So, yeah. That whole Double Fine on KickStarter thing is a runaway phenomenon. At the time of this writing, the project has topped $1.4 million in financial backers — having only asked for $400k from Double Fine’s fans. And now, the buzz all over the video game world is the single, inevitable question: What does this mean for the future of video games?

It’s mind-boggling when you think about it. Tim Schafer’s Double Fine Productions couldn’t get a single video game publisher to sign off on a new point-and-click adventure game, so he took the project to KickStarter and asked the fans to fund it. And fund it they have — more than tripling the project’s intended budget and topping $1M in pledges in just 24 hours. And this is only the beginning; the fundraising project will continue accepting donations until mid-March, so it’s possible that number could climb much, much higher.

So what does it mean?

Well, let’s temper our excitement for a moment. You can’t (yet) say that we now live in a world where big-name video game publishers are no longer necessary. Let’s not forget that had this been anyone but one of video gaming’s superstars (of which there are precious few), it’s unlikely the KickStarter project would have gotten this much attention. Indeed, there are plenty of unknown developers already trying to get their games funded on KickStarter — none of which can hope to touch the $1M+ donations that Double Fine has received. Another factor that makes this a unique situation is that Schafer (pictured above) is well known as one of the best adventure game makers in the business, and he’s merely asking for the funds to make another great adventure game. That’s something he hasn’t been able to do in a while, and the old-school gamers nostalgic for his point-and-click titles are of course all too eager to part with their money for a chance at a new adventure game from the master builder.

On the other hand, this situation does set a very important precedent. For the game studios out there with plenty of fans, this undeniably opens new doors. I’d say it’s only a matter of time (probably a very short amount of time) before we see other boutique developers bypassing publishers altogether and launching their own KickStarter campaigns. It’s a staggeringly attractive notion to them: full creative freedom to make the game they want to make, and they don’t have to split any of the profits with a publisher. It’s the best possible scenario from an artistic standpoint.

But is it the start of a revolution? Only time and major players in the industry can answer that. For some initial reactions, Edge Magazine has posted a fascinating compilation of reactions from numerous game developers, including Minecraft‘s Markus ‘Notch’ Persson, Epic’s Cliff Bleszinski, Id’s Tom Hall, and many more. And for his part, Tim Schafer has been Tweeting like a madman ever since the KickStarter campaign began. He’s understandably over-the-moon, but it’s far too soon for him to even consider the idea of going down this road again for another game in the future. He’s just focused on this project, as he should be. (Among other things, he’s all but confirmed that an iPad version of the game will be made.)

The other star of this drama has been the platform by which Double Fine achieved its success. KickStarter had an amazing 24 hours yesterday, including hitting $1M not only with Double Fine’s project but a second one as well — after never having hit $1M before with any project — and a few other milestones, which they chronicled on their blog. Obviously, they have to be hoping that this is the beginning of even bigger things to come.

I can’t predict the future, but as someone who was inspired by this situation to join KickStarter and back a project there for the first time, I just want the most creative game studios to get the chance to make the games that deserve to be made — publisher or not.

What do you think Double Fine’s crowd-funding success says about the future of gaming?

You are not looking at a real human being. Hard as it is to believe, this video demo of a new 3D skin mapping technique is CGI being rendered in real-time.

Imagine playing Call of Duty or Skyrim or Arkham City with in-game characters that look every bit as 100% real as you and me, with living, breathing skin that’s both uniform and randomized to the perfect degree — perfect enough to fool the ultra-discerning human eye. Created by a pair of researchers named Jorge Jimenez and Diego Gutierrez, it’s called “Separable Subsurface Scattering” (SSS), it was made to be used by video game developers who need realistic human skin in modern video games.

The amazing thing to me is that the video and the technology behind it are not pre-rendered. It’s written in Direct X 10, and to prove it, Jimenez and Gutierrez have made their tech demo freely available to download. I know as I watch it that this character is a fabrication, but my mind refuses to accept that it’s not real, because it’s flawless.

Now I’m dying to see a character using SSS skin in motion. Let’s see the skin move, stretch, and contract. If it’s just as believable in how it moves, then future video game avatars are about to ascend to a whole new level of realism.

Skyrim Sunlight Souffle

Now you do not need a lot of imagination to get an inkling of what the channel is all about, do you? It is reminiscent of the blog Inn at the Crossroads, where they feature food from the hit fantasy book series turned TV series Song of Ice and Fire. While that blog showcases mouthwatering images, Feast of Fiction gives you video tutorials, complete with matching themed costumes. Could we have expected anything less?

Feast of Fiction is still in its infancy, though. While they only have two videos as of now, it seems that they are on the right track.

They started with a recipe from the much awaited game and title it Skyrim Sunlight Souffle. Whether or not you are into the game, the recipe itself is worth trying in the kitchen! Here’s the video teaching you how to make it.

For the recipe itself:

Ingredients
- 2 1/2 Ounces Cow’s Cheese (we used Gruyere cheese for the sunshine sauce, Parmesan cheese to cover the souffle dishes)
- 1 Ounce Butter
- 1 Ounce Flour (non rising)
- 4 Eggs (added in by us, original recipe didn’t have eggs but calls for it)
- 9 Ounces Milk
- A Dash of Salt
- A Dash of Pepper
- A Cupful of Ground Nutmeg (reduced to a dash)

Instructions
- Stoke the flames of your oven, and achieve a moderate heat. (Preheat to 400)

- Grate the cheese into thin shavings by running a finely honed elven dagger over the block.

- Separate the egg whites from the yolks, and beat the whites vigorously until they thicken.

- Begin preparation of the signature Sunshine Sauce: – Melt the butter, and add in the flour while stirring continuously until well blended. – Move the mixture to a smaller flame and begin gently stirring in the milk. It is crucial that you do not stop stirring! – Continue to do so for ten minutes, until the mixture thickens. Then, and only then, will the Sunshine Sauce be considered ready.

- Add the salt, pepper and nutmeg, and remove from the flame.

- Add in the grated cheese, and then the egg yolks. Stir well until fully blended. Then, gently add in the egg whites with a spoon made of carved hickory wood. (fold the egg whites in gently, making sure to not destroy air bubbles)

- Gently pour the mix into four stonework souffle’ dishes, filling each nearly (but not quite!) to the top. (if you’d like, prepare the souffle dishes beforehand by coating them in butter and grated parmersan cheese)

- Put the dishes in your moderately hot oven and shut that door! Keep sealed for 25 minutes, or your scrumptious suns will rise, only to fall down flat into the oven’s abyss. (put in oven and immediately reduce heat to 375 degrees. Bake until the souffles rise and tops are browned. DO NOT OPEN TOO EARLY or the souffles will fall)

- Remove after 25 minutes, and serve immediately.

They say that souffle is one of the hardest things to make, but if these guys were able to hack it, you and I should have a fair chance of success as well!

Bioshock

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Call of Duty

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Crysis

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Dead Space

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Fallout

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Gears of War

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God of War

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Half-Life

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Halo

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inFamous

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Limbo

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Mario

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Mass Effect 3

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Portal

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Red Dead Redemption

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Shadows of the Colossus

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Sim City

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Splinter Cell

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Team Fortress 2

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World of Warcraft

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Walmart in Porter Ranch, Los Angeles, following the incident

Bargain shoppers looking for video game deals at a Walmart in Los Angeles last night learned the hard way that Black Friday shopping can be hazardous to your health, when one female shopper got so fed up with the mob that she pepper sprayed the people around her.

There are conflicting reports about why the unidentified woman sprayed the crowd. Apparently there was a mad rush at a kiosk holding discounted Xbox 360 and Wii games (which you can see in this video), among the shoulder-to-shoulder shoppers mobbing the electronics department at the Walmart in Los Angeles’ Porter Ranch neighborhood. Reportedly, the crowd became crazed when the store conducted a “big reveal” of discounted video games that had been hidden under a drape. During the subsequent rush to get discounted games, they trampled on other electronics merchandise and ripped the plastic off of some of the games while trying to grab the limited supply items.

What happened next is where things get confusing. Some reports indicate that the woman with the pepper spray was reacting to other shoppers who were cutting in line. Another report said that the authorities were categorizing the incident as “competitive shopping,” which suggests that it was the malicious act of shopper trying to gain the advantage. Yet another report states that the pepper spray-wielding woman feared that she was going to be robbed amid the chaos, so she used the the spray as self-defense.

At least twenty shoppers (some reports say only fifteen) were affected by the pepper spray, yet somehow the woman at the heart of the incident managed to escape the store before she could be apprehended. Local police are said to currently be scouring store security videos, while the store is searching through sales receipts, so that she can be tracked down and arrested on felony battery charges.

I know “doorbuster” discounted video games are exciting, people, and that we’re all living in hard financial times. But come on. Do we really have to attack other shoppers just to save a little money?

Because I love you, dear reader. That’s why I scoured through all of the Black Friday ads to compile this list of the best deals for scoring quality gaming hardware at deep discounts. ‘Cause if you’re going out on Thanksgiving night to wait in line in the cold, darn it you should know if it’s worth it!

Smart buyers are also advised to remember that Amazon is offering round-the-clock deals on video games (as well as all sorts of other products), but they have no pre-published list.

$100 Kinect Bundle

Toys ‘R Us, Walmart
If your must-have Christmas gift is Microsoft’s Kinect sensor, you won’t find a better deal than this $100 bundle, which includes the sensor, a disc copy of Kinect Adventures, and download vouchers for both Fruit Ninja Kinect and Gunstringer. That’s the hardware plus three games for considerably less than the sensor alone usually costs ($150). If you’re only going to Best Buy and don’t feel like fighting the crowds at Walmart or Toys ‘R’ Us too, you can get just a Kinect sensor there for $100. But when you can get that plus three games, isn’t it worth the extra trip?

$200 160GB PlayStation 3 Bundle

Best Buy, GameStop, Radio Shack, Sears, Target, Walmart
The good news is that if you’re in the market for a great PS3 deal, you won’t have any trouble finding one — it’s the exact same bundle and price you’ll find at all of the retailers listed above. And every one offers the same bundle of the system, a DualShock 3 controller, and both LittleBigPlanet 2 and Ratchet & Clank 4.

$140 4GB Xbox 360

Target
You won’t find a better price on a basic Xbox 360 console anywhere this year than Target’s bargain basement price of $140. Of course, for that price, you’re not getting any extras; it’s just the console and one controller. (GameStop has the exact same deal, but Target’s beats it by $10.) If you want a basic Kinect starter kit, you can get a 4GB console, Kinect, and Kinect Adventures for $200 from Walmart. If Kinect isn’t your thing but you’re interested in multiplayer gaming, try Walmart‘s other $200 bundle that includes Gears of War 3, a 3-month Xbox Live Gold membership, and a $50 Walmart gift card.

$100 Wii

Walmart, Sam’s Club
Only at Walmart (and its wholesale big brother) can you get this limited edition blue Wii console for just $100. It comes with the console, one Wii Remote, and one Nunchuck controller. No games are included, but at that price, you should be able to afford a game or two to go with it.

$180 Nintendo 3DS Bundle

Best Buy, Target
Options are very limited for buyers looking to score a discounted 3DS this Black Friday. This $180 bundle is pretty much the only deal in town. Target offers it with a bundled copy of Super Mario 3D Land, while Best Buy is giving you your choice of Mario or The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D.

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Snake Rattle and Roll

I applaud anyone who actually managed to finish this game! The aim was simple, complete each of the eleven stages without losing all segments from your snake. Simple? SIMPLE?! Not only did playing from an isometric camera angle make it almost impossible to judge distances, but there was also a time limit to each level, just to make things that much more difficult! Oh, and as if that wasn’t hard enough, each level was jam packed full of irritating little enemies that were an absolute nightmare to kill. At least the game had multi-player.

Darius II

Why Darius and not Truxton? Simply because Truxton offers you far too many power ups and the enemies can become predictable at times. On the other hand, Darius II side scrolls across levels which consist of huge obstacles and hordes of enemies that fire a barrage of bullets. Just when you think there is time to rest, you are thrown into an enormous boss battle that usually fills the screen with lasers, bullets and all kinds of destruction. This game is definitely not one for the weak.

Mega Man X2

Sure, Mega Man X2 was nowhere near as hard as the original on the NES, but that was released in the 80’s and this is a 90’s list. Mega Man X2 was by far the hardest Mega Man game of the 90’s and was of course, one of the best. Unfortunately you can’t simply use dash to get to the end of the level as enemies flood you with attacks and you’re faced with impossible situations such as a floor covered in spikes. Fortunately you are given enough abilities to slowly but surely make your way through this death trap of a game.

Altered Beast

Yes, this game was technically created in the 80’s, but it didn’t move to the Genesis/Mega-Drive platform until the 90’s so it has just about managed to make its way onto this list of doom. Why Altered Beast you ask? Well, it has no continues! It’s short, it’s hard and 9 times out of 10 folks will lose all of their lives by the third stage. As it is quite a slow moving game, it can be quite hard to maneuver around enemies and a lot of cheap deaths can and will occur. Fortunately it has awesome music and therefore no matter how frustrating it can be, you will always find yourself coming back for more!

Super Thunder Blade

Has anyone ever actually beaten this game without the use of save states? You essentially take control of a military helicopter and try your absolute best to avoid obstacles coming towards you. This is done whilst taking out enemies that are bombarding you will flares, bullets, rockets and anything else they can throw at you. Think of it as an impossible Space Harrier game.

This is a guest post written by Simon Parry. Simon is a writer for Liberty Games, an arcade machine and games room equipment retailer.

Star Wars: The Old Republic screenshot

It’s been in development for over three years and teased hundreds of times, but LucasArts and BioWare have finally announced a release date for Star Wars The Old Republic, their groundbreaking MMO. At the 2011 Eurogamer Expo in London, BioWare’s founders made it official: TOR will be here just (barely) in time for Christmas.

At long last, American players be able to get our grubby little fingers on Star Wars The Old Republic on December 20, 2011. European players must wait two more days for launch on December 22. Purchasing the game will entitle you to a 30-day subscription, and then you’ll need to sign up for a subscription plan. These will come in three flavors:

• 1 Month: $14.99
• 3 Months: $13.99/mo.
• 6 Months: $12.99/mo.

That’s it. No “annual subscription” or “lifetime membership” options at present. If you pre-order the game now, you’ll get a special pre-order code that you can enter at the game’s official website, qualifying you for early access to the game.

Star Wars: The Old Republic screenshot

Driver: San Francisco

EA, Sony, THQ, Ubisoft, and Warner Bros. Interactive have all announced plans to start charging for “Online Passports,” which will be required purchases for players who want to play with used game discs. Specifically, these $10 passports will be needed to play multiplayer games (like Ubisoft’s Driver: San Francisco, pictured above), but there’s nothing to keep publishers from using the same policy for singleplayer campaigns in the future.

The basics are thus: you buy a brand new game, a passport code comes with it, which you use for accessing all of the online features of the game. Once the code is used, it can’t be transfered to anyone else. So if the disc winds up in a “used games” bin at a retailer, or even if you just borrow it from a friend, you won’t be able to access any of the online features — unless you shell out an extra $10 for a new passport.

I can understand where game publishers are coming from with this; it’s a means of preventing user abuse of their online services. But it also muddies the waters between games being a tangible product, versus a virtual/digital service. With games starting to occupy more and more space in the cloud, game possession could become a thing of the past. Maybe soon we’ll all be renters, and there will be no owning games anymore.

The music industry tried out that same model a while back with devices like Microsoft’s Zune, where you had unlimited access to cloud-based music for a monthly fee. On the other hand, film buffs have taken to this business model in huge numbers, accessing Netflix’s entire inventory of movies for a monthly fee. The burgeoning digital book industry hasn’t caught onto this notion yet, but it’s probably just a matter of time.

Services like Gamefly are already already offering video game rentals (though this new policy means that playing the online portions of rented games will cost you an additional $10 per game), but are gamers ready for where this road may inevitably end?

Now for a serious question: How well do you know your American history?

If you are not the type who paid attention in school, then you might have gaps in your knowledge of American history. No need to fret, though, as there are many ways by which you can refresh your memory and be the true patriot that everyone needs to be.

For gamers, here is the perfect way to make sure that you know American history by heart. At least the most salient points.

The guys at GamePro have done a great job going back in time and putting together screenshots of video games. These games are supposed to be representative of important periods in American history, and the resulting graphic will definitely stick in the mind of any one who has the slightest inclination towards gaming.

This American history timeline starts with the Declaration of Independence – perfect for the holiday celebrated yesterday – which is partnered with the game Birth of America. You move along in time with Gun, The Oregon Trail, Gettyburg, and so on, till you get to the “present” with The Political Machine, which represents the 2008 presidential elections.

American History in Video Games

I am not American so I only know bits and pieces of this timeline, and neither am I a serious gamer, so I only recognize a few of the games. Still, it is one of those pieces of work that one cannot ignore. Also, I would love to see an updated version of this in the years to come, with the hopes that today’s science fiction games will become reality.

What other games would you have included to represent periods in American history? What games would you include for America’s future?

Nominees were made based on the top picks of 35 media outlets that covered E3. All of the participating media outlets were then invited to vote on the top winner in each category. Besides BioShock Infinite, other multiple winners include The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Battlefield 3, and Sound Shapes.

In honor of BioShock Infinite‘s win, I present you with a full gallery of screenshots from the game, at the bottom of this article. It’s a good list, but I’m surprised to see several big names shut out, like Batman: Arkham City, Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception, Tomb Raider, Mass Effect 3. They can’t all be winners, I guess.

One of the most telling winners was the PS Vita in the “Best Hardware” category, which was up against Nintendo’s Wii U as the other major nominee. If the PSP and the Wii had been shown off for the first time at the same E3, there’s no doubt that the Wii would have won. The fact that Sony was able to overtake Nintendo among the minds of media personnel says a lot about how much faith said media have in Nintendo’s chances of generating another Wii-sized success.

Here’s the complete list:

Best of Show: BioShock Infinite

Best Original Game: BioShock Infinite

Best Console Game: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Best Handheld Game: Sound Shapes

Best PC Game: BioShock Infinite

Best Hardware: PlayStation Vita

Best Action Game: Battlefield 3

Best Action/Adventure Game: BioShock Infinite

Best Role Playing Game: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Best Fighting Game: Street Fighter X Tekken

Best Racing Game: Forza 4

Best Sports Game: FIFA Soccer 12

Best Strategy Game: From Dust

Best Social/Casual Game: Sound Shapes

Best Motion Simulation Game: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Best Online Multiplayer: Battlefield 3

Best Downloadable Game: Bastion

Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, A, B. It’s one of the most popular cheat codes of all time, appearing in more than 100 games, and gamers know it as the Konami Code. But did you know it was never intended to be used by gamers at all?

In 1986, game developer Konami ported the classic side-scroller Gradius to Nintendo’s NES system. While the port was being worked on, a programmer named Kazuhisa Hashimoto found the game remarkably hard to play. Fed up with Gradius‘ high level of difficulty, he decided to create a special code that would make the game considerably easier to play test.

That’s how the famous keystroke sequence was birthed. Entering it at the start of the game gave players a full cache of power-ups to start out with. Entering it in reverse gave players thirty extra lives.

The code made it to the retail version of the game because Hashimoto never removed it after play testing was complete. No one seems to know how the code’s existence became widespread knowledge — did Hashimoto himself tell a friend who told a friend and so on? did some lucky gamer happen upon the code while entering random keystrokes? — but regardless of how, it became so popular that Konami developers started using it for play testing in nearly every game they worked on. And just like before, they left it in the retail version of the game, for savvy players “in the know” to use.

Eventually, developers outside of Konami caught on to the code’s popularity, and began putting it into their games as well. You’ll find it in such classics as Contra, Castlevania, Dance Dance Revolution, Metal Gear Solid 2 and 3, and more. The Konami Code appears in many modern games as well, including Half-Life 2, Mercenaries 2, Plants vs. Zombies, Quake 4, and Little Big Planet 2.

The code is so popular, it’s taken on a life of its own outside of gaming, too. A huge number of websites have at one time or another displayed easter eggs when users input the Konami Code, including Facebook, Google Reader, Digg, Marvel.com, Gamespot, Netflix.com, MLB.com, and many more.

This year’s 17 amazing artworks have been announced, and they show off the artsy side of games from the last year — and some yet to come. Personally, I find it interesting that with all the hype about mobile games and social games over the last year, there are no winners from iOS, Android, or Facebook.

Anyhoo, here are the winners…

Title: “Amorphous Drake”
Artist: Lucas Graciano
Game: Legends of Norrath
Company: Sony Online Entertainment
Platform: PC

Title: “The Bridge”
Artist: Erik Zaring & Anders Gustafsson
Game: The Dream Machine
Company: Cockroach, Inc.
Platform: PC, Mac, Linux

Title: “The Cottage”
Artist: Hamzah Kasom Osman
Game: Drawn 3
Company: Big Fish Games
Platform: PC

Title: “Chronos Battle”
Artist: Tyler Breon
Game: God of War III
Company: SCEA/Santa Monica Studio
Platform: PlayStation 3

Title: “Dead Walking
Artist: Chris Moffitt, Brad Crow, Nathan Stefan, & Bart Tiongson
Game: Orcs Must Die!
Company: Robot Entertainment
Platform: PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3

Title: “The Dragon Play”
Artist: Brian Thompson and Hamzah Kasom Osman
Game: Drawn: Dark Flight
Company: Big Fish Games
Platform: PC

Title: “Flemmeth”
Artist: Matt Rhodes
Game: Dragon Age 2
Company: BioWare
Platform: PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3

Title: “Good Friends”
Artist: Matthew Halpin, Andrew Matthews, Matthew Preece, Radek Walachnia, & John Laws
Game: Kinectimals
Company: Frontier Developments, Ltd.
Platform: Xbox 360 Kinect

Title: “Grim Exploits”
Artist: Colin Foran, Claire Hummel, & Ryan Wilkerson
Game: Trenched
Company: Microsoft Game Studios/Doublefine
Platform: Xbox 360

Title: “Incident at the Workshop”
Artist: Ivan Simoncini
Game: Alien Swarm
Company: Valve Software
Platform: PC, Mac

Title: “Market Fire, Columbia (Shop Sweeper)”
Artist: Ben Lo
Game: BioShock Infinite
Company: Irrational Games
Platform: PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3

Title: “Normandy”
Artist: Mikko Kinnunen
Game: Mass Effect 2
Company: BioWare
Platform: PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3

Title: “Oktonok Cay Cannery”
Artist: David Guertin
Game: Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One
Company: Insomniac Games
Platform: PlayStation 3

Title: “Paper World”
Artist: Say Oh & Damian Kim
Game: Paper World
Company: Namco Bandai Games
Platform: Wii

Title: “The Pelican Inn (Pub)”
Artist: Andrew Kim
Game: Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception
Company: Naughty Dog, Inc.
Platform: PlayStation 3

Title: “Stahl Arms”
Artist: Jesse van Dijk
Game: Killzone 3
Company: Guerrilla
Platform: PlayStation 3

Swamp Skull Jeff Haynie Mystery Case Files: 13th Skull Big Fish Games

Title: “Swamp Skull”
Artist: Jeff Haynie
Game: Mystery Case Files: 13th Skull
Company: Big Fish Games
Platform: PC

Video games can be difficult.  Some so much so that yours truly, after failing miserably, refuses to play certain titles ever again.  That said, many gamers are fortunate enough to have the gift of sight to help them traverse the various levels imagined by the creators of games. 

One man, Terry Garrett, blind since age 10, not only plays video games, but excels at playing certain titles using only the game’s sound.   In particular, Garrett is extremely good at playing Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee.

According to Wired,

“Garrett lost his sight in 1997 at age 10. That same year, his older brother brought home Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee. Entranced by the game’s charming narrator, Abe — a Mudokon slave with his lips sewn shut — Garrett set out to make his way through Oddworld’s danger-filled settings.

Although he couldn’t see a single image on the computer screen, he could hear the sounds — footsteps, voices, music. At first he couldn’t figure out what all the noises meant. Frustrated, he tossed the game aside. But he came back again. And again.”

Not one to be defeated by the game, Garrett is now skilled enough to beat the game and has his sights (no pun intended) on beating another game, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Garrett plays the Nintendo 64 title on his PC with an emulator and a controller for the Xbox 360.  Through intense study of the game which included listening to friends play and questioning them on aspects of the game, Garrett can make it to the Water Temple, almost halfway through the game, without any assistance.

How impressive do you find Garrett’s video game playing abilities?  Have you played either title Garrett enjoys?  If so, were you able to beat either?

Jaeden Amero recently showed off his creation and got a fair bit of attention for it. So what did he do? The process is something I cannot really comprehend – yeah, sue me – but in essence, he stripped down the game into the bare essentials.

While everything is still quite recognizable – there is no way that you can’t recognize the “Mario-istic” elements, really – you will find a whole of stuff “missing”. Here’s a landscape view – looks familiar?

How about this?

Considering that this is his first NES hack, you have to give it to him! If you want to know more about how he did this, check out Patater; and here is the download link to the Minimal Mario IPS Patch.

If you haven’t got any plans for the weekend (yes, I do realize that it is Christmas), this just might be the distraction you have been looking for!

WIN: Safe Shopping
Following a New York Times article about an unsavory businessman who’s in essence gaming Google’s search rankings by garnering negative reviews about his retail operation through all manner of creative and repulsive means, Google have altered their ultra-secret algorithm to not reward back-linking points for bad reviews. So, this is really a big win for people who don’t want to have their eyeglasses frames urinated on and mailed back to them stinking of human waste. Which is, by the way, one of the threats the aforementioned businessman levied against a customer. By not rewarding merchants for bad reviews, Google’s attempting to take a step towards consumer protection – or at the very least, making it easier for us to shop smarter.

WIN: South Korean Policy
Let me preface this by saying there is nothing win, and nothing remotely funny, about increased tensions and military action between North and South Korea. But when it comes to defending their response to North Korea’s shelling, South Korean defense minister Kim Tae-young’s response was the very definition of win. When pressed about why their retaliation to the shelling was delayed and, some say, soft-peddled, Kim said simply, “This isn’t StarCraft.” Thus, an army of terran cosplayers shuffled home with heads hung low in disappointment.

FAIL: Job Security
You are a writer on one of the most successful shows on television. Ratings are through the roof and climbing. A second series has been swiftly and decisively awarded. You’ve pretty much had champagne on tap for weekly celebrations of blockbuster viewership. You’re set. What could possibly go wrong? Well, the director could fire you and all your colleagues wholesale. That’s precisely what’s happened behind the scenes at AMC’s smash comic-to-TV hit The Walking Dead. Frank Darabont’s massacre of the show’s creative team has plenty of people scratching their heads, but sources say that the majority of the writing that’s done so well for the show thus far was penned by Darabont, Robert Kirkman, and freelancers. Perhaps the news won’t bode poorly for the future of the show, but it sure sucks to be a Walking Dead writer this week.

FAIL: Beorn No More
Beorn the bear-man in The Hobbit movie was reportedly written for Ron Perlman. Guillermo del Toro, whom Perlman called “the coolest guy I know” in an interview with Spinoff Online, had apparently penned Beorn’s part in the film with the understanding that Perlman would participate. But that participation was conditional. Now that del Toro’s off the job, Perlman’s no longer in the running for Hobbit fame. Batman…Fanfastic Four…Iron Man…Highlander…Mortal Kombat…The Outer Limits…The Tick…Star Trek…Hellboy…his filmography reads like a geek’s check list of things to bring with you to a deserted island. His involvement in The Lord of the Rings franchise could have quite possibly elevated him to geek godhood. Oh well.

WIN: Eel-ectricity
An aquarium in Japan is lighting a Christmas tree with electricity generated from an eel in an aquarium, which is making a strong statement about environmentally-aware power sources and eco-friendly…hang on, let’s be real. The only statement this display is making is WTF, this Christmas tree is lit by an eel! How freaking cool is that?? Can I please get an eel to power my Xbox 360???

FAIL: Time Management
Ray Muzyka, founder of BioWare, had a nice whinge this week about his biggest pet peeve with the video game industry: too many games. According to his interview with Develop, he finds there simply aren’t enough hours in the day to play the plethora of worthwhile and enjoyable games that hit the market all the time. And he would have to – not only for his own entertainment, but to stay current with what competitors are producing. “I try and play two-or three hours a night, but that’s hard and it’s not enough,” he complained. I, for one, am guessing his solution to this particular problem will be to release even more games that suck every spare moment out of our lives. Yeah, I’m looking at you, Dragon Age II.

WIN: Close Encounters of the Microbial Kind
It was one of the most highly-anticipated and highly-speculated press conferences in recent memory. When NASA dropped the bomb that it had something big to tell the world about the search for extraterrestrial life, the Internet promptly exploded with everything from “Wow! signal” SETI to life on Jupiter theories. It turns out the big scoop, leaked prior to the conference, was that a new microbial life form has been discovered in California. This life form lives on arsenic, making it quite a unique little critter, indeed. NASA says it will expand how we think about life outside of Earth, opening up new possibilities for life forms in environments we previously thought uninhabitable. Score one for the believers. Biology has just been revolutionized.

Robert Overweg is an artistic photographer whose “photos” are screenshots from the virtual worlds of video games. The remarkable thing is, his photographer’s eye somehow manages to make his screens look like real-world artsy photos. But while his palette is nifty, his subject matter is what makes it really interesting…

Using realistic game worlds like those you can explore in Left 4 Dead 2, Modern Warfare 2, and Half-Life 2, Overweg has created numerous collections like “Glitches,” which finds art in unintended errors in a game, or “The End of the Virtual World,” which finds the edges of maps and depicts them as if the world is flat and you’ve come to the end of it. He also has a (NSFW) collection called “People I Have Met,” which has portraits of extremely realistic NPCs. You can find more at Overweg’s website.

His results are somewhere between high art and geeky cool. But Overweg himself is the real deal; he holds actual exhibitions in L.A., Germany, the Netherlands, and more.

I still remember when I first played Starcraft. I wasn’t that good at it, but I just couldn’t stop playing. My mother would remember the game because she threatened – several times – to smash the computer if I didn’t go to bed before the sun came up.

So today, gazillions of gamers will be holding their breaths in anticipation, and by the end of the day, they will finally be able to see if the game is worth the wait. Surprisingly, Blizzard did not release full copies of the game to reviewers. The result is that even pro game reviewers and critics will be testing the game together with the rest of the masses.

What we do know is that the races are the same: Terrans, Protoss, and Zerg. We know that the game is very heavy on the story side. We know something of the storyline:

In the distant future, in the darkest reaches of space, the ghosts of the past whisper your name. You are Jim Raynor, a marshal-turned-rebel on a vigilante crusade to bring down the Dominion and its nefarious leader, Arcturus Mengsk. Haunted by betrayal and remorse, some believe you may have given up the fight. But you have promises to keep…and a need for vengeance that’s long overdue.

The game trailer gives us a glimpse as well.

I wouldn’t mind playing this game, but remembering just how the first one ate up my time many years ago scares me. Maybe when I feel like I can handle the temptation better. Anyone here buying Starcraft II? Share your experience with us!

A long-awaited holy grail of rhythmic games is finally coming to pass. Harmonix and MTV Games have just announced that Rock Band 3 is adding a piano keyboard to its collection of instruments — a collection that already includes guitar, bass, drums, and three microphones (for three-party harmonies). That’s seven players that can rock out together at one time.

Before you get too excited, I should point out that the new piano peripheral is a small, two-octave keyboard, sporting just 25 keys. The drum kit is getting an upgrade that includes three cymbals, and the two guitars available for Rock Band 3 will have actual strings.

As the world of simulated musicianship edges ever closer to realistic music playing, Harmonix has wisely chosen to include a Pro mode in Rock Band 3 that will teach you how to play your chosen instrument or instruments for real.

83 songs are being added to the Rock Band library with this entry, along with access to the Rock Band empire’s nearly 2,000-title song list. Among the new songs:

• Metric, “Combat Baby”
• Rilo Kiley, “Portions for Foxes”
• Them Crooked Vultures, “Dead End Friends”
• The Vines, “Get Free”
• The White Stripes, “The Hardest Button to Button”
• Phoenix, “Lasso”
• Ida Maria, “Oh My God”
• Juanes, “Me Enamora”
• Jane’s Addiction, “Been Caught Stealing”
• Smash Mouth, “Walkin’ on the Sun”
• Spacehog, “In the Meantime”
• Stone Temple Pilots, “Plush”
• Dio, “Rainbow in the Dark”
• Huey Lewis and the News, “The Power of Love”
• Joan Jett, “I Love Rock and Roll”
• Night Ranger, “Sister Christian”
• Whitesnake, “Here I Go Again”
• The Cure, “Just Like Heaven”
• Ozzy Osbourne, “Crazy Train”
• Queen, “Bohemian Rhapsody”
• Jimi Hendrix, “Crosstown Traffic”
• The Doors, “Break On Through”

Click here for a complete gallery of screenshots from Rock Band 3 and images of its peripherals.

PIXELS by PATRICK JEAN.
Uploaded by onemoreprod. – Watch original web videos.

My life has revolved around video games ever since I could remember. When I was a kid, I was in competition with Bryan Roda. I had an Atari 2600 which I loved, but sometime after I moved next door to him, he got an Atari 7200 which he played on his mammoth 32-inch TV. And it was in his bedroom, too! Between that and the G.I.Joe Aircraft carrier, old Bryan had a few edges on me, and it was quite upsetting.

Flash to middle school, and my life with Nintendo Power magazine. I had a subscription since the first issue, and it guided me through tough times in Zelda and Mario games. High school brought Sega, Street Fighter and NHL 95, and I feel in love with my wife because of her love for Mario Kart.

The video above is named Pixels, and it was done by Patrick Jean. It tells the story of video games – old school video games, no less – popping out of a TV and attacking New York City. It includes classic appearances by Donkey Kong, Space Invaders, and even Pong. Plus the production value is pretty spectacular. You know, I have no idea why I’m vamping on about this thing. Just watch the video because I said so.

Please.

Boy there’s a sentence I never figured I’d write.

First, let’s do a little backstory. I’m not a Michael Cera fan really, although I have seen most of his movies. He tends to play the same character in all of them – lovable doofus who falls in love and gets the girl. That’s why originally, I had no interest in this movie. In fact, I had no interest even 30 seconds into the trailer. But wait, there’s more.

I’m also a huge Simon Pegg fan. Shaun of the Dead, and Hot Fuzz are steady members of my favorite DVD titles list, and his appearance in Star Trek was excellent as well. Edgar Wright has directed both Shaun and Hot Fuzz, so I was excited when I heard he was directing this movie. So put these two together: Michael Cera who I’m mildly interested in as an actor and Edgar Wright who is an excellent director. What do you get?

Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World. The premise is simple at first: Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Then there’s a problem. Except this time, the problem is a little different.

See, this girl has 7 ex lovers that Scott has to defeat so that they can be together. Sounds weird, right? Defeating them? As it turns out, that’s exactly what she means. Scott has to fight each one of their characters in a series of amazing fight sequences that are almost indescribable. It’s what would happen if X-Men and Street Fighter met in an alley and it all happened live.

I’ve suggested a few trailers here, but this is the one you should go see. Go check out the site now, then tell me how awesome it is. Seriously, it’s awesome.

A few months back, my wife and my mother were talking about decorating our then-impending child’s baby room, and the subject of painting the room came up. My mom had painted Sesame Street characters along the wall, so that started the ideas. I’m not sure if my wife wanted to one-up or top my mom or not, but she decided to paint the entire room in Dr Seuss. Characters, background, etc. One giant Dr Seuss room. It took a few months, but she got it done and it’s amazing looking.

Which brought up the topic of what to do with this new talent in the future. We used to have a video game room prior to the baby, so the subject of doing a room painted with a Super Mario Bros scene – level 1-1 we were thinking – going around the perimeter would be pretty cool. Ideas are still flowing, but we’re a little ways off before we’ll start on that project. But I’m always on the lookout to find cool decorations for this room. That’s when I found this bad boy.

It’s a hanger – for clothes, headphones, bodies, whatever – that mounts to the wall via a fairly sturdy system. This would be perfect for our room, and it’s on my to-buy list. The 8-Bit hanger. Perfect.

Of course that led me to the next big find, the Wall Bar. It’s a plain and simple physical version of the very first set of Photoshop tools. I’m not a graphic designer, but I am a photographer and having a piece of work like this near my desk would be awesome. Is it a definite purchase? Not so sure, because it is $69.99. But it’s definitely pretty cool.

See? Random stories lead somewhere eventually.

Indyposted recently featured the top celebrity gamers of our day, and was I glad to see some of my all-time favorites make the list! Alright, I’ll be honest – there’s really just one that I’d die for in that list. And, guess what? He made it to the top spot! You ready for this?

VIN DIESEL. Yup, this hottie is one hunk of a geek! The Indyposted write up says it all:

Vin Diesel is justification to geeks everywhere. He’s hot, he’s rich, he’s talented, and he’s proud to admit that he’s a gamer (and rumor has it that he’s a DnD player as well!). He even has his own video game, Wheelman.

I can’t say much about Wheelman as I’ve never played it myself, but who cares? It’s Vin Diesel we’re talking about!

Other big names that made it to the list include Cameron Diaz, who loves WoW, according to the grapevine. There’s also Samuel L. Jackson, although they say he has picked up the controller only a few times. I wonder what games he plays? Then there’s Robin Williams. The news is that he loves playing Call of Duty.

Who’s your favorite celebrity? Is he/she a gamer like you?

[photo via reddit]

In 2005, I was dating this chick who I was just kinda into. She was alright, but she lived pretty far away and she smoked, so it wasn’t a good match. It was a Sunday afternoon, and I was out on a blind date with this small whale when I decided to fake an illness – I think it was anthrax poisoning – and bail out. Since I was all the way over on that side of town, I gave the first girl a call.

“What’re you doing?”

“Playing Mario Kart on the Nintendo64.”

“…”

A few years later we were married, and we just had our first child. We also have every Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft console ever built, plus a Sega Genesis for fun.

Back in high school though, I didn’t own a console. Instead, every day after school I’d head over to my buddy Shann’s house and play games. The hot tickets at the time were NHL 95 and Street Fighter II, so we switched between the two depending on the day.

I never got the hang of the hadouken move. No matter how hard I tried, I always seemed to pull it off when I didn’t need it, but when I needed it most, I ended up doing nothing. Pissed me off to no end.

Which is why I really enjoy this picture. Sure, it’s Photoshopped and all that, but it reminds me of my insane frustrations with trying to roll my left thumb just right. Damn that controller.

Games are thought to be big distractions to learning, especially the formal kind. I recall when I was in college, I’d stay up all night playing my favorite adventure and shoot ‘em up games. Of course by the time I attend my classes, I’d be a walking zombie, with rarely anything getting through my sleepy brain. I wonder how I ever finished my degree a semester early.

Now word is that some schools are actually using video games as a tool for learning. Not only are they using video games as alternative means of teaching, they are actually using video games almost exclusively in their teaching curriculum.

Popular science writes how students are, for instance, encouraged to alter a game’s parameters in order to achieve the desired outcome, or to work in a social context in order to achieve some collaborative goals.

The Quest to Learn school opened last September in Manhattan, welcoming the first class of sixth-graders who will learn almost entirely through videogame-inspired activities, an educational strategy geared to keep kids engaged and prepare them for high-tech careers.

The goal, of course, is usually to win the game. But it’s in how the technology is used and manipulated that students learn. The video games might touch on knowledge of history, with the students role-playing as spies working against each other’s governments. Or the games might involve physics by requiring the students to move objects through space, given certain parameters. The possible scenarios go on and on.

With video games, learning becomes fun. Kids nowadays are bombarded with different sorts of media, like email, instant messaging, social networks, and video games. Why not explore these applications in order to foster a love for learning? The disadvantage, though, is that this teaching method might put too much focus on the fun aspect of learning, and not the intrinsic value of learning, itself.

Education through video games might be an appropriate methodology for preparing students for skills like programming, design, coding and the like. One concern here is whether this method also works for other real-world applications and professions. How about literacy? How about fundamentals in math?

Media is fast evolving, and along with this, everyone also follows suit. Education is but one of those important aspects of human life that is adapting well to change. Teachers are favoring online collaboration over traditional submission of paper homeworks. Classrooms usually have computers, audio-visual systems and wireless Internet access. Video games might just be the next big thing when it comes to helping impart the value of learning.