ugachaka :: Jacob was here

As some of you may have noticed, there have been some changes here since your last visit. This blog has been upgraded to WordPress 2.5 in all its glory with a fresh new design and everything.

Now that the burden of upgrading software is over, there’s that gaming thing that I do. I’ll steal a page from a popular gaming blog to give you my gaming diary for the last several months.

Since my last post, I did receive a copy of Assassin’s Creed by returning my scratched disc, and finally did complete the main story of the game. Due to my obsession with achievement points, I finished the game lacking only 1 Templar and 3 missing flags somewhere in the huge Kingdom and the achievement for memory glitches — mostly because I had no idea what those were when I started playing the game. Anyone want to tell me where they found the last Templar? (Otherwise, I am just consulting the maps. [Note: no link because maps now seem to be down.])

Before I finished off Assassin’s Creed though, I also went all OCD on Mass Effect and completed a playthrough as the most evil Vanguard Nemesis that you could ever be — no, really, I think I finished with only 9 Paragon points because of mistakes I made. Who knew that beating a civilian across the level was equivalent to saving their life?

I’m not sure what I gained from the experience of being the most evil Shepard that ever lived. At a certain point — about 3/4 of the way through the game — I maxed out the Renegade point meter entirely. From that point on, the evil was only for my pure enjoyment, but I was committed to my goal.

I think on my next playthrough — oh yes, there will be another — I am going to try to be a completely good Vanguard as I get on my way to level 60. But, I still won’t play with Kaiden because he is worthless.

I have plans to complete a playthrough as an Adept at some point as well just because they seem like such a cool character when you max out that Singularity ability. I played most of the final portions of the game with Laila simply because she made everything in the room float to the middle and die. That’s an awesome party trick.

Luckily, I completed all of these game quests just in time to pick up my copy of Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

Yes, Brawl was the game I most eagerly awaited this year. While I regret that it doesn’t have online voice chat during matches — not even with friends — the multiplayer is outrageous. I can’t stop if I get going on it with a group of friends. I found that a simple speakerphone cell phone call plopped down on the couch will suffice for any online opponents that I may challenge.

I beat most of the singleplayer portions of the game already, and I plan to complete it all over — again and again — until I get every trophy. If you have seen the trophy wall at all, I haven’t used any of my hammers yet. I’m going to wait until there is really something good to use.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl has dominated most of the game playing since I got it. It hasn’t left my Wii, and my Xbox 360 has been used for little more than playing DVDs from Netflix.

I am just now starting to reclaim my free time from blogging and Smash Bros-ing. Next up on my gaming agenda is a little online game called Ikarium and Super Mario Galaxy.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl

I just finished reading Game Over: Press Start to Continue: The Maturing of Mario by David Sheff and Andy Eddy awhile back. Since it had such a nice business slant, I posted my review over at my business blog at wannabeMogul.com–even though I really read the book because of my incredible urge as a childhood Nintendo fanboy.

If you haven’t read this book and want to learn more about the gaming industry, read it. I suggest checking Half.com or Amazon to try and pick up a used copy.

The book is a great read even if you aren’t a Nintendo fan.

The really interesting part of the book is how it sheds a light on what Microsoft might have been thinking when they launched the Xbox and how much Nintendo’s plan for the NES might have influenced that.

The question has been posed all year with the breakout success of casual gaming and perceived casual console, the Wii.

How will casual gaming really affect the industry? Kill the hardcore market? Flood Xbox Live with a ton of soccer moms?

No.

I believe that the casual gaming market will help the entire industry in general.

For one, by bringing in a flood of new gamers playing a variety of non-violent, friendly fun games like Scene It! and Guitar Hero on the consoles, we might finally be able to raise off the stereotype of violent loner gamers that seems to hang so predominantly in the minds of every politician in the world.

Second, more gamers means more good games that may be more niche. With a larger market, game developers can devote the resources necessary to produce a game that may only be fun for fans of the Dr. Who TV series or Battlestar Gallactica. Don’t call me out if those aren’t niche enough audiences for you, but I am only suggesting that game developers can now focus on hitting up topics that may not have appealed to the hardcore gamer.

Regardless of the success of the consoles, hardcore gaming will not be abandoned. Even on the Wii, you are looking and a slew of new titles this year and next including Super Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Bros. Brawl and a new version of Mario Kart. You have already had Metroid Prime 3. Altogether, these games will make the console a smash success for diehards and casual gamers alike–if any of them can find one in stores.

Overall, the market stands to get better because of this big push. If you are a true hardcore gamer, just ignore the casual ads. They are not for you, but guaranteed, once every three years or so, a studio will put out a masterpiece for you to enjoy just like you always have. No worries.

It all started with a Kotaku post under “Rumor” that Jeff Gerstmann, longtime editor and game reviewer at Gamespot, had been fired because of pressure from Eidos, publisher of Kane & Lynch: Dead Men, after Gerstmann gave the game a 6.0/10. Eidos has a huge ad campaign running on Gamespot that had to be redirected from pointing to the review to pointing at the official Kane & Lynch site after word of the review score got out.

A Penny Arcade cartoon later, the Internet was full of gossip and no comments as everyone sought to get to the bottom of it all. The text review of the game was edited, and the video review disappeared under fishy circumstances.

Since then, there has been some moving and shaking, but nothing has been really determined. Gamers seem to be coming to a boil all over the Internet about this latest controversy because if indeed Gerstmann was fired mainly for not catering to the advertiser, it threatens game journalism’s integrity.

The most disturbing piece of the whole mystery comes from an anonymous commentator on Valleywag known as only “gamespot.” Kotaku summed up his several comments. Together, they paint the picture that Gamespot is becoming more and more advertiser-friendly and business-controlled with less editorial control. That’s not exactly what gamers want from their game review houses, so it is really getting people riled up now.

This whole situation is disgusting with each new bit of info popping out through the cracks. Enjoy your brand-building CNET family, you just pissed off your core readerbase. Have fun living that down. When you start wondering why your hits are plummeting into the crapper, just look back to this.

-Nikilii, commenter at Kotaku.com

My personal take on this whole situation is that there must be some hidden facts that we just don’t know yet about this situation. Even though the timing seems right if Gamespot was going to make a drastic move like this and get all the gamers upset–considering the big game push for the holidays is on a down swing–I don’t think that Gamespot would have overlooked the timing in relation to the Kane & Lynch fiasco. They would have had to realize that they should wait just a few weeks simply to offset any suspicious correlations.

Most journalistic institutions also understand the need to keep the business end of things away from the editorial side, and I wouldn’t jump to blame Gamespot of trying to combine the two until there was more hard evidence.

Rumor is that more will be heard officially on Tuesday.

Until then, gamers can only wait, argue and speculate over whether they should be suspicious of one of the major gaming hubs of the Web.

Stephen Totilo asked what to do when your partner in gaming leaves town if the two of you were playing the game together.

Apparently, this situation came up with one of MTV News staff when she left town for Thanksgiving and left her boyfriend with Super Mario Galaxy.

I think proper etiquette, at least for me, states that when you are playing a game with someone explicitly, you can’t play it without them even to explore areas you have already visited. If the two of you started it together in aims of finishing it, you shouldn’t leave your partner behind.

I have a co-op game on Halo 2 that is still saved because I haven’t gotten a chance to finish it off with the friend who started it with me. It’s just wrong to finish it with someone else or alone because that is our game.

I guess you could be flexible with this rule if the game is brand new and there is a very definite co-op mode established–meaning there is a co-op and single-player campaign to enjoy, but in this situation, it would be rare to make a deal with a friend to play it all the way through together unless it was some similarly-addicted roommate who would be present at all times of gameplay. I know with Gears of War and Halo 3, I played co-op with several friends at different times, but considering that none of them could be around for more than a day or two each week, there was no deal on us completing the game together.

With Super Mario Galaxy, the game is sort of a single-player adventure. There is a co-op mode, but it doesn’t really give the second person much to do besides waggle the Wiimote around at times to assist the first player. Switching levels is the only acceptable form of multiplayer, and that can get messy. In other words, if you explicitly set out to play this game with another person, you really can’t do anything without that other person present. The single-player/co-op player experience are the same and playing through alone ruins what you had going with the friend.

Good luck to the boyfriend of the MTV News copy editor. I might have just justified your girlfriend’s anger.

It was scary there for a second when Super Mario Galaxy seized the upper hand in the battle for the greatest videogame of all time–at least in the category of reviews.

A few more reviews came in to upset the new champ–possibly on purpose if the reviewer was a big enough Zelda fan–and now Ocarina sits back atop all games as the greatest accomplishment.

Does this break the 9-year streak at number 1? I don’t think it should count considering Super Mario Galaxy was still in the process of being reviewed. It would be unfair to let a streak be broken by a game that only held it for a few days.

And yes, I may be biased until I actually play Super Mario Galaxy, but I got to stand up for my man Link.

A cryptic new Zelda site has shot up on the Web [via Kotaku]. While Nintendo has made no announcement, and it would seem they are more concentrated on other legacy games like Smash Bros., some people are still speculating.

It seems like a joke, but why would someone start up a site like this? A new Zelda community?

I am a huge fan of ONnetworks and all their HD-produced podcasts. My love stems mostly from two of their programs: The 5 Minute Drill for my fantasy football addiction and Play Value for an entertaining “Best Week Ever”-style doc on the history of videogames from the very beginnings of Nintendo. The podcast follows along nicely with a book I am currently reading called Game Over on the history of videogames. You can check it out at the link below.

Game Over Press Start To Continue

Check out the latest edition of the video cast below, and be sure to check out all the Play Value episodes to feel smarter about your own knowledge of the videogame industry.