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A copy of ‘Super Mario Bros. 3’ sold for $156,000
It's the most expensive game ever sold at auction.
Games of a Lifetime: Thomas' picks
After more than ten years devoted to video games and the people who make them, Joystiq is closing its doors. We won't be reporting on the best games of 2015, so join us for one last hurrah as the Joystiq family reveals their Games of a Lifetime. Super Mario World I'm not a marathon video game player – for me, binging on or tirelessly replaying masterpieces downplays the great moments within, tainting them with an undeserved state of blandness. And yet, there is something about Super Mario World's construct that is immune to my fickle play style. Though I've been hurling Luigi down pits since I was old enough to earn player 2 privileges, Super Mario World is a ceaseless joy to return to, even if an encore ensues moments after besting Bowser with a few well-aimed Mechakoopas. I'm inclined to most romps through the Mushroom Kingdom, but Super Mario World's memorable level design, subtle secrecy and introduction of the greatest power-up of all time elevate it above every other Mario Bros outing. Above all else, it's the king of fun within my gaming career – there is not a moment coded into that rackety cartridge that isn't bliss to play, even when a pack of Rip Van Fish inspire a spike of stress with their chase. Super Mario World was, is and probably always will be my hometown in the world of video games, and I look forward to reveling in nostalgia as I shove a pack of kids into their lava-filled demise during future homecomings.
Choose your first starter again in Pokemon Monopoly
If you're going to start fights with friends and family members over imaginary property and play money, you might as well get a gameboard that recalls something you can consistently enjoy. As the Toy Fair International 2014 foretold, a Pokemon Monopoly Kanto Edition is now available for pre-order from GameStop, with the trip down memory Route lane priced at $45. Players will have to revisit the series' most important question: Bulbasuar, Squirtle or Charmander? Pikachu, Eevee and Jigglypuff are also available business tycoons, but why pass up an opportunity to stir up old starter Pokemon-related rivalries while playing a relaxing game of Monopoly? Judging by GameStop's listing, your financial type Pokemon battles can begin on October 1, the date you can first encounter Pokemon Monopoly in the wild. Of course, this assumes you've lost enough pieces from your 1999 edition of Monopoly: Pokemon Edition to render it unplayable. [Image: USAopoly]
Twitch Plays Pokemon final stats: 1.1 million players, 36 million views
Twitch has announced the final statistics for cultural phenomenon Twitch Plays Pokemon, which came to a dramatic close earlier today. And while only one pokemon trainer can be the very best, more than 1.1 million people tried. The actual number of TPP "players" - as in, those who entered commands in the game's chat - totaled 1,165,140, according to the Twitch official blog. As if that weren't quite ridiculous enough, here's some more rare candy to chew on: Total time: 16 days, 7 hours, 45 minutes and 30 seconds Peak players: 121,000 Commands issued: More than 122 million Onlookers: More than 9 million Total views: More than 36 million Total minutes watched: More than 1 billion For reference, the total number of views is more than twice that of Shanghai, the city with the highest recorded population in the world. Granted those aren't all unique views, but that's still a freaking lot of views. Unofficial stats have also been collected by the community, for those who'd like to know just when each magical moment transpired. According to one account, it took Twitch Plays Pokemon 22 tries to beat the Elite Four. It only took them two tries to beat Blue, the game's archenemy. Two! The weight of TPP cannot be overstated - aside from the various memes and religions it's created, there's even a petition to have the US government officially recognize March 1 as Helix Day. Praise Helix. [Image: The Pokemon Company]
Twitch slays Pokemon after two weeks of non-stop action [Update: New game on Sunday]
The livestreamed crowd-play event Twitch Plays Pokemon has ended, as thousands of players pooled their efforts to defeat the Elite Four in Pokemon Red. The game was completed after 16 days of consecutive play and saw over 35 million viewers during that time. Twitch Plays Pokemon is a Pokemon Red mod that allowed Twitch viewers to control the game's main character Red by entering commands in the streaming platform's chat window. The event began on February 12 and reached 75,000 concurrent viewers after five days of play. There were plenty of doubts that players would even be able to cross the Safari Zone in the game, let alone view its ending credits, though the game's creator told Joystiq that "even when played very poorly it is difficult to not make some progress in Pokemon." The community that gathered around Twitch Plays Pokemon upheld a narrative that extended beyond Pokemon Red's initial scope and included the Twitter-trending Bird Jesus (Pidgeot) and the spiritual consultant and deity Lord Helix (Omanyte). Joystiq also talked with MIT associate professor T.L. Taylor about the event's place in network and game culture, who said it tapped into "something I think is very compelling. So I don't think we're going to see [crowd-play] go away as a genre." Considering how entertaining this has been, we certainly hope not. Update: As it turns out, the Twitch Plays Pokemon stream now features a countdown timer ticking away roughly 26 hours and 25 minutes as of this writing that notes, "A new adventure will begin." That pegs the start of what seems to be the next version of Twitch Plays Pokemon at 7:00 a.m. EST Sunday morning. [Image: The Pokemon Company]
Twitch Plays Pokemon: Creating an oral history in real-time
When I began my phone call Sunday evening with T.L. Taylor, an associate professor of comparative media studies at MIT, I opted to check her loyalty to the one, true Helix god. "All sensible people are," she joked. Even when observing Twitch Plays Pokemon from an academic standpoint, it's easy to get wrapped up in the emerging community-crafted narrative surrounding the live, always-on event. The crowd-created stories in Twitch Plays Pokemon are enough to fill four seasons of serialized TV drama, complete with the surprising death of characters and the rise of clearly-defined heroes, villains and idolized "gods" like the Helix Fossil, all caught in a religious war. Yet it moves at a pace that can make some accounts of the multiplayer game seem outdated within hours. In fact, by the time I came back to this very paragraph, the Helix Fossil was revived and turned into the Pokemon Omanyte (affectionately called "Lord Helix" by the players). "[The channel] actually takes one of the kernels of what makes Twitch so interesting, which is turning what would otherwise be your private play into public entertainment for others," Taylor said. "What I think is great about this channel and is so fascinating is that the entertainer also becomes the crowd."
Twitch Plays Pokemon, but can Twitch beat Pokemon?
"Even when played very poorly it is difficult to not make some progress in Pokemon," the mastermind behind Twitch Plays Pokemon told Joystiq. The Twitch community is putting that opinion to the test.
Twitch Plays Pokemon levels up to 75k concurrent viewers, learns democracy
Last week, the chat-controlled Twitch Plays Pokemon grabbed our attention, as ten thousand people were able to simultaneously control the lead character in Pokemon Red/Blue. In the near five and a half days of the stream's existence, it's crossed 75,000 concurrent viewers, though Twitch says that the number of unique visitors to the chaotic game tallies over 300,000. Given the madness of Twitch Plays Pokemon, the stream's creator implemented a new system for the crowd-controlled game: a democratic voting system. Now, those that type commands are essentially casting their vote for the next action in the game, which goes into effect after a couple seconds. It also allows voters to add a number after their desired command to indicate how many times the action should be performed, such as "right3" being used to tell our hero to go right three times. As expected, not everyone is on board with the new voting system, so the command "start9" is gaining traction to stall the game's progress. That's why the creator also added another voting system, allowing viewers to push a meter to either "anarchy" or "democracy," presumably to decide the future format of the game. Twitch Plays Pokemon has also amassed plenty of extra attention in the form of its own observational Twitter account, Subreddit and even public Google Doc status tracker. Among the noteworthy activities on the stream since last week, the community opted to throw away two Moon Stones and its starter Pokemon Charmeleon, relied heavily on its "Bird Jesus" Pidgeot and has earned four badges in the game. [Image: Twitch Plays Pokemon]
Thousands control one Pokemon master on Twitch simultaneously
Twitch Plays Pokemon looks like an average Twitch game stream at first. In fact, it is a game in itself, as viewers are able to control the hero of Pokemon Red and Blue by inputting commands in the streaming platform's chat window. As of this writing, the stream is nearing ten thousand viewers after close to two days of play, many of which are wildly typing "a," b," "up," "down" and other instructions, sending the obedient Pokemon master into frenzied directions. We've embedded the stream after the break. As much as it sounds like players would never be able to accomplish much in this fashion, viewers were able to push on past the second gym leader of the game, Misty. Our math may be shaky at best, but we figure that with the diligence of the stream's viewers, we'll have collected all the Pokemon in a month. We shudder to think of what will happen with the beloved, singular Master Ball in the game, however.
Final Pokemon Origins episode translated into English, available now
If the animated Pokemon show the franchise grew up with wasn't really your thing, you can try a different, sans-Ash Ketchum origins story with Pokemon Origins. Destructoid noticed that the fourth and final episode of the series, which is based off the Pokemon Red / Blue storyline, is now available in English. You can watch all four episodes on the Pokemon website or go mobile with The Pokemon TV app in the App Store or Google Play store. Each episode runs just over 20 minutes. The series follows Red's journey from Pokemon Zero to semifinalist for the title of Pokemon Champion, with the other contender being that smug jerk, Blue. There's also an encore battle involving Ash's quest to finish filling the Pokedex. If you're willing to take a break from your own conquest in Pokemon X & Y, Origins is a nice way to remember how the Kanto region laid the foundation for the world of Pokemon.
'Pocket Monsters: The Origin' anime TV special takes Pokemon back to basics
Pocket Monsters: The Origin, unveiled during this weekend's ongoing Pokemon Game Show in Tokyo, is a new animated TV special slated to air on TV Tokyo on October 2 at 7 p.m. local time. As the name implies, The Origin takes the world of Pokemon anime back to its franchise's humble roots as a Game Boy game. Based on Pocket Monsters Red and Green, The Origin forgoes Ash Ketchum and Pikachu for Pocket Monsters Red's eponymous lead and his Charmander. Gary Oak has likewise been replaced with Green, the lead from (you guessed it!) Pocket Monsters Green. Professor Oak/Dr. Okido and Brock/Takeshi do return, although Misty/Kasumi is nowhere to be found in the above trailer. No word yet on if Nintendo has any plans on localizing the special, or if it is more than just a one-off installment.
The Birds and the Beedrills puts a mature spin on the Pokerap
There's no real way to ease into this, so: A rapper by the pseudonym White Licorice has painstakingly crafted a track titled "The Birds and the Beedrills." Its innuendo-filled lyrics contain references to all 151 Pokémon from the series' first generation. It is, in no small measure, a masterpiece.
