Articles

To Rumble or Not To Rumble?

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After getting into a small discussion over at 10-hit Combo on the lack of a rumble in the PS3 controller, I started to wonder if rumble is really all that useful. Does having your controller vibrate at certain points in a game make the game better, or are we lying to ourselves, making it seem more interesting than it really is?

After much mental and spiritual discovery, I came to the realization that it probably depends on the game. For FPS’s, I really need a rumble. If I don’t feel the controller shake when I pull that trigger, I cannot connect emotionally with a game. The rumble for me is the closest thing I can get to actually “feeling” a game. I can attain a higher level of immersion in a game with a rumble feature than I could if it didn’t include it. If I saw a huge explosion, but felt nothing from it, then the game would get very boring for me. →  All you need is read.

Best Game Ever – Cave Story

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When I was considerably younger, I had no disposable income but way too much free time. So I did what any sensible young gamer would do: I looked for free games on the internet. Back then, pickings were pretty slim, and the only downloadable games worth playing were severely limited shareware. Most of those, if they were any good at all, were not worth the registration price.

A dozen or so years later a truly great freeware game had finally come out. The game was Cave Story, and it had been painstakingly designed by one individual (who goes by Pixel) and later translated by Aeon Genesis. It comes across as a game that might have come out for the NES in its prime; simplistic graphics and basic music may lead you to believe this. But the game is a rich Metroid-esque action game that has great replay value and lots of secrets.

It may have been a stylistic decision by Pixel, or it may have been a matter of practicality, but the straightforward sound and graphics do not adversely affect the game; the visuals are more than serviceable, and actually have a fairly distinct art style. →  Castle Readigami 2

Digging our own grave

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This Friday, videolamer accomplished something it’s been striving to achieve for the past few months – an article of ours made it to the front page of digg.com. Unfortunately, what was supposed to be a chance for a much wider audience to read our work turned into a minor debacle. Ah, the cost of success.

You may have noticed the 40 hours or so where the site was completely down. Turns out Host Gator, our not so competent host, suspended the videolamer account after the digg traffic crashed their server and took out other non-gaming sites with it. Why their server couldn’t handle the thousand or so page views is beyond me, but we have been forced to upgrade our plan to a semi-dedicated server.

This means you can feel free to sit at home and reload the front page 46 times a second, eagerly awaiting our wit and wisdom. And in the off chance we have any other minor mass success, the site won’t be broken for more than a day. →  I’ll get a job later, for now I’m going to read this

Weekly News We Care About Wrap Up – 1.5.07

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Crappy developer buys crappy developer
Traveler’s Tales, the awesome company behind such classics as Sonic 3D Blast, Crash Twinsanity and Muppet Race Mania has purchased Embryonic Studios, which is responsible for the all time great Looney Toons: Back in Action. Traveler’s Tales aren’t too bad, really, I’m just bitter over their multiple attempts at killing excellent franchises (Super Monkey Ball Adventure came from these guys).

I’d rather see a headline that reads, “Boring studios who make predominantly licensed crap go out of business due to the general public’s lack of interest in Disney for the past decade.” It’s always possible these companies are consolidating due to a shrinking market, much like the Great Abacus Consolidation of 1174.

Rare founders leave their company
The Stamper brothers, reportedly media shy partly due to their ugliness, have left Rare. They founded the company Ultimate Play The Game (pretty catchy name) in 1983, which later evolved into Rare. Microsoft doesn’t seem particularly bothered by their departure, simply saying that the brothers have helped shape Rare into the important company it is today. →  Readbot Chronicles

Ten years without a new genre

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A decade is a long time.

A few days ago in the comments to “Houston, Wii have a success story“, I made a rather old-fogey remark about re-hashes of games that I’d essentially been playing since 1992 or thereabouts. This got me thinking…when I complain about developers making the same game over and over, what I’m really complaining about is the fact that they’re making games in the same genres. Do you remember the sense of anticipation when you first played Wolf3D or Dune II? It didn’t just come from what you could do within that game – it was a realization of what that particular game meant for the future…because its underlying gameplay mechanics were simple enough and yet deep enough that they moved from being differently quirky games to inspiring an entire genre of development and expansion.

With that feeling in mind, I started doing some research. It turns out that this past December marked an important anniversary in gaming; it has been 10 years since a new genre was introduced. →  The Last Readment

N’Gai Croal to Phil Harrison: What’s Up With Rare?

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Following yesterday’s big news story about Rare’s departing co-founding brothers, Chris and Tim Stamper, N’Gai Croal of Newsweek interviewed Sony’s Phil Harrison and asked him what he thought of Rare’s recent decline in fame.

Can someone explain to me why he asked Sony this question? Did he willingly pick the most irrelevant person to ask, or was it, “Damn, I have this huge hole in my Q&A sheet. Hmmmm. Oh, I know what to fill it in with!”

Phil tries admirably to dodge the issue a bit, and tries to assume logically what happened.

“… I think that they became quite insular and quite inward-facing, and they missed some of the trends that were going on in the business generally. Now also, if you sell your company to Microsoft and get hundreds of millions of whatevers, currency in the bank, it does tend to defocus management a little bit.”

Feeling a bit embarrassed that he even went that far, he ends by saying:

“But Rare, and prior to Rare, Ultimate, are responsible for some of the best games ever made.” →  Actraiser Readnaissance

The Madden Cycle

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Guess what the best selling game of 2006 was (or probably was)? Why am I even giving you guys a guess; its Madden 07 of course!

Like a lot of gamers, I guess you could say that Madden is wearing a little thin on me. I understand why it sells so well; the NFL has such a huge fanbase that even if a few disgruntled gamers decide to stop buying it, there’s an army’s worth to fill in the gap. I also understand the desire to play a good simulation of America’s most popular sport (I’m a diehard football fan myself). Despite this, I have no desire to play the game, and a lot of that has to do with what I call the “Madden Cycle”. Here’s how it goes:

1) EB/Gamestop employees remind me that Madden is coming out. I better preorder it, since every store in the area will be getting boxes of copies, and I don’t want to miss out

2) Every sportscast on TV reminds me again – Madden is coming out soon. →  Drakenread 2

Wii Virtual Console: Nostalgia Driven?

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With many obscure and unknown titles being released for Nintendo’s Virtual Console, many pundits are saying the service is merely driven by nostalgia; older gamers trying to relive their pasts by purchasing any game they grew up with, even if those games are horrible in nature. Many also think games from back then are too basic when compared to current games, and are not worth the time.

Personally, if you look at most of the NES titles, then yes, most games are a little too basic and will only be bought for nostalgia’s sake. Games like Mario Bros. (Arcade) and Ice Hockey do prove most critics’ points. But that’s only one console out of the possible five. You can’t deem something worthless when you’re accounting for only 20% of the situation.

Titles like F-Zero for SNES, Gunstar Heroes for Genesis, Bonk’s Adventure for Turbografix-16, and Super Mario 64 for N64 all have amazing staying power when compared to games of today. →  Tokyo Xtreme Reader: Drift 2

2007 Predictions With Some Sugar on Top

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2006 has come and gone, and it was one hell of a year. Nintendo raked in the dough like never before with the Wii and DS, Sony released the PS3 to somewhat lukewarm reviews, and the 360 started to come into its own with some stellar software. So what about 2007? What major stories are we going to be reporting this time?

For Nintendo, 2007 is going to be a hugely defining year. If the Wii can keep the momentum going, then it can truly be a comeback story. Wii Sports has done a great job at making the Wii an amazing experience, and it will probably keep the Wii’s popularity up for awhile.

Come this summer, however, and gamers are going to be asking for more. By then Nintendo will have probably revealed Brain Age and Big Brain Academy, as well as a few other titles to showcase the wii-mote with non-gamers in mind.

We may even see downloadable Wii-Ware games at some point. →  Games are the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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From the gang at videolamer.

Here’s hoping 2007 bring you awesome video games, the money to buy them with, and the significant other to give you head while you play them (works for boys and girls!).