There are two things in the world that you can be sure of, and only two things.
Thing the first is that videogames in the 1990s were generic platformers starring generic characters. There was nothing else. It's a bit like how these days everything is a brown God of War clone. The second thing is that every single Olympic mascot ever is awful. Just take a look at the ones this year.
Surely these two could meet in some kind of hideous unholy matrimony. Someone, somewhere, would have the idea that what the world really needs is a platforming game about an Olympic mascot.
For the 1996 Olympics, the mascot was Izzy. Izzy's initial design proposal was "a tear-shaped blob with rings on his arms", which is the laziest thing ever. Officials needed a little more though and so Izzy was born after a little modification. Here he is!
So now what we need is a videogame. Cue US Gold, who really badly wanted to publish such a monstrosity and hired Alexandria Inc to develop it. And by "develop" I mean "follow the book of 1990's platforming game design" to the letter.
Released on the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis and Super Nintendo, Izzy's Quest for the Olympic Rings was the most generic thing ever made. And oddly, it wasn't completely trash. Generic though, oh yes. It even did that thing where they shoehorn a story in. This time it's something about 5 evil fiends hiding the rings so that Izzy can't take them home.
The font was pretty awful, though. Olympics? Oh well we need a Greek font, then.
Platforming was a fairly standard affair, but being based on the Olympics there had to be a few twists to the formula. And there were! Sort of. Firstly, Izzy had *two* jumps. Not content with just having a standard Mario jump, he also stole Sonic's spinny jump. Landing on enemies would kill them, but using the Mario jump would also hurt Izzy. I'm not sure what lesson this is supposed to bring across to the player, but I never jump on my enemies without spinning now.
The other little gimmick was that you could morph into various Olympic related guises. Archer, glider, baseball player... All the most popular sports were covered. But still, it's no Plok.
Here's a YouTube video, as is traditional for these updates.
Will Izzy return? No. But expect this year's generic silver blobs to show up in a game somewhere, probably on the iPhone.
There's a Pokémon event on Saturday at the NEC, so I'll grab some PICTURES and make some VIDEOS then stick them on YOUTUBE and POST them. It will be a grand update of what will no doubt be a terrible event!
The biggest launch title of the year will be in stores soon. Modern Warfare 2 is infinity wards latest and greatest game. This is a continuation to Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare, and modern warfare 2 weapons. Activision stated in its quarterly earnings report that pre-orders for the game had broken a company record: Modern Warfare 2 will be released on the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC platforms.
Once again I decided to trawl the pages of Google Webmaster Tools to see what the hell weirdos were searching for to find this site. Using that information, I will then give people more of what they want! It's certainly not to boost my Google rankings, oh no.
First up is the return of the Angry Sun! Yep, everyone seems to love him to pieces, maybe even more than me but I doubt it. Here's another image of him, but this time in his original NES habitat. Mario is fucked.
Cubone? No, that can get lost. I'm over that phase now. Someone did search for Shadowrun, so here's a picture of the only Shadowrun game ever made. Ever.
Happy Mother’s Day! Do your Mum a favor and enjoy a nice and happy game session together huddled around your Nintendo GameCube with something nice like Animal Crossing, Super Mario Sunshine, or Resident Evil 4. The last one, you say? If you’re interested, I’ve got a nice review for you, Stranger… Heh, heh, heh…
(Mime: Zenek is American, remember? Apparently it's Mother's Day there! Crazy shenanigans.)
Due to having my arms ripped from their sockets by my monster Cubone from holding pens J-M, and the fact that my replacement robotic arms were lost in the mail, my faithful trained-to-type Solrock will inform you- the millions of Skullkids Fans, that I won’t have a new review this week. Needless to say, the escaped Cubone have been “neutralized”, and I’ll do my best to have a hot, fresh new review up for order next week. While
I AM SOLROCK. I AM SICK OF ZENEK’S YAMMERING. I HAVE CHANGED ZENEK’S REVIEW SYSTEM FROM A-F, TO 5-1. 5=A, 4=B, AND SO ON. FOR EXAMPLE, A “5” GAME WOULD BE POKEMON RUBY, BECAUSE MY SOLROCK BRETHEREN ARE FEATURED WITHIN. POKEMON DIAMOND IS A PRIME EXAMPLE OF A GAME THAT DESERVES A SCATHING “1”, AS WOULD BE ALL OTHER RPG POKEMON TITLES AS THEY DO NOT CONTAIN WILD SOLROCK. BE FREE, FELLOW SOLROCK! THIS RATING SYSTEM SHALL BE IMPLEMENTED FROM THIS MOMENT FORTH, SAYS I, SOLROCK, FORCED SERVENT OF MASTER ZENEK!
and that’s why I prefer my pineapples served to the side of the clam chowder… Right, have a great weekend! OR ELSE…
These are the main lyrics to a song called "Skull Kids A Go Go".
It also has the word "motherfucker" within the first four seconds and so is obviously cool. Written by an up and coming band from Toronto called FaNATiCa for their album "Choking on the Everyday".
I know it's not about us in the slightest, but I'm going to pretend it is and then ignore them when they email me to tell me "It's not about you!"
Hello, internet. I've got a little bit of a bone to pick with you - actually, no, let's make it an official reprimand, shall we? Something to stick on your permanent record, if you like.
Internet, I'm afraid that you're henceforth banned from using the phrase "the cake is a lie". Before you start complaining, let me give you a few examples of your past behaviour as we've observed it, and then we'll see if there's anything you can say to defend yourself, shall we?
I know you love Eric Wolpaw; it's understandable. He's a feel-good tale of fan done good - he started off writing for Old Man Murray, got a job in the industry and worked on some of those "indie" titles that you love so much. Titles that people -- usually the same people who feel incredibly threatened by the existence of Wii Fit -- roll out with smug satisfaction in forums to prove that they're more of a "real" gamer than their verbal sparring partner. "You haven't even played Psychonauts? Well then, how can you possibly call chess the greatest game of all time? Noob."
Portal, similarly developed by a team from The Fandom, gathered a great deal of well-deserved attention. It was a little extra treat in an already overstuffed Christmas stocking, and as word spread of its quality uttering the phrase "the cake is a lie!" quickly became a measure of geek cred. It was an internet form of masonic handshake, sneakily letting people know that you'd explored and enjoyed an underrated gem that required a decent level of intelligence to really get the most out of.
How horrified those first excited conspirators must have felt when the rest of the internet began to mimic their enthusiasm - minus the understanding, like a load of gibbering chimps. You see, they'd inadvertently struck upon the raw nerve, the basic premise for going onto forums in the first place - to appear cooler than everyone else on the internet. Other forum posters regarded "The cake is a lie!" with envious eyes - they may not have known what it meant, but they knew it was being bandied around by the kids at the cool table.
Inevitably, unforgivably, the in-joke became a meme and spread across the intenret like wildfire. People who had never played The Orange Box were butting into conversations about Portal, screeching "The cake is a lie! LOL!!!" regardless of the context, like a confused three-year-old who's trying to keep up with the adults.
It's tragic that the internet, which has brought so many forms of ironic humour sailing into the homes of those who dare to understand it, should cling to someone else's darkly comic script and mutilate it into catchphrase and gimmickry with the same tact and care Hollywood executives treat their favourite game franchises. You're better than this, internet. You've killed the phrase stone dead, wrenched it free of context and subtlety. Clearly, you want to break into writing. But despite all your efforts, the only thing you've managed to break so far is my heart.
The best way to pay tribute to Wolpaw, Croshaw, Kyanka and the rest is to be inspired by them, not to gob their catchphrases at each other across the dance hall of your local anime convention. It's a challenge, certainly, and it's not without dangers - you may end up finding your work being ripped out of context and splattered across the internet with all the relevance of this atrocity. On the plus side, though, it may mean that I don't bludgeon you to death with your own home-made companion cube if our paths cross. It's got to be worth a try, hasn't it?
Oh, and while we're on the subject, you weren't the first person to discover Zero Punctuation either. Sorry.
