Warshaw Awards Celebrate 2003's Gaming Missteps

Thanks to Shacknews for their feature revealing The Warshaw Awards for 2003, celebrating "some of the worst missteps of the year" in videogaming. The awards are named after Howard Scott Warshaw, creator of the famously poor E.T. for the Atari 2600, and victors include Namco for R: Racing Evolution, which "eschews virtually everything that Ridge Racer fans had come to expect", David Duchovny for "quite possibly the worst [voice acting] I've ever heard from a mainstream actor" in Ubisoft's XIII, and the IGN gaming website for their "obscene McDonald's advertising campaign."

Comments

Phantom Console?

[Alphanos]

I don't know whether enough people knew about if for it to get an award, but a company has been claiming to be producing a new console called the "Phantom". Apparently their production facilities were investigated and found to be a very large, empty office with a single desk in it. Let the vapourware jokes begin:).

Re:Phantom Console?

[CaptainMurphy]

that was the console that was supposed to play all the current generation's systems' games wasn't it? and there was a bunch of legal controversy around it if i remember. i knew it would never make it

Re:Phantom Console?

[FlipmodePlaya]

The more that comes out about it, the more it looks real. Big sites and mags have been interviewing the creators (forgot the name), and it seems it might not be an investor scam after all.

Personally, I believe that the developers are sincere in there hopes. Unfortunately, the idea of the console is pretty worthless. It will never reach production, much less make it off the ground.

When your overhead will be outrageous, and you main demographic is used to bootlegging all of their games, there's no way to win.

Re:Phantom Console?

[FlipmodePlaya]

I believe it's more of an iTunes for games type thing than an all-in-one console. They intend to set up a server, and sell games off of it for download. There are supposed to be rental schemes, downloadable patches, etc. They want to let indie developers put their games up there for cheap, to get some exposure and profit. It supposedly will run Windows games, but you must download them from their server.

It would seem that cutting out the middle man (store), and shipping/production, the cost of distrbuting a game would be very low. With so many gigs of games needing to be transfered, though, I can't imagine it turning a profit. How easy would it be to set up a hacked mirror of the server, or something, and give every user acess to every game free?

Re:Phantom Console?

[n0wak]

Sincere?
http://www.cedmagazine.com/ced/2003/1003/10a.htm
Hey, this looks good. Look, they got screens of their interface ... HEY, WAIT A MINUTE! That's Metroid Prime!?!
http://www.cedmagazine.com/ced/2003/1003/images/a2 _lg.jpg
Either they're idiots, or that's some blatant bullshit right there. And blatant BS is what I'm betting on.

Re:Phantom Console?

[cgenman]

You can get a lot more photos here, not all of them are renders. Notice also that the game in the windows is not being played, merely viewed. It could be a demo video being played, or a static screenshot, or (far more likely) the screen is a mockup and the consoles haven't reached the beta testers yet (they haven't). In case you haven't noticed, all screenshots get touched by photoshop before going out to the general public, just some more than others. Mocking up an interface that doesn't exist, and that hasn't gone out for refinement, is perfectly acceptable. The choice of Metroid Prime for the screenshot was a stupid one, but at least they have good taste in games.

We shouldn't put the Phantom on that list until 2004. I'm curious to see the size of the flameout.

The McDonalds ad campaign

[Anonymous Coward]

Penny Arcade comic here.

Re:The McDonalds ad campaign

[Anonymous Coward]

Penny Arcade!!!!!!!!!!! +5,000,000 HILARIOUS!!!!!!!!!!

Goddamn that comic sucks balls.

really no one liked E.T.?

[7-Vodka]

I had that game and I thought it was dope. strange. I hated it sure, but I couldnt put it down.

Re:really no one liked E.T.?

[Scrameustache]

I had that game and I thought it was dope. strange. I hated it sure, but I couldnt put it down.

Ah yes, the "fall in a hole" game, where you get out of a spaceship, and fall in a hole.
Try again, fall in another hole.
Again, that first hole, damn, thought I was far enough away.
Again, DAMN THAT HOLE!
Again, WHY DO YOU MOCK ME! Stupid hole-filled game.
Again, sanity fading away, holes making impression in psyche...

And so on.

holes...

Re:really no one liked E.T.?

[cgenman]

Honestly, that was better than "A Boy and His Blob." At least you could see the hole in E.T. "A Boy and His Blob" consisted of walking around, throwing unmarked colored jellybeans at your blob. Eventually you would map out what every one did. From then on, you had to walk up to every wall, floor, ceiling and other surface in the game, feed the blob the appropriate jellybean, walk through blindly, and see if you fell to your death. This task wasn't made any easier by the limited number of jellybeans... As if someone was going to cheat and use 3 ladders from "ketchup" instead of two.

In this case, "fall in hole, die, reset" wasn't just a mistake, it was the gameplay. The only merciful thing about the game was that it was one level long, and the second half of that level was a series of copout, easy training screens that should have come first. Why Nintendo Power hailed it as the second coming of your deity of choice is anyone's guess, but I'm guessing money.

Re:really no one liked E.T.?

[7-Vodka]

HUH? the game I remember had me running around trying to find pieces of a phone so that I could call the space ship and get picked up. While eating chocolate for energy.
I don't remember much about holes.

Re:really no one liked E.T.?

[Anonymous Coward]

"A Boy and His Blob" consisted of walking around, throwing unmarked colored jellybeans at your blob. Eventually you would map out what every one did.

Or you could just use the manual.

From then on, you had to walk up to every wall, floor, ceiling and other surface in the game, feed the blob the appropriate jellybean, walk through blindly, and see if you fell to your death.

Or you could throw a jellybean off the edge of the screen, which would briefly show you what was on the next screen (at least long enough to get a general sense of what you needed to do). Again, I'm pretty sure this was mentioned in the manual.

Re:really no one liked E.T.?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe they are talking about the Atari 2600 E.T. game, not any of the others.

Re:really no one liked E.T.?

[7-Vodka]

mine was a 2600 game

Enough with the E.T. bashing...

[BTWR]

Seriously! Enough! It was a bad game. But was it the greatest pile of crap in history? No. I saw my friend beat it recently, and it actually wasn't that bad when I got to see someone play who knew what he was doing. Just my $0.02, it's just getting old is all...

Re:Enough with the E.T. bashing...

[Zoshnell]

The E.T. floggings will continue until morale improves, don't you know that?

Re:Enough with the E.T. bashing...

[MWoody]

Yeah! I mean, after all, Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is FREE. It may not be 1942, but it's a damn good play.

^_*

Re:Enough with the E.T. bashing...

[Smedrick]

Hey, I liked playing E.T. Granted, I haven't played it in nearly a decade, but I could definitely name some worse games for the 2600. Hell, I think I had more fun playing E.T. than the recent Mega Man Network Transmission (it left a horrible scar).

Obscene McDonalds Advertising?

[whorfin]

The only thing obscene about it is the flavor of those McGriddles(tm). I tried one, and after a couple of bites lost my appetite. I'll stick with a nice bacon egg and cheese biscuit, thank you very much!

David Duchovny

[cgenman]

I think the author is being a little hard on Duchovny. When have we ever seen him as animated as Michael Ironside? Lacking the subtle clues of minute physical gesture, generated characters in videogames need to put a lot of variation in tone and pacing. Duchnovy traditionally relies upon eye and minor head movements. That's not to say he isn't a great actor, but he's far too subtle and visual to be a great voice actor. He has less intonation than Ben Stein. Thinking that would translate well to an audio-only role is Ubi Soft's fault.

Re:David Duchovny

[JFMulder]

I haven't played XIII so I can qualify his acting. But there's just something wrong about casting Duchovny's voice for that character judging from the promo video on XIII's website. I can't really explain this, but to me the face of the character doesn't fit with the voice. It's kinda like with badly dubbed anime, where the voice doesn't really fit with the overall look of the character. Picture Tom Cruise with the voice of Chris Rock. ** shudders **

Re:David Duchovny

[irokitt]

OK, so Duchovny is not a bad actor. But his "performance" in XIII (which is actually what I've been playing this week) is undeniable sub-par even as video game "acting" goes.

Mario Party

[Apreche]

A lot of what this guy says is just duh hay kind of stuff. And while I'll agree Nintendo's press releases were not as funny as intended. Mario Party still freakin' rules. If you don't like Mario Party its probably because you don't have 3 friends 3 controllers and a freakin' party.

The rest of the article is like "The N-Gage sucks". Not even close to news.

Re:Mario Party

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't like Mario Party its probably because you don't have 3 friends 3 controllers and a freakin' party.

Maybe the problem is he has 3 friends and 3 controllers so he has to sit out all the time!

Poor Warshaw

[thelenm]

I feel bad for Howard Scott Warshaw every time I hear his name mentioned in connection with the E.T. Atari game. It wasn't really his fault it was so terrible... they told him they had to have it on the shelves in time for the Christmas shopping season, and gave him about a month and a half to work on it. At least, that's what he said in this interview. A way overhyped game for one of the most successful movies of all time, and they give one programmer six weeks to do it? Even in 1982 that was suicide, no matter how brilliant the one programmer might have been.

Re:Poor Warshaw

[dafoomie]

Warshaw was the guy that made the worst 2600 game ever (E.T.), and the best 2600 game ever (Yar's Revenge). If you need a tiebreaker, he also made Raiders of the Lost Ark, which was a pretty good game.

Re:Poor Warshaw

[Bloomy]

He did one of those "know your video game history" commercials for G4. He said Yar's Revenge is one of the best games of all time and E.T. is the worst game of all time. So he probably has a sense of humor about it.

Re:Poor Warshaw

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. The guy's a decent programmer who did pretty well considering the time frame... they should of called this the 'Romero Awards'.

Ridge Racer R, Nintendo

[cgenman]

He's also being too hard on Namco and Nintendo. Racing Evolution was no terrible game, it was just "different." In a series known for being identical to the way it flagshipped the PS1, it was time for a risk. They took the risk, they alienated some fans, and now they are in a much better position in the market. Would he have preferred another Ridge Racer 5? It was a failure, true, but a noble one.

Likewise, saying Nintendo's head is buried in the sand ignores the fact that nintendo has testmarketed an online adapter, the Bulky Drive. Japan doesn't have very high broadband penetration. If the decision were based on Japan alone, there just isn't enough households for all of the extra work required in porting games to online multiplayer. The X-Box online is a no-brainier, and the PS2 has to keep up, but the 'Cube? Would Mario Party be better if 10% of the 10% of households with broadband decided to play online? Except to the extremely hardcore, not releasing an online adapter shouldn't count as a blunder. The whole N64 cartridge thing... That was a blunder. No Mario Kart Online yet? Don't be foolish.

Re:Ridge Racer R, Nintendo

[robbway]

I have R: Racing Evolution and I think it's a very fine game. I think perhaps this award should have gone to Auto Modellista (Capcom) for having more fishtails than Finding Nemo. AM is an embarrassing mess for Capcom where everything is right except for the driving simulator.

R:RE is clearly an offshoot of the Ridge Racer line, as they clearly avoided calling it Ridge Racer VI. Ridge Racers are arcade games, not driving sims. I did research awhile back and found previews of a Japenese RR6 which was supposed to be cel-shaded and feature real cars this time. I'm getting really bad flashbacks on Auto Modellista.

AM I blind/ Stoopit? PLease explain McD add

[Anonymous Coward]

How is this McD's add obscene? I just dont see it

Re:AM I blind/ Stoopit? PLease explain McD add

[Anonymous Coward]

It is basically plastered all over the site, but not quite as obvious as the banner ads in that small shot.

Take a look at the top, you will notice that the ad is embedded into the normal navigation bars, as well as 'M' logo with Mc's red color plastered all the other borders. It is as if McDonalds took over their standard site templates.

I wonder if the paying customers had to put up with this.

Read the whole article..

[orthancstone]

Rest of it is "N-Gage sucks?" I'm looking at it right now and I only see that in one paragraph...

Good job of oversimplifying it...

Nice of them to list the winners...

[Anonymous Coward]

They provide links to the content too... but no pictures and no descriptions of what the files/tools do! geez...

Halo for the PC

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean runs as slow as a dog.. and has all though pointless coridoors and then a room and then a corridoor...

Re:Halo for the PC

[irokitt]

Owned by M$ too. Anybody else seen all of the Penny Arcades lamenting the fixation the industry has on Halo?

Obscene?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wtf when I read "obscene McDonald ad" I expect to see Hamburglar raping Grimace or something, not tacky commercialism.

Re:Obscene?

[Anonymous Coward]

Haha, rape is really funny. Hee hee. Dumbass.

Re:Obscene?

[th3space]

When it's a fictional burgular tapping an oversized gumdrop...you're damned right it is.

What an ugly site...

[Anonymous Coward]

First time I've seen someone fix the leading that tight for a long time. Overlapping text! Yay! My favorite!

Copy-and-paste to text editor before even attempting to read time...