Sasuke: Ninja Warrior

So am I the last person on earth to find out about Sasuke/Ninja Warrior? I guess you can catch it on G4 late at night (Must. Set. TiVo). However, you can find plenty of highlights (including the new impossible 2007 course) on the YouTubes.

What's amazing to me is that I feel like I'm watching people play a videogame in real life. I know that sounds so cliche, but it's just so damn true. Just look at it, if that's not a platforming side-scroller, complete with a boss stage, I don't know what is.

Spoiler alert: If you watch the show, this footage may not have aired yet. It's of one of the only people to have ever completed the 4th stage.

Evidently there are very few people (less than 1%) who've ever finished the course.

Also: There's a lady's mode as well, called Kunoichi.

Seriously, why don't we have theme parks where I live where I can pay to go play on these things? I'd die of exhaustion, but holy cow, does this look like fun real life gaming.

GameJew Takes on Education

My favorite internet star of the moment, GameJew (AKA Jonathan Mann), takes on education in the latest episode: GameJew Episode 7. He visits a videogame class at a technical college, then talks to a professor of interface design at an arts school, and finally ends by driving around a videogame bus to teach kids how to play co-operatively.

There's a wealth of interesting insights here - like the fact that the kids value winning over challenge, something that a lot of hardcore gamers may not understant, since one common critique that can lower a review score is that the game is "too easy."

The 3D interfaces designed by the teacher Jonathan interviews are also beautiful and inspire new possibilities for videogame controls.

GameJew is one of the smartest, funniest, most creative commentators on the culture of videogames today, and I urge anyone interested in that to check out his work. It's not always perfect, but I would argue that it never fails to engage.

Ms. Spartan in DOA4

I hadn't heard this anywhere before, so in the off chance that you weren't aware of it . . .

Link a la 1up.com

Apparently the Halo 2 playable fighter in DOA4 is a girl Spartan. Giving DOA's usual propensity for skimpy costumes and advanced mammary physics, I was pleasantly surprised to see her fully armored, without armor boob-slots and still helmeted. According to the article, Spartan-458 isn't a throw-away character. 55 unique moves of her own, taller than most the other characters and speedy to boot, she should be some good fun for you dual-wielding DOA/Halo fans.

-matt

Colossi and the Banned Ad

I've had a chance to play Shadow of Colossus and I'm finding it very difficult to contain my hyperbole. Let's just assume that I've said every possible, positive thing about the game that I could while using a bare minimum of qualifying statements just to appear as though my assessment were objective.

Which, of course, it is not. A primary indicator of which is that Ico may very well be my favorite game in all of eternity. Every instance that I've had to write of Ico's virtues I have taken on with exuberance. Not just any run-of-the-mill exuberance, mind you, but with unadulterated, Viking exuberance. You know, when they got blitzed on mead and charged naked and screaming into battle in the hopes of dying for Odin so as to join their kin in Valhalla.

So, it's from that place that I am approaching Shadow of the Colossus. I find the story arc, beauty and the overwhelming contrasts of scale to be just as enthralling as they were in Ico, but in a different emotional context. In Ico, the sense was of being lost and vulnerable, yet determined to overcome. In Shadow of the Colossus, this determination of the main character takes center stage and the environment isn't a strange puzzle to stumble through, but a knowable to be foreceably conquered.

It also doesn't hurt that the colossi fucking rock. While I've been told the all-boss-battle gameplay metaphor has been used in the past, I'm certain its never been done like this. Each Colossus is a "level" with a sort of Zelda-like overworld in between. Someone's probably pointed that out already.

Also, there's this. I'm no longer in cahoots with the rest of the intraweb the way I used ta be, so you nerds have probably already seen this and passed it to the AllYourBase bin. Apparently it's a Euro-PS2 price-drop commercial that was banned. Thanks Fira :) - sorry for the delayed response.

I'll Defend Yu
After trying to be productive for the better part of the morning, I found myself without much to do. Boredom set in. And naturally, my thoughts turned towards the stack of games I'd gathered in the past month; free time proved to be a precious commodity during the weeks of E3 preparation and I often chose to spend it socially rather than with a controller in-hand. Yet this afternoon, rather than peel the plastic off Enthusia or Devil May Cry 3, or return to Guild Wars to level, I somehow got the urge to robotically run through the streets of '80s era Hong Kong in Yu Suzuki's flawed epic Shenmue II for the Xbox. I know. I'm completely insane.

Right trigger to run? Come on. Required d-pad assisted turning that make Resident Evil's oft-ridiculed controls feel fluid? Yup, it's in there. It's almost as if the developer went out of its way to make playing the game as frustrating as possible. And don't even get me started on the dialogue or voice acting. If I hadn't already had an early save game on my Xbox, I would've returned to the subtitled Dreamcast version. The Japanese vocal track is far superior to the laughable localization most are familiar with.

The gameplay, too, is heavily flawed. I'm quite fond of the fact that Ryo Hazuki, our main character, has to work a job to afford life on the road. Or rather, I'm fond of the idea. In practice, the work segments are a bit too repetitious and often too dependant on luck rather than skill. I don't expect work to be fun, even in a videogame, but I would like the ability to excel and earn more money in turn. Shenmue, unfortunately, doesn't often allow for that sort of thing. And can it get tedious...

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Shopping for the national pastime.

My local home opener is April 11th this year. It’s a day game at one of these recently erected but old-styled urban ballparks – for some reason the park is in a distant suburb, but we can overlook that. You’d think I already have my tickets, that I’ve anxiously awaited the event since sometime late last year. But I haven’t paid much attention to baseball in more than twenty years.

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What Could Happen in the Next Hour?

Let's talk about something fun for Friday. While on tour with Dealership, we watched a lot of DVDs to pass the time during those 12-hour-drives across this vast nation. We discovered that movies are slightly less desirable for road trips, because they require sustained focus. TV shows, however - bitesized, snappily written bits fo fluff - are, like trail mix, perfect fodder for consuming on the go. "Freaks and Geeks" was awesome, and "The Simple Life" was painfully hilarious, but the one that we got really addicted to was "24".

You probably know the premise of the show: events take place in real time, over the course of twenty-four hours of a single day. Sounds somewhat unsustainable - after all, the show takes place in LA, and wouldn't you waste at least half an episode every time a character had to drive somewhere?

But this is fantasy LA, and besides, something bad always happens before the character reaches the destination, in part because the action can never slow down. Which leads to a very interesting type of show - a show that must be open-ended and flexible, that must maintain pacing, that must weave together several threads in a way that makes sense at the end - in short, a modular show, put together in blocks of well-balanced plot-bits.

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Future of Tech TV

Last month when the purchase was announced I was out on a back porch in San Francisco with Adam Sessler. He said he didn't know what would happen, but he was hopeful that the quality of TechTv could be maintained, and that the people who worked there could keep doing what they had been doing.

But now things are looking a bit bleaker. Sure, TechTV had its flaws, but compared to G4's non-stop prattling it seemed a paragon of intellectual commentary on videogame and technology culture. The rumour is that the entire SF office will be closed down and relocated to LA. Damn you, Comcast.

And you want Disney, too? Is there no end to this devouring cable monster?

I'm giving up on TV. Except as a vehicle upon which to play games and watch DVDs.

And what are you all doing this weekend?

32-1? That was a hockey match?

There's nothing like watching your opponent rack up children's league basketball scores in a hockey match to put you in your place. Based upon six months of fairly in-depth experience with Xbox Live I've isolated three things about networked gaming I believe to be true.

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There are no old, bold pilots.

When do you retire a game, even one of your all-time favorites? With a narrative game, that's a relatively easy decision: at the end of the game. Or one of the several possible endings of the game. Or when you've played through the game on the highest difficulty setting. Or when you've loved, lost and just flat given up on ever "winning". Okay, perhaps it's not such an obvious decision; but worse yet is determining when to quit playing a "sandbox" or non-narrative game, or a game with an online gaming competitive feature.

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Pushing My Buttons

by Kyle Hebert, guest contributor

Console gaming is big business. In November alone Sony sold over a million consoles.  That said, surely most Americans have, at some point in their life, wielded a control pad and with  joysticks and a few brightly colored buttons guided a plumber, fox, soldier through digitized terrain. Why is it then that movies and television shows can’t get it right when depicting a character playing a video game?

We’ve all seen it before: players with one thumb repeatedly mashing buttons while the other twirls the joystick mindlessly. If their machinations are to be believed then the best way to enjoy whatever game they’re playing is to watch as the character jumps around in a circle.

Some games have production values and costs on par with big budget movies. The least movies and television could do is correctly portray the industry that is nipping at its heels.

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Oh, no! Convergence again.

This isn't the first year that a film associated with a tie-in video game has been nominated for an Academy Award; but it is the first year the collaterally marketed game has garnered very good if not outstanding notices from a wide variety of game media. Yes, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King marks a milestone in the -- pardon my use of this eye-smacking word -- convergence of film and video games: good film; good game.

For those of you who give a damn what I think about the other nominations: kudos to Alec Baldwin for his shot at best actor in a supporting role; likewise, Johnny Depp for best actor. For what it's worth, my pick -- not a prediction but the desire of my heart -- is a Lost in Translation sweep: Coppola for director (she'll have the statuette to whack Spike over the head with if they run into each other at the ceremony); Murray for best actor; and, finally, it takes best film (Coppola will then have an Oscar for keeps that isn't all bloody -- like a tiny model murder weapon from Clue -- due to her estranged husband encounter). Sofia, if you are reading and I know you are, when the ink dries on your divorce decree, I will be lamentably unavailable. Pass by, my dear; maybe in another life, a different time and place.

An aside, ever since Gandhi, doesn't Ben Kingsley just automatically get nominated every year? Must be built into AMPAS's vote-tallying software or something.

"Taito" is Japanese for "insane".

This morning, CNN reports that Japanese video game maker Taito will rerelease the all-time classic Space Invaders -- from the accompanying photograph, apparently the somewhat less classic color version -- to the United States in an arcade enclosure. Taito plans to sell the units through Namco, which retains U.S. distribution outlets, for a reported 300,000 yen. That's 24 million rupiahs. Seriously, though, it's a chunk of change. Approximately US$2,800. Immediately, you must be thinking, as I was, that Taito's marketing people have lost their pachinko balls; or they're shipping the units through Thailand, where the pressboard arcade enclosures are stuffed with special, organically grown all-natural "padding" and then ferried along to North America.

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Is Disney Really "Kiddy"?

Kingdoms Hearts became one of Sony’s Greatest Hits titles a little while back, and I noticed that retailers were finally kind enough to lower it to its appropriate price. Do you all remember the backlash surrounding the collaboration between Disney and Squaresoft when they revealed the game last year? After the announcement, legions of forum goons quickly spammed message boards across the gaming world, up in arms over Square’s treachery. How could Square sell its soul to the "kiddy" devil?, they decried.

Anyone who played the game once it was eventually released would probably admit that although a bit spotty, Kingdom Hearts’s story could’ve easily adapted to a Final Fantasy game. And Square Enix’s recent decision to include KH as one of its three main franchises only bodes well for further plot development. So, I guess Kingdom Hearts wasn’t akin to a typical Disney movie like the goons originally proclaimed...or was it?

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What's Sexy?

The BBC reported that Mr. Darcy won out in a recent poll as the fictional character whom British women would most like to date. What's not to love about Darcy? Okay, he's a little stuck-up. But he's extremely handsome, well-bred, of a good old family (although that aunt of his is insufferable) and he happens also to be the richest man in the county. That never hurts.

As far as electronically-generated fictional characters go, however, there isn't much to make women swoon. Mostly you get muscle-bound dorks with very little character, like Turok or that Doom gunslinger. You get broody pouty boys with troubled pasts in Japanese rpgs, like Squall or the Canadian equivalent, Carth (although I admit I have a soft spot in my heart for him). You get little prepubescent boys like Link.

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Gamers and Goths

As many of you already know, White Wolf is suing Sony over its new Underworld movie for copyright infringement, claiming that Underworld's characters, theme and setting are based on White Wolf’s Vampire: The Masquerade® and Werewolf: The Apocalypse™ roleplaying game series. While the lawsuit itself is rather ridiculous, it did make me think about the intersection of goth culture and gaming.

During the Austin Game Conference last week, I went with some friends to the Elysium Nightclub to see the Crüxshadows perform. I had never been to a goth concert before but I had nothing better to do and was desperate for entertainment. Surprisingly, I rather enjoyed it and will mostly likely be attending their next show in SF. Upon entering the club, I was immediately impressed by the amount of games they had. In addition to the pool tables you would expect in most bars, there were two pinball tables (with the suitably gothy themes of Dracula and the Adams Family) and a whole section devoted to classic arcade games (which were not noticeably gothy at all unless you consider Joust somewhat intimidating). Who knew gaming was so prevalent in the goth scene?

After a little digging around, I was able to find official Sims skins for the Crüxshadows' lead singer and a full featured Underworld Half-life Mod. Anyone else know of other examples of goth gaming?

A Little Romance

It's been a Bioware infestation at the Justin and Jane Gaming Palace. I got the new NWN expansion pack, Shadows of Undrentide, and it's a whole new universe of addiction. Justin picked up Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and, uh, hasn't really put it down yet.

Both are fine adventures in the honorable Bioware tradition, where good guys are good and bad guys are delectably twisted. I managed to convince Justin to switch with me for a few hours so I could check out KOTOR, and I almost didn't let him have the controller back.

I played a female scoundrel and I tried really hard to get her to go on the Dark Side of the Force. One of the guys who joined my party is definitely a Light-side kind of guy, so it was natural that he didn't really seem to trust me very much. In fact he kept complaining when I shook people down for money or collected bounties on innocent heads. But at one point in the conversation, he said, "I'm all ears, beautiful."

My choices were:
1. "I think that's inappropriate."
2. "Beautiful? You've got to be joking."
3. "I like the sound of that."
4. "Are you flirting with me?"

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A little R&R with D&D

Tabletop RPG enthusiasts are coming out of the woodwork all around me.

Last Friday I was at dinner for a friend of mine, who is in my band. A couple of the guests there looked at their watches around 10 pm and said they had to leave. Why? "Uh... we've got a Runequest date."

Which is funny, because I had a D&D date the next day. Saturday was all D&D - seven and a half hours, guided by the guys from Ogre Cave.

Then on Sunday night we went to help a friend shoot a music video. We chatted afterwards with the band and the director: "How was your weekend?"

Justin: "It was great, we played D&D."

The band: "Why didn't you call us?!! We want to play!"

What's going on? Three years ago I could not find a single person who admitted to playing D&D who wasn't a professional game industry person of some sort. Now my friends are all coming out of the closet as tabletop RPG fans. Other cool people into D&D: Vin Diesel. Further evidence of mainstreaming: a new Dungeons and Dragons movie for 2004 is rumored. Is it now cool to be into D&D?

Or have I slipped into an alternate universe?

In any case, I now have a dream: an all-girl D&D group. I'll DM. Who's with me?

You're in Control! or, Play with your Pee

The geniuses at MIT Media Labs (and I'm not being sarcastic) have come up with an expensive but sanitary way to play at the urinal. The stream is read by sensors and used as the interface for an onscreen game mounted above the urinal. "You're in Control encourages cleanliness while reintroducing play to the act of micturition," says the paper (available in PDF).

For the future? "We envision a variety of additional software applications. For example, users could play a game in which they uncovered a hidden image with their urine." Oh, fun! Pee off the sand and find the treasure! "Another possibility is a co-operative networked game -" Never mind, I think I'll stop reading that now. My favorite: "Users could even browse through news stories, advertisements, and stock quotes as they voided their bladders, in a new form of bathroom multitasking." Sounds great. When's the female version available?