Backhand of Justice

Every serious gamer has a collection of old games, whether it’s dusty SNES cartridges lined up on a bookcase somewhere, or PS1 discs sealed away in a binder. While nobody remembers what connector is required to hook up an original NES to a TV, or even whether that technology exists anymore, that physical reassurance is there. Worst case scenario, emulators for old games are widely available online.

With the news that Halo 2 online is shutting down, however, we have to come to terms with the idea that online games, no matter how popular, will not survive the test of time. Even the Modern Warfare 2 and World of Warcraft’s of the world will be condemned to obscurity once that online experience can no longer be replicated. read more

The Onion strikes again … or should I say ’struck’ considering this gem is from 2000. I thought it deserved a second look. Damn kids and their toys.

Keep reading for Guile being busted for Insurance fraud, the 12 most ridiculous things you can buy on the internet and Macquarie giving all us bankers a good name.    read more

Dante’s Inferno is probably an OK game. Yeah, yeah, I know it’s trendy to criticize EA’s grand vision of The Divine Comedy as an exploitative debacle. If you focus on just the story, that’s probably fair. What I don’t understand is why everybody is so critical of its gameplay without even having played it.

The term ‘God of War ripoff’ has been thrown around liberally of late with the release of Darksiders, and if any game deserves it, it’s Dante’s Inferno. That being said, why does that make it a bad game? Why does everybody say ‘Just wait for God of War III, that game is going to be awesome!’ Does a game get a free pass on repetitiveness just because it’s part of the franchise which originated its style of gameplay? read more

[Today's article comes from our favorite guest contributor John Johanas, or as he's known around these parts, 'the situation.' All hate mail should be forwarded to him, care of Japan]

After only a brief time playing it, I could tell that Final Fantasy XIII will definitely be passionately argued about. How could a game with such budget and hysterical hype live up to the games that came before it? Luckily, it seems as though the production team didn’t seem to concern itself over all of that.

What will shine through (if you can get past somewhat cliché Japanese RPG concepts) is that this game is unique in its own respect, and game play wise, is vastly improved from anything we have seen in the series before. read more

The games industry is growing faster than almost all other consumer entertainment products. Players are united globally across the internet, and the future looks bright for game sales and publisher profits through digital distribution. Why, then, am I expecting creativity to be constrained by the expansion of a global market?

Innovation flows primarily from smaller developers to the Activisions and Electronic Arts of the world. Can an independent developer with limited resources afford to ignore the opportunities presented by a global audience by failing to cater to all tastes? Mainstream appeal here we come. read more

Ignore the inflammatory headline; the answer is clearly yes. That doesn’t change the fact that it’s happening much  more slowly than I would have imagined.

Steam announced its ‘impressive’ subscriber figures of 25 million last week. While total sales up 225% in 2009 sounds impressive, it’s actually quite pathetic. Going to the store involves tiresome walking. Why aren’t more people downloading games? read more

The physics of Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus. Narrated by David Attenborough.

Keep reading for Mega64’s Guns at GDC push, the battle royale between sauropods and whales, and the most awkward weatherman in the world. Enjoy!

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I’m not going to make a tired argument that print is dead; everybody knows that print is dead. It’s a long and embarrassing process for the old establishment to go from dying to dead, but we’re past the halfway point.

Instead, I want to argue that print gaming magazines should give up not because they can’t compete with the speed of the internet, but because video is all people care about anymore. It’s no surprise that the video features are put front and center on every website. Giant Bomb has come from nowhere on the back of their videos, and until you embed magazines with video Minority Report style, they’re doomed to failure. read more

It’s finally happened: my computer has fallen behind the curve. What was once a proud and powerful machine has been beaten into submission by new games. Dragon Age bloodied its lip; Mass Effect 2 delivered the deathblow.  read more

Many reviews of Mass Effect 2 have been criticized for containing spoilers, such as the one on Gametrailers.

While I’m not going to examine whether or not reviews should contain spoilers, or even whether a reviewer should warn about potential spoilers (why watch a video review if you don’t want to be spoiled?), it does indicate just how cinematic games have become. read more