Not the best night

30 October 07 | 21:12 | Posted by:

Man, it's not been a good night in these here parts. First, the trains out of the city were shut down because some guy killed himself on the BART line. Then a rather large earthquake hit San Jose. (I was standing on the ground floor when it struck, which was a strange new experience for me -- my knees buckled and the ground felt like it had suddenly become lumpy.) Between the rail suicide and the temblor, San Francisco seems determined to be Tokyo tonight. Once Godzilla strides out of the ocean, we'll be set.

Oh, yeah. Also, due to a studio scheduling conflict we weren't able to record Retronauts tonight after all. Not for lack of interest, I might add.



Anyway, now that I've almost certainly offended someone somewhere by saying something that could be misconstrued as me callously mocking tragedy, let's talk about my Leopard install. It was also a tragedy! Not a "significant earthquake" type tragedy, mind you. Just an "Oops, I guess I didn't scrub my system well enough to avoid that known installation conflict after all" kind of thing. (Turns out Leopards hate APEs.) Buuuut after a clean reinstall, my computer is back to running just lovely, thanks. Better than before, in fact, aside from some of the weird new OS quirks that I'll have to adjust to. And to commemorate my clean new system, I've installed a clean new piece of desktop art, which also has the side effect of making me hope Bionic Commando hurries up on its way to Virtual Console. Dang it.

Also! I've reviewed Mega Man ZX Advent. I only mention this out of sympathy -- the world's general lack of interest in the game (while perfectly understandable) really seems sort of sad given that this is the series' 20th anniversary. It's a busy autumn and Advent might actually be the most irrelevant-to-the-zeitgeist entry in the series ever. It's actually pretty good, though! Assuming you can still stomach the thought of Mega Man.

category: blog, games | forums | 34 comments | §

Round 'em up, head 'em out, move 'em on

29 October 07 | 20:32 | Posted by:

Your weekly release columns are ready for your perusual.



Please to read. Although I guess you don't need encouragement. The general consensus on these columns last week was that everyone likes them, even those who aren't personally interested in buying anything. Personally, I find them enlightening -- I'd never have known that Phoenix was made into an anime, for instance, or that it's actually been localized for the U.S. That is rad. On a related note, you may have noticed that I haven't been promoting any reader-created content lately -- it hasn't gone away, though. I'm regrouping and taking a different approach to presenting it (and turning the main page back into a blog). Expect to see the results of this diligent labor soon. Yes.

P.S.: We have another Retronauts recording session scheduled for tomorrow. However, I do not guarantee that it will go up this week. I'm about to install Leopard on my MacBook and it could very well end in tears. Wish me luck....

category: film, games | forums | ten comments | §

"For the path you take will LEAD to certain DESTRUCTION"

28 October 07 | 13:01 | Posted by:

Am I the only one who experiences brain-lock when approaching the final stage or dungeon or whatever in a video game? I'm ready to head into the last level of the game I'm reviewing, but I can't bring myself to tackle it. I even made a false start a little while ago, a foray just far to realize yeah better not. I don't know why this always happens, but if I let myself pause before a game's finale I have a hard time overcoming the weird psychological block that says, "Naw dude, better not." I spent about a week dickering around in Final Fantasy VII before delving into the Northern Crater, for instance. And I forced myself to complete MGS3 in one sitting last Sunday because I knew if I quit before completing the final boss gauntlet I'd never convince myself to go after the Boss.

It's stupid, of course; usually when I put the wraps on a game my first thought is, "Oh, was that it?" Ah, my stupid brain.

Edit: Oh, was that it? Sigh.

category: blog | forums | 34 comments | §

TGS backwash: Down the ramen hole

27 October 07 | 14:09 | Posted by:

My weekend looks to be dedicated to working on my very last big review of the season, so I should probably blog now before my head gets all funny from too much inverted gravity and those constant, effeminate cries of "WHEE HEE" from its shrill castrato hero. More to the point, I should post this Tokyo Game Show-derived article now before it becomes even more irrelevant. It's only been, uh, five weeks? Six? Yeeeeeah.

I have mentioned at various times a strange place we ate last year -- alternately "the ramen hole" or, more correctly, "the ramen gloryhole." Thus called because (1) you eat ramen there and (2) it is a dehumanizing, anonymous experience that leaves you slightly uneasy but nevertheless wholly satisfied. That is because the ramen is so good -- seriously, no one who eats there doesn't love it. So we went back this year, and I acquired photographic proof of its (glory) holy ways.


It's technically called Ichiran, but it will always be "the ramen hole" in our hearts. Here's another reason why: It doesn't have a storefront, just a random, poorly-marked stairwell leading down into who knows what on a normal Shibuya street. I do not know how anyone from our group discovered this shop in the first place, but it truly is a hole in the ground.

Post continued after link >>

category: blog | forums | fifteen comments | §

Astro(mech)boy

25 October 07 | 10:46 | Posted by:

So, with the addition of R5-F7 (yellow-detailed Y-Wing fighter droid), R4-M6 (Mace Windu's hilariously purple droid) and R4-K5 (young Darth Vader's even more hilariously "dark" replacement for R2-D2 -- the Nathan Spencer of robots!) I think my astromech fleet is once again up to date.

Yes, it's a sickness. I don't need to be reminded.

category: blog | forums | 31 comments | §

Learning to let go

24 October 07 | 23:58 | Posted by:

The Internet never ceases to amaze me.



For instance, you might think that 18 months is an unhealthily long time to be nursing a grudge over some random stranger's opinion about a video game. But that is because you are mentally balanced, emotionally healthy and don't really belong online, you see.

category: games | forums | 30 comments | §

Taking the "naught" out of "Retronauts"

24 October 07 | 15:30 | Posted by:

A PODCAST APPEARS! COMMAND?

   FIGHT
>DOWNLOAD
   ITEM
   RUN

category: games | forums | 26 comments | §

Catch and release lists

23 October 07 | 12:11 | Posted by:

I'm trying to wrangle these weekly release columns into a regular schedule. Here is a start! They are all available at once. Please refer to the ones you find most relevant to yourself. If that is all three, all the better.


Also, I'm curious. My site tracker is sort of terrible and has differentiating between pages more specific than "front page" and "not front page," so I can't dig up precise info on which articles are most popular. Do you find these columns valuable? Would other kinds of columns be equally or more useful? Please to comment, if you would be so kind.

category: film, games | forums | 32 comments | §

Mission report

22 October 07 | 11:45 | Posted by:

I'm pleased to report that Operation: Diligent Slacking was a resounding success, though not without some small casualties.

Objective One: Portal
Status: Complete
These 200 minutes of entertainment fully justified my purchase of The Orange Box, although I guess eventually I'll play the Half-Life Episodes, too. But what is this hole in my heart? It appears to be a void in the shape of a weighted companion cube.

Objective Two: Crackdown
Status: Essentially Complete
Having initially played through the game on an Xbox 360 debug, I didn't quite have the time take down the last couple of bosses and sort of ran out of steam with my immediate replay of the retail version. That is no longer a concern! The completist in me does feel somewhat compelled to round out that Achievement list, though I am suppressing that urge. Curiously, I found myself playing the game far more effectively this time, the skills and tactics honed by my many hours of Halo 3 transferring rather effectively into this third-person perspective.



Objective Three: Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence
Status: Complete
Finally. Great game, but very unforgiving if, say, you have to stop playing midway through the quest and spend two months working on reviews of other titles, thereby losing your feel for the controls, the sneaking and the tactics. Also, whoever told me that the battle with The End is more than 2/3 of the way to the actual end is a stinking liar who tricked me into thinking, "Well, I can easily complete the rest of the game in a sitting!" Which I did, but not without repercussions...

Casualty Report
Auditory damage: Subject's right ear suffers from temporarily muted hearing and a low ringing sensation likely caused by 13 hours of sustained headphone use.
Exhaustion: Subject is very tired because freaking MGS3 just kept going and going way after it should have ended. Due to an excess of Volgin battles and a tension-killing escort mission, subject did not complete this objective until well after 3 a.m.
Recommendations: Pace yourself, dude. This isn't a race.

category: games | forums | 17 comments | §

Serve the public trust

20 October 07 | 10:37 | Posted by:

Because we at GameSpite are compelled by our built-in directives, including the one where we can't harm an employee of OCP, we now provide you with this very important public service announcement:



Do not play Robocop Vs. The Terminator! Not that you were likely to, but you know, just in case. Walt Simonson's brilliant art can make terrible things look tempting. So be safe, citizen.

I meant to publish this article last week, to coincide with the rerelease of Robocop. That didn't work out, but such is my dedication that I took some time from my busy schedule of doing nothing whatsoever all weekend to post it for you. Yes, for you. But now it's Me time again: An entire weekend with no reviews to work on, no immediately pressing articles to write, no trips to take. And my girlfriend's off in New York City until Monday. So, that's about 48 hours in which to totally blow off everyone and everything else and vegetate for the first time in two months. I'm already well on the road to self-indulgence, having played through Portal last night (review: Totally great! Go play it.), and now... I think I'll watch Robocop. It's on my mind, for some reason.

category: blog, games | forums | six comments | §

Another reason to look forward to Revenant Wings

19 October 07 | 10:45 | Posted by:

Vaan makes fun of every Final Fantasy plot, ever.

I didn't realize it was possible to develop jetlag without leaving your time zone, but after three days of waking up before dawn to catch flights up and down the west coast my body decided today that 6:30 is its new proper time to wake up and tackle the day. Awesome! I'm gonna go cry now.

I didn't have a chance to copy edit and link this week's anime column, so my apologies (especially to Mightyblue). As penance, I will stumble about today in exhaustion as though I were a zombie.

category: film, games | forums | six comments | §

I certainly am tired

18 October 07 | 22:36 | Posted by:

I guess waking up at 4, flying to LA and conducting business about the E For All show floor before flying back home will do that.

Full report tomorrow, but here is a quick, off-the-cuff observation: Sony and Microsoft really screwed up by skipping this show. I don't think it's going to be a massive show or anything, but for a Thursday (and a day mostly given over only to press) it was much more active than I expected. And when you walk in the main door, there is Nintendo -- with a wall of kiosks showing off their two biggest games. The gaming press is perpetually peeved at Nintendo's tendency to do an end-run around us, but honestly it's pretty smart of them. The company seems to go for connecting directly with gamers at shows like this and Penny Arcade Expo, where the main competition is largely a no-show. That sort of thing, I think, sends a message to the people who actually matter, i.e. the ones with dollars to spend on video games.

That being said, I sure don't envy my coworkers who have to man the 1UP booth through Sunday. That show just doesn't have enough going on to make four days of attendence even slightly palatable.

category: blog | forums | three comments | §

Sleepy in Seattle

17 October 07 | 20:43 | Posted by:

I am taking this quick moment between work-related trips to post something. I actually tried posting yesterday to ask for recommendations on where to eat in Bellevue, but my iPhone apparently doesn't like the cookies this blog uses and so it was an abject failure. Alas.



I was holding onto this Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike article until Friday, because that was supposed to be when everyone could go live with news of Street Fighter IV's existence. Of course, the news leaked early. This was destined to happen -- in fact, we took bets at work on how quickly it would happen -- because Capcom's press event this week is in Europe, and the European press is either incapable of or unwilling to abide by the tenuous thread of (legally-binding) gentlemen's agreements through which the gaming media functions. Technically it was an American outlet that blabbed, but it's an American outlet with a British parent company, so I assume this means their ambition is to import European gaming press ethics to the States. Excellent!

But who cares about my complaining, right? Read the stinking article, a hagiography of 3rd Strike by way of a love letter to Makoto.

category: games | forums | twelve comments | §

Garfield hates Mondays guys

15 October 07 | 12:58 | Posted by:

Me, I'm not so crazy about them, either, but that's my own fault for committing to the Retro Roundup project. So even when I take a Monday off, like today, I'm still downloading and testing games at 9 a.m. and hammering out a write-up. Awesome! But enough complaining -- have at you.



This week's DVD column is up, and boy are my arms tired it is as entertaining as usual. Please also do not miss the game releases for the week, and last week's write-ups of Ninja Gaiden and Blazing Lazers. The Ninja Gaiden piece is particularly excellent. And timely! Because the sequel just hit Virtual Console, you see. So, read. It is what I'm paying you for, here.

category: film, games | forums | eight comments | §

Gluttony

14 October 07 | 22:23 | Posted by:

When my girlfriend's family and friends come to visit, the result is that we all end up spending most of the weekend at her friend Ryan's, being force-fed a week's worth of amazing food (and a month's worth of wine) in the course of a few days. The resulting protracted food coma unfortunately prevents me from updating here in a timely fashion, for which I apologize. I've been sitting in a daze contemplating shabu shabu and homemade Vietnamese espresso ice cream. And lots of nigori.



But neither wind nor rain nor snow nor sake can prevent me from updating this week's game release list. Although, geez, this week was hardly worth the trouble, eh? But soldier on, gentle readers. Things will get better next month. After reading my Mario Galaxy preview (it goes up in the morning), you may in fact find yourself incapable of playing anything else, so great will be your giddy anticipation. Did I say giddy anticipation? I meant frothing demand.

category: blog, games | forums | five comments | §

Interplanetary intergalactic

11 October 07 | 18:20 | Posted by:

Man, today pretty much evaporated, marking the first day of a week-long string of evaporating days. Today (and tomorrow, I guess) see a big Nintendo media event -- well, "big" if you don't compare it to everything that went down in Japan earlier this week -- while I'll be in Seattle Tuesday and Wednesday for a demo that will sublimate magically into a big EGM preview, then headed to LA (and right back) Thursday to interview a couple of developers at E For All. And while I'm not at events I will be entertaining more guests, who seem to have developed an uncanny ability to schedule their trips for my busiest weeks.

And here I thought my life would suddenly be calm and manageable once we were done with our Halo 3 coverage. Ah ha ha.



In the meantime, here is an article about Ninja Gaiden. The old one!

category: games | forums | fifteen comments | §

Sorry don't make it so

10 October 07 | 13:27 | Posted by:

Yeah so I finished my solo Heroic playthrough of Halo 3. Maybe someone should have mentioned to Bungie that the game's difficulty curve is completely backward, with the most vicious encounters in the earliest stages -- although admittedly the main reason I breezed through the last two missions is because I finally realized that Flood are now susceptible to "head" shots. When twelve bursts from the battle rifle equals twelve kills, those massive melees seem a lot less intimidating.

I was initially annoyed that I didn't get my Heroic achievement points -- I'm guessing because I finished several missions while Live was overloaded, so the servers never got the all-clear announcements -- but then I remembered: Who actually cares, anyway? I find that apathy makes so many things in life less infuriating. The point is, I'm done, and now I can spend time revisiting the real Xbox 360 game of the year. I never did get to try out the downloadable harpoon gun.



Up today here in GameSpite land is a review of Blazing Lazers. Or should I say, half-review, half-why-modern-shooters-are-lame screed? A screed fully endorsed by me.

category: games | forums | eight comments | §

Yourself or god

09 October 07 | 13:10 | Posted by:

It's another big, dumb week of game releases -- dumb in the sense that, honestly, who has time to play all of these really great looking games? Let alone the kind of middling-to-crappy ones? I mean, this week's releases are so good that one of them is already a Fun Club selection and a second is about to become one. Well, technically five, I guess.

Such great timing, too. I earned my Halo 3 "Marathon Man" Achievement over the weekend and just need to clear one more stage on Heroic before I get those 40 or 50 gamerpoints. Then I can put away Halo 3 and not think about it again for a very long time. It's a very good game, no question, but good lord I should not have let myself get drafted for all that coverage of the game. Writing that much about any one thing is not healthy.

(Actually, I'm very nearly tempted to gush a bit about the game's terminal text. But no. Sticking to my guns.)

category: games | forums | six comments | §

It's your weekly Gamespite update

08 October 07 | 17:10 | Posted by:

Not sure how to spend your hard-earned yet rapidly-devaluing dollar? Feel like saving up for the future would be a tragic mistake? Well, pilgrim, we've got you covered.



First, you've got your usual weekly DVD releases. I find myself surprisingly excited by the pending re-release of Robocop -- I've never actually seen the movie in its entirety, but I suspect it's going to hold up fairly well to my scrutiny. Its vision of the "future" strikes me as sober and realistic, which is always the least embarrassing sort of cinematic future when you look back a few years down the line.



And then there's the weekly anime supplement, for which I serve as a gracious host despite the fact that most anime makes me want to punch people in disgust. Of course, so do most movies, but there's that certain je nais c'est quoi about anime. (That's French for "stigma," and it's a stigma that the medium has visited entirely upon itself. As this week's column says, "One of the most perplexing things about Japan is that some of the better mainstream anime shows are based on pornographic games and cartoons.") But hey, whatever. I won't judge you for your tastes.

Unless you're one of those people who keeps clicking on Kotaku's stupid "OMG real life anime-inspired porn!!" entries. In that case, I want to punch you in disgust.

I also kind of want to punch Interpol for their forehead-slapping belief that the fact that you can reverse an application of the Photoshop "Twirl" filter by applying a reversed twirl is some kind of super-secret spy knowledge. Really, hasn't the entire world known that for like a decade?

Ha, ha, just kidding. I wouldn't really punch Interpol. That would make me some kind of terrorist.

Please don't put me on the no-fly list, ECHELON :(

category: film | forums | thirteen comments | §

Mr. Mom IS "The Batman"

07 October 07 | 16:01 | Posted by:

This review of Batman makes me feel old. I think I need to implement a new rule for site contributors: do not remind me that things which I remember as epic parts of my junior high years are in fact older than you.

That said, I can't decide if it's a good or bad thing that the recent almost-good-enough-to-be-considered-"film" movies based on comic books make 1989's Batman -- which at the time seemed so much more mature and convincing than any comic book movie I'd ever seen -- feel like a goofy circus production. Much as I admire Batman Begins and V for Vendetta, I kinda worry that they've set a precedent for even darker (and more serious) comics-based cinema. And as we all know, when comics try to do serious, it usually embarrasses everyone involved.

I suppose we're safe for now -- but the minute they tap Frank Miller to pen the screenplay for Howard the Duck II, all bets are off.

category: film | forums | 26 comments | §

Journey into exploitation

06 October 07 | 16:16 | Posted by:

I read today that a woman has launched a book-burning campaign to destroy all children's books without happy endings. Apparently she's afraid that the likes of A Series of Unfortunate Events might expose young ones to inappropriate concepts such as the complexity and ambiguity of morality, or the fact that life doesn't always turn out to be complete care-free and happy. Sometimes our culture's collective determination to protect people from themselves baffles me.



And then there are times that overbearing watchdog-types actually don't seem so bad. For instance, the movie featured in today's review, The Crippled Masters, could never be made in today's culture of political correctness, since it ultimately exists for the sole purpose of staring and laughing at a man born without arms. (This review, however, is more along the lines of staring in bewilderment at the movie and wondering what its creators could possibly have been thinking.)

category: film | forums | fourteen comments | §

Go west young man

05 October 07 | 20:35 | Posted by:

First: I've spent the day putting together the biggest Retro Roundup since the very first one, back at Wii's launch last November. This is the long-intended counterpart to that first update, in fact -- a massive collection of all the Xbox 360 games that hit Live Arcade before the Wii's launch. I've even atoned for the terrible sin of our misbegotten DOOM for XBLA review! It is good.

Nintendo fantards, of course, will want to seize this opportunity to note that I clearly hate Nintendo because I didn't even put a single Virtual Console game on there. 1UP anti-Nintendo bias: logged and confirmed.



Today's featured article is bobservo's paean to Wild Arms 4. He likes it quite a bit more than I did! And actually, this review is making me reconsider my fairly lukewarm review... maybe I didn't appreciate the game for what it really is. For shame. So please to enjoy this positive, uplifting piece of work. With luck it will soften your defenses so that when we go back to being our usual jerky, sarcastic selves it will strike you like a steel fist to the sternum. Pow.

Also, be sure to go respond to this post to assist with possible future Retronauts endeavors! Maybe.

category: blog | forums | fifteen comments | §

So unpleasant inside and out

04 October 07 | 00:03 | Posted by:

Today's GameSpite feature is something a bit different from the norm: The first installment of Brandon's CryptoSafari Snap! series, an ongoing look at the cryptozoology of games. This particular chapter looks into the secrets of the enigmatic Tsuchinoko. Apparently it tastes fantastic.

---

I've been reading more these days. I used to be a book junkie, long ago, and then I started writing more and ceased to have quite so much time to read. But that's no good -- the Law of Conversation of Mass and Words dictates that you need to take in at least as much as you output, and I don't want to go arguing with universal constants. So, I've started in with essential sci-fi that I've somehow managed to miss reading all these years: William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy.

Discovery one: Neuromancer is both very good and shockingly far ahead of its time. Its ideas about technology and networking were either highly prophetic or totally influential, and everyone involved in Shadowrun, Dark City and the Matrix should be paying him royalties. It was so good, in fact, that it inspired me to hit up Alibris for a used book shopping spree to find some of his other work.

Discovery two: It turns out there's more than one William Gibson in the world! Some other dude named William Gibson used to write pulpy medical dramas in the '50s. Imagine my surprise when I opened up that package.

category: blog | forums | 20 comments | §

Everlasting peace out

03 October 07 | 00:01 | Posted by:

Internet! Be aware that on this day contributor wumpwoast has completed his epic journey into the very soul of Mega Man's black-and-white (or green-and-grey, if you prefer) adventures with this profile of the woefully underappreciated Mega Man V. Read! And enjoy! Unless you hate tough love for good games. In which case, you must be new. Welcome to GameSpite. You're probably not gonna want to hang around here for long.

---

And now, a question.

Can something be said to be a tradition if it happens regularly despite your best efforts to prevent it? I ask because I've discovered that I have a "tradition," of sorts, involving new cell phones. Namely, whenever I acquire a new cell phone, I inevitably drop it on the pavement during my first few days of ownership, severely banging it up. And this only happens once per phone -- I drop it when I first get it, and never again. And only my own phones! Never rental phones. It's happened four times now. I think that makes it a tradition.

Also, I've noticed that the nicer the phone, the more quickly (and visibly) the damage happens. Back when the Razr seemed new and unique, the scratch was moderate and happened within a week or so; my Blackjack earned a major nick within two days. And yesterday I finally bit the bullet and bought an iPhone, which as of this morning has severe dents on three of its four corners. That's less than 24 hours. Awesome. I assume the next phone I buy will fly out of my hands as I open the package, streak across the office and deflect off the walls into the bathroom and down the commode.

Fortunately, that will be a few years yet, I think; I finally have a phone that will last me a good long while. (Assuming I don't destroy it.) I'd been waiting on committing to an iPhone until the price came down (check) and I could determine how long it would be until a 3G/MMS-compatible version would arrive. Since the same slow-connection phone is slated for European release later this year, it seemed safe to assume the answer was "not for a while yet." And after using a Japanese rental phone for a week -- a rental phone that put my slugtacular, unreliable BlackJack to shame! -- I decided to give in, despite the phone's flaws.

Said flaws are actually much less aggravating in person than the Internet's complaints would have you to believe. Which makes sense, really; once you adjust for the Internet's collective, over-developed sense of entitlement, nothing is ever as bad as people make it sound online. And what it does well, it does so well. Don't worry, I won't go on about it; I'm way past my techno-fetish phase and can simply appreciate it as a nicely-designed piece of hardware with lots of options, an excellent interface and refreshingly painless synchronization with my computer.

And dents. Lots of dents.

category: blog, games | forums | sixteen comments | §

March for no reason

02 October 07 | 13:33 | Posted by:

The weekly game release list for this week is now online, along with a copious supply of (perhaps unnecessary) sarcasm. You wouldn't have it any other way.

category: games | forums | twelve comments | §

Video killed the radio star, then ate his brains

01 October 07 | 21:11 | Posted by:

This week's video release column includes an unsettling amount of horror movies. Seriously, click through and look at all of them, milling around at the bottom of the page. Just like the zombies they feature. These videos want to devour your braaaaaainnns.

Also, in case you somehow missed it, Nintendo actually grew a spine and used Virtual Console for its intended purpose today, i.e. bringing us games that had never before been released in the U.S. Yes, I know, The Lost Levels showed up on the Super NES, but we've never had the original 8-bit version before. (Sure, there was also the unlockable bonus version in Super Mario Bros. DX, but that port was so cropped to fit the Game Boy Color's screen that it was practically unplayable. This is the real thing -- no compromises.)

Needless to say, the ability to play Sin & Punishment legitimately on an American console is so rad that I've made it this week's Fun Club alternate selection. I also bothered to put together a new Retro Roundup in order to state the obvious, which is to say that you absolutely need to download these if you want Nintendo to realize that playing classic Japanese imports is the only reason we own Wiis.

(Apropos of nothing, I am inordinately proud of the header image on the Retro Roundup.)

category: film, games | forums | eight comments | §