Weekly Video Game Podcast – July 1, 2010 <90 mins (82.8 MB)>
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It’s finally up. Despite my computer’s best attempts to delete all the audio files and my house’s attempt to drive me insane by losing power in the middle of post-production, I’ve finally managed to put together this week’s Video Game Podcast. Chris and I talk for nearly 90 minutes about video game sales, the future of the industry, OnLive, and other assorted nonsense. While downloading the podcast, continue reading below for the sales charts for the last four weeks (all data comes from VGChartz.com) as well as a list of the games that came out last week and this week (including trailers where available).

Video Game Sales for the Week of May 29th, 2010

Video Game Sales for the Week of June 5th, 2010

Video Game Sales for the Week of June 12th, 2010

Video Game Sales for the Week of June 19th, 2010

Retail Game Releases Last Week

(click title for trailers)

Retail Game Releases This Week

(click title for trailers)

Downloadable Game Releases Last Week

(click title for trailers)

Well, it took much longer than I anticipated but here’s the latest edition of the Weekly Video Game Newsletter. I should be back to having it as a weekly feature. I already have several things written for next week’s issue so it shouldn’t be a problem unless something comes up like it has the last couple of weeks.

Inside you’ll find a full review of the E3 conference that took place a few weeks ago. I also voice list the games to keep an eye out for. There are also several reviews and Hall of Fame write ups, a look at Rockstar games throughout the last couple of years, and an analysis of the first week of sales for the two biggest games of the year so far: Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Red Dead Redemption. It’s a whopping 20 pages so there’s plenty of material to feast on.

The Weekly Video Game Podcast will be up on Tuesday. I spent way too much time fighting with the columns to work in Microsoft Word for the newsletter. The podcast is looking to be around 90 minutes long and is very light on E3 nonsense. It’s definitely going to be good stuff.

The Weekly Movie Podcast will be up Tuesday night supported by three movie reviews (of movies that are still in theatres!!!).

There was a lot of hype going into the 2010 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3). For the first time in a while it felt like all three major console manufacturers were destined to shine at the event. What transpired last week in Los Angeles was a bit bizarre. Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony did not hold back and did their best to win over the confidence of both the media and consumers. The reactions between media outlets and gamers may differ but this E3 really showed that the industry is moving into two separate directions.

Microsoft started the event early with a Kinect event on Sunday night with Cirque de Soleil. While this no doubt impressed those in attendance, a presentation of that level may have put Kinect into the red permanently. Just the circus act alone will need to ensure that Microsoft will sell several hundred thousand units of Kinect. Throw in the planned huge marketing blitz that Microsoft will unleash upon the world during the holidays and Microsoft will no doubt have to sell at least a million, if not several million units this holiday to not be buried.

If Kinect wasn’t already behind the eight-ball, many hardcore gamers who use E3 to prepare their holiday wish list were incredibly disappointed with Microsoft’s show on Monday. While the show started off strong with many hardcore titles, not much new stuff was shown. Even the highly anticipated titles didn’t come off strong. Gameplay video for Halo: Reach and Gears of War 3 were

disappointing in the fact that they didn’t really show off anything new. It felt like we were seeing more of the same as we have seen with previous instalments of the franchises. It wasn’t all like that as Call of Duty: Black Ops sort of felt like a mix between Call of Duty and Far Cry gameplay. While they only showed a trailer and it looks to still be at least another year away, Metal Gear Solid Rising looked to be an interesting reboot for the series with it resembling a mix between established Metal Gear Solid gameplay and Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden. However, it seemed like Microsoft wanted to rush through the traditional Xbox 360 games as quickly as possible as their keynote was dominated with Kinect stuff.

While the hardcore crowd may not like it, this is what Microsoft needed to do. Microsoft has never been profitable in the home console business. Even though they had plenty of momentum at the beginning of this generation of consoles, they’re almost out of gas. Sony has made great strides to make the Playstation 3 competitive against the Xbox 360. In fact, it’s getting to the point where there are some major releases that are selling more copies on the PS3 than on the Xbox 360 (which opens up the question as to how many more Xbox 360 owners there are than PS3 owners considering that many 360 owners have bought more than one console to replace defective ones).

They need to go after Nintendo because, at the moment, the Big N is running unopposed. Nintendo is the only console manufacturer making money this generation. They’ve done that catering to an untapped market. Now Nintendo has a monopoly on this large group. Microsoft and Sony can cater to the hardcore market all they want but, considering that they’re not making any money doing so, they need to go after a market that Nintendo virtually owns in entirety…aggressively.

So, most of the Microsoft presentation was an attempt to curry favour with the mainstream media. In fact, most gaming media reporters were relegated to the back of the auditorium for the Microsoft presentation. For the most part, the first few rows were dominated by reporters for major newspapers, television networks, and major news websites.

Kinect was a major part of this casual strategy as Microsoft showed off six games in detail for the new piece of hardware. However, many of them were glitchy and seemed to have problems in some way or another. In fact, it suspiciously looked like the game footage for some of the games were prerecorded and people acted along with the game (Kinectimals was one of the games that looked guilty of this with the girl’s hands not moving in conjunction properly with the on-screen hands and her talking while pretending to hide yet the in-game microphone not picking up on her speaking). They also showed off a very lame on-rails Star Wars lightsaber game that might have been neat in the arcades back in the mid-90s but looks very outdated in 2010.

However, Microsoft did a very smart thing by giving away the new Xbox 360 Slim (which they revealed at the end of their show) to all of the reporters at the show. Yes, some reporters can easily be bribed and Microsoft definitely earned some positive press by giving away all those systems. Even if gamers felt shafted by Microsoft’s press conference, it was very successful for the company. Kinect was the talk of the show for many. In fact, many members of the mainstream press were given private time with Kinect under ideal and highly supervised conditions to ensure that reporters would only get a positive experience with Kinect.

Electronic Arts had their press event later that day. Like Microsoft, there weren’t many surprises. Most of the content they showed had already been revealed and there weren’t that many games talked about that we didn’t already know about. In fact, they only talked about two new games and an expansion pack for Battlefield: Bad Company 2. Unfortunately, one of the games revealed was a new Need for Speed game. Considering that Need for Speed games are no longer as important as they once were and don’t sell all that well, it was a big letdown. It would have been better had they announced a new Burnout, considering it has been several years since the last iteration of the franchise. It almost feels insulting considering that Criterion Games, the makers of the Burnout series, are developing the new Need for Speed game.

Another retreaded franchise of EA, Medal of Honor, was front and center for their presentation. They showed off a 24-player multiplayer event that was unimpressive. Graphically, it didn’t look that great and this was despite the fact that they reduced the screen size of the gameplay footage to show off multiple screens. In fact, on the live Internet feed, they seemed to show more footage of people’s hands manipulating a game controller than the game itself.

Electronic Arts was quick to mention that they were using an early alpha edition of the game so it might be a bit buggy but then immediately after the game demo they announced that the multiplayer beta was going to be online June 21st. That’s an incredibly quick development cycle for a game to go from early alpha to playable beta for regular consumers (although they announced that those who owned Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and preordered Medal of Honor would gain access to the beta on Jun 17th). That’s just plain dishonest. If Microsoft or Sony had done something like that for Kinect or Move, there would have been a backlash. Luckily for EA, nobody really cared considering that nothing big is expected for Medal of Honor. There’s a chance that Medal of Honor will only be the 3rd or 4th best-selling FPS of the year. It will do well but it won’t be a breakout hit like Modern Warfare was a few years ago.

The last event of the day was Ubisoft. The biggest mistake I made throughout E3 was to watch that piece of garbage. Joel McHale was the host of the event and he did such a horrible job that even though I thought Ubisoft had some really interesting games, he almost had me ignoring them. He wouldn’t shut up for a minute and felt the need to interrupt the people who were introducing their projects with horrible jokes that sometimes were very insulting. He undermined Ubisoft’s entire show and set them backwards despite them having a solid lineup of software.

In fact, we saw a lot of content from Ubisoft that we hadn’t heard of before. Sure, there may be some who were disappointed by the fact that they didn’t get a chance to see anything regarding Beyond Good and Evil 2, but there were plenty of interesting titles that look to be on tap for the next year. Shawn White Skateboarding, Raving Rabbids: Travel Through Time, and Rayman Origins look like fantastic games and have the potential to make end-of-year top ten lists. They finally showed footage of the previously announced Tom Clancy: Ghost Recon Future Soldier and Driver: San Francisco. While both games still left plenty of questions unanswered, they looked like they were taking their respective franchises in the right direction. Overall, when it came to software, Ubisoft did an incredible job.

The only trainwreck that wasn’t McHale’s fault was the Your Shape presentation. Ubisoft had shown off Your Shape during the Kinect portion of Microsoft’s event and, for the most part, things went well. However, the Ubisoft presentation exposed the bugs of Kinect. The big problem was that they did virtually the exact same thing for both the Microsoft and Ubisoft events. The woman who did the Microsoft show also did the Ubisoft show. However, it appeared as though she lost two inches in the few hours between the two events. The Kinect sensor had indicated two different heights for her. Also, while it was a bit apparent during the Microsoft event, the Ubisoft demonstration kind of looked like there was tons of ‘waggle’ involved. Definitely not a good sign for a major part of Microsoft’s strategy moving forward.

However, they also took the time to show off new hardware…sort of. They beat Nintendo to the punch by announcing they will be releasing their own Vitality Sensor apparently before Nintendo. Innergy will be a relaxation game but it won’t be released for a particular system. It will be a USB device for the computer. They also decided to take the time to show off Battle Tag which is essentially a laser tag knockoff. It’s not new technology at all. In fact, I remember the stuff being around when I was a kid fifteen years ago. The hook here is that it communicates with the computer to keep track of the score and to issue new challenges. Why Ubisoft would want to move in this direction is beyond me considering that most of their software is intended to keep their consumers in front of the television. If kids realize that they can have fun away from a video game system, the company is finished.

All joking aside, Ubisoft could have had a really good show. McHale was so bad that he almost killed it. The quirky products didn’t help either as they felt like diversions away from the good stuff. Ubisoft is one of the few game publishers that are making money year over year and their lineup is solid enough that I don’t foresee any change to their financial status. However, even if they were to get McHale’s appearance fee back, I doubt that it was enough to make up for the potential loss of sales that McHale caused by preventing the press from enjoying the products presented. There has been virtually no mention of Ubisoft products in the mainstream media outside of Your Shape: Fitness Evolved (but that’s basically due to the fact that it was a big part of Microsoft’s event). Even though Shaun White Skateboarding has my vote as one of the best games to come out of E3 (and this is coming from someone who can’t stand skateboarding/snowboarding games), I read and saw very little about the game reported in the press. Unless Ubisoft throws plenty of marketing money behind these smaller titles, I don’t see there being much hype behind these products. Here’s hoping for Ubisoft that McHale doesn’t have an unsackable mutli-year deal.

Nintendo kicked things off on Tuesday with a thud. Even though most people felt Nintendo stole the show, it almost never happened. Shigeru Miyamoto was trotted out to present the new The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword at the beginning of Nintendo’s event and then things went horribly wrong. The Wii remote that Miyamoto used was not being all that agreeable and made the game look hardly playable. In fact, Bill Trinen, who was translating for Miyamoto, looked very stressed out as Miyamoto muttered stuff angrily in Japanese. Trinen looked as if he didn’t know what to say but he managed to keep his cool and blamed the problem on interference.

It’s mostly Nintendo’s fault as they didn’t learn their lesson from last year with the problems that arose during the Wii Sports Resort demonstration. From what I can gather, the issue is that the Wii Remote’s pointer interacts with the screen via infrared. The setup wasn’t intended to be played in an environment with tons of people and plenty of bright lights. All that interacts with the infrared and can cause quite a bit of interference. Most of the reporters who got hands-on time with the new Zelda game said that it worked beautifully.

Nintendo continued their tradition of past E3s by showing off a bunch of casual titles that keep the hardcore market sedated. While Mario Sports Mix looked somewhat interesting, nobody in the audience was asking for Wii Party or Just Dance 2. At least the push with Just Dance 2 is understandable considering that the Xbox 360’s Kinect will be encroaching on Nintendo’s territory and one of their big titles is Dance Central. Just Dance has been a major success for Nintendo and Ubisoft and they need to show that they won’t allow Microsoft to steal some of their turf without a fight.

Things changed quickly though when Nintendo showed off the trailer for Goldeneye. The new game exclusive to the Wii sent the crowd into the first big frenzy of the week. Thankfully, Nintendo was just getting started as they announced a brand new game starring Kirby and another one with Donkey Kong (and it doesn’t involve bongos!!!). Then they showed off the biggest item of all of E3 with the Nintendo 3DS. While they didn’t show off much in terms of game footage from the system, they did announce one new title for the system; Kid Icarus Uprising. The game looks great and puts the system on par between a Playstation 2 and a Gamecube (although some of the stuff seen on the E3 floor where slightly better than Nintendo 64 visuals, so it’ll take some time before we see some decent video footage of games). Since the 3D effect can’t be seen through giant screen videos, the conference ended by Nintendo sending out a large army of women with Nintendo 3DS systems tethered to their hips for the audience members to try out.

If Sony felt like they were going to have it easy after the Microsoft conference, they probably were sweating bullets after Nintendo’s show. It was the first time since the revealing of the Wii that Nintendo had a strong E3. Actually, it almost felt like E3 should have ended with Nintendo’s show because it was so great. Sony came into this E3 playing catch-up and Nintendo nearly lapped them after a mind-blowing 80 minute presentation.

Sony still had some big guns of their own to wow the crowd; although in the end it felt like a mixed bag. They tried to push the importance of 3D gaming and how the Playstation 3 will be the only system this holiday to have games available that can be played in an additional dimension. The problem with this though is that, while it wowed the crowd of glasses wearing journalists (and the people watching the Internet stream of the show if they were overworking their imaginations or on some sort of hallucegenic), Sony seemed to completely ignore the mass public’s current apathy towards 3D televisions.

While 3D movies are all the rage right now in cinemas, nobody is buying 3D televisions. The reason for this is because, for the most part, the financial investment to see 3D movies in theatres is on the theatre operator (while the ticket payer only has to pay a very small surcharge compared to the total cost of the equipment upgrade). However, when it comes to 3D televisions for home use, the entire financial burden is saddled with the consumer. If 3D televisions were cheap it would be one thing but they tend to start at the asking price of over $2000 and go up steadily from there. Combine that with the poor economy and the fact that many people have already shelled out for new TVs in the last couple of years and you’ve got a recipe for a very cold market.

Yet Sony is telling us that 3D gaming for the Playstation 3 will be immediately adopted and, if we’re not on the boat, we’re about to sink. Then again, this is the same Sony that told us rumble wasn’t important in a game system’s controllers (and later changed their mind). It’s also the same Sony that told us that Blu-Ray was the wave of the future. In four years, Blu-Ray has still only captured 11% of the home video market (DVD pretty much has a stranglehold on the rest) and is only gaining around 2% market share per year (and it’s growing at a constant, not exponentially). By the time Blu-Ray overtakes DVD in market share, it will have been overtaken by another format like solid-state media.

But back to the games, because Sony talked about a few of them. Killzone 3 looked really gray, which is what I hear the kids like in their first-person shooters nowadays. They they talked about the Playstation Move controller. In a nutshell, it’s a Wii Remote knockoff (down to the Nunchuk-type controller extension). However, the pointer functionality is sensed by the Playstation Eye camera instead of by an infrared sensor bar. Sony is playing it off like the whole thing will cost consumers $50 (which is the cost of one Move controller) but, considering that the Navigation sub-controller is pretty much required (at a cost of $30) and that most Playstation 3 owners don’t have a Playstation Eye, it becomes a really expensive setup. If you don’t have a Playstation 3 and you’re interested in the Playstation Eye, you might as well start saving your pennies now as its going to cost well over $400 dollars to be set up properly. Remember when Playstation 3’s weren’t moving all that well at $400 when the economy was better? Apparently Sony doesn’t because there doesn’t appear to be a price drop happening before next year.

Unlike Kinect which looked drastically different from what we’ve seen with the Wii, there wasn’t much to say about what the Move can bring to the table. In fact, most of it is almost identical to what we’ve seen with the Wii. They showed off Sorcery which looks like a very elaborate tech demo. It basically resembles a Harry Potter-type platformer and could have some potential but there wasn’t enough shown off to make it seem like a must-buy title (although to be fair, it’s coming out in 2011 so there’s still plenty we don’t know about it and plenty for time to redefine the controls and the graphics). They also showed off the Move-enhanced Tiger Woods 11 which plays exactly like the Wii version (including the Wii-version of Tiger Woods 10). In fact, Tiger Woods 11 look so similar to a Wii title that they had motion-control issues while it was being demoed. Another title they showed off was Sports Champions which looks a lot like a realistic version of Wii Sports Resort.

One quick thing about the similarities between Wii Sports Resort and Sports Champions: one of the neat things about Wii Sports Resort is that it looks incredibly cartoony. It looks fun to play with a group of friends. Sports Champions’s realism kind of takes away that goofiness that makes Wii Sports Resort appealing. Even Microsoft gets it with their Avatar characters which are just knock-offs of Miis.

Then, it became very clear that Sony doesn’t have a clue. They basically acknowledged that they’re having problems with the PSP sales. However, instead of promising a boatload of new titles (outside of a new God of War and the camera-enabled Invizimles) or coming out with new hardware that fixes some of the issues that are currently plaguing the PSP like the lack of real analog control or incredibly long load times, they basically blame the PSP’s problems on poor marketing. That couldn’t be the furthest thing from the truth. The PSP has been marketed very well in North America (aside from that fake blog fiasco from a couple of years ago).

I had been worried before E3 last year that my PSP would collect dust after major developers announced they were abandoning the platform. However, at E3, they showed off a strong library of games and throughout the holidays they practically bombarded the airwaves with interesting PSP commercials for the hardware. I was not too concerned about the system’s prospects last November because it looked like Sony was doing a good job marketing the system.

The games, on the other hand, were very poorly marketed. Not much was mentioned about many of the first-party PSP titles and the third-party PSP titles could have been vapourware for all it matters. In fact, Sony decided to forgo advertising the PSP version of LittleBigPlanet (which had been released as Sony’s big holiday PSP title) and decided that pushing the year-old PS3 version of LittleBigPlanet was a safer bet (in hindsight, it wasn’t a horrible play since LittleBigPlanet had a very strong 2009 holiday season).

So a summer marketing campaign with an annoying kid is not going to matter any. If there’s no content worth buying and the games control horribly due to a poor interface, then gamers are not going to invest money in the system. Just look at the Nintendo 64 or the Gamecube. Both great systems at the time if you didn’t mind waiting every three months for a good game to come out (ok, maybe two months for the Gamecube).

Speaking of LittleBigPlanet, they showed off the sequel to the PS3 game although none of the demoed part of the game involved the single-player game. They were showing off mini-games created using the level editor within the game. The problem here is that while LittleBigPlanet eventually sold two million copies, it took two heavily promoted holiday campaigns to do so. The chance to play someone’s creation of Bumper Balls (stolen from Mario Party) does not make me want to spend $60 on a game. The only question I had about this title was whether the controls were tightened up to make it feel less like Sackboy meanders around on screen like a drunk. I still have no idea because they didn’t mention anything about the single-player stuff.

They showed off more Medal of Honor 2 and Dead Space 2 which wasn’t all that interesting considering we had already seen these games earlier in E3. However, it’s interesting to note that PS3 will be getting exclusive special editions of each game (which probably explains all the Sony references during EA’s conference on Monday). It almost feels very bizarre considering that EA was one of the first publishers to be visually disgruntled over the launch of the PS3, it’s high price point, and it’s complex hardware architecture that made developing games for it a nightmare early on. Now the two companies are in bed with each other. Is there a developer backlash against Microsoft?

Since we’re on the subject of bitter enemies who became hot-and-heavy lovers, Gabe Newell came out and announced Portal 2 would be coming to the Playstation 3. This is kind of hilarious considering that Valve was probably the biggest voice against the Playstation 3 (probably even bigger than Microsoft) and that EA’s port of The Orange Box to the PS3 a few years ago was considered so horrible that some reviewers deemed the game unplayable. However, it appears that Valve and Sony have made up to the point where Newell said that the PS3 version of the game would be the best console version (although the best version overall will still be the PC version but he failed to mention that to the audience).

They showed another trailer for Final Fantasy XIV Online but still no gameplay footage. They finally dated Gran Turismo 5 for November 2nd, 2010 (as long as they don’t push it back to 2011). Then the show ended with a new Twisted Metal game.

Some people are really excited about this but I still can’t see why. There has only been one Twisted Metal game that sold over two million copies in North America (the second game in the series on the original Playstation). Twisted Metal is not a strong Playstation-branded franchise. It felt like they ended the show with no promise. If they had ended it with the Move or 3D gaming, it would have felt like the show ended with a bigger bang. Instead it just ended.

There is one thing of importance to mention about Sony’s event: Kevin Butler. They had him come out and do his funny shtick but it didn’t help sell a single console. He can bash (or his writers can have him bash) Microsoft’s Kinect or anything the Nintendo 3DS all he wants but at least there’s substance to what they have. It felt like Sony was chasing after their competition throughout their entire event. It wasn’t that their show was bad but it didn’t feel like there was any substance. It didn’t make me excited to be a PSP owner (unlike last year) and it didn’t make me feel like I needed to become a PS3 owner (unlike last year). Kevin Butler is funny and all but I would have rather the time wasted on him devoted to highlighting more games instead of cramming a bunch of titles within a few trailers that offered about five seconds worth of gameplay.

It’s hard to compare the three console E3 events because they were all trying to do different things. Microsoft was trying to captivate the casual market. I think that they did a decent job and do have quite a bit of momentum going forward (some retailers are saying that Kinect presales are doing very well and are actually surpassing Wii sales). The problem is that many of the hardcore fans feel like they’ve been abandoned by Microsoft. The thing though is that there really isn’t much of an alternative. Sure, the Microsoft core audience can all go out and buy PS3s but that’s probably not going to happen. Maybe they’ll see something more exciting at July Gamescon but for now they’ll have to contend with having to look forward to an “absolutely horrible” lineup of games on deck, including; Halo: Reach, Gears of War 3, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Medal Gear Solid: Rising, and Fable 3 (not to mention all the games announced at the EA and Ubisoft conferences as well).

Nintendo was lucky in that they didn’t have to waste time introducing a new method of input into a pre-existing device. Basically, Sony and Microsoft had to announce that they recreated the wheel while Nintendo was able to use the wheels they created four years ago to highlight an explosive lineup of games. For the last couple of years, Nintendo left people who watched their E3 presentations with a feeling of emptiness because they were busy wasting their time on gimmick products (remember Wii Music?). This year it was all about games and Nintendo delievered. It also helped that they were introducing a brand new system that would show off things that haven’t been done before. Nintendo didn’t have to waste time trying to copy or compete with the other companies. They just brought the goods to the show and left everyone watching the show feeling fulfilled.

Sony couldn’t do any right, it seems. Their 3D gaming is going to be a bust in the short term. If they can keep it going for the next five years, they’ll have something to work with because people will eventually adopt 3D technology when the prices go down and the glasses aren’t part of the equation. The Move feels like another thing that Sony has ripped off from Nintendo (whatever happened to Sixaxis?). They didn’t reveal any big titles (Twisted Metal is not a big title) and showed off plenty of stuff that we’ve already seen before. That being said, it’s not like Sony didn’t have decent content to show off. However, their stuff didn’t stand out. There’s a reason why Sony is getting very little mainstream press from this event. It’s because it feels like we’ve already seen Sony’s event before.

All in all, E3 was enjoyable. There were plenty of interesting titles shown off and there really was something for everyone. Usually, after watching all the presentations during the expo, I only see a couple of games that I get really excited about (usually a Mario game and one other title). This year though I got excited by a bunch of games and I might be making quite a number of preorders in the next couple of weeks. If you’re a casual or a hardcore gamer, it really doesn’t matter; E3 had plenty to offer for anyone who’s interested in gaming entertainment.

The latest edition of  Peter Anthony Holder’s Stuph File podcast is up on his website. Very good stuff as he interviews the guy who does the Uncle John books. My Dad and I have been big fans of the books for years. Maybe I’ll pick up the new Canadian edition later this week.

Don’t forget to check out Peter Anthony Holder’s website!

Click here for the link to the The Stuph File Program: Episode #0045

Click here to subscribe to his podcast via iTunes

Click here to subscribe to his podcast via RSS

Thankfully, E3 is over so at least I won’t have to spend most of the day talking and writing about video games. I can get back to writing about other stuff for the site. I’m not covering Gamescon. I want to write more about movies and stuff about Montreal and other things.

If you listened to Madness Brewing Live on Wednesday, you heard about the problems I’m having with the Video Game Hall of Fame. I’ve come up with a new system for voting and I’m in the middle of preparing a new ballot and sending it off to the voters. I’ll have more information about it on Monday’s video game podcast. It took more time to prepare than I would have liked (much to my annoyance which I’ll be more than happy to rant about on Monday’s podcast).

At least the site redesign is finished. I’m quite happy with it and the review and Hall of Fame pages look much better than they did before.

Video Game Review
Project Gotham Racing 4
Microsoft Xbox 360
2007
Developed by: Bizarre Creations
Published by: Microsoft Game Studios

Racing games are a dime a dozen on the Xbox 360. Microsoft has published almost as many racing games on the system than any other genre combined. Bizarre Creations and Microsoft Game Studios’s Project Gotham Racing 4 is a solid addition to anybody’s 360 racing library. It’s fast, fun, and gorgeous. It’s not perfect and has some serious issues but still stands as one of the superior racing games of the HD generation.

The game is played like a semi-realistic racer. While the controls are not as sensitive as the Gran Turismo games, they’re not as forgiving as the Ridge Racer games. There’s a fair amount of drifting in the game but those who can corner around tight turns without having to drift much or brake too hard will tend to leave the competition in the dust.

That’s not to say that the game doesn’t want you to drift. Not at all. The game employs the Kudos system which rewards the player for long drifts, good cornering, and passing competitors. Kudos can be spent on new tracks, cars, and game modes. Kudos are also earned by winning races and competitions.

The single player mode has two main categories: arcade and season. The arcade mode is split into several chapters consisting of ten races each. Medals are awarded based on the difficulty level the player chooses. Completing a challenge on the highest difficulty level earns the player a platinum medal. It’s nothing new as the arcade mode has been a staple of the Project Gotham Racing franchise since the beginning. It’s fun stuff but not as in-depth as the season mode. Still enjoyable nonetheless.

The season mode puts the player into a racing career where winning tournaments will cause the player to rise through the ranks and gain access to more challenging races. The more challenging the tournament, the more Kudos that can be earned. Once a player has achieved a certain ranking, they are moved up to the next skill level. The higher the skill level, the greater the access to racing events that have more kudos to earn.

The multiplayer aspect of the game is fun. For the most part, it’s online although you can partake in two-player offline split-screen races. The real neat online mode is the tournaments feature that requires players to qualify and then compete in races at the end of the day. It’s entertaining even though new players to the game will find themselves having trouble coming close to winning their first online race.

There are seven classes of cars. They range from A (the fastest and most powerful) through to G (whoa, slow down there grandma). Earlier races in the career mode will only allow for the weaker classes of cars to be used while the more skill-testing tournaments will demand for only the best cars in the game. However, each race has a restriction as to what class of car can be used; you can’t use a higher or lower classed car. This might be a problem for some as there are some great cars that one might grow fond of in the middle levels (like B or C class) but unable to use them in A class tournaments. True, the A class cars might be faster but some of those lower classes have cars that handle so well that it makes up for the loss of speed.

Bikes are also present. They handle differently than cars. Using them strategically during the career mode will be of great benefit since completing a season event with a bike or a car makes no difference. Sometimes the tight handling of a bike is of great advantage. However, very few bikes have high top speeds. So in longer, straighter races they become a problem. To complete the arcade mode, players will have to complete most courses with both a bike and a car which takes away all the strategy.

The game controls very well. The triggers make the controls feel perfect as some of the courses need some finesse with the gas pedal. However, I found myself relying on using the handbrake more than the regular brake. Still, I never found myself once having a problem remembering what button to press and never felt confused by the controls. Even though racing games shouldn’t have complicated controls, some companies can’t get the layout done properly. There should be no complaints by anyone about how this game is configured or handles.

The graphics look great. The cars look highly detailed and look almost like the real thing. The place where the game scores major points is its attention to detail. All nine cities (Well, technically eight cities and a race course) have been perfectly replicated down to the tiniest features. Even though it’s getting a bit annoying to see tons of product placement in video games, it’s still pretty cool to see the actual fast food restaurants line a particular street from a city like they do in real life.

It’s not all pretty. There are some areas where there’s slowdown. It’s a problem on rainy courses in some tight corners. It’s a major issue when you’re trying to perform a tight corner during a cone race only for the game to freeze up and your timing to be thrown off. It’s unnecessary and problematic and prevents this game from being one of the best in its class.

The sounds are great. The roaring of the engines really make you feel like you’re part of a real life race. The soundtrack of the game is excellent too as there’s plenty of options available that will please everyone. From the latest sounds to classical music, this game has it all. It’s one of the few games on the system where you won’t be thinking all that much about putting in your own custom soundtrack (although that option is available).

There were some issues I noticed during the career mode while racing. There were times where it told me incorrect information on the HUD that influenced how I handled my car while racing. It would sometimes tell me during a timed lap or during a cone race that I was either well ahead or way behind in a particular race. Then when I’d finish the race, it would tell me the exact opposite. I can understand if I make a mistake while racing and lose a few seconds but there were a few races where I was supposedly sitting in first with an eight second lead and then I would finish the race only to be sitting dead last twelve seconds behind the leader. It was frustrating in having to deal with this bug since it caused me to react to my position. I shouldn’t have to make a decision on whether to drive more aggressively or cautiously because of poorly written computer code.

Even with the issues, the game is a lot of fun. The season mode is a blast to play through and will keep any racing fan occupied for many hours. On top of that you have the arcade mode and the online play. Add it all up and you can see there’s a ton of content available. The racing in the game is very well done and grabbing the checkered flag feels very satisfying. A great thing about the game is the class system of cars that allow for some of the fast cars to be available right away so that players aren’t stuck with only slow cars at the beginning. It assumes that this is most likely not the first racing game that the player has ever touched so there’s no need to throw in a crawl-before-walking mechanic.

Project Gotham Racing 4 is a very fun game. It feels like a more complete racing experience than the previous three instalments in the series. Bizarre Creations and Microsoft did an admirable job with this title. However, it felt like they still should have delayed its release by a couple of months to iron out the wrinkles (like the graphical slowdowns and the HUD glitches). This could have been one of the best racing games ever but it’s problems do knock it down a few pegs. It’s a great racing game; just not the greatest racing game.

☆☆☆☆

If Super Mario Bros. was the first platform game that felt like an adventure, Metroid was the first platform game that felt like an epic event. Never before had a game’s environment felt so real as well it was also one of the first games to give the player a choice in how they wanted to explore the game. While The Legend of Zelda predates Metroid in Japan, for American gamers, this was their first window into seeing the future of gaming.

The player controls bounty hunter Samus Aran. The instruction telling the player to press start is the only in-game help the player will receive during the entire playing experience. It’s up to the player to decide whether to explore the planet Zebes by going left, right, up, or down in the side-scrolling quest. It feels like most places are accessible from the beginning. Sometimes there are barriers that prevent players from moving into a particular area unless they’ve found the right weapon to blast the barrier. Sometimes players stumble into open areas that are extremely difficult without the right type of weapon to combat the enemies. But most interesting of all is that some areas are accessible by exploring the terrain with all the available tools. A well-placed bomb in a inconspicuous place might get Samus access to an area that will help her progress on her journey.

Many people consider Metroid to be the child of the best characteristics of the first Super Mario Bros. and the original The Legend of Zelda. However, while the platforming elements of Metroid were directly inspired by Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda was not something the game developers turned to often while developing the game. Many of the innovations made famous by Zelda were actually in development for Metroid before Zelda’s release like open-world exploration and a weapons system. While there was communication between the two teams working on the individual projects internally at Nintendo, the two games were developed separately. As well, there was no way for the developers of Metroid to anticipate or predict The Legend of Zelda’s eventual success.

Metroid was a sign that more people would be required to develop console games due to their complexity. Most arcade games at the time were still being developed and designed by a few people. Metroid had fourteen people working on it. Super Mario Bros. only had seven and Zelda had ten. But even then, many of the people working on the game did not stay confined within their roles in the development process. It was common for people working on one subject of the game to suggest ideas to the people working on other parts of the game. An example of this is that Hirozaku “Hip” Tanaka helped out with graphics and writing the game even though his only credit for the game is for sound composition.

The sound and graphics of Metroid were great. Even though the soundtrack for Metroid was limited, the main theme of the game made the player feel like they were embarking on a great saga. However, it was the game’s opening music that set the tone for everything. The few tones heard prior to the game’s start were eerie in that it made one feel like they were isolated in a  lonely place. This was complemented well by the graphics as the visual presentation made it feel like that Samus was a long way from home and stuck on a planet filled with unfriendly creatures. The black background kept the dark and desolate mood going as the detailed sprites made the game come to life. Even though it was still an 8-bit game, the attention paid to detail for the monster design was incredibly well done. The evil creaturs looked genuinely frightening due to intelligent design rather than being a pixelated mess and looking disgustingly gruesome for no proper reason.

Another title that’s tied to Metroid is Kid Icarus. They’re often referred to as sister titles because many gameplay elements and most of the team from Metroid were employed with the Kid Icarus game. Kid Icarus was released four months after Metroid in Japan and was actually released a month earlier than Metroid in North America. The reason why the Metroid, Kid Icarus, and The Legend of Zelda time releases are so backwards is because all three games were developed for the Nintendo Disk System in Japan. The Disk System was a add-on for the Famicom (the Japanese NES) that would allow players to save their game progress. However, the attachment was never released stateside and adjustments needed to be made that would allow for users to keep track of their progress without having to start the game over from the beginning every time the game was powered on. The Legend of Zelda, despite it releasing only a week later in North America after Metroid, was the first game to feature a battery backup to save the game progress. A password system was implemented with Kid Icarus and then Metroid. In fact, the Justin Baliey code for Metroid is one of the most popular codes on the NES and ranks right up there with the Konami code. That code exposed Samus for what she truly was.

That’s right, Samus Aran was a woman. However, most people who played the game when it was just released didn’t know it. Only once the game was completed did people find out the truth. In fact, the faster one beat the game, the more people would see of Samus…literally. While it wasn’t the first time that the main character of a popular video game was a female (Ms. Pac-Man was a more popular game than the original Pac-Man), it was the first time where a female character in a starring role was running around with guns a-blazing. While the strip down to the bikini for fast completion times didn’t do anything for the feminist movement within video games, the game itself proved that people had no issue accepting a female as the main character in an action-adventure game. One could argue that many people didn’t know that Samus was a woman when the game first came out. However, Metroid remained popular during the lifespan of the NES and is one of Nintendo’s biggest franchises. The first batch of people didn’t know but the millions that would later get interested in the franchise definitely knew and really didn’t take any issue with her gender.

The legacy of the game is a bit weird in that even though Nintendo acknowledged it as one of their major franchises during the mid-90s, it was largely ignored for a while. Metroid II: The Return of Samus was released for the Game Boy in 1991. It featured the same style of gameplay as the original and was portable. Super Metroid came out in 1994 for the Super Nintendo and is widely regarded as one of the best video games of all time. However, despite the critical acclaim for Super Metroid, there wasn’t a Metroid game for Nintendo’s next home console, the Nintendo 64. One of the frequently offered explanations for this by Nintendo executives is because they wanted to make sure Metroid’s transition to 3D would be worthwhile rather than offering a poor experience. Many companies rushed the transition of their franchises from 2D gameplay towards 3D too quickly and disappeared from the gaming landscape as a result. Even though fans of the series were routinely disappointed by the lack of Metroid appearing during major gaming events like E3, they would be rewarded greatly after both Nintendo learned the ins-and-outs of 3D gaming and the technology for 3D gaming improved greatly.

It was  the Gamecube in 2002 that saw the next instalment of the franchise. However, the game was played as a 3D first person shooter. Metroid Prime sparked a trilogy on both the Gamecube and the Wii. The Gamecube received Metroid Prime 2: Echoes in 2004 while the Wii received Metroid Prime 3: Corruption in 2007 (as well as a collector’s edition package containing all three games in the series optimized for the Wii’s motion controls). Metroid: Other M is a return to the series 2D platforming roots. To be released in 2010 for the Wii, it will be a convergence of the old style of Metroid games from the NES and SNES as well as some action from the 3D perspective similar to the Gamecube and Wii games.

There were also several Metroid games released for Nintendo handhelds. Metroid II was the only one released for the Game Boy but several Metroid games came out for the Game Boy Advance. Metroid Fusion was released in 2002 and featured gameplay very similar to that of Super Metroid. Using the Game Boy Advance-Gamecube link cable, players who completed the game and connected their system to the Gamecube (with a Metroid Prime game inside of the console) were able to unlock the original Metroid game. Metroid: Zero Mission was released in 2004 and is a quasi-remake of the original game. While the game borrows many of the same areas, characters, and scenarios from the original, Zero Mission also includes new areas and enemies to fight on top of enhanced graphics and music. The Nintendo DS also received a Metroid game with the release of Metroid Prime: Hunters in 2006. The game is played exactly like the other Prime games on the Gamecube and Wii although players use the system’s touchscreen to aim Samus’s weapons by tapping the area where they want to shoot.

Aside from the unlockable feature in Metroid: Zero Mission for the Game Boy Advance, the original game has been made available for purchase on a few other occasions. The game was released as part of the NES collection for the Game Boy Advance in 2004. It was also released on Nintendo’s Virtual Console service for the Wii in 2007.

The only thing that’s unfortunate about Metroid is that it does seem to be a title that hasn’t been able to age well. It’s open-world gameplay is rudimentary compared to the games today and passwords, which were annoying to deal with back in the 80s, are very beyond annoying to deal with considering that all modern systems are now equipped with internal memory for game saves. Still, Metroid set gaming standards when it was released and, with a bit of imagination and forgiveness, is still a great game to play today. If Metroid hadn’t come along, gaming wouldn’t have progressed as quickly as it did entering the 90s.

The Montreal Canadiens have continued their long tradition of trading away key players of their hockey team for literally nothing. I think it’s my fault because I was born. I keep asking my Dad if the Habs pulled this crap when he was younger and he always looks back at me and laughs, saying that back in his day the Habs were too busy winning Stanley Cups for stupid stuff like that to happen.

The Habs miracle run of this past season ended with a loss to the Philadelphia Flyers in the conference finals; a place the Habs haven’t been since 1993. Not only were the Habs considered unlikely candidates to make it that far in the playoffs but they basically tripped into the playoffs at the end of the season. To say that the Habs looked pathetic the last month of the season would be an understatement. They made the 1992-93 expansion Ottawa Senators look like an all-star team.

However, a few players shined throughout the playoffs and turned the Habs from a laughing stock to Cup contenders in a matter of weeks. While Mike Cammarlleri was scoring goals at a record setting pace, the big story was Jaroslav Halak shutting down not only Alexander Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals but also Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and the rest of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Halak’s performances were so good and so awe-inspiring that it made me, a long time Habs cynic actually care about the team.

So they rewarded Halak’s brilliant play with a one-way trip to St. Louis. Sometimes professional teams reward an outstanding player for their performance during the year with something extra like a car or a exotic vacation. I’ve never been to St. Louis but I’m pretty sure it’s as far away as exotic as a North American city can get.

Looking at what the Canadiens got, it looks like the tradition of horrible trades will most likely continue. The Habs got a minor leaguer and a player who’s still in the juniors. Both players have a combined SEVEN whole NHL games under their belt. You know, it would be something if they had picked up two junior players that were lighting the lamp up non-stop in their respective leagues but neither are.

Ian Schultz is a right-wing who’s been playing for the Calgary Hitmen for the last three seasons (he played one game in 2006-07). At the time he was drated in 2008, he led the Hitmen for penalty minutes that season. He’s a big guy that’s closer towards being an enforcer with limited ice time rather than someone along the lines of Zdeno Chara. In fact, some had criticized the Blues for picking him too high as they picked him 87th overall in the third round while he was ranked 92nd out of the North American players according to Central Scouting’s final rankings. He has improved a bit in the last two seasons as he’s nearly doubled his point-output from 30 in 2008 to 55 in 2010. However, if he’s only scoring 55 points in junior, he’s most likely not even going to come close to replicating those stats in the NHL.

Lars Eller is a centre/left-wing who has only played seven NHL games. He did score two goals for the Blues though. There seems to be plenty of upside with the guy but also quite a bit of hang-ups. According to multiple scouting agencies, he’s got tons of potential and Central Scouting actually had him ranked 3rd amongst European skaters in 2007. He played in this year’s AHL All-Star Game. However, he was a –1 for the Peoria Rivermen of the NHL in 70 games. He also comes from Denmark which isn’t a country known for their hockey players. While that may mean absolutely nothing during the regular season, it means that he’s little exposure to big game situations like World Championships and other international hockey events. He might be able to win big in his small pond but the NHL has much bigger fish.

So in Eller there’s potential and Schultz there’s cap liability. Not exactly what the people in Montreal want to hear. Maybe there was something else in the equation that we don’t know about (problems in the locker room, personal decisions, etc.) that have influenced too many horrible trades for Montreal in recent memory. From all things that I’ve heard was that Halak generally kept his nose clean and was a choir boy compared to his goaltending counterpart on the team, Carey Price. Does this mean the Habs have something in the works for the draft or do they have another trade up their sleeves? Are they trying to save cap space for a major player coming in or are they trying to throw money at players who might be leaving? It’s going to be a very interesting off-season for the Habs.

Read my full rant and all the info you need to know about the two new players by clinking on this link.

A few weeks ago I did an interview with Matthew Doucette of Xona Games. It was a really good interview and I’ve received quite a bit of positive feedback from the interview. It had previously been only available in the middle of one of the weekly video game podcasts but I’ve decided to make it avaliable as its own separate download in its entirety. We talk about one of the best games currently on the Xbox Live Indie service, Decimation X; as well as the upcoming Duality ZF. Matthew also shares his opinions on what its like being an indie developer and how interesting a road its been for him and his brother Jason (the two of them comprise the entire staff of Xona Games).

It’s really worth the listen and if you have an Xbox 360, I highly suggest you pick up Decimation X. It only costs around $1. Personally, I can’t wait to get Duality ZF in my hands.

Right click to download and listen to my interview with Matthew Doucette of Xona Games – 39 mins (35.9MB)