HYPETRAIN – April 18th, 2011

Choo choo, party people. Put down your controllers, it’s time to throw some news into the HYPE fire. That’s right, rail accidents are occurring all over the country as an unaccounted for locomotive roams, without explanation, on the tracks – the HYPETRAIN. It’s pulling into your station, so get HYPED!

So much to HYPE this week. Something about Hideo Kojima! Something about a new Nintendo console! Lots of developers talking themselves up! An indie thing! Business! Other stuff! Graphics!

All aboard! Last stop until gaming paradise.

Self-analysis from the sages

As we all know, game developers are the wisest creatures on the fucking planet. It’s so difficult these days to boot up a game and not feel mentally inadequate, saying to ourselves, “God damn, this game was made by someone smart as hell.” Well, the monks on the hill have recently ended their vow of silence, and they have some wisdom to impart… about themselves.

• Platinum Games (formerly Clover Studios) are responsible for just about every Japanese game that you still think is good. Bayonetta, Vanquish, God Hand, Viewtiful Joe, Okami, and the upcoming Anarchy Reigns. If you’re a fan of theirs, which we all are, then you’ll be thrilled to know that they have released a nebulous manifesto, discussing their mission to be “the face of Japanese game studios on the worldwide stage,” and for their “contributions to not only be towards the games industry as a whole, but also be contributions towards our homeland of Japan.” Could this mean anything at all?
• From Dust is a downloadable title being developed by Ubisoft, in the vein of Populous and Black and White. Of course, it’s commonly known that when you’re being similar to Populous and Black and White, you’re being creative! The game’s director said some stuff about how making the game with intention for it to be downloadable has enabled the team to take risks and be creative. Sounds plausible!
• When I think of stunning game design successes in the past year, I think of Bulletstorm. Cliffy B and Adrian Chmielarz, developers of hit game Bulletstorm, agree! Real talk for a minute: it’s hard for me to read anything Bleszinski ever says or play any games he makes without getting angry at him. Moving on.
• If you like hearing game developers talk about how cool they are, then you’ll love the Future of Games Symposium held by UC Santa Cruz. There were various discussions about various things, especially writing and dialogue, and Gamasutra pretty much has the scoop.

Busisness is exciting, too (when it’s videogames)

• There is a war being fought over Facebook games, and as usual with these games, whoever wins, consumers lose. You didn’t know, because you didn’t care, and I can’t blame you, but here is another excuse for you to hate on Mark Zuckerburg, CEO of Facebook and leading man in that pretty good movie that came out! Facebook will be implementing an on-site currency through which all payments and profits on the site must transfer. This allows Facebook to take a 30% cut from all of those Farmville profits. One Facebook game developer, Playdom, is resisting, and setting up their own site where players can access their games. I think I speak for all of us that the only people in this world more loathsome than Facebook game developers are the Facebook moguls themselves! Let us all hope that blood is shed as a result of this conflict.
• Konami has promoted Hideo Kojima, creator of Metal Gear Solid, to vice president. This move was orchestrated by the Twelve Highest, a shadowy board of super-directors who rule over Konami in silence. Kojima’s new power is only to be a pawn to the Twelve, who are actually alien ghosts, ghosts who it turns out are US Senators. Wait– what’s going on!? I’ve just intercepted a telephone call from the CEO of Konami, and I could have sworn that he just said Kojima has been dead for years now! Hold on, I’m going to trace who he’s calling – the president!?
  
• Do you have any fondness for EA Games? EA Games is pretty sure that your answer is ‘no.’ In this Escapist article which is for some reason focused more upon Mirror’s Edge 2, Frank Gibeau, chief of the company, describes EA’s effort to restore the integrity of their brand and to let their millions of acquired studios retain their own internal culture. Also, I guess he mentioned that Mirror’s Edge 2 might be a thing.
• If you’re a PC Gamer, then chances are that Valve owns you. Even if you don’t play their games, digital distribution accounts for more than half of PC game sales, with Steam representing about 70% of those digital sales. So quickly, we forget about Impulse! With tons of unique sales and a complete lack of any DRM, there is certainly an argument for using it instead of the Great Steam Overlord. Oh, they sold to Gamestop? Okay, nevermind.

Lighting round miscellany

• Right now, Portal 2 is in the midst of a possible early release. If you don’t already know about the elaborate “alternate reality game” leading up to this announcement, or if you’re wondering why there’s a portal gun in your Audiosurf, check out the conspiratorial madness of the investigation into the mysteries of the potato. Also, there’s a Portal 2 comic.
• Much to the rage of someone out there probably, Total War: Shogun 2 and Crysis 2 both shipped without DX11 support. Good news, whoever you are!
• This new indie game, Ace Of Spades, is like Minecraft with guns. Rock Paper Shotgun likes it.
• Do you guys think Nintendo will release a new console ever? I dunno! Maybe they’ll surprise us at E3!
• New indy bundle! Pay whatever you want, it goes to our favorite charity, you get a bunch of games.

Okay everybody, leave me alone!