (Remember, more turds means it is worse)
Production Values: 2.0 – This was actually pretty decent. They had a pretty reasonable recreation of Las Vegas landmarks buried in sand.

Story: 6.5 – There are plenty of worse movies to copy than Waterworld.

Action: 5.0 - The action was at least more entertaining than an Uwe Boll film. Honestly, people doing action movies should take notes from Shoot ‘Em Up. That movie was awesome, and the plot was kept to a minimum even though I actually sort of cared for the characters.

Faithfulness to the video game source: 7.0 - To be perfectly frank, I’ve never really played a Resident Evil video game. The terrible character relative controls and the fixed cameras was a big turn off back in the day because I was hooked on Mario 64. Resident Evil 4 has been on my list of games to play for a while, but I was waiting for the price to go down, and then it came out for PS2, so I was waiting for the PS2 version’s price to go down. Now it’s out for Wii, and I’m morbidly curious to see if they used the Wii-mote in any sort of interesting way, although I imagine they won’t, and I’ll kick myself for not getting the PS2 version. Anyway, I’m familiar with the games to know that they really just share the Umbrella Corporation name as well as Clare Redfield.

Laughs: 7.5 - Unfortunately, this was not funny bad. It was just bad bad.

Total Turds: 6.0 - Skip it unless you hate yourself.

Surfer Dude Reviews Star Wars

2008-04-23T20:52:00.000-07:00

So, there has been a gossip website going around called Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars with some interesting exclusive rumors. I have asked a friend of mine, Surfer Dude, to post some amazingly factual unannounced rumors. So, take it away surfer dude!

Surfer dude here. Firstly, Star Wars sucks. Secondly, let's break some amazing unannounced titles, shall we?

EA will be releasing another Battlefield after Bad Company (and no, I'm not talking about Heroes)
There's another Burnout coming to every platform you can imagine (Perhaps even DS?)
Madden 2010 will come out Fall 2009
Hamonix is hard at work on Rock Band 2
Mass Effect 2 will be released on every platform you can possibly imagine (EA is currently looking for Nuon port). It may be a timed exclusive on Xbox 360 and the other ports will probably be of worse quality
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I the official game of the movie will be coming out in 2010 on Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, DS, PSP, every cell phone imaginable, GBA, PS2, PS1, Sega Saturn, the original NES, and oscilloscopes
Nintendo is working on games for all of their popular franchises: Mario, Zelda, Animal Crossing, F-Zero, Metroid, Pokemon, Advance Wars, and any other game that they've ever made that you've liked
Wii Music will come out at some point
Activision is working on another Tony Hawk game to counter Skate 2 this fall
Blizzard is planning a third WoW expansion
If “This is Vegas” sells well, Midway will do a sequel
LucasArts is working on several other Star Wars video games besides the Force Unleashed
Metal Gear Solid 4 may be Kojima's last, but it won't be the last (and probably won't be Kojima's last either)
Another Grand Theft Auto is in development right now! It will most likely take place in a city other than Liberty City!
Epic is working on an Unreal Tournament 2009

That's all the news surfer dude has at the moment! I'm sure he'll stop by later with some AMAZINGLY non-obvious news posts later.

Sonic and Mario Moustache Competition

2008-02-05T21:04:00.000-08:00

So, it's crunch time where I work, and as much as I love making video games, getting up, working, going home, sleeping only to get up in order to go back to work is a little dull. On my way home from work one day, I was trying to think of what sort of thing I could do to add some excitement to my life that met my constraints of having absolutely no free time. As soon as I pondered this, the answer came to me like a flash of lightning! Grow a moustache! It met the prerequisites. It would spice up my life and require no time. In fact, I think it'd save me time! That's less facial area to shave, and over the course of a month, I may save a total of 5 minutes. That extra 5 minutes of sleep does sound pretty appealing during crunch time. Anyway, I was explaining my philosophy of recreational moustache growing to some coworkers when one mentioned they had competitive moustache competitions at his previous employer.

I have a confession. I have two goals in life besides making great video games. One is to become a competitive eater. The second is to proudly represent my country at the World Beard and Moustache Competition. I'm doing pretty poorly on the first goal, but by organizing a company wide moustache competition, I figured I could start getting some practice in order to eventually compete at the national level. I quickly organized a company wide moustache competition, and now fun and excitement has returned to my life!

This got me thinking, with an international event as exciting as the World Beard and Moustache competition, it's amazing that no one has grabbed the video game license. I mean it's practically the Olympics of facial hair! Wait a minute... Sega and Nintendo have figured out a way to improve on events that epitomize the amazing will of athletes and their unrivaled mastery in controlling their bodies. They replaced real athletes with licensed characters! So, here's my brilliant revelation! I should get the license and create Mario & Sonic at the World Beard and Moustache Competition (with of course permission from Nintendo and Sega).

Now, I know what you are thinking. Eggman or Wario has already won! Well, in this game, any of your favorite male characters from the Sonic and Mario series can grow amazing facial hair. Maybe your favorite character isn't female. Perhaps you are partial to the Princess Peach or Toadette (I love both mushrooms and women, so Toadette is my favorite). I imagine there's one person who actually can stand Amy, Sonic's special lady friend. I do have trouble imagining that anyone actually likes Blaze, Cream or Rouge – the other female characters rounding out the current Sonic cast. Daisy is totally just Peach with brown hair created only because blond didn't render well on the original grayscale Game Boy. I don't want to create a sexist game, so I think that perhaps we could include an armpit hair growing minigame for the female character.

Now you may be thinking, “Nintendo is the awesome! They would never license out Mario for a stupid game like that!” Let's examine that statement, shall we? In thinking what random officially licensed Nintendo things I own, here are a few things that come to mind: Mario boxer shorts (they have somewhat lude text on them “Kiss me, I'm Italian” and “Show me the Princess”), Mario socks, Mario t-shirts, a plush Mario, a Mario action figure, Nintendo adult pajama bottoms (not the footy kind unfortunately), a Famicom tissue box holder, a plush Famicom, and a Nintendo business card holder. I'm sure I have plenty more, but that's all I could come up with off the top of my head. There are plenty more that I don't have such as Nintendo PC speakers (shaped like the ? block) and a friend of mine has the Mario branded Shasta Soda. If you think that's a lot, it's only a small fraction of what Nintendo has branded. I'm pretty sure I saw an official Super Mario Colostomy Bag when I was at last at the drug store. In short, Mario gets around. Sega's not much better. I suppose I haven't collected Sega stuff as avidly, but I do have Sonic action figures, plushes, socks, t-shirts as well as a Dreamcast tissue box holder, but I don't think that's officially licensed.

I'm sure you're already checking your favorite retailer's website to preorder this game, but you might be desperate for more information in order to steer your lucid dreams to be about playing this game. It's obviously going to be for the Nintendo Wii since I don't think there's any chance of getting Mario of appearing on any other system (except the CD-i for Hotel Mario and PC for Mario Teaches Typing). The gameplay would work as follows. You choose your character. All the characters begin without facial hair, so Dr. Eggman or Wario don't have a clear advantage. The first part of the game is the act of growing the facial hair. This is accomplished by waggling the Wii-mote. After several hours of waggling, your character will have some stubble. After two days straight of waggling, you will have about a centimeter of growth. Now that you are past peach fuzz, you'll be able to compete.

The bulk of the game is about working your way up to the international beard and moustache competition, but like any athletic event, you can't just start at the top. You have to work your way there by winning smaller competitions. These will bring you trophies that you can put in your trophy room that you can arrange yourself similar to Playstation's Home. Hopefully the CPU on the Wii can handle awesome physics, so you can try and stack all your trophies and sit on top them just like Home. At least I think that's what you are supposed to do in Home. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding what Home is about.

Winning championships also gives you more money to purchase moustache wax and other shaving accessories. In fact, all your character starts out with to shave initially is a shard of broken glass. After winning some tournaments, you can purchase a straight razor, a safety razor, a three bladed razor, a six bladed razor, a fourteen bladed razor, an electric razor, an electric razor with goo, a beard trimmer and a nose hair trimmer. You can also purchase moustache wax, Rogain for Beards and Moustaches and testosterone injections to increase the rate at which your character's hair grows. As you win the lower tournaments and grow more hair as well as shaving products, you will finally work your way up to the world championship.

The game will use WiiConnect24, so you can visit your friends if you remember their stupid friend code. Although I have a ton of friends with Wii, I haven't bothered to enter their string of random digits which would enable me to play all my online games with them like.. umm.... yeah, I got nothing. Well, luckily, this trophy room feature would give you a reason to swap codes! Well, probably not, but networked trophy room makes an AWESOME bullet point! It's like Game 3.0 user created content combined with the remix generation level of customization!

For those who are really dedicated to their virtual craft and are willing to spend months and years waggling, there will be actual international championships that will take place on a new channel similar to Everybody Votes. It will be a double elimination tournament. Players will have to log over 100 game hours to qualify to prevent people from entering without crazy facial hair.

This is exactly the kind of innovative gameplay that the Wii needs so desperately. This game will not only sell millions of copies of its game but drive Wii hardware sales to even greater heights than it is currently at. It will also prove that Nintendo isn't the only publisher that can have a successful title on the Wii. If you work at a publisher and would like to publish this brilliant title or get a more thorough design document, post a message in the comments, and I'll be happy to get back to you.

Video Game Movie Review: DOA: Dead or Alive

2007-12-08T17:16:00.000-08:00

DOA: Dead or Alive actually came out over a year ago in Australia. It took almost a year to have a limited release in the United States, and pretty much tanked. It made $260 thousand in 505 screens its opening weekend and moved out of most of those screens very quickly. According to IMDB it wasonly at 6 screens two weeks later. So, it probably shouldn't have been released in the US after all. For comparison, Bloodrayne made 1.5 million its opening weekend in 985 screens.

Was the movie really that bad? Was it worse than Bloodrayne (which if you read my earlier post was quite terrible)? Hells no. Was it any good? No, not really. Unless you enjoy cheesy movies (which I do). Then, it might be good for a laugh. Firstly, one problem is Dead or Alive isn't the most popular video game series, so the movie might not have mainstream appeal. Although, if I say the game with the "boob physics", it's more recognized for than than the actual name of the game. Since other games have probably copied their procedural boob bounce model, it's specifically the game where you can use the "age" value in the options menu to adjust how much bounce there is. 99 years old is a good age, right? I think if real 99 year olds saw that much bounce, they might have a heart attack, but I don't there are any that have played the game. Perhaps they wouldn't need viagra then? Maybe the problem is that old women are all wrinkly not attractive at all, and that's why old men have erectile dysfunction. Perhaps I can talk about old mens' penis problems some other time. I need to focus on the task at hand – reviewing DOA: Dead or Alive! (Yes, the actual movie is called DOA: Dead or Alive. I think Dead or Alive by itself was already used.)

The Dead or Alive series has a story (I think), but after playing several of the games, I am unable to figure out what it is. It's only told in the instruction manual and minute long pre-rendered scenes when you beat the game, but the cinematics are more about showing off the most CG skin the ESRB will allow than they are plot exposition. So, the movie could be true to the video game story. I'm not really sure. I read some stuff about the plot on Wikipedia, but it was pretty dull, so I'm just going to go off the small amount of stuff I've picked up from the games and my brief perusal of everyone's favorite online source of misinformation.
The movie focuses on the characters of Tina, Christie and Kasumi. If they were your favorite fighters, (no one plays DOA for the guys) then you may enjoy the movie. A little. If you like Hitomi or Koroko, they aren't even in the film. Lei Fang is in approximately 30 seconds of it. Helena who was a dignified opera singer in the games (and my favorite character) is instead a ditzy tween who spends most of her time in a bikini and roller blading. Ayane who is a ninja, and hails from Japan is played by a honkie... (If you aren't hip to the lingo that means a white person) I thought this was an interesting casting choice. A white woman playing a Japanese woman... Hmmm.... Seems like a stretch for Natassia Malthe of Bloodrayne 2 fame, but considering the original Ayane didn't have much personality anyway, I guess she did alright. In the game, she was the half sister of Kasumi because Kasumi's father's brother raped her mother. They didn't seem to be related in the film because Ayane was in love with Kasumi's brother Hayate (her half brother in the video game). If they were, it would have made the film more interesting. Anyone reading see Lonestar?

Kasumi was played by Devon Aoki, who is half Japanese and not attractive at all, but I guess she is the only person fractionally Japanese in Hollywood, so any time there is a part for a Japanese woman, she gets a call. (It seems Ken Watanabe is the only Japanese guy in Hollywood, but at least he's Japanese and can act) Her acting was appalling, but on the bright side, her deadpan performance did make me snicker from time to time. They should have cast Zhang Ziyi who is Chinese but at least looks the part more and is incredibly talented actress. I didn't think she could act until I saw her in 2046, and she blew me away with an absolutely amazing performance. Hmmm... Then again, with acting chops like that, doing this crapfest would probably be beneath her. Well, she could at least kick ass like in Crouching Tiger or Flying Daggers. I guess for cheesy movies you need bad acting, so perhaps I'd ruin the film by recasting it. The only person who really “fit” in the movie was Jamie Pressely. She played Tina and seemed to recognize the film for what it was and really seemed to enjoy laying on the cheese. Unfortunately, she had a grating southern drawl that grew rather annoying as the movie went on, which sucked. I hope that's not her natural voice. I don't recall her sounding like that in other movies, but I don't really recall what other movies she was in...

The plot was somewhat similar to the games although there were a few changes. Firstly, it starts out with a lengthy introduction to each of the three main characters. Kasumi is a princess of some crazy ninja city in the middle of a boxed canyon. Perhaps she lives in Blood Gulch? She does have a CG palace, which looks nice and fake. She jumps 14 feet over a giant gate that apparently opens up to a sheer rock wall, and she has a portable hang gliding kit, which seems odd because it seemed like an old fashioned ninja village. Apparently not. That or Amazon.co.jp ships to palaces in boxed canyons on top of sheer rock walls bordering a large body of water. Maybe they do. I don't live in Japan, so I wouldn't know. Anyway, this all seems perfectly plausible except for what happened next. A magical throwing star sought her out while hang gliding out of the forbidden temple. It told her that she was invited to the DOA tournament. It didn't tell her instructions or anything, but she managed to get there. These problems were solved by an omnipotent camera cut and a very liberal suspension of disbelief.

Tina was introduced in a less ridiculous but perhaps less entertaining way. She was a pro wrestler but frustrated because people didn't think she could fight for real. Comforted by having a private yacht and a dude to drive it for her, she ended up fighting off pirates trying to exploit the lawlessness of international waters. After warding them off, she received another flying star inviting her to the competition. Apparently, the stars have super GPS trackers or something as well as some sort of perpetual motion propulsion system because her boat was in the middle of the South Pacific.

Christie murderous tendencies have been downplayed and now she's more thief than assassin. In her introduction, her partner/lover turned her in to the cops, so she wouldn't get away with the money they stole in order to get her to attend the DOA tournament with him, so they can steal even more money. Seems like it'd be easier just to ask if she'd like to steal more money. What's 1 million when you can have 100 million? No apparently, she needed the elaborate ruse. She's very willing to forgive someone who could have condemned her to a life behind bars for the rest of her days. Maybe the guy is really good in the sack?

After THOSE introductions, how can the movie not be solid gold? They found creative ways to work in the theme and spirit of the video game – T & A. They had a bikini clad volleyball game true to the source material as well as frequent close ups on the T & A regions. They had a duel in the rain in wet skimpy clothes. It would seem that they knew their audience despite the poor success of the film.

Although the characters were quite similar and the general theme stayed the same, the general story arc made a bit less sense than the DOA video games. Yeah, DOATEC is some super evil corporation doing evil research, but instead of cloning the combatants or creating the ultimate fighter they want to create the ultimate... sunglasses. I wish I were making that up, I really do. In fact I wish I could come up with things that stupid because I think this blog would be way funnier if I wrote stories about organizing fight tournaments to make high tech sunglasses, but instead I just complain about the game industry! Although, perhaps I'm doing something right because I think this blog gets more hits than people who saw the movie. Well, at any rate, they collected data about all the fighters by implanting them with nano-technology, which provided them with HUD for the video feeds when they monitored the fights. They actually found a way to work in power bars! BRILLIANT! I wish I could be a Hollywood screenwriter. If I ever had writer's block, I could either come up with a random string of technobabble to resolve any situation or just use nanotechnology. Anyway, these ultimate sunglasses were being sold to terrorists all over the world because they used the fighter's nanotech collected data to allow the wearer to predict the weaknesses of rival fighters in hand to hand combat. Now, I can't see how Osama Bin Laden being the world's greatest martial artist would have any value at all to his terrorist group, but maybe I lack the imagination of today's Hollywood writers. Perhaps that's why my touching screenplay about a 12 year old girl dying of leukemia who's parents die in a car crash that teaches an alcoholic nurse the value of life was not optioned. Maybe now that the brilliant writers of this movie are striking, it's my chance!

Although perhaps the humor inherent in the ridiculous plot was unintentional, they seemed to purposefully go for humor in the relationship between Helena and one of the scientists in charge of nano-monitoring/sunglass technology. They had him imagine talking with Helena, Helena constantly forgetting his name and other silly stuff. I actually got a kick out of this intentional humor too. It's no “Big Lebowski” but was funny. Not as funny as the super kung fu sunglasses, but amusing nonetheless.

In general, I wasn't really bored during this film, which is pretty high praise for a video game adaptation and more than can be said for Bloodrayne 2. Normally, there's plenty of slow and boring parts as they try to flesh out a 5 line summary of a game into an hour and a half motion picture epic. So, would I recommend this film? I guess it depends on if delight in cheesy movies like myself. If so, you'll probably be entertained. Could your time be better spent elsewhere? Most likely! As I mentioned above, 2046 is absolutely brilliant, and I bet you haven't seen it! The Big Lebowski gets better every time you see it, and I've seen it well over 20 times to prove it! But, if you are looking for extremely cheesy fun and planning on making some popcorn and inviting friends over, I think you'll have a good time. Here's the total turd review (keep in mind less turds is better):

Production values: 4.0 – Not too bad here. Much better than an Uwe Boll film. Not a super CG fest like blockbusters these days, but that may be a good thing.

Story: 7.0 – The story was actually ridiculous. This isn't necessarily bad because it made the movie quite amusing.

Action: 3.0 – There was a reasonable amount of fighting - at least enough to keep me entertained. The action wasn't as amazing as “Live Free or Die Hard”, but the story was even stupider to make up for it.

Faithfulness to the video game source: 2.0 – It was darn close. There were boobs, butts, bathing suits and some crazy ass scheme by the evil DOATEC corporation. The companion they added to Christie was annoying. However, the companion they added to Helena was amusing. But as far as video game movies go, this is one of the closest. That's kind of sad actually.

Laughs: 2.0 – I got a kick out of it. (Less turds means funnier) Not the funniest movie ever, but the sheer ludicrousness of the story made me laugh.

Total turds: 3.0 – I can sort of recommend this. I enjoyed it. It was crap, but not unbearable Uwe Boll crap. It's more akin to popcorn movie summer blockbuster crap. The story is no worse than any Steven Sommers blockbuster and the acting is on par. (Did you see Van Helsing? Dracula's brides had the worst overacting I've seen outside of community theater!) Sure, there's not as much CG, but I think this movie did a good job of embracing the campy-ness, and so I enjoyed it.

Video Game Movie Review: Bloodrayne 2: Deliverance (and some thoughts on Uwe Boll)

2007-10-20T18:08:00.000-07:00

Firstly, I don’t know if I have regular readers, but if I do, I’d like to apologize for the long pause since my previous post. It turns out making games is a time consuming process and I’ve been busy. I don’t think I have regular readers since most people who frequent this site are Nintendo fanboys who would die to defend the house of Mario from any negative remarks I may make. So, they probably don’t miss me. Anyway, luckily I’ve been able to tear myself away from the computer monitor for long enough to stare at my TV to watch Bloodrayne 2: Deliverance. If you’re like me, you will have two reactions to this:

You will be very disappointed to miss the theatrical run
You will be shocked to find out that it’s already released to video.

Fear not Big G readers! It went straight to video, so you didn’t miss it on the big screen. I happen to be a big movie buff with an unnatural zest for video game movies, so I think I shall start reviewing video game movies, especially ones that you may have missed out on. My rating scale will be the turd. 1 turd isn’t too terrible. Perhaps on par with a Hollywood blockbuster like Underworld. 10 turds is unbearably awful and incredibly painful to watch like Gigli or the Texas Chainsaw Massacre part 4: The Next Generation. If you want to lose the will to live, then try watching those movies. I dare you. I will rate them in various categories and assign a final turd rating, which is not an average.

So, firstly, I’d like to start this out by saying Uwe Boll is a terrible, terrible human being and an even worse film maker. Between cussing out Wired, beating up his critics, and making pile o’ crap films, it’s amazing he has time to troll the message boards reading all the hate on the web about him. I don’t like jumping on the Uwe sucks bandwagon, so let me continue by saying that I don’t hate Uwe Boll. He’s a terrible person, yes, but I like him. That's right! Your eyes don't deceive you! I like him. Why? Because he entertains me. I own Bloodrayne, Alone in the Dark and House of the Dead on DVD, and I saw all 3 in the theaters. I saw House of the Dead on opening night, and there were like 20 people in the theater and about 7 of them walked out before the film was done. I was laughing my ass off. I’m not laughing because the movie is intentionally funny. I’m rather laughing AT all the people who made the terrible, terrible film and how bad they are at their jobs and how ashamed they must feel that all their hard work went to produce such a stinker. (Except Uwe Boll who is constantly frustrated because we don't appreciate his genius.)

That being said, I’m the guy that keeps Uwe Boll in business. I’m the one that allows him to keep butchering our favorite video games. You may ask how I sleep at night. Well, thanks for asking, but actually quite poorly. I have insomnia, but I’m still okay with giving Uwe Boll money because he entertains me. I just don’t enjoy laughing at his appalling films. I also enjoy laughing at his crazy hijinks like his immense frustration with why his target audience hates him. If you are reading this Uwe, take some notes. Get out a magic marker and write this down. "Du saugst!" For those who spreche nicht gut Deutsch, that means "you suck". Your movies are terrible. You take much loved video game franchises and take big fat German dumps on them. Now, in Uwe’s defense, he always says that people shouldn’t say he’s a terrible film maker from his video game adaptations alone. They should see his other films. Well, I plan on seeing his other films, so I can make fun of them also, but I haven’t had a chance to see them just yet. Unfortunately, there are worthwhile films that I’d like to see, and it’s beyond comprehension that his other films could be any good because his video game adaptations are so bad. Let’s take the first Bloodrayne as an example.

The Bloodrayne video game was about a half vampire chick fighting Nazis all the while making cheesy wisecracks that are befitting of any action movie hero. Pure entertainment, right? Not much to screw up, right? WRONG! Uwe Boll took a fat crap on a sheet of paper and had his crack team of writers use that as source material for the first film. Bloodrayne instead of a confident hero, who always has the right one liner for the occasion, was transformed into a whining emo cry baby in the middle ages fighting who knows what because the plot was so damn stupid.

Luckily, Bloodrayne 2: Deliverance is not as bad as the first. Unfortunately, that’s not saying much because the first one was a steaming pile of dog doo. (I’ll try and get around to reviewing it later for those of you who were fortunate enough to miss it). According the interview on the DVD with the brilliant mind behind Bloodrayne 2, Uwe, there 100 years in between the first and the second movie, in which Bloodrayne immigrates to America through New York, and then settles in the Wild West. So, that’s where the movie begins. Other than Uwe and a character named Rayne, there are no real similarities between the first and the second movie. Since the first one was so terrible, that’s probably a good thing. Kristanna Loken is a terrible actress and in my opinion, not very attractive. If I’m going to watch a terrible film with terrible acting, I might as well be looking at someone pleasing to the eye. Natassia Malthe fills the roll much better in that regard. The dark emo and gothic story beats from the previous movie are pretty much gone.

Instead, it seems Billy the Kid was really a vampire, and it’s up to Rayne to stop him. Vampires versus cowboys sounds pretty good, right? Unfortunately, that’s where the wheels come off the wagon. There is very little fighting and a whole lot of boring nothing. It’s difficult for me to remember how they filled up 90 minutes because almost nothing exciting or of interest happened. Rayne’s character was practically mute, which may have been a good thing depending on Natassia’s acting ability, but I can’t judge her as an actress from this stinker since she had such piss poor direction and so few lines. In the crew interview, the writers stated that Uwe said Westerns are about the set up and not the actual action. In this movie, that was pretty much what they did. Unfortunately, it wasn’t exciting rising action like in a properly filmed western. It was stuff that should have hit the cutting room floor. Any editor worth his/her salt would have cut these snooze fest down to 5 minutes – the ending credits.

Although the movie was largely forgettable, the writing was so poor, it amused me. Here are some highlights. Billy the Kid describing his brilliant plan to create an army of vampires to overthrow the world says, “Witness the greatest story ever told”. Rayne after someone tells her that she can’t fight all the vampire cowboys because she’s a woman follows with “Your fly is unzipped.” And finally, one of the last lines in the film that had no relation to anything that I could figure out: “Life is like a penis. When it's hard, you get screwed. When it's soft, you can't beat it.”

So, here’s the final rating: (these are out of 10 turds where 0 is acceptable 10 is unbearably terrible)

Production values: 8.0 – Unlike most Westerns, it didn’t take place in a desert. There was plenty of green grass and trees. That’s probably because they were using the set from something else. In the credits, it said that they had the writers pretty much write the story on the set because they had such a short production time.

Story: 7.0 – Vampires in the west could be cool…. Maybe if Uwe Boll weren’t involved. Unfortunately, it proved to be very boring.

Action: 8.5 – There were a few guns. And a few blades. Maybe I fell asleep during the film because I just finished watching it and I can’t remember how they filled up 90 minutes with so little action.

Faithfulness to the video game source: 9.5 – There’s a character named Rayne and a Brimstone society. That’s about it. Rayne who although didn’t have much personality in the game, is completely different.

Laughs: 5.0 – There are some bad movies that are just funny. Blade 2 cracked me up from start to finish. Bloodrayne 2 just had a few great lines, most of which I’ve repeated in this review.

Total turds: 8.5 – Not the worst Uwe Boll film by any means, but is perhaps the most boring. Few laughs and very little action makes this one worth skipping.

PS. Uwe, if you are reading this, please feel free to post a comment about how brilliant you are and how I'm an idiot and a jerk for reviewing your movie. Also, please dicuss how I'm a coward and you could beat me up. Also please include all sorts of spelling and grammatical mistakes similar to your e-mails to wired, so I can laugh at you.

Games that NEED Sequels

2007-02-16T15:49:00.000-08:00

Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon - Despite what many Nintendo fanboys might think, The Wand of Gamelon was the last innovative Zelda game. Every game since has had the exact same gameplay as the very first Zelda (besides Zelda II, which for some reason, everyone hates). Windwaker was like a cell shaded Ocarina of Time. They added the grappling hook! Whooptie doo! Ocarina of Time was just like the first Zelda with a third dimension. Even Twilight Princess is the same as the old Zeldas with a wolf and the twilight realm. The twilight realm seems familiar... Hmmm... Maybe because that's the same idea they had in “A Link to the Past”? Anyway, at least they gave Link a voice and a character. I'm sick of controlling a mute husk of a man devoid of any essence of humanity. I'll take the Link from Wand of Gamelon even though he wears more lipstick than most transvestites. Honestly, I prefer the whining “Well, excuse me princess!” Link from the animated series to the Link from the recent games. Link is always after a kiss from the princess, something I can completely relate to, whereas the Link that appears in the current games is an emotionless heroic automaton, something which I've never been.

Dance Aerobics – With the craze of game based workouts and Wii weight loss programs, one might forget the wonders of the Power Pad and its dance based aerobic exercise. Sure, maybe dance combined with aerobics may not be exciting as newer exercise crazes like Taibo, but I have vague memories of it being popular way back in the 8-bit era. (Screw generations of people or even decades. All measurement of time periods should be based on console technology) The advantage of bringing back Dance Aerobics for the Wii is that it's an established IP, and they don't have to license it from Billy Blanks. The Wii version would come with special socks that had holsters for your Wii-motes so it could detect the position of your feet. There would be a sexy female instructor on the screen 80s style with big hair, a neon pink leotard and matching headband. And leg warmers. You can't forget leg warmers. I think this game would be a huge hit.

Ninja Golf – Ninja Golf combines my two favorite genres of games, fighting and Golf. No, I don't mean like Lee Trevino's Fighting Golf. I mean Kung Fu fighting! Actually, wait a minute. Golf games typically suck. Luckily, the majority of the game Ninja Golf is spent in awesome kung fu action! Putting is my least favorite thing to do in golf games, so luckily they scratched that in favor of throwing ninja stars at a fire breathing dragon. A wise gameplay decision, I'd say. I think the sequel should be made for Wii. The Wii has two golf games already, but they are boring since there is no ninja related activities. Besides, the Wii controller was really designed to capture the motion of one thing – Nunchucks. Half the controller is called a nunchuck for Pete's sake.

Kung Food – You like food, right? Everyone does. You like kung fu, right? Of course you do. So, this classic Lynx title combines the two. There aren't enough games about fighting vegetables. Video games these days are lacking creativity, so how's this plot for creative? Here's a quote from the instruction manual:
"Your kitchen is usually a safe, warm place. Not any more. The top secret chemical you stored in your fieezer became active when the door was left open. Now the contents of your freezer have come to life, and the effects of this chemical have spread throughout the kitchen. Even you have been transformed. Reduced to a little green man, you must boldly go to your freezer and destroy such transformed tidbits as ice demons and killer kung fu carrots. If you fail, your
fearsome food will conquer the world."
Now that's creative! I think we can stick with the same story and basic gameplay and just give it a next gen touch! This game needs photorealistic graphics, normal maps, specular highlights and lots of HDR! Perhaps it could even use a brown filter over the screen too. This sequel would sell faster than Gears of War!

Joy of Sex – I don't know if this Philips CD-i was a game exactly. It was more like a DVD using the CD-i controller as a way of selecting the menus since VCD didn't support interactive menus. The video content featured some dirty looking drawings and shots of creepy looking actors paid to read off prompts about their pretend sex lives. All in all, I think the next gen sequel could use more of a Clockwork Orange spin. Your in game character is forced to watch this horrifying content with its eyes strapped open. The only options are to watch this appalling content or swallow your tongue and die. Obviously, if you choose to swallow your tongue, it's game over. If you can survive the 20 hours of agony that the remake will provide, you win! What you'll most likely win is a vow of celibacy.

Zombie Dinos from Planet Zeltoid – You should stop reading right here. The title alone should explain why this game needs to be remade. Zombie Dinos from Planet Zeltoid. That's the greatest game premise. I haven't played the game in a while, but basically in some of the most gripping and enthralling cutscenes the world has ever seen, Dexter the Dinodroid explains how the evil Harry the Harrier and his brain blobs are going back in time to enslave the dinos to take over the world. Dexter the Dinodroid's amazing lifelike motion received an award for its creators, the Chiodo Brothers best known for Killer Klowns from Outer Space. You have to see the video to understand how truly breathtaking it is. Also breathtaking was the theme song that somehow managed to express this plot in ballad form. If I get a chance, I'll try and rip the song from the disc somehow, so you CD-i less people can enjoy the emotionally resonant theme. Incidentally, the game was released for PC also, so you could probably pirate it. Anyway, for the sequel, I'd change... Hmm... nothing. It's already gaming perfection! I'd say it's just due for a re-release! Sony's Playstation Store doesn't have many titles. Perhaps someone should notify them of this gem ripe for a re-release?

Skydiving Extreme – Okay, so I own this game, but I haven't gotten around to playing it. I've never even heard anything about the game, but if it'll sell just based on a great title like that, then it definitely needs a sequel. Skydiving... TO THE EXTREME! I have a relatively amusing cell phone game about sky diving. The one complaint I have with it is that it isn't extreme enough. Luckily this game looks to rectify that.

Perfect Weapon – One of my all time favorite games. This game makes the PS1 look like the Sega 32x CD, which in and of itself is a feat for the history books. There's nothing I enjoy more than moving a character that controls like trying to direct a drunk oil tanker captain orally. You don't believe me? Remember those oil spills in Alaska? I didn't have enough Perfect Weapon experience, so I failed to guide the inebriated mariner. Frequent awkward camera cuts as well as constantly draining health completes the gaming perfection that Perfect Weapon has honed. For the sequel, I think nothing should be changed. The game was clearly already perfect, as indicated by its title, so it just needs a re-release. Perhaps it should be ported to the Wii, so they can come with an even more unintuitive control scheme with gesture based actions in order to give the game some added challenge.

The BIG G's Guide to Microtransactions

2006-11-16T20:38:00.000-08:00

Many people have been making a big fuss about electronic distribution, downloadable content and microtransactions. It seems that it's obligatory that all next gen games must have some other crap that allows game developers to squeeze more money out of consumer's wallets. And why not? If people will pay for it, why shouldn't we the game developers get paid for it? So, let me break it down and show you what microtransactions will allow for the future of game development:
Exchange rates – All the MMOs do it, so why shouldn't single player game developers? Although gold auctioning is against the rules, more and more companies are opening up to this revenue source. SOE is allowing servers with sanctioned auctioning (SOE gets a cut of course). Second Life thrives on changing real to virtual money, and Eve Online lets you pay for your subscription fee with in game credits. EA has already started this trend with The Godfather. You can pay real money to get in game credits! Now, the in game credits are different than credits in an MMO game since they only affect your single player experience, not your interactions with other characters. But, I guess some people are willing to pay to make a game easier. Heck! Some people are even willing to pay to get their Xbox Live Gamerscore boosted. I'm considering that since my gamescore is embarrassingly low. No one will ever respect me when I actually have time to play Gears of War online, so I better shell out the dough, so I won't get laughed off Live by a 12 year old with a gamerscore of 30,000.
Charging for cheats and unlockables – Cheats and unlockables are normally included in a game to add replay. Why give that extra replay for free when you can charge for it? EA is ahead of their time because they've realized that there's no reason to give something for nothing. With Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2007, you can buy the unlockables instead of earning them, but it's not long before big head mode costs an extra dollar. If you like concept art, that's going to be $2. If you want the hard difficulty, that will cost you an extra $3.
Toll bridges – Have you ever played a game where getting from point A to point B was really slow and boring? I remember in Final Fantasy X, if you wanted to go back to an earlier town before you were given the airship (which was quite late in the game), you had to walk the entire linear path back to where it was, and you had random encounters of weak enemies all the time, so it was really frustrating. Why don't game developers make it difficult and slow to get around, so gamers won't mind paying a toll? The advantage of this method over unlocking the toll bridge content is that the game developers get the micropayment PER usage.
Charging for keys – Say you want to get into that secret room. Maybe there's something good in it, but you don't know because the door is locked. If you want the key, you can search and search. Maybe the key is really hard to find. Or even better, it could be impossible to find. But if you want the key the easy way, you can pay. The key can be purchased from an in game vendor with real money in order to make the purchase less jarring to the gamer's immersion.
Arcade games – No, I'm not talking about Xbox Live Arcade. I'm talking about “insert coin to continue” arcade games. With the DMCA and all that, we are moving farther from actually owning our media and more towards licensing it from the content creators. No longer do we have the freedom to do what we want with our property because it might ruin some sort of licensing agreement or ridiculous copyright protection scheme. The game industry might take a step back with all this micropayment stuff to create pay to play games like physical arcades. Soon, you'll cringe at hearing “Blue Wizard needs food badly” again! Apparently, blue wizard eats quarters, but I'll be darned if those weren't effective at feeding him!
Pay for the “good” ending – Multiple endings are all the rage in games these days. Maybe it's to give the illusion that the gamer actually had some bearing on the outcome of the game. It's no more bearing than a choose your own adventure book, but I guess some people are fooled. Regardless, multiple endings usually translates into several crappy ones and one good one. There is rarely a game that has multiple endings where they are all desirable. For example, Indigo Prophesy, which was really awesome up until the end, had two bad endings and one slightly better ending. Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie leaves you with the crappy ending of the giant ape dying unless you unlock everything. Then you are treated to the good ending where the misunderstood giant primate lives happily ever after. Does he walk off into the sunset holding hands with Naomi Watts? I hope so, although I imagine the whole ape/woman romance wouldn't fly. Did that confuse anyone else about the 1976 King Kong? They kept saying Kong raped the woman. I don't see how that's physically possible. Anyway monkey business aside - in the future, you will only be able to get the good endings if you pay.
Pay for patches – Now that all games are patchable (I got Gears of War the day it came out and had to download a patch immediately when playing), why is it that game developers are giving those patches out for free? They require extra time and effort to develop, so shouldn't that cost be transferred to the consumer? Soon, if you want all the extra bug fixes and multiplayer balancing, it'll cost you another $1.
Although one might say that “next-gen gaming” is about motion controls and better graphics, that's not really the main thing that we'll see this generation. It's nickle and diming the consumer!

Message Boards: The Best Source for the Industry Secrets

2006-10-13T01:02:00.000-07:00

I've heard the next Splinter Cell iteration after Double Agent is going to be Xbox 360 exclusive, so I was curious if Playstation 3 was getting Double Agent. I did a quick search, and didn't read anything definitive except IGN said back in January that Ubisoft hadn't announced it. With the game coming out this month, potential Playstation 3 owners might wonder if there is a PS3 release around the corner. As it turns out, that was the case because at the bottom of the page, there was a link to the message boards entitled "Any chance for PS3 release?" I figured someone had already found out the truth, and posted it, so I was relieved my relatively brief search for knowledge was over. In looking for the answer, I found this little nugget of truth:
"I hate Sony. They're so competitive when Microsoft is humble. It's like MGS [Metal Gear Solid] being so competitive and copying everything Splinter Cell, when SC is doing their own thing and not fighting back. It's like a metaphor for Ghandi."
I had no idea that Mahatma Ghandi similar to a very successful software company that is often getting sued for their competitive business practices. I also had no idea that Metal Gear Solid (made by Konami) and Splinter Cell (made by Ubisoft) had anything to do with Microsoft and Sony, but apparently, I was incorrect. Apparently, Sony was behind it all copying Splinter Cell in Metal Gear Solid, and Microsoft told Vivendi to take it. After a little more searching, I stumbled on this amazing secret:
"It is to expansive to make games only for one gameing system even Halo is being shiped to ps3 dont belive me call and ask.360 is getting assassins creed too so ya its comeing out for ps3.Dont get me rong I hate Sony but hey its the truth."
Now, that statement is unintelligible gibberish to most who don't frequent message boards. Luckily, I've read enough nonsense on message boards, so I can understand this bastardization of the English tongue. Here's a translation:
"It is too expensive to make games only for one gaming system. Even Halo is being shipped for PS3. You don't believe me? Call and ask. 360 is getting Assassin's Creed too, so yes, it's coming out for PS3. Don't get me wrong! I hate Sony, but hey, it's the truth."
Now that it's been translated into proper English, the truth is revealed! So not only did this industry insider have the scoop on Splinter Cell, but he dropped the bombshell (possibly accidentally?) that Halo is coming out for the Playstation 3! As unbelievable as that sounds, this Bungie deepthroat was so sure of it, that he challenged us to call to confirm that it is in fact the truth. Since he is so sure of himself, I figured I'd take him up on that challenge. Here's a transcript of my conversation with Microsoft:

Me: Hello, is this Microsoft?
Microsoft: Yes, this is.
Me: Hi Microsoft! It's so nice of you to answer you phone.
Microsoft: Don't mention it!
Me: Anyway, I was reading on an IGN message board that Halo 3 is coming to the PS3. Is this true?
Microsoft: Yes it is.
Me: Well, that doesn't make any sense. Why would you want to put your most popular title on the PS3? It would make more financial sense to keep it exclusive to the Xbox 360, since you are a first party after all.
Microsoft: Well, look at it this way – don't you think people who own PS3s want to play Halo 3 also?
Me: Yeah I guess. Are you going to port it to Wii too?
Microsoft: Sure. We love Wii. Wii60 forever!
Me: Don't you think you should be more competitive with your rivals?
Microsoft: Our company is not competitive at all! Our corporate slogan is “What Would Gahndi Do”?
Me: Oh, okay. Thanks Microsoft for your time.
Microsoft. You're very welcome.
Me: Bye Bye!
Microsoft: Later dude!

So, there you have it! Microsoft is porting Halo 3 to the Playstation 3.

Bed, Bath and Beyond! The Game

2006-09-15T00:36:00.000-07:00

Hell is a popular setting for video games. From the Doom series to Devil May Cry, everyone's least favorite afterlife destination has had its share of digital representations. Let's face it – so far, the video game representations of the unimaginable horror have been lacking in authenticity. Never have I been exposed to something frightening and painful that I have had to turn the game off in order to prevent soiling myself. The typical portrayal of hell is similar to Dante's Inferno. Although it is a classic work of literature, no literary scholar is going to argue that Dante really went on a journey to hell. Relying on the Inferno's fictional imagery is a crutch that prevents game makers from creating a vision so horrifying that gamers may suffer from heart attacks. That is why I present to you my personal vision of the unspeakable evil that is hell: Bed, Bath and Beyond.

Opening Cutscene
The game will start with the protagonist, an average Joe named... well, Joe. Anyway, Joe isn't the sharpest tool in the proverbial toolshed nor is he particularly good looking. But, somehow he managed to snag himself a smoking hot wife named Jane. After the initial honeymoon, the relationship started deteriorating. Joe forgot little things, and Jane couldn't stand it. He forgot to celebrate the 5 1/2 th week anniversary from the first time he bought Jane flowers. Although he frequently dusted the bookshelf, he never dusted on top of the actual books. Perhaps the worst infraction that Joe committed was leaving the toilet seat up. Jane, like many women, assumed that the toilet seat's natural state was down, not up, and rather than splitting the labor 50/50, she felt that Joe was the only one qualified to adjust the position of the toilet seat. Unfortunately for poor Joe, he loves Jane with all of his heart, and he certainly can't do any better, so he wants to save the marriage at all costs. So, the game begins when Jane gives him a simple list of things to purchase from Bed, Bath and Beyond. Somehow, he must journey through the depths of hell and return with 12 hangers, a pink fuzzy toilet lid cover, a toothbrush holder, and a new shower curtain with little duckys printed on it.

Level 1: The Parking Lot of Hell
Joe had never been to a Bed, Bath and Beyond before, so he didn't know what to expect. His love for Jane and even his very sanity will be put to the test as he journeys in the Beyond! In the first level, Joe must find a parking spot, which is a horrible ordeal in itself. This will provide about half an hour of gameplay as Joe follows random pedestrians to their cars. Often, they start walking down one lane only to switch to another and before he can get there, someone else is already waiting for that spot. After the first level, Joe descends into the bowels of the existence in order to save his marriage. Little does he know that the price he may have to pay could be his very soul.

Level 2: The Demonic Laybrinth
The gameplay continues as all excursions into Bed Bath and Beyond start: at the beginning of the labyrinth of horror. For those of you who have been fortunate to avoid the pain and agony that is shopping at Bed, Bath and Beyond, I will explain to you the inner workings of this hell on Earth. Unlike most stores with aisles and signs over each aisle explaining where you can find what you are looking for, Bed, Bath and Beyond is arranged as a maze. There is only one correct path from start to end, so if you want to shop there, bring your walking shoes (and some holy water) because you will have to trek through the entire store even if you just want to buy a bar of soap. So, the second level consists of Joe navigating through the labyrinth forced to look at a bunch of crap he'd never buy. The products vary depending on what's popular at the time, but their poor quality doesn't. They find a popular character and brand every conceivable product with that character. I could have sworn I saw a Spongebob Squarepants colostomy bag there once. So, once poor Joe completes level two he has made it to the end of the store. The only problem is that he has found nothing required to save his marriage.

Level 3: The Labyrinth in Reverse
The third level consists of wandering backwards through the maze looking very carefully at all the cubbies and dead ends that Bed, Bath and Beyond features. Although the store may look small from the outside, it is called Bed, Bath and Beyond for a reason. The store really goes Beyond the earthly realm into hell itself. That's why you can spend hours wandering through the maze seeing more crap than you can possibly imagine. This level actually takes nine hours for the gamer to complete, but time in hell runs slower, so Joe still may be home in time for dinner.

Level 4: Can Anyone Help Joe?
Joe, like most Bed, Bath and Beyond patrons can't find anything on his list after wandering through the labyrinth. So the next level consists of wandering around looking for someone who works there. Occasionally Joe will spot someone who looks like they work there from the back. After trying to chase them through the maze, they shake him. If he ever does catch up with them, he will realize that they do not work for the store, they just look like it. That, or they shove their nametags in their pockets when Joe approaches them. Who besides Satan himself knows the real mysteries of hell?

Level 5: The Never Ending Line
Although Joe isn't the smartest guy in the world, a stroke of brilliance comes to him in the next cutscene. He can wait in the line at the cashier and ask the cashier where the products he's looking for are. Unfortunately, this is no ordinary line! Snails outrun the pace of the line, and as soon as he gets close to the register, the cashier closes it, and he is forced to start all over. Finally, after hours and hours of waiting patiently, it is his turn to talk to the demon at the cash register. This demon has taken the disguise of a 19 year old high school drop out goth who resents having to work at a place with such bright lighting. In this cutscene, Joe is almost on the verge of tears because he's so happy that after all the grueling trials, he can remain (somewhat) happily married to Jane. Unfortunately, the goth demon has no idea if the store actually sells any of the products that are on Joe's marriage saving list, nor does she know where to look for them. When Joe asks politely if she could find someone who could help him, she claims that she does not know how to operate the paging system. Joe can barely let out a “But...” before she screams in a shrill voice “NEXT!”, and effectively filters Joe's existence out of her perception. Joe has reached the depths of despair. He considers shopping elsewhere, but Jane is a shrewd as she is attractive (probably more so) and will want to see the receipts, so if she finds out that he didn't buy the products at Bed, Bath and Beyond like she requested, she will surely divorce him.

Level 6: The Depths of Despair
Since Joe is committed to maintaining his marriage, he cannot leave the cursed void. Unfortunately, he cannot find the requisite items to maintain his marital status, so he is trapped in hell. This level strives to recreate in the gamer the inner turmoil that the our protagonist Joe feels. Frequent flashbacks to the good times of his courtship and marriage with Jane are interspersed to fully illustrate to the gamer what Joe is about to lose. The first time Joe laid eyes on Jane at the company picnic, their first kiss, when Jane bought Joe all new clothes for his birthday, when Jane cried because he didn't wear those new clothes every day, and so on. A special despair meter will ship with the game to make sure that the player is truly feeling the despair. When the player reaches the lowest level of despair that is tolerable, a special cutscene will trigger. In this cutscene Joe will sigh and collapse against a wall of towels, and they will knock over revealing a special cubby that houses all of the items that he's looking for! With a renewed vigor, he navigates back to the checkout line.

Level 7: The Never Ending Line Part 2
Joe is forced to wait in the line again only to suffer the same hardships that he faced last time. Long, slow moving lines and closing registers are minor frustrations to him because he feels relaxed because he was finally able to locate the items and save his marriage. Unfortunately, this is no time for the gamer to let his/her guard down! The last level is about to begin!

Level 8: The Final Boss
Joe finally reaches the cashier, and it's the manager of the store. Thinking that the manager would be responsible, he is horrified to find that the manager is even more worse than the goth demon! The manager clearly hates his job but hates life even more than that. He gets a sick pleasure out of the misery of others. When our long suffering hero whips out his credit card to purchase marital happiness, the manager has a sick smile on his face as he points down to the out of order credit card swiper. Joe suggests that the manager logs out and logs into one of the several other cash registers that are empty with a working credit card swiper, but the manager refuses. Joe digs through all of his pockets, his wallet, scraping together all the money he possibly can. He comes up 1 penny short. Pleading with the manager does no good, and Joe is about to offer his eternal soul in exchange for a penny and his marital bliss, but luckily an angel in disguise as an irritated and impatient customer rudely shoves a penny in his hand, thus ending his excursion into the depths of hell.

Ending Cutscene
Thinking that his marital woes were finally over, he returns triumphantly to his loving wife, only to find out that she's not speaking to him because he left the toilet seat up again. She snatched the items that caused Joe so much strife out of his hands (including the receipt) and slammed the bedroom door in his face. She threw out a pillow and sheet indicating that he had to sleep on the couch and immediately locked the door. Exhausted from his grueling trek into the bad half of the afterlife, he took the pillow and blanket, curled up on the sofa and got some much deserved rest.

Top Ten Movies that NEED a Game Adaptation

2006-07-30T15:07:00.000-07:00

Firstly, I'd like to apologize for the lack of updates to my blog... Work has been really busy, so I haven't gotten much of a chance to write anything. Sorry! Hopefully, this post is so great, it'll make up for it.
10) Taxi Driver - One of my all time favorite films, this story about loneliness and isolation is begging to be converted into a really bad GTA clone. Oh wait – they tried, but unfortunately, it got canceled. Darn!!!

9) From Justin to Kelly – Now, I haven't seen this film (I've been meaning to, but for some reason, I just never made the time), but I can only imagine what a wonderful game this would be. I mean, the movie has Justin, Kelly (if you didn't know, they were on American Idol), singing, beaches, umm... Justin... Kelly... Romance... Between Justin... and Kelly... What more could you ask for in a video game? Since this game would have Justin and Kelly in it, I'd say nothing!

8) For Your Height Only – For those of you who are unfamiliar with this film, it's a James Bond parody starring a creepy looking 2' 9" tall Filipino midget named Weng Weng. I'm pretty sure they made up the dialog as they went along dubbing over its original Tagalog because the dialog doesn't make any sense. Despite that, this movie just begs for a video game. It has everything: guns, assassins, remote control hats, jet packs, and a midget.

7) Texas Chainsaw Massacre 4: The New Generation – This movie has very few chainsaws in it and ZERO chainsaw massacres. Instead it had Matthew McConaughey and Renee Zellweger giving the best performance of their respective lives. Their combined star power would totally make this game awesome. Leatherface instead of massacring people with chainsaws like the title would lead you to believe, spends his time dressing up in drag. This presents some awesome gameplay opportunities that would appeal to women gamers. You could choose dresses for Leatherface, and accessorize, so he would look as cute as possible.

6) Cool as Ice – Games are about fantasy fulfillment. A Cool as Ice game would fulfill everyone's fantasy of being Vanilla Ice. Who wouldn't want to be Vanilla Ice as he rides into a small town on his motorcycle and turns their worlds upside down with his bad boy with a heart of gold caricature?

5) The Wizard – I want to make a cross country journey without my parents to enter a video game competition, and this license would allow me to vicariously live that fantasy. In the game, you'd get to control a character who is playing Rad Racer with the Power Glove, so you'd get to relive all the frustrations of the Power Glove virtually. Plus, this would give Nintendo yet ANOTHER format to re-release Super Mario Bros. 3. Did I mention the game would have the awesome star power of Fred Savage? THE Fred Savage! It can't get any better than that! (Except with the following games)

4) Super Mario Bros. The Movie: The Game – Not since Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game would a game be this awesome. Super Mario Bros. The Movie really showed gamers what Super Mario Bros. was missing: a realistic pseudo-sci-fi story and fully developed characters. That and Dennis Hopper. King Koopa totally should be replaced with Dennis Hopper in all subsequent Mario games. (Or Mr. Belvedere) If Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game taught us anything, it's that games turned into movies turned back into games are much better than the original.

3) Zardoz – Apparently a comic book artist got the Zardoz license, so it'd be great if the games could be released along side of it. Zardoz is one of the few movies that makes less sense as the film goes along, and that's saying a lot because the movie starts out with some guy with a drawn on mustache and a blue towel over his head saying gibberish, and immediately follows it with a giant stone head that proudly proclaims "guns are good but the penis is evil" and spews forth a plentiful supply of rifles from its stone mouth. You think I'm making this up? See the movie! Regardless of how nonsensical the film may or may not be, for 99% of the film, Sean Connery walks around wearing a red speedo and bandoleers. That has great game written all over it.

2) The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonzai: Across the Eighth Dimension – Who wouldn't want to play as everyone's favorite neurosurgeon/rocket scientist/race car driver/rock star/adventurer/comic book hero/leader of a creepy kid cult called the Blue Blaze Irregulars? This game would have the surgery excitement from “Trauma Center”, the rocket race car driving from “F-Zero”, the rocking out from “Guitar Hero”, the action/adventure from a “Spiderman” video game, and a “Pikmin” style minigame where you command your legions of children. The only game that would be better immediately follows the picture.

1) Snakes on a Plane – I can't believe this isn't already a game. Think about it: Snakes. That are on a plane. Samuel L. Jackson. Killing snakes on a plane. What's not to love? I can't imagine a better video game. The only thing that would be difficult about designing this game is Sam Jackson is invincible, so there's no way a stupid snake could hurt him. He's Sam Mother %&#$ing Jackson!!! Maybe if you let too many passengers die, you'd lose. Regardless, this would be the best movie game ever. (Also, vote for me as the biggest Snakes on a Plane fan. You won't regret it!)

Sony didn't rip off Nintendo. Nintendo ripped off Microsoft (among other companies)

2006-06-08T23:36:00.000-07:00

I've played with the Wii. The pointing interface wasn't all that great, but the motion sensitivity was kind of cool. Sony also had a pretty cool motion sensitivity. I thought Warhawk felt more natural then some of the more gimmicky uses for Wii software. (Shake the controller to attack in Super Mario Galaxy) Where was Microsoft's motion sensitive controller? Let's travel back in time to the year 1999. Microsoft, always at the forefront of innovation, released a motion sensing controller called the Sidewinder Freestyle Pro long before the Wii was even dreamt up. Don't believe me? Here's a review. So, everyone is complaining, “Oooo. Sony TOTALLY ripped off Nintendo with the PS3 controller.” The truth is that Nintendo totally ripped off Microsoft's Sidewinder Freestyle Pro. Nintendo's David Yarton made the ridiculous claim, “any innovation that has come in gameplay has come from us... With Nintendo, I'm trying to think of anything we've copied... but I can't.” Maybe he's not thinking hard enough. Let's take a look, shall we?

The D-Pad
Maybe Yarton wasn't aware that this was first featured in Cosmic Hunter for the Microvision. Nintendo introduced it afterwards in their Game and Watch games, but since Microvision was similar, you can bet they played it.

The Gamepad
This was first featured for Vectrex. Vextrex had an analog stick instead of a d-pad, but Nintendo wasn't the first one to veer away from the Atari joystick style controllers.

The Light Gun
Although the Zapper was cool, light gun games date back to 1936 with the “Seeburg Ray-o-Lite”. In this game, you'd shoot ducks... Sound familiar?

The Analog Stick
The analog stick that was a much touted feature of the Nintendo 64 dates back to 1982 for both the Vectrex and the Atari 5200.

Rumble Pack
CH products made a force feedback joystick that came out before the N64's rumble pack. On top of that, Sony's Dual Shock was more innovative because it combined two different types of motors to create different rumbling sensations.

Touch Screen
Palm Pilots and Microsoft's Pocket PC featured touch sensitive games before the DS came out.

Motion Sensitivity
Microsoft released a motion sensitivity gamepad for PC back in 1999 called the Sidewinder Freestyle Pro.

So, in conclusion, Yarton can claim Sony copied Nintendo all he wants as long as he claims that Nintendo copied all their ideas also. It's easy to say you've never heard of any of these devices, but except possibly in the case of CH Product's force feedback joystick, I bet Nintendo was well aware of the ideas they were taking.

Britney's Baby Abusing for Nintendo Wii

2006-05-25T22:04:00.000-07:00

Now, I may have been critical in the past of the Wii, but I've seen the light! I've realized what exciting gameplay opportunities the Wii opens up for gamers. Screw "Britney's Dance Beat"! "Britney's Baby Abusing" is the Britney licensed game for the next generation. The Wii's unique controller will allow you to recreate all the bad parenting that Britney is known for! "ExciteTruck" is for losers because it doesn't have a license or gameplay innovations. With "Britney's Baby Abusing" you can drive Britney's car with the baby on your lap. Don't steer too quickly or the baby will fall off! All of the baby's falls will be realistically modeled with the rag doll physics you'd expect in a next gen game (or current gen plus game, since the Wii has weak hardware).
There's plenty of fun minigames that take advantage of the unique wii-mote controller design. You can try and balance the baby on one hand because you need to take care of your precious drink with the other. This uses the the motion sensing functions of the wii-mote. You can go high chair shopping and buy the most unstable and cheap ones because money is tight. Using the mouse like functions of the wii-mote, you have to put makeup on your baby to cover up the bruises when Department of Children and Family Services makes one of their frequent visits.
This is the must purchase game for the Wii! This is the game that will give people a real reason to buy a Wii. Babies are far too precious for most people to abuse in real life, so you can live vicariously through Britney and her bad parenting!

Playstation 3 Controller + Mouse – Buttons = Wii-mote

2006-05-19T00:41:00.000-07:00

At E3 I got to play with my Wii, so for those of you who weren't as fortunate as I, I'll give you the lowdown. The Wii-mote's functionality can be summed up with the following equation: Playstation 3 Controller + Mouse – Buttons = Wii-mote. The tilt/motion sensing was pretty much identical to the Playstation 3. Nothing fancy there. The positional sensing features (that the Playstation 3 lacks) was like a really hard to use mouse. There was a cursor on screen, and very slight movements would move it around. It almost felt like games that map the small response area of an analog stick to the entire screen for a cursor (except it didn't center, and you could go off the edges). There are a lot less buttons on the Wii-mote than there are on the PS3 controller, so a game like Warhawk would have been difficult, plus if they had a game like that, you may have to hold the Wii-mote sideways (like you had to for several Wii games like ExciteTruck), which is a lot less comfortable than the PS3 controller or holding the Wii-mote the proper way. So, Wii (the royal Wii) are not impressed with the Wii. I enjoyed Warhawk with the PS3 controller more than any of the Wii games. Everyone can point fingers and say who ripped off who, but honestly what does it matter? It's all about the execution, and so far, I think the motion sensing was executed better with PS3.

Come play with my Wii! (Pronounced We)

2006-04-27T23:30:00.000-07:00

If you are living under a rock and haven't heard people screaming WTF, then you might not know that Nintendo's official name for Revolution is Wii. More like Wtf? Seriously, WTF was Nintendo thinking? I'll tell you what they were thinking. Some marketing team put a ton of thought into that one, and they came up with a ridiculous story that explains why they think it's good. Here's a quote from their website:
Introducing... Wii. As in "we." While the code-name Revolution expressed our direction, Wii represents the answer. Wii will break down that wall that separates videogame players from everybody else. Wii will put people more in touch with their games... and each other. But you're probably asking: What does the name mean? Wii sounds like "we," which emphasizes the console is for everyone. Wii can easily be remembered by people around the world, no matter what language they speak. No confusion. No need to abbreviate. Just Wii. Wii has a distinctive "ii" spelling that symbolizes both the unique controllers and the image of people playing it. And Wii, as a name and a console, brings something revolutionary to the world of videogames that sets it apart from the crowd. So that's Wii. But now Nintendo needs you. Because it's really not about you or me. It's about Wii. And together, Wii will change everything.

Let me tell you something. If you need to explain WHY it's named Wii, then that's a bad name. No one gives a crap if the distinctive spelling symbolizes the unique controllers! If you have to explain it, then it’s not a very good symbol. Good symbolism invokes the intended image in average Joe Consumer’s head. Bad symbolism requires a complicated explanation like what appears above and still doesn’t leave an impact. I guarantee you the only reason marketers actually thought up that crap is because they spent hundreds of hours trying to justify such a stupid name.

The Xbox 360 suffered from the same problem. Marketing people went on and on about how 360 is like 360 degrees, which means total immersion, or an all encompassing circle, but pretty much everyone else thought it was silly to skip 359 numbers. People don't want something that has deep symbolism that you'd never figure out unless they told you. People want a name that sounds cool. I'll tell you something, “playing with my wii” does not sound cool. Maybe Nintendo isn't familiar that “Wii” sounds like “Wee”, which is slang for the male genitalia, urinating and small. None of which seem to be a good thing to associate with your console. Let me give you some example dialog and they should conclusively prove what a horrible name it is:
“Hey Bobby! Do you want to come over after school and play with my Wii?”
“My Wii is more fun if two people play with it!”
“Hey Walmart! Do you have any Wii in stock?”
“I like playing with my own Wii.”
“I would like more games to play on my Wii”
“My parents told me to go to bed, but instead, I stayed up late playing with my Wii.”
“I was shaking my Wii to play with my Monkey Balls!” (Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz is confirmed for Wii)
“I was waving my Wii back and forth, and a bunch of white particles appeared on the screen.”

Honestly, I don’t know how developers for “the Wii” can’t be ashamed. If someone asks you what you’re working on, you’re only response is “I’m creating a new game that you play with your Wii.” I’m glad I’m not working on one because I’d die of embarrassment.

I was unnecessarily hard on “the Revolution” before, but I don’t know how anyone can take it seriously with a stupid name like “Wii”. Some of my friends have told me this name actually makes them want to buy it less. That CAN’T be good for business. In response to criticism Perrin Kaplan on IGN said, “Live with it, sleep with it, eat with it, move along with it and hopefully they'll arrive at the same place.” That translates to tough crap! If you don’t like our name TOO BAD! Honestly, that’s a pretty terrible message to send to consumers. If you don’t like our product, DEAL WITH IT! WE DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU!

Now with 30% more achievement points!

2006-04-11T19:03:00.000-07:00

I actually had time to turn on my Xbox 360 for about 20 minutes last Sunday, and on the live page, it said FREE DOWNLOAD WIK: FABLE OF SOULS GAME OF THE CENTURY SUPER PLATNUM AWESOME EDITION or something to that affect. I thought it might have something to do with the Verizon free Xbox Live Weekend, so I downloaded the file in the hopes that I could get something free. As it turns out, it was only the demo, which was quite disappointing. I wanted to quit the demo, and it had a big long movie supposedly showing me all the reasons I should buy it. Nothing looked appealing until I saw one of the bullet points: “Earn 200 Achievement Points”
Now this idea has me intrigued... Long gone are the days where “good gameplay”, “well written story”, and “fun multiplayer” are bullet points... 200 achievement points?!?! Maybe the developers of Wik aren't familiar with Xbox Live, but all Xbox Live Arcade games can give out (maybe they must?) 200 achievement points, so that's not much of a feature specific to Wik. But, this got me thinking. If 200 achievement points are enough to make people buy a game, maybe games should make all the achievement points easy to get. I heard that was one good thing about “King Kong” for 360: it was easy and quick to get quite a few achievement points. How long before Microsoft gives into gamers achievement point cravings and starts selling them? If that won't happen, how long before we have “Achieve: The Achievements” released on Xbox Live Arcade, that gives out its 200 achievement points really easily and for a low, low price! I hope this happens soon because I'm lagging in achievement points behind my friend who got his Xbox 360 at launch. Gamespot has already recognized what a hot commodity achievement points are and created a guide to get an easy 1000 points.

The Next Hit Tycoon Game

2006-03-25T21:28:00.000-08:00

The tycoon games are running out of ideas. Zoo Tycoon, Roller Coaster Tycoon, Cruise Line Tycoon, Tycoon City, Tycoon University and Porn Tycoon (Playboy the Mansion). Here's an idea! Spam Tycoon. Yes, you run a junk e-mail company, and you have to spam as many people as possible. You start by spamming with the penis enlargement pill ads. You work your way through OEM software, prescription software and web design until you are sending out fake press releases giving stock tips. (I don't purchase individual stocks, but I'm guessing most people who do can afford spam filters or don't get stock tips from spammers. But, maybe the spammers are banking on fools who will soon be parted of their money)

Have your company hire programmers to create programs to crawl the web for e-mail addresses. Create strategies for text in the spam to avoid those pesky Bayesian filters. If you want to break the law, then you can start phishing scams, send out those pleas to help launder millions of dollars, and hack boxes in order to use them to spam as many people as you can. But be careful! If you don't treat your employees well, they may report you to the cops! Your game will end if you get arrested. Yes, if you like simulations, then Spam Tycoon will be an enjoyable romp while you go from someone hand e-mailing pieces of spam to your friends to a vast spamming empire that is annoying people world wide!

The Big G's Getting Down: Shake Well Before Opening

2006-03-16T18:36:00.000-08:00

If Mark Ecko gets to make a game about defacing public property with paint and claim it's art, then I think the Big G needs to take it to the next level. The creation of art with paints was so last millennium. Van Gogh? Picasso? Da Vinci? They we all last millennium. The kids of today want to ruin things with modern art, not the old fashioned paint-based art of their parents. Manzoni? Offili? Friedman? These renegade modern artists appreciate the medium that today's youngsters understand: feces. Mark Ecko combined art and vandalism, but using paint was his mistake. These days, the youth want to make MODERN art with feces AND vandalize! So, without further ado, I present to you: The Big G's Getting Down: Shake Well Before Opening. It has an equally ridiculous name, but a much better artistic medium: human feces. In order to stop the oppressive government and to shock the populace out of their every day lives, you have the power of your bowel movements to communicate all the truths that the corrupt politicians want to hide! Not only does the game allow you to put your poop to good use, it also is educational! Over 30 hours of dialog by these seminal artists in the field of fecal based art was recorded, so you can learn how to make lots of money off of your crap while you play! (Some of Manzoni's poop went for around $40,000)
The game also features a special mode where you can take pictures of your own real life defecations and upload them into the game to use as in game art. If that wasn't enough features to make you crap your pants, the game also has a complex neural network that compares your poop to the fecal based masterpieces of other modern artists. From that, it calculates an estimated worth of your bodily waste in an art auction. Who knows! You may find out that you've been shitting gold for quite some time!

4 months, 16 days, 22 hours and 7 minutes...

2006-03-16T12:15:00.000-08:00

... after preordering, I received my replacement Xbox 360, and it works great! It only took me 3 months, 15 days, 10 hours and 20 minutes after launch to receive a working one... I better reserve my Playstation 3 soon, since it's going to come out in 8 months...

Secret to Getting Places in the Games Industry

2006-03-15T18:44:00.000-08:00

Want a cushy job where you don't have to do any work, or the quality of your work doesn't matter? Just make a name for yourself! How do you do that? Many people try and get ahead in this industry, but they go about it in the wrong way. Rather than doing productive work, you need to devote your career to self promotion and taking credit for other people's productive work. This is probably true in any industry, but at least in games, the APPEARANCE of doing work is much more important than doing ACTUAL work. Think about it – if you're actually doing work, it can get overlooked. You'll be the unsung hero of the game, yes, but who wants to be unsung? You don't get anywhere by being unsung! Get sung! In fact, devote yourself to singing your praises.
Create a blog (similar to this one) and assert that you are the greatest thing to happen to this industry since the joystick (or gamepad depending on your controller preferences)! Hire a publicist to manage your image and to assist in getting the word out about how great you are... Maybe you should even do interviews, Game Developer talks about how all the smart things you “did” on your last game and a 1up.com blog. (Incidentally, my 1up.com blog just points to this one) Let's face it! The content doesn't matter. As long as you've hyped up your involvement in whatever games you may or may not have worked on, they'll be plenty of people to eat up your every word!
If we want to make more celebrities in this industry (which of course we do! Then we could have our own Oscars!) then we need more names! And the only way you get a name is by bragging! So, this is my message to all you game developers out there! Stop doing work and start taking credit for it! You'll find it's a lot more rewarding that way!

Happy Pi Day!

2006-03-14T13:59:00.000-08:00

Today is Pi day celebrating the most useful irrational number in game development. Sorry for the lack of updates. I received a working Xbox 360 last Friday, so that has kept me occupied. I'll post the final counter later.

4 months, 7 days, 7 hours, and 33 minutes after preordering...

2006-03-01T19:29:00.000-08:00

and 3 months, 5 days, 19 hours, and 46 minutes after launch, I happily went to EB Games (now Gamestop) to pick up my Xbox 360. What could stop me from entering the HD Era? The Xbox 360 didn't work... *sigh* I contacted Microsoft's tech support department (haven't heard back yet), but it seems that I'm doomed to remain in the Standard Definition Era forever.... The counter has changed to when I get a WORKING 360!

Let Uwe Boll Make a Movie Based on Your Game

2006-02-22T19:19:00.000-08:00

Uwe (pronounced ooooh-vay. It's German!) Boll is thinking about not making movies based on video games! We can't let this happen! There are plenty of good reasons to sell out!

1) Uwe Boll thinks his movies aren't trash, and I agree – He doesn't say that they are masterpieces, but in IGN's Dinner with Uwe, he says they aren't trash, and complains how people on the internet aren't fair to him and the IGN suck ups agree. Now, I think Uwe Boll is right in this regard (although IGN seems really spineless to side with that monster). Uwe Boll films aren't trash. They may be horribly awful steaming piles of crap, but I've had to pay to see them, so it is dissimilar in that regard to trash because people throw out trash, so you can get it for free if you go dumpster diving. It's probably more similar to a toilet you have to pay to use. You really have to go, and you see the last person using it walk out. That person was Uwe Boll, and he managed to get every last drop of poop on the toilet seat and none in the actual toilet. You spent your last euro (since as far as I know, they only have pay toilets in Europe. Here in America, we have freedom – freedom from entrepreneurs exploiting our natural bodily functions), and you really have to go, so you sit down on Uwe's foul toilet seat. I think that's a much better analogy than trash. Maybe Uwe will complain about my criticalness of his work in his next interview because he seems to like whining a lot.

2) Every movie based on a video game license sucks – They all suck including Uwe Boll's. “Super Mario Bros”? “Street Fighter”? I think Raul Julia died of embarrassment when he saw his performance in that film. I've seen them all except the straight to video “Double Dragon” (which despite having Alyssa Milano in it, has to suck since “straight to video” is always synonymous with crap). The best movie to video game translation was “Mortal Kombat”, which is hardly a great film. That's pretty sad. If someone is going to take a giant dump on your carefully developed IP, why shouldn't it be Uwe?
I don't know if you saw Doom (or read the novelization), but there was very little they could have done to screw Doom up. All they had to do was non-stop demon killing, or just have the Rock do his eyebrow thing for an hour and a half, and they'd have a great movie. Instead, there was all this psuedo-science trying to find out the cause of the stupid virus, and the brother and sister with troubled pasts reuniting under less than ideal circumstances. Here's a much better screenplay:

Scene 1 – Interior shot Mars base
Bystander: Oh no! The gateway to Hell has been opened!
Bystander gets mauled by a zombie
The Rock: It's time to kick some ass.
The Rock picks up a BFG and ad libs while slaying demons. The demons also kill a lot of innocent bystanders in very gory ways.
Fin

It's not a question of money. I'd sell that to Hollywood for $5. I think it's gross incompetence on the part of Uwe Boll and Hollywood in general on what gamers are looking for in a video game movie. We're looking for something VERY SIMILAR to the game. We don't want radical changes to the story. When they bought the license for Doom, there was demons on Mars. What did they have in Doom the movie? Well, it wasn't demons! They bought the Doom license so they could do a horrible first person segment. Let's take Bloodrayne for example. I like the story. It was cheesy and funny. Hot vampire woman fighting Nazis. Pretty straightforward, right? Somehow in Uwe Boll's twisted mind, it became a period drama set in the 1700s, and was mind blowingly awful. Here's some notes for you Uwe: “YOU SHOULD HAVE MADE BLOODRAYNE ABOUT HER FIGHTING NAZIS!” Maybe Uwe should spend his time listening to fans criticism rather than giving long and boring interviews whining about how nobody likes him and how we are all jealous of his success. Yep, you hit the nail on the head. We say your movies are bad not because they are bad because we envy you. We all desire in the bottom of our heart to be a director of horrible video game adaptations. I can't wait for Uwe Boll's Dungeon Siege because I'm sure it'll be the story of three pirates (one blind, one deaf and one mute) transported to a dungeon in the future, and they are the Earth's only hope for overthrowing the corrupt dictatorship. It seems like they just take the title of the game and guess what the game might be about rather than actually playing it and working from that.

3) He's the only one who will buy your license – If someone buys your license, you get money regardless of how terrible the movie is. Uwe says all of his movies have made a profit (mostly because they cost around $20 million to make with $15 million advertising). So, you get free money for doing nothing! Besides, a few top licenses (Halo, Dead or Alive, and Silent Hill) no one is making movies based on games since they are beginning to realize that they all suck.

4) You get a lot of free publicity – Gamers everywhere will be talking out your game. Sure, they won't be saying good things, but there's no such thing as bad publicity, right? Maybe people will wonder if your game is truly as wretched as the Uwe Boll pile crap masquerading as a film. I bought “Alone in the Dark” to see if it was quite possibly as horrible as the film. It wasn't very good, but it was better than the film, which isn't saying much.

5) You'll gain a newfound appreciation for your voice actors – Let's face it. Most video game voice acting isn't all that great. Let's take for example the first lines in House of the Dead 2 “We're meeting G over there” in deadpan monotone. Or Goldman's oscillations in pitch on “We've got to protect the life cycle!” Both of those horrendous line readings are better than the guy that wears the yellow raincoat in “House of the Dead” the movie. Tara Reid as a bright archaeologist in “Alone in the Dark” was the worst casting since Denise Richards as a Nuclear Scientist in “The World is Not Enough”.

6) You'll gain a newfound appreciation for your writer – Again, “House of the Dead” has a horrible story. “Bloodrayne” is campy cheesy fun, but definitely not going to win any awards. These writers are at least better than the ones that write Uwe Boll screenplays. I'm not sure where he can find people that are that bad at writing, but my guess is he gets a bunch of 3 year olds drunk and sits them in front of a word processor.

So there you have it! Game developers of the world, get on your phone and call up Uwe today! What do you have to lose other than your dignity and self-respect?

How long will I have to wait for a 360?

2006-02-21T19:39:00.000-08:00

I'm not getting my 360 this week, so I've made counters indicating how long it's been since preordering and launch. I think you'll be shocked at the ridiculous amount of time I'm having to wait. View them here. (Unfortunately, blogger won't let me use Javascript, so I had to put them on a different page)

I have Full Auto, but I don't think I'll ever get a 360

2006-02-20T22:31:00.000-08:00

So, I went to EB Games on Friday to pick up my Full Auto with faceplate. They were closed at 8:45! I told the guy that I'd be there at 8 or 8:30, and he didn't say anything about them being closed?!?!?! I couldn't believe it. Could it get any worse for me? I came back on Saturday, so I could end this crapola, and sure enough, they still had the faceplate on hold for me. They wanted to know why I wasn't there yesterday! I explained to them that I DID in fact show up, but they were closed for some strange reason.... He explained that they had computer trouble, so they closed early. Well, it all seemed worth it because they still had my faceplate! I called EB Games today to see when their shipment of Xbox 360 would come in since mine was due. I didn't have a doubt in my mind that my time was finally up! I'd finally get the 360 that I craved so badly, but! Alas, cruel fate! They aren't getting in any this week... I was dumbfounded. There must be some mistake! They didn't get in any last week, and they get 4 in every other week (and I'm 4th on the list). I explained this to the EB Games employee, but he brushed me off saying that they just aren't getting any in stock.... So, I think I'm never getting one. Here's my Full Auto faceplate though. It looks really good on my Xbox:

Things are looking up... Sort of.

2006-02-17T15:52:00.000-08:00

Someone let the UPS guy into my apartment complex, so he left DOA 4 at my door. Many people claim that Xbox 360 games don't look any better than Xbox games, so I decided to test the theory by putting DOA 4 in my Xbox. It didn't play. They do the same thing that Xbox games do if you stick them in something else – they play a short video saying that you need to put it in an Xbox. I almost shat my pants when I put an Xbox game in my PS2 by accident, and it instructed me to put it in my Xbox before realizing how easy that was to do (if it has a small partition that acts as a DVD video disc, PS2/Xbox will just play the video).

As far as Full Auto, I called up EB Games this morning to see if I could cancel my Full Auto preorder, but they said that they were giving out the faceplates first come first serve. I said I couldn't come in until after work, but the guy said he'd hold it for me... So, we'll see if that happens or not when I go in later today. Although, I suppose all of this is a moot point since I don't actually have a 360.

I'm being punished, but I don't know why

2006-02-16T14:36:00.000-08:00

So, I called EB Games before going there to pick up my Full Auto preorder. They said they had it in, but I wanted to make sure I got the faceplate, so I asked about that. They said I preordered it after the cutoff date (February 1st), so I wouldn't get one. I explained to them that I wouldn't have preordered it there had I known that I wouldn't get the faceplate. They said they didn't know that either, and they'd try and see if they could order more faceplates blah blah blah. Yeah right. There's no way they'll get me a faceplate. So, now I have to try and return my preorder (which I foolishly paid for the entire thing up front) and order from EBGames.com, which appears to have a plentiful supply of faceplates.
To make matters worse, my Dead or Alive 4 is supposed to be delivered today (from ebgames.com). UPS always delivers packages at around 2 pm to my apartment. I'm at work at 2pm, so I try and ambush the UPS guy before I leave for work, since he's on the same street that I live on (just the other side). I tracked him down this morning and noticed it was a different driver than usual. The usual driver is really cool. He's usually really nice and gives me the packages in the morning when I track him down. I asked this guy if I could have my package. He said no. Apparently, he had to deliver a bunch of stuff before 10:30 that was like overnight express or something like that, and he couldn't be bothered to spend 30 seconds handing me my package... I wanted to complain and say that it probably took as long to explain to me why he couldn't do it as actually doing it, but instead, I just walked off dejectedly.
So, what does this mean? It it some sign to indicate that I will never enjoy next generation gaming bliss? Do I not meet the minimum requirements to enter the HD Era? Am I not part of the Remix Generation that J Allard spoke of? Or should I stop patronizing EB Games? (Both games and the system were ordered from them) I don't know, but I'm very tempted to cancel all my preorders, give up gaming and game development forever and become a Buddist Monk in the Himalayas.

Xbox 360 Woes

2006-02-15T19:03:00.000-08:00

I'm the laughing stock of my company. Now, that's pretty typical for me, but this time, the reason is a bit different. It's because I preordered an Xbox 360. Why is that so humiliating? Here's the full story. My first encounter with the supposed pinnacle of gaming technology was at E3. I played Full Auto and loved it, so I made up my mind to get Xbox 360 along with Full Auto at launch. I was devastated when they pushed the Full Auto release date back, but I was excited about Kameo, so I was still planning on getting it at launch. I wanted to preorder the system at Best Buy, so I could get the reward points (and apparently, they were going to let reward members preorder it), but after jerking me around for a while, they finally said they weren't doing preorders. I headed to the nearest EB Games on October 20, 2005 (I know this because I still carry the faded receipt with me in my wallet on the off chance that I'll get an Xbox 360), and preordered one. They told me that I was on the second shipment, but I'd probably get in on the first since they had a lot of cancellations. I was satisfied. They assured me I'd get it before Christmas. I ordered Kameo and Project Gotham Racing 3 thinking my Xbox 360 would come shortly after launch if not at launch. I was dead wrong. I kept calling and calling EB Games. The story was that I'd get it before Christmas. I could wait. I had some good PS2 titles to keep me busy. When I called before I went on my Christmas vacation, they said I'd get it in January or maybe February. I was devastated, but at least I'd get it before Full Auto came out. I kept calling. They said they get 4 every two weeks, so I just had to play the waiting game. I called EB games last week, and they said I was 4th on the list, and that I'd get it either last week or no later than today. I ordered Dead or Alive 4 from EB Games online, so I could get the free calendar thinking that I'd have a system to play it on by the time it arrived. I called again on Friday of last week. No 360 yet. I went in on Saturday to preorder Full Auto to ensure that I got the faceplate. They said to call back on Monday because they would get a list of what is in their weekly shipment. I did. No Xbox 360 this week. I'm going to pick up my copy of Full Auto later today (with faceplate), but I have no system to play it on. My Dead or Alive 4 will arrive tomorrow. But, I still don't have an Xbox 360. So, MAYBE next week I'll get my Xbox 360. But, maybe I'll never get it. Hard to say. Peter Moore said that anyone should be able to walk in a store and get an Xbox 360 in four to six weeks. Although that may be hard to believe, I don't want it to be true if I actually get my Xbox 360. Once I get mine, I want everyone else to suffer the gamut of negative emotions I've endured for these four long months: anxious waiting, longing, and kicking his/herself for not camping out at Best Buy. If I don't get mine soon, they better start having them in other stores. It occurred to me that maybe I got bumped way down because I didn't preorder enough accessories from that EB Games. Or maybe the employees are buying them and selling them on ebay. *Sigh*

The Future of the Game Industry

2006-01-13T00:27:00.000-08:00

People are wondering how the industry will sustain itself with the rising costs of next gen development. The BIG G knows that most development costs aren't going to rise. I know what you are thinking: “Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?” I'll tell you why: because they don't have to. Rather than make games that utilize the awesome power of the next gen platforms, just don't! “But The BIG G, WE won't buy them!” Maybe YOU won't, but people will. All you need to sell a game is a good license. All you have to do is attach your game to a popular TV show or movie, crap in a box, ship it, and you're guaranteed sales. More content? Who needs it! Better graphics? Just get something good enough so the pictures look good enough for the back of the box. There are good licensed games out there, but some don't sell because the license isn't popular enough, isn't gamey enough, or just uninteresting to the mass market consumer. There are many bad licensed games where the game is absolute crap, but it has a great license so it sells like hotcakes. Rather than spend the extra money, publishers should (and will) take the least amount of risk and make a bad licensed game for cheap. That way each game is less expensive to make, so if it happens to flop because no one cares about your license, then its not as much of a loss for the company. With that money you could have spent on quality you can diversify your licensed game roster to amortize the costs of the ones that flop. Also, the cost of a license can be the same as other game companies spend on marketing, so if you make a licensed game, you don't need nearly as much money spent on marketing. Licensed games are the future of the industry. That is, until the quality gets so low that people stop gaming all together, so another video game crash occurs like back in the Atari days. Man, I want to play E.T. for the 2600 right now! (I can't believe I actually paid $4 for that game... What a rip off!)

Next-Next Gen Preorders?

2006-01-12T11:58:00.000-08:00

It seems with each subsequent generation, the consoles seem to be increasingly difficult to get at launch. I remember looking everywhere for an N64, but I found one at KMart. Playstation 2 was really hard (I had a Dreamcast, so I was content with waiting). I reserved my Xbox 360 about a month before it came out, and I still haven't gotten it. So, if you know any retailers taking preorders for Xbox 720s, Playstation 4s, or Virtual Boy 2s (my guess for what follows Revolution) please let me know because I think I need to put in my preorder right away!

Top 10 reasons GameCube Was Lame

2006-01-11T23:38:00.000-08:00

Now, I've been accused of being a Nintendo fanboy on my message boards. This isn't the first time. (Although it is the first time I've been accused by a poem) I used to swear by Nintendo ever since receiving my NES. This generation though, it seems like Nintendo has been lagging a bit behind. It was the last console out of the three I got, and I have the least amount of games for it. Most of the games I do have for it are Mario Party, and frankly, by 7, I'm sick of them. What did Nintendo do wrong this generation? How does that reflect on next generation? Let's discuss!

10. No entertainment center features – This may be a minor point to some, but I don't have a real DVD player. I just used Xbox and/or PS2. That's pretty darn cool. Xbox has Windows Media Center Extender if you want movie playback from your PC, but you need a Media Center PC. You can mod your Xbox and get a pretty awesome Media Player that will do everything. Then you can finally watch all those TV shows you video captured or downloaded through legal means) on your TV (unless your computer is in the same room as your big screen TV and you have video out). Xbox 360 is supposed to let you stream videos off your PC if you have Media Center (which no one does) or Vista (which everyone soon will). Even the PSP makes a really bad ass movie player if you put MP4s on your memory stick. Sure, they are gaming platforms, but it's relatively easy to use the powerful hardware (unless you don't have powerful hardware *cough* Revolution *cough*) to do some cool video playback. I for one am looking forward to Blu-Ray on Playstation 3. (HD-DVD isn't as good of a format [15 GB per layer vs 25 GB], and buying a separate drive for Xbox 360 might not actually be much cheaper than buying a standalone player, but we'll see what wins the next gen video format wars. Sony lost with its superior BetaMax product way back when.)

9. DK: Jungle Beat – This game got really good reviews and a lot of praise, but I didn't like it at all. It seemed like a really lame game with a very awkward control scheme. It really should have been shipped as mini-games with Donkey Konga... Taiko Drum Master had more interesting mini-games that actually came with the main game rather than playing $40 for almost no content.

8. Legend of Zelda: Windwaker – What a let down. I liked the cell shading, but it was exactly like playing the other Zelda games except with a grappling hook, and the horribly annoying sailing and conducting. It took like a minute to pull out the baton and conduct the wind changing song, so usually when I teleported into an area, I tried to wiggle the stick back and forth to get to land without playing the darn song. Sailing was annoying, and when you almost beat the game, they extended the game with more sailing and finding stuff. I hate looking for things in real life, so naturally, I hate looking for them in video games... I wish I could get people to pay me to look for missing papers and stuff in my apartment.

8. Mario Sunshine – I LOVED Mario 64. I was anxiously awaiting a successor... I'm still waiting. Mario Sunshine just didn't do it for me. The levels weren't as fun, and I don't like cleaning. I wish I could get people to pay me to wash my car.

7. Poor HDTV support – Nintendo thinks that HD isn't important. The FCC disagrees since it is regulating that by May of this year, all broadcasters must broadcast in HD. GameCube actually supported component 480p out, but they removed the jacks on newer GameCubes... The component cable was really hard to find. I had to order mine direct from NOA, which was a pain. Very few games actually support progressive scan on the GameCube, which is quite lame. If you've played it on an HDTV, you'd be disappointed too, especially because some Xbox games actually support 1080i, which looks excellent. (Last I heard, it was only 6 games though)

6. Weak hardware – GameCube has the weakest hardware of the bunch. Debate it all you want, it can't compare to Xbox, and there are many PS2 games that look much better than any GameCube game (Ratchet & Clank series, God of War, etc).

5. No shaders – Shaders are awesome. Play “Panzer Dragoon Orta” and you'll agree!

4. Bad third party support – GameCube didn't get all the ports because of the worse hardware and small market, so that sucked. Also, they didn't get very many good 3rd party exclusives except Capcom (Viewtiful Joe, Resident Evil 4), but then they went ahead and released those for Playstation 2.

2. Crappy controller – Anyone who says they like the GameCube controller is a liar. Not only do the X, Y and Z buttons suck a lot, but it doesn't have enough buttons for cross-plat games. The other two have 12, but GameCube only has 8.

1. Not enough RAM – And the number one thing is, there isn't enough RAM. I suppose I should be specific. There isn't enough main memory. It features 40 MB total if you include the A-RAM, but only 24 MB is main memory. (Less than the PS2's 32 MB) Main memory can be used for optimizations, effects, better AI, higher res textures, larger environments, etc. GameCube is missing out!

So, there you have it. The funny part is, Nintendo didn't learn from their mistakes, and the Revolution suffers from all of these (except it MAY have shaders, but unlikely) if they port Windwaker, Sunshine and DK: Jungle Beat. It looks like Nintendo wants to repeat being last place!

Katana: The Soul Controller vs. The Revolution Controller

2006-01-10T22:18:00.000-08:00

Since I'm a peripheral whore, when I found out that they were releasing the Katana Soul Controller in the US (about a year after it came out in Japan), I just HAD to get it! And judging from the amount of feedback I've received, it seems that my Revolution controller comparisons are the most popular, so why don't I compare the two?

Controls
Katana: The Soul Controller, has everything a Dual Shock controller has (two joysticks, a d pad, and 12 buttons). The Revolution controller only has 6 buttons (A,B,X,Y, select and start) and one d-pad. I think it's clear that The Soul Controller is victorious!

Game Support
The Soul Controller works out of the box with EVERY PS2/PS1, and that includes its awesome gyroscopic controls. The Revolution controller can double as an NES controller, but it doesn't use the gyroscopic controls. It doesn't have enough buttons to work with any of the other platforms the virtual console is supposed to emulate, so you need an add on or separate controller. The Soul Controller wins since there is a ton more PS1/PS2 games than there will be for Revolution. (I'm discounting Virtual Console games that require add ons! The Soul Controller works out of the box!)

Connectivity
Both are wireless, so they are evenly matched here.

Appearance
The Katana wins hands down. Not only does it come with a sheath, but it comes with a display stand. Now that IS a cool controller. I feel like a samurai just because I own it. The only thing that weakens the appearance is the blade is pretty darn fat, so it can't really mask for a real sword. (Also, this isn't necessarily related to appearance but when you draw the sword from its sheath, it makes a hollow “FOOP” noise, which isn't very samurai-esque...)

Name
Katana: The Soul Controller is an awesome name. I don't care what they call the Revolution controller, it's not better than “Katana: The Soul Controller”. Katana wins!

Functionality
The only motion sensing the Katana does is swinging the sword registers as square. This is not configurable. A vertical swing doesn't register as anything different. On top of that, the buttons are quite difficult to press. I'd like to give this to “The Soul Controller”, but I just can't in good conscience... It's functionally horrid. The buttons are difficult to press and it doesn't register every swing, thus making it the fourth worst controller I've ever used. (The worst was that gyroscopic gun that played Halo at E3 that I mentioned in a previous article, the second worst is the Atari 7800 controller because it hurts your hands after 2 minutes of gameplay, and the third worst is EyeToy specifically in the game Sega All Stars. I was so excited about playing another Nights game only to discover that it was unplayable... Also, I wasted like half an hour at a party trying to show off my EyeToy only to realize that the person's house was impossible to light in such a way that any of the games were playable...) Revolution wins!

Conclusion
Katana is the winner 4-1. Sorry Revolution! You lose again!

Top 10 Reasons You Should Run Out to the Store Right Now and Purchase a Gizmondo

2006-01-09T21:05:00.000-08:00

You may not have heard of the Gizmondo. You may not even know of any stores that carry it. There certainly aren't very many. But after researching what little information I could find on the greatest handheld ever, I have discovered 10 reasons why you are morally obligated to purchase one immediately, if not several!

10. It has a cool name – Gizmondo! See how that rolls right off of your tongue? It is too cool to have a three letter acronym to abbreviate its greatness. Gizmondo! Say it loud and say it proud! Gizmondo boldly proclaims the future of handheld gaming!

9. Huge selection of awesome games – Well, maybe not quite a HUGE selection... Actually, there are only 14 games available... But, they have a mean Checkers game, which is featured in “Classics Compendium”... Isn't it quality over quantity anyway?

8. Pocket Ping Pong 2005 – According to the Gizmondo site: “If you liked Dead or Alive Xtreme Volleyball, you'll love Pocket Ping Pong 2005. It's table tennis set to a sandy, sexy backdrop. You'll love the competitors' minimalist beachwear, the sunny atmosphere and the fast-as-lightning action, complete with totally accurate ball physics.” Ball physics? I think the only thing people who played Dead or Alive Xtreme Volleyball were interested in was boob physics. I figured I'd write this article before going out and purchasing it myself, so I haven't seen the boob physics, but maybe they put their effort into that instead of gameplay because it got horrible reviews according to here.

7. Momma Can I Mow the Lawn? - A game with a name that stupid, has to be good, right? From the Gizmondo site: “In his leafy hometown, grass is abundant, and many people are grateful for Kurt's offer to mow their lawns, often rewarding him with extra cash if he does a good job. The real fun begins when he forgets to ask permission or enters prohibited areas such as parks and sports grounds.” Now, I'd much rather mow the lawn in a video game for video game money than mow the lawn in real life for real money! Gizmondo has really hit upon a winner here!

6. GPS – Sure, the only current use is Navigator 2006, which costs $250. You can get a stand alone GPS unit for less than that, so I have no idea where all the money is going if it already has GPS built in, but the best part is the car stand for the Gizmondo costs $60!! What a steal for a piece of plastic! Games can use it too! The game “Colors” is going to use it so you can battle gangs based on real world turf... That's a feature that all avid gamers have been yearning for!

5. Commodore 64 Remakes – The best games on the system are the Commodore 64 remakes “Trailblazer” and “Point of Destruction”. When I spend a ton of money on a handheld with fancy 3D hardware, I want 2D things that I can play on my Commodore 64.

4. It's out of stock on their website – That clearly means it's a hot commodity! They definitely aren't out of stock to conceal the fact that they don't have any since there is no demand.

3. Trustworthy business – After reading about the dismal financial outlook of the company, and the very honest directors, how can you not want to invest in their product? Hey, they may always be in legal trouble, but at least they own a modeling agency. That's what's really important in a hardware vendor, right?

2. Free advertising! - If you want the reasonably priced Gizmondo, you have to sign up for an ad service. Your Gizmondo gets three ads delivered it to it per day that it's turned on. Whoo hoo! I don't get enough ads on TV, radio, billboards, movie trailers, magazines, the internet, in the front and back of books, planes pulling sky banners, blimps, on taxis (including on the hubcaps), and I even saw a new advertising medium last weekend where they have people drive around on mopeds that pull billboards.

1. It's soon be obsolete – You have to be quick to get your regular Gizmondo because the much improved Gizmondo Widescreen will be out soon thus rendering the current Gizmondo obsolete! It's been on the market for less than three months in the US, and they are already replacing it! That's clever business!

GameCube Exclusive Mario?

2006-01-04T15:35:00.000-08:00

Apparently, if you make a game on all three platforms, you can put Mario in the GameCube version to try and give people a reason to buy what usually works out to be the weakest version. Mario appears in NBA Street V3, Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix, and probably many more upcoming Nintendo ports (also, Link appeared in Soul Caliber 3 for GameCube). No one bought “Hotel Mario” for the Philips CD-i, or “Mario is Missing” for SNES so maybe we shouldn't tell Nintendo marketing that Mario isn't enough to sell a game, but now that Nintendo is giving away their precious character, it's lead me to think about what games we should put Mario in.

True Crime: Streets of the Mushroom Kingdom
The next GameCube installment of the True Crime franchise should show the urban crime drama of the Mushroom Kingdom. The mushroom people can be cops and civilians, which you can start on fire with fireballs, or beat them to a bloody pulp with your Raccoon Tail. You can do some drug deals for Bowser by selling 'shrooms to school children. And don't forget the "Hot Coffee"! You can finally collect your reward from the Princess for saving her all the time!

Mario Xtreme Beach Volleyball
This game only features the ladies of the Mario Universe: Peach, Daisy, Toadette, ummm... Maybe Birdo? I don't know if the transvestite counts as a woman though... They could bring back Wendy Koopa and Koopas other Daughters from Mario 3 and Mario World. Yeah, they all don really REALLY small bikinis (which you can remove if you hack the game) and play some volleyball, go shopping and all the other killer gameplay DOA: Xtreme Beach Volleyball is known for.

Leisure Suit Mario
Leisure Suit Larry made a comeback courtesy of High Voltage Studios. Rather that the racy, naughty humor that the old games had, the new one had gross out humor ala' American Pie (and boy was LSL: MCL gross...) Unfortunately for GameCube owners, it was PS2/Xbox/PC only, so you guys REALLY missed out... Well, they should make the GameCube version with Mario as the horny college student. He can score with Peach, Daisy, Todette or if he gets really drunk, Birdo. Finally a game about Mario getting some action! I was beginning to think that maybe he and Luigi were more than just brothers, if you know what I mean.

Mario Kombat
Yes, the bloody fighting franchise that made so many waves way back when is still around and kicking. If they can put Link in Soul Caliber 3, they can put Mario in Mortal Kombat whatever number they are on. (I think the world stopped caring after 3) Mario can throw fireballs, summon pipes from the ground to teleport elsewhere, and morph into raccoon form. He can have a fatality where he tears the ribcage out of the other character's chest and plays it like a xylophone using the other character's eyeballs mounted on shards of his/her collar bone for mallets. He could play the Super Mario Bros 1 theme song!

Revolution vs. Xbox One

2005-12-15T19:37:00.000-08:00

So, Revolution specs have been leaked onto IGN's site. The quote that best describes the specs is the following: "As soon as we find out what it can do then we'll know if Revolution will just be like an Xbox or something a little more." To me, these specs are quite disappointing. If you aren't disappointed, then you don't appreciate the new gaming experiences that increased power can open up. Complicated physics? No can do. Realistic reflections? Ha! Normal mapping? Laughable! Hundreds of enemies? Sorry, wait for Revolution 2 (or buy a PS3 or Xbox 360). Since I like speculating on the Revolution, let me tell you if it'll be like an Xbox or something a little more.

Processor
The Revolution has a processor that's possibly twice as fast as the GameCube processor. GameCube has a 485 MHz PowerPC, so let's assume the power is like a 970 MHz PowerPC. Xbox has a 733 Mhz. It's difficult to compare different architectures just based on clock speeds, but since the Xbox 1 got about twice the CPU performance of GameCube, I'd say they are the same.
Winner: The same.

GPU
No details have really emerged, but IGN reports that the Revolution dev kits are just GameCube dev kits at the moment. Let's assume that the GPU is a souped up version of the current GPU. The current GPU isn't nearly close to as good as the Xbox GPU, which features shaders and all sorts of goodies that GameCube lacks. So, although it's not obvious what the clear winner is, I'm guessing they'll be similar in power.
Winner: The same.

RAM
Revolution has 88 MB of useful RAM along with the 16 meg of slow ARAM according to IGN. Xbox has 64 MB.
Winner: Revolution!

HDTV support
Revolution will support 480p. Xbox 1 supports 480p, 720p and 1080i. Miyamoto has claimed that people can't tell the difference... I don't know what mushrooms he's been eating, but you can totally tell the difference between a 480p game and the higher HD resolutions.
Winner: Xbox

Controller
Yeah, yeah, yeah, everyone is claiming that the Revolution controller is the greatest thing since the joystick, so MAYBE I'll let the Revolution win here. But really, what good is the controller if no one makes games for it? Most development studios aren't really enthused about making games for it. Sure, the big companies release press releases saying they will develop for it, and individual people say how great it is, but I'm betting most of the game developers who praise it won't actually make games for it since it is their studio's decision, and most studios (that I know of... Sure, I don't know everyone, but I know a good slice of game developers) aren't doing Revolution games. You can do a cross plat game for PS3 and Xbox 360 and hit a large target audience, or risk it all on one platform that might not actually have good market penetration... So, most studios aren't going to want to do it, especially because a lot have already started developing next gen tech. They aren't going to abandon it and go back to their current gen tech for Revolution, are they? Maybe that's good because Revolution will get some fresh, new developers, but on the other hand, the new blood will be inexperienced and might
make mediocre games...
Winner: Uncertain

Well, there you have it! The Xbox has better HDTV support, but the Revolution has more RAM. Otherwise, they'll probably be comparable. The one ramification of the poor hardware specs is that Revolution won't get ports. That's someone good because titles will be able to utilize the controller more, but it's also bad because there won't be very many games for it...

Professional Gaming is a “REAL” Sport

2005-12-02T16:58:00.001-08:00

I don't know if you read Foxsports.com (I certainly don't), but they have this article on the most “feared” people in sports. I noticed Fox Sports has adapted a very interesting definition of sports. It's good that they chose an athlete from my favorite sport (competitive eating), but pro gaming? Fox Sports is the authority on sports, so if they consider a sport, it must be. Let's look up the definition of sport, shall we? According to dictionary.com, the definition is "An activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often undertaken competitively."

Man, moving a mouse sure requires a lot of physical exertion! So, if video games, qualify as sports, I'm hoping they'll make minesweeper an Olympic event. I'm awesome at it! And if we are qualifying video games as sports, why aren't other games? Chess should be a sport then too. It requires just about as much physical exertion as Quake and is just as competitive.

Since video games are now sports, we can have the shameless “athlete” promotion. Just as athletes can promote a product that they know nothing about, so too can professional gamers. Take Jonathan “Fatal-one-ty” Wendel for example. Does he know anything about motherboards? I doubt it. Does buying his motherboards make you a better gamer? Definitely. Just like buying Air Jordan sneakers makes you a better basketball player. The most crucial product that he sells that improves your gaming product is the Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS. About this product, he says: "When I'm competing I need top-class performance and the most realistic sound to help me know where my opponent is and Sound Blaster X-Fi really delivers for me...there is nothing faster or better. I only put my name on the very best products. If you're a serious gamer, you just have to get one of these!"

If you're a serious gamer that is made out of money or has some sort of money tree, then The BIG G agrees that this is a good purchase... But, $279.99 for a sound card?!?!?! Let's look at the feature set and how it applies to gamers. Firstly, it comes with a remote. That costs extra money, but is very useful for gaming. I play all my games with an IR remote. Secondly, it has 109 db SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio). Now, that means that the noise is 1.26 * 10^-11 times the original signal. If you are a loser with a completely obsolete SoundBlaster Audigy 4, which features 106 db SNR (features a little less than twice as much noise [2.51 * 10^-11]), you need to go upgrade right away. Let's assume that Jonathan “Fatal-one-ty” Wendel is playing the game on 100 Watts. I'm thoroughly convinced that he's such an amazing gamer that he can not only HEAR the noise at 2.5 picowatts, but it also makes him a worse gamer! This is why his endorsement is so valuable. Let's take a look at his statement that there is nothing better. Creative makes the X-Fi Elite pro, which has more features like 116 db SNR and some that only appeal to audio professionals. Despite it has a lot less noise, CLEARLY, IT IS WORSE because Jonathan “Fatal1ty” Wendel says so!

When I become the world's greatest Minesweeper pro athlete, I'll only endorse sound cards with 32 bit audio at 384 kHz and a 200 db SNR because that's what I need to get my best Minesweeper performance. Selling out rules! Incidentally, feel free to contact me for product endorsements. I have as much integrity as “Fatal-one-ty”, so I'll convince people to buy the top of your line regardless of how practical it is.

First 50 Cent Tries to Sell Drugs to Kids, then Horribly Violent Video Games

2005-11-29T12:42:00.000-08:00

In an interview with 1up, the producer of 50 Cent's game says the following about 50 Cent's new game: “you can grab an enemy and steal all of his valuables, leaving both his ego shattered and his pockets empty. Then, you can beat him over the head with your sawed off shotgun until he tells you everything he knows, freeing him of any remaining dignity. Lastly, you can choose to boot him away, giving him false hope of survival as you proceed to blast a hole in his back, which also sends him flying into the path of an oncoming train.” Now, according to Reuters, 50 Cent thinks "parents should buy their children his new video game, rated 'mature' for blood, gore and sexual themes, and use it as a teaching tool."

If there's anyone parents should trust on the effects of violence in video games on children, it's an ex-drug dealer who's been shot several times over drug feuds. According to Wikipedia, 50 Cent insinuates that he either killed or had killed Darryl "Hamo" Baum in revenge for getting shot, so he also is probably a murderer.Despite the fact that he makes money off of every person he convinces to buy his game, I'm sure he's speaking out in favor of his game because it is a learning tool that teaches children the fun, glamor and excitement of being a drug dealer. 50 Cent, you are a real saint, and I salute you for your never-ending quest to educate children.

Reviewers are always right

2005-11-28T17:22:00.000-08:00

Reviewers have the very important task of giving game developers feedback and consumers recommendations. It's nice to know that they use their position of power wisely and don't screw over either consumers or developers. Let me enumerate some of the great things reviewers do.
With so many games being ported to multiple platforms, it's great that reviewers don't take the time to review each platform individually. Oftentimes, one may be significantly better than the other, but why waste the readers time with a careful evaluation and comparison of the different versions? Let's use “X-Men: Next Dimension” for PS2 and GameCube as an example. Both reviews on IGN said "The textures on the character models also appear to be using too many shadows and are a tad on the blurry side." The GameCube version has higher resolution textures, so they are significantly less blurry. Same line in both reviews, but different textures. The GameCube review even mentions the menu options in the PS2 version, but the GameCube version had different names.

It's also nice that reviewers are so aware of all the finer points of games. They always claim things are at a high framerate when they are smooth regardless of the actual framerate. So, any effort to get your game to run at 60 fps is wasted if it drops down below 60 on occasion. Sometimes, they make conjectures on how the technology of a game works, and they are completely wrong, but at least they make an effort, right? Isn't that more important than accuracy?

Reviewers are NEVER biased by past successes or failures. If Blizzard were to release a real stinker, I'm sure it'd get EXACTLY the same reviews as if some small developer that has a history of failures released the same game. It's very difficult for people to be unbiased, but reviewers are able to overcome all of these. Likewise, reviewers are never influenced by other reviews out there. There definitely isn't a tendency to conform to other reviews either... People have a tendency to trust a reviewer with an average review, but reviewers aren't afraid to alienate themselves based on their own personal feelings.

Since reviewers are so accurate, reviews are becoming increasingly important to game developers. Warner Bros is going to punish its licensees if they didn't get good enough reviews. So, I applaud Warner Bros for taking the initiative for making the true authorities on game quality the determining factor for developer's financial rewards. They are trying to prevent bad games, which sell based on a license, which I think we can all agree is a good thing. As a game developer, I think Warner Bros idea is reasonable. Developers of bad games that sell well just because of the license shouldn't be rewarded. But should reviewers be the ones with the power? As this article proves, they clearly are the authorities on games, so they are a great choice.

Jack Thompson: A Retrospective

2005-11-17T22:57:00.000-08:00

Jack Thompson is big news these days in the video game industry. I’ll objectively report on the highlights of his tumultuous career, which includes little known factoids that are often overlooked.

1988: Jack vs. Janet: Round 1: Begin!
Jackieboy ran against Janet Reno for the office of Dade County State Attorney. During a debate, he handed Janet a slip of paper which said: "I, Janet Reno, am a homosexual, bisexual, heterosexual. If you do not respond then you will be deemed to have checked one of the first two boxes." Now, although that technique may have been a good way to pick up chicks in middle school, it doesn’t quite work well in the political debate setting. Janet Reno crumpled up the paper and ignored it... I guess Jack deemed that she is a lesbian... Too bad that doesn’t make her one... He suggested she was a good target for blackmail, and later credited the motivation for all of her decisions to be blackmail.

2000: There are no words to describe this.
Criticized Janet Reno’s steel drum playing ability and her ready access to pitchforks. I really can’t explain this one. You have to read it to believe it.

Early 2005: Lowenstein = Satan?
Compared Lowenstein to many evil people throughout history: Joseph Goebbels (Nazi propagandist), Adolf Hitler, and Saddam Hussein. Geez! I never knew the president of the ESA had the power to do more evil than slaughtering millions of people! Well, according to Jack, he does.

July 22nd, 2005: Believe everything you hear
Someone told Jack that the Sims had “full frontal nudity, including nipples, penises, labia, and pubic hair”. Jack promptly complained to everyone he could. How many times can you cry wolf before you lose your credibility?

August 3rd, 2005: Really HOT coffee
Jack claimed there was some cheat code that unlocked all sorts of dirty things in GTA: San Andreas... It didn’t exist, so he promptly dropped that complaint.

August 19th, 2005: Jack was called a douchebag
This buddy icon was posted on badassbuddy.bolt.com. Jack contacted the NYPD and FBI to investigate this “threat”. I’m sure the FBI has them working round the clock on that case.

October 10th, 2005: Satire is very tricky
Along the same lines of Jonathan Swift’s modest proposal, Jack proposed a rather disgusting game and was going to donate money to Paul Eibeler’s (Take Two’s chairman) charity of choice if it was made.

October 17th, 2005: It's better to give than receive
Turns out that the charity part was just a joke. According to Jack, us gamers are too stupid to realize that. He’s so right. I knew I shouldn’t have eaten babies after reading Swift’s “Modest Proposal”. Crap! Hindsight is 20-20. Luckily, Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins followed through on Jackie’s broken promise (err... I mean, clever joke) and donated $10,000 in Jack’s name to the ESA Foundation believing that to be the charity that Eibeler would have chosen. I’m guessing Jack wasn’t happy about that because the ESA Foundation is a charitable foundation from the ESA; the very ESA that has supposed evildoer Lowenstein at the helm... In response, he faxed the Penny Arcade people as well as some press places a letter supposedly sent to the Seattle Police Department complaining about the “harassment” from the Penny Arcadians. The Seattle Police Department never got that fax...

November 8th, 2005: Jack Thompson Witnessed GTA Kill People?
Apparently, the defendant team of lawyers in the Alabama GTA lawsuit thought Jack Thompson's press release smear campaign was against legal ethics, and the judge was considering removing him, so Wacky-Jackie took the initiative and removed himself with a lame-ass excuse. He also indicated that he expects to serve as a witness... What did he witness? Was he there that fateful day when GTA started whispering "kill everyone" to the gamer? Does he know anything about video games? Adolescent psychology? Last I checked, he was just a muckraking laywer who likes to threaten more than practice actual law.

Present: Sue, sue, sue!
He’s busy threatening lawsuits against everyone. Scott Ramsoomair over at VGCats, Mike and Jerry at Penny Arcade, practically anyone who speaks ill of him. If I’m lucky, he’ll threaten me with a lawsuit. Defamation of character? Libel? Slander? I'm sure it'll hold up in court. Maybe he should sue www.wikipedia.org because that’s where I got most of my information. Someone should ride the trend and start making t-shirts that say “Jack Thompson threatened to sue me and all I got was this lousy T-shirt”. He could then threaten to sue everyone who bought one, thus fulfilling the prophetic shirt... So, Jack, if you read this and would like to sue, please post a message on my blog. I’m sure my readers would like to hear your ridiculous threats, and I'm sure my lawyer could use a good laugh.

The future of management

2005-11-12T18:52:00.000-08:00

You know what the main problem with the game development industry is these days? The BIG G does! It’s management. There isn’t enough of it. We are going about this all wrong. Some games have over a hundred employees, and I’m betting most of those aren’t managers. That’s COMPLETELY the wrong approach. We need projects with MORE management. We’ll create a really sophisticated structure with levels and levels of management and clear responsibilities. At the top will be the visionary. He’ll come up with the high-level concept like “clone Halo”. He’ll give useful feedback like “make it more fun” and “this isn’t cool enough”. Below him, we have the chairmen of the right and left sides of the screen. Each one is responsible for all the bugs, gameplay and art that fall on their half of the screen. They both are responsible for the board of directors (which of course has a chairman) that includes director of fun, director of ripping other games off, director of doing nothing, director of time wasting, and director of scheduling. Below these directors, we have the subdirectors. The subdirectors are below the board of directors, but are in charge of the individual departments. So, there’s a subdirector of art, animation, production, management (an integral department to making a game), programming and design. Below, them are the leads. The leads are broken up into many important categories. Each department will have a lead for each character or enemy, a lead for each type of object, and a lead for each level. Below that, there are several sub leads. The subleads work on specifying EXACTLY what they want in the game. They lead the subsubleads who write exact specifications for not only what is wanted, but how to do it. Then, all the work can be done by one completely unskilled person. This person doesn’t need to know how to use Maya at all. They can just follow the step by step instructions provided by the art subsublead assigned to that particular object. No programming experience? No problem! The document will tell them exactly what they need to type!

Why will this work? So much time in game development is wasted on reimplementing features because inexperienced people are making incorrect decisions. With so many great directors, they’ll know exactly what is necessary first, so they’ll be able to boil the problem of making a good game down to its simple elements. It’ll be so simple and easy that one unskilled person will be able to make the entire game when oversaw by 50 directors.

The Government Needs Even More Warnings and Fines

2005-10-20T11:59:00.000-07:00

The Governator recently signed a bill that requires “violent” video games to carry a special label and makes it illegal to sell them to children under 18. (What about children over 18?) The word violent is open to interpretation… Is Lego Star Wars violent? You can hack off Lego limbs with your Lego Light Saber… I hope we can keep that out of kids’ hands, so they don’t get any ideas and start mutilating their Lego figures.

But really, why should the government stop there? I think when they are judging whether they deem content fits their definition of “violent”, they should also deem whether a game is good or not. The punishment should be the same for selling a bad game as it is for selling a violent game to consumers. I propose that retailers would face the $1000 if they sell a bad game to a consumer. Isn’t that also a horrible infraction that we should be worried about? The government should do us all a favor and keep their idea of a bad game out of our hands as well as keeping their idea of a violent game out of our children’s hands.

Why stop there? Why are video games singled out? Why not do this for music and movies? If a retailer sells a copy of N.W.A.’s “Straight Outta Compton” that has the hit song “F--k Tha Police” or NOFX’s “So Long and Thanks for all the Shoes” featuring “Murder the Government” to a 10 year old kid, shouldn’t they be fined $1000? I’m betting a ton of retailers have sold copies of “The Matrix” to 14 year olds. In “The Matrix”, the protagonists are terrorists that slaughter a bunch of innocent security guards. No one’s complaining about that! But perhaps more importantly, if a retailer sells copy of “The Sign” by Ace of Base or “From Justin to Kelly” they definitely deserve to be punished!

Game Boy Micro vs. Retieval Mankind’s Batman

2005-10-18T23:15:00.000-07:00

Recently, I went on a trip to Taiwan. Always on the look out for new trends in gaming, I discovered the game system that was the latest rage in Taipei. It’s called “Retieval Mankind’s Batman”. Since my Nintendo comparisons are the most popular (judging by the number of people who post comments), The BIG G is undertaking another. The BIG G Presents: Game Boy Micro vs. Retieval Mankind’s Batman (A The BIG G Production)

Cost
The Game Boy Micro costs a ridiculous sum of $99.99. Retieval Mankind’s Batman costs an even more ridiculous $199. The only saving grace for Retieval Mankind’s Batman is that those are New Taiwan Dollars, not US Dollars, so that amounts to less than $6 US. Winner: Definitely Retieval Mankind’s Batman.

Controls
Game Boy Micro has two face buttons and two annoying to press shoulder buttons. Retieval Mankind’s Batman has four face buttons, which I like a lot better than those stupid shoulders... The thing that really sets Retieval Mankind’s Batman apart is that it comes with two additional controllers that can be used for multiplayer. I’m not entirely sure the controllers actually work, namely because I couldn’t really figure out how to play any of the games, but they look so darn cute!!! Retieval Mankind’s Batman is victorious yet again!

Availability
I don’t think Retieval Mankind’s Batman is available in the US, but it’s so good, it’s worth the trip to Taiwan. That being said, Game Boy Micro is a winner here because it saves you the trip.

Configurability
Game Boy Micro has detachable faceplates. Those are only useful for a cosmetic change. The back lists 3 wild and crazy configurations that you can set Retieval Mankind’s Batman in: 1) Single man and Sample battle with handhold style 2) Single man and Sample battle with table style/Double men and double battles with handhold style 3) Double men and double battles with table style. Retieval Mankind’s Batman is a clear winner here.

Games
Game Boy Micro not only plays all the Game Boy Advance games, but it also plays every other Game Boy game. I’m sure that’s thousands of games. Retieval Mankind’s Batman COMES with an INCLUDED 4 games. Even though on the actual hardware it claims to be the “Batman Trilogy”, it includes 4 games, none of which feature Batman. But, it’s not the quantity of games that matter, it’s quality. Frankly, I don’t think any of the Game Boy’s current offerings can compare to “Hero in the World”, “Strong Whale on the Sea”, “Dragonfly Battle Team” and “Football Ground of Legend”. Those are some great titles for some high quality games. On the back, it lists four other titles. It is unknown to me whether these are the games I was supposed to get with the system, or if these are other must have titles from the vast library of Retieval Mankind’s Batman games. The gems listed on the back are: “Kinght-Erranf Walk” (I’m not sure what a Kinght is or what Erranf means, but the games sounds awesome just the same), “Hero of Ball land”, “Huge Warship Action”, and “King of Air”. Winner: It’s a hard choice, but I need my “Strong Whale on the Sea” fix, and Retieval Mankind’s Batman is the only console that I can turn to for that.

Overall
Nintendo has released another loser handheld because Retieval Mankind’s Batman beats it hands down. The only category that it lost to Game Boy is availability, but I’m sure the fine company that brought us the quality Retieval Mankind’s Batman game system will branch out to the US very soon.

Two 360 choices? That’s one too many!

2005-10-11T16:10:00.000-07:00

Many people are complaining that having two Xbox 360 options will confuse “Average Joe Consumer”. Well, let’s just ignore the fact that the $300 Core bundle is silly to purchase because you have to spend $40 for a small memory card if you want to save you games. So, consumers are faced with two choices when purchasing the system! What is the industry coming to? There’s no way the consumers can handle it! They will be so intimidated, they just won’t buy an Xbox 360 at all. I know what you’re thinking: “Woah, The Big G, you’re jumping to conclusions!” No I’m not! Let’s flashback to a simpler time where consumers were less educated: the Genesis era.

Now, I’ll just preface this by saying that the Genesis options aren’t nearly as overwhelming as the whopping TWO choices for Xbox 360, but consumers understood less back then. The RAM Expansion for Saturn/N64 helped open their eyes to the idea of scalable home consoles. Anyway, Sega Genesis managed to overcome these small confusions to be neck and neck with SNES in the 16 bit era. Microsoft’s choice is so much more confusing though, so it’s hard to say if like Sega they can overcome their severe consumer confusion. Anyway, here’s the brief overview of Sega’s Genesis offerings:

Sega Genesis 1
This was the original. It had a headphone jack, and was large and rectangular. The headphone jack may not seem important, but if you want to get stereo sound with your 32X composite video, and you are using the supplied 32X AV cable, you need it. The 32X came with a crappy mono stereo cable, and apparently, you could call up customer service and order a stereo one, but somehow I think they won’t still provide them. It was compatible with both Sega CDs, but really only works well with the Sega CD 1 and not the Sega CD 2. You need to add an extender on the Sega CD 2’s platform in order to accommodate the larger body, so it’ll look ridiculous and take up a ton of space.

Sega Genesis 2
This did not have the headphone jack. It was smaller. The Sega CD 2 was designed to fit with this model. If you had the Sega CD 1, it’d look stupid because the Sega CD 1 is too big for the smaller Genesis 2. If you want to use it with 32X, you most likely won’t be able to get stereo sound unless you are playing Sega CD 32X because the Sega CD has stereo audio out in the back, but they ports don’t work when you are playing Genesis or 32X games since they use the audio hardware on the Genesis main system.

Sega Genesis 3
This was even smaller still and was a budget version of the Genesis long after its popularity waned (1998). It won’t work with any Sega CD’s because it doesn’t have an expansion port. I doubt it'll work with the 32X either since that requires a different port that was probably removed also.

Nomad
This was a portable version of the Genesis. It won’t work with Sega CD or 32X.

Sega CD 1
This works with the Genesis 1 and 2 only, but really only looks good when combined with the Genesis 1.

Sega CD 2
This works with the Genesis 1 and 2 only, but really only looks good when combined with the Genesis 2.

Sega 32X
This is the only way to play 32X or 32X CD games.

CDX
This is a pseudo-portable combined Sega Genesis and Sega CD that doubled as a portable CD player. If you want 32X, you need a special adaptor to make it fit. The BIG G thinks you’ll be hard pressed to find one of those now.

X’eye
This is a combined Genesis and Sega CD made by JVC with all sorts of crazy features such as two microphone inputs, MIDI port and S-video out. None are particularly useful. I have no idea about its compatibility.

The Power Base Converter
If you’re interested in playing Sega Master System games, plop this on the top of your Genesis, and you can play them. It’ll only work with the Genesis 1. They made one that would work with Genesis 2, but it didn’t have the card slot and was only released in Europe. Unfortunately, you can’t use this and the 32X at the same time.

The BIG G, I’m confused. Which one should I get?
Well, here’s the beast that I have:

It features the Sega Genesis 1 for the headphone jack, the Sega CD 1 because it matches the Genesis 1 better (and CD trays are cool), and the 32X which has composite video out (the composite video out even works for regular Genesis games!). I can play Sega CD 32X games with the greatest of ease! Plus, if I decide to get “The Power Base Converter”, I can use it with the Genesis 1, but I’ll have to remove my 32X. That is what the BIG G would recommend for you. I also have a Nomad to game on the go, but I only have 7 Genesis games whereas I have 15 Sega 32X games, 16 Sega CD games and 4 Sega CD 32X games, so I can’t have too much fun on the go.

But I mean, in all honesty, that’s not nearly as confusing as the two models that Microsoft offers for the Xbox 360! With hard disk and without? Man, I still can’t wrap my mind around that. Oh, how I dream of the days when it was simpler!

The DS is Not Innovative

2005-10-10T11:11:00.000-07:00

Nintendo always claims they are innovative just like Apple claims it didn’t rip off the GUI from Xerox. Well, the DS is just a rip off of an old Sega product called the Pico. Maybe you don’t remember the Pico. Well, I do. Vaguely... Very vaguely. It was a console for very young children (I believe all the games were rated EC for “Early Childhood”) that featured edutainment games. It hooked up to your TV and had a story book component too. It pioneered the use of a touchpad for gaming and was the source inspiration for the Nintendo DS. Consider this: Nintendo DS’s top selling game in Japan is “Brain Training for Adults”. Pico featured brain training games for kids! Sounds like a rip off to me! Also, the Pico has one main advantage on the DS. The DS just has a stylus. The Pico features a “magic pen”!!! A MAGIC PEN!! That’s way cooler than the stylus that Nintendo offers. Plus, it has MAGICAL POWERS! Nintendo, why won’t you start innovating on your own? And why don't you create your consoles with magical powers?!?!?

The Best of The BIG G

2005-10-06T13:11:00.000-07:00

If video game companies can make a "best of" collection and sell you the games you already have for extra money, then I can make a "best of" list of my blog posts! So, rather than giving you new bloggy goodness today, here’s a repackaged “best of” collection, as chosen by me:

5. The next XXXX vs. XXXX game
1 on 1 fighting games rule. I propose the best idea ever for a blah vs. blah fighting game.

4. Revolution vs. Evolution
This is the controversial Revolution commentary that started my other controversial Revolution commentaries.

3. People Just Don’t Understand Target Videos!
There’s been a lot of talk of target videos with the upcoming next gen systems coming out soon, and they require some explanation, so people don’t get the wrong ideas.

2. Forget globalize! Solarize!
Outsourcing is the big talk in the game industry. When outsourcing fails to India and China, there are plenty of other locations to explore. Like the sun... oooorrrr...

1. Outsource to the Moon
The moon! Read this one first! It’s the best, and the solarize article is supposed to come after it...

From the Streets, YO!

2005-10-04T21:49:00.000-07:00

Let’s face it - the best art, regardless of its medium, is from the heart. In other words, the things that people know best are what they can best translate into their art. “Grand Theft Auto” is so “good” because gritty violent crime is the lifestyle that most game developers understand the best. It’s been hard life for us game developers. We grew up on the wrong side of the PCI bus. It was kill or be killed. Back in my hood, we used to knife the kids that were programming in BASIC on their Apple ][’s instead of assembly. We used to computer jack at gunpoint all the good stuff from the people who work at Fry’s. I was shot a guy in the face just to get a 3 1/4” floppy drive. I still have to wear a bulletproof vest because I defected from the Apple gang to Microsoft back in 98, and the Apples have craved my blood ever since.

“Grand Theft Auto” is the groundbreaking game that made game developers realize that it was okay for them to expose the gritty life that we developers live to popular culture. It is invigorating to realize that people want to hear the story of your average game developer. The “Grand Theft Auto” series has sold like a bajillion games. There are plenty of more violent urban games coming: “Godfather”, “Scarface”, “50 Cent Bulletproof”, “True Crime”, “Saint’s Row”, “APB”, and “Crackdown”. These other developers aren’t just jumping on the GTA bandwagon because GTA was such a smash hit - it’s because they finally feel it’s okay to tell OUR story - life in the ghetto of the internet.

The Best In-Game Scripting Language: PERL

2005-10-03T22:47:00.000-07:00

Everyone uses Python, Ruby or something based on C++ for in game scripting. I think these are all the wrong choices. These are structured, understandable languages. This is completely undesirable! The real correct choice is PERL. Think about it. You can write gameplay code that looks like dolphins, compress everything in as little space as possible, and make your code completely unmaintainable. You can obfuscate it by using implicit variables, confusing regular expressions, and inconsistent syntax! All of these are desirable features in a scripting language, but the real reason for using PERL for a game scripting language is because it guarantees job security because no one will be able to understand your code!

Super Scope 6 Revolutions

2005-10-01T01:05:00.000-07:00

In doing more research from the various news sites (1up.com has the best write up), it’s become clear to me that some of my initial assessments were wrong. It’s not like a 3d mouse in its obtainment of positional and orientational information. From 1up.com: “Two small sensors placed near the TV and a chip inside the controller track its position and orientation, allowing the player to manipulate the action on screen by physically moving the controller itself.” Judging from this quote, I’m speculating that the gyroscopic aspects for it are for sensing motion (like the Evolution) and the positional and orientational information is from the sensors on the TV like the..... SUPER SCOPE 6. A lot of the other write up info agrees with this, since a lot of its uses are basic light gun functionality (some of the demos were like that: block buster, irritating sticks, and maybe others). So, my next in depth Revolution preview will compare it to the Super Scope 6.

Appearance
Revolution: A glorified TV remote
Super Scope 6: A super awesome bazooka cannon
Winner: I’m going to go with the super awesome bazooka cannon aka Super Scope 6. It looks pretty darn cool. I remember they had an ad back when it was new where people would march around like soldiers carrying them. To this day, I’ve wanted to go to combat carrying my Super Scope 6.

Sensors
Revolution: two
Super Scope 6: one
Winner: Super Scope 6! It can get the job done with half the pesky sensing equipment! It must be superior technology! I think the real question is, do you have to calibrate the Revolution controller like you did the Super Scope 6? Only time will tell....

Game Support
Revolution: Unknown. Probably not many games if they release a standard controller add on for the Revolution like they announced.
Super Scope 6: Not many.
Winner: I’m going to have to go with the Super Scope 6 here because it already has a ton of classic games released for it.

Accuracy
Revolution: Hand controlled, no sight
Super Scope 6: It’s called the Super Scope 6 for a reason!!!
Winner: Super Scope 6. It had that Super Scope, and that scope was very super! It was deadly accurate, and Nintendo had the foresight to allow the scope to be configured for both lefties and righties! The Revolution controller’s designer clearly had in mind the oppressive right handed conspiracy to keep us lefties down! Have you ever written in a notebook with your left hand? The rings are on the wrong side! Have you used a pen with your left hand? Your hand smears across the stuff you just wrote! Have you ever used a left handed scissors? THEY NEVER WORK! You’d think it’d be easy to design a scissors that would be operable with the left hand, and it is - it’s just the conspiracy will only allow crappy left handed scissors to be released. But I digress.

Overall
Super Scope 6 wins! Although it’s clearly better than the Revolution controller, hopefully the Revolution will address its fatal design flaws - namely it took a whopping 6 AA batteries and if you left it on by accident (which I did without fail), it would drain the batteries even when it wasn’t being operated. But hopefully, Nintendo will port all the classic Super Scope 6 games to Revolution, so I can play them because I have two Super Scope 6's and neither of them work... I should have made that a category, oh well. Too late! Super Scope 6 has already won!

We MUST Force Women to Develop and Play Games

2005-09-30T22:53:00.000-07:00

When writing the article about “SitC Online”, I was reminded of all the talk about how we need women game developers to make games appealing to women. There was an article about this in Game Developer back in February. Let’s look at that idea, shall we? Probably the most successful game with women (not counting web-based flash games like “Bejeweled”) of all time is “The Sims”. That was designed by... ummm... Will Wright. Crap. Bad example. Well what about games designed by women? Let’s look at the work of Stevie “Killcreek” Case. There’s a good point! She designed “SiN” and “John Romero’s Daikatana” all veritable hits with the female audience.

The real problem is current game developers (including male game developers) try to make fun games. Apparently, women aren’t interested in fun games since they don’t buy the current games even when they are really fun (including many titles which aren’t the least bit degrading to women). Only women can unlock the secret of what women desire in a game. Since apparently it’s not fun (current game developer’s goals), it has to be some mysterious thing that you need two X chromosomes to discover... It must be something along the lines of “Barbie’s Dress-up” or “Spend the Night”, both female targeted games. Plus, men need women to tell them that their ridiculously proportioned female models are ridiculously proportioned and are a turn off to potential women gamers. Men can’t tell and definitely need women game developers to inform them... But really, male game developers are targeting the wrong demographic. Rather than selling sex, which sells quite nicely as the creators of “Dead or Alive: Extreme Beach Volleyball” can attest to, they need to take a risk and explore the uncharted waters to get the female audience. Really, few games (even ones with women developers) have reached out to the female demographic, so from a financial success it may seem very risky, but it clearly isn’t if you have enough women developers on the team.

Maybe, when it comes down to it, most women just have better things to do. Maybe game playing doesn’t appeal to them. Maybe that’s part of the demographic. Different demographics have different tastes, and maybe video games just aren’t the average woman’s cup of tea. But really - every article that talks about attracting women into games just sees them as a demographic to expand into. Really, that’s what we should be talking about. How can we take money from women - not how can we provide them with quality entertainment. But, the Rubik’s cube on how to get women interested in gaming just hasn’t been solved yet. The secret will be miraculously cracked when we get enough women in the industry.

Most of the female game developers I know like the same type of games as male gamers. They are attracted into the industry because they like the games the industry produces now. So, what we must do is find women who aren’t interested in the regular games and make them design games. They are the untapped demographic, so we should have them designing what appeals to them. Stay at home mom that enjoys a good game of minesweeper now and then? We can draft her to make the next women’s hit game!

Re-Revolution

2005-09-28T00:04:00.000-07:00

So, since everyone loved my accurate comparison of the Revolution controller to the Evolution controller, I will now do a comparison of quite possibly the most coveted and revolutionary feature of the Revolution: the backwards compatibility. As I said before, everyone really wants a Revolution for one feature: the backwards compatibility. The Revolution’s main competitor for backwards compatibility is the Yobo Gameware FC Game Console. So, let’s take a look, shall we? Game Support
Nintendo will have to re-release all the games it wants to be emulated. It can of course, re-release it’s entire back catalog, but Nintendo will have to push third parties to support their service as opposed to re-releasing in “Super Mega Awesome Collections”. Probably some classic games like “Bible Adventures” will never get released. Nintendo hasn’t mentioned cost, but you’re smoking too much wacky tabacky if you think Nintendo is going to give them away for free. If they did, that’d eat into their precious re-release series on the GameBoy, which they can’t have. The FC (Probably short for Family Computer, the name of the NES in Japan) Game Console will play any cartridge. ANY CARTIDGE! So, it will play any NES game you already have, or plan on getting. If you’re a true gamer, you have your old NES games buried in a closet somewhere, it’s just your original Nintendo stopped reading cartridges. Problem solved with the FC! It plays them all flawlessly. You’ve probably already bought all the games you want to play at least twice (NES, GBA) anyway, why buy them a third time? FC Game Console wins here.

Video Quality
Nintendo has already said they won’t support true HD resolutions (just 480p). The FC supports a composite video connection. Although in order to support 480p, they need to support component connections, so Revolution has a bit of an advantage here. All in all, I don’t think NES games video quality is limited by the connection, so it’s a draw.

Audio Quality
Whether the Revolution will support better audio connections than RCA cables has not been announced. It’d be nice if they supported Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS, but considering they aren’t supporting HD really, it might not be that likely. Even still they’ll have to at least support Dolby Pro-Logic II to be backwards compatible with GameCube. How does this compare to the FC? It’s mono. Considering all the NES games are in mono, I don’t think this is a real disadvantage. Potentially, you can have noise on an analog cable, but I doubt anyone will notice when playing NES games. Draw!
Hardware
The Revolution will support a Power PC chip with an ATI GPU giving it the performance it needs to emulate the performance of the original NES. Nintendo has said that performance is not a goal of the system design though. The FC has “high performance” according to the cover of the box. The FC edges out the Revolution because it is “high performance” compared to the lukewarm performance Nintendo has promised for the Revolution.

Control
The Revolution has a fancy controller with gyroscopic and positional sensors. The FC has “Easy button operation” according to the box. I’ll have to agree with that statement. Although you can tilt a Revolution controller to the side and use it like a really large and crazy original NES controller, your fine friends at Yobo have improved on Nintendo’s original design by offering a slow motion button and rapid fire B and A. On top of that, you can use all your old Nintendo hardware, Zappers, The Advantage, Power Glove, Robotic Operating Buddy, and so on. If you really want the wireless that the Revolution offers, you can use some Freedom Connection to make any controller wireless. Unfortunately, I don’t think the official NES Wireless Solution, The Satellite, will work since the plug layout of the controller ports is different on the FC. If you don’t want to maintain pesky line of sight, then you can get a brand new radio controller, with the same technology that the WaveBird, Revolution, and Xbox 360 controllers have. The FC wins again!
Price
The Revolution will be cheaper than other next gen systems, but will it be cheaper than $20? I think not. Victory for the FC.

Availability
I got mine at E3 last year, in Kentia Hall, the red-headed stepchild of the LA Convention Center. Nintendo of course was there (in one of the two real halls), and I imagine the “FC Game Console” isn’t approved by Nintendo, so the salesman is lucky that no one ever goes to Kentia Hall... Bad for business, but good for staying out of jail. Anyway, if you want an FC, you can find one pretty easily on Ebay or by searching on google. The Revolution isn’t currently available, so I think the FC wins again.

Overall
The FC won or tied in every category, so rather than investing a ton of money in an Nintendo Revolution, why not buy an FC and second hand games from flea markets? Yobo Gameware FC Game Console is better than the Revolution!

Creativity is Unnecessary

2005-09-24T20:29:00.000-07:00

In talking to many people about the Nintendo Revolution, the main selling point is not the controller. It’s the backwards compatibility. Everyone is excited about playing classic Nintendo games over again. If you look at a lot of titles these days, everyone is jumping on the re-releasing bandwagon: “Midway Arcade Treasures 1-3”, “Taito Legends”, “Sonic Gems/Mega Collection”, “Sega Classics Collection”, “Tecmo Classic Arcade”, “Namco Museum”, “Intellivision Lives”, “Capcom Classics Collection”, “Megaman Anniversary Collection”, and the list keeps going on and on. Nintendo, always ahead of the trends, was pioneering this with “Super Mario All Stars” for the Super Nintendo, long before the current re-release craze. So, this leads me to believe that we as game developers no longer need to make new content. We just need to repackage old good games and sell them over again. Think about it: count how many times you bought “Tetris”. A lot more than once, I’ll tell you. I even had “Welltris”, a “Tetris” clone in a well where the pieces could go on four walls and a floor. Man, that game was sweet. The only reason people over 10 buy a GameBoy is to play the re-releases of Nintendo games.

If your conscious bothers you when you re-release a game that is less than 10 years old, you can just do a straight port with updated graphics, like the GameCube version of “Resident Evil”, “Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes”, and the oft-rumored “Final Fantasy VII” remake. If you want to get really snazzy, you can “update” classic gems. There’s a lot of this going on: “Ninja Gaiden”, “Metal Gear Solid” (The BIG G will bet you that 99% of the MGS fans never even heard of, let alone played the Nintendo game), “The Bard’s Tale” and the new “World of Final Fantasy VII” or whatever blasphemy Square is doing to their precious IP. (Did I say blasphemy? I meant... errr... What a great business move! Saps like myself will totally buy anything that says “Final Fantasy VII” on it... Well, I suppose I won’t buy the cell phone games, but still...)

So, why haven’t all the publishers caught on yet? It’s essentially free to re-release all your old gems, and people will buy them! Someone at Interplay or Acclaim should be taking notes. I’m sure they could make a “Best of Interplay” (Fallout, Descent, Battle Chess, The Bard’s Tale [the original, not the remake], Out of This World) or “Acclaim Classics” (NBA Jams, Turok, Arch-Rivals, Smash TV, Mary-Kate and Ashley: Girl’s Night Out, and... well, it doesn’t matter what’s on it, as long as the name is cool, people will buy it). These products would save their bankrupted companies, unless they already liquidated their IP, so they couldn’t re-release their back catalog.

SitC Online

2005-09-23T18:21:00.000-07:00

I don't know if you read Gamasutra, but I found out about an interesting new product called "Spend the Night". It is "a female-centric, sexually-themed multiplayer dating game and community". One of their new employees's said, "There’s a myth that women aren’t interested in erotic content, which is totally untrue. Women are just as interested in sex as men are, but there is little in the way of online content for this vast market." Someone should take this a step further. They need to add a license to get the mass-market appeal! Women interested in sex? What license matches that? "Sex in the City" of course! Think about the great gameplay "Sex in the City Online" would have! You can have promiscuous sexual romps in the safety of your computer screen! You can meet up with your girlfriends and talk about the important issues in your life, the things that really matter: promiscuous sexual romps. I mean, people complain that women aren't interested in games because they are reduced to sex symbols. Now women can do the same thing to men! I mean because really, the problem with objectifying women is not because it's degrading and reinforces men equating them to objects, it is the unfairness because men aren't treated as objects too! It's all about equal treatment even if it's bad treatment. So, think about all the fun things women would do in "SitC Online". You could buy expensive clothing, where the amount of cloth in the garment is inversely proportional to the price. You could have sex. You could go shoe shopping and organize them in your massive shoe closet. You could have sex with strangers. You could wear your fancy shoes and slutty clothes, go out, pick up a guy (or multiple guys) and have sex with him/them! I can't imagine a game that would be MORE appealing to women, except maybe we also need to make a "Desperate Housewives Online" to get the coveted older women demographic. This game is the breakthrough title that game developers need to finally solve the problem of women not being interested in games.

The BIG G sez console gaming is dead. Long live PC gaming!

2005-09-18T18:55:00.000-07:00

Many people are complaining that the next gen hardware is too expensive. $399 for the Xbox 360?!?!? Sony has said that PS3 is going to be expensive, so it’ll be at LEAST $399! The BIG G sees the cause for concern, and the only solution is to turn back to PC gaming. Just think, you can get next gen graphics if you spend $500 x 2 for dual Nvidia 7800 graphics cards (using SLI to run both), $1000 on a Pentium 4 3.46 GHz Extreme Edition, and then $400 on 4 gig of RAM. The best part is, once you drop probably about $3000 on your super PC, none of the current games will really take full advantage of your monster hardware. By the time games are made that actually can squeeze the full power out of your hardware, they’ve come out with Pixel Shader 5.0, 64x Anisotropic Filtering and 256 bit floating point color values (double precision for each color channel), so you’ll just have to replace your hardware again. For the consumer that can’t afford $399, there’s always PC gaming to turn to.

Revolution vs. Evolution

2005-09-16T00:38:00.000-07:00

As The BIG G suspected, Nintendo was hardly revolutionary. The BIG G already has that controller, except it was made by Gamester and for the Playstation 1. They even ripped off the name: the PS1 controller is the Evolution, theirs is for the Revolution. Let’s compare, shall we?

Appearance
Revolution: A glorified TV remote
Evolution: A futuristic power glove
Winner: If I’m gaming, I want to look like I’m doing something other than navigating a DVD menu. If my neighbors look in on me and I’m playing Revolution, it’ll look like I don’t know how to work my DVD player. If they see me with the Evolution, they’ll be like, “Man, that guy’s a sweet gamer!” Hells yeah I am. Evolution wins!

Buttons
Revolution: Two main game buttons plus a D-pad
Evolution: Seven main game buttons plus a D-pad. Plus it has an LCD display and some buttons that correspond to it, but I can’t for the life of me figure out what they are supposed to do since it didn't come with an instruction manual.
Winner: This was a close call because the Evolution is missing R1 for no apparent reason, so it’s certainly not very good at controlling PS1/PS2 games. Also, if I wanted to use analog mode, the controller pressed triangle when I moved it up and some other button when I moved it down, so it’s not very good at all, BUT a two button controller is like a one button mouse! I refuse to use a mouse with less than 5 buttons (including a scroll wheel) so how on earth can I deal with a two button controller?!?! Evolution wins again.

Gyroscopes
Revolution: 3D tracking (like a 3D mouse) with tilt
Evolution: Just tilt
Winner: considering that the tilt just plain sucks, I can only imagine that the new 3D tracking makes it even worse, so I’ll stick with my Evolution here.
Game Support
Revolution: Probably not much because it’s going to be darn hard to port to the system, and even harder to use the controller well.
Evolution: All of PS1 and PS2 games.
Winner: Although there’s limited degrees of functionality for the Evolution in most games, I’ll go with the Evolution here again just because of the sheer volume of titles.

Overall
Evolution wins!!!! Sorry Nintendo, you failed to out do Gamester’s crappy barely functional PS1 controller.

Next Gen IS PHYSICS

2005-09-15T00:10:00.000-07:00

So, everyone knows that with the next gen we have hit the graphical peak. The processors are so powerful that we can reuse the extra computing horsepower for the second most important thing to gameplay: physics. Now we can start designing games that have the realistic immersion of real life. In Doom 3, you could shoot a box, and it would role realistically. That was really cool! It made the game way better. Crates are a staple in every game. Now we can have crates that can stack and fall! Think of the great gameplay scenarios that opens up. If you destroy a crate on the bottom, the others will fall down. Now they are a navigation hazard! Doesn’t that sound fun? We can start having real world physics for other things too. We can have realistic jumping physics so your character only moves like a foot in the air. (I don’t know about you, but when I jump, I don’t go flying up to twice my height) We can greatly enhance my favorite thing in games: falling damage. We can have the player hit the ground with a real impact, do a rigid body simulation on the leg bones, and fracture them if you fell from too far. Then for the rest of the game, we can use an IK solver to simulate how you’d walk when your legs are broken in the particular place.

The next exclusive license purchases

2005-09-14T23:53:00.000-07:00

EA bought the exclusive NFL football as a service to the gamers, so gamers wouldn’t get confused about which was the “good” football game when they went to the store. Well, I think more publishers should do this. Let’s take Marvel for example. EA has “Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects”, Vivendi Universal has “Hulk”, Activision has both “Spiderman” and “The X-Men”, THQ has “The Punisher” and Microsoft has the Marvel MMORPG. Which one should you buy? Someone should buy the exclusive license so you no longer have to choose. If someone is buying the license to all Marvel properties, someone should also buy the rights to all of a movie studio’s properties. Sony can already do it. Imagine if the “Spiderman 3” game only came out for Playstation 3, since Sony Pictures is making the movie. Any company could by rights to all of Paramount’s properties. Then they could have crossover battles between the Rugrats and Star Trek! That’s what I’m looking forward to play! While they are buying exclusive movie studio licenses, why not get the exclusive license to make games based on real life? I’m sure that if you pay someone enough money, they can work it out so you are the only publisher that can make games based of reality. Crap, while we’re at it, why doesn’t a game developer get the exclusive license to make games? Then they’ll be no confusion on which ones to buy! They’ll all be the high quality that consumers look for, since only one company will be doing them.

The next XXXX vs. XXXX game

2005-09-13T20:46:00.000-07:00

Ever since X-Men vs. Street Fighter, the crossover versus battle games have gotten very popular. There’s Marvel vs. Capcom, Capcom vs. SNK and “Marvel: Rise of the Imperfects”, which is essentially Marvel vs. EA. I’m telling you what the next big one is. It’s “Kellogg’s vs. General Mills: Cereal Fight 2K6”. These breakfast cereal behemoths have been battling for your bowl real-estate for decades, but now they can duke it out in a virtual battle. Think about the great cast of characters. In Kellogg’s corner, there’s Tony the Tiger, Toucan Sam, Dig’em Frog, Snap, Crackle and Pop. Fighting for General Mills are the Trix Rabbit, L. C. Leprechaun, the Honey Nut Cheerios Bee, Count Chocula, Frankenberry and the viscious Boo Berry. As an unlockable, Quaker has added the ultimate character, the Quisp Alien into the mix. Think about all the great attacks. Tony the Tiger’s vicious battle roar can be combated by the Leprechaun’s magic charms. The Dig’em Frog can do a hop attack against the Trix Rabbit’s.... well, come to think of it, the Trix Rabbit just sucks. He can’t even get some cereal from a bunch of lousy kids. Sure he may be a master of disguise, (although he looks like a rabbit wearing clothes to me, but maybe the kids in the Kellogg’s universe are idiots) but he can’t even grab some cereal from mean and obnoxious kids. Well, there’s always a worst character in fighting games, it looks like we’ve found ours. Here’s a screenshot from the menu selection screen:

People Just Don’t Understand Target Videos!

2005-09-12T20:08:00.000-07:00

Now, I don’t know if you read sites like Penny Arcade or 1UP, but there was a big stink about the Next Gen Madden video looking way worse than the original target video. This may come as some surprise to you because IGN reported the following: "But before you dismiss the commercial, the people at Tiburon say that some of the Madden team didn't want these visuals seen, not because they are setting the bar too high, but too low. Seriously, they say that these are the visuals they were shooting for originally, but that the team now feels that they will be easily surpassed.” 1UP said that they might just be using placeholder animations that they will replace by release. They don’t know much about games development because Tiburon has to be just fixing bugs now in order to launch with the 360. Minor animation tweaks is the best we’ll get.
So if all that’s the case, how do you rectify the two sides of the story? EA says they’ll do better than the target video, but the gameplay looks much worse! It’s simple really. The target video shows the quality of the pre-rendered cinematics (FMVs) in the game. Tiburon thinks they can play even better quality video than that on the Xbox 360, and they’re probably right! I’m sure you can do perceptibly lossless video compression on a video like that, even if the video is rendered at 720p resolution! That’s all target videos show. They are to give people an idea of what is to come for cinematics.

Game Designers are Obsolete

2005-09-11T15:31:00.000-07:00

Everyone thinks that game designers get to make all the important decisions about what goes into a game! WRONG! Marketing gets to pick. The marketing department really knows the gamer, understands the gamer, and knows what makes a quality game, so they should take even more responsibility away from the game developers! The marketing department should say exactly what features are necessary for a good game, and then programmers should implement them. Game designers visions just might conflict with the true visionaries in the marketing department, so we shouldn’t have them. They know that bullet points on the back of the box, not the quality of the game inside, sell the products!

“World of Warcraft”? Screw that! I’m talking “World of The BIG G”!

2005-09-10T15:03:00.000-07:00

The problem with MMORPGs are they aren’t immersive enough. They don’t have a consistent version of a realistic world. That’s where I’ll one up them with my genius MMORPG idea. It’s called “World of The BIG G”. It features 10 playable races: humans, orcs, elves, trolls, halflings, dragons, rocks, chickens, robots and dinosaurs. You can also breed the two races, so you could be a half chicken, half rock. That’s what I’ll play as. It’ll be in a rich fantasy environment, and you can choose awesome character classes like: wizard, warlock, morlock, witch, refrigerator repairman, warrior, knight, thief, one of those crazy guys that spray paint themselves silver and stand really still in big cities for tips, clown, killer klown, robot, and taxi driver. Everyone will have to be perfectly in character at all times. We’ll outsource to the moon (see earlier entry here) to have a board of GMs that will censor every piece of dialog typed in real time in order to make sure it’s in character. For example, if you are a wizard, you have to speak everything in poetry. “I’ll cast my exploding lung spell on that dragon” becomes:
“Ye dragons of olde, hear my curse,
Soon you will be taken away in a hearse.
Dragons see, and dragons scream,
Not after they taste my exploding lung cream.”
If you are a one of those crazy guys that spray paint themselves silver and stand really still in big cities for tips, anything you type is automatically censored because those guys don’t talk at all. If you are a taxi driver, every other word you type is replaced with profanity, and it’s misspelled to simulate a thick accent. It’ll be the perfect MMORPG experience!!!!

The Gontroller

2005-09-09T19:33:00.000-07:00

Everyone makes a big fuss about the supposed innovation of the Nintendo Revolution’s controller. Nintendo’s not innovative. They just take old technology and re-brand it. The BIG G offers you here the REAL innovative next-gen controller. The BIG G calls it “THE GONTROLLER”. It’s very simple really. Below is the image from The BIG G’s patent application:

The bottom pad goes on the ground. The player stands on the swivel base. It’s a ball joint, so the player has to lean his/her entire body to tilt the pad. The ball joint registers the orientation of the player both leaning of the pad and twist. The ball joint doubles as a pressure sensor, so it can tell when the player jumps off of it. This is the only truly revolutionary controller design. Think about it. You want the character to walk forward? Just lean forward. You want the character to jump? Just jump. You want the character to circle strafe while firing in the upper left quadrant of your screen? Well, too bad!

Forget globalize! Solarize!

2005-09-08T23:31:00.000-07:00

I’ve previously posted about outsourcing to the moon. Yeah, that’s thinking 5 years ahead when people find out that outsourcing to other countries doesn’t work. What do people do in ten years when they figure out moon outsourcing doesn’t work? THE SUN! Think about it. The sun is the greatest energy source of all time. It’s a gift that keeps on giving! The sun will be providing free fusion energy for longer than the human race will last. If you move your employees to the sun, it’ll radically cut down on operation costs since you’ll get free power. Game development places are always in sunny, nice weather places. Well, it doesn’t get any more sunny than on the SUN! Think about that. People complain that programmers never have a tan. That would soon change when they are relocated to the sun! They may get more than just a tan there, like horrible amounts of radiation, but it's worth it to look good, right?

The next big hit movie license

2005-09-07T23:53:00.000-07:00

All my favorite classic movies have either been made into games or are becoming games ("The Godfather", "Taxi Driver", "City of the Lost Children", "Dune", "Bram Stoker’s Dracula") SAVE ONE - the single greatest achievement in cinematic history - "Citizen Kane"! Just think what a great game you could make out of that! It’d be part simulation because you’d have to run a hit newspaper. Part of it would be a dating simulation where you’d find a trophy girlfriend to replace your cold and unloving wife. And it wouldn’t be "Citizen Kane" without the special art collection mode! If Orson Welles would appear as Unicron in “Transformers: The Movie”, you better believe his family would let you dig him up, resurrect him in order to perform in “Citizen Kane: the Game". You better believe zombie Orson Welles would give the performance of his life.. errr. Afterlife?

BPU - the future in gaming hardware

2005-09-06T22:31:00.000-07:00

What’s a BPU? Only the future piece of hardware that every gaming system will have to have. It’s a Big-moment Processing Unit. What’s a big moment? It’s a richly cinematic experience that only interactive entertainment can provide! Creating these big moments is very processor intensive, so soon we shall have this specially created processor to offload the work of creating these cinematic masterpieces. The BPU will have special instructions to accelerate the common operations in creating big moments - ridiculously over the top explosions, close or awkward cameras that make playing the game hard but make it seem more exciting, and extraneous particle systems that don’t make any logical sense. Be sure that on any hardware you are thinking about developing for, they support BPUs or BPU expansion packs.

Zeroeth Person Shooter

2005-09-05T21:29:00.000-07:00

First person shooters may be the current genre of choice NOW, but it’s only a matter of time before there’s another innovention that improves on the winning formula. Well, ask any programmer, and they’ll tell you that you always start counting at zero, not one. So, the only way to out do a first person shooter is with a zeroeth person shooter! Just think, no longer is your view clumsily restricted to your character’s eyes. In fact, no longer do you have a view! The view was just distracting you from the real point of the game anyway. Add this radical new gameplay with some cool physics simulations, and you’ve got yourself the best selling title of the next generation!

Outsource to the Moon

2005-09-04T20:27:00.000-07:00

There’s a big buzz in the industry for outsourcing these days. It won’t last. Companies will soon learn that the quality of the work in the other countries isn’t up to snuff, communication bandwidth becomes a major problem, and it’s difficult to manage. Well, they aren’t going far enough. If you really want to outsource, rather than looking across the world, look up - AT THE MOON! Think about it. The moon is the perfect place to outsource. The cost of living is NOTHING! There’s no taxes or pesky governments to enforce labor laws. If you think people in other countries will work for cheap, just imagine what you can pay people on the moon. THEY’LL WORK FOR AIR, for Pete’s sake! There’s plenty of air here on the earth, but the entire moon workforce will be suffocating, since there’s not much of an atmosphere there. So, supply the moon employees with air, and they’ll do the best work imaginable because if you don’t give them air, they’ll suffocate to death.

No button games

2005-09-03T22:24:00.000-07:00

As technology gets better, people think we are moving towards increasingly complicated controls. That’s wrong. The future of games is in the controller with zero buttons. As a game developer, we are increasingly frustrated that we can’t ensure that the gamer is getting the experience as we designed it. So, what we’ll do in the future is have controllers with no buttons. Picture this - you put the disk in the console, and you EXPERIENCE everything the way the game developers dreamt it up. There’s no lousy controls for you (the gamer) to mess up THEIR (the game developer’s) experience. It’s exactly the vision the game developers had in the first place replayed for you perfectly! Also, we want to cut all the extra stuff out of the games that just wastes the gamer’s time. I’m thinking these new non-interactive games would be maybe an hour and a half to two hours in length. THIS IS THE FUTURE OF GAMES!

Your one stop source for the inside scoop on the game industry

2005-09-02T21:46:00.000-07:00

Hey, The BIG G here! I've decided to create this blog to provide people inside and outside the game industry with nuggets of knowledge about the REAL state of the industry. Only I have the real insight in the future of the industry, so if you stick around here, you might just learn something!