cellular telephone

Weekly News We Care About Wrap Up – 12.21.07

by

PSP sales explode in Japan
Sony’s handheld has been selling very well lately, this last boost thanks to a new red model. If Sony simply releases a new model and/or colored PSP every other month they may be able to seriously compete with Nintendo. At least on the hardware front.

Games simply don’t appear to sell on the PSP. The leading theories as to why this is are:
If you cut yourself while playing you won’t even notice.

1. The PSP is a successful multimedia machine. A significant percentage of purchasers are using it to listen to music and watch movies. Reports of people not particularly interested in games buying the system are common, and even dedicated gamers (see Christian of this website) are very interested in all the multimedia aspects of the PSP. →  Read the rest

Weekly News We Care About Wrap Up – 8.31.07

by

Nintendo stops whoring out Metroid, or at least Retro stops
Please, let Retro make a game it wants to make. I know you own them and want to assign them to a franchise because franchises make all the bling, but it’s really not in your (my) best interest. You have no “mature” themed franchises left, unless you’re giving them the next console Zelda. An excellent developer like Retro also deserves to be rewarded – let them design a game from the ground up. It could be dark, with nudity and blood everywhere. Perhaps bloody nipples. You know, mature.

You would get what you need out of them – an awesome title for the older gamer who is too insecure to play something cute and candy colored. Retro would get what (I assume) they want – the chance to make a game without being assigned 75% of the design. →  Read the rest

Review – Brooktown High

by

There are two things that shame me as a man:

First, I have a collection of Hello Kitty cell phone trinkets that would make a twelve year old Japanese schoolgirl beam with pride. There is a good reason I have amassed this wealth of dangly goodness but this is neither the time nor the place to defend my less- than-masculine obsession. Second, is Konami’s new PSP title, Brooktown High and the frequency with which I play it.

You are a new student at Brooktown High School. It is your senior year, you are single, and you must score with as many hotties as is humanly (or in this case, digitally) possible. This is as close to being a player as you are going to get without contracting the cold sores and awkward itching that comes with the title, Medium Pimpmaster Supreme, which is what I was known as in high school. →  Read the rest

Weekly News We Care About Wrap Up – 4.20.07

by

Sony’s Q2 release schedule
Between the PS3 and Wii’s upcoming releases, I wish I had a 360. Though some (Matt) would disagree, it looks like adopting a next gen system early is a bad move. After Paper Mario there’s nothing I want to play on the Wii, at least nothing at the current going rates of titles. Maybe I’d pick up Metal Slug for $30, Excite Truck for $25 and only ask to be paid $20 to take Wii Play.

At least my stupid investment only cost $250 and there are plenty of good Virtual Console games to play. If you’re one of the few rich people with a PS3, look on the bright side — you’ll be able to download Joust soon.

New Wii/DS studio CEO speaks
I like what co-founder of Jet Black Games has to say:

“With game team sizes at the time already easily exceeding 100 or even 200 people, it seemed like this might be the last opportunity to work in a smaller, more creative environment… given our company’s values and goals, it was natural that we align ourselves with Nintendo.” →  Read the rest

Weekly News We Care About Wrap Up – 4.8.07

by

Resident Evil games coming to Wii
Capcom loves to remake and rerelease Resident Evils. Resident Evil 1 was released first on the PS1, then the Saturn, and PC, then the director’s cut came out on the PS1. This was followed by the remake for Gamecube and the slightly modified Deadly Silence version for the DS. Somewhere in there a mobile phone game was released, but at least Capcom had the sense to scrap a GBC version. Some PS1 games don’t look good on an NES — who knew?

Good news for people who have only played this game eight times — the Umbrella Chronicles game coming to the Wii looks very much like a recreation of the first game (with some of the second thrown in to placate whiners like me). →  Read the rest

Weekly News We care About Wrap Up – 5.5.06

by

Analysts analyze the future through use of crystal ball
My arch enemy Michael Wallace of UBS Securities predicts this next generation console battle will be different than the last because the systems are so expensive. Startling revelation number two is that the Wii is unique so publishers won’t just port every game they make onto it. Wallace and his crony Stephen Kam think the “Wii” is a kiddy name but it won’t matter if the system has good games. Somehow these guys, who I assume majored in bullshit in college, missed the classes on image and branding because A) people don’t have infinite time to research everything so they often need to go with their gut reaction B) people are stupid and shallow and C) the name really is god awful. →  Read the rest

Weekly News We care About Wrap Up – 4.28.06

by

Nintendo renames the Revolution
Nintendo is the US after September 11th. They built up a great deal of good will, especially after developers revealed they’re making real games for the system. But like Bush II, Nintendo has squandered the world’s interest by pursuing a terrible PR campaign and bombing Iraq. So the analogy isn’t perfect. My point is Nintendo had everyone listening and now they have everyone laughing. Image has long been one of their main problems and they seem to revel in not fixing it.

I will stop being friends with anyone who actually calls it the Wiimote.

With that, I present to you the Nintendo Wii, pronounced “we.” In case the pun wasn’t painful enough, Nintendo has named the Revolution controller the “wiimote.” In order to stress how stupid their marketing people are, Nintendo’s press conference consisted of terrible puns. →  Read the rest

Media Station 363

by
XBox360 back
There seem to be about 250 ports on the back of this thing!

It’s said that Americans want everything in a single package. We want a machine that chops, dices, blends, cooks, roasts, minces, and purees. We want a lawn tool that cuts, mows, prunes, digs, weeds, and buries bodies. The Japanese, however, supposedly want specific devices for each thing. They would rather own more things, each doing what they are designed for very well. I agree with the Japanese; I do not want a cell phone that takes pictures. I want a cell phone that has a long battery life, gets great reception and has clear sound. I do not want a dolly that is also a hand truck, a step ladder land a flatbed cart. Actually, I probably don’t really want any dolly. →  Read the rest