A Videogame Canon

Angry Birds Space…

A Videogame Canon – Angry Birds worth Two Billion Dollars?…

May 5th, 2012

I like this new trend of developers tapping into nostalgia and going back to the primordial game roots. But I wonder how much of the success of games like Legends of Grimrock is due to gamers buying into the nostalgia. Maybe it’s just the tried and tested gameplay.

People bought FireRed and LeafGreen not just because it’d be a nostalgia trip, but because of the game substrate itself- The game play experience is nearly identical, just with a face lift. We should remember we liked the original Red and Blue Pokemon for the gameplay. So maybe it is the sheer effectiveness of these primordial gameplay types that also lend to success.

April 28th, 2012

I’ve been hearing about this, but until just now, I’d been reading this as “Legends of Grimlock.” No joke. I was legitimately assuming it was some kind of campy promo for the inevitable, next Transformers movie.

April 28th, 2012

You are mostly incorrect about Metroid Prime. I would go as far to say that many players already know Samus is a woman before they even begin the game from playing past iterations of the franchise. However, you are never really fooled into thinking Samus is a man, she is never portrayed in a way that could give the player that impression, her gender is just concealed until the very end of the game. Although, if you charge your beam and shoot it when you are facing a wall, the reflected light makes her face reflect into your visor, so in subtle ways like that, the player may actually be fooled into thinking she is a woman, which she is of course.

April 27th, 2012

Thank you P Whalen! I googled the images, since the scenes I saved of the game on my iPhone don’t pertain as well to my writing, plus I didn’t want to spoil any of the best moments.

I updated the last photo in this post with my own saved screen shot, for a better representation of the actual resolution of the game.

I highly recommend S&S to anyone who has ever loved being immersed in a game before.

April 27th, 2012

This is an excellent analysis. I keep hearing/reading about this game, but I haven’t checked it out yet. I think I’ll add to my “games to play this summer shelf.” It looks like there’s a PC version.

I was just curious, did you get these screenshots off of iPhone or somewhere else?

April 26th, 2012

In my opinion you are very right. I recently visited the Art of Video Games Exhibit in the Smithsonian Museum of art and saw a very similar statement. It read how all art is about portraying and providing an emotional experience. And that is what video games do. By the way Red Dead Redemption did a good job on my tear work. What was the videogame that got you ?

April 26th, 2012

Tragic and unfortunate story. I agree with your claim that videogames cannot be a training guide. I own a firearm and can say in videogames the mechanics when firing are way off. The only realistic thing you could learn from FPS’s is equipment.

April 26th, 2012

I view this article a few weeks ago. The male avatar definitely tells the majority crowd who plays FPS’s. I am not sure on the purpose of it always being Caucasian. Unfortunately, white supremacy I presume?I never played Metroid Prime so correct me if I am wrong, but during the entire game up until the ending isn’t the player fooled in thinking it is a male? I think she is so successful because the player is so shocked that all the manly destruction was done by an awesome female avatar.

April 26th, 2012

Cool information about game tester salary, very straight to the point. Let me hear what you think about the article i have back in my website Video Game Tester Salaries. Thanks and keep it up..

April 21st, 2012

“The truth is strategy has and always will be a relevant part of every video game”

I can see what you mean when you say that strategy pervades even the simplest games such as Pac-Man, but I disagree with you here. Sure, strategy is a necessary element of most traditional video games, but I don’t think strategy is relevant to all games, nor something even found in all video games. The game I talked about in my last blog, Sword & Sworcery only arguably has strategy, for it is basically a point n’ click game where walking along a linear path is the meat of the game. Its puzzles could be boiled down to simply tapping every inch of the screen until you solve it, and the battles are basically rhythm games that can be trumped simply be memorizing the attack patterns-The strategy isn’t really relevant in either case.

Another example would be Guitar Hero. Sure, it could be argued that there is strategy involved in “winning” a song, but it is more a game of muscle memory and hand eye coordination.

April 20th, 2012