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Where's the game where we're a castaway on a deserted island and the object of the game is to find food and clean water and build a shelter
This game looks like it could fit that description.

Where's the game where we play a salty Southern lawyer
Here's another.

Where's the game where we get to play as Dr. House and diagnose mysterious illnesses while crushing the patient's spirit with cruel insults.
That would be fun, but there's a surgeon game coming out for the DS too. :)

I find it interresting that both his examples are games that are coming out in the near future. But I do get his point : these kind of different games are very few and very far between.

But those picture that you pulled up, they are four USB 2.0 ports, there is two more on the back of the PS3. And there is what looks like THREE Ethernet ports! (Two of the ports are output, someone say LAN Party?!)

Here's a better picture of the front ports: Front
And a picture of the back of the PS3: Back

I think the USB layout is good for memory sticks. Better than stacking since some sticks are too chubby for that. And I'd imagine that some people would get right on the PC support, eventually.

But those picture that you pulled up, they are four USB 2.0 ports, there is two more on the back of the PS3. And there is what looks like THREE Ethernet ports! (Two of the ports are output, someone say LAN Party?!)

Here's a better picture of the front ports: Front
And a picture of the back of the PS3: Back

I think the USB layout is good for memory sticks. Better than stacking since some sticks are too chubby for that. And I'd imagine that some people would get right on the PC support, eventually.

I was just browsing through the xbox360 games on 1up, and apparently duke nukem forever is going to be released on it...

http://www.1up.com/do/gameOverview?cId=3140411

Screenshots:
http://www.1up.com/do/media?cId=2019488

Ask the guy in the red tie, or the kid in the foreground if there's violence in this game.
here

This is the current state of VR

The same company (Nippon Ichi Software) and artist (Takehito Harada) behind Phantom Brave also produced Disgaea (in fact, the main characters make a cameo in a bonus area after the end of Phantom Brave)

Disgaea's battle system is more reminiscent of Final Fantasy Tactics: grid layout, limited movement, jumping capability. Phantom Brave discards the square grid for a circular radius-based system. PB also has more strategic elements beyond just levelling up to Lv12,000... confinement limits: pull everyone out on the first turn, and your army might literally evaporate before the battle is over. Or, the choice between sending your people into battle unarmed (allows for summoning more people) and hoping to find a weapon laying around, or sending them into battle with a weapon, which could possibly save you should the map be low on items to confine. People you don't take into battle could be home making money and mana for you. Or just laying around in the sun all day.

Story wise, Disgaea is hilarious. Damn hilarious. If you don't like your battles to be centered around pure fluff like tracking down the evil demon who stole your picnic basket, don't look here. With multiple endings (even for dying on the first boss!) there is plenty of opportunity for replay. Parody extends all the way down to the core of the game. If you aren't level 5000 by the end of the game, you're doing something wrong, or you're not at one of the cooler game endings. Damage numbers pop up with "K" on the end when you pass 99999 (nothing quite as satisfying like finding a level 1 monster and doing 1000K damage to it). New powers and maps are unlocked by vote at the "assembly of darkness". Don't like the way they vote? Bribe 'em. Or just kill them all.

Meanwhile, Phantom Brave does what few games (or movies) have ever made me do... feel for the characters in the game. And these feelings are not always happy fuzzy feelings. People in the game are assholes. Shit happens. In the end theres a more or less happy ending, but I'd have preferred to have had the chance to rip a few characters' heads off along the way.

If you're a hardcore "tactical" RPG fan, you can play La Pucelle, which predated Disgaea technologically (and has character cameos in Disgaea. To understand all of Disgaea's cameos, go back to the ultra-cute musical (no, seriously: Cast breaking out into song and dance) Rhapsody on the PS1). I suggest playing La Pucelle before Disgaea (they were released in reverse order in the US), otherwise you will spend a lot of the game thinking about how much better the newer battle system was.

it should be here since the original link starts with #5.

Computer Gaming World Magazine runs a segment every month on what to do with $100, and they're usually right on, grab an issue and see what they say.

btw, just read this in the latest deadtree issue of egm:

starting april 1st $10 or more downpayment pre-orders for the new zelda will get a limited edition wind waker bonus disc that is redone with the same 'mature' graphics look & feel of the new zelda game. it also includes a few extra levels that were cut from the released game because miyamoto said "it had gotten too big for all ages to play".

i'm curious to see how the game looks and plays with the non cell shaded look. the screenshot comparison in the magazine was interesting. here's a link to a pic.

for all of you zelda 'kiddie graphics' haters, keep an eye out for this as you are missing out on a really great game!

Oh, yes. Quite right, quite right.

You do not have to write me out of your will, or kick me from your house.

parsons is the bungie studio manager, the guy who makes sure the dev's dont have problems so the games get shipped.

in his own words:

EGM: "Studio Manager" is such a vague title -- can you describe your role at Bungie?

Pete Parsons: I think the main thing is, I am the non-talented person supporting an amazing team of talent, making sure that nothing stands in the way of the team making a great game, and doing good things for Bungie in general. That in itself is made up of a whole bunch of very focused duties helping to make the games we make, and a vast range of unpleasant duties that I'd prefer not to go into. [smiles]

Technology-dependent things like video games and special-effects-laden movies need to be compared with things from their own era, never the present. So the fact that you find it lacking today says something about today's games, but it might say absolutely nothing about its actualy quality relative to other games at the time it was released.

Example: Star Wars is unarguably a classic trilogy and one of the first great multi-film epics. But there aren't many people under 18 who actually think the original Star Wars movies are worth watching. (Please don't flame if you are and do, because I said "not many", not "none". Plus we are all nerds here, and so not a representative sample.) But its lack of appreciation today says nothing about it's significance back when it came out.

P.S. The original Tomb Raider was largely well-rated, and more recently made 1up.com's Essential 50.

They didn't "wait until after the game was done." The article had already been updated, and that information was clearly stated in the post you replied to.

60 out of 380 is 'half?'

Score:+5, and you didn't even RTFA.

For a counter perspective, check out 1UP's look at the issue.

Long story short, the lead designer for The Playboy Mansion and the lead product developer for Bloodrayne are female, and the lead designer for Beyond Good and Evil is male. Many of the people listed in the article cross the line between the traditionally expected viewpoints. Many female designers and artists are comfortable with a larger degree of sexuality in their characters, and many male designers take a more respectful "kid's gloves" approach to the issue. The designer most directly responsible for the look of Laura Croft left the company after the first game because they wanted to sex her up too much (Legend has it she is based upon his niece).

This is not as black-and-white an issue as "men are sex-starved, women are victims." Quite frankly I find that reductionism insulting. The majority of the male gaming population does not act like 13 year old boys. Have you been around 13 year old boys recently? If the current statistics are correct, the percentage of 6 - 17 year old boys playing videogames is holding at about 20%. Which means 1 in 5. Which means that the obnoxious kid that you bump into on the Halo 2 server is probably in reality an obnoxious kid. And if he understands that the behavior is unacceptable, he will change. But if you shrug and make gross generalizations based on sex, that makes it OK for him to continue and insults the rest of us unproductively.

And please lose the stereotype of the lifeless piply male gamer. It's been debunked. Multiple times. over and over again.

i agree with you mostly. however i think there might be a little bit of truth to what he said. i can see it being good for a reviewer to try to find an audience for a game. there are some games that are fun but it would be hard to figure out who the game would be fun to.

for example "Katamari Damacy" is one of those games that is fun but it's hard to describe why. there's nothing really quite like it. if you saw a really cool game that may not be marketed well or at all and you fear that the game may not be discovered it would be a service to the readers to tell them that they should ignore the box and buy the game.

of course the opposite can be true too for bad games. if you see a game that is truly bad or is really not going to please the audience it seems to be marketed at, you might want to tell the reader that. for example, "Steven Seagal Is the Final Option". it is a game that is aimed at god only knows who. however a good reviewer would tell the reader that they should play this game if and only if they have received a blunt trauma to the head or have the iq of a turnip. fortunately seanbaby did just that.

..TV made for kids like our friend Bobby:After you beat the death star level, there should be a snow level, then a small speederbike level. They should make a Matrix game in the theme of Star Wars. So then you take out your sword and run up to a guy and go, "Chiiing!" And after you saw though his head, you fly inside your X-wing.

Yet, she's not adverse to posting "sexy, come-hither" photos of herself...

personal page
1 Up page

I sure would love to Flower her Zoe...

Here y'go:

1 2 3 4 5

Here y'go:

1 2 3 4 5

Here y'go:

1 2 3 4 5

Here y'go:

1 2 3 4 5

Here y'go:

1 2 3 4 5

http://zoeflower.1up.com/

Cute.

source
Taking the stage first, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata introduced some of the fundamental capabilities of the DS, including the ability to share and download games. Using the system's wireless connection, players can download game demos from wireless store kiosks or share games for multiplayer using a single card. As mentioned yesterday, Nintendo also plans to use this feature with its next Pokemon movie, beaming data to the handhelds of theater-goers.

http://senseis.xmp.net/
Here's a wiki dedicated to Go. I've found it very useful.

http://playgo.to/interactive/
An interactive tutorial

http://www.britgo.org/cartoons/
comic for beginners

http://www.usgo.org/
the American Go Association

http://www.smart-games.com/igowin.html
demo version of "The Many Faces of Go". I highly recommend the full version, but it's very very expensive. if you get to the point that this demo is no longer challenging, you should probably purchase it...

http://gobase.org/software/editors/
SGF editor

http://gobase.org/software/clients/
play go online with other ppl

http://go-club.1up.com/
a club I started on 1up

http://games.slashdot.org/games/04/09/24/1742243.s html?tid=202&tid=106
like knoppix, but for go players

ok, that's all for now =P

I wonder how many people's first reaction to "DDO the MMO" is, "Wow, finally, I can dance off against people online!"

The MMO market is now "mature". A lot of people have found that they have games they like, and won't leave them. You have to differentiate. A lot of games will have great stories and a few interesting features, but getting a 4-year EQ players to drop his subscription and his plans for EQ2 is going to take some work.

City of Heroes, however, is a bona fide hit; they're proving that they can break the formula, both in setting and in gameplay, and be rewarded for it. It was over 180,000 subscribers at last count, and still growing fast (atop the retail sales chart). They're also pounding out updates, have their sequel in full development, and will have an additional angle on updates powered by their release to euro and asian markets (which NCSoft obviously knows).

D&D Online, however, is going somewhere weird. Originally, I read they were "doing away" with attack bonuses and planned to do "combo attacks" instead, but now it sounds like you'll have to use keyboard combos to use all your attacks your attack bonus entitles you to. This is scary. Real time-ish combat which does away with the long-in-development nuances of attacks of opportunity and initiative hurts the ruleset - witness the issues with Neverwinter Nights, and stupid likes like 1-action spells being interrupted by random attacks that just HAPPENED to be scheduled by the engine during the animation sequence of the spell. If there hadn't been all this weirdness, I would have been very enthused over DDO.

There's also the Matrix MMO coming out soon; people are getting their beta test entries now. They certainly have interesting combat animations. We'll have to see how the gameplay goes; I know a lot of people won't even touch it unless the word of mouth is incredible, since they're bitter over the final 2 movies and the buggy PC game. (which I thought was very fun, but it DID have some issues)

I don't care how realistically you try to render it. Real people still don't have hair like this!

This movie is going to kick ass!

1 2 3

This movie is going to kick ass!

1 2 3

This movie is going to kick ass!

1 2 3

Atari's Battlezone appears to be the first example. Released to arcades in 1980, this 3D-esque vector graphics tank simulator was a quarter-guzzling favorite of many- including the US Army. Years before having their own FPS, the Army comissioned special versions of Battlezone to train their tank pilots. This article discusses the game and touches on it's millitary connection.

Was "blast processing" anything more than a superficial marketing term? Was it referring to anything in particular with the hardware?

Well, Parish has already given Xenosaga enough abuse. I'd also link his review of it on his personal site, but it was taken down quite a while ago.

Making them play all the way through Stretch Panic might do it too.

It was all breasts, all the time.

Super Mario Bros 1, on the other hand, has only seen four major releases on any system (NES, SNES(Mario All-Stars), GBC(Super Mario Bros. DX), and GBA(NES Classic).) They probably haven't been whoring it as much due to the fact that it doesn't really stand up as well in this day and age next to later games. Not that I'd be surprised if the next Mario Advance game was a port of the All-Stars version of SMB1.

One thing Atari does do well, which obviously does not include making great epic games, is teasing the press. Quite frankly, the press has no balls, and Atari's Enter the Matrix proved it once. EGM, for example, dedicated half of its magazine and cover to the game the month before it came out, with cautious but glowing language. Driver 3 proves the balllessness of the press once again. Driv3r isn't nearly the comedown that ETM was, but for a massively marketed game that's getting 5/10s and 60%s, it's as if these people had played an entirely different game before it came out.

EGM's, for example, doesn't say specifically, "this is a great game," but it comes as close as it can. Driver 3, EGM claims, is "high-revving hardly-a-GTA-clone that's peeling rubber to the PlayStation 2 and Xbox." The language used is as excited as it woul be in a 8 or 9/10 review. Yet, they're not even looking at the full game. I wouldn't doubt if a majority of the preview came from a designer just talking about great the game is, and the previewer transcribing it.

1up, the online media conglomerate for several print magazines, goes further. "Judging by the time we've spent so far with the near-final . . . it avoids the pitfalls that all the other GTA wannabes fell into. From a technical standpoint, DRIV3R is already something special."

CVG is as generous and used as many exclamation points as the editor probably allowed. "We haven't even had a chance to talk about how the top-notch storyline is shaping up, the amazing Hollywood voice cast, how cool the first-person viewpoint is and the way you can complete missions by going in with your guns blazin' or your wheels squealin'."

Gamepro, in a hands on preview, said the game "was looking very nice," "collision detection is already solid," and the "variety is sure to please anyone." Likewise, Gampro promises that "Driv3r is already shaping up into what looks like an incredibly fun title."

Of the quick survey I did of DRIV3R's previews, IGN's was sadly the most realistic. They list a few of its problems, but then reassure, "We know it'll be fixed." The rest of the preview sounds like a giddy school girl. Likewise, Gamespot admits that the graphics are rough, but "Driver 3 definitely looks promising." Then, like IGN, they seem to apologize for that nugget of truth with an entire paragraph on how great Driver 3 will be. It's as if they just insulted the game designers' mothers.

What's happening here is a symbiotic relationship between the press and the publishers. Like movies, music, or comic books, in most cases a game makes a majority of its sales during the first 2-4 weeks of its shelflife. There are exceptions, including GTA3, but the largest portion of games aren't GTA3s, but DRIV3Rs. With regards to print magazines, that renders the reviews almost useless. The people that buy after the first month probably don't read game magazines and sites nearly as much as those who do buy in the first month. Secondly, first day buyers often don't even have online reviews, let alone the print reviews which come out a full month or two after the game's release. That means that buyers are relying on previews almost exclusively.

And I think the publishers know it. What's going on here is simple, as demonstrated by the extremely apologetic and defensive Gamespot and IGN reviewers, is that if the previewers were honest, they'd lose their "exclusives" and

There's a significant difference between a stylus and a mouse. If there wasn't and they were the same thing, than Nintendo would've had a player using the stylus to control Metroid DS, not the pad.

Except you do use the stylus to control Metroid DS.
1up's Metroid Preview

No it's the Balloon Fight

I see no incentive to subscribe to something that's being converted from print to digital media. I'd rather subscribe to a website, like IGN. Say what you will about their reviews, but they always have up-to-date news, plenty of pictures and video of the newest games, and there's some actual original content lurking in their Insider section. Plus, for $5.95 a month, it's exactly the same price as that month's EGM or what have you.

Now on the other hand, print trumps digital in a couple areas. For example, coverage from E3. Sure, all the websites have their coverage up as it's happening, but there's soooo much content! I like to buy the EGM or other mag after E3 and be able to leaf through it. When I find something that looks interesting, I can find further details on the web.

Also, it's frustrating when you find a nice site that has infrequent updates. There is a 'zine called Polygon, and while they may not have the most current reviews and previews, their layout and writing style is 'A' material.

Ziff-Davis has the right idea with their website, 1UP. If you check a review for a game, they'll give you the 1Up review, the EGM Review Crew ratings, and possibly the review from Official PS2 or Xbox magazine.

I like gaming sites but print still has intangibles that cannot be replicated on the computer.

What color is the sky in Dvorak's world? The Xbox is outselling the Playstation 2. Xbox parties have quickly replaced LAN parties, and the fact that you can mod the hell out of it has almost turned soldering into a fad. The only place I can see the Xbox as hurting Microsoft is that PC gaming may suffer as a result. But what does Microsoft care if they already control most of the PC world through Windows anyway? If anything, the Xbox is increasing Microsoft's stronghold in the home.

This written from a Gamecube fan.

as proved in "grabbed by the ghoulies" which was mostly a failed gameplay experiment

A little cold of Microsoft to dump DoubleFine RIGHT before E3 . They could have at least given them one terminal to setup in. Microsoft took up as much space as EA, Activision, and another small publisher combined. Sickening.

So what is it? Here's all I could rake up about Sega so far:

• Sega to Co-Publish Matrix Online
• Sega pledges support for DS and PSP

So what is it? Here's all I could rake up about Sega so far:

• Sega to Co-Publish Matrix Online
• Sega pledges support for DS and PSP

So what is it? Here's all I could rake up about Sega so far:

• Sega to Co-Publish Matrix Online
• Sega pledges support for DS and PSP

According to this article, Sega's supposed to make their "big announcement" tomorrow morning. Has enyone heard any inside info about what this may be? New console? New Phantasy Star?

Did anyone else look at this screenshot and immediately think "Yeah, that's a Nomura character all right."? Nothing against the guy's work, it's just... well... he's got more belts than real clothes.