Tag Archives: Video Games

A great video review of what makes the new Prince of Persia game so unique

A former coworker tipped me off to this video, originally posted here. It’s a video review of the author’s choice for “game of the year,” and it’s not what you might think.

Well, OK. I know you’ve read the title of this post. So yes, it’s probably exactly what you might think. He makes a compelling case for what is so unique and revolutionary about this game.

As I mentioned in a recent post, I got Prince of Persia from my parents for Christmas and have been playing it for the past few days. I’ve gradually been coming to realize on my own what this reviewer is talking about.

At first I was kind of shocked (and a little disappointed) when I realized that you couldn’t die in the game. Too easy! I thought. But I have had many game experiences in the past like what he describes, where if you screw up you have to start over at the beginning of the level. Extremely frustrating. With Prince of Persia, I was initially somewhat put off by the discovery of this “no death” policy, but as I played on I realized that the developers built in the proper challenges and rewards in other ways.

When you’re battling a boss for instance, when you do something that would have caused you to die in another game, in the few moments while you’re being rescued by the princess who accompanies you on the adventure, the boss regains some of its energy. So, in other words, you do still get “punished” — it will now take longer to beat the boss — but you’re never thrown completely out of the experience and forced to repeat your steps again and again until you just happen to get it right.

That’s the thing that’s really revolutionary about this game: it allows you to keep on with the necessary trial and error until you learn what to do, not in a pathetically easy way, but in a non-frustrating way. You still have to figure out what to do, and develop skill with certain maneuvers, or you’ll never get past certain obstacles. But unlike with other games that force you to go back to well before the point where you’re currently stuck, and then repeat several minutes of things you’ve already done, you can just keep at it until you get it right. Imagine having to do that “repeat several minutes” thing 10 or 15 times when you’re up against a challenge you’re particularly struggling with, and you’ll see why I’ve left so many games unfinished. And I’m an “experienced gamer!” Sort of.

And now back to our usual inanity

If you’re getting tired of my political rants, my dissing of Sarah Palin, my man-crush on Barack Obama, then welcome back to business as usual here at room34.com.

Three words: Ho. Ly. Crap. Although I played my fair share of Super Mario Bros. in the late ’80s, I was too old for the Saturday morning cartoons. But now my son isn’t, and they’re selling them on DVD at Target.

I always enjoyed the little quasi-calypso ditty that accompanied Mario’s journeys in the Mushroom Kingdom, but until now I never realized there were words.

Do the Mario!
Swing your arms
From side to side
Come on it’s time to go!
Do the Mario!

Take one step
And then again
Let’s do the Mario!
All together now!

You got it!
It’s the Mario!

Do the Mario!
Swing your arms
From side to side
Come on it’s time to go!
Do the Mario!

Take one step
And then again
Let’s do the Mario!
All together now!

Come on now!
Juuuust like thaaaaat!

OK, Pokémon is cool after all

Pokémon FireRedSince I was in my mid-20s when Pokémon was created, I never really “got” it. The only thing I knew about it was the whole seizure thing. But then I had kids. Just before he turned 4, my son went through a brief-but-intense phase of obsession with the Pokémon cartoons and toys just before he discovered Mario and the video game floodgates opened, leaving all past obsessions (Thomas, Star Wars, etc.) in the dust (if you’ll pardon the mixed metaphor).

So as the video game thing took off, I bought him Pokémon FireRed for the Game Boy Advance, thinking I could tap into his pre-video game interest. I vaguely knew that the games were RPG-style, but I didn’t make the connection that, unlike in many games, where there’s reading but it’s fairly inconsequential, in a Pokémon game it is absolutely essential that you be able to read in order to play. Since my son’s still a pre-schooler, that didn’t work out so well.

Eventually, I decided to give the game a try myself, and I’ve become completely hooked. It’s kind of ridiculous, but the characters are tremendously varied and creative, with clever names, and the RPG elements of the game are solid and very well-done. What can I say, it’s fun!

But it wasn’t until I encountered one particular foe, that’s not only funny looking but very cleverly named, that I fully embraced the Pokémon world: I’m not even sure what it is, but it appears to be a purple, wheezing puff bag, with a very self-satisfied smile, oozing toxic fumes, named (I love this) “Koffing.” And here it is, in all its nasty glory. Apparently there’s a mutant evolved version named “Wheezing” as well.

Koffing More Koffing Koffing and Wheezing

Obviously I’m not the only person who appreciates Koffing’s unique appeal. He’s achieved the ultimate honor: an “ate my balls” page.

Something has to give in your life to be this good at Super Metroid

I didn’t play many console video games between outgrowing my Atari 2600 in high school (while I would visit friends’ houses for regular reminders of how much I sucked at newer games on their NESes) and getting my GameCube in 2003, but since then I’ve had a bit of a renaissance and am a lot better at these games than I used to be.

But I will never be great at Super Metroid. In particular, I cannot for the life of me get the timing right for wall jumps in that game. I’ve been able to do them on occasion, but it’s just been luck.

Now my son is playing it (on the Wii) and he seems to be drawn like a magnet to the spot where you have to wall jump to get out of a deep shaft. (The spot where the native creatures “teach” you the wall jump.) And then he wants me to help him. Good luck with that!

I decided to try to research what the trick is. I got some leads, but I still doubt I’ll master it. And there is no way that I’ll ever be able to do a 32-minute speed run like in the following video. Of course, wall jumps are all over it. (I can’t even begin to imagine how to do the wall jump against a single wall. I didn’t even realize it was possible until I saw this!)

Get Flash to see this player.

Getting Ready for MGC

MGC, for those not in the know (including myself, not terribly long ago), is the Midwest Gaming Classic, a big event coming up in a couple weeks in Milwaukee where I will join throngs of like-minded geeks, many of whom are also, like me, regulars in the AtariAge Forums, to play old video games, talk about old video games, buy and trade old video games, and just basically live for a brief moment in a world where they are still relevant (a world outside of our own heads, that is).

Being a person who can still fire up a game of Yars’ Revenge pretty much whenever I feel like it, this is a welcome experience indeed. I am planning to take a few of the rarer but also less-interesting (to me personally) titles from my collection as trading fodder, and I’ll see what I come home with. I just wish Paul Slocum would’ve been able to have a finished version of his Homestar Runner-themed Atari 2600 RPG homebrew ready in time for it.