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Going really, really hardcore with WoW
Tobold linked to a new blog about MMO gaming called Hardcore Casual, and the first entry is a nice one-- it's all about the differences between a "carebear" game like WoW, and the much more hardcore games of the past. His big example is Ultima Online, where players could gank each other and actually loot the corpses. Playing a game where others could steal your armor is very different from playing a game where BoE means it's yours forever.But you don't have to go back that far to find a really hardcore game-- in Blizzard's own Diablo 2, you could play "hardcore mode," which meant that when your character died, that was it. Game over, no respawns, nothing. Either you lived and beat the game, or you died and lost the ability to play your character and everything with it.To tell the truth, I'd love to see a server like that in WoW. Not because I'd love to play it (what are you, crazy?), but because the stories coming off of that server would be terrific-- we could all just stand in awe of the character who made it to 70 on the Hardcore server. Or would that even be possible? Especially if the server was PvP (and it would be, wouldn't it?), it seems like an impossible challenge to keep a character alive that long, especially since the other side would be gunning for anyone who got too high. Would you play on a hardcore server, where you could lose your life (and/or your gear)?
Cory Barlog talks E3 inside the developers studio
Like the subject of a James Lipton (pictured) interview, Cory Barlog, creative director on God of War, enjoyed the fluffiest time on the receiving end of a journalist's questions in the latest Sony blog post. So fluffy, in fact, that there wasn't even a journalist asking the questions. It was Barlog asking the questions, which he then answered. But wait, it gets better. Instead of talking about the game he's working on, namely God of War: Chains of Olympus, the self-scribed interview tangents into "mini-E3." Although an utterly pointless post that actually takes shots at Min-E3, it's still fun to watch a developer ask questions to himself, which he then answers back.Our favorite question in the "interview" is when Barlog asks himself if he could sit one person in front of his game, who would it be? Barlog answers himself, "Jack Thompson. I think after 5 minutes of playing the game that hard crunchy exterior would melt away and reveal his candy coated liberal center." Best answer ever! Only to be outdone a few moments later saying that he doesn't really consider Min-E3 a real E3, so when he attends this year it'll be his "7 and 1/2" time going. He also says he wants to play BioShock (a non-PS3 title as far as we know, which is kinda refreshing to see on the site). We hope to actually speak to Barlog at Min-E3 about Chains of Olympus, or at least host witness to him talking to himself about it. By the way, we're totally kidding around here about Barlog interviewing himself. It's just that the byline to the Sony post says it was written by Cory Barlog instead of giving the actual author who then pasted Barlog's answers into the ongoing series.
Blogging Zelda
As bloggers ourselves, we understand the incredible demand such a duty can take on a person. Heck, just covering all of the Nintendo news every day, let alone doing other things such as hosting Game Night, is enough to drive a person insane. That's why we can hardly believe this man is set to extensively blog about his experiences in every Zelda game. He's even planning on blogging the latest title still due out on U.S. shores, Phantom Hourglass, and is currently making his way through Zelda II: The Adventures of Link at the moment. Odds are you've already beaten each title yourself (or, should have), but just in case you haven't, or you enjoy reading about someone else's perspective, this just might be a fun read for you.[Via Joystiq]
Sony CEO Jack Tretton goes blogging
Sony executives are really loving their new blog. Even Sony America President and CEO Jack Tretton's ghost writer has written a post for the site about "a quick look back" and " a strong push forward" ... and we all know why the look back is quick. Anyway, Tretton finally gets to craft a public message without pesky things like words and journalists getting in the way. The Sony blog is a place for Tretton to breath free and just talk to the consumer like an open and honest ... oh, what's that? Tretton says, "Everything communicated in any form these days has to be considered an 'on-the-record statement' so as much as I'd like to, I can't completely throw my corporate hat out the window." Ok, so maybe the information won't flow like the spice on Arrakis, but we're still listening Jack, so what's on your mind?
It came from the Blog: Forums!
What's that you say? You can't have a guild without forums? Well, we must agree with you, as we've gone and set up WoW Insider's very own guild with a set of forums for you, the guild membership. You'll find the forums at our very creatively named guild website - www.itcamefromtheblog.com (genius, isn't it?) While registration isn't required to post, we do encourage it. Try registering with your character's name, jumping into the conversation, or starting one up. As always, please keep it family friendly, as we have members of all ages and persuasions in the guild.WoW Insider staff will make an appearance when we can, but we're really focused on blogging here to bring you the latest news, information and commentary as it relates to the World of Warcraft!
We have a new blog competitor: Sony
Uh-oh ... are the PlayStation Fanboy blogs in trouble? Sony has thrown off their gloves, and they're ready to go head-to-head against us in the blogosphere. The top people from Sony Computer Entertainment America will be sharing their thoughts on the state of PlayStation, and will undoubtedly leak a few secrets along the way.The PlayStation.Blog will feature "product news and title announcements to developer updates and industry opinion posts – all of which will come straight from the people here inside SCEA who are working, thinking and playing with this stuff every day." (Editor's note: it's two words, Pat.)Of course, we kid about this whole "competitor" thing. We've pushed Sony incessantly on getting more proactive with the gaming community, and it looks like they've finally taken our advice. This is a step in the right direction, and we can't wait to find out more from the PlayStation.Blog.
Introducing PlayStation.Blog, Sony's official blog
From the "It's About Time" department comes word that Sony has just launched the official PlayStation blog titled, unsurprisingly, PlayStation.Blog. To be clear, we're not talking about the "semi-official" ThreeSpeech (or Major Nelson for that matter); this is a straight-up "official" blog run directly off Sony's own servers. What can we expect from the site? Well, that's not clear yet. SCEA's Patrick Seybold writes, "At the moment, we're thinking about sharing all sorts of things here, ranging from product news and title announcements to developer updates and industry opinion posts – all of which will come straight from the people here inside SCEA who are working, thinking and playing with this stuff everyday." Want to let them know what you want them to write about? They have comments enabled and, to help ensure those comments are productive, have a comment policy. As for us? We'd love to be able to check there for all of your PlayStation-related media alerts and press releases, that sorta thing. Oh, and the scoop on what exactly is included in those sometimes mysterious PS3 firmware updates. Oh, and maybe the ability to change that password (look who's talking, we know). That's it. For now. Welcome to the jungle, Sony! Let us know if you need a tour guide, we'd be glad to help out where we can.
Four different controller options for Super Smash Bros.
Today's Smash Bros. blog update provided two things we've all been waiting for since the countdown went up: New information of any kind The controller the game will use. Those of you who said they'd adapt the game to Wiimote/Nunchuk play were right. Those of you who said they'd keep the Gamecube controller compatibility: you were right. Those of you who said it would use the Classic Controller: you were also right. Those of you who said you could play the game with a Wiimote turned on its side: if you existed, you would have been right as well.We had cooled on the subject of Smash Bros., but now we're as excited as we were when we saw Snake pop out of that box. Not only is this going to extend the life of the game (by allowing players to master four different methods of control) but it is also going to allow for different styles of play, and therefore more variety in strategy and technique.
Super Smash Bros. Brawl tidbit roundup
For those not compulsively checking the official Smash Bros. website daily for bare snippets of information, we here at Wii Fanboy have decided to perform the service of coalescing tidbits into tidbigs. Over the past week, a few interesting details have surfaced.Most of the reveals are item-based: you may now move freely with projectile weapons (finally!), and as detailed earlier here, the new "Gooey Bomb" item was unveiled. The most interesting new item, however, is the Smash Ball, which activates character-specific "Final Smash" attacks. Mario's is entitled the "Mario Finale" attack, which unleashes a spread-fire explosion attack, and we've seen Link's Triforce blade attack in an earlier video. Since most competitive Smash Bros. players contend without the randomizing effect of items, it'll be interesting to see if this affects higher-level gameplay.Also unveiled are some of Pit's (of Kid Icarus fame) attacks, which include a controllable arrow of light and limited flight capabilities (most likely the Up+B special). Brawl looks like it's coming together nicely ... do you guys agree?
PC Gamer takes on weeks-long GalCiv battle
People on the internet generally don't enjoy reading long articles. We understand. You've got places to go, people to see, episodes of Heroes to watch. Who has time to actually scroll through several screens worth of writing when there's so much to do?That being said, we heartily recommend that you set aside a few minutes and read through PC Gamer's epic account of what is likely the longest game of Galactic Civilizations 2 ever played.How long exactly? The "Gigantic" sized match has been going on for 16 days now and is just beginning to show signs of an imminent ending. Besides being routinely laugh-out-loud funny, Tom Francis' running account captures the intricacies of interstellar diplomacy, taxation, genocide, despotism, popularity rankings, and extremely foolhardy military planning in a form that even people unfamiliar with the game will find interesting. Go ahead and read it. That status report will still be there in fifteen minutes.[Via Kieron Gillen]
WoW Drama, a blog about serious business
I can't believe, considering my fascination with the great WoW drama that shows up every week in Guildwatch, that this has existed for months without me knowing about it, but I guess it has. There is apparently an entire blog dedicated to nothing but gritty, stupid, complicated WoW drama. How genius.At GW, we just stick to guild drama, and it's true that most of the really great stuff comes from that. There's nothing better than a WoW is Serious Business guild post or a shocking Vent session (that poor kid is really crying! wow!). These guys have also expanded into PvP drama, and even reviewing some classic stuff. The site is run by two guys named Kingfox (who I believe has commented on this site before) and Eddie Bax, and while they could update a little more often (it seems like they've been too busy raiding lately, what's there is definitely an interesting read.I don't know what my fascination is with this stuff. I guess maybe it's that I always seem to have no trouble remembering that I'm just playing a game, and so the people who completely forget that just amuse me to no end. I don't want anyone to get hurt (although feelings do often get hurt in good drama), but it just seems like so much of this stuff could be avoided if everybody just lightened up. It's a game, folks-- there'll be other guilds to join and other loot that drops.
Thompson sues Kotaku owner over comments, suit dismissed
[Update: The Kotaku suit has been dismissed by Federal District Court Judge Paul Huck, GamePolitics.com is now reporting. Apparently, Thompson "failed to follow the proper federal court procedure for amending a complaint." Thompson says he'll try it again though, so please, read on.]The smoldering battle between Florida lawyer Jack Thompson and the gaming press has been taken to a new level. In a tersely worded post yesterday on Kotaku, Brian Crecente revealed that Thompson has added a complaint against Kotaku owner Gawker Media to a March 13 suit against the Florida Bar.The childishly-worded complaint (He actually makes a "NOT!" joke on page 27) focuses on a few Kotaku commenters (which Thompson mistakenly refers to as "bloggers") that allegedly said Thompson "should be shot ... struck with a baseball bat, shot in the face by an irate gamer, [and] castrated and his testicles stuffed down his throat," among other things. To be fair, those are some strong, hateful words, and threats like these are not necessarily protected by the first amendment. Still, Gawker or Kotaku probably can't be held liable for them -- a federal judge ruled in June 2006 that "bloggers cannot be hit with libel suits on the basis of anonymous postings on their Web sites."Perhaps knowing this, Thompson goes a different route in his complaint by alleging Kotaku is part of a "civil conspiracy ... to deprive Thompson of his various basic constitutional rights" and that the site is "attempt[ing] to intimidate a citizen for the exercise of his constitutional rights." Mark Methenitis goes into detail on what exactly is legally wrong with this overreach over at his Law of the Game blog. All we'll add is that we're sickened by this obvious attempt at legal intimidation and we support our blogging brothers at Gawker all the way.
Pictoblog, picture blogging with the DS
We've always equated PictoChat with the banana peel in Mario Kart DS. It might be better than nothing, but we were really hoping for something a little more useful when we opened up that item box. Despite its polished interface and availability with every Nintendo DS system, hardly anyone uses PictoChat regularly. This can be attributed to the application's limited functionality and lack of online support. Unless you're sending phallic doodles to a nearby friend, there's really no reason for using the communication utility.Thankfully, there are several homebrew projects that better realize the DS' potential as an instant messenger or a canvas for digital artists. Pictoblog is another application that extends the system's capabilities, enabling users to sketch something out on the handheld's touchscreen, and upload the picture to a post on their blog. Pictoblog works with a number of CMSs like WordPress, Movable Type, and many others. Developer 0xtob has set up a test blog for users to experiment with, but it probably won't be long before the site is flooded with crude illustrations of the male anatomy.
Kmart plays with one blogger's emotions
Seriously, how sadistic are you Kmart? You lure us in with those blue light specials and soon we're signing our name in blood on the dotted line. All for what? A cheap set of plush terry cloth towels? Well, you've tormented us for the last time! Well, actually, you tormented a different blogger for the last time, but all for one and one for all, y'know?See, a blogger, who is still without a Wii (poor lad), has been checking on a daily basis to see if he could snag one of those elusive Wii. And he isn't about to pay for one of them rip-off bundles, either. So upon seeing the system for sale, all by its lonesome, via Kmart's website, he decided to snatch it up with the quickness, only to be let in on the cruel, cruel joke: the console is in stock but only available in quantities of zero. [via digg]
Rogue Amoeba offers teaser and sign-up to test new mystery app
Oh Paul Kafasis, you clever Rogue Amoeba. What with your two-punch post of a teaser and sign-up offer for a new mystery app dubbed "AHT." What could this new app from the makers of Audio Hijack, Fission, Nicecast and Airfoil be? Is AHT simply a code name, or an acronym? Will AHT complement Rogue Amoeba's presence in the audio space, or will it be some new venture into RSS, video or even GTD? No one knows yet, but Paul said they'll be picking their first pool of testers on Wednesday, February 28th, so head on over and toss your name into the hat to test what I'm sure will be an excellent new offering from one of Mac OS X's much-respected 3rd parties.[Update: Rogue Amoeba has filled their list of testers for now, so the submission form has been closed.]
Ratchet & Clank heads to gold; developers ruminate
High Impact Games, developers of the upcoming Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters, has started their own blog at Club IGN. Obviously, it's filled with tons of PR-talk that hype up the game. However, considering the impressive footage of the game we've seen so far, I think it's safe to give the team the benefit of the doubt, and assume the game's at least pretty decent. With the game's release now only a few weeks away, the game is quickly approaching gold status. A few random tidbits of note from their blog: On control: "I find myself switching between analog stick and D-pad moment to moment, depending on whether I'm platforming or annihilating angry robots with upgraded Lacerator." On graphics: "[Ratchet]'s been cut down to half his normal polys, but the furry little guy looks almost indistinguishable from his PS2 counterpart!" On mini-games: "It's a real joy to see Clank hold his own in the demolition derby game. Is that a gleam of anger I see in his tiny green eyes? Malice?" High Impact promises more updates to their blog soon, so those of you interested in the game may want to bookmark their Club IGN page. We'll have a full review closer to its February 13th launch date.
Sony flog and more remembered at 1UP
Sony's fake blog, "All I Want for Christmas is a PSP," still lives in infamy. It hit number three on 1UP's list of "top ten WTF moments of '06." "Chock full of painfully awkward slang, the whole thing peaked with a horrendously embarrassing hip-hop video that as much as we'd like to we just can't un-watch." If you missed out on this marketing blunder, check out the links below:See also:Flog archived for your pleasurePSP for porn, pedophiles and Nazis ... according to FOX[Via Joystiq]
Why don't portables get more respect?
The DS sells more than most consoles. The PSP has some games that look better than many PS2 games. Despite this, there are few magazines or websites devoted to portables. When the web or a mag do focus on a portable, it always seems to be to a lesser degree. If you need any proof, just look at the number of portable games that go un-reviewed compared to consoles. But when the sales are up as is the quality of the games, why do handhelds still get shafted? They're a substitute It seems as though some gamers and press view portable games as a substitute for "real" gaming. Just something to pass the time when you're somewhere unpleasant and unable to play a console game. While it is true that the very nature of a portable game is to give you gaming on the go, it doesn't necessarily mean it isn't as fun or as valuable of a gaming experience as console games. Anyone who's gotten sucked into Lumines or Vice City Stories for hours can attest to that. Kid Stuff While it's true that many games aimed for children have been released for portables through the years, there's no shortage of great games for any age. Especially this generation of portables, it seems more and more portables are aiming their sights for older gamers. Brain Age, Metal Gear and GTA are proof enough that in no way are portables just for the playground. Less vocal fan community One thing that hurts the portable gaming community is that despite the great sales for systems and games, the fan community is far less vocal than the typical console fan base. Of course part of this seems to be self perpetuating since if there aren't many online or print sources for portable gaming, there are obviously less places for those fans to express their feelings. Not as many huge titles Some would say that the portables lack blockbuster titles and that is why they garner less attention. This hardly seems like a good excuse though since at this point nearly every blockbuster franchise has a version on handhelds. From Metal Gear to Mario, if there is a big game on a console there is typically a counterpart on the portable. Not only that, but some portable games consistently sell better than most console games. So while there may be no good reason portables get overlooked, it does seem like they're on there way to reversing this fate. With the increased importance of blogs and forums in the gaming world, it seems like only a matter of time before portable games do get the equal respect they deserve. Until then, the average gamer may just be too busy playing their PSP to even care.
Make your own PSP-compatible blog
Long before I started to write on PSP Fanboy, I had a personal blog, and I worked hard to ensure that it was PSP compatible. Now, there's an easy WordPress plug-in for bloggers that will automatically detect and render a PSP-formatted version. Cool, no?WordPress is one of the leading blog platforms out there, so if you're already blogging, this might come quite in handy. If any of you have PSP-formatted blogs, feel free to share them here![Via Joystiq]
It could have happened: Halo on DS
Matt Cassamassina over at IGN has updated his blog with a supremely interesting entry: apparently, a version of Halo was quite deep in development for the Nintendo DS. Though several publishing mishaps resulted in the eventual cancellation of the project, one must wonder what could have been.Indeed, Matt C. even got to play an early build of the project, impressed with the accurate recreation of perhaps the world's most popular console shooter. He compares the gameplay to that of Metroid Prime: Hunters, but, you know, Halo-fied. Certainly, when you walk past the pearly gates and into Gamestop's heaven branch, this game will be at the forefront. You know, right next to Chrono Break and NiGHTs 2.
