Vidya Game News – October 15, 2015
This week’s news is from Russia with FUN!
– Some guy named Steve Colebert had the Zelda orchestra on. You’ve probably heard about it already, but if not, it’s totally on Youtube.
– From Kotaku, Brian Ashcraft has a re-post of a popular old post that has a tour of Nintendo’s original headquarters in Japan.
– A hardcore Japanese gamer has kept his SNES on for 20 years because he’s worried that his save game data for obscure game Umihara Kawase might be at-risk. Preston Phro of Rocket News 24 has a good write-up here.
– If you’re in the Portland, Oregon area, then you still have time to check out the annual Classic Tetris World Championship! It takes place this weekend, Oct. 17 and Oct. 18, at their own yearly Portland Retro Gaming Expo. There are prizes ranging from $125 to $1,000 for top-four finishes.
– Uproxx and plenty of other sites had this item on someone mashing up Kendrick Lamar and Super Mario Bros.
– Per the official Natsume Twitter account and some other sources on the Internets, Nintendo is moving on from re-releasing older games (SNES, Game Boy, NES) on the Virtual Console. Along similar lines, hackers discovered a list of about 70 future online releases by Nintendo.
– Gamasutra’s Christian Nutt has a really good Q&A with producers who have worked with Nintendo before about the process of creating games in conjunction with the company.
– CinemaBlend has a write-up of a nifty YouTube video that re-imagines Star Wars Battlefront as a SNES game, Super Star Wars Battlefront.
– WHO’S A GOOD DOG? Atari is a good dog, and he’s available for adoption!
ON THIS DAY IN VIDEO GAME HISTORY…
– Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver came out 15 years ago for the Game Boy Color. These were the first proper, full sequels to the original blue and red installments, and solidified Pokémon as a phenomenon.
– Wild Arms 3 came out in 2002 for the Playstation 2. It’s a niche RPG series with a sort of Western feel and theme, and worth checking, especially the later games that iron out some of the kinks of the first installment.
– The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring was released 13 years ago for the Playstation 2. While it received mediocre to bad reviews, this was still way better than the SNES installment that was a past YPB game.
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 – August 20, 2015
On the East Coast, it’s been too damn hot to do anything but play vidya games, and to read about vidya games. Here are some of the highlights from the past week:
– Holy smokes, the Mortal Kombat movie is now 20 years old! Hollywood Reporter has an awesome oral history of the movie, by Aaron Couch. The biggest ‘trivia’ aspect is probably that Cameron Diaz was initially cast as Sonya Blade, before being replace by Mrs. Pete Sampras after breaking her wrist.
– As mentioned on many sites and on the Playstation Blog, there will be a nifty Playstation 4 bundle available in November that will come with a Star Wars theme and a Darth Vader chest panel. Included are the latest Star Wars Battlefront game and four classic games, like the Super Nintendo’s Super Star Wars.
– The Sega Blog has a multi-part interview with Sega staff on today’s release of 3D Gunstar Heroes. It’s an upgrade on the cult classic from the Genesis era.
– From Kotaku Australia, Kevin Wong tries to defend Mario Is Missing. It’s a #hottake to me, since I’ve played it and not been impressed.
– Freelance artist Brooke Luder apparently did some pitch work for Crazy Taxi 4 and The Sonic Classic Collection, which is summarized here at the Sonic Stadium. You can find Luder’s portfolio here.
– Sega will be releasing Puyo Puyo Quest in the states, under the title Cranky Food Friends: A delicious drop and match RPG. The news was on Pocket Gamer and other sites. If it looks and sounds familiar to you, it’s because it came to the U.S. way-back-when as Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine.
– A neat roundup from Marc Morrison on 411Mania, in The 8 Ball column, which has the top eight worst 2D platformers, mostly from the eight and 16-bit eras. Some of the selections aren’t surprising, and they’re mostly correct: Home Improvement, Captain Planet, Bebe’s Kids…
Who has the largest Nintendo collection in Australia? Sam Crowther possibly, according to WA Today.
ON THIS DAY IN VIDEO GAME HISTORY…
– The only game of real significance released today, short of updates to sports games, is One Must Fall: 2097. It was a cool fighting game for the PC, which featured fightin’ rowebuts that you could upgrade. Man, August can’t get over soon enough…
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.
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