- Uncategorized
The Week in Anger
Or outrage, or scorn. Video games are just one pushcart in the vast marketplace of ideas, where everyone shouts down the quality of the goods. Then again, sometimes the merchants deserve the berating. So let’s recap the week’s most noteworthy reactionary topics, scoring them for the outrage they summon and the skepticism they invite. Or…
By Owen Good Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Sony Was Surprised How Few People Wanted To Make Games For Vita
Why is the PlayStation Vita floundering? One reason is that people just weren’t interested in developing games for it. At least that’s what Sony boss Shuhei Yoshida believes. “One thing that was surprising and disappointing to us was the [lower] number of third parties to come out [in support] after launch,” Yoshida told Gamasutra in…
By Jason Schreier Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedCall of Duty Developer Offices Get Attacked By Zombies, Sort Of
Treyarch has made cool-looking stuff in the Call of Duty video games, including the introduction of the series’ fan-favorite Zombie modes. You wouldn’t know it, though, for how boring their offices looked. But, thanks to art collective IAm8Bit, visitors can now tell that these folks really know the undead. The video above gives a look…
By Evan Narcisse Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedTruck Yeah, Let’s See All the Vehicles of Farming Simulator 2013
You city slicker video gamers think farming simulation video games is nothing but updating the roster with the latest GMO corn from Monsanto and slapping the Indiana State Fair champion cow on the cover. Well, there’s a lot more to it than that. Equipment changes every year, the same as in any sports league. And…
By Owen Good Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Escapism Squared: High Times With a Video Game
[Editor’s Note: What follows is a story about someone who took drugs and writes honestly about her experience. We do not endorse the use of drugs and warn you to be mindful of the risks of any substance that’s subject to abuse. We accept the reality that many who play games use drugs or have…
By Patricia Hernandez Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Sony Won’t Say How Many People Have PlayStation Plus, But They Will Share Other Plus Stats (And an October Surprise)
Microsoft refuses to say how many people subscribe to Xbox Live Gold, and Sony still won’t say how many people use PlayStation Plus—the premium PS3 service I’ve said is far and away better than Gold Jack Buser, senior director of PlayStation Digital Platforms, declined to give that number during a brief phone chat with me…
By Stephen Totilo Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedPick Your Squad And Keep Them Alive In This XCOM: Enemy Unknown Interactive Trailer
This interactive gameplay video for XCOM: Enemy Unknown isn’t quite a demo, and it’s not quite a trailer. It’s sort of like a choose your own adventure tutorial, letting you make simple decisions about squad management and tactics. And like a choose your own adventure book, if you flip through it afterward, you can see…
By Kate Cox Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Four Splendid Gaming Apps… and NFL Pro 2013
As Owen Good often reminds us, not every Gaming App of the Day is a good one. For every Bad Piggies, The Room or Bar Story 2 there are a dozen NFL Pro 2013s, and he seems to wind up playing them all. Oftentimes we’ll play gaming apps for our daily spotlight based on our…
By Mike Fahey Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Resident Evil 6 Meat Stunt Might Make You Lose Your Lunch
Capcom is sponsoring an art installation in East London. That sounds innocuous, except that said art installation is at the Smithfield Meat Market, and is called “Wesker & Son Resident Evil Human Butchery.” Well, that’s certainly one way to get attention for next week’s release of Resident Evil 6 The meat market is not, of…
By Kate Cox Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
The SteelSeries Free Controller Makes Mobile Gaming Almost Too Easy
This past Monday I sat down with SteelSeries chief marketing officer Kim Rom at a local cafe to eat barbecue pork sandwiches and check out the company’s new Freedom to Play line of mobile gaming products. As Rom explained the intricate details of the Free Mobile Wireless Controller I got further in Temple Run than…
By Mike Fahey Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Video Game Music: A Killer Opportunity For Hollywood Composers
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Video games are the new best way to make a living composing music It’s not just indie developers and composers who are figuring this out—Hollywood has gotten in on the action as well. A new article at the L.A. Times goes in-depth with some of the…
By Kirk Hamilton Published September 28, 2012 - Reviews
Looper Might Be the Best Time Travel Movie Ever
Note: This review originally ran on Tuesday, 09-25-12. Forget The Jetsons, DC Comics’ Legion of Superheroes or any other shiny, happy vision of the future. The decades ahead of us aren’t guaranteed to get much better than the present. Truth is, everybody makes bad decisions that trap us into lives we don’t see coming. That…
By Evan Narcisse Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedWeapons Negotiation Deal Turns Into The Biggest Roller Coaster Of Emotions
You might say it’s more of a roller coaster of… personalities? Identity confusion? Episodes of schizophrenia? Whatever the hell is going on in the video above, Warialasky sure does hit that weird space of reality-bending that they always do.
By Tina Amini Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedThe Small Things in RPGs That Matter A Lot
Think about the last game you spent serious time playing. Visualize everything. Imagine how it looked, how it sounded, how the controls felt in your hands. Picture the last thing you did. Okay. You probably thought in broad strokes: maybe you remember going on a mission of some sort, like shooting a hive full of…
By Jason Schreier Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Thousands of Developers Want to Make Games for the Ouya
Let’s say you’re someone who put up their hard earned money to back the Ouya. You already believed in the hack-friendly Android-based game console enough to help it become one of Kickstarter’s biggest success stories. But you might be wondering just how many developers are going to be making games for the thing. Well, in…
By Evan Narcisse Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedA Startling, Emotional Alternate Ending For Black Mesa
When does something stop being “fan-made” and start being real? Considering the fact that the excellent Half-Life tribute Black Mesa was itself made by fans of the original game, this amazing alternate ending, created and uploaded by Machinima filmmaker TomahawxX, feels perhaps a touch more real than your average fan-made video. The filmmaker, who created…
By Kirk Hamilton Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
Now There’s an Entire Studio Dedicated to Making More Mobile Sims
Finland, Finland, Finland, the country where I quite want to be, your mountains so lofty, your development studios dedicated to creating more mobile games for The Sims franchise so fresh and new. EA Maxis has opened Maxis Helsinki to focus on making virtual people for us to torture on our tablets and phones. There can…
By Mike Fahey Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
This Great Mass Effect/Dragon Age Fan Art Kind of Breaks My Brain
I have joked about “Dragon Effect” before, when playing through BioWare’s vaguely parallel science-fiction and fantasy-franchises at the same time. Fan artist Andrew Ryan Art, though, has done one better. Miranda as Morrigan I can actually kind of buy in to. And of course Jack is a dangerous-looking blood mage. For the full set, which…
By Kate Cox Published September 28, 2012 -
UncategorizedThis Is What Every Slender Video On YouTube Is Like
I know, I know. You’re all tired of the Slender videos. “It’s not even scary!” many of you have said in the past. But don’t worry. This one is a mockery video by Evanz111. *Headphone users beware.* Every Slender video on YouTube. [YouTube via Reddit]
By Tina Amini Published September 28, 2012 - Uncategorized
The Most Badass Weapons in Borderlands 2
What’s the most badass weapon you’ve seen in Borderlands 2? We’ll start. Above is my favorite and best weapon. Sure, I’ve got a Tediore rocket launcher that does over 10k damage. (Although the danger with having a Tediore-made rocket launcher is that I’ll forget it shoots out an extra rocket when I reload it. And…
By Tina Amini Published September 28, 2012