Blood N’ Guts

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This week, Sega announced that they plan to make few Mature Wii games.  Capcom followed with a similar statement (which they had to clarify with simple PR speak).  Some folks seem to be in a frenzy over the news, so let us slow down and parse it a bit.

Yes, their decision is a bit puzzling at first glance.  They claim that some of their M rated games, like Madworld and House of the Dead: Overkill, sold as well as they expected, yet the failure of games like EA’s Dead Space: Extraction scares them.  Why be scared of someone else’s failure when your own product is doing “well enough” by your own standards? Because while small companies like Atlus build their business model around games that can keep them afloat with modest sales, Sega is (or pretends to be) a bigger entity that wants and needs bigger numbers.  In other words, what I am reading from Sega is that they could be a charity case, and take some risks for the sake of Wii owners, but they’d rather not.  →  Rule of Read

Demon’s Souls is the GOTY

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It is no secret any more that many of us at videolamer are huge fans of Demon’s Souls.  Those of us who have played it would easily consider it one of the best games of the year, if not the best game on the PS3.  But our tastes in gaming do not always line up with the mainstream press, so we could only wonder how well the game would fare in the end of the year awards.  Surely it would win a few “Best RPG” or “Best PS3 game” trophies, but did it stand a chance at becoming the overall Game of the Year?  Apparently so.

According to an Atlus newsletter email, Demon’s Souls won gamecritics.com’s GOTY, as well as Gamespot’s.  In addition, it won three other awards from Gamespot, and nominated for two more.  Add in those a few wins in the aforementioned “Best RPG/PS3 game” categories, and it it appears that the little game that could fared as well as the biggest releases of the year. →  Four out of five dentists recommend reading more.

Changing Game Cases

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When the Playstation 2 was released, gaming saw an unexpected, but seemingly logical shift in packaging.  CD jewel cases were replaced with the taller, sturdier cases used for DVD videos.  Considering the PS2 used DVDs, this made a lot of sense, and everyone appreciated having a case that wouldn’t break apart so easily.  It also helped video games look like a much more legitimate entertainment option.  A Playstation 1 game would sit indiscriminately amongst your CDs.  A PS2 game, on the other hand, would stand nicely on your movie shelf.  This line of thought was somewhat damaged by the tacky green colors of Xbox cases, but you get the point.  Not since the days of the Genesis had games been so easy to keep and collect without resorting to extraordinary means of preservation.

That might change yet again, thanks to a new mandate by Walmart, AKA the industry’s biggest customer.  In an effort to reduce the costs of shipping, the retailer has told the entertainment world to cut down on packaging.  →  All this can be yours, if the read is right.

Some of my Favorite Box Covers of the Decade

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Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (2001)

Resident Evil (2002)

Castlevania: Lament of Innocence (2003)

Killer 7 (2005)

Castlevania: Curse of Darkness (2005)

Contact (2006)

Electroplankton (2006)

Fallout 3 (2008)

Dragon Age: Origins (2009)

And this doesn’t really count as the game doesn’t even come in a box,
but Braid (2008)

Finishing a Final Fantasy

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Yesterday, Final Fantasy VIII was uploaded to the Playstation Store. For just ten bucks, you too can relive one of the most controversial and most poorly regarded games in the franchise. I know I intend to.

My history with FF8 is long. My brother bought it at launch as one of many people who were swayed by the graphics alone (no offense intended bro. I’ve probably done triple the number of stupid things in my gaming life). He eagerly tore into it, and I followed shortly after with my own save. We both slowly crawled through the game, amazed by the visuals but struggling with each new challenge. He quit somewhere around disc 2, and I puttered out around the third. Looking back, I consider this an insane achievement, because we both got that far using GF summons almost exclusively during battle. Our characters were so weak, so poorly constructed, that no other attacks could do any meaningful damage. Imagine having to watch a GF summon animation at least once every random battle. →  What can change the nature of a post?

Post PlayStation 2: Choose your own adventure!

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You are in an excellent position as the market leader in the gaming industry. The PlayStation 2 went from strength to strength and, with few exceptions from the enemy, had some of the best games ever created. Nintendo have frankly just given up on the Gamecube and the Xbox is really heavy. With a huge installed base and the future looking bright what do you do next?

There’s only one thing for it! Make the PlayStation 3. Go to 1
We’ve only just seen the true power of the PlayStation 2 with, of all things a Gamecube port. Let’s stick with it for a while. Go to 2

1) A good idea but disaster! Microsoft have announced a successor to the Xbox and it looks like they will get it to market before you. Do you:

– Fuck it. Hype the shit out a machine we haven’t thought about yet. Ours has got 14 USB ports and can link to up to 13 controllers. →  Can you read me now?

Bordello of Bugs

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A few days ago I lost about five hours of time to the notoriously buggy Age of Empires DS. I’d waged a long war of attrition against the Taira and it was roughly round 80 when mid combat the game just froze. Majesco did put a piece of printing paper in the game’s case that warned of bugs, so really it was my own fault.

Ten minutes ago I got permanently stuck in Grandia for the PS1. A river of poison was just too magnetic for my four member party to escape and so no matter what direction I pushed, they simultaneously ran in place.

We have written about bugs and glitches many times before, but this time I have a solution. Not a useful, working or well thought out solution, but a solution none the less. Someone, preferably not me, needs to create an archive of game breaking bugs. It can be Wikipedia style and allow gamers worldwide up upload pictures of games being broken and heartbreaking tales of time lost to sloppy coding. →  I’ll read you, my pretty, and your little dog, too!

Review – Gitaroo Man Lives!

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Gitaroo Man is PS2 rhythm game originally released way back in 2002 At the time, lack of availability prevented it from gaining anything but niche popularity, but a 2005 reprint by online retailer Games Quest Direct brought it back into the gamer’s eye right around the same time that Guitar Hero was poised change the genre forever.

The increased availability (you could find the reprints at almost any Gamestop) and the game’s quirky Japanese style helped make it into a cult hit that is still revered by those who found Guitar Hero and its ilk to be a little too influential. Even better, the game was released yet again in 2006 as Gitaroo Man Lives! on PSP. Having myself been burnt out on rhythm games for the last year, I decided to see whether this really would be a refreshing change of pace.

Gitaroo Man Lives! plays with a blend of two mechanics similar, though not identical to those found in Guitar Hero and DDR. →  Snap! Crackle! Read!

Review – Devil Survivor

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Sometimes innovation doesn’t come from wild, crazy new ideas but from the melding of old. Like combining the wheel with fire, Devil Survivor melds two of the oldest RPG battle systems and the result is a flaming tire of fun. Battles take place on a grid following the standard SRPG trope of battles taking place on grids, but when two combatants meet the map cuts to a standard turn-based party-on-party RPG system. Suffice to say, the integration of these two long lived standards is almost as exciting as the monetary standard integration of Europe following World War II.
What Yuzu lacks in personality she makes up in breasts.

Battles are entertaining and copious; free battles are always available and the grind is only mostly mind crushing and soul numbing, a definite improvement over most RPGs. Unfortunately, mission design is poor in general and objectives range from “kill stuff” to “save them and kill stuff,” hitting no points between. The redundancy of your team’s goals means Devil Survivor is mostly composed of throw away battles, also known as “being a Nippon Ichi game.” →  There is only one really serious philosophical problem, and that is games.

Tomb Raider Underperform

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My newest Gamefly mailing was Tomb Raider Underworld, one of the only games on my queue that isn’t new and low in availability. I figured that if the last two Crystal Dynamics led TR games were solid, that they’d follow it up with another winner. Boy was I wrong.

It isn’t that Underworld is terrible. Just incredibly mundane, and in some ways a step back from Legend. Whereas that game was much more linear and straightforward than Tomb Raider usually is, Underworld edges back toward the large, mazelike environments of the old games, where you aren’t always sure of where to go (especially when backtracking), and sometimes the next route pops up in a place you could have swore was blocked off earlier. It isn’t quite as bad as it used to be, but it was nice to play Legend and know you didn’t have to climb up several floors because you missed a jump. The game is also incredibly dark, which makes sense considering the setting, but it also makes it more difficult to determine areas you can access and where you should jump (again, just like the old days). →  Today I consider myself the luckiest reader on the face of the earth.