Blog5 Games

After years of publisher (books, folks, books) Daewon butchering Nintendo’s system (with non-existant after service) and software (with shoddy localizations), Nintendo has finally come to its senses and created a Korean branch. Until now, Ninty produts have been licensed out to Daewon, who has then turned around an sold the goods to varying degrees of success. The company has even released a handful of titles. But Daewon is not Nintendo.

Over at Korean game portal Ruliweb, the boards are buzzing with excitement—even if there are rumors circulating that Nintendo of Korea is still working with Daewon. Speculation that is furthered by the images of the DS and the GameCube on the Daewon site, which are no doubt hold-overs from previous launches. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Ruliweb] Thanks, Torokun!

 
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Related: “Play Station” Is Japanese for “Sex Station”

Electronic Arts just sent out some new screens for Xbox 360 real-time strategy title Battle For Middle Earth II. This is the first RTS for the 360 and boasts a pretty slick interface and amazing graphics. No wonder, Westwood co-founder Louis Castle is the game’s executive producer.

The real question here is can a mouse and keyboard genre like RTS work on a console with a controller? Halo managed to prove shooters can make the transition, but is it too much to expect RTS can? Brian Crecente

 
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Filed under: Sony PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii

Speaking to Japanese magazine Ge-Maga, who also published some discouraging statistics, Metal Gear veteran Hideo Kojima and Final Fantasy guru Tetsuya Nomura have both called the PlayStation 3 the best console for the future, echoing similar sentiments from Sony President Howard Stringer.

Kojima, while a staunch supporter of goofy analogies the PlayStation 3, did consider its lack of rumble unfortunate, and questions why the company could not at least give the player an option to switch between using motion sensor and rumble features. In Kojima’s words, “the best thing would be a PS3 with controls like the Wii.”

Kojima has been a big fan of Wii’s controls but criticizes its lack of horse power — “in terms of functions, it’s a machine with past concepts.” We admit, the idea of a WiiStation is indeed quite nice, we will probably have to wait a generation for Kojima’s dream to materialize.

See Also:
Kojima, Nomura talk PS3

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Sony really just can’t catch a break lately: the PS3’s too hard to make, Microsoft’s got a year on them in the next-gen war, Immersion won’t let them use Rumble and Ken Kutaragi is a lunatic. And now, the cow that drops through the roof of your barn after your survive the twister: Sony’s been ordered to pay an additional $243 million in taxes to the Japanese Government.

The taxes are in relation to transactions between the games division and a U.S. subsidiary, as well as overseas transactions in its CD and DVD-making operations. Said Sony:

Sony and SCEI believe that their allocation of income for the periods in question was appropriate and that they have paid the proper amount of taxes in each of the jurisdictions.

It’s a bad tax season for Sony, after they were previously nailed with 100 million in back taxes after a U.K. court ridiculed Sony’s argument that the PS2 was a home computer, and therefore could safely dodge E.U. taxes on entertainment machines. Florian Eckhardt

Sony says ordered to pay extra Y27.9 bln taxes [Reuters]

 
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Related: Last Week, Japan Loved Square More Than Mario
Related: “Play Station” Is Japanese for “Sex Station”

Filed under: Culture, Business

The man responsible for introducing us to Freddy Krueger may soon be following in the footsteps of the Wachowski brothers, Steven Spielberg, and other Hollywood heavyweights who are crossing over into the gaming biz. And unlike some people in the entertainment industry, writer-director Wes Craven feels that if video games contain “deep stories, characters, and narratives”, they should be considered forms of art.

Speaking with author and Mercury News blogger Dean Takahashi at the MI6 Game Marketing conference, Craven also confirmed he is “in talks” to make an original video game. However, if you’re expecting a Resident Evil-style romp from the horror maven, you may be surprised with what he eventually produces. The former college professor feels there are not enough educational games on the market, and sees opportunities to simulate world politics and health problems. Whatever it is, Wes, don’t let “you know who” make a movie out of it.

In addition to Nightmare on Elm Street, the prolific Craven has also written and/or directed The Hills Have Eyes, Swamp Thing, Scream, and Red Eye.

See also: WesCraven.com

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What were you expecting, the Xbox 360 power brick? It looks about the size of the GameCube’s. Note: that glowing is not from the Wii’s power source. Thank gawd. Brian Ashcraft

Wii Power [Go Nintendo]

 
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It’s a testament to how far ahead of his time R.O.B. the NES Robot was that even after watching a 7 minute documentary explaining how you use him to play Gyromite, I still don’t have any idea how to play it. The Wikipedia clears some of it up, but all I know for sure is that the sound of R.O.B.’s joints moving sounds like dull chainsaw cutting through human bone. Thanks to Zac for the tip! Florian Eckhardt

Gaming Archaeology: R.O.B. [Powet.tv]

 
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Related: Nintendo R.O.B. Makes Top Robot List

Filed under: Culture, Nintendo DS, Retro

He is 10 feet tall and weights about 2,600 lbs. He is the reason Nintendo became a household name. He is … made of 4,000 cans.

On Thursday, Nintendo of Canada and Canstruction joined forces to create a canned sculpture of Mario, in honor of New Super Mario Bros. becoming the fastest-selling game in the country. All cans used in the art are being donated to the Daily Bread Food Bank.

Pictures of the event can be found here and here. Notice how his mustache, eyebrows, nose and ears seem to be the only non-canned items … the rest is pure, unadulterated, cylindrical goodness.

[Thanks, semiunderscore and bassbeast]

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Looks like I’m not the only one who thinks Xbox Live Arcade needs some more SmashTV or Crimson land style action. Not only was last year’s Mutant Storm Reloaded very pretty and a hell of a lot of fun, PomPom games is currently working on a promising sequel, Mutant Storm Empire, and Xboxyde has the first high-res screenshots of the upcoming… what do you call this kind of game? Is it still a SHMUP if there’s no spaceship? Florian Eckhardt

20 Mutant Storm Empire images [Xboxyde]

 
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Filed under: Sony PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox 360, Business

“Tepid reaction” is a phrase we have used before, in describing the Wii-naming and the Japanese Xbox 360 launch. Now it seems appropriate to add to that list Japanese PS3 developers in a post-E3 world.

A survey released in the latest issue of of Japan’s Ge-Maga magazine, which IGN purports to be the oldest videogame magazine in Japan, revealed that many Japanese developers are unhappy with the current state of the PS3 for a variety of reasons. A quick summary:

• 90.29% of those surveyed disagreed with the PS3’s price point.
• 56.31% disagree with the multiple SKUs.
• 55.82% think the console will not sell with its current announced lineup (what about Riiiiidge Raaaacer?).
• While 48.54% are unfazed, 32.52% of those survey were less confident with the PS3 after its E3 showing.
• 62.13% feel the PS3 won’t reach its goal of 6 million units sold by March 2007.

In each case, the number of unsure responses were less that five percent (except for E3 impressions, with 15.5% giving no impressions). While the price point and multiple SKU reactions may not phase Sony, the other opinions should scare them. If developers feel that the PlayStation 3 user base will not be large enough to support their titles, they might consider more multiplatform titles (Sony doesn’t care) or abandoning PS3 development altogether. 

Knowing the Japanese audience cares little for the Xbox 360, will developers flock to the Wii?  Aside from its rabid fan base, Sony is going to have a hard time convincing detractors and unsure consumers to spend $600 on a console at $60 to $100 per game.

[via PS3Fanboy]

[update 1: Maybe it is regional to write “unphased,” but having to make a few spelling corrections anyhow, the debated word has been altered to “unfazed.”]

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New Super Mario Bros. has been toppled from its seat as biggest selling game in Japan. Ascending to the throne is Square Enix RPG Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria. There were 280,000 copies shifted last week. The game’s limited edition Artifact Box has shown up “used” and commanding up to 41,000 yen (around US $400), which is way more than its original 14, 910 yen (US $130) sticker price. Brian Ashcraft

Artifact Box Crazy Expensive [Akiba Blog]

 
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Filed under: Sony PlayStation 3, Microsoft Xbox 360, Peripherals, Business

Assuming the mouthpiece behind this piece of chatter, we’ll have to take this all with a grain of salt. However, IT Wire in Australia has spoken with Mark Whittard, general manager of Toshiba’s Information Systems Division in Australia, about the possibility of an internal HD-DVD drive making it into next generations of the Xbox 360 before the end of the year. He is quoted as saying:

“The Xbox [360] is coming out with an HD-DVD player towards the end of this year. … I would imagine that there are plans in place to put an HD-DVD drive internally in future revisions of the product. They’re not speaking about it publicly at the moment but I would expect them to do that and fairly soon.”

It can be hard to imagine this becoming a reality, unless production costs are reduced dramatically sometime soon. Considering the flack Sony and the PlayStation 3 have received as far as pricing with their costly Blu-ray drive included, to have the 360 price stay the same or even inch a bit higher wouldn’t be the most prudent business decision. Besides, who really needs an HD-DVD player anyway?

[via Eurogamer]

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Is there anything that those canny paper crafters can’t do? DeeperShade over at the BeyondUnreal forums has come up with a pattern for Samus Aran in morph ball mode.

I was going to try to put it together and give you a non-theoretical shot of it in action, but luckily, someone did it for me. Florian Eckhardt

Samus Aran Morph Ball PaperCraft Build [Beyond Unreal]

 
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Related: Metroid in Push-Pins
Related: Gamers Gets Fresh With Samus
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Film student Harvey James likes game site Insert Credit. A lot. Like so much that drew how he thought his favorite writers looked. Says Harvey:

There’s a process I think we all go through with any writer whose work we enjoy- we build up a mental image of what they look like. We never pause and try and work this out, the images just somehow pop into our heads as we read. In my case, it usually turns out to be way off.

Off, yes. After Harvey drew his favorite writers like Tim Rogers as he imagined them (above), he then did it again after he e-stalked and found out what they look like. But, Harvey does illustrate an interesting point: as “virtual” relations increase, our imagination is called upon to add a physical likeness to that person we’re playing online with. And for those wondering, Florian looks exactly like you imagine him, but with an ascot and no pants. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Insert Credit]

 
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Eurogamer Television has an official Blizzard World of Warcraft video up, showing the Burning Crusade flying mounts in action for the first time. A mock broadcast from the Gnomeregan Gnews Network briefly covers the history of getting mounts to fly (Yetis cratered) and follows a dwarven test pilot as he takes his winged serpent for some counter-gravitational pirouettes and loop-de-loops.

Flying sure looks like a hell of a lot of fun, that’s for sure. Let’s hope those dives and barrel rolls aren’t just scripted in — they look like a big incentive to reach 70. Florian Eckhardt

WoW: Burning Crusade - Flying Mounts [Eurogamer]

 
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Related: Superman Loves WoW
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Filed under: Nintendo DS, Nintendo GameCube, Sony PlayStation 2, Sony PlayStation 3, Portable, Sony PSP, Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox, Microsoft Xbox 360, Action

“It was the only warning we would ever get…” And without any warning, the Transformers movie teaser has arrived four days early. Paramount and Dreamworks have given us a pleasant surprise for the holiday weekend, but I wouldn’t count on the multi-platform game launching ahead of schedule next Spring. It has been six months since Activision acquired publishing rights, and they still haven’t announced a developer.

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Know-it-all analyst P.J. McNealy told face-stuffing marketers at an MI6 luncheon about just how complex manufacturing the PS3 will be. He said that the number of parts used to make a PS3 is even more astounding that the 1,700 parts found in the Xbox 360. What does this mean?

• Limited yields on Sony’s end.
• Complex hardware leads to oodles of problems.
• PS3 ramp-up won’t hit its stride until 2007.

McNealy even got in a few zingers:

We’ve learned the Sony Playstation 3 is not just a game console. It’s a movie platform. It’s also a super-computer.

An analyst with a sense of humor. Heh. It’s thought that Sony’s won’t begin production until July or August. After launch, the company expects hitting a target of 1 million consoles per month, with six million units shipped before March 2007. I expect shortages, fist fights and crying. Lots and lots of crying. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Next-Gen]

 
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Related: Do You Want To Do More With Your Console Than Just Game?
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If GT had any sanity rattling around in their cerebellums at all, this list of the Top Ten Video Game Weapons would be Painkiller’s entire arsenal and five other guns. It isn’t; they don’t. And there’s a lot of often gibbering hyperbole. But it’s still a lot of fun early on a Friday Morning.

But huh? The Doom chainsaw wasn’t found until late in the game? Yeah, I guess E1M2 is later than E1M1. I also like what they say about the BFG: “the most brilliantly disguised acronyms in video game history!” How do you brilliantly disguise an acronym? Florian Eckhardt (Thanks, Jonathan!)

 
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Filed under: Culture, Business

Ad critic returns with this ad for (the now delayed) Superman Returns: The Videogame, featured prematurely in the June 2006 issue of Game Informer (click on the thumbnail for a high-res scan). It doesn’t look like much at first glance; however, upon closer inspection, you’ll notice those three rather substantial chunks of (gulp) text. After busting out your reading glasses you realize that EA — the giant game maker whose employees make a famously Faustian arrangement: their soul (and/or free time) for the chance to make video games — is running ads talking up their developers!

As MTV News reminds us, this isn’t the first time EA has highlighted developers in an ad. In 1983, one of the then-upstart Electronic Arts’ earliest ads posed a handful of game designers alongside the question, “Can a Computer Make You Cry?” EA Vice President of Advertising Shawn Conly told MTV, “In some ways, that was a partial inspiration for where we’re taking this right now.”

Indeed, the Superman ad isn’t alone! Additional ads will include NFL Head Coach, Madden 07, and NCAA Football 07 (as seen in the July issue of EGM). All the titles are made by EA’s Tiburon Studios (”a quirk of scheduling,” says Conly) but now your average mag-reading gamer can know that also. Right there, in the upper right hand corner, the ads read, “Creative Close-Up: EA Tiburon Studio  Orlando, FL.”

What say you, ad critics? Is EA’s ad a super-success or a krypyonite-klunker? Sure, we might care about developers, but does your average, non-Joystiq reading gamer? Is it too text-heavy? What, if anything, would you like to see them change? Is this another sign that EA has turned over a new leaf?

See also: Ad Critic: Auto Assault, Ad Critic: Oblivion , Ad Critic: Tomb Raider, Ad Critic: Hitman.

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Nine feet of non-perishable canned food were stacked to create this Mario sculpture in downtown Toronto. Built to promote New Super Mario Bros. and support “The Daily Bread Foodbank”, architects (yes architects!) used over 4,000 individual cans and a few bags of SmartFood Popcorn to create the 2,600 pound statue. And we just thought architects designed buildings. Brian Ashcraft

Previous: Canny Mario [Kotaku]
More Here [From the Bottom Up]

 
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