Tuesday’s Trope: Lethal Joke Character
[Tuesday's Trope is a weekly department highlighting an amusing video game trope from TVTropes. Aggrogate is not affiliated with TVTropes.org in any way. All trope examples come from TVTropes and are shared via the Creative Commons license.]
Almost every fighting game has a character nobody wants to play because he's too weak, too strange, or too useless. That same character inevitably turns out to be completely unstoppable in the right hands. They might be extremely difficult to master, but once you figure out how to take advantage of their unique abilities they're absolute monsters in the ring. They are Lethal Joke Characters.
Tournament fighters aren't the only games to have lethal joke characters. Many RPGs feature seldom-used characters that can be grinded or equipped properly to turn them into invincible killing machines. Blue mages in Final Fantasy games are often lethal joke characters, because it's so difficult to get their best abilities. If you can expose them to just the right magics, though, they easily become the most powerful members of your party.
Examples of lethal joke characters include:
Blizzard Wants A Starcraft Movie Directed By James Cameron
MTV Multiplayer recently posted a short interview Rob Pardo, the EVP of Game Design over at Blizzard about the progress of the World of WarCraft movie. "We're still super excited about it," he says, "but it's still in that story-development phase."
The World of WarCraft movie is based in the WarCraft universe, the setting of the strategy trilogy and wildly popular MMO. Coming from Legendary Pictures, the movie was first announced in 2006 and Sam Raimi, of Evil Dead and Spider-Man fame, attached to direct last year. Having just released massively critically and financially successful StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty, MTV asked if the other Blizzard properties would be coming to the silver screen as well.
"We've always had an interest in seeing our stuff on film or TV," Pardo replied. "It's just tricky to find the right partners. We probably could have made a ['StarCraft'] movie or something on TV years and years ago, but it's really important to us that we find creative people that are really talented but also really excited about our properties. That's always been the challenge for us. I think if Jim Cameron came to us tomorrow and said, 'You want to make a 'StarCraft' movie?' we'd probably sign that ... That's why we did the 'WoW' movie. We were really excited about being involved with Legendary Pictures, who we thought had a really good track record with these sorts of movies that would make sense for our franchises."
It's interesting to note that the WoW film is currently in development hell, with few people actually expecting it to go anywhere. That being said, maybe in a few years people will stop attaching such a stigma to films related to video games. Yes, I'm referring to Scott Pilgrim.
The Future of Motion Control: How To Improve It
This short video on Sony's blog demonstrates where the PlayStation Move is at in terms of development. Now that the Wii is about to turn four, Sony and Microsoft are both poised to make wigglin' and wagglin' major features of their consoles as well. The Wii's motion controls have failed to deliver on the promise of a total game-changing console. Despite this, the Wii has some real gems but games which actually utilize the motion controls well are few and far between. Today, most gamers still use thumbsticks, shoulder triggers, and face buttons for a majority of their games. Here are a few ways motion controls could finally make games better.
Trapped Chilean Miners Get PSP’s
Thirty-three Chilean miners have been trapped underground after a mine collapse for over three weeks, the longest anyone has been trapped and survived. The miners are doing their best to keep hope up as rescue crews lower food and supplies to the trapped men, and the Chilean government has contacted NASA for advice on "nutritional support and behavioral health support". NASA is sending a doctor and an engineer down to Chile to aid with the efforts, but in the meantime rescue workers are adopting a creative approach to keeping the miners engaged and sane.
In one of the more recent supply shuttles, among other things was a package of PSP's and a power supply, as a PSP's battery only lasts about 6 hours. The PSP's are to "help preserve their mental health". No word on who gave the PSP's, but it is nice that someone was thinking of them. Hopefully they came with Lumines, Meteos, and the PSX Final Fantasy games. That'll distract them for months.
via GamePolitics
Metroid: Other M Out Today
I'm a Metroid fan, but Other M seemed intimidating. While I understand why the fan base was excited when Team Ninja was announced as the developer of the next Metroid game, I found myself nonplussed. I was never a huge fan of the Ninja Gaiden series because of the abstract control scheme. So far, the reviews have been pretty good—and when they aren't being perverts, Team Ninja makes pretty good games. Everyone says even though the horizontal to vertical switching isn't handled as well as it could have been, it's only a minor detraction from a good game. The live action commercial makes it look quite exciting. Metroid: Other M. Press release after the jump.
Snakes and Lattes: Toronto’s newest board game coffee shop
A new cafe with a nerdy and clever twist opened yesterday in Toronto's Koreatown. Snakes and Lattes stands out as the city's (and possibly the continent's) very first board game cafe; customers can settle down with a cappuccino, hang out with some friends, and play any of the coffee shop's 1,500 board games. It's a concept that gained some popularity in Asia over the last few years, but never came to America until now.
There's far more to board games than the classics from Parker Brothers we all grew up with. Nestled between the relatively shallow diversions of Monopoly and Clue and the obsessive, long-term hobbies of Dungeons and Dragons and Warhammer 40,000 is an entire world of complex, deep, self-contained board games that can provide hours upon hours of enjoyment for friends. Many of these games have seen video game adaptations, like the XBLA ports of Carcassonne and Settlers of Catan. Here's hoping Snakes and Lattes flourishes and board game cafes spread across North America. And if not, I'll still gladly take on anyone in a game of Illuminati if I ever find my way to Toronto.
[Photo by D.A. Cooper/Torontoist]
Microsoft bumping Xbox Live Gold to $10/month, $60/year in November
Microsoft's Major Nelson has just announced that Xbox Live will be getting a price increase for its Gold subscriptions. Starting November 1, a 1-month XBL Gold subscription will bump up from $7.99 to $9.99, a 3-month subscription will bump up from $19.99 to $24.99, and a 12-month subscription will bump up from $49.99 to $59.99. Based on some of the responses to Major Nelson's announcement, including a few remarks from players with Gamerscores well over 50,000, people aren't happy about this change.
It's long been the case that clever gamers could find good deals on Xbox Live Gold subscription and Microsoft Points cards. Frankly, if you ever paid the full $50 for a year's subscription, you were taken. Amazon currently offers a 12-month subscription card
EA registers domain name for The Sims 4
Fans of The Sims might be pleased to note that EA has registered the domain name "thesims4.com," according to SystemLink. Or maybe they'll be less than pleased, considering The Sims 3 hit stores only a year ago. Too soon to make it obsolete? Nah, especially since, without an actual announcement, we're not likely to see the next Sims for at least another year.
Keep in mind that there is still no official word of a new Sims sequel, but keep your eyes peeled for the floating green diamond in the near future. Personally, I'd like The Sims 4 to give me the ability not only to construct my own fallout shelter beneath my house, but also to then initiate the nuclear/zombie/robot apocalypse. Maybe then the neighbors will be willing to disregard my Sim's crappy charisma and pay him a visit. It seems the only logical direction to take the series.
Nintendo cutting DS prices by $20; DSi to retail for $149, DSi XL for $169
Nintendo is trimming the prices of its handheld gaming systems, taking $20 off the suggested retail prices of the DSi
Now, the big question is... who doesn't have a DS yet? Over 130 have been sold worldwide, making it one of the most popular portable gaming systems ever made. Yes, in just 6 years, the DS (and all its iterations) has sold more units than the original Game Boy.
BioWare CEO discusses the lack of DA2 character creation choices
Speaking to VG247 at gamescom, BioWare CEO Ray Muzyka sought to assure Dragon Age fans that the absence of character creation options in Dragon Age 2 will not constrain the wide world of player choice BioWare's epics have become known for.
"Given that he is a human in this universe," Muzyka says, "that’s just the way this particular chapter in the Dragon Age universe is built. It’s built around him being a human, and hence your choices are a little more constrained at the beginning, but on the other hand that enables us to do a lot more other cool things as well, in terms of the way the narrative flows, and the other party members that join with you are really cool and interesting and diverse."
There has been some backlash toward this direction for Dragon Age 2. Dragon Age: Origins gave players the opportunity to choose their character's race, gender, and backstory, all of which helped determine how the story began and how people would react to the character. However, Dragon Age 2 takes a page from the Mass Effect series, plunking players down in the shoes of protagonist Hawke, who comes with his own fixed history. It's still unclear what, if any, benefits or changes save files from Dragon Age: Origins and Awakening might have on Dragon Age 2.
Navigation
Recent Posts
- SMBC Covers Internet Policy Better Than Me
- The Humble Bundle is Back Again, and Now For Android
- Happy Quinceanera, Final Fantasy 7
- Panning Silver: The Wrongo Superman (Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #114)
- Bronycon: Bronies and Q Hit the Meadowlands This Summer
Recent Comments
- Doubleself on The Top 5 Sandbox Games
- I_TBAG_U87 on Anatomy of the Rage Quit
- Hosting forums on Marvel Vs. Capcom 3: Yes, Deadpool Can Shoryuken (And Why This Is Awesome)
- TheShufflingSkeleton on Get a LittleBigPlanet 2 Beta Key Here!
- Brian on Is Sony Screwing Up the PS Vita? Not Yet. Maybe. Sort of.
