Street Fighter on Virtual Console goes online
[UPDATE]

post from Destructoid on 12 November 2011 11:05:36 PM. © Destructoid

Street Fighter on Virtual Console goes online [UPDATE] screenshot

[Update: According to Capcom Unity, this is also coming to Europe and the States. I still think it's a case of "too little, too late," but at least the West isn't getting completely screwed over again.]

Son of a less than classy lady. Those Japanese and their damn preferential treatment.

What has been the biggest complaint with the Wii's Virtual Console? That the games released for it are untouched? That no effort is made to enhance them for greater accessibility in today's interconnected world? Sure, other platforms like PSN and XBLA have added online play to several pieces of legacy software, but their retro library is not as expansive as the Wii's. It's a shame more wasn't done to freshen up these old classics.

Well, guess what? The VC release of the Genesis version of Super Street Fighter II has Wi-Fi capabilities in the Land of the Rising Sun. So did Puyo Puyo earlier this year, in fact. Are either of these games coming to the West? Of course not. Western devils don't deserve more than the bare minimum of effort. Street Fighter will. Not that anyone is still buying Virtual Console games anymore for this to matter.

This is so stupid. Why couldn't stuff like this happen earlier in the console's life and on a global scale? It could have possibly grown the popularity of the Virtual Console and resulted in publishers' offering even more of their back catalogs. Why wait until the Wii is effectively dead? I just don't get it.

Japan Gets Super Street Fighter II with Online Play on VC [Nintendo Life]

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The Alone Sword is a Zelda-lite set underwater

post from Destructoid on 12 November 2011 10:05:52 PM. © Destructoid

The Alone Sword is a Zelda-lite set underwater screenshot

Happy weekend, everyone! If you've got a few minutes to kill, why not give The Alone Sword a spin?

The Alone Sword is exactly as I described in the header -- a Zelda-lite set underwater. You take control of a sea star creature (which heavily resembles an Octorok) as he / she / it swims around looking for hidden keys and fighting aquatic bosses. The controls are not what you'd expect from a typical Zelda clone. Underwater traversal leaves you at the whim of forward momentum, sliding around as though running on ice. Your sword points opposite your direction of movement, and attacking will swing it 180 degrees, propelling you in reverse. It sounds odd and difficult to get the hang of, but it makes sense considering your liquid environment.

It's a decent time-waster that shouldn't take more than 20 minutes to clear. There's a pretentious back story about alien visitors creating a virtual memorial based on the dreams of the planet's departed souls, or something or other. Whatevs, man. It's about a starfish that kills ocean life with a cheap sword made from wooden garden posts. That's all you need to know.

The Alone Sword [Kitty*Lambda]

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Gold Ahoy

post from Escape Games 24 on 12 November 2011 08:05:25 PM. © Escape Games 24

Gold Ahoy is another free online addicting and challenging point and click hidden object games online at Free GAMES Online. The seashore's littered with loot, matey! Find and click all items at the bottom of the screen before time's up. Old Blackbeard's treasure won't stay buried for long! Good luck and have fun!Play Gold Ahoy

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Pocket Potions Review (iPhone, iPad)

post from Gamezebo: Casual Game Reviews, Previews, Cheats, Tips, Forums, Free Games, and More on 12 November 2011 07:08:58 PM. © Gamezebo: Casual Game Reviews, Previews, Cheats, Tips, Forums, Free Games, and More

Gamezebo Rating:

Business simulation games are fairly common within the mobile space, and the latest one to be added to it is the title of Pocket Potions. Developed by Breaktime Studios, the application allows players to manage their very own mystical potion shop. Hosting a handful of only slightly new game mechanics, most of the differences come from the overall presentation. That said, these differences are more than just a visual reskinning of an older game, but a unique style all of its own.

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Enigmatis: The Ghosts of Maple Creek Collector's
Edition

post from Escape Games 24 on 12 November 2011 07:07:16 PM. © Escape Games 24

Enigmatis: The Ghosts of Maple Creek Collector's Edition is a great Enigmatis series point and click Collector's Edition downloadable hidden object games released at Gameso. Find a kidnapped teenage girl and save yourself in Enigmatis: The Ghosts of Maple Creek, a fun Hidden Object Puzzle Adventure game! After waking up in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, you must piece together your

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We need your questions for the TtWaV finale!

post from Destructoid on 12 November 2011 07:06:58 PM. © Destructoid

We need your questions for the TtWaV finale! screenshot

_{[Talking to Women about Videogames is a series where Jonathan Holmes talks to different people who are women about the biggest videogame news of the week for some reason.}_]

Next week, the Talking to Women about Videogames written editorial and video are both going to be a little different. They mark the end of what we're calling "Season 1" of the show, which feels like as good time as any to answer your questions about this thing. Since the show first started 10 weeks ago, it's gotten an amazingly wide breadth of reactions, but almost all of them were tinged with some element of uncertainty. Some people hate it, some people like it, but either way, almost everyone who has talked to me about it has asked "is that what you were going for?"

I hate to lose that ambiguity, but I also don't want to be one of those jerks who wont answer questions about the stuff that he's doing. That's why I'm promising to answer as many questions about TtWaV as possible, assuming you guys have anything you want to ask. even if it's a really mean. Actually, I'll make sure to try to answer just as many mean questions as nice ones (again, assuming you guys have anything you want to ask at all). Mean questions are sometimes the best questions.

So yeah, ask me things! Right now! In the comments of this post! I want to talk to you about talking to women about videogames.

Oh, and there is another teaser after the jump. Just couldn't resist rescuing that conversation from the trash can, regardless of the bad audio.

video details and more

Past Episodes:

Talking to Women about Videogames: 3DS 2nd nub panic

Talking to Women about Videogames: Gears 3 isn't perfect?

Talking to Women about Videogames: Sexy vs. sexist?

Talking to Women about Videogames: What makes you want?

TtWaV teaser: Sony's online sucks now?

Talking to Women about Videogames: I'm not a real gamer?

Talking to Women about Videogames: Fear for the future

Talking to Women about Videogames: Going mainstream

TtWaV teaser: Battlefield 3 Vs. Modern Warfare 3

Talking to Women about Videogames: You! Like what I like!

TtWaV Teaser: Should Skyward Sword be rated M?

Talking to Women about Videogames: The ESRB has failed

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Skyrim's giants go up against some very poor
guards

post from Destructoid on 12 November 2011 07:06:58 PM. © Destructoid

Skyrim's giants go up against some very poor guards screenshot

video details and more

The giants of Skyrim are people you simply don't want to mess with. You can kill all the damn dragons you want, but nothing can prepare you for the sheer power of a giant. This video serves as a testament to that.

You see the above image? Yeah, that's a couple of giants surrounding an extremely unfortunate guard; a guard just trying to do his job, you know. You might think that the moments after this will see said guard dead on the floor, but no. This guard's planet needed him, so he flew. Flew like a bird.

Oh, and the other guard that gets hit is just weird, that's why he flew.

What happens when Skyrim Guards fight Giants [YouTube]

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Nasscom GDC 2011 Convergence of Gaming
awesomeness

post from Gaming Box on 12 November 2011 06:18:57 PM. © Gaming Box

I got an invite for Nasscom GDC 2011 event on my blog to attend the 2 day event which was going to be held in Pune this year, as a gamer myself I could not have asked for any better … Continue reading →

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The sad reality of Dark Souls

The sad reality of Dark Souls screenshot

I dreaded Dark Souls in the weeks before its release. I really did. This was mainly due to a couple of inescapable realities:

1) Demon’s Souls was probably the most mentally grueling experience of my life (grueling even to the point where this very site infamously refused to comprehensively review the game, due to the reviewer essentially throwing up his hands in surrender). I swore, if there ever was a sequel to that game, I’d have no part of it.

2) When I defeated Demon’s, I was single. Now I’m newly married. Sure, she’s seen me dump some sad amount of hours into gaming, but I had no doubts Dark Souls would subject her to depths of depravity that wouldn’t even scratch the surface of what she had witnessed prior.

Of course I’m writing this, so you know what direction I decide to go in. And it was a decision that has corrupted the very fiber of my being. To what extent you ask? Well, that’s what I’m here to painfully lay out for any of you smart enough to not go out of your way to play Dark Souls.

Now, I’m not going to sit here and spend this whole article obsessing over the ravenous difficulty level of Dark Souls. It merits more than a passing mention, and I will certainly not try and avoid a topic so fundamentally intertwined into the DNA of a game like Dark Souls, but I’m going to dwell a bit deeper into this thing. I’d like to really paint a picture of what DS turns a normal gamer into. And believe me when I say, it’s not a pretty picture.

I’ve gamed since I was a young kid, always owning every system available, and never taking any real break from playing. This isn’t to say I’m a hardcore, incredibly skilled guy -- I’d like to think of myself as generally good at pretty much any game thrown my way, but rarely great. No, I save that description for people who destroy Disgaea 4 without breaking a sweat, or play through Doom II on Nightmare mode just cause they’re bored.

But I do really like tough games, going back to completing Devil May Cry 3. From there it was stuff like Ninja Gaiden Black, God of War III on max difficulty, that sort of thing.

Then came along Demon’s Souls. I heard the stories, and, while they may have been brutal, I thought my resume was strong enough that I wouldn't get too overwhelmed. I was right. I did, eventually, get through the game, but what I wasn’t prepared for was the systematic annihilation of everything I held dear in my life.

And now, goddamnit, it’s happening again with Dark Souls.

People who don't play the game just don’t understand. They don’t. They know it’s hard, and probably are fleetingly impressed when a Dark Souls player emerges victorious, but they really can’t ever know how deep into your mind this game plunges itself. In a way, Dark Souls is the perfect title; until you complete it, your soul is horribly contaminated. Only moving on to another game after claiming victory will purge it.

There’s the beautiful cathartic argument that comes with successfully navigating Dark Souls from start to finish, but what those message boards don’t really mention is the disgusting underbelly. It’s a vicious cycle, and for those who are peering in from the handsome outside, let me give you a glimpse into the twisted reality.

If you’re playing Dark Souls right now, you’re at one of these points:

1) Stuck at a bonfire right before boss.

2) Stuck trying to reach boss.

3) Tediously farming easy areas to build up your character to have a chance at either 1 or 2.

The problem is, whichever number you’re experiencing, you desperately want to be at one of the other two! Sound bad? Well, it’s not ... it’s worse. Let me give you a prolonged, but incredibly realistic example.

It doesn’t take long in Dark Souls before you’re grabbing your cell phone on your coffee break at work and killing the battery Googling shit like “Anor Londo archers.” (We’ll get to those shitheads in a bit.)

And from there you see a poster saying something annoyingly coy like “Oh, rofl, if u have the poison arrows you’ll pwn them”. Then you’re sitting there in the staff room realizing you don’t, in actuality, have any poison arrows, so then what’s next? Google search “Where do I get poison arrows?” Invariably, a merchant comes up in your search, but then it’s an area you haven’t been to yet. Fuck! Now it’s a Google search for the specifics of this area to acquire the arrows to kill the Anor Londo archers, and it’s just always the worst example of the most painful trail of breadcrumbs known to man. Then what happens? You get back to the Anor Londo archers and end up erroneously shooting the arrows you got in the first place. Back to delightful Plan A, whatever the hell that might be.

Incidentally, Anor Londo is the section that inspired this article, and it’s not an exaggeration to say I died over thirty times on the archers part alone. If you’re reading this, and you don’t have poison arrows, take it from me ... when you get to the top, turn right and ROLL. If I can help just one person -- just one! -- then it’s all worthwhile.

Another reason that Dark Souls is totally different from the rest of the gaming world is the sense of community it builds. People always talk about the in-game summoning community, but, to me, it’s the outer world.

I love games like Uncharted and Gears of War. But when I meet someone who mentions that they just finished one of those, my response is usually along the lines of “Oh cool, me too. Fun game."

Now, if I’m out somewhere and someone mentions they just finished Demon’s Souls, I inevitably start blabbering shit like “Really? Oh god, I remember that like it’s yesterday. Hey, so did you want to quit when you died twenty times on the Armored Spider before you even got a hit on him? What about Flamelurker, please tell me you didn’t glitch out on him ... or Maneaters either while we’re on that topic. What was your class? That couldn’t have been easy when you were in 5-2 ... ”

And if they let me, I’ll go on for hours, I don’t care if it’s at a funeral -- partly because it’s so rare to meet someone who actually went through the same harrowing ordeal as me, but mostly because there’s that bond that screams to the world “Fuck that Gears of War 3 ‘Brothers to the end’ bullshit, that’s us!”

The picture I’m trying to paint for you is this: Demon’s/Dark Souls are known for their difficulty, but it’s actually much worse than its reputation suggests. For normal gamers like me, I literally have to let it overtake my life just to stand a chance. Countless hours of in-game repetition, research when I’m not actually playing the game, and seemingly infinite examples of when I lay in bed thinking “Maybe I just cannot do this part”, only to set my alarm for 6:15 when I normally would set it for 7, just so I can get a couple tries in before I start my morning rituals before work.

Dark Souls is the best game I’ve played in a very, very long time, but at what price? I do take solace in the fact that I’m not too far from the end, but that excitement was dealt one fatal blow just today: my friend, who was also pushing through Dark Souls, finished it about an hour before I finished this article. His triumphs, his hilarious failings (to me anyways, certainly not to him) are now a thing of the past. So now I’m depending on any of you who read this.

Drop a comment and let’s talk about how low Dark Souls has made you sink to. Until you finish it, talking about it is the only thing that helps. Come to think of it, it helps after the fact, too.

Godspeed.

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Have some Zelda orchestra for your face

Have some Zelda orchestra for your face screenshot

Alright, Skyrim had its time in the sun. Now to switch hype trains and get pumped for Skyward Sword!

Fans who were unable to attend the 25th Anniversary Symphony will still be able to get their jam on with the special CD packed into all copies of Skyward Sword. The above video, which originally ran on Nintendo Video on the 3DS, takes you into the orchestra's recording session. Enjoy!

The Recording of The Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary Special Orchestra CD [YouTube]

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