January 2009
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Stuff we liked in 2008: Little Red Riding Hood’s...
We were so enamored with Little Red Riding Hood’s Zombie BBQ, we wrote almost 20 posts about the campy, fairy tale-themed shoot’em-up this year! The only other games that received anything close to that amount of coverage were Mega Man 9 and Wonder Pets.
Three details that are fab:
Red’s Spanish accent (the game’s publisher and developer are based in Barcelona).
Near...
December 2008
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WatchTrailer for Iron Master: Legendary Blacksmith. “Make hundreds of arms and armors from Touch Action Games.” Barunson Creative’s DS game is basically a game about running a shop inside an RPG!
Not only do you make weapons and armor, you also manage a shop and deal with the paladins, warriors, archers, and other stereotypical RPG members who come in. Feel the thrill of management!
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Super Shooting eBay Watch →
Sorry for being all Shooting Watch-crazy lately — but last night, I went looking around on eBay for vintage Shooting Watches, in order to compare their design with the new one. I didn’t find any originals, but I did find the Super Shooting Watch.
This Super Famicom-style variant on Hudson’s game-training device is rare enough, selling for $100 on eBay when one even appears on...
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“Final Countdown Cover Remix Thing” by...
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Legacy of Ys-y listening →
The DS ports of Ys Book I and II came with a soundtrack CD in Japan, but only when purchased in the Special Box, a 9,800 yen bundle of both games that came out two months after the original, separate release of the games.
In contrast, Atlus’s North American release includes both games — as well as the soundtrack, if you preorder from a “participating retailer” (probably...
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Nintendo DSi for $225 at Success HK →
That’s much cheaper than the $300 I spent to import a DSi when it launched in Japan in November!
In related news, Takara Tomy has a new line of “Slipon” socks and leather pouches for the DSi, available in a variety of colors from $7.90 to $9.90 (plus s/h). They don’t look bad at all:
See also: More DS accessories
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Spelunky! →
Derek Yu’s Spelunky is a super-charming tile-based platformer with a unique hook: the levels are randomly generated. It seems like a pretty deep adventure, with usable items like ropes and bombs, and also treasure strewn about. Even without the infinite level design, I’d be in love with the style, not to mention the name, which is almost as much fun as the game itself. Spelunky!
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Babblenauts →
I missed last week’s 1UP FM podcast due to holiday freak-outishness, which means that I missed a 35-minute interview with Jeremiah Slaczka, Creative Director of 5th Cell, and Matt Cox, lead designer of Scribblenauts. It’s definitely worth checking out, as is anything related to Scribblenauts.
It’s pretty interesting to hear Slaczka’s perspective on the big user-generated...
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Stuff we liked in 2008: Civilization Revolution
It’s an understatement to say that I’m a fan of Civilization. Pound for pound, hour for hour, I’ve probably devoted more time to Civ than to any other franchise, except perhaps Final Fantasy — and that only because I sank a few years into Final Fantasy XI. I often have Civ IV running deep in the background of my computer, so I can swap over for a few minutes of destruction...
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Game Republic's Okamoto relates wives to Dragon... →
1UP posted a hilarious interview with Yoshiki Okamoto, CEO and president of Game Republic, the independent studio behind the Genji games and the Phantom Hourglass-esque Dragon Ball: Origins.
Speaking with 1UP’s James Mielke, currently engaged to a Japanese-American woman, Okamoto shared his experiences with Asian women (pardon the brackets!):
YO: I had a Japanese wife once, too, but we...
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New homebrew, old consoles →
The new Retronauts blog at 1UP features a homebrew column — something that is rare enough on its own. But A Taste of Homebrew specializes beyond just homebrew: Jess Ragan intends to highlight new homebrew titles for old systems, which is a pretty interesting, and underappreciated, subject.
The first game to be highlighted is Toyshop Trouble, a holiday-themed 2600 game made for AtariAge....
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“You have to love what XSEED is doing with the in-game digital magazine GameFan:...”
– — from Play’s preview of Retro Game Challenge (Game Center CX). It’s interesting to see that the fake GameFan Magazine will actually feature an editor and writer from the real (and defunct since 2000) GameFan! Both Halverson and Des Barres currently write for Play.
Former EGM...
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Stuff we liked in 2008: Sound Load
From the moment I first read about the announcement of a new Treasure game on DS, I was ready to love it. When I found out that it was a Bangai-O game, I was in heaven. It turned out to be even more special than just a Bangai-O sequel, with completely freeform level structure that opened up all the stages at once, and a completely intuitive, drag-and-drop level editor that could be called up at...
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“This is a side-scrolling action game in which players control a cartoon toaster...”
– The ESRB reveals a Wii game called Eduardo the Samurai Toaster, based on an Independent Games Festival entry from last year.
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DI (almost) Y arcade stick guide →
Cheap Ass Gamer forum member controlcommerce wrote up an excellent guide to building your own arcade stick (for PS3/PC USB) without any knowledge of woodworking or soldering. The guide includes links to sites that sell the requisite Sanwa and Seimitsu sticks and buttons, as well as premade kit boxes and even custom circuit boards.
The project isn’t cheap, coming in at $150 or so, and...
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Tiny Review: Utsusu! Made in Wario
A new WarioWare game! Albeit, a downloadable one with only a fraction of the usual amount of microgames (I wasn’t counting, but there are around two dozen).
Three details that are fab:
Goofy microgames, like playing peek-a-boo with a baby and waving at a schoolgirl.
After finishing a microgame set, you’ll see a slideshow of your captured movements paired with comic elements...
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DSi firmware update and a DSi flashcart news...
With DSiWare’s launch in Japan today, Nintendo released a required firmware update for the DSI, version 1.2J, presumably to accomodate the 10 downloadable games released on the service. According to initial reports, the update does not lock out flashcarts. Fantastic!
While we’re on the topic of flashcarts, let’s quickly go through all the slot-1 carts that have been either...
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Stuff we liked in 2008: Black Knight + Knights of...
Continuing our recap of 2008 highlights, I present to you our mash-up of Sega’s Sonic & the Black Knight trailer with the audio intro from King Arthur & the Knights of Justice, an early 90s cartoon series.
If you didn’t watch it the first time we posted the video, watch it now. It will blow your mind out of your ass.
Other stuff we liked in 2008: No More Heroes
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Awkward movie night →
Play-Asia is offering a possibly unofficial (I don’t know) Hong Kong release of the Onechanbara movie for just $13.90. The image above is from a Japanese poster, but it uses the same picture as CN Entertainment’s cover.
I find everything about Onechanbara, and pretty much the whole Simple series, completely hilarious and delightful, so I’ve been quite curious about this movie...
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“Of all the squishy electronics accessories released in this 21st century, the...”
– Tim Rogers, writing for Kotaku, previews the Dragon Quest IX Slime Speaker Stand.
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Stuff we liked in 2008: No More Heroes
We’ve already started being inundated with end-of-year countdowns and retrospectives, all of which do their best to quantify the best/worst experiences of the year. We thought we would do something different — less organized, and less pretend-authoritative. Basically we’re just going to post things we liked this year.
Games, news stories, videos, whatever we can think of that...
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Game Trailers Center CX 2
Trailer for Demon Returns, one of nine (!) new fake games in Game Center CX: Arino no Chousenjou 2. It’s like a rad mix of Pac-Land, Ghosts ‘n Goblins, and Adventure Island.
My apologies for the janky video capturing, but there were a bunch of clips, and I didn’t notice the stray borders until everything was uploaded. Anyway, on to more trailers!
Kugure! Girijan MAX, a...
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“She chatted with a guardman, Zobio. Then, they fell in love, and…
Broke a...”
– From the intro sequence to Sega’s House of the Dead EX, the arcade spinoff first announced in July. Siliconera has video footage of the game, a cute, cartoony light-gun-based minigame collection.
It’s interesting to see the series branching out simultaneously in two different, weird...
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WW8BJD →
Just in time for Christmas, Doctor Octoroc has completed his brilliant 8-Bit Jesus album, a collection of Christmas chiptunes each made in the style of an NES game’s soundtrack. The complete 8-Bit Jesus has doubled in size to 18 tracks, including some redone versions of the existing songs.
Awesomely, Octoroc is offering physical copies of the CD, for $15 each. Sadly, the offer is a...
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“What? Really?”
– — Goichi Suda responding with feigned surprise when asked by EGM about rumors of a Contact sequel.
The Grasshopper CEO makes sure to remind us that Contact’s director, Akira Ueda, left the studio and now heads Audio Inc., but he doesn’t give any concrete details about whether...
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Finally, our Zombiegiving winner
My apologies for waiting nearly a month before announcing our Zombiegiving contest’s winner — shit got real, keeping me super busy lately.
Before I reveal the victor, I’ll note that we originally picked out a different random commentor to win this free copy of Little Red Riding Hood’s Zombie BBQ. That person (who happens to be a regular reader), however, didn’t leave a...
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