The Negative Edge News Report 07.04.07
Posted by Tommy Coloma on 07.04.2007
Metroid Prime 3's lack of online play, PopCap giving Sony's PR a run for their money, Capcom's announcement of the century, and More!
Did you know that Transformers opened on a Monday? For the longest time I thought that it would open on the 4th of July. It wasn't until Sunday that I found out about the early release. Being able to watch a movie that I've been looking forward to earlier than I expected to is just all kinds of cool. To me, that is the equivalent of getting Metroid Prime 3 on the 13th of August instead of on the 20th. Sadly, things almost never work that way with video games. So, it wasn't really a surprise when Nintendo recently pushed the game back to the 27th. That's cool. A week is nothing, right? Everything was rosy until another news item hit the nets - Metroid Prime 3 will not have online support. In an interview with GamePro, Michael Kelbaugh, the President and CEO of Retro Studios, explained that "it's something we talked about early on, but we only have so many resources. We opted to devote those resources to making a better single-player experience." While I am very disappointed about this announcement, I guess that I shouldn't really have expected online multiplayer seeing as how Nintendo didn't really promise it in the first place. It's just that this was their chance to show everyone how console first-person shooters should be done. Sure, Halo's control scheme is nice, but can you honestly tell me that you'd prefer a regular controller to a mouse/keyboard setup? With Prime 3 we could have gotten an awesome online FPS with mouse-like control. We'll still have the mouse-like control, but how cool would it have been to be able to take it online? We'll never know. The only silver lining that I see is that Escape from Butcher Bay became one of the best first-person shooters on the Xbox because the developers focused on making it a single-player game. I'm hoping that Metroid Prime 3 will follow suit. Either way, it's Metroid. We'll be picking it up no matter what.
Oh! Transformers kicked ass. Though I have some complaints, I still consider it to be the best summer movie I've seen so far. It's strange 'cause when the movie was first announced with Michael Bay as the director, everyone (myself included) thought that it would blow. I'm glad to say that we were wrong.
The news as I see it
A Sony-quality quote that wasn't spoken by as Sony rep
"Very few games are developed without reference to past games. There's always going to be titles that build on a previous mechanic or game. But there's a fine line between that and very bold-faced rip-offs that aren't adding anything to the game and are just trying to make a quick buck."
Those words were spoken by Jason Kapalka, the chief creative officer at PopCap Games, during an interview he had with GamesIndustry.biz. If it was anyone else I wouldn't have paid attention. But to have someone from PopCap spout those words is absolutely ridiculous. Hello? Zuma! What the fuck is that? As a programmer, the bullshit they pulled with Zuma is pretty much the one thing I worry about the most - plagiarism. How horrible would it be to put together an awesome super cool game only to have someone blatantly rip it off and get famous off it it? That's exactly what PopCap Games did with Zuma.
See the picture on the left? That's a picture of Puzz Loop, which was released in 1998. See the one on the right? That's a picture of Zuma, which was released in 2003. Don't let the graphics fool you. They play exactly the same. Sure, the visuals in Zuma are better, but that's expected from a game that came out 5 years later. And just look at some of the awards that Zuma won -
Runner-Up, Game of the Year (2005), IGN.com
Wireless Puzzle Game of the Year (2005), IGN.com
Nominee, Best Game, 5th Annual Mobile Choice Consumer Awards (U.K. - 2005)
Game of the Year (2004), RealArcade
Top Shareware Games (2004), Adrenaline Vault
Now that's all kinds of bullshit. Did they even acknowledge where they got the concept from? What did they say when they accepted those awards? If I wasn't so cheap, I'd buy myself a copy of Magnetica (the true updated version of Puzz Loop) out of general principle. I wish Mitchell Corporation would do something about this whole situation. It just annoys me to no end!
Street Fighter: The Movie - Round 2
It looks like they were really serious about making a Street Fighter movie that focuses on Chun Li. If a script review at LatinoReview is to believed, it looks like things might turn out better than expected. According to the article, this movie is basically a revenge flick (my favorite type of flick). Chun Li's father was taken away by Bison and she wants to take him down. The script doesn't try to shoehorn in unnecessary characters and only brings in people that make sense to her story. I'm sure they're taking some liberties here and there (Gen as her teacher?), but I think that this is much better than including every single character for the sake of including them. They've got some balls to not include Ken and Ryu. This shows that, at least at this point, they know who to focus on. If Transformers has taught me anything, it's that movies that by all accounts should be bad, can actually turn out to be good. For now, I'm looking forward to this movie.
Get ready for a new game that will be sequelized to death!
Damn it! I've been devoting too much time to Street Fighter recently. I promise, unless Capcom announces Street Fighter IV at E3, I'll lay off of the Capcom lovin' for a little while. But for today, I'd like to report that Capcom has just put out a teaser web site for an "original" 2D fighting game that is supposedly coming soon. Details are scarce, but, according to Insert Credit, the new game will focus on characters from Sengoku Basara. While getting an original game would be nice, I was actually hoping for another sequel. Marvel vs. Capcom 3, CVS3, SF4, or Capcom Fighting Evolution 2 - all of those would have been welcome. Capcom Fighting Evolution 2 especially. The first one was beyond horrible, but Capcom has a knack for significantly improving things after the first in a series. It took four iterations to get to the fun that is Marvel vs. Capcom 2. Can you find me anyone who liked the four button layout and the EX selection in CVS1? Street Fighter III:1 and Street Fighter III:2 weren't great but everyone swears that SF3: Third Strike is the best thing since sliced bread. Yeah, a sequel to any of those games or Street Fighter IV would have been great. If Sengoku Basara is the next 2D fighter that they're serving, we'll have to wait even longer (or forever) to get back to our 2s, 3s and 4s. Well... Maybe that's a good thing.
Insert Credit's article also indicates that the game will be developed by Arc System Works. If true, this would be hilarious on so many levels. If I remember correctly, some of the people that worked on Street Fighter left Capcom and eventually ended up at Arc System Works. Wouldn't it be wild if Capcom came to them and asked them to make the next Street Fighter game because they didn't know how to do it any more? Joking aside, I hope that this isn't true. The play mechanics and graphics might end up being like those in Guilty Gear X (i.e. not pixilated), but that style is being overrun buy a lot of comparable (and some may argue superior) games already. Big Bang Beat, Melty Blood, Arcana Heart, Akatsuki Blitzkampf - it's hard for me to keep track these days! They're cool but we have enough of them. I still like playing Capcom-style fighting game thank you very much.
The Week In Releases
Super Mario Bros. 2 (Wii VC)
This game apparently came about because Nintendo of America believed that the real sequel to Super Mario Bros. would have been too much for us to handle. That was actually a good thing since we were treated to the goodness that we know as Super Mario Bros. 2. For those of you that don't know, this is essentially a remake of a game called Doki Doki Panic. Actually, it's similar to the way PopCap ripped off Puzz Loop in order to create Zuma. The graphics were changed to fit the world of Mario and some of the play mechanics were tweaked. In all, it's essentially the same game. The difference is that Doki Doki Panic was developed by Nintendo themselves, so they were essentially ripping off themselves. That's OK since Capcom does it all the time.
Dokidoki Majo Saiban (DS Japan)
If you read my column regularly, then you'll know what this is. Because of my recent inability to do anything past the first cave in the new Zelda game, I have no intention of ever touching (ha!) this game unless it gets localized. Trying to play a Japanese game without being able read Japanese is NOT fun.
Ninja Gaiden Sigma (PS3)
If I had a PS3, this is the one game that I'd get. I want to see how well a game that was originally on the Xbox turns out on the PS3. It might give us a hint on how good (or bad) The Chronicles of Riddick will end up.
Plus, it's Ninja Gaiden. What? Are you not excited? Check out the Minibosses site here and get the Ninja Gaiden song (they came out with the studio version a few months ago and I've got to say that it's pretty nice). If that doesn't get you excited, then nothing will. Now if they'd just do a cover for the song in level 2-2 of Ninja Gaiden II...
Jewels of Cleopatra (PC)
I tried the demo out last night at around 2 in the morning. I didn't go to sleep until around 3 because I used up the full free hour that the demo allows. Does that mean that it's good? I guess. It's pretty much a clone of Bejeweled, but of course, it does come with a twist. In each board, you are essentially leading a character from point A to point B using the tiles that you've matched as stepping stones. Every time you have a match, the tiles turn gold. You're basically leading the character down a yellow-brick road that you created with your mind (isn't that deep?). You have to play it to see what I mean (hence the link to the demo that I've provided). I didn't think that it would be fun since it was VERY easy at the beginning. But after a few stages, things started to get hectic. Different tiles, traps, speed runs, mini-games, and I'm sure that's just the tip of the iceberg. I might actually pick this up just so that I have something to play on my laptop.
If Mario was real, do you think he'd be feeling any remorse for killing everything in sight? Look at that smile on his face. I don't think so!
The Anime Circle
Gantz
Last week I gave out a link to the Gantz manga. Oddly enough, Dark Horse just announced over the weekend at Anime Expo that they've licensed the manga for distribution in the US. I assure you that I am not psychic. The fact that I gave out the link to the translated manga is mere coincidence. Don't you wish that you'd checked it out when I handed you the keys to the kingdom? You can always look back to last week's column to get the link.
Daicon IV Opening Animation
I was going to talk about the Gantz anime and probably another series called Simoun, but then I saw the radish that Mario is holding in one of the pictures above and it reminded me about Daicon IV. A daicon is a giant radish in Japanese. Well, in 1983 there was a sci-fi convention over in Japan called Daicon IV. Gainax, the ones responsible for everyone's favorite mind-fuck Neon Genesis Evangelion, was tapped to make the opening animation for the convention. What they came up with was this video. As you can see, it's jam-packed with references to tv shows, movies, and books. Watching this video will give you Anime nerd cred. Believe it!
And, since we're on a remake theme this week, I might as well provide you with the intro to Densha Otoko. Densha Otoko is a J-Drama whose intro is somewhat of a remake of the the Daicon IV animation. I likes!
To be continued...
That's it for this week. I'm about to jump in. If I can make it past the Raging Storm of the goose, I'll be back next week.
