Culture

Have Your Cake And Play It Too

Sick of looking at video game-themed pastry that you can’t eat, well here’s another one for your ravenous gamer eyes. I’m not sure who the rightful owner is of this one, but I’m going to take an educated guess and say that he or she turned 25. Simply Googling “NES Cakes” resulted in more variations than I wanted to document, but here’s just a few cakes:

A bit messy but tasty looking cake on Gizmodo
No points for artistic ability, but for sheer size on Geekstir
Another on MyWii
A tiny and dark looking NES controller here (focus your attention on the cake)
A brown NES Controller (because it’s chocolate) here
Finally a more up to date controller for the Wii on Nintendo Wii Fanboy.

Miyamoto pwns Colbert

Stephen Colbert recently expressed his rage at being beat out for Time’s Most Influential Person by Miyamoto and Korean pop star, Rain. Hilarity ensues:

GTA IV Addiction Level

Rockstar either has a very giddy Statistician working for them or they just love to keep track of every move you make in the game. I say this because the “Stats” section of GTA IV tracks everything except, correct me if I’m wrong here - how many times you’ve said the “F” word or inhaled the smoggy air pollution.

Within the stats section is of course, your “Addiction Level” to the game. Currently I’m sitting at “The Weekend is Here” If your level isn’t listed, pick the closest one:

• Fiend
• Detox / Retox
• Wake up Buzz
• The weekend is here
• That’s some good s***
• Bummed in the Gob
• Getting a bit twitchy
• Tweaking Hard
• High on your Own Supply
• Coming Up
• Straight Addict
• One toke over the line
• Serious Habit

Uwe Boll: Genius

Regardless of whether you think Uwe Boll is a genius or not, now you can own one of these facetious decals and post them anywhere to inevitably help promote Uwe and his game-to-movie making skills.

Priced at $1.99 on Ebay, the seller’s comment: “Show your support for the mentally challenged!” is a genius statement in itself. I ask you, Mr. Seller, when the public sees these stickers floating around, will they know or care if he’s a brilliant filmmaker or not? Who’s the real genius here? Remember - Bad press is better than no press.

Uwe as kind enough to give us an interview last year when he was just finishing up Postal and is currently working on a number of titles, including:

• Zombie Massacre (2010) (in production) (producer)
• BloodRayne 3 (2009) (in production) (producer)
• Sabotage 1943 (2009) (in production) (producer)
• Alone in the Dark II (2009) (V) (post-production) (producer)
• Far Cry (2008) (post-production) (producer)
• Tunnel Rats (2008) (post-production) (executive producer)

Here’s a video of Uwe speaking (NSFW) to the public regarding the “Ban Uwe Boll” online petition:

To each his own I say. Let’s see Decal Man make a movie people will go see.

Help promote the genius here

GTA IV: A Dissenting Voice

Everyone on my friends’ list (including me) has been playing GTA4. I haven’t seen this level of domination since Halo 3, or maybe Gears of War before that.

I’ll be holding off on my views about GTA4 for a while. I want to give them time to percolate and simmer. I need my initial reactions (good and bad) to be tempered a bit by experience and thought.

One blogger has made the decision that he won’t be playing the game. Nat over at buttonmashing.com explained why he’s not playing GTA4. An excerpt:

I would not be surprised if GTAIV is Game of the Year. I’m not playing it, and I probably never will. . . .

I’ve changed. In the past, I would play any game that was popular or a triple-A title without any regard to content or subject matter. I just cannot play a game where it’s good to be bad. I pretty much avoid games where you are a serial killer, psycho, or just some crazy going postal. The GTA games let you do just that. You’re rewarded for being evil, and not just a satiric or comedic type of evil. Generally, the worse you are the better. I’m not against violence. I like playing Crackdown and Assassin’s Creed, but even then I don’t play them all that much anymore. Now, someone will argue that I really don’t know the game because I’ve never played it. However, there’s so much about GTA in popular culture and reviews that I’m pretty sure I’m not too far off the mark.

An interesting read, and I’ll admit I was feeling much the same way he was. I did feel like GTA4 was going to be iconic in many ways, though. Also, not having kids around also makes it easier to justify my playing it.

So far, this is the first (rational) post I’ve seen talking about why GTA4 content is not appropriate. I’d be interested to see other viewpoints along these lines.

Midway unveils Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe

We all knew a new Mortal Kombat game was coming when Midway put up a countdown, however, I doubt any of us expected the direction the Mortal Kombat series was going to take. Midway is set to release Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe this fall on PS3 and Xbox 360. The game is obviously the 10-years-too-late answer to Marvel vs. Capcom. Two DC writers are on-board, but we’ll probably still get a ridiculous story. You can probably guess who will likely be on the character roster, but Batman, Superman, Sub-Zero, and Scorpion are the only ones revealed thus far. The game will also feature interactive environments to keep things interesting. However, there is some bad news.
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50 Reasons You’re a Crappy Customer

Games Radar compiled a list from game store employees of what they hate about their customers. Grandmas buying Manhunt for their underage grandchildren, fanboys, and immature kids are the few who make their jobs like hell.

So, when the employees of an actual Minnesota game store sent us a list of the 50 things they hate about their customers, we couldn’t help but chuckle in absolute agreement. Our office contains more than a few veterans of retail, so we can confirm that, yes, a lot of you stroll into your local GameStops, Game Crazys and EBs completely unaware of how much of an obnoxious ass you are.

We have to remind ourselves that even when we have to put up with bad game store retailers that they have to deal with other stupid customers. So let’s try to help make their job easier by being considerate to their feelings.

Click here for the whole list.

Source: Games Radar

A light-hearted look at our passion

A week or so ago, the May ‘08 edition of Paste magazine found its way into my mailbox. For those not in the know, Paste is a monthly magazine that covers music, film, and culture while generally hovering over the Indie interests in those areas. It’s all part of the necessities for one to keep their ear to the street and maintain their Indie cred. Now you’re probably asking yourself what does a magazine that is mostly about music have to do with video games. Well, besides an article about independent game developers making their way into the mainstream, there’s a piece entitled The Diary of a Video Game RPG Hero.

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IGN’s April Fool’s Joke: Legend Of Zelda Movie Trailer

This mourning I got up and decided to stay true to my Aeropause duty by writing about a news item. To my dismay I remember it was April Fools and decided to wait a day so I don’t report on some false item. However this is too good to pass up. IGN made a fake teaser trailer of the Legend of Zelda Movie. It’s funny how great the production value is for a small April Fool’s Joke. Check it out.

Source: IGN

Did you know that the Sam & Max guy works for Pixar?

This interview with Sam & Max creator Steve Purcell may not have much to do with the video games, but S&M fans should find it worth it a read.

Purcell discusses a little about the creation of the Freelance Police, and the article begins with a tiny overview of his career… from comics to LucasArts to animation. Primarily, the interview pimps the upcoming release of the Sam & Max Animated Series DVD box set. Which, if you’ll recall, did not use the same voices as the original Sam & Max Hit the Road adventure game. There was a lot of internet gnashing of teeth when they announced the “new” voice cast.

Another item not mentioned is the work Steve Purcell did for early Sega franchise Toe Jam & Earl. Check the manual; it’s full of vintage Purcell character designs.

And I will swear to you that, somehow, someway, Purcell did some background art work for the Sega Channel. I distinctly recall seeing a Max figure hidden in one of the genre screens. But of course, back then we didn’t have weblogs to categorize and immortalize that kind of gaming minutiae.

via Toon Zone