Sixty Hertz

Great expose by 1up.com on Q-entertainment, the company responsible for Lumines, Ninety Nine Nights and Meteos. 

http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3152290

Not quite “Beta Levels” as the video suggest but more of what we would call Test Levels are exposed in this video. Anyone interested in how games are made may want to take a look at it. These Test Levels are where the developers can isolate entities to test them quickly and tune them accordingly with out the complexities of a full fledge level.

http://www.destructoid.com/beta-maps-in-zelda-lost-worlds-in-wink-waker-wind-waker-cheat-codes-unlock-maps.htm

Our take on this situation? 

Where are the Fan Conventions? E3 was always for Retailers 1st and Press 2nd, developers 3rd and fans are not even included. Where are the Fan Cons????

The death of E3 will hurt all the smaller publishers and developers that can’t afford to hold their own retail shows or Fly around the country and attend the Retail driven shows or Press driven Shows. Reducing the amount of exposure for smaller pubs and smaller games. Is this good for the industry as a whole? I don’t think so. Is this a sign of worse things to come. I would venture a guess: yes. Big Publishers already have a strangle hold on this industry, and when one of them does something dumb the whole industry feels it. Smashing E3 will leave the smaller guys out of the fight, and they’ve been barely in the fight to begin with. 

The industry is already too dependent on big titles to keep it afloat, when GTA isn’t out our industry flounders, not because there areen’t great games out, it’s just nobody knows about them (thanks to the press and the retailers). The retailers don’t care because they are making a killing off of second hand games, they need not sell new titles except for the big ones. Of course that keeps them alive but it doesn’t help the smaller publishers at all. Retailers seem to believe they only need EA to keep the industry around, but EA has a 20% share of the market, that’s big yes, but it’s also only 20%.

E3’s death is a sad sad thing for the industry, especially the smaller titles from smaller publishers. Hopefully we are wrong… 

For those who haven’t imported yet… here’s a taste of things to come…

http://www.gametrailers.com/downloadnew.php?id=12034 

Scouring the net I found several interviews on one of my favorite SHMUP developers G-Rev…

http://www.edge-online.co.uk/archives/2005/06/the_small_guns.php  DEAD use this one:

http://web.archive.org/web/20070930181653/http://www.edge-online.co.uk/archives/2005/06/the_small_guns.php

http://www.dreamcast-scene.com/index.php/Main/SenkoNoRondeInterview 

http://www.dreamcast-scene.com/index.php/Main/UnderDefeatInterview 

http://www.got-next.com/features_read.php?id=344 

I hate .asx’s but here ya go…

http://www.tecmo.co.jp/product/korobot/mov/movie001.asx 

In the U.S. it’s called Yoshi’s Topsy Turvy. This innovative title was created by one of the more underrated (at least by the western press) developers: Artoon. Known for Blinx and Pinobee. They seem to be a developer that focuses on graphic, technical and game play innovation, in other words a triple threat. They are quite versatile, one minute working on GBA and the next working on Xbox 360.  There big title in the works is Sakuguchi’s Blue Dragon. Anyway I skipped this Yoshi title (out of pure ignorance) when it came out years ago but ran across a video that i thought displays the spirit of artoon:

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/n08/kygj/top/y02.wmv 

Sent to me by a friend of mine on IM… i have no idea what this is supposed to be, it’s called “Heroes Marked”, and it seems like a game intro…

http://thewiiremedia.revolutionreport.net/video/games/46/heroesmarked.mp4

Update: Got more info on it: it’s a WII game teaser from Grasshopper/Suda 51 the people responsible for Killer 7, Shining Soul 1 and 2 (2 being the serious sleeper - go out and buy it now if you love dungeon crawlers), and the DS Contact amongst several other titles that escape my brain right now.

Konami’s arcade game is worth checking out… Don’t know if this will every be in the states but it looks like a ton of fun. More games like this will differentiate the arcade from the home…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4S1Zw8LdSuE 

Not your traditional vid game but still very interesting all the same. Interesting vid’s on a new style toy - check it out.

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/game/docs/20060720/movie03.zip 

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/game/docs/20060720/movie04.zip

If anybody can trasnlate this it would be greatly appreciated…

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/game/docs/20060720/toy226.htm