Duke Nukem 3D Releases on XBLA Wednesday
And I think they should call it Duke Nukem Forever.
Basically I’m just updating about this to posit my theory that George Broussard is actually dead. I believe he died in 1996, soon after the release of Duke Nukem 3D. He was judged by his maker to go to Hell and be punished for the rest of eternity. Beelzebub, the Lord of the Flies, told Broussard “for your sins in the World of Man you shall be tortured for all time! Because you were so proud of your creation, your ‘video game’, you shall be forced to make Duke Nukem… FOREVER!”
Now George Broussard is stuck on a neverending cycle of creating an entire game from scratch, dropping the engine, recreating it from scratch, dropping the engine again, and so on and so forth for eternity.
King of Fighters XII is going to kick everyone’s ass.
I was dicking around on TEH INTERNETS when I stumbled across the announcement that all of King of Fighters XII’s graphics are going to be hand-drawn. There are a couple of gameplay videos floating around. I present for your enjoyment exhibit A:
Oh my dear sweet Lord. This is beautiful. As I say several times a day, thank god for Japan. If they didn’t keep my beloved 2D fighters alive I don’t think anyone would. No word on a US release yet, but if we all wish hard enough, maybe I’ll get my very own personal arcade version.
Farewell, Aladdin’s Castle.
When I was a kid, one of my dreams and aspirations for life was to be left in an arcade overnight, allowed to play whatever I wanted whenever I felt like it. I guess I just assumed the games were free at night or something. Fuck you, I was young. I just hated waiting in lines to play Sunsetriders, or having to share Captain America and the Avengers with people twice my age who wanted to treat me like shit. Or, even worse, even though I was pretty good at Street Fighter 2 for someone my age, I hated that I couldn’t play it without getting my ass kicked and my money wasted. I just wanted all the other people to go away so I could have the whole arcade to myself.
Well, dreams do come true. And it’s not as great as I had hoped.
The other day I stopped at East Towne Mall (Knoxville Center my ass) to pick some stuff up and grab some food. To this day, I still feel a (admittedly very mild) euphoria when I get to the pizza place in the food court, because it’s right next to the arcade, an old Namco Aladdin’s Castle. Words simply cannot express what an influence this place had on my formative years.
Some of my earliest memories are hazy blurs of playing The Simpsons and X-Men, my parents (or, more commonly, my grandfather) literally holding me up to the machine and letting me play. I can still to this day point to exactly where those machines were in the arcade. As I got older, I started to get into 1-on-1 fighters, starting with (what else but) Street Fighter 2. I remember the day Mortal Kombat was introduced, and being amazed at the line of teenagers waiting to play it. I remember when they put a Street Fighter vs. X-Men machine in, and I found the first fighting game I was good at. I remember playing Rapid River over and over again, until I got too hot and tired, at which point I’d play Arctic Thunder, just because it had a really powerful fan. It was my first social hangout as I moved into adolescence, when my best friend and I would hang out and dick around. I remember collecting and saving up over 2000 tickets, which, by the way, I’m never going to get a chance to spend now.
I walked in to play a quick game of House of the Dead 2, when I noticed that the relatively large, busy arcade that I had gone to every time I visited the building was replaced with a small little hole in the wall that looked like the windowfront of a department store. It was completely deserted, even of attendants. There were maybe 8 or 9 games inside, and really only 4 of those were actual video games: Tekken 5, House of the Dead 2, Time Crisis 4, and Crisis Zone (A police chase game was also available, but was awful), and of those 4, only 2 worked. No one at all was inside, not even any attendants. I spent a dollar, collected my token, and started to play HOTD2. The gun’s accuracy was maladjusted, so I could barely hit anything. I tried switching guns, only to find that the other gun’s trigger was barely even attached. There was no one to ask for my money back. I decided to not even bother spending my last token. As I attempted to play, a kid, about my age when I loved this arcade, watched me play. I leaned over to him and said “This place used to be my favorite place in the world when I was your age.” All he said was “There’s nothing to do here.” before he left with his sister. He didn’t even ask to play anything.
And why would he? He could go fire up his Xbox 360 and play Moving, Artistic World War II Story 5 or Totally Badass Space Marine 12 with 20 other people across the world. I guess that’s an advancement, but what about those of us who still want to play Poorly Translated, Impossible-To-Understand-Story Shooter? What about someone who just wants to kill some time with a quick game that’s not a fucking puzzle game with a stupid name or another generic 3rd person shooter?
A lot of people think that the problem with the arcade industry today is that the technological advantage of the equipment has been eliminated. People can play games that are just as or even more technologically advanced at home for one price, without having to wait in line or blow $80 of quarters, with other players to boot. This is absolutely true; no one can argue that, unless the game has some kind of wacky attachment, like a ballroom dance floor, or a magic hat, or something, the arcade machine can’t really offer any technical advantage over a console. However, I think the real problem with the arcade industry is that, when that technical advantage disappeared, they simply never looked for another advantage, half-heartedly attempting to provide an input device one couldn’t have at home, and quitting when those peripherals starting appearing for consoles. But where could they turn, you ask?
If I didn’t have a solution, it would have been really stupid for me to put that rhetorical question.
I think the biggest problem with the arcade industry as it is right now is that it’s being thought of as a gaming platform, rather than as an establishment. Modern arcades should be treated like casinos, simple as that. Just look at how successful casinos are; you can play a game of poker at home, with your friends, drinking and eating whatever the hell you want at a price that’s not going to cost all your winnings. You can even gamble, to boot, no cheating dealers, or card counters, or mob hitmen to tell you when you’ve won enough, or any of the other problems associated with casinos. But Las Vegas is still one of the world’s top vacation spots, and they aren’t going to watch shitty magicians.
If the arcade is thought of as a form of non-shitty casino, a lot of problems are eliminated. Instead of just going after whatever the most technically advanced game is in the book, operators should look for what people are actually going to play. Rather than competing with consoles by having the exact same product as them (“I have Soul Calibur 4 at home, why would I pay another $15 to beat it here?”), they could compete by having stuff you can’t go pick up at Blockbuster and play at home for a week (“Wow, they have Gaplus! Hey, fuck ‘AAA’, I could get a way higher score than him!”). It’s really not that hard to figure out. Buy a Street Fighter 2 machine for $200 and have a tournament. Give a prize every week to whoever has the highest score in Galaga. The trick is to pull people in with games they’re interested in, and for the most part, that’s going to be simpler games
Look at Xbox Live Arcade. Very few XBLA games have “next-gen” graphics, and the gameplay mechanics are often very basic. These games are not successful because they look nice, or because the gameplay is so complex; they are successful because they are simple, innovative, fun, and cheap. This is what the arcade industry has lost. The only games in arcades anymore are racing games, light gun shooters, and DDR. (Oh, and those fucking hunting games. Goddammit I hate those.) How fun would it be to sit around an arcade machine with three friends and play Castle Crashers? There is a certain atmosphere and mystique to an arcade that you simply can’t match at home, and that’s what they should capitalize on.
Imagine, if you will, a fairly large building, teeming with arcade machines, and with a good-sized restaurant. At any point while you’re playing, you can order a pile of hamburgers for you and your friends, or a pizza, or pizza bagels, or any other horrible-for-you snack food. Plenty of older games are available, of course, like Galaga or Gauntlet (notice how often I mention Galaga. That’s because it’s critical to any good arcade.), as well as newer ones, a sequel to Castle Crashers, a line of people with quarters up waiting to play Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix, a good, old-fashioned 2-player machine featuring Commando III. This is what I imagine, a melding of old and new in a social environment where no one feels out of place, and there are plenty of actual games that appeal to kids and adults, hardcores and casuals. Very similar to a casino, but not full of elderly, chain-smoking Wisconsinites, and with no gambling(I can’t stress this enough. Gambling attracts the shittiest people.). Tournaments are held frequently, with decent cash or non-cash prizes. A leaderboard shows the highest scores for certain games for the week. Basically, Xbox Live Arcade with a restaurant and a real social element. No more playing online with douchebags. If arcades were filled with simpler games more suited for the arcade environment, games that people could compete on and or just play for fun, have a good time with their friends and maybe order some food, they could become a legitimate force in gaming again. This is something I had thought would happen when casual games got big; I expected to see Bejeweled machines and a resurgence of games casual players played when they weren’t 50/playing sports/girls, like Galaga and Pac-Man. This happened, to a very limited extent. But for the most part, arcades just kinda sat around as the casual movement continued to move.
Arcades always marketed almost solely to kids in the 80s, and this was the best possible business plan, because the generation before had no real desire for video games. This is not the 80s; the demographics have changed. The kids that games were solely marketed to in the 80s are adults now, with kids of their own, and they see no problem at all with hanging out at an arcade playing games with their kids. Believe me, I’m right next door to Sevierville, TN. I’ve seen the arcades there. There are PLENTY of parents playing games with their kids. If someone would capitalize on this, it could completely save the arcade industry.
This, however, probably does not mean anything for my beloved Aladdin’s Castle. At the point it’s been reduced to, it probably won’t make it through another year. I’ll never understand how people expect their business to be more successful by reducing the appeal of it, but maybe that’s why I’m not a businessman. No matter how great any other arcade is, it could never capture the appeal my arcade had for me, simply because it’s not what I grew up with. I have the best wishes for the arcade industry, and I’d do whatever I could to support it, but my arcade will always be this shitty mall arcade. It hurts to see it go. Oh well. At least I’ll always have one of their tokens.
We’re Back
Sorry kids, technical difficulties on the site prevented me from updating. By “technical difficulties”, I mean “exotic sexual diseases”, and by “on the site”, I mean “from a Filipina hooker”. Updates will resume soon.
Fuck Yeah, a Prinny Game!
One of my favorite video game characters ever, the Prinny from Disgaea, is getting it’s own game, “Prinny: Is It Ok If I’m the Main Character?”. I don’t have anything funny to say about this, I just think it’s awesome.
Oh, wait, I thought of something.
If you have a problem with this character having his own game, I hope you fall in a river and drown.
Things That Have Been Pissing Me Off Lately – Part 2
Ok, this one’s going to be kinda short, because it’s not too bad, and I can’t really justify stretching it out.
It really, really bugs the shit out of me when people tell you how many games they’re planning in their “new series”.
Was that too short? I guess I should elaborate.
Nearly every original game that comes out anymore is part of a “series”, according to the developer.
You don’t have a fucking series until you release more games. This is where the problem lies: one game is produced, and in the lead-up to the game, the reviewer is talking about how the game is part of this huge, never-ending series, but when the game comes out, it’s immediately evident the game’s not going to get one sequel, much less 12, and furthermore, that they really obviously haven’t even planned out past one sequel. What’s wrong with just releasing a game and seeing how it goes? Is it a requirement that you have to be a pretentious asshole, or are you just using it as an excuse for not finishing the goddamn story the first time? I would say to look at A New Hope (Star Wars) for an example of how to finish a story satisfactorily while leaving it open for a sequel, but it’s pretty obvious developers have been looking at it, since they keep ripping it off.
But I guess I can’t think of any series with good storylines that haven’t been a “planned series”, other than Mega Man, The Legend of Zelda, Final Fantasy, Mario, Sonic, Dragon Warrior, Lufia, Castlevania, Metroid, Ninja Gaiden, Mother/Earthbound, and several others, so maybe I’m the one who is wrong here.
The Internets Man Came.
I put more internets in my internets box. I’ll be posting more from now on.
OH GOD HOW DID THIS GET HERE I AM NOT GOOD WITH COMPUTAR
