Okay
I’m as big of a Nintendo homer as anyone on the planet, but Okami just might be the game that makes me break down and get a PS2.
Fri, September 22 2006 » Games » No Comments
Weekend and Inform
Had a really wonderful birthday weekend with Kristin and some writerly friends and their families. Boats were ridden (ok, one boat). Leinies were consumed by the deck on the lake. Blackberries were picked. And most of all, good company. (Karen has provided a helpful map of the premises on her blog.) Besides the revisions of [...]
Mon, August 7 2006 » Games, Life Studies » No Comments
It’s really not my style
“Marisa: Long time no see. Meiling: Hey, when did we get acquainted? Marisa: A moment ago, right? Meiling: Oh no, I’ve met a real crazy girl. Marisa: Whatever. You’re in the way. You’re the guardman, right? Meiling: That’s why I’m in the way. Marisa: So you ARE the guardman! Meiling: I’m just a normal person [...]
Thu, July 27 2006 » Games » No Comments
underdogs
There are three major roles served by what we’ll refer to as “underdog” systems: 1. To air out new ideas that, though worth exploring, will never be mainstream in their seminal form. 2. To act as a gadfly toward the market leader, spurring change where it would not otherwise occur. 3. To provide an independent [...]
Mon, July 24 2006 » Fiction, Games » No Comments
The Virtual of the Virtual
So instead of pretending to play football, you can pretend to pretend to play football: That’s right, you can pay $20 to have a sneak peek at the new version of Madden. ESPN TEAMS UP WITH EA SPORTS TO OFFER AN INSIDE LOOK AT MADDEN NFL 07 PAY-PER-VIEW EVENT AVAILABLE ON TV AND ONLINE Beginning [...]
Mon, July 24 2006 » Games » No Comments
Bending Stories
I haven’t played Indigo Prophecy, but this is a fascinating “post-mortem” article from creator David Cage about the narrative processes that went into the game: Among the writing techniques that I developed for Indigo Prophecy, Bending Stories definitely received the most attention from the press. The basic idea was to solve the classic difficulty of [...]
Tue, June 20 2006 » Games » 2 Comments
Super Paper Mario
Can’t wait for Super Paper Mario. It’s Mario! As a piece of paper! With…math in the sky?!?
Mon, June 19 2006 » Games » No Comments
gold farming
Okay, I can’t resist posting about this: Weeks go by as I chase ghosts and rumors of Chinese workers clicking 12 hours a day. Word has it that 300 farmers are working at computers lined up in airport hangars somewhere in Asia. The opening sentences to a William Gibson short story circa 1989? Actually, an [...]
Wed, May 3 2006 » Games » No Comments
Panoptikon 2.0
Do you have an unquenchable need for penal simulation? Prison Tycoon is for you! And I wish I was making this up but I’m not! Brick by Brick… Start from the ground up placing the very walls and fences that will house and contain your prisoners. Choose from multiple isolated environments and get to work. [...]
Mon, April 24 2006 » Games » 1 Comment
The Ultimate Tie-In
Yes, they actually released a video game based on the Skittles “Taste the Rainbow” campaign. Skittles. I don’t know what’s more shocking-the very existence of this game, or the fact that it actually didn’t completely suck.
Tue, October 4 2005 » Games » No Comments
Beer Can Exorcism!
I was only lukewarm about the upcoming first-person game Geist, in which you are a wanderin’ spirit possessing all sorts of people: You are John Raimi, a disease-control agent with the federal government, on loan to an elite counterterrorism unit. Your team is sent to investigate the shadowy Volks Corporation. When the operation goes horribly [...]
Thu, August 11 2005 » Games » No Comments
Infernokrusher Core Branding and Product Placement Strategy: A Roundtable
Ok, well, it’s technically not a roundtable…but feel free to chime in or not! In light of recent brand orientations, it has been ascertained after intense scrutiny that Kingdom of Loathing provides high-grade Infernokrusher potentialities in terms of target audience participatory matrices for explosions, implosions, jolts, reorientations: kentucky-fried meat crossbow, meat vortex, mafia aria, sonar-in-a-biscuit, [...]
Fri, July 15 2005 » Fiction, Games » 2 Comments
Best Thread Involving Meat Ever
More numiastics, in a way. After quite a bit of time away from the game, I’ve been goofing around with Kingdom of Loathing during my downtime here and there, for when I need something mindless…anyway, this probably will make zero sense to anyone who hasn’t played it. But now they’re having poetry contests. The prize? [...]
Wed, July 13 2005 » Games » 1 Comment
More Killer7
Penny Arcade blogs about Killer7: Simultaneously, I think it’s rare that we as players truly think about what it would mean for a game to be “art,” straight up, with no qualifications. I’m not even sure the two terms can abide without rancor in the same sentence. Games are products, we buy them, and like [...]
Mon, July 11 2005 » Games » 2 Comments
Killer7: Fancypants
I really want to get my hands on Killer7. It really seems Up My Alley. In particular, I want to don my turtleneck while I’m playing: In other words, cappuccino-sipping, turtleneck-wearing academics looking to uncover all the hidden meaning and intention in all sorts of “works” would probably have a field day with Killer7, which [...]
Thu, July 7 2005 » Games » No Comments
Attention Retro Gamers
Nintendo’s next-generation console, Revolution, is due mid-2006, and this was announced today: [Nintendo's president] said he wanted the Revolution to be a “virtual console” and as such the Nintendo Revolution will be able to download 20 years of Nintendo content - virtually every Nintendo console game ever created will be playable on the Revolution, from [...]
Tue, May 17 2005 » Games » 1 Comment
Blogger, why are you so touchy today?Anyway, speaking of the GameCube, I rented SoulCalibur II last night, a highly regarded fighting game. Nothing too cerebral, good for some button mashing and the like. It’s always interesting how even single-player games in our household are communal affairs. Kristin is really really good with puzzles, and I’m…not. [...]
Wed, April 27 2005 » Games » 2 Comments
We don’t have a Nintendo DS (though we have a GameCube)-but PacPix looks pretty freaking cool, and very meta: “One day a mischievous wizard came up with a mysterious invention called “Ghost Ink.” When something is drawn using this ink, it turns into a Ghost. These ghostly tricksters would then jump into pictures and books, [...]
Tue, April 26 2005 » Games » No Comments
Thu, September 30 2004 » Games, Poetry » No Comments
Thu, September 30 2004 » Games, Poetry » No Comments
