The Negative Edge News Report 05.23.07
Posted by Tommy Coloma on 05.23.2007
The "New" Riddick Game, Pirates, the King of Fighters Movie, Odin Sphere, and More!
The Halo 3 beta and Wind Waker have been taking up a big chunk of my free time (of which I have very little these days). Thankfully, I was able to pull myself away long enough to bring you yet another edition of The Negative Edge.
The news as I see it
Does it come with the option to trade 20 menthol Kools for a surgical shine job on our eyeballs?
Pitch Black happens to be one of my favorite movies of all time. The DVD sits right next to my copies of Predator and Aliens. It's that entertaining. Sure, it's no masterpiece, but I believe that it has earned its spot right next to those two greats.
Now imagine my surprise back in 2004 when the video game prequel to Pitch Black ended up being one of the best Xbox games ever. It's too bad that not too many people were able to experience the awesomeness of this game. Of course, there was a PC version, but the requirements were so high that not too many people were able to play that version either. I most definitely would have checked it out for the Director's Commentary alone. Now, those who missed Escape from Butcher Bay will have another chance to check it out as the game will receive a makeover in the form of The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena for the Xbox 360 and the PS3. According to Eurogamer, the newer version will contain a new sequence that takes place on a scavenger ship called Dark Athena, a multiplayer mode, updated graphics, and (possibly) a commentary mode similar to what was seen in the PC version.
Are you Okaaaaaaaay?
According to Variety, a live-action King of Fighters movie is set to start filming early next year. The screenplay is being written by the person that did Jet Li's Fearless and it will be directed by Hong Kong action director Gordon Chan.
Despite the fact that the entire series has too many characters to name and enough converging storylines to make anyone's head spin, I actually have some hope for this movie. There's just so much they can do with all the storylines they have to work with. However, I'm sure that those hopes will be dashed away once they reveal the actors and actresses. You can't have a KOF movie without at least Terry Bogard, Mai Shiranui, and maybe Athena. Going by typical Hollywood logic, they'd cast flavor of the month actors and actresses in these parts. Let's see - Terry Bogard would probably be played by Owen Wilson, Mai would be played by Jessica Biel (if she doesn't take the part of Chun Li in the new SF movie), and Athena would be played by some coked out Hollywood actress (for now let's say Lindsay Lohan). How about Kyo, Iori, Shermie or my personal favorites, Vice and Mature? Why should I have all the fun? Have any suggestions for any of your favorite characters? They can't be any worse than what Hollywood will think of. Send them my way! I'll post them next week.
This might actually work...
Bustaaaaaaaaaaaa Woooulllllf!
Pirates, cheaters, and importers are now suffering together
Microsoft has started to ban people who updated the firmware on their DVD drives in order to play "backups" on their 360s. I'm all for stopping piracy and cheating and all that, but there are legitimate reasons to modify one's console. Or at least one that I know of. Can you guess? If you said "to play imports," then you either read the title above or you are just that good at reading my mind! Well, as of now, there are only a few games for the 360 that I'd want to import (Oneechanbara vorteX and Super Robot Taisen XO to name a few), but that might change in the future, especially if Capcom, SNK, and/or Sega Sammy bring on some 2D goodness the way they did with the original Xbox.
The only consolation that I have is that whenever I die online, I can be sure that it's because I suck at the game and not because someone is using a hack. That would seriously piss me off.
345 out of 3851, or roughly 1 in 11, people want the Simpsons arcade game on Xbox Live Arcade
Over at Gamerscore Blog, the blog that is "written by members of Microsoft Games Global Marketing team," a question was posed - "What do YOU want to see on Xbox Live Arcade?"
I took a look at some the responses at around 4 PM PST on Tuesday, May 22, 2007 and I noticed something - a lot of people were asking for the Simpsons arcade game. That four player quarter eater that we all know and love. Given that around one in eleven people are asking for it, you'd think that some deal is being worked out as we speak. Maybe they are working on it. I just wish that these guys would at least acknowledge that they are aware of what a large chunk of the users are asking for, instead of keeping us in the dark until an announcement is made right before a release. Maybe something like "Yes, we are aware that a lot of people are asking for TMNT. Or Street Fighter. Or the Simpsons." Instead, we get this - "..." Maybe they don't want to show all their cards, but at least some acknowledgement that they are aware would be nice.
I'm going on a tangent here, but... Ok. So they've got a Street Fighter game out there, but I'm fairly certain that, when given a choice, Street Fighter II Turbo is one of the last SF games that a majority of gamers would like to to see. My guess is that the average gamer would rather see something like Marvel vs. Capcom 2. While that is my least favorite out of all of the Street Fighters (well, maybe least favorite after Street Fighter: The Movie The Game), I can't deny that this probably had the most appeal in the eyes of the average arcade goer. I'd be ok with a Live Arcade release as long as they do a real good job with the matchmaking. There is a huge divide between good players and bad players and, being one of the bad players, it really isn't fun to play against anyone that is even remotely good. Like I can't even touch the other player. It just isn't fun. So they'd need to figure out some way to make it fun for non-hardcore players or else people would just end up only playing the game offline.
Back to the subject at hand - I'd like to add that these guys (MS as well as Sony and Nintendo) are taking their sweet ass time with their download services. It's not like they don't know what people want, right? How can they not know? All they have to do is look in any video game-related forum and they're sure to find at least one thread where people talk about what they want to see. Right now, the tech savvy among us can download and play virtually any console and arcade game that we grew up with. Not only that, but we could play it with better emulation and superior online capabilities (ZSNES anyone?). I'm all for buying stuff on the Virtual Console or Xbox Live Arcade, but what incentive do I have to wait for the games that I want to play when I can get a better experience somewhere else NOW? I was hoping that Sony would step up their game and get both Nintendo and Microsoft to get off their asses and start to release good stuff on a continuous basis, but that unfortunately never happened. Luckily, I have several PS2, GameCube, and DS/GBA games to keep me busy, but if I'm craving some old-school games, legit might not be in my vocabulary if I can't find the game that I want to play.
Halo 3 - is it awesome?
I've played it off and on since the beta started to work last week. My overall impression is that it's fun to play, but I don't see that much of a difference between it and Halo 2 except for a few different weapons and shinier graphics. That isn't necessarily a bad thing. Whether or not it's fun to play is what matters to me. Please note that I'm no Halo expert so I won't notice many of the finer details when it comes to changes in gameplay and whatnot. All I know is that I, a person that doesn't play a lot of console first-person shooters, think that it's fun to play.
Upcoming Wii games - are you impressed?
Nintendo just sent out a press release containing a list of upcoming releases for the Wii and DS through September. After taking a minute or two to look it over I came back slightly disappointed. For the Wii, the only game that I am even remotely interested in is Metroid Prime 3 Corruption. Mario Strikers Charged might be cool if they make it an online multiplayer game, but other than those two, what is there to look forward to? The DS isn't any better. Maybe Brain Age 2, Phoenix Wright, or Luminous Arc, but that's it. It's summer time. Shouldn't game companies be coming out with the good stuff since a lot of us will have nothing better to do while trying to escape the summer heat?
The Week In Releases
Streets of Rage 2 (Wii VC)
I didn't own a Genesis back in the day so I never got to get past the third level of this game. In those days, I always considered Final Fight to be a superior game. It's time for me to see if my assessment was correct.
WarTech: Senko no Ronde (Xbox 360)
This is a shooter and fighting game hybrid. You have an energy bar like in most fighting games but instead of going at it in hand-to-hand combat, you pilot a mech and shoot your opponent into oblivion. I didn't really expect this to ever make it to the US so this is a pleasant surprise. I still don't think that it's worth the $60 price tag, despite the fact that it, along with Dead or Alive 4, is one of the few fighting games on the 360.
Odin Sphere (PS2)
I talked about this a few weeks ago, but now it is finally upon us. I'm looking forward to all that hand-drawn goodness. Here is the trailer -
This week's background wallpaper
Can you guess what this week's theme is?
Cornelius
Gwendolyn
Mercedes
Oswald
Velvet
These were all done by Slovman over at deviantART. I have high resolution version of the assets that were used to make these, but they're too big put anywhere, so I just linked these instead.
That will be 255 Rupees please
Used Xbox 360 - Don't buy one!
The only recourse Xbox 360 owners who have been banned have is to get another 360 since the ban is attached to the console, not the user's Xbox Live account. Can you guess where their banned systems end up? That's right! So, if you ever plan on getting a used 360, make sure that the store or auction that you get it from allows you to return it if you cannot get onto Live.
Space Channel 5 SE (PS2) for less that $3
One of my favorite games of all time. It's sad that the game is so unpopular that it was, as the cashier informed me, the cheapest game they had in the store. Well, for less than the cost of some fries and a burger, you too can enjoy the awesomeness of this underappreciated masterpiece. That's right! Masterpiece!
That is all I have for this week. I am currently surrounded by a bunch of cute penguins that say "dood" a lot. If I can keep them from exploding, I'll be back next week.
