Fine you cowards, I’ll be the bad guy and say what no one else has the balls to:
Honey, no. Just no.
Okay, now that that’s out of the way…
Day one of the Con is behind me, and my feet are nearly destroyed. All day was spent either walking or standing in line, with only a few points where I got to sit down. But it’s been a blast, and I’m still struck by what a large presence gaming has at the show this year. For example, you can’t go anywhere on the floor without seeing people carrying the Little Big Planet tote bags Sony is apparently handing out – everywhere I look, a canvas ragdoll is staring back at me. At Comic-Con. Weird.
Well after about 6 hours on the road, I finally made it to San Diego and settled into the place I'm staying, a bed and breakfast a couple miles north of the Convention Center.
Yeah that's right: bed and breakfast. Hey, when you're trying to find a room on the cheap for Comic-Con, you gotta think outside the box, people. Every other typical hotel room in the vicinity was either booked months ago or was charging $200+ a night. My spot is $130, plus they make breakfast for me. Suck it.
So anyway, after I dropped all my stuff off I decided I'd walk to the Convention Center. Random impressions:
At the risk of sounding like the third-waver I almost am, there's nothing hotter than a nerdy girl. "Interesting" and "clever" goes a long way, don't it?
You can find all of the above and more at Heartless Doll, a new pop culture blog with a female perspective and a healthy chunk of gaming content. We're both Village Voice Media, so the doll crew is like a bunch of digital little sisters. Which is kind of a gross comparison given the first paragraph, I guess, so just wipe that from your memory bank, mmmkay?
Nintendo DS 783,000 (452,600)
Nintendo Wii 666,700 (675,100)
Sony PlayStation 3 405,500 (208,700)
Sony PSP 337,400 (182,300)
Microsoft Xbox 360 219,800 (186,600)
Sony Playstation 2 188,800 (132,700)
And the software:
Platform - Title - Units
PS3 - Metal Gear Solid 4 - 774,600
DS - Guitar Hero On Tour - 422,300
360 - Ninja Gaiden II - 372,700
WII - Wii Fit - 372,700
WII - Wii Play - 359,100
360 - Battlefield: Bad Company - 346,800
WII - Mario Kart - 322,400
WII - Lego Indiana Jones - 294,500
DS - Lego Indiana Jones - 267,800
PS2 - Lego Indiana Jones - 260,300
Right off the bat: this is going to be a bit of a short one, for two reasons. First, I have a ton of shit going on early this week, namely a 3-hour polygraph examination on Tuesday (part of a draconian job application process)… the anticipation of which having pretty much made me catatonic with anxiety.
But then I have a ton of (more enjoyable) shit going on later in the week: a little thing called Comic-Con 2008! More on that after the numbers talk.
Above is a little video of the second level of Mega Man 9 (announced for PSN, WiiWare, and XBLA), and it makes me almost giddy.
For those who haven't followed the MM9 info, Capcom has made a bold choice: make it so loyal to the series, so faithful to the classic gameplay that they even go as far as using 8-bit graphics and sounds. And indeed: aside from the lack of flicker and slowdown, the game could easily pass for something Capcom made and shelved 15 or 20 years ago, only to dust off now.
I love it. What a courageous move in this day and age of more 3D, more high-res, and more pyrotechnics! And watching the video (namely the trouble the player has in navigating a perfectly old-school pair of enemy-guarded platforms), it's obvious the gameplay makes no concessions for any modern concept of what a game's difficulty should be, either.
After playing through and loving No More Heroes, which is thick with pixelated visual flourishes and tinny, 8-bit musical fanfares, I wondered if someday we might see games using a prior generation's technical shortcomings as just another tool of artistic expression. Like Rodriguez and Tarantino digitally adding scratches, grain and missing reels to Grindhouse or even Spielberg shooting Schindler's List in black-and-white, would game developers someday add things like flicker, slowdown, limited frames of animation, horrendous Engrish or even pop-up to a game to better express themselves?
Well, Penny Arcade has made a nice visual shorthand guide for anyone who isn't self-loathing enough to suffer through all three of the Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony E3 conferences. Click on the strip for the normal-sized version on their site.
(If you're unclear, from left to right that's Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony.)
Among the relatively mundane 360 news coming out today (new dashboard, Mii - er, I mean Avatar support, a modest $50 price drop) comes one surprising tidbit nobody saw coming: Final Fantasy XIII - one of the handful of games named as a reason to own a PS3 - has been announced for the Microsoft console. Not exclusively, mind you - that would be the true megaton announcement - but it is coming, and according to Square-Enix, at about the same time as the PS3 version.
Wow.
Wander over to a gaming messageboard right now and you'll see packs of wild, freerange fanboys snapping and snarling at each other over the news - in either sadistic delight if they're Xbox kooks, or pure rage as Sony zombies. Entertaining reading all around!
So if tonight when you're trying to sleep you hear some sort of strange, wet smacking sound outside, don't be alarmed - it's just some Sony fanboy throwing himself off a tall building. Maybe this guy.
As far as July 2008 goes, there were three big things I've been really looking forward to:
1) The Dark Knight opens (I'll be there for the first midnight showing, tickets already bought, Final Fantasy Tactics A2 set aside to pass the time in line),
2) Comic-Con (which I'll be covering for Joystick Division, more details on that next week), and finally
3) Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution.
Well I'm still waiting on the first two, but Civilization Revolution did finally come out this week for the 360, PS3, and even the Nintendo DS. (Has anyone played the DS version? How is it?) I've only played the demo so far but can't wait to dig into the full game, sitting in front of me as I type. I'm curious to see how this supposedly streamlined, console-friendly interpretation of the series holds up.
But most of all, I'm excited to continue my eternal campaign against the English, my lifelong (virtual) enemies thanks to the very first game of Civilization I ever played.
Capcom has released another trailer in their promotion of Street Fighter IV, this one all traditional animation, depicting a brawl between Ryu, Akuma, and a third wheel who jumps in at the end... with a few intriguing flashbacks.
Presumably, this means Akuma will be in SFIV - no big surprise there. But it also seems to suggest another character from Street Fighter lore - one long thought dead - might make an appearance.
I can't tell you how big a SF fan I am. I can't tell you how obsessed I was with it back in the day. I can tell you how my high school career suffered as a result: greatly. Akuma definitely executed a shun goku satsu on my GPA.
Yes, yes: I'm a week late with the NPD blog. I was out of town last week having an adventure in Oklahoma. The humidity is really something else there, everything just seems vaguely sodden. It makes the 110 degree plus weather here in Arizona a relief by comparison.
Anyway, to the numbermobile! This month, I'm including last month's hardware figures to compare.
Hardware (Last Month):
Nintendo Wii - 675,100 (714,200)
Nintendo DS - 452,600 (414,800)
Sony PlayStation 3 - 208,700 (187,100)
Microsoft Xbox 360 - 186,600 (188,000)
Sony PSP - 182,300 (192,700)
Sony PlayStation 2 - 132,700 (124,400)
...and software:
Platform - Title - Units
360 - Grand Theft Auto IV - 871,000
Wii - Mario Kart - 784,700
Wii - Wii Fit - 687,700
PS3 - Grand Theft Auto IV - 442,900
Wii - Wii Play - 294,600
Wii - Super Smash Bros. Brawl - 171,100
PS2 - Iron Man - 130,600
Wii - Guitar Hero III - 116,800
DS - Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorer of Darkness - 107,000
DS - Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time - 102,000
Commentary and goofy animated gifs after the jump!
So by now PS3 owners are rejoicing as they crack open their Metal Gear Solid 4 cases (Smells good, doesn't it?). The PS3 exclusive has been eagerly awaited by fans for more than a year, and at 12:01 a.m. earlier this week Gamestops and Best Buys all over Miami (and the rest of the country) opened their doors and handed out copies of the game to the screams and grunts of the mostly male crowds.
According to a story at 1UP, the outspoken head of Tecmo's Team Ninja, Tomonobu Itagaki, has resigned. His apology to his fans:
I truly feel sorry to all the fans of the games I have made. Ninja Gaiden 2, which will launch on the 3rd of June will be the last Ninja Gaiden I will create. I will also never be able to make Dead or Alive 5. I regret the circumstances that have forced me to leave Tecmo, where I had worked for so many years, and I regret the disappointment this will cause my fans.
So what are these circumstances that led to Itagaki's departure? Money, naturally. According to him, Tecmo owes him a "completion bonus" for Dead or Alive 4, which he claims was promised and then reneged on. Confronting Tecmo's president Yoshimi Yasuda about the unpaid monies turned ugly: "[Yasuda] turned defiant, telling me 'if you are dissatisfied with the decision not to pay the bonuses, either quit the company or sue it.'"
Itagaki apparently chose option C: All of the above. He's suing Tecmo for 148 million yen, which - due to the depressed U.S. dollar - converts to about 180 gabillion cubeddollars. (Okay actually it's about 1.4 million USD.)
Well on its way to racking up a million views before it's even a week old, the latest YouTube viral - "Why every guy should buy their girlfriend Wii Fit" - has become a bit of a phenomenon. In the clip (assuming you're too lazy or prudish to just check it out yourself), a guy secretly records 60 glorious seconds of his girlfriend playing the hula hoop segment of Wii Fit in her panties - then quietly signs off by turning the cam on himself and flashing a look of depraved triumph.
I studied this video carefully. Very carefully. I watched it repeatedly, many times a day and in many different lighting conditions, and two thoughts occurred to me after this intensive review:
1) Where am I? What day is this? Am I in the future?
and then, shortly after:
2) This has got to be a marketing stunt.
It was just a little too perfect. Considering the timing, reading the reactions, seeing how other outlets were beginning to talk about it... it all seemed a bit convenient. Then there was the video's poster, "tinsleyadvertising" - an ad agency?
Had Nintendo made a foray into viral marketing?
The circumstantial evidence was damning; now I just needed someone to try on the bloody glove. For that I went straight to the man behind the behind (I'm sorry, I couldn't help it), Giovanny Gutierrez...
Posted by Jonathan McNamara at 2:25 PM May 22, 2008
Admit it. You've often thought about how great life would be if you could just turn gaming into a job. Making a living by engaging in your favorite past time would be pretty sweet, wouldn't it?
Think again.
Regular readers of Wired's Beyond the Beyond blog will no doubt be aware that Shanghai native Ge Jin has shot a documentary called "Gold Farmers." As the name suggests, the documentary chronicles the existence of chinese workers who play repetitive MMORPGs like World of Warcraft to sell the items and in-game currency for real money.
No foreplay, let’s just rip dem britches down and get right to into those figures!
Hardware:
Nintendo Wii - 714,200
Nintendo DS – 414,800
Sony PSP – 192,700
Microsoft Xbox 360 – 188,000
Sony PlayStation 3 - 187,100
Sony PlayStation 2 – 124,400
…and software:
Platform – Title – Units
360 – Grand Theft Auto IV - 1,850,000
Wii - Mario Kart w/ wheel – 1,120,000
PS3 – Grand Theft Auto IV – 1,000,000
Wii – Wii Play – 360,000
Wii - Super Smash Bros. Brawl – 326,000
PS3 - Gran Turismo 5: Prologue - 224,000
DS - Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness - 202,000
DS - Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time - 202,000
Wii - Guitar Hero III - 152,000
360 - Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare - 141,000
Click through for analysis, commentary, and rants!
Not shocking, but great news anyway: Capcom has released photos of the original four bosses from Street Fighter II - Balrog (or Bison, depending on your nationality), Vega (or Balrog, depending on your nationality), Bison (or Vega, depending on your nationality), and Sagat (or... actually he's Sagat everywhere, I just got into a rhythm there) - in full 3D and mixing it up in Street Fighter IV.
I'm busting. I love it. I can't wait. Some people are disappointed that Capcom is dumping most (i.e., seemingly all) of the Street Fighter III cast for part IV, but those people are crazy and should not be listened to. The gameplay was brilliant, but with only a few exceptions (Makoto, Ibuki, maybe Dudley), the SFIII roster was ass. Complete and utter ass. And I don't mean Jessica Biel ass... I mean goatse ass. Google it, and you'll get the picture (in more ways than one).
I admit, as a purist I was skeptical and dismayed when I heard SFIV was going to be 3D rather than traditional 2D, hand drawn animation... but I'm really liking how it's turning out aesthetically. Now if only they could get those backgrounds to look as good...
Well, the rumors were true: Midway has confirmed their next Mortal Kombat will be a crossover title, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, "koming" sometime this fall. According to GamesRadar, the only characters confirmed so far are Sub-Zero and Scorpion from the MK lineup and Batman and Superman from DC.
Obvious questions come to mind: "How in the world would Sub-Zero be able to tear off Superman's head?" "How can Batman have a fatality when he doesn't kill people?" Well the rumor is we don't have to worry our pretty little heads about it: there won't be fatalities in the game at all.
So I'm hesitant on two levels. As a comic geek, the match-ups just don't work very well - the mere idea of Catwoman punching Superman in the face - and potentially knocking him out - made my eyes roll so much, I needed to sit down from the vertigo. The level of nerfing Superman in particular will have to suffer is ridiculous to the point of making him a joke character.
And as a gamer, no over-the-top violence means MK vs. DC will have to rest on the strength of its gameplay... which is like stripping Jessica Alba of her looks and forcing her to be successful on the strength of her acting ability.
But we'll see. In the meantime, I decided to put together a list of the Top 5 Superheroic Fatalities You WON'T See In MK vs. DC...
I can’t explain my fascination with the monthly NPDs. Who cares how well a game or console sold in a given month, right? Well… I do. And so do a lot of other gamers, so we’ll just make this a regular thing here at Joystick Division, “The Numbers”, posted the day the figures are released each month. So here we go!
We'll start with the March 2008 hardware sales figures:
EA CEO John Riccitiello has said that he wants to ensure his employer is one day recognised as video gaming’s all-time greatest company.
I’m crossing my fingers and hoping he means in terms of sheer mass, or square footage, or their benefits package or something. Because trying to envision a future where the qualitative all-time greatest video game company is EA… well, I’m not sure what that world looks like.
The suggestion (and when I say “suggestion”, I mean “drunken boast, surely”) that EA could someday, somehow achieve such a distinction is hard to fathom… at least based on the quarter century it’s logged in so far.
“Our research supports the idea that people who are heavily involved in game playing may be nearer to autistic spectrum disorders than people who have no interest in gaming.”
Well that’s just fabulous.
This was one of the conclusions drawn by Dr. John Charlton of the UK's University of Bolton and Ian Danforth of Walla Walla, Washington-based Whitman College, also concluding that game addicts tended to also exhibit the following traits: “neuroticism, lack of extraversion and lack of agreeableness” – all three considered signs of Asperger's disorder, "a variety of high-functioning autism”, or so they say in their press release.
Regular readers of Wired's 
