What If? 03.10.09: Week 10 - Heel Donkey Kong, Xbox Handheld System, More

Posted by Greg Bruno on 03.10.2009

What If Donkey Kong turned heel? What If Microsoft made an Xbox handheld system? And perhaps the most important 411 related What If question ever asked...all inside!



Did you miss me? Don't worry; you don't need to say it. Your eyes already gave you away. I know you did. If you're wondering where What If? was last week, we're going to be going through a scheduling change. What If? will now be a bi-weekly column. I was curious to see how many more questions we could get so trying the every week other format should allow us to gather more questions for future columns. So from this point on, we're bi. You can't unread that.

Thanks to everyone who reads and sends in questions! Keep'em coming! As a porn director would say, "Nothing is too dirty, at least pretend to like it, and don't get any on me!"

This week marks the tenth edition of the column. It grew up so fast. I remember when all we were doing was answering ridiculous questions and now we're…well… still doing that same thing. But we managed to piss off Jack Thompson while doing it, so let's consider that an achievement shall we?

This week, we're joined by my personal hero, Rod Oracheski. Rod is awesome, like 70's style awesome too - not that cheap 90's shit when just anything was at least 'cool' either. When not busy being awesome, he's doing other stuff.

Plus he's David Redkey's favorite writer.

Also, Mark Salmela stopped by to give his thoughts on two of our questions. You never know where he's going to rear his…rear.

What if rock band games became DLC only?

Rod Oracheski:
Wow, would Achievement whores ever HATE the game. Sucking away all their time and not rewarding them for it anymore? Taking a cue from Lance Storm, if I can be serious for a minute...nobody would notice. The game is already heavily reliant on DLC and people love it. Well, people except Warner Music executives, who believe for some unknown reason that they should be paid more for continuing to do abso-fucking-lutely nothing other than license out their music for use in Rock Band.

Sums up the music industry, doesn't it? They were paid good money to do nothing, but they see how much money is being made (more than is coming in off the albums!) and decide they want to get even more money for doing nothing - and if they can't get more money than by God they'll just shut the whole thing down! And people say the music industry can't change?

Greg Bruno
I personally think this would work out well for the series. There's really no reason to continue making disc versions of the same game. The Guitar Hero franchise is sinking into the ground with all these discs they keep putting out. The simple fact is, no one wants to keep swapping out the games to play certain songs. I think Rock Band 2 had it right when they incorporated the importing of songs from the first game into the second. That was a brilliant move that allowed players to keep rocking out to the songs they loved from the original game. Not to mention all the DLC people collected being able to be played across both games. I think if Rock Band 3 were a huge bundle of new songs available only via download, people would buy it. Of course, the problem you then run into is storage space. How hard can it be to mod a terabyte hard drive into an Xbox 360?

What if Donkey Kong returned as a villain once more?

Rod Oracheski:
Wow, a heel turn for DK - after having a cartoon and a game that features bongos? Could anyone really take him seriously these days though, I mean a villain that throws barrels? They'll have to get him a gun or two, and maybe some hench-monkeys. Naturally he'd still be going after Mario, but I don't think women's rights activists would be very happy if it was yet another 'kidnapped the Princess' scenario, so they'd have to find other motivation.

Maybe Donkey Kong was running one of the many failing banks (I mean what could a gorilla really know about sub-prime mortgages anyway?) and he's trying to embezzle bailout funds?

Greg Bruno
This would be amazing. Imagine, Donkey Kong turns evil once again and overthrows Bowser. Of course, there would be an epic battle between the two (King Kong Vs. Godzilla, anyone?) With DK now the main enemy in Mario's life once more, he's in for a world of hurt. Primates have way higher cognitive abilities than reptiles, so it probably wouldn't be as repetitive as "Capture Princess Peach." No, DK would go after Mario himself. What use does a gorilla have with a hot blonde, anyway? Don't answer that. Mario, now hunted, would have to resort to Rambo style fighting tactics. Not only is DK smarter than Bowser…he's got thumbs. Mario is fucked.

What if Microsoft announced a hand held Xbox?

Rod Oracheski:
Chiropractors would be flooded with business as people complaining of sore backs would fill their waiting rooms. Seriously, this thing would need a neck strap of some kind. I have a 600mm lens that weighs 15 pounds and I'm willing to bet a handheld Xbox would challenge it for bulk. On the bright side, at least I'd be reasonably sure it would have two analog sticks.

Greg Bruno
I'd buy it. No doubt. If I could bring, let's say Halo 2, on the train or the bathroom or the bathroom on the train, I'd love it. Of course it would have to integrate the majority of the features on Xbox Live as well. I'd imagine it would have the sort of connectivity that the PSP has with the PS3. Microsoft would make tons of money off the unit. Every 12 year old on Earth would have this on their Xmas list. I intend to PWN them all while shitting.

Mark Salmela:
I'm torn on this one, but I'm going to stick to my belief that it would be a disaster for Microsoft. I don't want to come across as a Microsoft hater, but just look at how the PSP is doing. Sony has dozens of developmental teams to back their platforms yet they can only dedicate a few games to the PSP a year. Imagine how Microsoft would do having to split its teams between the 360 and a handheld console? Rare can only put out so many games guys *and even fewer that don't totally suck*. My point is that unless Microsoft wants to hand out checks quicker than the government right now there's no way a Microsoft handheld would receive a decent amount of exclusives or even good games. With everyone shifting development over to the Wii right now Microsoft needs to worry about making sure Xbox 360 stays a lead SKU for developers, not trying to convince developers to start making games for a new handheld. Thankfully Microsoft is smart and they won't make a handheld console, but if they did it'd be an absolute disaster in my mind. But then again it didn't stop them from making an mp3 player now didn't it?

What if 411mania developed a video game or video game system?

Rod Oracheski:
The 411mania One-Shot-Deal 5000 console would revolutionize the world!

Actually it's unlikely such a groundbreaking console would ever come out. After making dozens of trade show appearances to promote it (without ever showing it) and attending tons of free parties in the process, we'd launch the pre-order website only to have it crash and subsequently delete it. It would get no fewer than three 'firm' launch dates, with the final one being pushed back citing technical issues with the HyperReal processor/graphics chip combo. In the end, we'd wind up acting like it never existed while launching our line of keyboards for your lap - perfect for people who do all their hardcore computing while sitting on a couch.

Greg Bruno
It's already in development. We can't talk about it, and I'm not sure how you got this information, but let me share with you some interesting tid bits to whet your whistle. The codename for the new console is "The Ramon" and it is fully backwards compatible with any boxing or UFC game on the already market. It will launch with a game called "Why did I give these lazy fucks a writing job?" It's an emotional roller coaster of a game full of joy, tears, and friendship. And there are dinosaurs.

Mark Salmela:
Well there are a couple things that my dream video game would include. First off you have to fight Terror. I mean come on; Terror is our number one enemy now days. We're pretty much in a war on Terror in real life, so if we made a video game it'd have to mimic real life. We also need to make sure we're Targeting our enemies, since our game would need to have a strict focus and not become sidetracked *unless it's for sweet mini-games*. There'd have to be plenty of enemies, and lots of guns to shoot them with *and lots of blood for them to bleed*. I'd imagine locations would include oh let's say a nuclear power plant, an airport, and for the heck of it, let's say the Golden Gate Bridge. Enemies would include things that are often stereotyped as hoodlums and evil-doers, such as hookers, terrorists, and people who wear hoods. The action needs to be nonstop and bug-testing is at the bottom of the priority list. Hell, for every minute we spend bug-testing we need to spend at least 3 hours inserting more blood and decapitated body parts. Oh yeah, what a glorious game 411 would construct. In my opinion Ashish needs to get off his ass and send me and a crack team of my choosing a big, fat check to make this game. I'm thinking 3 months and 3 million dollars later Derek Robbins, Drew Robbins, maybe Joe Roche, and I could construct quite the game for Targeting Terrorists….

That'll do it for your dose of nonsense. Remember to leave your own What If? questions below to have your questions featured in an upcoming edition of the column.