Vidya Game News – August 26, 2016
– Celebrating its birthday this week? The Super Nintendo! Aaron Couch from The Hollywood Reporter has a good piece here, which features some good stuff from Blake J. Harris, the author of Console Wars. Over at SB Nation, Marc Normandin and others write about their four favorite sports games for the system.
– Cool graphics from Video Game Densetsu, as they collected some old Sega pixel-making.
– The new Toejam & Earl game, Back in the Groove has picked up an appropriate publisher: Adult Swim! Read more from Michael McWhertor on Polygon. Our episode on the game is here!
– Boing Boing and a bunch of other sites had a link to a hamster finishing a Super Mario Bros. level.
– From a couple different sites, an Epic Donald game was considered at various points.
– Obduction, a spiritual successor to Myst, has gotten a good review from PC World and from Polygon. And hey, check out our episode on Myst here!
– Nintendo has acquired JESNET, a console distribution company in Japan, for $46.5 million. It’s seen as a sign of the big N ramping up console production for the NX.
– On Cinemassacre this week! Mike and Bootsy play Where’s Waldo, a notoriously crappy game. And, Mike and James have a showdown, the U-Force vs. the Power Glove.
ON THIS DAY IN VIDEO GAME HISTORY…
– Today was a good day for games. First, Ecco: The Tides of Time came out for the Genesis. It was the sequel to the first game, and the hottest dolphin game of 1994.
– A little game called Goldeneye came out in 1997! We covered that awesome, FPS from Rare on a past episode here.
– Super Mario Sunshine came out for the Gamecube on Aug. 26, 2002. It’s 14 years old! God, it feels like it came out yesterday.
Video game history information comes from GameFAQs and Moby Games. And as always, if you’d like to support the show, do so via our Amazon link.
Vidya Game News – October 29, 2015
“Intruder alert! Intruder alert! Chicken! Fight like a robot!” – Berzerk. Don’t be a chicken, read these news links and stories.
– In honor of 30 years of Bomberman, Konami has announced a new game in the series. Pocket Gamer has the story, translated from Japanese news suit Famitsu.
– A new Zelda game means a new addition to the series’ already confusing timeline. IGN has a breakdown here.
– Marketing Week’s Thomas Hobbs interviews Jon Rooke from Sega, who talks about their new strategy when it comes to mobile and traditional games, and confirms that they’re looking into re-releasing Shenmue.
– Also, Sega mistakenly named a character “Boob” instead of “Boo” in one of their mobile games, per Cinema Blend.
– US Gamer has an extensive interview with Masayuki Uemura, one of the creators of the NES. It’s definitely worth checking out.
– From Tech Times and many other sites, the Oliver Twins have discovered and released a long lost Dizzy the Adventurer game, Wonderland Dizzy. You can check out the news article here.
ON THIS DAY IN VIDEO GAME HISTORY…
– In 1988, the Sega Genesis came out in Japan. While it strongly challenged the SNES in America, it always trailed in Japan. And as Steve has said repeatedly, check out Console Wars if you’re interested in the history of Sega.
– Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex came out in 2001 for the Playstation 2. It was apparently the fourth game in the series.
– It was only two years ago, but Battlefield 4 and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag both came out today.
Video game history information comes from GameFAQs and Moby Games. And as always, if you’d like to support the show, do so via our Amazon link.
Vidya Game News – July 23, 2015
The original box art for the Sega CD version of Night Trap.
Man, July is almost over! Where does the time go? Quicker than the final quarter in a game of NBA Jam! Anyway, here is this week’s news post:
– Dave Voyles is a sturdier man than most, since he’s taken on the technical challenge of turning the infamous Night Trap into a playable online game. For more information, check out his post on Gamasutra.
– There is an awesome new documentary project on Kickstarter, called Insert Coin: Inside Midway’s 90s Revolution. If the project hits its goal of $75,000, it plans to cover all the games of the era: Smash TV, NARC, WrestleMania, and of course, NBA Jam and Mortal Kombat.
– On past episodes, Steve has mentioned how much he liked the book Console Wars by Blake J. Harris, which really covers the rise and fall of Sega. The Mary Sue’s Dan Van Winkle has an interview with Harris here. (And hey, if you want to buy the book, don’t forget about our Amazon link!)
– From Chris Arrant of Newsarama, details on the deal between Atari and Dynamite to publish items on the gaming company’s deep back inventory of items.
– The latest effort from Honest Trailers? The Super Mario Bros. movie!
– A United Kingdom company is now offering retro game mural wallpaper.
– Via Riley Little of Game Rant, a dad has turned his child’s nursery into one with a Mario Kart 8 theme.
– Business Insider has an unwrapping of the new $500 Nintendo Entertainment System. (Warning: Video will autoplay!)
– David Nield of Motoring Research has a list of the best retro tech of the 1990s, which includes the Super Nintendo and the Game Boy Color, amongst other devices like beepers, point and shoot cameras, and Nokia phones.
Box art for Max Payne.
ON THIS DAY IN VIDEO GAME HISTORY…
– In 2001, Max Payne came out for the PC. According to Wikipedia, the three games in the series have now sold more than 7.5 million copies. It was known for introducing Matrix-style “bullet time” to games.
– And since it’s July, almost nothing else came out. Womp womp womp.
Video game history information comes from GameFAQs and Moby Games. And as always, if you’d like to support the show, do so via our Amazon link.
Vidya Game News – July 9, 2015
Holy crap, a Nintendo Playstation!
First, some important show-related news! You can now support us whenever you’re making a purchase on Amazon. Got something to buy? Do it via this link, and we’ll get a cut of your sale, at no extra cost to you. It can be for any goods, even non-vidya game stuff, and we’d definitely appreciate it! (Let us know if you make a purchase, and you’ll get a shout-out on the show. ❤ )
Surprisingly, even though we’re now in the dog days of summer, it was a great week for news. The biggest of which…
– A prototype of the 1991 collaboration between Nintendo and Sony on a CD-based system has been unearthed [right]. Polygon’s Brian Crecente had a good interview with the guy who found it, and that’s also where the picture comes from. That system eventually became the Playstation. (And to hype that Amazon thingy once again, there is an awesome breakdown of the rise and fall of Sega, and how Sony’s Playstation factored in, via Console Wars.) Some folks online aren’t convinced the prototype is real, but no one official has come out strongly to refute it.
– Speaking of failed Nintendo projects, Jon Fingas from Engadget details how Project H.A.M.M.E.R. became vaporware over the course of six years of painful development.
– Have you ever played Missile Command, Centipede or Asteroids and thought, “Man, wouldn’t this be cooler as a graphic novel???” … Okay, me neither. But hey, Dynamite Entertainment has you covered, via an article from UK Wired’s Matt Kamen.
– A neat feature, if you like readin’, from Matt Gander at Games Asylum. In “We’ve Got Issues,” he covers the Dreamcast magazine wars of the United Kingdom.
– I must begrudgingly give credit to Food and Wine’s millennial section for featuring “the ultimate bar setup for Nintendo nerds.” It includes Mario pipe shot glasses, Legend of Zelda ice cube trays and NES Zapper bottle openers.
ON THIS DAY IN VIDEO GAME HISTORY…
– The Wizard’s Castle was released in 1980. Like many other games “featured” in this here blog in July, well, there really wasn’t much to choose from in terms of releases. However, the awesome CRPG Addict has an exhaustive review of the game available. It should not be confused with the wonderful Home Movies episode “The Wizard’s Baker.”
– Cryptic Studios was incorporated in 2000. They’re the makers of popular online multiplayer games City of Heroes and spinoff City of Villains.
Video game history information comes from GameFAQs and Moby Games.
Your Parents Basement 