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• The Curious Case of Playstation Home

  I sometimes forget that Playstation Home, Sony’s proposed Frankenstein Monster that blends Xbox Live-like online service with an American Apparel-ad-meets-Second Life 3D space, even exists. Following its debut at GDC 2007, I was intrigued by the idea, but in the intervening eighteen months, Home has yet to materialize in any meaningful way. A closed beta trial of the service launched way back in April 2007, preceding a tentative launch later that fall, and that beta has since been extended half a dozen times. Home’s actual launch is out there, somewhere in the unknowable vaporware-future, and thankfully so. According to any and all hands-on reports from beta testers, Home is a ghost town, empty but for a scant few trendy avatars wandering the eerie Logan’s Run-style wasteland, hunting for an awkwardly animated dance party that may never happen. Read More... Posted Sep 23 2008, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 4 comment(s) Filed under: home, nintendo, microsoft, xbox 360, sony, animal crossing, Playstation, uncharted, warhawk

• R.I.P. Xbox 720 and Playstation 4: The Future of Gaming

  When Dennis Dyack laid out his vision for the One-Console Future, he theorized that the extinction of multiple videogame consoles wasn’t just a utopian possibility “where games would become better in quality, cheaper, and more widely available.” He said it was inevitable. I’ve never agreed with Mr. Dyack, but I don’t necessarily think he’s too far off. As Wedbush Morgan’s resident maverick Michael Pachter says in the latest episode of GameTrailers’ Bonus Round, the console war is already on the road to being less about technological difference’s as it is about a war of branding. Not who has the better games, graphics, and controllers, but whose name is cooler. I think that’s true. But it’s only one possibility. Read More... Posted Sep 03 2008, 02:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: nintendo, microsoft, michael pachter, wii, sony, Playstation, dennis dyack, xbox, seamus blackley, gametrailers, bonus round geoff keighley

• Games We Will Never Get to Play: Kenji Eno’s D2 for M2

  My obsession with Kenji Eno continues to grow despite the fact that I have yet to play a single game he designed. It isn’t just the mystery behind the man and his philosophy on design that’s got me so intrigued, but the fact that his games have always been on the periphery of my experience, especially the original D. Long before I had a Playstation or even a home computer that had a prayer of running the game, I remember gawking at pictures of the macabre adventure title in advertisements and being both fascinated and legitimately creeped out. When D2 came out for the Dreamcast, I was keen to check it and satisfy my younger self’s curiosity, but lost interest when I found out that the American version had been heavily censored. Thanks to Lost Levels and PC Games That Weren’t’s Timo Weirich, Kenji Eno and D just got a little bit more delightfully mysterious. Read More... Posted Aug 28 2008, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, PC, Playstation, 3do, d, Kenji eno, lost levels, games we will never get to play

• The End Has No End

  I recently played through Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction and, while I had a long list of problems with the game, the conclusion cinema was certainly a troublesome concern. More than anything else, the massively disappointing finale made me realize how intensely narrative-driven the game was, even more than the New York Times' claim that the game was an interactive Pixar movie (which, for the record, it totally is not). Ever since games first became produced on discs rather than cartridges the focus on cinema-centric storytelling has been undeniable, most notably with early Playstation games like Final Fantasy VII and Metal Gear Solid. Read More... Posted Aug 07 2008, 01:30 PM by Derrick Sanskrit with | with no comments Filed under: metal gear solid, nes, Playstation, final fantasy vii, cinematics, endings, ratchet &amp, clank

• Far Out, Man

  When the demo for PixelJunk’s latest play on genre convention, Eden, went live on the Playstation Network late last week, I was still knee deep in a country spanning jaunt, my only real gaming time devoted to quick sessions of Shiren the Wanderer and Phoenix Wright: Justice For All. I’ve been following Eden closely since Dylan Cuthber and Q Games started showing it off earlier this year, intrigued by its subdued yet dense pop-art visuals, deep house soundtrack, and its peculiar momentum-based play. Now that I’ve spent some time with the free appetizer hosted on PSN, I am, like Derrick, entranced by Eden. Beyond the basic satisfaction of moving through Eden’s gardens, its central theme of growth – your actions bring life to the environment resulting with subtle shifts in each garden’s music – is emblematic of the shift in the way games broadly can be classified. Read More... Posted Jul 31 2008, 12:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, derrick sanskrit, everyday shooter, phoenix wright, Playstation, psn, shiren the wanderer, eden, pixeljunk, echochrome

• The Chrono Trigger Port: Are You Excited or Disappointed?

  Though the 16-bit console wars were savage in the early '90s, the end was in sight by 1995 and the Super Nintendo was crowned the obvious winner. (Except by pouty Genesis fanboys who feebly compared Phantasy Star IV to Final Fantasy VI. I mean, it's a good try, but...nah.) The Genesis was panting and dry-heaving at the finish line, but the Super Nintendo barely broke a sweat. In fact, it looked healthier than ever thanks to an injection of A+ games at the end of its life. One such title was Chrono Trigger, a now-legendary RPG by Square(-Enix). We should all hope for the dignified hero's death that the Super Nintendo recieved thanks to Chrono Trigger's legacy. Read More... Posted Jul 02 2008, 07:30 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: remake, nintendo ds, rpg, chrono trigger, Playstation, square-enix, genesis, chrono cross, luca, port, marle, robo, super nintendo, phantasy star, crono, 16-bit, final fantasy iv, console wars

• The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial, Part 3

  Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! We cite Punch-Out!! here not for starring Mike Tyson (a controversial figure, even before his rape conviction), but for the degree to which it epitomizes a trend that would dominate gaming in the late-'80s and early-'90s: the "beat up stereotypes from around the world" gameplay model. Granted, most of Punch-Out!!'s characters are too ludicrous to really offend; it's hard to imagine Pacific Islanders getting all up in arms about King Hippo being kind of a jackass. That said, the sight of cross-eyed Piston Honda babbling "Sushi, Kamikaze, Fujiyama, Nipponichi!" as a mid-match battle cry is a little unsettling. — PS Read More... Posted Jun 20 2008, 01:13 PM by John Constantine with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, peter smith, metroid, nintendo, derrick sanskrit, xbox 360, final fantasy, top ten, call of duty, pokemon, Playstation, tomb raider, punch out, mcdonalds, heavenly sword, fable, mike Tyson, narc, dead or alive, persona

• The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial, Part 2

  Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Call of Duty 4 is a game obsessed with realism, its depiction of combat situations and the tools of war meticulous to an almost terrifying degree. Early in the game, you are placed in the gunner’s seat of an AC-130 Spectre over a Ukrainian field, the night vision view of an aerial assault looking no different than an Iraq war newscast, the radio confirmation of kills unsettlingly casual; a game so realistic that it mimics a soldier’s detachment from killing. It’s strange then that the game, for all its incessant specificity, sends the player to kill Arab soldiers in “the Middle East”, and not an actual nation. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare has sold over seven million copies in a war-weary United States in under a year. Am I the only one who finds this sort of depersonalization unsettling? — JC Read More... Posted Jun 20 2008, 01:12 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, peter smith, metroid, nintendo, derrick sanskrit, xbox 360, final fantasy, top ten, call of duty, pokemon, Playstation, tomb raider, punch out, mcdonalds, heavenly sword, fable, mike Tyson, narc, dead or alive, persona

• The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial, Part 1

  Games have been raising hackles since their inception. Howell Ivy kick-started gaming and controversy’s relationship when he designed Death Race in 1976, a simple black and white game that was, well, about running people over for points. That was enough to get America riled up, prompting 60 Minutes to run the first of many, many televised news stories about the psychological effects of gaming. But public outrage is unpredictable. Politicians and parent groups have been shocked by d-list titles like Manhunt and Night Trap while more popular, widely played games with far more inflammatory content have passed by unnoted. Today, 61 Frames Per Second presents The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial. A number of these are games that we are surprised did not cause uproar in a number of communities. The rest are games that we ourselves find seriously questionable in content. How do you feel about these videogames? Indifferent? Appalled? Leave a comment and let us know. — John Constantine NARC I don't know about you, but I have at least a couple of friends who have occasionally sold drugs. They're pretty lucky they grew up in the relatively permissive '90s, and not in the merciless, Reaganite '80s presented in NARC. Sure, NARC gives you bonus points for arresting dealers instead of killing them, but that's because it's almost impossible to do. Far easier is just perforating them on the spot. As my fellow blogger Cole notes, "I guess dismembering hundreds is okay if they're pushin'." In fact, there was some parental outrage over NARC's unprecedented level of gore, but its moral assumptions went pretty much unchallenged. — Peter Smith Read More... Posted Jun 20 2008, 01:11 PM by John Constantine with | with 7 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, peter smith, metroid, nintendo, derrick sanskrit, xbox 360, final fantasy, top ten, call of duty, pokemon, Playstation, tomb raider, punch out, mcdonalds, heavenly sword, fable, mike Tyson, narc, dead or alive, persona

• Where is The City of Metronome?

  Back in 2005, Swedish developer Tarsier came to E3 with a big game they’d been cooking up called The City of Metronome. Metronome, even three years later, remains a visual feast, its faceless characters, early 20th century fashion, and twisting cityscape sitting somewhere between Edward Gorey and Pixar, Ralph Bakshi and Alex Proyas’ Dark City. Tarsier had also created an exciting foundation for play in Metronome; every action was based around sound. A player could control the city’s citizens, alter architecture, and even fight using sounds recorded in the game. And recording wasn’t just a clever twist on item collection either, as the player could create their own noise to record by interacting with the world (breaking glass, having a conversation, etc.) Few games in the past five years have been as conceptually exciting or strange as Metronome. Read More... Posted Jun 11 2008, 10:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, bioshock, where is, Playstation, city of metronome, psn, take-two, tarsier

• The 61FPS Review: Ninja Gaiden 2 Part 1

  When Team Ninja’s Ninja Gaiden finally released, it was mind-altering. No three-dimensional action game played as well, looked as good, or had its raw scope, and no one in the world was expecting it to deliver as it did. After all, the game had been vaporware for half a decade. Remember when Tecmo announced it as a game for Sega’s Project Katana (the development codename for Dreamcast)? How about when it was supposed to be a Playstation 2 launch title? By the time Team Ninja announced that they’d be releasing it as an Xbox title, I was starting to wonder if the game existed at all. When no screens or video of the game materialized for another three years, it was fair to assume that Gaiden was destined to be little more than trivia fodder. But then February 2004 rolled around and there it was. That month will, in my mind, always be a benchmark in the history of action games. Ninja Gaiden has aged well in four years, its multiple revisions and expansions right through the Playstation 3 remake Ninja Gaiden Sigma proving its foundation to be sturdy and engaging. 3D action games broadly, however, have surpassed it. God of War brought bigger, more exciting environments and enemy confrontations while improving accessibility and even Ninja Gaiden’s immediate forebear Devil May Cry added more depth in its third and fourth entries. Even the lackluster Heavenly Sword took away Ninja Gaiden’s crown as the genre’s most visceral visual spectacle. I’ve been lukewarm on Ninja Gaiden II since it was announced last year. I couldn’t tell what was wrong. Something about it just seemed so sterile, so rote in comparison to everything else hitting the new wave of consoles. Dynamic limb removal is the big innovation? Really? This is Ninja Gaiden II! Time to redefine 3D action a second time! I realize that’s an unfair expectation to put on a game but it isn’t unfair to expect a modicum of refinement, some change to the established formula that utilizes both hindsight and the power of new technology. That’s why Ninja Gaiden II is, initially, so disappointing. Read More... Posted Jun 09 2008, 02:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, xbox 360, devil may cry, 61fps review, Playstation, ninja gaiden, dreamcast, god of war

• Games Cost Money: Sony Cans The Getaway and Eight Days

  While the salad days of the Playstation 2 are at an end for Sony, things have been looking up for the entrenched corporate monster in 2008. Little Big Planet continues to wow, Gran Turismo 5: Prologue had a healthy release in April for a game that’s little more than a demo, and the buzz surrounding Metal Gear Solid 4’s impending release is loud enough to even drown out some of that Grand Theft Auto fervor that’s been going on. The stigma surrounding the Playstation 3 – that it’s an expensive, ugly machine without many games to play on it – is slowly starting to fade, and it has everything to do with some truly exciting exclusive software. So it’s disheartening to hear that two games being developed by Sony’s own London Studio have been cancelled. Eight Days, a Michael Bay-tinged action game that fused car chases with shootouts in the American southwest, and The Getaway, a sequel to London Studio’s successful PS2 Brit-crime drama series, have both been given the axe “due to the redistribution of resources and budget.” While I’m the first to exclaim my love for the big-budget blockbuster games coming out on the 360, PS3, and PC these days, the truth is that, for at least the short-term future, they may not be an economically feasible pursuit for most developers. Read More... Posted Jun 05 2008, 11:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, little big planet, next-gen, xbox 360, metal gear solid, sony, gran turismo, Playstation, halo, the getaway, eight days

• Personal Firsts: My Gaming Scrapbook, From A to Wii

  Written by Amber Ahlborn At some point in the 1980s, the year nebulous in my memory, my mom bowled with her team every Thursday night. I loved Thursday nights because dad let me stay up late to watch M.A.S.H. and Benny Hill. Sometimes he and I would hop in the car and go visit mom at the alley, and that was the best. Dad would sit and watch mom bowl. Me? I would squeeze every last quarter I could get out of him. With a fist full of change and dollars soon to be converted into change, I’d walk down to the alley’s hamburger bar, snag a stool, and drag it through the glass doors into the arcade. Without deviation, I’d position my stool in front of the “Ostrich Game” and stay planted there until I ran out of money. I’m speaking of Joust of course, but at that age I could neither reach the controls without a stool to sit on nor read very well. Read More... Posted Jun 02 2008, 01:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: pac-man, metroid, wii, legend of zelda, snes, nes, ico, mega man, atari, gamecube, amber ahlborn, kaboom, katamari damacy, chrono trigger, firsts, pikmin, Playstation, joust, pitfall, star fox, ps2, frogger, super mario bros, ds