DP’s Gaming Videos #1
March 5th, 2008
Ever since I started working on some video content for the site last December, I’ve had a couple of ideas floating around about what I could offer beyond the video retro reviews. So far I have a few, very ambitious ideas for upcoming posts which you’ll probably see a long way down the track.
What I also plan on doing is capturing anything that I find interesting while I am playing a game and then share it with you readers. So with this in mind I have four videos which I have recently uploaded which are worth discussing.
Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams PAL Options
This is a quick snippet from Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams for the Playstation 2. The video is of the frequency and language select screens (PAL regulations) with some fantastic localization.
GameBoy Camera – Run! Run! Run! Speed Run
Remember the GameBoy Camera? It was that dodgy, first party camera peripheral for the Gameboy Pocket. If you have used one of these before then you’ll know that the camera cart comes with a surprising number of extras such as some primitive photo editing tools, slide shows and mini games. The mini games are notorious for having insanely high scores, this video displays me hitting the 15 second mark for the impossible, button mashing mini game; Run! Run! Run!
I hooked my camera up to my Super GameBoy and then used a SNES turbo pad to cheat my way to this high score. By past memory, I reckon that the set high score to beat is 15 seconds which I could have beaten depending on the timing of my jumps.
Today Tonight – Red Ring of Death Article
Today Tonight is a current affair program which plays weekdays in Australia. They ran this segment about the Xbox 360 Red Ring of Death problem. In typical Today Tonight fashion there is plenty of cringe worthy mistakes, I think that the worst one is how the guy in the clip states that EB Games pay for his replacement consoles which I found quite hilarious. My apologies on the out of sync voices and meh quality.
Mario Kart 64 – Awesome Finish
I played a surprising amount of Mario Kart 64 multiplayer last holidays, this 3 second snap is of one of our great finishes. I (Toad) was about to hit a bomb (another friend) while my brother (Luigi) was floating in mid air.
I’ll be keeping a close eye out for any other unique video ideas that come my way over the coming weeks.
Tags: gameboy camera, mario kart, onimusha, pal, red ring, today tonight, xbox 360
Is There Any Truth in MGS4 Coming to the Xbox 360?
January 5th, 2008
If you’ve been keeping your eye on the video game rumour mill over the past several months then its highly likely that you have heard about the constant stream of rumours about Konami planning a port of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots for the Xbox 360. This rumour has been floating around for a few months now, so I thought that it was about time I’d address it.
Is it Technically Possible?
I guess this would be the first question that we should ask ourselves. Unfortunately for us this question is difficult to answer. Not technically but rather we have no idea of the scope of MGS4. All that we have seen of the game so far is the first chapter and possibly some snippets of later in the game. As usual Konami have this one completely under wraps and the only real clue that we have is a quote from Ryan Payton saying that MGS4 is even longer than MGS3: Snake Eater.
So It looks like I’ll have to do some guess work here. Personally I can’t see MGS4 being any larger than 20GB in raw size. Which would mean that it would have to fit on two Xbox 360 DVDs. And really thats fine, games on the 360 are already 2 discs. I do think that in order to fit on the two discs or to just run on the 360 some settings will have to be toned down. It would probably mean lowering the resolution of some textures or something like that. Then again it is hard to say how much MGS4 will make use of the cell processor. But overall, from what we know now. MGS4 for the most part should run decently on the Xbox 360. Although I wouldn’t be surprised if (in typical Kojima style) MGS4 blows away our expectations and pushes the PS3 to the limits. Meaing that it could never be down ported to the Xbox 360. Argh this is so hard. ><
Would Kojima Productions want to port it over to the PS3?
For almost every rumour that gets released Kojima-san himself states otherwise. So its pretty clear that the team is not interested in releasing an Xbox 360 port.
Although I think that all of this doesn’t matter because the fact is Konami need to sell too many copies of this game just to turn over a profit. And all of this pressure is going to be put on the North American sales because MGS is no longer a game for the Japanese (it simply doesn’t sell as well) and the PAL territory sales will make little difference overall. Now if you look at the previous sales of MGS games, namely MGS2 (because it was the most hyped) of about 7 million games in its lifetime. It becomes pretty clear that MGS4 will not achieve the magic 1 million sales on release especially with the small North American PS3 user base. So knowing this I think that Konami as a business might have stepped in and have assigned the team to work on a port after the PS3 version is completed, just to recoup production costs. Basically it all comes down to if Konami want to make a profit out of this game and chances are they will.
Once again on the flipside MGS3: Snake Eater had high production costs and still remained solely on the Playstation 2.
So What Would This Mean to Sony?
I think we all know the answer here, it means bad news. MGS4 is their ace in the hole for the hardcore user base, so no exclusive MGS4 can only be bad for Sony. And it would probably be the game in which defines the movement of developers dropping off with Sony.
Conclusion
I always use to think that an Xbox 360 port would never happen but ever since I started investigating it seems as though I just get more and more confused. So at the moment I’m not really sure what is going to happen. All I know is that come July I will be playing the best game on the Playstation 3. What about you guys, do you think that this port will take place? Will MGS4 just be a timed exclusive? Hit me up on the comments box or vote in the site poll to be heard.
Tags: kojima, konami, metal gear solid, playstation 3, port, ryan payton, xbox 360
The Gaming Race for the Holiday Season
November 17th, 2007
Its been a very fruitful few weeks for the gaming industry, with release after release of the year’s most anticipated games all in one very short time span. Its been a very interesting time for us gaming enthusiasts. During this time period I’ve been using websites like Game Rankings to find out which games are hits and which games are misses, and what makes them good or bad.
I have to say its been an interesting race for the best game of the holiday season. With most of the major games out the way, I think that its a good time to analyze the situation. So lets run through some of the big games. Here is what I’ve discovered over the past few weeks.
Major Disappointments and Surprises
I want to start off with Assassin’s Creed; 2008’s most ambitious game title with it’s unique go anywhere, climb anything game mechanics. Now Ubisoft definitely delivered in this field but they unfortunately slipped up in a number of important areas. If you’ve been following the game’s progress, especially over E3 then you’d be familiar with some of the game’s bugs and glitches that occurred during presentations and also during hands on with the game. ‘m talking simple things like some unresponsive AI etc. Unfortunately these errors still exist in the final build, in fact when taking a closer look it appears as though the game in some ways might have been a little rushed out the door. The other main problem is that the gameplay remains fundamentally the same throughout the game; find intel and then assassination a person of importance, rinse and repeat 9x and you get the idea. This game is currently scoring about 82% on GameRankings which isn’t bad but its seen some average reviews from IGN (7.5/10) and 1up(7/10). Also the GameTrailers review, despite talking criticism thought out gives the game a 9.1/10.
Now while Assassin’s Creed was a little disappointing, Super Mario Galaxy came out and surprised a lot of people. At the moment its sitting on a strong 97.4% with 18 reviews. The game is pretty much what you would expect, the plumber reinvents himself in a space like environment. Each planet that Mario traverses has its own respective physics which make for some interesting platforming environments. Presentation wise Mario Galaxy hands down is the best game on the console, sugary coated goodness.
Just What We Expected
Overall the majority of anticipated games all turned out like you’d expect, generally its because most of them are in some ways safe bets. So its a bit hard to mess up. Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is a kick ass “dude raider”-esque game with perhaps too many pirates, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock relies on the same formula with a few new elements such as boss battles to not make it feel stale (but don’t worry thats Rock Band’s job ;)). Crysis is a stunner with its graphical prowess it removes some of the annoying gameplay elements that were in Farcry.
Battalion Wars 2 for the Wii was as you’d expect another decent Wii adaption of a Gamecube franchise. Most of the motion control works although there are a few issues here and there. Naruto: Rise of a Ninja for the Xbox 360 is your above average anime affair that makes use of its lisence well. A simple battle system drops it down a peg.
Call of Duty 4 is a fantastic rush, Infinity Ward has heightened the intensity of the game’s scripted battle events. In a way these events and the game’s length can be seen as slighty problematic but the authentic combat look and feel easily brush these aside. Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles is a game made for fans of the series. Although the motion controls aren’t perfect and the game can be a little finicky with enemy weak points its still a good, lengthy arcade shooter for any one interested in the genre.
For the portables, Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness was pretty much an ungraded version of the original PS2 game, nicely rounded into a PSP title. Both Castlevania Dracula X Chronicles and Contra 4 are as tough as nails which is a real set back for newer players. Contra limited itself by sticking to a safe, conventional design while Castlevania had a few platforming quirks.
Just Plain Average
Out of the bunch there were a few titles there were pretty meh; Clive Barker’s Jericho failed to live up to the horror author’s name and was pretty average. The same applied for Kane & Lynch: Dead Men. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games was pretty much what you’d expect, a mini game romp with some mildly interesting Wii mote games.
Conclusion
Putting things into perception, safe bets are still financially secure for developers with games like Guitar Hero III. Franchise favorites like Mario or Call of Duty continue to move the industry forwards with expansions on tried and true gameplay. And games are still being hyped beyond potential and no matter what the end result gamers everywhere are disappointed.
Tags: Assassin's Creed, Battalion Wars, Call of Duty 4, Kane & Lynch, patriots, wii, xbox 360
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