tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-218358062024-03-07T15:06:26.570-08:00Low FierceI mostly babble about videogames...
<br>
<br>
<a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/LowFierce">RSS Feed Link</a>
<a href="http://lowfierce.blogspot.com/atom.xml">Atom Feed Link</a>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.comBlogger103125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-81149074824033793762011-06-10T15:45:00.000-07:002011-06-10T16:01:21.587-07:00Capcom community and its aversion to updates<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr3KRJvzhSR2DV5lelB8xg0y58mgfK2Zyibh0Fci7_8z1xk2-v1lSKxq_dFs4gdcVhI1inzHeNkpiaQUVQHsPIylc6_ORrZDVXBOfSshDrCqYZ-0D3OA8_vqXJniah8xH6w1du/s1600/Love_and_Hate_by_BaRo24.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 130px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr3KRJvzhSR2DV5lelB8xg0y58mgfK2Zyibh0Fci7_8z1xk2-v1lSKxq_dFs4gdcVhI1inzHeNkpiaQUVQHsPIylc6_ORrZDVXBOfSshDrCqYZ-0D3OA8_vqXJniah8xH6w1du/s200/Love_and_Hate_by_BaRo24.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5616728256662277890" /></a>Many competitive games ranging from Star Craft to even Virtua Fighter get updates all the time and with a community that welcomes these with open arms. The exception seems to be the Capcom community. Street Fighter inherently has not and is that a good thing or a bad thing for the community? Lets take a look as to why the community is not open to them like others. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Arcade Culture</span><br />Street Fighter II: World Warrior was released in 1991 to a bunch of teenagers that were competitive enough to spend a quarter at a time trying to be the best in their arcades. Capcom actually patched World Warrior at least 3 times that I know of – mostly fixing bugs with a slight hint of balance tweaks. Remember this was for the arcade so there was no real advertising of this or what the tweaks were – let alone getting arcade operators to install them. These updates required swapping out the entire board! And remember at this time World Warrior was everywhere - no donut shop owner is going to swap out a JAMMA board so that the game crashes less often. <br /><br />The most important thing to remember though is that this was a brand new genre of game being explored for the first time by not only the developers but the community as well. Just because Guile was really good and only person got to pick him at a time, didn’t mean there was anything ‘wrong’ with the game. Just pick Dhalsim. <br /><br />The main people attracted to Street Fighter were teenage boys that were full of testosterone and welcomed all kinds of challenges. Be it a certain number of wins, beating the people from the rival mall that had come to challenge them or beating people with only one button. <br /><br />If you look back at where the first real Internet discussions started regarding Street Fighter – Alt.Games.SF2, you will find example after example of people yelling at one another. Including heated arguments with Tom Cannon, Seth Killian and even myself. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Patches or Sequels?</span><br />On top of the machismo that exists within the Street Fighter culture, Capcom actually gave us patches…or sequels. Depending on how you look at it: <br /><br />1991 introduced World Warrior with 8 playable characters.<br />1992 introduced Champion Edition with balance tweaks and 4 extra playable characters. <br />1992 (late) introduced Hyper Fighting with balance tweaks. <br />1993 introduced Super Street Fighter 2 again with balance tweaks and 4 extra playable characters.<br />1994 introduced Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo with balance tweaks, new mechanics and more playable characters. <br />As you can see Capcom was giving us balance tweaks (aka patches) but also packaging it along with new playable characters and lots of other small things. <br /><br />This also lead to franchise fatigue as people got tired of playing the same game every year and competition was heating up from Killer Insinct, Mortal Kombat, Virtua Fighter, Tekken, etc. <br /><br />I’m not even going to go into the detailed nuances of the differences between the Japanese and American releases and how the console versions are based on the Japanese versions and the differences that can be found there. Suffice it to say, Capcom has actually patched Street Fighter 2 a lot, whether or not people think about it. Let us not forget Remix Edition. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Alpha Series</span><br />Alpha series is where things actually start to get a little more interesting. The fighting game community embraced patches/sequels such as CE and HF. SSF2 killed the franchise where I lived and in a lot of other places as well. <br /><br />Capcom took a small break and tried to bring old players back and make the game more accessible to new players with the Alpha series. While not as big of an impact as previous games, Alpha 1 had its share of success. <br /><br />And like Capcom had previously done, they quickly released a sequel – Alpha 2. This game however reignited the spark and the community began to grow again. Depending on who you ask, there is a lot of ‘cheap’ stuff in Alpha 2. From Chun Li to Custom Combos themselves or even Alpha Counters. Capcom actually tried to patch this game and released it as Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold. <br /><br />Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold arguably had some good changes along with a few new characters but was immediately dismissed by the fighting game community. People were too set into their ways by the time it came out and offered nothing new and or exciting to players. Alpha 2 Gold was a complete failure. <br /><br />Street Fighter Alpha 3 was soon released and again sparked the fighting game community and it began to grow as well. There was even the now infamous exhibition with Japan vs. America. There are a few versions of Alpha 3 that I know of – fixing an infinite with Guy for example, but that’s about it – just bug fixes. <br /><br />Capcom did release a ‘patched’ version of Alpha 3 though – known as Alpha 3 Upper and again was immediately dismissed by the fighting game community. <br /><br />The Capcom community gravitates towards their game and figuring it out. It seems that when Capcom tries to tinker with it, it has been met with hostility. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike</span><br />I’m going to quickly talk about the SF3 series as the history echoes what has happened so far. Sequel after sequel but then Capcom did patch 3rd strike. Capcom decided to ‘fix’ 3rd Strike by removing Urien and Oro’s unblockables. Once again, this was met with hostility and tournament players refused to play this version. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Capcom VS SNK 2</span><br />If there is any game that Capcom turned its back on – it was CvS2. And this may not have been a bad thing. A glitch, commonly known as Roll Cancel, was found early in the lifespan of CvS2 where every special move could be done and the player was invincible! No meter was required, simply executing the special move command as you normally would combined with a little bit of finger kung-fu to make it invincible. <br /><br />Now for some, this ruined the game completely. A lot of people refused to play the game with this glitch. But for some, including myself – this glitch actually led the game to be more playable. <br /><br />Prior to Roll Cancel being found, the tournaments were dominated by a small selection of characters. Now that the weaker characters had access to invincible moves – it leveled the playing field. Granted as the years went on, a top tier was solidified but it definitely expanded the lifespan of this game far beyond what Capcom had intended. <br /><br />There was a console version that removed this glitch and once again, the Capcom community turned its back on it. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Street Fighter 4</span><br />Before we dive into SF4 we need to take a look at where we have been and how we got here. Capcom was making arcade fighting games for competitive people for the most part. Not only that but when a new version did come out, there was no release notes or anything. People had to figure changes out on their own and one of the reasons why things were met with such hostility is because people thought, ‘well if they changed this one thing…what else did they break?’ type of mentality. Or a lot of it was misunderstood such as, ‘The arcade Wolverine and Cyclops both have easy infinites, but the home version only Wolverine does’ for Xmen vs. Street Fighter. <br /><br />By the time SF4 finally came out, not only had Capcom taken a long break but the competitive gaming scene had changed drastically with everything from Quake to Call of Duty or even World of Warcraft. <br /><br />SF4 came out during the era where people expected patches and games were easily to do so. People were quick to complain about Sagat in the arcade and while he did receive some slight changes in the home version, he is still a strong character. <br /><br />This is where things get interesting and I feel this is actually where Capcom excels at making popular games. They don’t go for balanced games, they strive for playability. Not only that – but by not going for balanced gameplay, they actually appeal to 2 key personalities. <br /><br />First is the personality that sees an overpowered character like Sagat and says to themselves, ‘I’m going to be the best in the world with this cheap character’. Think Tokido or even Mago. <br /><br />The second and equally as important personality is the one goes, ‘Fuck that…I’m going to do everything I can to NEVER play that cheap character and beat everyone who plays that way’. Think Clockw0rk or Daigo. <br /><br />By appealing to these 2 drastically different personalities – they not only get the extremes, but the middle ground personalities as well. <br /><br />And just for the record, Street Fighter series as a whole has been really well balanced and Vanilla Sagat may be the weakest top tier character in the history of Street Fighter. WW Guile, CE Bison, HF Ryu, etc were all much better. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Sales and Spectacle Matter</span><br />So another piece of the whole puzzle is that at the end of the day, Capcom needs to sell units and have their games displayed in exciting ways so that people want to play them and their sequels. There is nothing inherently wrong with companies wanting to make money. <br /><br />One of the key ways Capcom goes about doing this is making Ryu Strong. People naturally gravitate towards picking Ryu either in the arcade or at home and if he sucks, people are not going to have fun. Now I’m not saying they intentionally make Ryu the best or anything but there is a reason why Ryu is competitive in almost every version. <br /><br />Capcom isn’t alone in this – look at Virtua Fighter or even Tekken for what characters are consistently the best in their games.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-18458412048818126892009-03-03T10:53:00.000-08:002009-03-03T10:56:15.551-08:00The Dogface Show Ep 1, Part 1I promise I won't keep doing this. But I just wanted to update now that we have the first segment of the first episode up. Hopefully everyone finds it as fun as we had making it. <br /><br /><object width="480" height="295"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/GrU25QWX0PA&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x3a3a3a&color2=0x999999"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/GrU25QWX0PA&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x3a3a3a&color2=0x999999" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="295"></embed></object>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-58083966761096703272009-02-20T10:21:00.001-08:002009-02-20T11:03:18.449-08:00The Dogface Show<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiADJ18CiY6YmcJIPFXal58uyWmdWaWmm16LAJlc9wRsmt0hlfiutHXWSaVyReYRnlHdHMDOl8iRMuyU8JEmSWFkM0y-GHkLRnuIc8lTL909P5VN0audyQq1_CeBp8D8mjbiNK/s1600-h/dogface_stone.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 248px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiADJ18CiY6YmcJIPFXal58uyWmdWaWmm16LAJlc9wRsmt0hlfiutHXWSaVyReYRnlHdHMDOl8iRMuyU8JEmSWFkM0y-GHkLRnuIc8lTL909P5VN0audyQq1_CeBp8D8mjbiNK/s320/dogface_stone.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5304947369406201490" /></a> This is what I have been working on for a while now. So if you are wondering why I never update my blog anymore, it's because I have been hella busy with The Dogface Show. <br /><br />So what is the Dogface Show? Dogface aka Victor Ratliff has been a friend of mine for a long time now. We met playing Street Fighter and we did a <a href="http://gootecks.com/podcast/street-fighter-podcast-11-dogface-omni/">podcast</a> not too long for another friend of ours, <a href="http://www.gootecks.com">Ryan Gutierrez aka gootecks</a>. <br /><br />I believe <a href="http://www.sonichurricane.com/">Maj</a> was the one who had the original idea - but the idea is that Vic has such a great onscreen personality that we should put together a show of some kind. I came on board as executive producer - recruiting James Chen to edit and even Yanbing to do the logo. <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Here is the first trailer that we put together to highlight what the show is about: <br /><br /><object width="480" height="295"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/jCzI4QB9QY0&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/jCzI4QB9QY0&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="295"></embed></object><br /><br />Our first guests are Ryan Gutierrez and Mike Ross and focuses not just on Street Fighter but the culture of Street Fighter - hanging out, having a good time while also talking strategies and stuff. <br /><br />It's our first attempt and we'll continue to iron out the bugs. If all goes well we should have our first segment live next week. Hope everyone enjoys it!Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-47584674647137319442009-02-07T09:36:00.000-08:002009-02-07T09:44:25.229-08:00First You Runa, Then you Stopa!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUBLPoW5wA203BKJSMmYngFribgHybNpXY8YsqDJPQZT3UoeMyvcwjM1TlIsnG2Er3tCFaKvKSUpCaymZspOl1PAP-wux8kSOiNC1tam5_Swc1ghRes6Eg_lqXvxdQFFW6Uukj/s1600-h/street_fighter_iv_el_fuerte.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 109px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUBLPoW5wA203BKJSMmYngFribgHybNpXY8YsqDJPQZT3UoeMyvcwjM1TlIsnG2Er3tCFaKvKSUpCaymZspOl1PAP-wux8kSOiNC1tam5_Swc1ghRes6Eg_lqXvxdQFFW6Uukj/s200/street_fighter_iv_el_fuerte.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5300111844417666258" /></a>I don't know what it is - but I loves me some Street Fighter songs. Last year Turbo2k5 made me smile nonstop with Gigaton Punch and now Lil Shoto has been bringing the heat with this sick El Fuerto song:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.iplaywinner.com/news/2009/2/5/el-fuerte-run-stop-fierce-guide-by-lil-shoto.html">El Fuerto</a><br /><br />He also did a great Chun Li one also. <br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/e42UQy9vNKE&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/e42UQy9vNKE&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />He even did a great <a href="http://www.iplaywinner.com/storage/music/blanka.mp3">Blanka</a> one. <br /><br />I really hope this guy does the whole cast.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-62750337274470139152009-02-02T11:22:00.000-08:002009-02-02T11:34:47.207-08:00Evo2k dates and lineup for this year<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://evo2k.com/images/2009/header-banner.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 600px; height: 150px;" src="http://evo2k.com/images/2009/header-banner.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><a href="http://www.evo2k.com">Evo</a> this year will be July 17th - 19th, 2009 this year. Will still be held in Vegas, but will be at The Rio. <br /><br />The Games: <br /><br /> * Street Fighter 4<br /> * Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix<br /> * Soul Calibur 4<br /> * Marvel vs. Capcom 2<br /> * Guilty Gear XX, Accent Core<br /> * SF3, Third Strike, 2v2 team tournament<br /><br />As usual, we will hold exhibition events on Friday and Saturday night.<br /><br /> * Tatsunoko vs. Capcom Invitational Finals<br /> * Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix 5 on 5 Regional Team Tournament<br /><br />The TvC event will actually be the final 8 players of a 64 man invitational tournament that we will run before hand. The TvC finals will run just like any other Evo finals.<br /><br />If you have any questions feel free to head over to <a href="http://www.evo2k.com">evo2k.com</a> or <a href="http://www.shoryuken.com">shoryuken.com</a>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-68618092635056101312009-01-26T14:30:00.000-08:002009-01-26T15:05:31.480-08:00Combat SystemsA little over 5 years ago, me and Eric Williams were bored at Border's and discussing the various systems found in fighting games. Specifically Capcom 2D games. We generated a long list of what each game brought to the table for the first time. I was having a problem at work trying to remember how certain games handled things when I stumbled across this. I figured I would post it up, in case anyone else finds it helpful. This is by no means all inclusive or perhaps even accurate. More or less a brain dump we had one evening.<br /><br />Unfortunately I don't have time to screen cap or vid cap what all of these things are and if you don't follow the Capcom fighting game scene I'm not sure how helpful this will be since there is a lot of jargon but if you have any questions I'll do my best to answer.<br /><span class="fullpost"><br />Street Fighter 2: World Warrior<br />2in1's<br />Links<br />Special Moves<br />Kara Cancel<br />Negative Edge<br />Meaties<br />Dizzies<br />Mashing<br />Projectiles<br />Short+Fierce<br />Breakable Objects<br />Bonus Stages<br />Cross ups<br />Air Throw<br />Block Damage<br /><br />Street Fighter 2: Champion Edition<br />Button Charging for special moves<br />Vega's Wall Climb<br />Evade<br />Get up Animations<br />Same Player vs. Same Player<br /><br />Street Fighter 2: Hyper Fighting<br />Joystick Controllable Movement Specials<br />Air Special Moves<br />True Reversals with Specials<br />Teleport<br />Air 2in1's<br /><br />Super Street Fighter 2<br />Dizzy particle right away<br />Text Messages (Combo Meter)<br />Rekka Ken<br />DJ's Uppercut Punch<br />Projectile Absorption<br /><br />Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo<br />Throw Techs<br />Overheads<br />Supers<br />Juggling<br />1st game with playable hidden character(?)<br />Character Variants (old vs. new)<br />Controllable Limbs<br />Weapon Loss and Pickups<br />New Joystick Motions - Fei Long, Cammy<br />Throw Whiffs<br /><br />Street Fighter Alpha 1<br />Chain Combos<br />Alpha Counter<br />3 Part Super Meter<br />2 on 1 (Ryu/Ken vs. Bison)<br />Command Roll<br />Friends Super<br />Hit Throw<br />Rekka Ken Options (Guy)<br />Taunts<br />Character Intros<br />Rival Fights<br />Mini Launchers (Rose's Scarf)<br />Fireball Reflect<br />Air Block<br />Block When Landing (Trip Guard)<br />Auto Block<br /><br />Street Fighter Alpha 2<br />Tech Rolls<br />Custom Combos<br />Combo-able Alpha Counter (Rose)<br />Stance Changes<br />Poison Super<br />Timed Button Input Specials (Gen's Kick)<br />2 Hit Air Jumping move (Gen)<br />Super Jump<br />Fake Special Moves<br /><br />Street Fighter Alpha 3<br />Counter Hits<br />Air Techs<br />Every Move Has Potential To Juggle<br />2 Button Throws<br />Can Combo After Throw<br />Guard Crush Meter<br />Blue Blocking<br />Damage Reduction<br />Command Counters (Karin)<br />Pushblock<br />Dodge<br />Crouch Cancelling<br />Can Be Thrown While In Block/Hit Stun<br />OTG Command Grabs<br />System Variants (X vs. A vs. V)<br />Command Dash<br /><br />Capcom Vs. SNK<br />Rolls<br />Ratios/Teams<br />Running<br />Prolonging getting up Animation<br />Command Charging of Meter (S Groove)<br />Immobilizing Supers (Iori)<br />Healing<br />Infinite Low Life Supers<br />Mash Inputs to change animation (Yamazaki)<br />Bird Interaction (Nakoruru)<br /><br />Capcom Vs. SNK2<br />Level 2 Cancels<br />Low Jump<br />Parry<br />Just Defend<br />Raged<br />Command Activate Meter (N Groove)<br />Counter Roll<br />Roll Cancelling<br />Helper (Chang)<br />Auto Guard<br /><br />Street Fighter 3 (all of them)<br />Special Into Super<br />Parry / Red Parry<br />Universal Overhead<br />Variable Supers / Meters<br />Dizzy Meter<br />Unblockable supers (Denjin)<br />EX Specials<br />Kara Throw<br /><br />Marvel Series (all of them)<br />Super Jump<br />Double Jump / Triple Jump<br />OTG<br />Flying<br />Flying Screen<br />Air Combos<br />Gems<br />Air Dashing<br />Back/Forward Dashing<br />Combo Into Throw (Air and Ground)<br />Super Armor<br />Vertical Scrolling Stages<br />Healing<br />Tagging<br />Assists<br />Team Supers<br />Snapback<br />Shuma - Super/Eyeballs/Time Gem<br />Normal Move Projectiles<br />No Continue If Hit<br />Block Damage<br />Status Upgrades<br />Stealing Of Moves<br /><br />Darkstalkers (All of them)<br />Pouncing<br />9 Supers<br />Dark Force<br />No Update On Rounds<br />Cursing<br /><br />2D Misc<br />Lying Down<br />Command Dodge<br />Weapon Clash<br />Disarm<br />Unthrowable<br />Slow Down<br />Suicides<br />Destroys<br />Anti Chip Damage<br />Jump Cancelling<br />Roman Cancel<br /></span>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-40788097467814654652009-01-20T22:35:00.000-08:002009-01-26T14:27:35.724-08:00facelift<span id="fullpost"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1zxAP6a0REDvW64kdUZbh44XlBiL7898s94pbrmeTX7tCtQKLb413KDWRhNsfGKsQofXSdDVN6lH8JYC4h9q8hdWxUmc1amr1M5koxkG9HVgov4slD5IJiHK5IciP3Hq4YVnt/s1600-h/spring_cleaning.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 142px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1zxAP6a0REDvW64kdUZbh44XlBiL7898s94pbrmeTX7tCtQKLb413KDWRhNsfGKsQofXSdDVN6lH8JYC4h9q8hdWxUmc1amr1M5koxkG9HVgov4slD5IJiHK5IciP3Hq4YVnt/s200/spring_cleaning.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293632540573525490" /></a> So I got sick of how everything was looking and decided to update tonight. Not 100% sure this is the final look either, but I like it better than how it was. So we'll see. In the interim, I'll be re-arranging some stuff and re-organizing some stuff. Let me know if you like it! <br /><br />Was in Madison all of last week working on Wolverine. You may have seen the last issue of EGM ever with it on the cover. The Raven guys have been a blast to work with. Gustavo, who I worked with on God of War 1 is on the game and has been doing a fantastic job. I can't wait for everyone to see some more footage, let alone get their hands on it. I'm sure there will be some exciting things in the months to come. <br /><br />Have you guys had a chance to play Prince Of Persia yet? I hope so because my next post will probably be about that game; as I think it very well is my personal Game Of The Year. I'll spoil the hell out of it next time I update.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-82890551501304459142009-01-19T15:30:00.000-08:002009-01-19T15:34:05.966-08:00Talking with your animators<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e97/mizuyuri/Eric/anticipation.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 225px; height: 263px;" src="http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e97/mizuyuri/Eric/anticipation.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a>Eric Williams wrote up a great blog post about animations, talking with animators, etc. You should definitely go check it out. <br /><br /><a href="http://pushing-buttons.blogspot.com/2009/01/attack-animations-part-1.html">Click here to read what I'm babbling about.</a>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-50494253741302143332009-01-04T18:21:00.000-08:002009-01-04T18:33:33.210-08:00Kitchen Sink Brush (Gold Tooth)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.betterlivingthroughdesign.com/gold-tooth-brush.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 200px;" src="http://www.betterlivingthroughdesign.com/gold-tooth-brush.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />I don't know why - but I kind of like this. Definitely not worth $100 though. <br /><br />Found via <a href="http://www.betterlivingthroughdesign.com/2008/12/kitchen_sink_brush_gold_tooth.html">BetterLivingThroughDesign</a>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-57998265732053942552008-12-16T16:10:00.000-08:002008-12-16T16:20:50.948-08:00Double Damage is not your friendSo I meet a lot of designers these days – from seasoned designers who have shipped more games than me to designers whose first game is the one I’m working on them with. One thing that they all have in common, they all suggest giving Double Damage as a mode, attribute, attack, etc for the player or an enemy, boss, etc. <br /><br />Double Damage – the concept of an attack doing twice the damage compared to normal. For Example – if an attack does 5 points, then with this ‘AWESOME!’ attribute – the attack does 10 points!! Note: Double Damage always comes with 2 exclamation points, that’s how double it is. <br /><br />So why bother writing up something about this? Well I for one think that it’s a terrible idea 90% of the time. I’ll go into details about that here in a minute, but the main reason why I hate it is because it’s very ‘designery’ solution. It deals with knowing how the details work and playing around with the numbers. It’s not something that is easily understood nor appreciated by the player. <br /><br />Double Damage is almost always the first thing thought of when a power up is activated, a mode is turned on, etc. Let’s break down a little bit as to why I hate it so much. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Why Double Damage Is Bad</span><br />In most games these days – enemies don’t have health bars. Because enemies don’t have health bars, the player really doesn’t know how much damage they are doing with their base attacks. Because they don’t know how much damage their base attacks are doing, how in the world are they ever going to know they are doing Double Damage?<br /><br />Let’s break it down by math a little. Let’s say an enemy has 35 points of health. Each attack from the player does 5 points, so it takes 7 attacks to kill one enemy. We now double that to 10 – so now it’s 4 hits to kill the enemy. Is that really all that noticeable to the player? <br /><br />Using the same math example from above – what usually happens is that the player gets surrounded by a group of guys. No one is remembering how many hits they have dished out so far. Let’s be honest – most people are just mashing on buttons and don’t notice that 1 guy died faster than normal out of a big group. <br /><br />The other down side to Double Damage is when meeting new enemies for the first time. The player has no idea how much health they have or how much damage the attack’s from this new enemy does. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">When Double Damage Is Good</span><br />Like I said before, I hate it 90% of the time. So what is the 10% of the time I like it? <br /><br />I think it makes a shitty power-up on its own. I do like it when it gets coupled with something else. Such as adding effects to the weapon and now the enemies explode when killed. Something that is more obvious to the player that something ‘cool’ is happening. <br /><br />Obviously in situations where the player does know information – such as how much damage their attacks do or how much health the enemy has. This usually works out well in RPG’s since this information gets conveyed more often than in modern day action / adventure games. <br /><br />Double Damage can be a good thing but it needs to be used properly. Don’t treat it as something ‘cool’ that the player can have and that’s it. If you are going to use it – then really use it. We used it a lot in God of War – but never as a sole attribute. We bundled it along with 900 other things that the player could appreciate: Fire Particles, Super Armor, whole new set of animations, blah blah.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-28732589681482089512008-11-12T20:08:00.001-08:002008-11-12T20:39:04.286-08:00self pimpage<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdhHAErpaYyg0aPqwiiOatUDQonAupvesDY2vECqh7bFIZ00LFbgRDYb62_3oYUADOGJTlBz60X7lBnO33BKumdq9KKWnhiQSEogzwooH0RGlgGS-3t8-Eskgrp0DBOeb7e-NN/s1600-h/Photo+8.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 151px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdhHAErpaYyg0aPqwiiOatUDQonAupvesDY2vECqh7bFIZ00LFbgRDYb62_3oYUADOGJTlBz60X7lBnO33BKumdq9KKWnhiQSEogzwooH0RGlgGS-3t8-Eskgrp0DBOeb7e-NN/s200/Photo+8.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5267995437894048418" /></a>A few projects that I've been involved with here recently have been released so I figured why not spread the Derek love today. <br /><br />I did a podcast with Victor 'Dogface' Radliff the other night with Gootecks - a famous Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike player and now an up and comer in the world of SF4. You can find the podcast <a href="http://gootecks.com/podcast/street-fighter-podcast-11-dogface-omni/">here</a>. It was a lot of fun and hopefully you guys will find it fun as well. Note for those that visit my blog about videogame design and stuff - this is purely Street Fighter. <br /><br />For those of you who do visit here for videogame design - then you may be interested in this: <br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv_ENI0phGsDahmYGCFzmdVCumDbZYlD-WUpVWNZxF5uSF2ld5K0kHQJQG4R8vb2H6eKp5ikAy2gF0F3_ctNj3vgrdrWawCbdm5yw1rqsIjalrlWSyHFglsRu_uqB7UzVrRCSX/s1600-h/41qRkgTQuRL._SL500_AA240_.jpg"><img style="cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv_ENI0phGsDahmYGCFzmdVCumDbZYlD-WUpVWNZxF5uSF2ld5K0kHQJQG4R8vb2H6eKp5ikAy2gF0F3_ctNj3vgrdrWawCbdm5yw1rqsIjalrlWSyHFglsRu_uqB7UzVrRCSX/s320/41qRkgTQuRL._SL500_AA240_.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5267990277103332018" /></a> <br /><br />This book written by Steven Swink can be found <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Game-Feel-Designers-Virtual-Sensation/dp/0123743281/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226549532&sr=8-1">here at Amazon</a>. <br /><br /><br />Steve came into LA a while back to interview me for the book - which talks about 'feel' in videogames, something that definitely piqued my interest. If you pick up the book and look at the book - I have this lovely quote: <br /><br />"Steve has demystified what separates good games from great games, in a way that everyone can understand. Steve has written the very first book that deconstructs and examines the concept of why certain games feel better than others. Have you ever wondered why a simple action such as jump feels different in all video games? So has Steve, who has explored this and other actions to help everyone create better video games."<br /><br />So go out there and support <a href="http://gootecks.com">Ryan 'Gootecks' Gutierrez</a> and <a href="http://www.steveswink.com/">Steve Swink</a> since they are awesome people.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-9177600099428459352008-11-08T10:10:00.001-08:002008-11-08T10:26:37.959-08:00I <3 Castlevania<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvs74fun0-9ePS4IxIMNWVoImruLrmdktsxu0SL93qHwH_J9f3cCvXJyV9BAdSbFcgSt_6QTIc3P62iBlDJzM9KdA6ewDJ5pRvPbKID0Fat12ZCZDOkromjqDlUqB6W7Pd_j21/s1600-h/castlevania.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 256px; height: 192px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvs74fun0-9ePS4IxIMNWVoImruLrmdktsxu0SL93qHwH_J9f3cCvXJyV9BAdSbFcgSt_6QTIc3P62iBlDJzM9KdA6ewDJ5pRvPbKID0Fat12ZCZDOkromjqDlUqB6W7Pd_j21/s320/castlevania.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5266351559149872498" /></a> I finished my annual obsession with a new handheld castlevania game. Me and the other 200k people since these games barely sell. Sadness. <br /><br />While a lot of people see it as one of the best 'metroidvanias, I'm not sure if I would call it that. I had a lot of fun for sure but something is definitely missing. For me it was the lack of exploring and backtracking. They decided to have a lot of smaller maps like how Portrait Of Ruin was - but some of the maps I ran through once and never went back. <br /><br />Anyways, that's not what I wanted to talk about today. They have a couple of interesting mechanics, specifically for the more hardcore players. All of the bosses are really hard this time around. What makes them hard is simply how much damage they do to the player. They are all really pattern based - having 3 or 4 attacks at the most usually. With the limited number of attacks, the bosses become pretty easy to 'read' but one mistake and you are losing 1/4 of your health. <br /><br />So the interesting thing is they built a mechanic where if you beat the boss without taking any damage then you get a 'medal' which is just a reward, does nothing but says you beat the boss without losing health. Sort of like an achievement. On top of this though, they give the player a ring called, 'The Death Ring' which boosts all of your stats (maybe even doubles them). The 'gimmick' of the ring is that if you are hit once, you die instantly. <br /><br />After you beat the game, you are allowed to start the game over and keep all of your stuff (including this Death Ring). So you are able to achieve all the medals that you didn't obtain the first time through. So the game gives you this awesome ring - but one hit from the boss and you die. But you are trying to make it through the whole battle without being hit so it all works out. <br /><br />There are a few other interesting things in the game (such as the character you play after you beat it) but I'm out of time this morning.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-69208166064948345472008-11-05T20:14:00.000-08:002008-11-05T20:30:41.837-08:00Tomb Raider Demo - oh how you broke my heart<br><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2_Ms5AAyC_6odV_CbdDoIttEpDIccW1-YO74BWyzG9nB_lTY_DC8uzjZfmpfapqaNXCjQdTKRC309plrMuZdOMI0CwYuX3na64bYtifV5zbc9aIFo7jjEaptEOYZKyf8SeDt2/s1600-h/tombunderworld.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2_Ms5AAyC_6odV_CbdDoIttEpDIccW1-YO74BWyzG9nB_lTY_DC8uzjZfmpfapqaNXCjQdTKRC309plrMuZdOMI0CwYuX3na64bYtifV5zbc9aIFo7jjEaptEOYZKyf8SeDt2/s320/tombunderworld.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5265393712567108786" /></a>I unfortunately don't have a lot of time but I want to talk about the Tomb Raider: Underworld demo real quick. It's a gorgeous game for the most part and I'm definitely going to pick it up when it comes out. I enjoyed Tomb Raider Legend and wasn't a huge fan of Anniversary but I managed to finish it nonetheless. <br /><br />Tomb Raider has always been one of my favorite franchises and I was super excited when Crystal Dynamics took it over. That being said...there is one part of the demo that drove me nuts. <br /><br />They introduce this new mechanic where you pick a stick up off the ground and they teach the player to look for holes in the wall (or columns) to place the stick in. Once placed - it becomes a horizontal pole that she can climb which lets you explore the environment more and move on to the next puzzle or whatever. This is a welcome addition and seems like it could open a lot of things up. <br /><br />So step 1 in all of this - is seeing the stick on the ground. Step 2 is finding the proper place for it and Step 3 is putting it all together. Simple, clean and elegant. <br /><br />After doing all that I climb up and around and find the same type of stick ALREADY placed in a hole. So naturally they teach the player to remove the stick and now Lara can walk around carrying the stick. <br /><br />This is where Step 4 comes into play and this is what drove me nuts. Step 4 in ANY other videogame would be to remove the stick and find a new hole to place it into. So...I walked around for about 5 minutes looking for somewhere to place my new found stick. When Lara does any action such as jump she lets go of the stick. The worst part is that the stick has physics - so I'm up on this ledge, I let go of the stick and kick it off the ledge and immediately think, 'Oh no!! Now I have ruined the puzzle and must restart the game'. <br /><br />Turns out...all the player has to do is remove the stick from the hole that it was in to solve the 'puzzle'. There was no step 4!! Maybe because it's a demo and perhaps the middle part of the game and none of this really has context but I really did wander for a good 5-10 minutes looking for that 2nd layer of the mechanics that were just taught to me. <br /><br />Also - please tell the player what they have picked up. Again - this may just be a 'demo' thing but I picked up all sorts of things off the ground and she just put them in her backpack without ever telling me what they were.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-72918804232483216432008-11-02T16:04:00.000-08:002008-11-02T16:33:23.580-08:00More missing timeSo I made a promise to myself to try to update this blog more often and boy have I sucked at keeping that promise. Some days I wonder if I should stop updating at all. Not sure what I'm getting out of it let alone you the reader. I guess I'll just babble and see where this post leads to. <br /><br />Playing through Castlevania: Order of something or other on the DS right now. The DS is pretty much my favorite Next Gen system. Although I fucking lost mine on a plane trip here recently (with my coveted Soul Bubbles!). Thanks to an awesome person - they sent me a replacement. I was thinking about holding off and picking up that DSi thing - but that thing might as well be the Gameboy Color of DS's. Of course we all know what's going to happen - Nintendo is going to come up with some way of using the Camera in Animal Crossing and sell 9 million more units just like that. <br /><br />Castlevania is pretty damn hard this time around. I'm a huge fan of the route that Castlevania has gone since Symphony Of The Night - the whole Metroidvania route. This one doesn't seem to have a whole lot of exploring to it which bums me out, but it's still fun - when I'm not using Magical Tickets to escape back to the village so I can heal myself. <br /><br />I've been a traveling fool here lately. I've been in Madison, WI twice, Vancouver and Albany all within the last month or so. I have a stack of receipts scattered through out my laptop bag, bedroom and office that I need to collect and turn in. Anyone have a good method of keeping all that stuff organized? I definitely suck at it. <br /><br />The trips were fun though - I always enjoy going to visit the fine folks at Raven (madison). Something about making videogames in the midwest speaks to me. Plus I get to see an old co-worker of mine, Gustavo. Vancouver was fun because I had never been there before. Visited Radical now that they are part of the huge Activision Blizzard umbrella or whatever. Super Super nice studio - the main meeting room is a log cabin. It's completely out of control. Albany was also a brand new city for me - super cold but a lot of fun as well. I can't remember what projects have and haven't been announced so I'll just shut up now. <br /><br />I went to Universal Studios this year for their Halloween event. Wow - that place was amazing. Definitely hollywood level of makeup and gore combined with people jumping out and scaring me nonstop. There was one event where you take a tram to another part of the park and there is a huge plane crashed on the ground, broken in half, etc. Totally looked like the set of Lost or something. <br /><br />I went to the 1st halloween screening of Dr.Horrible here in LA on halloween night. That was a lot of fun as well - Joss Whedon himself was there along with Nathan and Felicia Day; no Doogie Howser but what do you expect. The movie was subtitled so everyone could sing along - plus they sold a bag of random interactive items. These were really random things like little 'curtains' so the crowd could lift them up when Dr. Horrible says, '...you're curtains.' or some nonsense like that. <br /><br />Oh yeah - started playing Dead Space (told you I was going to babble). Hrm...Need to play it some more to really form an opinion. The presentation is off the chart but I feel like I'm doing a lot of fetch quests so far which is getting a little annoying. I'm only on chapter 3 or 4 right now so hopefully it gets better. <br /><br />I'm downloading the demo's for the new Tomb Raider and Mirror's Edge - I'll go check those out when I'm done updating. <br /><br />Oh yeah - so a lot of games have been released (or about to) that I worked on the past year or so. Spider-Man: Web of Shadows, Quantum of Solace and Guitar Hero: World Tour. Where to begin? Spider-Man seems to either click with people or not. Never been involved with a game that is all over the map as far as review scores are concerned. Usually they are super bad or decent. <br /><br />All the games seem to suffer from a little nostalgia (Guitar Hero a little less but it's there) - Web of Shadows vs. Spider-Man 2 and Quantum vs. Goldeneye. In both instances (SM2 and Goldeneye) people seem to remember these games being perfect 10's or something. I'm not making excuses as I'm proud of both games but, damn - nostalgia is a motherfucker. <br /><br />There is good stuff in both games and it will be interesting to see what happens with both. <br /><br />Guitar Hero was definitely interesting. The only part I was involved with was multiplayer and it was interesting due to competing with Rock Band and trying our best to not straight up copy for fear of litigation. Now that the game is out - I see where a few mistakes were made and this is more of a mental reminder for myself to email some people on Monday. In all honesty though - both games (RB2 and GH4) have issues when it comes to multiplayer, both parts have good things but neither is perfect. Maybe next time out some issues can get ironed. But if you hate the multiplayer in GH4 then feel free to yell at me. <br /><br />Let's see - I finished reading, 'The Art of Learning' by Josh Waitzkin. Josh is the main character in, 'Searching For Bobby Fischer' - the child chess phenom. He talks a lot about how when the movie came out - for a variety of reasons he lost interest in chess and took up a type of taiwanese martial arts. He then went on to become world champion in that as well. Discusses how he conquered both a mental game and a physical game and the process of learning both. Super interesting and I definitely recommend it. Although his writing gets worse as the book goes on IMO. <br /><br />I think both demo's are finished so I'm going to go check those out.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-54626036303871099342008-09-20T09:49:00.001-07:002008-09-20T10:06:36.381-07:00Beasting The Daigo Is Super Simple<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/KmTlaH54hDo&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/KmTlaH54hDo&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />I really hate to 'link and run' but this video is pretty damn epic to say the least. My friend BAS sent it to me this morning and at first I didn't pay any attention to the song but then realized it was a 10 minute song about the Legendary Daigo. I asked BAS what the end says - he says something like, 'We didn't see you at SBO2008 - we missed you and please come back." Something along those lines. <br /><br />It's fun to see Daigo over the past 10 years - from coming to America for the first time to play <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgFEaSlD_kY">Alpha 3</a> with all of us. To watching him play Darkstalkers which I heard he was super good at but never really followed to be honest. All the way through CvS2, Guilty Gear, ST and 3rd Strike. It's been a fun 10 years to say the least.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-90422220854016139082008-09-09T11:16:00.000-07:002008-09-09T11:19:19.370-07:00Developers everywhere are in pain<embed src="http://blip.tv/play/gYwjwZJqjdEh" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="400" height="390" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed> <br /><br /><a href="http://pushing-buttons.blogspot.com/">Eric Williams</a> sent me this, so I'm not 100% sure of its origins. I get the feeling that it's not about game development but it still applies and makes me laugh. Enjoy!Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-9358319015729791022008-09-08T19:41:00.000-07:002008-09-08T20:45:35.143-07:00Lego's and ramblings<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://fredoichi.com/pics/LegoStick.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px;" src="http://fredoichi.com/pics/LegoStick.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a> This thing is so damn adorable. Big ups to <a href="http://fredoichi.com/">Fredo</a> for making this and all the other awesome stuff on his site. <br /><br />So what have I been up to these days? Not talking about vice president milf's thats for sure. I've been playing a lot of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGyfB6q2auU&feature=related">Newtonica </a>here lately. In case you haven't heard or played - Newtonica is an iPhone game made by 2 famous people - Kenichi Nishi and Kenji Eno. Nishi worked on Chrono Trigger and Chibi Robo, where as Eno who is a musician worked on D and the sequel. It's only $5 totally worth the money. Hopefully this is a sign of the future - the iPhone being a viable platform where small and unusual games can be developed and released. <br /><br />I spent a Saturday awhile back with another downloadable game - Ratchet and Clank Quest For Booty on the PS3. I don't know a whole lot about the development of it - how long it took, how much $ or what but this is totally what I want from games - spend $15, play for about 3.5-4 hours, beat it and move on with your life. The game is a little weird for sure - you spend $15 and you download the whole game and it looks and plays like a $60 game! In fact the $60 game I just got done playing not that long ago. This is a plus and a minus - I think it's a great value but I think psychologically a lot of people forget they only paid $15 and want a 20 hour long epic. However the value works out to be around the same - $15 for 4 hours = $3.75 and $60 for 20 hours = $3. <br /><br />I thoroughly enjoyed it though - was great to get back to platforming instead of just shooting everything like how part 3 was. I did miss clank with all of his banter and the weapons could have been new or at least upgraded but hey I had fun and didn't feel like the game owed me anything. I've been wanting them to do something new with the wrench since part 2 and I'm glad they finally did. Definitely an enjoyable game. <br /><br />I was also watching a lot of bad Smallville. Yeah yeah yeah, I know the show is no good but I somehow managed to watch all of seasons 1-4 and I noticed via Netfix that Season 5 was on HD-DVD so I figured I should put that thing to use. Man...it's like the show never goes anywhere! Anytime something does happen, the characters always mysteriously forget everything and the story resets itself back to zero so to speak. Season 6 is on Blu Ray but I just don't know if I can manage to do it. Does it get any better? Even Spike couldn't save the show. <br /><br />I'm going to go peep out Shirley Manson of Garbage and her acting skills on that Terminator show since it is returning to TV tonight. The fact that I'm excited to go turn on a show with Brian Austin Green frightens me.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-55455744771592970542008-08-12T20:32:00.001-07:002008-08-12T21:02:32.125-07:00Sega slaps one of their developers<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.joelogon.com/images_temp/stop-talking-ok-slick400.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px;" src="http://www.joelogon.com/images_temp/stop-talking-ok-slick400.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a>So in all honesty I kind of avoid those really long interviews that involve CEO's and what not. But this came to my attention today. This is from an interview at <a href="http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3756/the_evolution_of_sega_a_.php">GamaSutra</a> with Simon Jeffery who is now the CEO of Sega of America. When asked about Secret Level (developer of Iron Man and Golden Axe) if they would ever be an AAA studio, he had this to say:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3756/the_evolution_of_sega_a_.php?page=2">I think the design side of the studio... they don't have world-class designers, but they do have world-class technology and world-class art.</a><br /><br />Keep in mind that Sega owns Secret Level!! It is this guy's job to be like, 'Iron Man sold the #'s we were looking to sell and Golden Axe is going to be a huge hit!" or some other PR nonsense.<br /><br />Instead he compares them to another studio and talks shit about their designers. I've played Iron Man and trust me - design was not the single factor that made that game rank below the 50's on Gamerankings.<br /><br />It's very easy to blame design as to why things went bad but I'm sure he didn't bother to check the tools pipeline to see how long it takes to re-iterate on stuff or how often the game kept crashing right before Alpha, and the other 9 billion small things that make developing a game harder then it should be.<br /><br />I also love how this whole thing unfolds - he talks more about Secret Level by saying:<br /><br />"We acquired them for a pretty small amount of money and built them out."<br /><br />So they buy them for cheap knowing what they were strong and weak at and when Iron Man doesn't pan out he finds the easiest escape goat. Not only that but supposedly this 'design weak' studio is now in charge or re-booting one of their classic franchises. Not a great decision if thats how he felt in the first place.<br /><br />All I know is that if I was a designer at Secret Level I would be looking for a new job immediately. Don't put up with that type of abuse.<br /><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;">There are a lot of world class CEO's in the video game industry and you Simon Jeffery are definitely not one of them. </span>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-31561686219017784332008-08-06T21:35:00.000-07:002008-08-06T22:07:31.650-07:00Catching up with the worldI feel like I do a lot of these whole catching up posts which is really a sign that I need to update more. Yeah - I suck. <br /><br />So E3 came and went and I'm sure everyone has an opinion as to why it sucked. Like Eric - I didn't go to E3 this year either which was a little odd. I did however attend way too many parties including the Rock Band party so I got to see the Who. I also got to meet Stephen Totilo in person for the first time which was a lot of fun. Got to meet N'gai which was a highlight for sure. Now that I think about it I didn't get to meet a lot of developers - only journalists. Not sure what that says but it seems like it could be important! Ok...maybe not. <br /><br />I should have gone to Comic Con and I didn't. There are a lot of reasons why I should have gone - the most important being to see my friend Jeremy from Dark Horse but I can feel myself getting old and after being out til 4 a.m. every night during E3 I needed the whole week to rest and Comic Con was just too intimidating. <br /><br /><a href="http://www.evo2k.com">Evo</a> is coming up this week - I am attending that though. A really good friend of mine, Tommy Ho - an animator on God of War 2 is getting married this weekend so I'll be running a little late getting to Evo so I couldn't enter Super Turbo but thems the breaks. <br /><br />Speaking of God of War - I read the new issue of EGM this week. While not only being one of the best issues of EGM that I have read in a really long time - God of War gets name dropped like 900 times - 700 in the Diablo 3 article alone. So the new issue, which as Soul Calibur 4 on the cover, focuses on interviewing a lot of Jpnese developers and getting their opinions on the state of videogames and dives into how western developers have not only caught up but surpassed them in a lot of respects. It's cool to have them interview Kamiya (Lead on DMC1, RE2, Okami, blah blah) and when he answers with a controversial answer - you turn the page and there is an interview with Itagaki bringing up that controversial answer. <br /><br />I really like when when developers talk about games other then their own. I understand from a PR standpoint it is a bad thing - any mention is free publicity for said game but thems also the breaks. <br /><br />So back to the new EGM - there is a conversation with Rob Pardo from Blizzard who I have never met although I feel like I should have by now and he talks a lot about how they are taking cues from GoW to use on Diablo 3. I will fully admit to have never played Diablo 1 or 2 (I *hate* grinding in videogames) but it makes me want to play Diablo 3 haha. Hopefully that doesn't come across as arrogant because thats not my point. I want to play it to see what parts they thought were cool and were inspired from. <br /><br />The best part of this issue hands down was the interview with Hideki Kamiya. As I mentioned earlier he was lead on Devil May Cry 1, Resident Evil 2, Viewtiful Joe, Okami, and is now spearheading a new game called Bayonetta that I'm dying to get my hands on. I bug Seth every chance but he's a hard nut to crack. They asked Kamiya what he thought about all of the bigger action games such as Shinobi, Ninja Gaiden, etc and he had this to say about God of War:<br /><br />"My impression is that it's very carefully made, the details are all carefully made. So, Devil May Cry was a bit rough, but there's no roughness in God of War. I think that it's very well made. I feel a bit bad about talking like somebody who is evaluating the game, but I felt like they created the game very well for attracting new users. They give you a huge impact right in the beginning and just draw you into the game. I'm very impressed that they made the game like that. "<br /><br />There are so many moments in this paragraph that make me gush like a little school girl but the most important one is him talking about how we made the game very well for attracting new users. This was such a huge push for all of us on the project and for it to be recognized by someone like Kamiya...makes me want to send him internet chocolates or something. <br /><br />Other then that I have been very busy at work as Activision loves to put out 900 titles for the holiday season and all of those games are ending around now. I'm rather proud of the work that I did on Guitar Hero 4. After the project ships I'll try to talk about that a little bit more as it was an interesting experience. I've been very busy with Bond - working on it almost every single day for a while now. I didn't really touch any of the ingame stuff - just a small part but I'm proud of what was accomplished. For better or worse - everything that I worked on was already there in some form. I just showed up late and tried to help the team put it all together in a fun way and it seems to have worked out. Hopefully the people who buy the game will think so as well. There is one part in CoD that I *really* want to touch but I don't know if I will have the chance. I need to bug the people that be about that tomorrow actually. <br /><br />I've been going back and watching all of Buffy again. I'm on the 5th season and I'm so envious of how much Joss Whedon had accomplished by then, let alone now with Dr. Horrible. In fact...I'm being called to go start Buffy. Talk to everyone later.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-51091121022047463632008-07-22T21:15:00.000-07:002008-07-22T21:55:15.961-07:00Midway LA to close<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl9I4lUR2w73kYr-6_dweDiEyvamnLWuxTq3ksk4Y0GUsOfWUu99GRZ1xoZ5OWhJCix1aXW5hlOnxkTMQv473zv1TwAQemI538yxn0XFHJbOYJM0Yheq6OPEGPEWSIOQbrhLsN/s1600-h/paradox_games.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl9I4lUR2w73kYr-6_dweDiEyvamnLWuxTq3ksk4Y0GUsOfWUu99GRZ1xoZ5OWhJCix1aXW5hlOnxkTMQv473zv1TwAQemI538yxn0XFHJbOYJM0Yheq6OPEGPEWSIOQbrhLsN/s400/paradox_games.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5226059245228107698" /></a>I saw this headline on <a href="http://www.gamespot.com/news/6194839.html">Gamespot</a> today which I knew was coming for a while but kind of shocked at the same time to know that is reality. I believe as soon as they are done with TNA! Impact they are moving to San Diego. <br /><br />However before Midway LA ever existed there was Paradox - creators of Thrill Kill, Wu Tang, the Xmen fighting games, MK Shaolin Monks and the infamous Backyard Wrestling series. In all honesty the Paradox that I worked for has been gone since Midway came in and bought them out. In fact the office of the Paradox owner had been converted to a gym once Midway showed up. So it's a little weird for me to reminisce about this now but hey..thats the way life works sometimes. The picture above was taken when it was Paradox - I'm not even sure what the inside of Midway LA looks like. <br /><br />Looking back at all the talent that came out of there is beyond crazy. This is where myself, Eric Williams, Cory Barlog, James Che, Bruno, Gilley, Tommy Ho, Todd Piperi, Adam Puhl all basically grew up and figured out how to make video games. <br /><br />There was an amazing part of the warehouse we all sat in - with what may have been the greatest concentration of designers that I can think of. Mark Acero who is now working on Golden Axe, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2RNEjlqweQ">John Edwards</a> who is basically like ...i forget his exact title but hella high up on the MK vs. DC team, <a href="http://new-challenger.blogspot.com/">Omar Kendall</a> who is at THQ working on the next UFC game, Mike Bilodeau who is at Neversoft still I do belive, plus myself, <a href="http://pushing-buttons.blogspot.com/">Eric Williams</a> and <a href="http://8bitpixels.blogspot.com/">Adam Puhl</a>. We all sat basically right on top of one another in the middle of a warehouse. This doesn't even count all the other great designers that came through there such as Ben Cureton (rainbow studios i believe), Ben Kutcher (turned programmer early in his career but worked on the nail a trick stuff at neversoft and is still there), Jason Cole, Paul Edwards, Fernandez, etc We had the equivalent of doors turned into desks but back then we didn't know any better and made due with what we had. We also had crazy external producers from Sony come and break our producer's leg. Ahh - good times. <br /><br />It was a great place to work especially if you were into combat games since basically all Paradox made were fighting games. This is where we got to try out various ideas and see what worked and what didn't. We also got to work on such quickly cancelled games/demos as He-Man, a Fight Club demo, a Kung Faux demo...Im sure there were a ton more but nothing is coming to mind. <br /><br />Once Mystic Monks got picked up by Midway and turned into Shaolin Monks, Paradox was quickly bought out. This was around the time I left so like I said - it hasn't been Paradox for a long time and while I never did work at Midway LA I will still miss it in some weird way. I wish everyone the best of luck when it comes to finding a new job or moving to San Diego.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-38843938303578913702008-07-08T18:31:00.000-07:002008-07-08T18:44:18.340-07:00Where The Hell Is Matt?<object width="400" height="225"> <param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /> <param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /> <param name="movie" value="http://www.vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1211060&server=www.vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" /> <embed src="http://www.vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1211060&server=www.vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="400" height="225"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://www.vimeo.com/1211060?pg=embed&sec=1211060"></a><br /><br />I don't know the whole story but I do know that Matt used to work in the video game industry, specifically Pandemic. <br /><br />I've heard conflicting reports but the story I heard was that Matt got rather burnt out as it seems most video game developers do. He decided to travel the world and started making youtube videos doing it. He seems to have gathered a rather huge following on Youtube and now Stride sponsors him as he travels around the world. What he is doing aside from dancing...I don't really know. <br /><br />What I do know is that this video really does bring a smile - it touches my soul in some weird way. I hope you enjoy it as well.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-10364369050477703222008-06-25T10:38:00.000-07:002008-06-25T14:42:50.781-07:00HD Remix - 1st day of release video<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/wCseWmfIjzU&hl=en"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/wCseWmfIjzU&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />This video is brought to you by Neil 'CigarBob' Atkin. I've known Neil for about 12 years now. We first met via AGSF2 and me sending him a B3 tape on VHS and him sending me some 2nd Impact footage from Southern Hills Golfland that Eddie Lee went to. Over the years me and him exchanged a lot of videos and a lot of excuses (oh man - the package got returned, wrong address - my bad!') but I still heart the Neil. While I am sad that he didn't send me this video in the mail I'm glad that it does exist. <br /><br />I'm not sure if that is Neil's laugh or not but that very well may be the best laugh on the planet.<br /><br />NOTE: To be fair to Sirlin this juggle with Ken has been removed for a while. Made it into the beta though. Don't expect this to be in the final version that comes out.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-6641953020590487462008-06-25T07:47:00.000-07:002009-08-27T10:35:23.324-07:00Dear Sony - Please update your PS1 games on the PS StoreSo last night I turned on the old BBQ to play some Conan (more on that after I beat it...) and of course I had to update the damn thing. While I am sick of pointless updates I hit OK and agreed to the 1.1 user agreement (don't they need to update that thing one of these days?). After the update I decided to hit up the PS store since I never use that thing. <br /><br />I got all excited since I've been playing my PSP here lately (the 2nd syphon filter game if anyone is curious) and thought maybe I'll grab some new PS1 games to put on the PSP. While I am excited for R-TYPES (seriously - who came up with this name? Terrible) I'm so fucking sick of seeing the same 9 games that filled up the PS1 section for the last 12 years. I get it - Jet Moto and Crash 2 are good games but damn I swear these are the only games that have been on sale in Best Buy and now online for what feels like over a decade. <br /><br />Quickly scanning the 21 titles for sale (exhausting...I know) it's obvious the majority of the library is limited to Sony titles. However with stuff like Tekken 2 and Symphony of the Night (something I did buy and played through like 3 times on a trip to Shanghai) it gives me hope that maybe some more are coming. But damn...when!?!? Where is Tobal 2, Final Fantasy, Tekken 3, Street Fighter Alpha 3, Metal Gear, etc? I'm sure there is probably some problem with games that had multiple discs but if the PSP scene can figure out a solution then I'm sure you guys can also. <br /><br />While I'm on the subject of PSP - seriously STOP PORTING PSP GAMES TO PS2!! Ratchet - Size Matters on the PS2 is a mess.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-20826490065369996962008-06-21T08:09:00.000-07:002008-06-21T08:32:14.741-07:00Spider-Man: Web Of ShadowsWhen I first started working at Activision this was one of the many games I worked on (I obviously can't talk about them all but I did mention Kung Fu Panda earlier) and this trailer has really blown me away. <br /><br /><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=8,0,0,0" id="gtembed" width="440" height="320"> <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain"> <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=35351"> <param name="quality" value="high"> <embed src="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=35351" swliveconnect="true" name="gtembed" align="middle" allowscriptaccess="sameDomain" allowfullscreen="true" quality="high" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="440" height="320"></embed> </object><br /><br />Tom, Tim and Shaheed have done a really good job of elevating Spider-Man to a new level never seen in previous Spider-Man games. It's really weird looking back because before when being involved with video games I would be knee deep in the day to day stuff and implementing and bug fixing and all that. With WoS it was a more hands off approach and a lot of documentation and just meeting with them face to face. It's kind of cool to see how far those 3 (and I shouldn't forget the animators either - Alex and James) have come given all the obstacles that have been in the way. <br /><br />So yeah - disregard those screen shots that got posted earlier. Those things don't do the game justice what so ever. In fact I'm not sure if any screen shot really does a game justice. What a weird concept huh? Taking something that is moving and selling it with a static photo? Eric and myself used to always joke that one day we hope when you turn videogames over in the store to see the back of the box that instead of a photo it would somehow show a video clip of the game. Totally off topic tangent here but when I went to go see Indy 4 the theater had taken plasma screens and turned them vertical using them to show off video of up and coming movies. Was way more impressive then a traditional movie poster. <br /><br />Back to Spider-Man though! Hopefully everyone will check out the trailer and get excited - I know it's been rough for Spidey fans - the 3rd movie, Kirsten Dunst in general, and the 3rd game wasn't so hot either. Stay strong true believers!!<br /><br />Oh! And screw all those haters on Spider-Man: Friend or Foe. That game was a lot better than anyone gives it credit for. It was a fun Lego Star Wars type of game but somehow the press just didn't see that at all and slammed it. Time to stop rambling.Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21835806.post-19460137445489272472008-06-17T08:42:00.000-07:002008-06-17T09:04:45.071-07:00Interesting look at Star Wars Galaxies from an insider<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.weblogsinc.com/common/images/4979765886586287.JPG?0.6722500316178447"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px;" src="http://www.weblogsinc.com/common/images/4979765886586287.JPG?0.6722500316178447" border="0" alt="" /></a>So I know nothing about this game what so ever aside from what friends have told me about it. All I really remember was a lot of drama about who could be a Jedi and what it took to be one. Plus compared to WoW every MMO seems like a failure to me so I don't know if it really was or not. However I stumbled across this and found it an interesting read.<br /><div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;">Ruben Field</span> has this to say:<br /></div><div><div>"So we were given the directive to make Galaxies better.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Not just make Galaxies better, but make it succesful. Not the 200k subs it had, but really succesful. The idea was that we had the most valuable IP in the entire world, and we fucked it up to the point of having 200k subs."</div><div><br /></div><div>Like I said - I gots no real knowledge on this game, had to look up what in the world NGE (New Game Enhancement) even meant but I found it an interesting read. Not often do you find such a detailed look at what went wrong with a game. </div><div><br /></div><div>Click <a href="http://rubenfield.com/?p=86">here </a> to read the rest. </div></div>Derek Danielshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00207977813227663547noreply@blogger.com0