He’s right. As a gamer, these are the moments that make video game playing worthwhile… and they’re also the ones that are the most frustrating. I identify the most with #9. That game was seriously messed up, because it connected the sanity of your character with your real-life sanity. There were so many moments in Eternal Darkness that made you go WTF. Vanishing point shrinking, corrupt memory cards, phantom insects crawling across your screen… seriously crazy stuff.
Do you agree with this list of the top 10 OMGWTF moments in video games? Is there a seriously epic or shocking moment that you feel should have made the list? Maybe it was the moment when your mom said she wanted to buy a Nintendo Wii? I’d love to hear about your video game nostalgia. Oh, and be forewarned that Craig does drop the F-bomb on a few occasions. Parental guidance is suggested.
It’s no secret that I’m a pretty big fan of rhythm games, even if I am not particularly good at them. Rocking out to that pint-sized guitar is a heck of a lot of fun, especially if you can get a few friends together for a jam session.
When it comes to Guitar Hero III, I am able to complete most of the songs on the hard difficulty setting and I can handle a few of the songs on expert. Hier Kommt Alex is particularly fun. That said, the most epic track on Guitar Hero III has to be Through the Fire and Flames by Dragonforce. The song is about eight minutes long and it is absolutely crazy.
Youtube user iamchris4life has got to be one of the best Guitar Hero artists in the world, because he has managed to get 100% on expert with Through the Fire and Flames. The best part is that he documented his monumental achievement. It has to be seen to be believed. Seriously. Wow.
On Wednesday, I made my way over to the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Downtown Vancouver to attend the second annual Vancouver International Game Summit. This video game conference provides global perspectives on developing games for the next generation of consoles and features presentations from many of the leaders in the industry.
We all know that video game developers are getting increasingly influential and it certainly helps that I have been passionate about video games for as long as I can remember. The Vancouver International Game Summit (VIGS) provided a different perspective for me, because they approached it from the developer’s point of view, rather than from the gamer’s point of view.
In between Rock Band sessions with Stephen Fung, we attended a session hosted by Propaganda Games, the Vancouver development studio behind the recently released Turok game. In the session, they described a recent event that they held at the company wherein employees had to completely develop a game in less than five days. You are assigned your team members — there were about 7-8 people per team — on Monday morning and the completed game must be ready by early Friday afternoon.
This is one crazy timeline! They had to come up with a unique concept, create the artwork, and engineer the game from scratch in under a week. It just goes to show you how much talent is in the video game industry. Among the mini-games developed were a fighting game that involved the Rock Band drum set, a Viking adventure controlled by the pitch of your voice, and a game where you roam a retirement home as the Grim Reaper. Hilariously awesome stuff.
Whereas my Sony PSP is quickly collecting dust in the corner, my Nintendo DS still gets a fair bit of play in between sessions of Mario Kart Wii and Super Smash Bros. Brawl. It may not have the same graphical process as the PSP, but it just seems like I have more fun playing on my Nintendo DS.
It’s expected that a portable video game machine, like a cell phone or any other portable device, will go through the usual wear and tear. Thankfully, I invested in a cheap airform case from eBay shortly after I purchased the Nintendo DS and this has done a great job of protecting my touchscreen game machine from most of the daily abuse. The trouble with the airform case is that it effectively offers no protection when I actually want to play some games. What about then? How am I supposed to protect the DS from scratches and damage?
A couple of my friends decided to take the route of a silicone skin that wraps around the outside of the DS Lite, but I don’t like the rubbery feel of the skin when I’m battling the foot soldiers in TMNT or racing my way through Mario Kart DS. Well, it seems like Gelaskins is coming to the rescue.
Gelaskins already produces a series of artistic skins for electronics and they recently expanded this selection into the realm of the Nintendo DS Lite. Visiting their website, you’ll find that they have over 50 different designs for the DS Lite. The skins are essentially 3M stickers with some funky designs printed on them. Gelaskins was nice enough to provide me with a sample and that’s what is pictured here: Red Robot by ExplodingDog.
From what I can tell, these Gelaskins protective skins for the DS Lite are more about fashion than function — some of the designs are pretty expressive — but they will be enough to protect your DS from the occasional scratch or scrape. Just don’t expect the thin sticker to do much if your happen to drop your DS Lite off the table or into the toilet.
Peep the vid below to get a better sense of what you can expect from Gelaskins. Each set of four skins for the Nintendo DS Lite costs $19.99. And yes, thats a DS-Xtreme cart that you see.
Last year, Time Magazine asked you to vote for the most influential people of the year. After all the votes were tallied and the dust settled, it was Korean pop star Rain that was named as the most influential person of the year, beating out countless other candidates like political satirist Stephen Colbert. That was for 2007.
The race to the top of the Time 100 for 2008 has drawn to its conclusion as well and it’s not Rain that is sitting at the top of heap. Instead, all the Nintendo fanboys (and fangirls) have a huge reason to celebrate, because Time Magazine’s most influential person of the year is none other than Nintendo head honcho Shigeru Miyamoto. Hurray for Shiggy!
Given the continued the popularity of the Nintendo Wii and hot titles like Mario Kart Wii, it is understandable that Nintendo’s top dog would be mentioned on Time’s list, but it’s great to see him on top. The motion-sensing game console has managed to get everyone playing, from grannies to soccer moms, young children to hardcore gamers. With the upcoming arrival of Wii Fit, we could lose a few pounds too.
What sucks is that is Stephen Colbert was defeated by Rain yet once again, despite his efforts to sing in Korean and do battle with Jon Stewart and Conan O’Brien. He even had a book published this year! On a related note, it could be thanks to the Colbert bump that Mike Huckabee made the top ten, beating out the presidential hopefuls — Obama, Clinton, and McCain — that are still in the race.
Did the list turn out the way you expected? Did you vote Shiggy to the top?
Many of you may know me best as a freelance writer, but the great thing about having a personal blog is that I am able to provide you a glimpse into my non-work life as well.
I’ve been playing Nintendo games for as long as I can remember, going back to the days of Duck Hunt and Excitebike. More recently, a lot of my leisure time is getting occupied with Mario Kart Wii and Super Smash Bros. Brawl. They’re both an absolute hoot in multiplayer.
While Kart and Brawl are a lot of fun to play, the funniest game that I have enjoyed thus far on the Nintendo Wii has to be Rayman Raving Rabbids. The original Rayman franchise never tickled by fancy, but those ridiculous rabbids — which are almost like rabbits on crack or something — are absolutely hilarious. The game was so good that it spawned itself a sequel and now it seems that Raving Rabbids 3 is in development too.
We’ve already seen videos of the raving rabbids attempting to infiltrate Leipzig and now they’ve turned their attention to the upcoming Wii Fit and Wii Balance Board. You’ve gotta love them rabbids. Based on the release schedule so far, I’m guessing that Rayman Raving Rabbids 3 will hit store shelves around November of this year.
