59 posts tagged with videogames and sony.
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Let’s Get Really Nostalgic About The Early Days Of PlayStation
At a GameStop store on Launch Day of PS2 in 2000 [YouTube] ““There was a sense that video games were toys. And Sony is not a toy company.” That’s how a new mini-oral history about PlayStation revolutionizing console gaming begins over at IGN. The words belong to former head of Sony Worldwide Studios, Shawn Layden, and they ring true for anyone who grew up with an NES or SNES. The Nintendo consoles built for angular cartridges could take a beating like children’s building blocks, and the games often revolved around colorful worlds full of knights, dragons, and magic mushrooms. In the ‘90s, PlayStation felt like something entirely different. [...] In addition to the pitch of bringing arcade-level graphics into the home, there was the idea of a video game console that could channel the same feeling of cool imbued in the Sony Walkman and your older sibling’s collection of grunge and hip-hop CDs.” [via: Kotaku]
toxicity persists and worsens in highly competitive games
Despite Advancements, Games Still Aren't Doing Enough To Stop Toxic Voice Chat by Alyssa Mercante [Kotaku] “I started regularly playing competitive online games in 2007, with the launch of Halo 3. Back then, participating in in-game voice chat was harrowing for a 17-year-old girl whose voice betrayed her gender and her youth. I was subjected to such frequent and horrific hostility (rape threats, misogynist remarks, sexually inappropriate comments, you name it) that I eventually started screaming back, a behavior my parents still bring up today. And yet, voice chat is essential in competitive online games, especially modern ones like Call of Duty: Warzone, Apex Legends, Fortnite, Valorant, and Overwatch. All of these popular games require extensive amounts of teamwork to succeed, which is bolstered by being able to chat with your teammates. But in-game voice chat remains a scary, toxic place—especially for women. [...] I spoke to several women about their voice chat experiences, as well as reps from some of today’s biggest online games, to get a better understanding of the current landscape.”
Imagine if the only way to watch Titanic was to find a used VHS tape
An Alarming 87 Percent Of Retro Games Are Being Lost To Time [Kotaku] “The Video Game History Foundation (VGHF) partnered with the Software Preservation Network, an organization intent on advancing software preservation through collective action, to release a report on the disappearance of classic video games. “Classic” in this case has been defined as all games released before 2010, which the VGHF noted is the “year when digital game distribution started to take off.” In the study, the two groups found that 87 percent of these classic games are not in release and considered critically endangered due to their widespread unavailability.” You can read the full 50-page study on the open repository Zenodo. [more inside]
what's old is new again
The Best Reviewed Games of 2023 (So Far) [IGN] The snowball of games delayed out of 2021 and 2022 has settled in 2023, coalescing into the most exciting games lineup of the decade so far. 2023, arguably, marks the proper start of the PS5 and Xbox Series X generation with Unreal Engine 5 support building and an increasing number of developers dropping support for last-gen hardware. Each of the three console manufacturers has at least one blockbuster release scheduled this year — Starfield for Xbox, Spider-Man 2 for PlayStation, and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom for Nintendo — complemented by a generation-best third-party lineup that includes Hogwarts Legacy, Resident Evil 4, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Street Fighter 6, Diablo 4, Final Fantasy 16, Assassin’s Creed Mirage, Hades 2, and Mortal Kombat 1. Five Six months through 2023 and already the year has lived up to its lofty expectations.
Nothing Xbox does matters if the games aren't good.
Xbox Is Running Out Of Time To Get It Right by Ethan Gach [Kotaku] “But if Hi-Fi Rush showed the promise of Game Pass, where more focused and stylized games can find an audience without sanding themselves down into dust to appeal to a mass market, Redfall has done just the opposite. Arkane’s vampire shooter feels incomplete and plays like mush, a far cry from the striking, precisely drawn contours of immersive sims like Prey and Dishonored: Death of the Outsider. [...] For years now, Xbox fans and players have been waiting for Microsoft to begin delivering a steady stream of hit exclusives that can rise to the level of those found on PlayStation and Switch, and it simply hasn’t. The results of an acquisition spree of new studios that began in 2018 are mixed at best, with each bright spot—Psychonauts 2, Pentiment—overshadowed by delays, missteps, and radio silence around major projects teased years ago in a premature effort to drum up hype for the Xbox Series X/S.” [more inside]
The gaming industry has changed, and it doesn’t need E3 anymore.
E3 isn’t coming back. [The Verge] “The pandemic proved that gaming could survive without E3. The last year E3 took place in person was in 2019; the event was cancelled in 2020, held as a digital show in 2021, and bounced from in person to online-only and finally to fully cancelled last year in 2022. Yet even without E3 as an anchor, developers and publishers have found ways to make a splash that don’t include the investment required for a big booth on the expo show floor. And when the pandemic arrived, the industry already had a playbook to follow — a playbook written by Nintendo. Since 2011, the company has seen enormous success with its Nintendo Direct video presentations, letting anyone in the world watch big game reveals without attending a physical show. Since then, nearly every major gaming company has adopted the format to create newsworthy moments of their own, and they’re pre-recorded ones that can’t break down on stage or might embarrass in front of a live audience. ” [more inside]
People want features that make things easier to use, or more pleasant
A Timeline Of Adaptive Technology In Digital Experiences [Able Gamers]
“Despite its stunning popularity today, video games weren’t always so mainstream. In fact, at its outset in the 70s, the video gaming industry was a small niche market trying to grow its customer base and introduce the world to its technology and stories. As a result, a small-yet-devoted community began to emerge, and people with disabilities saw the immediate value of what the video gaming community could offer them. As such, video game developers and companies began to focus on accessibility in their software and cultivating adaptive technology solutions to promote their companies and games in the press. AbleGamers has spent the last sixteen years creating change via direct advocacy and action in the industry, fighting to remove the barriers to gaming that people with disabilities experience. Today, the major wins for accessibility that we’ve witnessed over the past decade prove that the industry is undergoing a transformation that welcomes people with disabilities to the community.”[more inside]
Your Destiny is on another Console
Sony buying Bungie for $3.6 billion Destiny studio will remain multiplatform, able "to self-publish and reach players wherever they choose to play" [more inside]
Generation 9
The long-awaited updates to the Xbox and Playstation are out this month. While both consoles have been praised for their jump in performance, the Xbox Series X (Digital Foundry, Polygon) boasts expansive backwards compatibility, Quick Resume game switching, and the popular Game Pass subscription; and the Playstation 5 (Digital Foundry, Polygon) has a “revolutionary” new haptic DualSense controller and highly-rated launch titles including the pack-in controller showcase Astro’s Playroom and Spider-Man: Miles Morales.
$$$ PUBLISHERS HAVE TRIED MULTIPLE WAYS TO AMORTIZE EXPENSE $$$
The return of the $70 video game has been a long time coming [Ars Technica] “Last week, 2K made waves by becoming the first publisher to set a $70 asking price for a big-budget game on the next generation of consoles. NBA2K21 will cost the now-standard $60 on the Xbox One and PlayStation 4, but 2K will ask $10 more for the upcoming Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 versions of the game (a $100 "Mamba Forever Edition" gives players access to current-generation and next-generation versions in a single bundle). It remains to be seen if other publishers will follow 2K's lead and make $70 a new de facto standard for big-budget console game pricing. But while $70 would match the high-water mark for nominal game pricing, it wouldn't be a historically high asking price in terms of actual value. Thanks to inflation and changes in game distribution, in fact, the current ceiling for game prices has never been lower.” [more inside]
Let's just pretend the PS2-era games never happened.
Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time [Game Trailer] “After a more than 20-year wait, a true sequel to 1998’s Crash Bandicoot: Warped is coming to PS4 and Xbox One on October 2nd. Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time picks up decades after the events of Warped, back when you defeated antagonists Neo Cortex, Dr. N. Tropy, and Uka Uka and left them stranded on a distant planet. The sequel picks up with the trio escaping, resulting in a rip in the fabric of space and time. Taking inspiration from the original PlayStation trilogy, the game will be a platformer; the trailer shows that we’ll still be spinning and jumping our way through enemies and over bottomless pits while also collecting Wumpa fruits. But it will also add new gameplay mechanics to refresh the classic formula, such as wall running, rope swinging, rail grinding, and Quantum Masks, which appear to allow the fuzzy marsupials to run on the ceiling or slow down time.” [via: The Verge] [more inside]
A lot of murder.
The Last of Us Part II Is Uncomfortable and Exhausting, But That's What Makes It Great [The Verge] “The Last of Us Part II is a sequel to the acclaimed PS3 game, which transformed developer Naughty Dog — then known primarily for lighter fare like the Uncharted series — into a studio able to tackle more serious and resonant stories. On the surface, the two games are similar. The original starred Joel, a haunted man who latches on to 14-year-old Ellie as a daughter figure, in a quest that sees them traverse a post-apocalyptic America in search of safety. It ends with him making a devastating choice to protect someone he cares about. The sequel is centered on Ellie, now 19 and settled in a relatively safe community in Wyoming. She has work, friends, a love interest. She struggles with Joel’s overprotective nature. Aside from the regular patrols to clear out infected monsters, it’s almost idyllic. But a few hours into the game — for reasons I won’t spoil — she sets off for Seattle with vengeance on her mind.” via: [Official Cinematic Trailer][Launch Trailer][Warning: trailers/reviews contain graphic descriptions of violence, murder, animal-abuse, & torture.] [*Discussion also contains spoilers*] [more inside]
V
PS5: The Future of Gaming Show [YouTube] [Twitch.tv] The PS5 reveal event starts today, June 11th, at 1 PM PDT / 9 PM BST / 10 PM CEST. The digital games showcase itself will run "for a bit more than an hour" and give viewers a "first look" at some PS5 games that will be playable when the console releases this holiday season, according to the official PlayStation blog. The event will be "best" streamed with headphones due to some "cool audio work in the show," but Sony did not specify further. [via: Gamespot]
BIG GAME ENERGY.
The big video games of summer 2020 [Polygon] “The summer of 2020 is shaping up to be one of the most unusual seasons for video games. It’s an atypically busy summer, in part thanks to a series of delays that have pushed AAA video games like The Last of Us Part 2 and Ghost of Tsushima to the summer months. Summer 2020 is also when video game fans will get to experience blockbuster movie properties as games: There are no major Marvel Studios movies this summer, but there is a pair of major Marvel games, one starring Iron Man and the other the full team of Avengers. And in the absences of the massively delayed Fast & Furious 9, we have an original Fast & Furious video game from the team behind Project CARS. It’s a summer full of big adventures, including a new Paper Mario game and the highly anticipated Cyberpunk 2077. (Nintendo Switch owners who don’t dig Paper Mario have plenty of ports to play to this summer: BioShock, Borderlands, and XCOM collections just dropped, as did the massive RPG Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition.) And much more.” [more inside]
△ O X ▢
A First Look At The PlayStation 5 DualSense Controller [Game Informer] “Sony has introduced its PlayStation 5 DualSense wireless controller. It's an evolution on the classic PlayStation controller form we've seen over previous generations, with some new features. The controller is slightly lighter, and Hideaki Nishino, Sony senior vice president, platform planning and management, says the company wanted to "maintain a strong battery life" for the rechargeable controller. "Based on our discussions with developers," Nishino said, "we concluded that the sense of touch within gameplay, much like audio, hasn’t been a big focus for many games." Accordingly, the controller uses haptic feedback and has trigger tension. Overall, the angle of the hand triggers and the grip of the controller is different from previous ones. Nishino says the company tested the controller's ergonomics with players of varying hand sizes, and wanted it to "feel smaller than it really looks."” [more inside]
Cloud gaming
Final Fantasy VII Remake: a flawed, but fascinating, reimagining of a classic [Polygon] “Playing the original release of Final Fantasy 7 in 2020 reveals a game with the energy of someone trying to create a blockbuster with the resources of a high school play. The vision, and the scope, of an epic was always there. The technology was still being developed. It’s that tension that still makes the original game one of the most interesting experiences of its era. The hardware was powerful for its time, but the team already wanted — and probably needed — more. So what happens when those technical limitations are gone, replaced with 23 years of progress? Final Fantasy 7 Remake happens, but how you feel about Square Enix’s effort to remake Final Fantasy 7 today — greatly expanded and unhindered by the technology of yesteryear — may say more about your feelings on technology and nostalgia than the game itself.” [YouTube][Trailer] [more inside]
"CYBERBULLETS CAUSE NO PAIN!!"
How Games Marketing Invented Toxic Gamer Culture [Vice Games] How early marketing campaigns for online gaming platforms suggested toxicity isn't a bug, it's a feature.
“Companies like Microsoft and Sony frequently marketed toxicity as a key selling point for their new online gaming platforms. This is a puzzling strategy from the vantage point of 2020, a time when toxicity is practically synonymous with online gaming and too often spills over into real-world harassment. Perhaps these campaigns were eerily prescient in anticipating the downward spiral of gaming culture. Or maybe these edgy advertisements modeled the exact brand of toxicity that the same companies are now struggling to curb.”
On March 4, 2000, the PlayStation 2 went on sale in Japan.
The PlayStation 2 Is Now Twenty Years Old [The Guardian] “Despite looming competition from the Nintendo GameCube and the Microsoft Xbox, the PlayStation 2 was an instant smash, selling more than three million units in its first year in Japan alone and hitting 20m worldwide by the end of 2001. The machine effectively ushered in the modern era of highly cinematic blockbuster action adventures, with titles such as Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Metal Gear Solid 2 and Devil May Cry thrilling players with their depth, visual detail and mature themes. But the sheer ubiquity of the console and its vast global user base also allowed for a growing pool of experimental titles, which used the power of the Emotion Engine in very different ways. From elegiac adventures Ico and Shadow of the Colossus to psychological horror classic Silent Hill 2 and hallucinogenic joyride Katamari Damacy, the PS2 was home to titles that inspired the nascent independent game development scene of the mid-2000s.” [Playstation 2 "Bambi" Commercial] [more inside]
It’s a big, black box. █ And it will play video games.
Meet Microsoft's PC-like Xbox Series X [Engadget] “Last night, The Game Awards was a showcase for industry stars and served as an unveiling for Microsoft's next Xbox... box. [...] Previously known as Project Scarlett, the next-generation Xbox resembles a PC tower, and it arrives holidays 2020. Xbox chief Phil Spencer wrote in a blog post that the Series X design allows Microsoft to pack in four times the processing power of Xbox One X "in the most quiet and efficient way." It's said to be no louder than an Xbox One X, helped by a single fan that pushes air through the top. Microsoft says the Xbox Series X can handle 4K visuals at 60 frames per second, and potentially up to 120 fps. The console will also offer hardware-accelerated ray tracing and variable refresh rate, along with 8K capability. It's compatible with software going back to the original Xbox and will work with Xbox One controllers.” [YouTube][Reveal Trailer] [more inside]
“I wondered what was happening in that silver box.”
The PlayStation is 25 Years Old! [YouTube][Documentary: Memories of Play] [Every PlayStation Startup Sound] “On December 3rd, 1994, Twenty-five years ago, the original PlayStation went on sale for the first time in Japan. With a lineup led by Ridge Racer and the promise of a 3D future, Sony quickly outpaced Sega and Nintendo and went on to dominate the video game console market. Rather than focus on games, we wanted to highlight the business and technology behind Sony’s hardware. So we brought together former Sony executives Makoto Iwai and Shuji Utsumi alongside tech experts Kazuyuki Hashimoto (Final Fantasy 7) and Masanori Yamada (Tekken) to reflect on the challenges Sony and its developers overcame getting PlayStation off the ground. From working with temperamental visionary Ken Kutaragi, to the limited memory available for games, to not being allowed to leave their office without permission due to tight deadlines, the group came prepared with stories to tell.” [via: Polygon] [more inside]
“It's the textures above all, and nothing is going to stop them.”
PC Game Install Sizes Are Ballooning And I'm Scared [Kotaku] “Earlier today, I was reading over the PC hardware specifications for the upcoming Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and, when I reached the hard drive space requirement, did a double-take. 175 GB. For one game. My hard drive currently has less than half that space free for all games. And Modern Warfare is far from alone in its Galactus-like hunger for hard drive space. The PC version of Red Dead Redemption 2, for example, will not stop until it has callously conquered 150 GB of your PC’s storage. This continues an upward trend seen in other recent heavyweight kingpins like the PC versions of Gears of War 4, Gears 5, Halo 5, and Final Fantasy XV, all of which clock in at over 100 GB when you add high-res texture packs (the latter even without improved textures). PC gaming has always been characterized by a little extra pain in the name of optimal pleasure, but this is reaching preposterously bonkers proportions.” [more inside]
Anyone who says cross is a cop.
We've all been calling the DualShock's X button the wrong name. [Eurogamer] “That symbol in the southernmost position of the four buttons on your DualShock controller. What do you call it? If you're of rational mind, you'll probably call it the "Ex" button, right? That's what I call it. That's what my pals call it. I mean, we've all seen detractors, those unsettling people who call it - wait for it - "Cross"! Ha! - but they're just being contrary. We all know the truth. We know we're right. Except we're not.” According to @PlaystationUK: [Twitter] “🔺⭕❌🟥 If Cross is called X (it's not), then what are you calling Circle? 🤔”
🕹️ The D-Pad is back.
Nintendo's New 'Switch Lite' Doesn't Actually Switch [The Verge] “The Switch Lite — the newly unveiled spinoff of the full-sized Switch console — doesn’t actually “switch.” Instead of the detachable controllers and TV dock that allows the standard Switch to shape-shift between a TV console, portable gamepad, and a mobile multiplayer machine, the Switch Lite has a much narrower focus on just one of those experiences — but that’s not a bad thing. Instead, it shows that the Switch’s audience and appeal extend to a different market than what the full-sized version currently serves.” [YouTube][Reveal Trailer] [more inside]
PREDICTION: Everything will be ported to the Switch
What to expect from E3 2019 [The Verge] “For fans looking to hear about the future of games, E3 has always been an exciting week. This year, though, there’s a big cloud hanging over the show. Two of the biggest names in the industry aren’t holding their usual press conferences; mega publisher Electronic Arts will instead be live streaming news and announcements over the course of a weekend; and Sony isn’t just forgoing a keynote, it’s skipping E3 altogether. [...] It has left some to ponder — and not for the first time — whether E3 is even relevant any more. Should you still be excited?” [more inside]
“Hopefully it’ll be out by 2025.”
Final Fantasy VII Remake [YouTube][TeaserTrailer] “After a long period of development hell, the Final Fantasy VII remake is finally back in the real world, with Square Enix dropping a short teaser trailer today and promising more to come in June. Previously, Square had said that the Final Fantasy VII remake would be episodic, and based on this trailer—which is entirely made up of scenes from the game’s first act, in Midgar—that may still be the case.” [via: Kotaku]
Off-White Game Boy with the Planet Hollywood logo printed on it
Console Variations collects pictures and information about limited-edition versions of video game consoles.
“Don't hug me. Go play with it!”
The gift of gaming: the joys of getting a console for Christmas [The Guardian] “We all remember that one Christmas present we got as a kid. The one we’d begged our parents for all year, the one we’d looked up 100 times in the Argos catalogue or on Amazon, depending on our age … For many of us, that present was a games machine. Whether it was a ZX Spectrum or a PlayStation 2, the process of unpacking these technological marvels, getting our mums and dads to set them up, then finally playing with the whole family, was magical.” [more inside]
“Daddy’s Big Little Nintendo”
A List Of Weird Names Luke Plunkett's Kid Calls His Video Games [Kotaku] “You and I, as adults, know to call things by their actual names. My kid is four, and does no such thing. For reference, he’s been playing some of these systems and games for around 18 months now. Which is why, despite now being a four year-old kid who can actually do a fairly good job of speaking like a human being, he persists with his cute lil’ baby names for the systems and games he was familiar with back then. They’ve stuck, and I just don’t have the heart to correct him, because there is nothing better in the world than hearing somebody be convinced a game is actually called “Mario Build It”.”
Buffering...
The next generation of streaming video games is on its way [Engadget] “There's a specific kind of frustration associated with crappy game-streaming services. It's all about the buildup: You find a game, whether it's something brand new or a long-lost childhood favorite, and boot it up. It takes forever to load. The title screen stutters and your heart drops, but it's easy to convince yourself it was just a bout of preliminary jitters. And then the game begins. And stops. And starts up again. And stops. [...] That's been the story with so many streaming services over the years, from OnLive to GeForce Now. However, this entire ecosystem is poised to change. After years of impossible promises and half-baked public trials in an incomplete online ecosystem, streaming services are finally viable, and major companies like Google and Microsoft are teasing the future of the industry.” [more inside]
“Microsoft and Nintendo sittin' in a tree, c-r-o-s-s-p-l-a-y-i-n-g.”
Fortnite Is Bad But Sony's Refusal to Play Nice Is Worse [Gizmodo] “Earlier this week, Nintendo delighted Fortnite fans by announcing that the game, which might just be the most popular game being played right now, was coming to the Switch immediately. Even better, Switch players would be able to compete with PC and Xbox players, too—instant digital distribution and multiplayer open to all! Nintendo’s announcement felt like a dream come true after years of console makers refusing to play nice. But it isn’t a dream, because Sony continues to flip the bird to its competitors and Fortnite players on the PS4 are being left out in the cold, unable to play with Xbox or Switch gamers.” [more inside]
E³
2018 E3 Recap. All the major announcements made at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in one convenient place. Trailers, announcements, etc.
“From hardware to software, controllers to culture,”
How Japan changed video games forever [CNN] “Japan didn't invent the first computer game. That accolade goes to "Space War!", a game created in 1962 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the United States. But ever since then, Japan has embraced gaming culture with an almost unrivaled passion. From the Super Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog games that became cultural giants, to the Sega Mega Drive and Game Boy consoles which were symbols of their time, gaming was led by Tokyo for decades. "Without the contributions of Japan, we wouldn't have a video game industry," Blake J. Harris, a video game expert and author of "Console Wars," says. "Or, at least, not one that resembles what we have today in any way. ” [more inside]
“— Nintendo has kept things simple for once.”
Nintendo’s Resurgence Was the Best Tech Story of 2017 [The Ringer] “Five years ago Nintendo started unraveling. The company was losing money for the first time ever as the monstrously popular Wii stalled in sales. Nintendo’s savior, a Wii follow-up christened the Wii U, turned into an elaborate act of self-sabotage. The system was poorly named (is that an add-on to the Wii?), poorly conceived (why is the controller a mostly useless tablet?), and poorly supported (where the hell is Metroid?). It became Nintendo’s worst-selling home console ever, and as the company’s losses mounted in 2013 and 2014, it appeared to be on the verge of obsolescence. Last life, no continues. But Nintendo often mines its biggest successes from spectacular failures.” [more inside]
“The Last of Us is a series that deserves much better...”
The Last of Us 2 Trailer Controversy Explained [Game Rant] “One of the nice surprises at Sony’s Paris Games Week press conference was a new trailer for The Last of Us: Part 2. While many fans were excited to see more footage of the highly anticipated game, others were outraged at the extreme level of violence shown in the trailer. Over the past couple of weeks, numerous outlets have stepped forward decrying the trailer for its brutality, but some fans may still not quite understand why there’s so much controversy.” [YouTube][Teaser Trailer] [more inside]
“Countless unfair deaths, mostly caused by a horribly haphazard jump.”
Crash Bandicoot: An Oral History [Polygon] “Naughty Dog released Crash Bandicoot [YouTube] for Sony's original PlayStation in September 1996. In it, the team took an old idea and changed its point of view, redesigning the idea of a 2D sidescroller and planting the camera behind its protagonist's back for the majority of the game. To learn more about what happened along the way, we recently spoke to the entire development team, contractors, musicians, marketers and others, hearing a story of long nights, groundbreaking technology, unbearable crunches and expensive parties. However, not every story lines up the same way, with some feeling that Naughty Dog discredited their contributions by burying who actually created the flagship character. One thing rings true throughout: The tales culminate in the creation of a game that redefined the platformer genre and laid some of the early cornerstones for making Naughty Dog the juggernaut development studio it is today.” [more inside]
“...the platform that could.”
PlayStation Vita: Is It Better to Burn Bright Than to Fade Away? [Playstation Lifestyle] “For PlayStation Vita, Sony hasn’t cut ties with its beloved handheld just yet. Third-party AAA support may be dwindling, but perhaps out of necessity the device has become more of a thriving hotspot for indie darlings, quirky Japanese titles and tactile platformers, and less a platform that boasts console gaming on the go. It’s been a funny old road for Sony’s handheld, though signs point to the PlayStation Vita motoring on for the foreseeable future, even if the Japanese platform holder’s attention, marketing and stage time will soon be occupied by PlayStation VR. The install base may have plateaued, but so long as the two-fold relationship between developers supporting the device and consumers picking up those ports — not matter how long they take to arrive — Vita will continue to exist as “the platform that could.” Let’s just hope we’ll be saying the same when its 5th birthday rolls around.” [more inside]
The Future is Now
Virtual Reality, a tech geek dream for decades, was long hobbled by high latency, clunky hardware, and perennially absurd reports on network news.
That all changed in 2011, when Palmer Luckey, then 18, built the first Oculus Rift prototype in his parents' garage with iPhone repair money.
Awed by its powerful sense of presence, developer John Carmack became a fan and demoed it at E3. The ensuing Kickstarter campaign shattered all fundraising goals, and Facebook controversially bought the rights for a whopping $2 billion -- alienating erstwhile partner Valve Software, the iconic creators of Half-Life/Portal/Steam.
A Cambrian explosion of headsets followed: Morpheus, HoloLens, Google Cardboard, Gear VR.
But perhaps most interesting is Valve's own counter-project: a breathtaking "room scale" VR set-up with Tron-like "Chaperone" and tracked motion controls called the HTC Vive.
With this week's commercial launch of Rift and Vive bringing us to the threshold of a new interactive medium, look inside for guides, notes, and killer apps for this, the stunning arrival of consumer VR. [more inside]
"...my dad found it in a box of 'junk' he was supposed to throw out"
A prototype of the Nintendo Playstation/SNES-CD may have been located. Photos are here. The ongoing forum thread is here and there is a reddit discussion as well but it in a private group. But a question remains: Is this all a hoax?
The game has attached itself to your reflexes on a molecular level.
The brainchild of Hidetaka Miyazaki and his team at From Software, the Souls games have gained a rabid cult following over the past few years. The newest spiritual successor Bloodborne (trailer 1, 2) has been out for a couple weeks now, and it's received stellar reviews across the board. It might very well be the best in the series, reconfiguring the dense gameplay in surprising ways and offering up an intricately-realized Victorian gothic world. Tim Rogers has written a lengthy, articulate, spoiler-free (in a narrative sense) analysis of Bloodborne's design - You Are the Experience Points. [more inside]
well-written instruction manual & large, folded color map 🌏
"Some games make an enormous impact on you when you play them, and time and technology do little to diminish that impact. I feel that way about quite a few games: Elite, Super Mario Bros, and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time are three that immediately come to mind. Secret of Mana is without question a fourth." [more inside]
SERVER SMASH
Waterson and Mattherson, the only two US east coast servers for the MMOFPS Planetside 2, are merging this month. On hearing the news, players from each server began talking smack, smack that quickly escalated to a call for a Server Smash, a 240 vs 240 campaign lasting 2 hours on one of the Planetside continents, to decide the surviving server name. [more inside]
There are those who said this day would never come...
A year ago, Microsoft was crucified in the press for the PR fiasco of the Xbox One, with rival Sony winning thunderous applause for its PS4 by simply maintaining the status quo.
But after doing a 360 180 on its hated policies, Redmond is attempting to close the gap with the most valuable package deal since The Orange Box.
A remarkable feat of engineering, Halo: The Master Chief Collection will feature on a single disc the complete HD-remastered campaigns of Halos 1-4 alongside Ridley Scott's Nightfall, the Halo 5 beta, and the holy grail of Xbox gaming: every last one of the series' 100+ multiplayer maps in a single unified matchmaking system incorporating the original engines, gameplay mechanics, and idiosyncrasies of each.
Ten years after Halo 2 (and four years after MS shut the taps), IGN suspects a plan by 343 to rekindle (and data-mine) Bungie's magic for an uncertain Halo 5, while Eurogamer welcomes the return of what it calls online FPS's peak. [More reaction: NeoGAF - Ars Technica - Reddit]
Bungie, meanwhile, stood with Sony to showcase its upcoming Destiny, the vaunted space epic that will beta this summer before facing its revamped forerunners later this year. More E3 coverage: Microsoft (5min) - Sony (5min) - Nintendo (airing noon EST) - SW: Battlefront - AC: Unity - MGS5: The Phantom Pain - Evolve - No Man's Sky - The Order: 1886 - Sunset Overdrive - Grim Fandango - Bloodborne - Arkham Knight - Scalebound - Mortal Kombat X - The Division - LittleBigPlanet 3 - Inside - Uncharted 4 - Crackdown
Counting Roses
Another Day, Another Press Conference Without Women
Another Day, Another Press Conference. Yesterday's Playstation 4 announcement was perhaps most notable in what it didn't include: any female presenters. Also discussed by Kotaku and The Verge. (The Verge also notes similar trends in press events from Nintendo, EA, HTC, and Apple.)
Shadow of the Bust
Sony is closing its Liverpool Studio, previously known as Psygnosis, developer of the WipeEout and Lemmings games (DHTML version, previously). The studio created games for 28 years, first gaining attention in the Amiga era for it's high production values and stunning box art (more, more ).
The Game Preservation Crisis
Trash cans, landfills, and incinerators. Erasure, deletion, and obsolescence. These words could describe what has happened to the various building blocks of the video game industry in countries around the world. These building blocks consist of video game source code, the actual computer hardware used to create a particular video game, level layout diagrams, character designs, production documents, marketing material, and more.
These are just some elements of game creation that are gone -- never to be seen again. These elements make up the home console, handheld, PC and arcade games we've played. The only remnant of a particular game may be its name, or its final published version, since the possibility exists that no other physical copy of its creation remains.
As a community of video game developers, publishers, and players, we must begin asking ourselves some difficult but inevitable questions. Some believe there is no point in preserving a video game, arguing that games are short-term entertainment, while others disagree with this statement entirely, believing the industry is in a preservation crisis.
Where Games Go To Sleep: The Game Preservation Crisis [more inside]
These are just some elements of game creation that are gone -- never to be seen again. These elements make up the home console, handheld, PC and arcade games we've played. The only remnant of a particular game may be its name, or its final published version, since the possibility exists that no other physical copy of its creation remains.
As a community of video game developers, publishers, and players, we must begin asking ourselves some difficult but inevitable questions. Some believe there is no point in preserving a video game, arguing that games are short-term entertainment, while others disagree with this statement entirely, believing the industry is in a preservation crisis.
Where Games Go To Sleep: The Game Preservation Crisis [more inside]
"Bio Force Ape" Meets "Bean Ball Benny"
Sure, you've played Final Fantasy VII, but what about Final Fantasy Extreme? You've played EarthBound, but what about Earth Bound (two words). You know all about Dragon Quest VIII, but are you familiar with Dragon Quest: Young Yangus and the Mystery Dungeon? There's a whole world of forgotten, canceled games out there just waiting to be discovered. Let 1UP's Jeremy Parish and Frank Cifaldi be your guides in an exploration of The Best Games That Never Were. (Previously)
WHY HULK-MARG MAD (AND THEREFORE SMASH)
Hulk-Margaret smash stupid Sony. Girls not stupid lilac people. Girls strong and awesome! AAAAARRRRR! Hulk-Marg like gems. Hulk-Marg like gem sweaters (previously). But Hulk-Marg no like pandering only to gem interests. Hulk-Marg well-rounded, has many interests and layers. Hulk-Marg give example: SMASHING. Let Hulk-Marg find PowerPoint and laser pointer. Hulk-Marg has PowerPoint here somewhere. Ahem. Hulk-Marg found PowerPoint. Made slides. [via mefi projects] [more inside]
"It's a Secret to Everybody"
"It's a secret to everybody" -- an unbelievably comprehensive blog post about the etymologies of the names of famous (and not-so-famous) video game characters.
Master the Art of the Quincy
HOME is out for the Playstation 3, and as Penny Arcade has observed, it really is "nothing more than a cumbersome menu, a rampart over which you must hoist yourself to accomplish the most basic tasks." But it's not a complete waste of time. Where else can you have the joy of observing someone being Quincyed? Here's a video of Quincying in action. Observe the quick change, the expedient retreat of the male suitors, the provocative pelvic motion. Here's how to master the art of the Quincy, should you be so inclined.
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