Points of Interest – 10/10/07
InFormers: Robots in the News
- While not purely TransFormers, it seems that the San Diego Union Tribune has taken an in-depth look at the publishing company IDW and the success they’ve had over the past year with their various properties, including our favorite Robots in Disguise, of course.
Assorted Mushrooms
- Bruce Timm is a hell of a guy. Who else in the cartoon biz would take the kind of time needed to answer the questions of so many fans?
- Everyone who’s into comics dreams of that moment where you just happen across a vintage gem from the golden age. Can you imagine having such a thing happen to you more than once, though?
Video Power
- Japanese music videos are so crazy. Case in point: This Rockman video, brought to my attention by Heatman.
- The Angry Video Game Nerd is back, this time looking at an old bad game I never knew existed, yet has a name I’m sure many are familiar with: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
- Itagaki reveals more of what’s on his agenda, speaking out on non-games, Zelda, and the DS hardware in GameTrailers’ newest video.
- Next-Gen takes a look at ten standard features they believe that every game should employ, and I am strongly of a like-minded opinion on several. Let’s see…
I’ve always been a huge proponent of #3, ever since the days we started using more than two buttons. It still disappoints me when I’m confronted with no opportunity to fix things to my liking, and the Virtual Console and GBA-on-DS games are the most prime of offenders.
#4 is a biggie, too. Though incidently, I think that if games want to compete with other mediums, players should be able to watch any cutscene they’ve seen already whenever they want, and be able to skip, pause, fast-forward, or rewind as necessary, for what basically amounts to all the same reasons as you would in a movie. Something happens, you can’t see/hear what’s going on, you accidently skip it, whatever. The option should be there to see it again, especially if it’s important, to see it again as desired.
#9, I’m not so sure. Tutorials are all good and well, but I think by MegaMan Battle Network 6, I’ve pretty much got the hang of how the basics work. I prefer an optional tutorial, like Mega Man X5, or the mansion Lara gets to play around in for Tomb Raider.
#10 is good, too. That’s what killed MegaMan Battle Network 5 for me, being thrown back to the title every time I died. ESPECIALLY on that last battle you can’t save before. I loved the game up until that point. Now I can’t bring myself to bother finishing it.
Thanks a lot, Capcom.
- Games Radar takes a serious look at this whole “rating of 10″ thing, and asks a selection of magazine editors (all conveniently from Future, if I’m not mistaken) what their thoughts on the highest possible score are.
And on a related note, check out who’s heading up Nintendo Power now– none other than now-former PSM and Game Players Editor in Chief Chris Slate!
- Another feature takes a look at the enemies of video games that just won’t go away. Sequel or something else, you’re likely to encounter plenty of these guys.
- You just don’t see promotions like this any more.
- Game|Life reveals why firing your PR department is a BAD idea.
…seriously, though. Beaumonts? I know I’m overreacting, but it still makes me retch a little inside. Still, I remember it wasn’t that long ago that Capcom had ads this bad. Anyone remember Zero’s quote from the ad for that controller?
To quote Kotaku: “Konami writing ‘Beaumont’ is a bit like Nintendo writing “Murio” or Microsoft referring to Hilo 3.”
- If my geometry teacher thought like this, maybe I wouldn’t have been such a horrible failure at it.
Then again, maybe if my Algebra 1 teacher bothered to teach me anything before I went into Geometry, that might’ve helped, too.
–LBD “Nytetrayn”