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Giant Bomb's Ryan Davis passes away at 34
Giant Bomb founder and Gamespot alum Ryan Davis has died. Giant Bomb put out a statement this morning, saying that Davis passed away last week. The site did not divulge the cause of death. "Many of you know that Ryan was recently married. In the face of this awfulness, many of us will at least always remember him as we last saw him: outrageously, uproariously happy, looking forward to his next adventure with the biggest grin his face could hold," Matthew Rorie wrote. Davis founded Giant Bomb in 2008 with longtime compadre Jeff Gerstmann after they departed Gamespot. Our condolences go out to Davis' friends, family and colleagues at Giant Bomb.
Harmonix: Rock Band in for a 'fundamental creative reinterpretation'
Harmonix is trying to find a steady beat after a stressful year with surprising highs and lows. In an interview with Giant Bomb, Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos mentions the company is considering a "fairly fundamental creative reinterpretation" of the Rock Band business. "We still have a loyal audience who continues to show up weekly to gobble up our weekly releases. That actually continues to be a profitable business for us, which is nice," said Rigopulos. "We're committed to the franchise, but when I think that when we do things with it in the future, it's going to be a pretty dramatic departure from what we've done before." Co-founder and CTO Eran Egozy added, "We do have plans on where we're going to go with Rock Band and how we plan to expand it. All I'll say for now is that it isn't what you think. You might assume we're going to add saxophone or something along those lines, but no, the kind of direction we're planning on taking Rock Band, the kind of innovation we have in mind, is taking it in a different direction, one that's more suitable to the kind of environment we're in, what people are doing now, what they're interested in playing now, versus, say, 2007." Egozy concluded, "It's more than ideas. We are working on it, and we have forward progress. It's an exciting, fresh take on it. I'll leave it at that."
Phasers set to fun, sit back and bust out the popcorn
Got a couple hours to burn? Love Star Trek and subsequently find yourself enjoying Star Trek Online? Well, we've got a couple videos you may want to watch, for entertainment purposes as opposed to tips related purposes. Giant Bomb has two -- although the "parts" aspects suggests further entries -- videos of a few guys sitting around playing Cryptic's upcoming Trek MMO and, well, basically being silly dorks. They start at character creation and hit the ground running, all while providing the kind of commentary that quite possibly could make you want to have on headphones if you're on a lunch break at work. It's fun stuff, and if you've got some time to kill the videos will most certainly help make time fly by more quickly. You can find the two videos embedded after the break.
Metareview: Dead Space: Extraction (Wii)
Did you know that Dead Space: Extraction landed in stores this week? It's true! We certainly dug it in our Snap Judgment, but in case that just wasn't enough for you, we've compiled a few other folks' opinions on the game just below. Worried about not seeing that beautiful screaming face in the future? We are too, folks. We are too. GamePro (100/100): "An experience that's more captivating and engaging than any light-gun game I've ever played before. [The story] mirrors Dead Space's thoughtful dialogue, characterizations and pacing which is a good thing all around." GameDaily (80/100): "Although we questioned EA's decision to do this, as well as bring Dead Space to the family centric Wii, everything clicks and the game's surprisingly enjoyable. Instead of conjuring up a cheesy narrative (as seen in other shooters like Ghost Squad), the developers put a lot of effort into the story and its characters." Eurogamer (80/100): "Gameplay is straightforward, yet it's a refined familiarity, borrowing numerous elements from the original Dead Space in abundance while wrapping them around the well-worn demands of a typical on-rails shooter ... One area that definitely benefits from the on-rails nature of Extraction is the overall pacing. Sometimes you creep along agonisingly, other times it feels like the enemy onslaught is never going to end. There are few occasions where you don't come away feeling like your scraped through by the skin of your teeth, and even on the game's lowest 'Normal' difficulty, there's a definite sense of achievement when you get through." Giant Bomb (60/100): "Extraction's marketing campaign would like you to think of it as a 'guided experience' that whisks you through the dramatic beginnings of the series' horrible space-monster outbreak, but in blunt terms, Extraction is an on-rails shooter. Blunter still: it's a light-gun game. These days, that's not a style of game serious game players usually gravitate toward. But keeping the genre's inherent restrictions in mind--not to mention the limitations of the Wii hardware -- Extraction is really pretty good, for what it is." %Gallery-49881%
Champions Online busts out its PvP trailer
Cryptic is churning out Champions Online videos at a faster pace as of late, between this PvP trailer and the recently released character creation walkthrough video. Although that's probably to be expected with September a mere seven weeks away. We're pretty certain that everyone in the MMO house that superheroism built are feeling the pressure as of late.Speaking of pressure, this new PvP trailer really does everything it can to make us feel it -- but in a good way. We'd say it succeeds int reassuring watchers that PvP will be exciting and dramatic in Champions Online. Our only suggestion for Cryptic would be not to stop here; keep expanding the Hero Games. It doesn't need to be crazy, but something tells us the current offering will only sate people for so long.At the end of the day, it all really depends on having a fun, balanced and rewarding experience. Here's hoping there's plenty of reason to pound our superpowered buddies in the face come the month of September. Oh, yeah, you can find the full Giant Bomb-hosted trailer after the break.
Giant Bomb makes an app (and, more importantly, a commercial)
Unless you're a fan of their website, you probably don't need the Giant Bomb iPhone app. It's a pretty limited use piece of software. While it does offer easy access to everything on their site, including videos, reviews, previews, and so on, it actually costs $1.99, and we can't really justify a purchase like that. Isn't browsing sites what Safari is for?But we are thankful that they made the app, because, at the very least, it encouraged them to make the commercial above. It features a few spot-on parodies (the first one overstays its welcome, but stick with it), and even has some nice iPhone-related humor. I don't know about you folks, but I winced when Apple's device went in the drink during the ShamWow parody. The app itself might not be worth the price, but the commercial is definitely worth every penny.
Star Wars: The Old Republic has hundreds of voice actors
Giant Bomb has been pumping out some great videos from E3 2009, but we of course took immediate notice of this interview with two Star Wars: The Old Republic developers from BioWare. Most of the conversation revolves around information we already know, until one of the devs reveals, "we have literally thousands of roles which are voiced in our game, which are done by many, many hundreds of voice actors." We knew there was going to be a lot of people, but, okay we didn't expect that many!Hundreds.Much of the Massively crew agreed that Star Wars: The Old Republic's classes would be limited to four or five on each side, due to the fully-voiced announcement. Now we're thinking differently with thousands of roles filled by many hundreds of voice actors. Suddenly, six or seven per side doesn't seem like a far away fever dream.If you'd like to see how it ends when you ask a BioWare dev about SWTOR's release date, check out the full video after the break.
Modern Warfare 2 intel captured in latest Game Informer
As per this month's Modern Warfare 2 cover story in Game Informer, details of the piece have surfaced over at GiantBomb. A smattering of new revelations are covered, including the flat-out refusal of co-op play in story mode (said to break the narrative experience). Additionally, Captain "Soap" MacTavish returns, bringing with him distinctly more open-ended gameplay, and a significantly fleshed out "special forces" mode (one that will mimic and expand upon the final "Mile High Club" airplane battle in CoD4). If you want more, you're just going to have to snag a copy of this month's GI. We'll be honest with you, though -- at this point, we expect greatness from the veteran development team at Infinity Ward. Luckily, from the looks of things, the game's release on November 10 will bring ever-widening smiles to the faces of existing fans and reignite our already burnin' love for the series.[Thanks, Sage]
J Allard to be Dr. J, but not the Dr. J you're thinking of
If no one else will volunteer, we'll be the ones to say it: We miss J Allard. If Microsoft ever needed a bald-by-choice, too-cool-for-the-room-as-long-as-that-room-is-at-E3 spokesperson, it's now. But if The Man in The Hoodie and Sports Coat is ever returned to us, we'll need to address him as Dr. J Allard, or Honorary Dr. J Allard, if you want to be a dick about it.Allard's alma mater Boston University will give him the degree (which is just as authentic as his image) on May 17 alongside Larry Bird and Steven Spielberg. Will Allard mark the event by performing a Triple Lindy into the nearby BU pool? We can dream.[Via Giant Bomb]
Ryan Davis talks up Giant Bomb's explosive re-launch
When Gamespot Editorial Director Jeff Gerstmann was abruptly fired under controversial circumstances late last year, it set off a sort of domino effect. In the wake of the scandal, Gamespot staffers Ryan Davis, Brad Shoemaker and Vinny Caravella all decided to leave the venerable site to start a new project with Gerstmann: a project called Giant Bomb. A skeleton of the site has been up since March, but the project really got going Monday with an overhaul that mixes user-created, wiki-style pages with editorial reviews, videos and podcasts from the four-man ex-Gamespot crew.We talked to Giant Bomb co-founder Ryan Davis about his thoughts on the new site and his departure from Gamespot, and game journalism in general. Some excerpts from our conversation (be sure to click the "Continue" link for the full interview):On Gerstmann-gate and the state of game journalism"Obviously we still have lots of friends and a ton of history there [at CNET], but we're so focused on the good stuff we're doing now. ... [Gerstmann-gate] certainly helped get our names in people's mouths in certain circles. ... Before [Gerstmann-gate] even happened, I felt like people needed to be more skeptical about what they read, with the massive influx of news-blogs giving little distinction between rumor and fact."We're not in the business of reporting news, but as far as the review process goes, we're being very open about a review being that person's perspective. We don't use fancy math to come to our reviews, we just go with what the reviewer feels the game merits. I think when a review has to represent an entire organization's perspective on a game, that's where you can run into trouble. Also, for what it's worth, I've never considered myself a 'game journalist.' I think they exist, but I'm a reviewer and a commentator more than anything."
Former GameSpot eds reunite at Gerstmann's Giant Bomb
Despite our obvious misgivings over naming a new internet venture "Giant Bomb," the fuse on Jeff Gerstmann's post-GameSpot outing keeps on burning, getting us closer to its eventual proper unveiling this summer. In addition to Gerstmann and GameSpot BFF Ryan Davis, you can add former 'Spotters Vinny Caravella and Brad Shoemaker to the still shortlist of Giant Bombs, as confirmed on the latest podcast for the still infant site. With GameSpot still smarting over Gerstmann-gate, will Giant Bomb succeed in attracting enough readers to warrant the growing headcount? We'll find out soon – Giant Bomb is "blowing up this summer." [Thanks, giantenemycrab]
Harmonix community team adds GameSpot alum
When GameSpot reviews editor Jeff Gerstmann was suddenly fired from his position, parent-company CNET lost nearly half-a-dozen staff members surrounding the controversy. One of those staff members, expert drummer Alex Navarro, announced he has landed at Harmonix, joining their community team, during the May 20th episode of the Giant Bomb Podcast."The concept of leaping headfirst into something like this, for a company I admire and respect as much as Harmonix, is straight up boner-inducing," Navarro eloquently wrote on his personal blog.So what does this mean for Rock Band fans? Navarro will help administer the Rock Band forums as well as help writing other content where needed. Navarro also hints at a more dedicated Rock Band developer blog which we hope is akin to the work done by Luke Smith at Bungie.The most important thing? Maybe we can finally get some Hard-Fi love in Rock Band.
Giant Bomb to watch, evaluate every game-based movie
It's common knowledge that movies based on games are generally awful (much like games based on movies). But for all the internet griping about everything from Dead or Alive to Hitman to anything by Uwe Boll, how many of us are insane enough to want an encyclopedic knowledge of every awful game-based movie ever made?The answer to that question is "at least one" and that one is former Gamespotter Ryan Davis, who has publicly set out to watch every game-based flick as part of "The Giant Bomb Video-Game Movie Experiment." While the project sadly leaves out game-inspired movies like Tron and WarGames and animated classics like Pokemon: Yet Another Insipid Movie, we still have to admire the moxie required to even attempt such a project. Will Davis' determination be enough to see him through? Will his sanity hold out? Find out this summer, only in theaters on the web.
