Vs. Airman is kind of mind-blowing the first time you see it. It is not a PC or flash game, but a romhack that can run on a real NES. But which game is it a hack of?
[more inside]
posted by JHarris
on Apr 5, 2011 -
17 comments
In the mid-1990s, a man named George Wood created a TV show called
Flights of Fantasy on a Maryland public-access channel. The show was was dedicated to videogames, and gained quite a few detractors; Wood was not known for his playing skills, research, or good taste, and the production was rather cheap. He would also tend to go off-topic, sometimes markedly so.
It had a small following, being a local public-access show, but would have been lost forever had Wood not joined a video gaming association called NAViGaTR, who archived the entire series, edited each episode, and put them online as
Gaming in the Clinton Years.
posted by Anatoly Pisarenko
on Mar 21, 2011 -
12 comments
BS Zelda Retrospective (SLYT). In honor of Zelda's 25th anniversary this month, this is an interesting look at the live-broadcast
Satellaview games in the Zelda series, which had some compelling and strange tweaks to the Zelda formula. The beginning is an introduction to the service, and the fun bit begins at
8:50.
posted by BlackLeotardFront
on Feb 23, 2011 -
13 comments
Trash cans, landfills, and incinerators. Erasure, deletion, and obsolescence. These words could describe what has happened to the various building blocks of the video game industry in countries around the world. These building blocks consist of video game source code, the actual computer hardware used to create a particular video game, level layout diagrams, character designs, production documents, marketing material, and more.
These are just some elements of game creation that are gone -- never to be seen again. These elements make up the home console, handheld, PC and arcade games we've played. The only remnant of a particular game may be its name, or its final published version, since the possibility exists that no other physical copy of its creation remains.
As a community of video game developers, publishers, and players, we must begin asking ourselves some difficult but inevitable questions. Some believe there is no point in preserving a video game, arguing that games are short-term entertainment, while others disagree with this statement entirely, believing the industry is in a preservation crisis.
Where Games Go To Sleep: The Game Preservation Crisis [more inside]
posted by timshel
on Feb 9, 2011 -
44 comments
Two brothers pull off the heist of the century when they steal money from a criminal kingpin. The kingpin retaliates by abducting one brother's girlfriend. Now the brothers and their two close allies must team up and rescue her, deal out some pain, and get away with their lives. You may think this sounds vaguely familiar, but you've never seen Nintendo's classic
Super Mario Bros. depicted like this. Presenting
The Brothers Mario [SLYT; contains strong language and scenes of violence; rated M-for-Mature].
posted by Servo5678
on Dec 16, 2010 -
35 comments
There are generally two approaches to thinking about games: narratology and ludology. The first emphasizes story, the second play. The next time I played Super Mario, on the Wii (you can order all the vintage games), I found myself in a narratological mode. Mario reminded me of K. and his pursuit of the barmaid Frieda, in Kafka’s “The Castle,” and of the kind of lost-loved-one dreams that “The Castle” both mimics and instigates.
The New Yorker profiles the father of modern video games, Shigeru Miyamoto. (
via Kotaku)
posted by incomple
on Dec 13, 2010 -
37 comments
Chrontendo is a video podcast in which a guy systematically described and discusses
every Famicom/NES game released. Currently up to 33 episodes and counting, and covering hundreds of games.
[more inside]
posted by JHarris
on Nov 1, 2010 -
23 comments
September 13, 2010 marks
the 25th anniversary of the
original Japanese release of Super Mario Bros, featuring the return of
everyone's favorite sailor,
Popeye. That's not right, he's the
Italian carpenter, Mario. Wait, now
he's a plumber with a brother (named
Luigi Mario), and they're not normal, they're super! And they're fighting to save
Princess Peach Toadstool from
an angry ox king, who became the stubborn but cute turtle Bowser.
[more inside]
posted by filthy light thief
on Sep 13, 2010 -
58 comments
Only in Japan, Real Men Go to a Hotel With Virtual Girlfriends: Dating-Simulation Game a Last Resort For Honeymoon Town and Its Lonely Guests. "Some devoted fans will go so far as to pay twice the rate—most hotels in Japan charge per guest not per room—to indulge the fantasy that they are not there alone. A night's stay, at most, can cost $500 though many rooms are cheaper.
In Atami, the Love Plus+ fans—mostly men in their twenties and thirties—stand out. Unlike the deeply tanned beach crowd wearing very little, they are often pasty and overdressed for the heat in heavy jeans and button-down shirts."
[more inside]
posted by Fizz
on Sep 5, 2010 -
49 comments
Animator OrinCreed said
I Dream In Retro is "based heavily on a dream I had that was caused by a long day of playing NES, SNES, and Genesis. In the dream I was moving through different levels from many games. In each level the music was wrong and my sprite (while fitting the bit style) didn't quite work with the game. During the dream I was abusing a cheat ability to use different weapons from pretty much any game I wanted at any time. The game itself behaved as it should, with my actions being the only aberration." The result was this loving tribute and mash-up of video game titles.
posted by ShawnStruck
on Jun 16, 2010 -
21 comments
Sure, you've played
Final Fantasy VII, but what about
Final Fantasy Extreme? You've played
EarthBound, but what about
Earth Bound (two words). You know all about
Dragon Quest VIII, but are you familiar with
Dragon Quest: Young Yangus and the Mystery Dungeon? There's a whole world of forgotten, canceled games out there just waiting to be discovered. Let 1UP's Jeremy Parish and Frank Cifaldi be your guides in an exploration of
The Best Games That Never Were.
(Previously)
posted by Servo5678
on May 27, 2010 -
30 comments
Platypus Comix has compiled images from around the Internet of
prototype game consoles and peripherals spanning from the original NES all the way to the Sony PlayStation 3. You'll see the NES's tape recorder, a touch pad for the Sega Genesis, the infamous Nintendo PlayStation, a PlayStation Portable you can clip to your backpack ("...or whatever reckless thing they thought you'd try."), a Wii controller with just one large button, and the embarrassing PS3 "serect" button.
[more inside]
posted by Servo5678
on Apr 14, 2010 -
38 comments
TheSmartAss.info's suite of Java emulators allows smooth, in-browser playback of literally
thousands of old-school video games:
517 Atari titles,
148 for DOS,
636 Game Boy games (and
410 for Game Boy Color),
2,019 (!) NES titles,
238 GameGear games,
802 Sega Genesis titles, and
284 for the Sega Master System. Highlights include
Space Invaders,
Frogger,
Galaga,
Pitfall!,
Super Mario Bros.,
The Legend of Zelda,
Metroid,
SimCity,
Zero Wing,
Duke Nukem,
Sonic the Hedgehog,
Aladdin,
Earthworm Jim,
Pokemon, and
Metal Gear Solid. Use
the search function to find your favorites! You can also register an account to save games on emulators that support it. Make sure to check the purple bar below each game for control info and links to alternate emulators in case the default one is buggy or slow.
posted by Rhaomi
on Nov 30, 2009 -
54 comments
"In a hotel room in Florida during the summer of 2008, we were given an exciting preview of a "
Nintendo Mixtape" by burgeoning rap group,
No Question? As we listened, we felt like Mario must have felt during his first ingestion of a fire flower. In other words, we knew immediately that this was some good shiz."
[more inside]
posted by kableh
on Aug 11, 2009 -
58 comments
The 2009 Super Mario Marathon will kick off this Friday as three gamers from Lafayette, Indiana jump their way through 25 years of Mario games to benefit the
Child's Play Charity. The marathon will be broadcast live online and you can track their
level progress at the site. Viewers of the event will have the opportunity to win some Mario-themed prizes. If old-school RPGs are more your thing, the
Final Fantasy Marathon, also live online, also with prizes, will be kicking off July 17 to benefit
ACT Today.
posted by Otis
on Jul 8, 2009 -
12 comments
(NSFW)
The Angry Video Game Nerd (taking a cue from seanbaby's
lead) has been producing video reviews of some of the most notoriously awful NES games, from
Top Gun to
Bible Games. (Can't miss:
The Power Glove.) Not content to go after one system, he's upgraded his range to take on other colossal failures like the
Atari Jaguar,
Superman 64, and
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (the movie). His newest series of videos,
You Know What's Bullshit?, takes on everyday nuances like
DVD box sets. He may be vulgar and his vignettes silly, but damn straight he's got a
point. Enjoy all his archived videos
here, spanning five years of obscenity-laced love/hate for his greatest passions.
posted by Christ, what an asshole
on Jun 23, 2009 -
18 comments
Reinier van der Ende, an x-ray technician at the largest hospital in the northern part of the Netherlands, decided to combine his work with one of his hobbies and proceeded to x-ray his collection of video game consoles, peripherals and game cartridges.
Here are the fruits of his labour.
[more inside]
posted by Effigy2000
on May 2, 2009 -
20 comments
