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Hey guys so Joystiq my favorite gaming blog is hiring a weekend editor for their site and I thought I would apply. I had to write two articles you could see on the site as news and then a review of a game called Music Catch and my pick of 2010 Game of the Year. These are the articles in their final form so do not go all crazy on them with edits. Some of you have already helped me with that. Let me know though if you read Joystiq if these are articles you could see on the site. That and I worked hard and damn it I want people to read them lol.
The “Dukesday” Prophecy: Duke Nukem Forever Preview
There is one prophecy gamers have been praying to come true since 1997: the release of Duke Nukem Forever. We have heard for 14 and a half years that our “Dukesday” was upon us. Year after year we were promised it was coming. Yet, disappointed as it did not. In 2001, 3D Realms told us it would be released “when its done”. The gaming world kept a candle of hope burning around our altar to the Duke until word came that 3D Realms was being downsized in 2009. Duke fans just accepted it was all over. After some legal action, Take-Two announced as the publisher they were moving the games development to Gearbox Software in 2010. It was then that we saw the first game play footage. That footage released a joyous wave of rapture. A release date was set, only to have been pushed back, again. Well, it is finally here my friends, June 14th, 2011! Hail to the King, baby!!
The first person shooter has changed a lot since the days of Duke Nukem 3D. Since Nukem 3D the genre has followed a trend of releasing serious games with complicated stories and emotional cut scenes. Duke Nukem Forever may be the answer to what the gaming world has been praying for: a breath of fresh air into the first person shooter. We have grown tired of the same duplicated formula with our FPSs. Duke is the original video game badass. He took all the qualities of our 80s action movie heroes and swallowed them with a bottle of awesome. He has no filter, does what he wants, and always got the babes! Duke Nukem Forever is guaranteed to cut out all the serious and emotionly driven cut scenes we have grown accustom to today and shoot a rocket of ridiculous fun and adult humor in our faces. Gearbox has promised a game full of crazy FPS action, puzzles, driving vehicles, epic settings and enemies so outlandish it will blow your mind, but they have also promised enough explosions that Michael Bay will be hiding in the corner crying in the fetal position!
This time we are not only playing in Dukes world but living in it as you can lift weights, shoot hoops, play some slots, pool, or air hockey. Gearbox has also promised an amazing and epic multiplayer. They promise us it is unlike any other multiplayer on the market. They proclaims they have turned gametypes we know and love on their heads. After almost 14 years Duke fans are expecting a no holds barred, over the top, brutally awesome game. On “Dukesday” I will be ready to kick some ass and chew some bubble gum, too bad after 14 years I'm all out of bubble gum.
Project Café au “Late”?
So we have seen rumors of the Wii 2, *cough cough* Project Café, for a while. We have no idea what it will be until Nintendo shows it off at E3. Most are speculating that it will be the Wii but in 1080p HD, with larger storage capability. There are crazy rumors about a front facing camera on the controller or the ability to use the 3DS as the controller. Honestly, if that is the case I hope it just sucks me into the game like Tron, but hey I can only wish, right? Rumors will abound as they always do, but is Nintendo too late? Sure they crushed the competition from 2007 to early 2009, but since, they have fallen off. According to analyst Michael Pachter from January 2010 to January 2011 Nintendo saw a decline in sales of 31.5% with Microsoft seeing a 14.4% increase during the same time, while Sony only saw a small decrease of 3% in hardware sales. Why is Nintendo’s decline so drastic?
Sure, Nintendo has still out sold the other consoles but Nintendo has been losing profits while Microsoft and Sony have been gaining in overall console sales, gaining subscribers to Xbox Live and PSN, and Kinect and Move sold very well in the 2010 holiday season. Sony has said the PS3 will be a ten year console while Microsoft has claimed the 360 will be the first console completely updated via software. Both companies plan on growing the entertainment aspects of their consoles while making their online services their top priority. The 360 and PS3 can be used as multimedia devices with your home computer, both offer better online multiplayer experiences than Nintendo, and are hi-def with the PS3's ability to play Blu-Ray. The Wii lacks these capabilities. Sure you could download Nintendo classics, which was great for classic gamers, but Nintendo went for the casual market and left their core gamers behind. Sony and Microsoft with their new peripherals are aiming at casual gamers but they never left their core audience asking for more.
So why a new console now? Many have thought the next gen era would last longer than the typical four year approach we saw in the 90s. Does Nintendo feel they need to have all the bells and whistles their competitors have? If so, is Project Cafe going to be too late in the multimedia and online console battle? The 3DS sales for $249, would Project Cafe be more? If it is more why buy it when Microsoft and Sonys systems have more time on the market as multimedia devices and have more online games core gamers want to play for a smaller price. Could this turn out to be another Virtual Boy for Nintendo?
We can only speculate what they will give us, but hopefully it is not the Wii 2HD. This is Nintendo we are talking about. They have surprised us before, but they have also disappointed. Let’s just hope that heart rate monitor they showed a few years ago was not for us, but them showing they had their finger on the pulse of the gaming world.
Music Catch Review
Want a simple game to pass that last hour on a Friday at work or on the subway? Music Catch is that game. The game is simple: catch the shapes with your cursor, yellow gives you a bonus multiplier and red will take that multiplier away. There is an additional purple circle, which turns your cursor into a black hole that sucks everything in around it except for the reds. As you absorb more yellow circles your cursor becomes larger which makes it more difficult to miss the reds. I suggest you have a laptop for this, a mouse will not net you the greatest control. I found the touchpad of my netbook was pretty responsive and the game detected the slightest movements, which many times was the reason I missed absorbing those red circles. I noticed that higher notes made smaller shapes and lower notes made larger shapes making interesting patterns. There is almost a pattern to the music and shapes but it isn't in exact time, seems to be more on individual sound as opposed to a set tempo. You can download the full version and let the shapes jump out to your own MP3s which can create interesting challenges based on your music library. I was willing to purchase the game for the iPhone but Apples current OS doesn't offer any way for games to use the music on your iPhone. Music Catch is a game that some casual gamers will find appealing. Personally, I found it too elementary. Its simple nature doesn't hold the attention of my puzzle loving brain. I would not suggest this to any hard core gamers, however I might suggest it to a person at work looking to kill some time. 2 stars out of 5
2010 Game of the Year
2010 Game of the Year for me has to be Heavy Rain. This was much more than a game. It was an interactive movie. Heavily influenced by the Choose Your Own Adventure gamebooks and film noir, Heavy Rain puts us in the shoes of four playable characters each looking to unravel the mystery of the Origami Killer. You must interact with objects in the games world or with other characters to progress the story. How you react to the objects in the world or to other characters in a cut scene will directly impact later scenes or the overall ending. Heavy Rain shows us that games are on par with Hollywood in their ability to tell engaging stories. Most games have one concrete set story: you ride the rail from point A to point B. However, Heavy Rain starts you at point A but allows you thousands of different points you could eventually arrive at. You will play this again and again just see where each character ends in the story. You will attempt to get the best ending you can then wonder what if I make a different choice here how will that affect the outcome? The biggest reason Heavy Rain is Game of the Year is its the supreme example of why video games ARE art. Some of the games smaller details will leave your jaw on the floor. Watching Ethan Mars, the protagonist, stand in the rain and shiver made me feel as if I was watching a real Hollywood movie. There are tons of games that have used rain to set moods or as a set piece but I have never seen a character shiver in the rain as if he were cold, until Heavy Rain. Tiny details like rain bouncing off a basketball, reflections in windows, or how shadows fell on walls and inanimate objects provided me with a sense that his world was real. Isn't “art” really just imitating life? Heavy Rain does a great job of imitating life. Heavy Rain's giant strides in making the games world seem real with seamless natural interaction between characters and the objects in their world, its innovative story telling, its attention to detail, and its wide open range of choices are why I say it is the 2010 Game of the Year.
The “Dukesday” Prophecy: Duke Nukem Forever Preview
There is one prophecy gamers have been praying to come true since 1997: the release of Duke Nukem Forever. We have heard for 14 and a half years that our “Dukesday” was upon us. Year after year we were promised it was coming. Yet, disappointed as it did not. In 2001, 3D Realms told us it would be released “when its done”. The gaming world kept a candle of hope burning around our altar to the Duke until word came that 3D Realms was being downsized in 2009. Duke fans just accepted it was all over. After some legal action, Take-Two announced as the publisher they were moving the games development to Gearbox Software in 2010. It was then that we saw the first game play footage. That footage released a joyous wave of rapture. A release date was set, only to have been pushed back, again. Well, it is finally here my friends, June 14th, 2011! Hail to the King, baby!!
The first person shooter has changed a lot since the days of Duke Nukem 3D. Since Nukem 3D the genre has followed a trend of releasing serious games with complicated stories and emotional cut scenes. Duke Nukem Forever may be the answer to what the gaming world has been praying for: a breath of fresh air into the first person shooter. We have grown tired of the same duplicated formula with our FPSs. Duke is the original video game badass. He took all the qualities of our 80s action movie heroes and swallowed them with a bottle of awesome. He has no filter, does what he wants, and always got the babes! Duke Nukem Forever is guaranteed to cut out all the serious and emotionly driven cut scenes we have grown accustom to today and shoot a rocket of ridiculous fun and adult humor in our faces. Gearbox has promised a game full of crazy FPS action, puzzles, driving vehicles, epic settings and enemies so outlandish it will blow your mind, but they have also promised enough explosions that Michael Bay will be hiding in the corner crying in the fetal position!
This time we are not only playing in Dukes world but living in it as you can lift weights, shoot hoops, play some slots, pool, or air hockey. Gearbox has also promised an amazing and epic multiplayer. They promise us it is unlike any other multiplayer on the market. They proclaims they have turned gametypes we know and love on their heads. After almost 14 years Duke fans are expecting a no holds barred, over the top, brutally awesome game. On “Dukesday” I will be ready to kick some ass and chew some bubble gum, too bad after 14 years I'm all out of bubble gum.
Project Café au “Late”?
So we have seen rumors of the Wii 2, *cough cough* Project Café, for a while. We have no idea what it will be until Nintendo shows it off at E3. Most are speculating that it will be the Wii but in 1080p HD, with larger storage capability. There are crazy rumors about a front facing camera on the controller or the ability to use the 3DS as the controller. Honestly, if that is the case I hope it just sucks me into the game like Tron, but hey I can only wish, right? Rumors will abound as they always do, but is Nintendo too late? Sure they crushed the competition from 2007 to early 2009, but since, they have fallen off. According to analyst Michael Pachter from January 2010 to January 2011 Nintendo saw a decline in sales of 31.5% with Microsoft seeing a 14.4% increase during the same time, while Sony only saw a small decrease of 3% in hardware sales. Why is Nintendo’s decline so drastic?
Sure, Nintendo has still out sold the other consoles but Nintendo has been losing profits while Microsoft and Sony have been gaining in overall console sales, gaining subscribers to Xbox Live and PSN, and Kinect and Move sold very well in the 2010 holiday season. Sony has said the PS3 will be a ten year console while Microsoft has claimed the 360 will be the first console completely updated via software. Both companies plan on growing the entertainment aspects of their consoles while making their online services their top priority. The 360 and PS3 can be used as multimedia devices with your home computer, both offer better online multiplayer experiences than Nintendo, and are hi-def with the PS3's ability to play Blu-Ray. The Wii lacks these capabilities. Sure you could download Nintendo classics, which was great for classic gamers, but Nintendo went for the casual market and left their core gamers behind. Sony and Microsoft with their new peripherals are aiming at casual gamers but they never left their core audience asking for more.
So why a new console now? Many have thought the next gen era would last longer than the typical four year approach we saw in the 90s. Does Nintendo feel they need to have all the bells and whistles their competitors have? If so, is Project Cafe going to be too late in the multimedia and online console battle? The 3DS sales for $249, would Project Cafe be more? If it is more why buy it when Microsoft and Sonys systems have more time on the market as multimedia devices and have more online games core gamers want to play for a smaller price. Could this turn out to be another Virtual Boy for Nintendo?
We can only speculate what they will give us, but hopefully it is not the Wii 2HD. This is Nintendo we are talking about. They have surprised us before, but they have also disappointed. Let’s just hope that heart rate monitor they showed a few years ago was not for us, but them showing they had their finger on the pulse of the gaming world.
Music Catch Review
Want a simple game to pass that last hour on a Friday at work or on the subway? Music Catch is that game. The game is simple: catch the shapes with your cursor, yellow gives you a bonus multiplier and red will take that multiplier away. There is an additional purple circle, which turns your cursor into a black hole that sucks everything in around it except for the reds. As you absorb more yellow circles your cursor becomes larger which makes it more difficult to miss the reds. I suggest you have a laptop for this, a mouse will not net you the greatest control. I found the touchpad of my netbook was pretty responsive and the game detected the slightest movements, which many times was the reason I missed absorbing those red circles. I noticed that higher notes made smaller shapes and lower notes made larger shapes making interesting patterns. There is almost a pattern to the music and shapes but it isn't in exact time, seems to be more on individual sound as opposed to a set tempo. You can download the full version and let the shapes jump out to your own MP3s which can create interesting challenges based on your music library. I was willing to purchase the game for the iPhone but Apples current OS doesn't offer any way for games to use the music on your iPhone. Music Catch is a game that some casual gamers will find appealing. Personally, I found it too elementary. Its simple nature doesn't hold the attention of my puzzle loving brain. I would not suggest this to any hard core gamers, however I might suggest it to a person at work looking to kill some time. 2 stars out of 5
2010 Game of the Year
2010 Game of the Year for me has to be Heavy Rain. This was much more than a game. It was an interactive movie. Heavily influenced by the Choose Your Own Adventure gamebooks and film noir, Heavy Rain puts us in the shoes of four playable characters each looking to unravel the mystery of the Origami Killer. You must interact with objects in the games world or with other characters to progress the story. How you react to the objects in the world or to other characters in a cut scene will directly impact later scenes or the overall ending. Heavy Rain shows us that games are on par with Hollywood in their ability to tell engaging stories. Most games have one concrete set story: you ride the rail from point A to point B. However, Heavy Rain starts you at point A but allows you thousands of different points you could eventually arrive at. You will play this again and again just see where each character ends in the story. You will attempt to get the best ending you can then wonder what if I make a different choice here how will that affect the outcome? The biggest reason Heavy Rain is Game of the Year is its the supreme example of why video games ARE art. Some of the games smaller details will leave your jaw on the floor. Watching Ethan Mars, the protagonist, stand in the rain and shiver made me feel as if I was watching a real Hollywood movie. There are tons of games that have used rain to set moods or as a set piece but I have never seen a character shiver in the rain as if he were cold, until Heavy Rain. Tiny details like rain bouncing off a basketball, reflections in windows, or how shadows fell on walls and inanimate objects provided me with a sense that his world was real. Isn't “art” really just imitating life? Heavy Rain does a great job of imitating life. Heavy Rain's giant strides in making the games world seem real with seamless natural interaction between characters and the objects in their world, its innovative story telling, its attention to detail, and its wide open range of choices are why I say it is the 2010 Game of the Year.
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