Points of Interest – 1/8/08
InFormers: Robots in the News
- Merch: Finding yourself wishing you had a nice, badass blade on your Movie Optimus Prime’s arm, just like the one he slaughtered Bonecrusher with in the film? Then check this out.
- Review: Another early look at an Animated toy, this time with Prowl in the spotlight.
- Article: Toy News International takes a look back at the year that was in TransFormers.
Assorted Mushrooms
- Video: At CES yesterday, Bill Gates invited everyone to take a look at what his last day at Microsoft might be like.
- Video: The Cat Cube, now available in stores everywhere.
- Video: The “One More Day” hate continues, as one disappointed fan attempts to burn his copy. But this is no ordinary book– it refuses to be burned! At least, it does at first.
- Videos: Speaking of One More Day, Newsarama has a video review of that story, and another on that same link which asks if the Marvel and DC crossovers have gotten out of hand.
- Article: And then another from Newsarama takes a look at the reactions to the whole One More Day story and what it means.
- Comic: Even Walky has a pair of special comic strips which look at how it’s played out.
- Video: From the makers of BRAWNDO (with electrolytes) comes POWERTHIRST.
- Video: David Lynch doesn’t seem to care for iPhone very much. At least, not the part where you watch movies on it…
- Video: My god… so many DUCKS! What could they all want?!
- Video: Oh, snap!
- Video: Drinking and riding the bus may not be as bad as drinking and driving, but surely it ranks somewhere.
Incidently, this just reminds me how much I hate taking the TTC…
This Japanese bus fight, on the other hand, is a bit quieter and more fun to watch.
- Video: …lotta videos today, huh? But who can help it, they’re pretty good today, too! Anyway, behold the future! Robots that eat snow and crap out ice bricks!
This is like something in a Mega Man game.
- Video: A controversial tell-all book by a wrestling fan has revealed that wrestling fans are in fact paid actors.
- Reviews: IGN checks out and rates the holiday season’s anime releases.
Video Power
- Interview: Capcom has found an interview with the voice of Ryu from Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie, Skip Stellrecht.
- Interview: Interestingly enough, Rockman Perfect Memories also has an interview, this one with Mr. Eddie Lebron, who is directing the fan-made Mega Man movie mentioned a few days ago.
- Article: Of interest to Virtual Console afficionados is Racketboy’s look at the best undiscovered TurboGrafx16 games.
- Newsbit: Who ever knew that the Wii would have such a big fan in the Queen?
- Videos: I have no idea why GameTrailers keeps adding videos for old Virtual Console games (by which I mean, old by the VC’s standards), but here are some more: Soldier Blade, Urban Champion, Baseball, R-Type III, Gradius, Dungeon Explorer, and Xevious.
- Video: On the subject of classics, ScrewAttack.com pulls R-Type DX out of the vault. Compare to the one above for extra fun!
As far as a solution to the battery issue goes… just play it on the GBA SP.
- Article: Sick of the arguments, IGN AU decides to find out once and for all, who has the best games: Nintendo DS or Sony PSP.
- Newsbit: IBM decided to attract some people to their CES booth by hooking up some Wii consoles with Wii Sports.
This is akin to what is known in wrestling as a “cheap pop.”
- Article: Looks like Capcom can talk to other people now; Next Generation has a feature up that talks to Street Fighter IV producer Yoshinori Ono about how they plan to revitalize the fighting genre.
- Interview: Can’t believe I forgot to mention this a few days ago.
In the fifth part of Joe Quesada’s (Marvel Comics’ Editor-in-Chief, if you skip the stuff above Video Power) interview with Comic Book Resources, they veer away from comic books and talk more about video games, and in doing so, Joe reveals that he might have been a part of how the NES got its start in America.
Ok, so the guy may have had a heavy hand in one of the worst comic book stories of all time, but according to this, I still owe him a debt of gratitude.
Just not where Spider-man is concerned.
- Article: Games Radar takes a look at the Top 7 Franchise Embarassments, the low points many a hit game series has stumbled upon.
- Article: The number of bad games based on movies is a shame all by itself. So then, what of games that are based on movies, but without the license?
Fortunately, they somehow turn out pretty good.
Incidently, while it’s not a movie per se, don’t forget that when Shigeru Miyamoto first set out to make a video game, he was interested in basing it on Popeye. Paramount weren’t interested until after they had a success on their hands, which meant the ideas got to be refined into a little something we know as Donkey Kong. Replace Bluto with DK, Olive with Pauline, the sailor man with the carpenter, and maybe the can of spinach with a big whopping hammer, and things become a little more clear. There are other parallels to be drawn, too.
And don’t forget, people have likened Mega Man to Astro Boy for years, and the X series took inspiration from Blade Runner. Whether or not Water World truly influenced Legends, however, remains a mystery to me, as I’ve never really seen the movie to know if they share anything besides lots of water. Oh, and people cite Battle Network as being rather Tron-like as well.
Can you think of more?
- Pics: Ever wonder how the worlds of Super Mario Galaxy might look if they were a little more… real? It looks like someone did, and you can see for yourself.
- Article: On a similar line of thought, ever wonder how real the game’s physics are?
- Merch: Want to get your Valentine the ultimate gaming gift? Then how about some personalized Mii chocolates?
- eBay: Up for auction: a promo reel for the baddest controller on the planet.
How bad?
So bad.
- Videos: Using the DS and Mario is one way to stand out from other TV stations.
- Comic: Making the best of a “bad” situation.
- Article: It’s sad, but even a game as great as Super Mario Galaxy just isn’t for everyone.
- Article: 12 months later, Game|Life has found the answers to their ten burning questions for 2007.
- Newsbit: Ok, this is just crazy. A son gives his dad a .22 rifle, tells him to shoot him, and the dad does. All because he wouldn’t look at the son’s Xbox.
Reeeeeeeeal stable family, there.
- Interview: Valve talks to 1up about how The Orange Box came together.
- Guide: Can’t find a Weighted Companion Cube? Knit your own!
–LBD “Nytetrayn”