Wookie Porn Machine

I just signed up for Gamespot Total Access, the paid subscription tier for the gaming website.  The process of how this came to be is a weirdly circular one which I'd like to note because it's such a strange trip to take.

The reason I joined wasn't because I wanted to pay for the service.  Nope.  The reason I joined was because I was a Giant Bomb Premium member.  You see, I was subscriber to Gamespot Complete back in the day, until what became known as the Gerstmann Affair.  In 2007, longtime Gamespot employee Jeff Gerstmann, who by then had the Editorial Director spot at the video gaming site, was fired over his pushback against the steady influence of the marketing department over editorial content.  This pushback game to a head after Gerstmann put up a fight over his review of Kane & Lynch: Dead Men, which he gave a "Fair" rating, essentially a mediocre grade.  Publisher Eidos threatened to pull advertising on Gamespot, advertising which had actually progressed to wrapping the entire site with ads for Eidos' game. For my part, I cancelled my Gamespot subscription in protest over Gerstmann's firing.

In the wake of the dismissal came the obligatory lawyerly suppression of information, a suppression that of course allowed naysayers to cry conspiracy, insisting that the whole thing had nothing to do with Eidos or Kane & Lynch.  Gerstmann himself went on to found Giant Bomb, a competing video game website that has steadily grown in prominence, to which I eventually paid for subscribers access in support for Gerstmann's efforts.  And here is where the story takes a hilarious turn.  Recently, parent company Whisky Media has sold off Giant Bomb to none other than CBS Interactive, owners of CNET, who operate Gamespot.  So Gerstmann ends up back with his former company, and I end up back with a Gamespot Subscription, converted from my paid access to Giant Bomb.  Funny, yes?  And all the while, the stakes in regards to big game companies eroding the editorial integrity of video game journalism keeps getting higher.  

Via the terms of Giant Bomb's purchase by CBS Interactive, the gag order on the details of Gerstmann's firings was nullified, and he revealed that marketing's pressure against negative game reviews was indeed the reason for his dismissal.  But the question remains: will game publishers continue to influence gaming sites' game ratings?  And if so, will the public do anything about it?

Over at The Dot Eaters: Video Game History 101, we have a retrospective of the life of Jack Tramiel, who has passed away at the age of 83.  He founded Commodore, creators of the great C64 personal computer, and went on to helm the consumer division of Atari during the Atari ST years.  He will be missed.

From my website, The Dot Eaters: Video Game History 101:

From Elite Systems Ltd., the guys who made the classic space exploration and trade game Elite in 1984, comes World of RETRO Computer GAMES, an iOS app featuring a collection of  near-100% accurate replicas of classic computer games.

And classic is the operative word here. In the free version of the app,  Datasoft's action platformer Bruce Lee (1984)is provided free of charge, with three packs of three games each available as in-app purchases for 99 cents a pop.  Paying 99 cents up front for the app gets you all the game packs included, along with Bruce Lee.  Any self-respecting computer gamer from the 80's will remember Bruce Lee, running and jumping through multiple screens collecting lanterns in order to open up secret doors in order to progress, all the while chased by a stick-wielding ninja and the green Sumo menace Yamo.  The game packs contain such gems as Freefall's chess-by-way-of-Tolkien Archon (1983), Epyx's one-on-one fighting game Barbarian a.k.a. Death Sword (1988), and the original The Bard's Tale: Tales of the Unknown (1985) by EA.

As almost always with these things when gaming on iOS devices, the app falters slightly with the control scheme, although this is mitigated somewhat through what Elite calls their iDaptive controls.  What this amounts to are contextual buttons that pop up in-game and are completely customizable by the user. You can increase their size and position, adjust transparency to see behind them, and switch from keyboard directional keys to a simulated joystick.  The stick is definitely a necessity for most of the games here, in particular for action games like Bruce Lee.  The ability to move controls to a more comfortable position is key to keeping things from getting too frustrating, although the low-resolution response of the joystick takes some getting used to.  Even with this stilted response, I'd have to say that the controls aren't a dealbreaker with this one. The ultimate workaround for the virtual joystick, of course, is to use ION's iCade, a nifty mini-arcade cabinet that connects with your iPad via bluetooth and provides 6 physical buttons and a solid joystick.  Retro Games supports the iCade, and using this feature makes all the difference in the world when it comes to controls in the game.

There's so much to love here.  The games feel spot-on, and give one a visceral thrill to be able to play these classics on a modern mobile device.  There are separate apps for both iPhone and iPad, but the latter is the best way to go, as buttons get crazily cramped on some of the games on the small screen.  A much appreciated ability to save and load games at any time is another big plus.



It's promised that 100 more games will be made available through in-app purchase,  touting such pleasures as Ozark Softscape's seminal M.U.L.E.and Archon's sequel, Archon II: Adept.  With a lineup like that, Retro Games should have the mobile classic gaming scene in its pocket.

Had he not been so rudely taken from us in 2001, famed author Douglas Adams, the man responsible for the immensely popular Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy books, would be turning 60 today.  

Over at my video game history site, I pay tribute to the man who gave us Vogon Poetry, the triple-breasted whore of Eroticon VI, and the number 42, as well as a few computer games.  Grab your towel and head over if you like.

Douglas Adams Remembered

Someone who grew up during the birth and golden age of video games would also have to be at least passingly familiar with the electronic pastime it replaced... pinball.  In practically every arcade there would be at least a few pinball machines vying for the attention of someone looking for something a bit more physical than Pac-Man.  I remember one of the troika of video game palaces here in downtown Toronto being the Pinball Spot.  After carefully traversing down the slick-tiled steep and dark stairway, one would be greeted by a huge square basement of video delights, as well as a long line of pinball machines stretched back along the left wall.  It was a pinballer's paradise to be sure.

Hoping to recapture that sultry allure is FarSight Studio's Pinball Arcade for iOS devices.  There is no shortage of pinball game simulations for game devices these days, so how does Pinball Arcade shape up against the competition?  PA's main hook is the painstaking detail that has gone into the recreation of the featured tables.  Tales of the Arabian Nights is unlocked when the game is installed, with The Black Hole, Ripley's Believe It or Not and Theatre of Magic available for paid download in-game.  These games range from between $1.99 to $3.99, and you can pick up all three in a pack for $8.99.  The app itself is 99 cents.  Other classic tables are promised in future updates.

The tables are great to play, lovingly constructed with no detail overlooked.  Each table also features a tutorial to take you through the scoring system, as well as an interesting text screen outlining the history of the machine.  Problems arise, however, with the game's physics.  Pinball games are the epitome of 'feel' in coin-op amusement.  How the ball interacts with the flippers, the speed it travels around the board, and the player's ability to influence these events are all critical elements to a pinball game's success.  There is a tangible connection between player and pinball.  I believe it is possible to recreate this connection and 'feel' in a computer simulation, but Pinball Arcade doesn't quite feel like it.  For all the love and care that the creators obviously poured into the tables, they skimped a bit on ball physics.  It moves wonkily quite often, changing speed or direction for no good reason.  The ball's movement off the flippers feels a bit strange too, all of which equals a bit of frustration on the player's part and failure to close that gap between the physicality of pinball and the cold calculations of computer simulation.

Wacky ball movement notwithstanding, I would still heartily recommend this app to all you Pinball Wizards out there.  Pinball Arcade sure plays a mean pinball.

The venerable Commodore 64 turns 30 this week, having been first introduced to the world at the 1982 Consumer Electronics Show (CES).

The C64 had a profound impact on two industries.  Not only did its low price ($525 at retail, compared to $1200 plus for the base Apple II model) further Apple's work at popularizing the computer for home use, the C64 became an incredibly prolific video game platform, on which many future game programmers cut their teeth.

It was a quirky system, especially the enormous 5140 floppy drive accessory, which was nearly the size of the computer itself, about 4 times the weight, and often seemed like it was going to shake itself off your desk while accessing information off 5 1/4" disks.  Despite this, the Commodore 64 became one of the most popular single computer lines ever, selling over 22 million units.

Although the 64K of internal memory in the C64 seems infinitesimally small, this powerhouse helped change the face of computing.

I've recently hammered out four new videos in my Video Games Evolved series.  I pay tribute to Bump 'N' Jump, Pac-Man, Dig Dug and Zaxxon.

Usually I do a run-through with the game as practice and then start recording gameplay footage, but of course with the arcade version of Zaxxon it took maybe 5 plays before I could survive long enough to get useable footage because the game is so bloody hard.  The Atari and Intellivision versions are the most dramatic departures from the arcade, at least graphically.  Sure, you can understand why the limitations of these two warhorses require a scale-back from the cool isometric pseudo-3D of the original, but still.... belch.  That ain't Zaxxon.  They come off more as a sparse River Raid, without the river.

One game where the INTY comes off surprisingly best is its Jump 'N' Bump port.  Usually the ColecoVision runs away with these arcade translations, but here, the Intellivision definitely captures the look and tone of the original arcade better than the CV.  Heck, even the 2600 version holds its own.  Will wonders never cease?

Having put a five or so hours into this one, I thought I'd post my thoughts.

The Devil is in the details, and when you first move around Dead Island and go about the business of trying to survive a zombie infestation of an island resort in Papua New Guinea, the little details that trip you up, get in your face and otherwise strive to keep you from having fun make this game hard to love.  There is no real tutorial to speak of, so learning the ins and outs of combat and inventory management is left up to the player.  Combat can be set up one of two ways; either analog or digital.  Digital, the default, means that you put a button to take swipes with your melee weapon and do some slight aiming on the fly, trying to target limbs to cripple your foes or to take them out quickly with a headshot.  Analog is a more precise, but much more fiddly set up where you use the analog sticks to directly control your weapons as you swing them.  Both processes take a good deal of time to feel natural.  

In the early going, DI is definitely geared towards melee play, with nary a weapon in site, save for one character's Fury move, where they can pull out a personal side arm.  These Fury modes allow each of the four selectable characters to perform a timed special move that comes in handy when their backs are against the wall.  As well, points are earned to enable players to add abilities to suit their play style.  There is also a robust weapon repair and creation system that keeps things interesting.

There are a tonne of missions available in a large, free-form play area, although almost all of these are fedex missions, and over all the mission structure isn't that compelling.  The plot isn't really all that much to write home about, either.  Things, of course, really start cooking when you play co-operatively with human players, although I'm finding the matchmaking system rocky at best, with most requests to join games on the fly ending up with a connection error.  For a game who's bread and butter is online play, the online component in DI is rather a buggy mess, missing basic features like kick voting.

Still, in spite of the unpolished nature of the game, it is a lot of fun to beat zombies to a pulp in a large play space.   You might have come to the island paradise of Banoi to soak up some sun, but you'll stay for the sheer joy of soaking the ground with zombie blood.

Taken from my blog, The Dot Eaters: Video Game History 101:





WarGames was a seminal video game movie from 1983 that helped solidify the public's view of hackers and computer nerds, as well as introduced an entire generation to the idea of networked communities and connected computers, albeit connected by a blazing fast 300 baud dial-up modem. You can read more about the history of WarGames and two other classic early 80's video game movies here at The Dot Eaters.

In that article, I mention an atrocious direct-to-DVD sequel mounted by MGM in 2008 called WarGames: The Dead Code, released to dovetail with the 25th anniversary of the original. Currently in development, and hopefully with better prospects, is another WarGames sequel from MGM. Recently, the writer for the project has been named, one Noah Oppenheim. He is an unknown commodity in feature films, with TV producer credits on The Today Show and Hardball with Chris Matthews, as well as a few reality series. Recently, though, Oppenheim has been swept up in a recent mania over famous escape-artist and psychic debunker Harry Houdini, as the planned writer of The Secret Life of Houdini, which will add the fictional 'secret spy' to Houdini's list of occupations. Oppenheim has also been pegged as the writer of the adaptation of a young-adult book called The Maze Runner.

Coming in to the WarGames project with a slightly more solid film background is Seth Gordon, previously named as director. Gordon's latest outing was Horrible Bosses, released this year and garnering a 69% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. What might make Gordon the best man to helm a project updating a classic video game movie is his work directing, shooting and editing The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, a wonderful documentary that detailed one man's attempt to wrest the all-time Donkey Kong high-score crown from the flamboyant Billy Mitchell.

With King of Kong on his CV, it gives one hope that Gordon and his crew will show the classic WarGames the loving treatment it deserves in an updated sequel.

Taken from my website, which deals in the history of video games:

The Visual Cortex: Covering TRON



Today this surfaces in the Cortex: a scan of the July, 1982 cover of Electronic Games magazine.

EG was the premiere video game magazine of its time.  I remember strolling into the drug store with my mom and spotting the second issue of EG on the rack in 1981.  It bothered me forever more that I missed that first issue.  EG was published from 1981 to 1985, the year its name was changed to Computer Entertainment in order weather the big video game crash and focus more on the burgeoning computer game market.  EG helped form video game journalism, and its influence lives on through the myriad of print and online coverage of the scene that exist today.

The feature story here is, of course, the release of Disney's video game extravaganza TRON, which promised to transport the audience into the inner-world of these new fangled computer boxes.  The hype for TRON was pretty intense, and helped seal the fate of the movie as a curious social artifact when ticket sales were considerably less than expected.  The movie itself is fun, but muddled and disjointed.  You can read the history of it, and two other seminal video game films from the early 80's, in my TDE article here.

EG was also the reason I stubbornly always called them "videogames", before Google's search algorithm convinced me the combined term never caught on, and would punish me in search rankings if I used it.

Without further ado, the July, 1982 cover of EG: