PS2J 330 News – Modern Gaming Art

Free games

  • Epic Games

    • Star Wars Battlefront II: Celebration Edition

      • 2017
      • Third and first person action shooter followup to the Battlefront reboot of 2015 that has you fighting on the ground and among the stars across a variety of maps in the Star Wars universe, with both the multiplayer Battlefield-style gameplay we’re used to in the series as well as a single-player campaign
      • The Celebration Edition bundles it along with a large collection of aesthetic customization content that was available through in-game purchase, all the way from launch up to and including The Rise of Skywalker

CES 2021 highlights

  • Razer showed off Project Hazel, clear futuristic face masks that qualify as N95 respirators, have a good silicone liner to prevent leakage or foggy glasses, and amplify your voice to help keep speech from sounding muffled
  • They also have the Project Brooklyn gaming chair, a bucket seat with an integrated keyboard tray and 60” curved display for more immersion
  • Panasonic has an AR HUD system for vehicles that use eye tracking and projected images on the windshield to show an intelligent overlay including alerts and directions lined up with real-world objects
  • LG showcased their new rollable display tech, leading to scroll-like devices with a thick rounded edge and an adjustable display size
  • Brink Bionics has the Impulse Neuro-Controller, a glove that can detect your intention to click your mouse 80ms before your finger moves
  • ColdSnap wants to be the Keurig of ice cream, aiming to provide pod-based soft-serve made to order in under 120 seconds
  • Petpuls is an AI driven smart dog collar that will decipher up to five different emotions (happy, anxious, angry, sad, relaxed) and track your pet’s activity and sleep
  • And Vuzix has some microLED smart glasses that actually look like something humans would wear, with the added benefit of cellular connectivity, noise-cancelling microphones, stereo audio, and a 3D HUD shown across both lenses

Lucasfilm Games is shifting their entire development strategy, opening the doors to more studios and ending EA’s monopoly on the Star Wars IP

  • The first big news to come from this is that they’re collaborating with Ubisoft on a story-driven open-world Star Wars game, which will be led by Massive Entertainment
    • You might have seen their name on things like Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, Far Cry 3, and Tom Clancy’s The Division 1/2
  • They went on to say that their relationship with EA isn’t completely ending though, which makes sense after the great success of Star Wars: Squadrons, and the middling success of Fallen Order
    • This is some good news for Reddit commenters who brought up a great point- why hasn’t Respawn taken their Titanfall chops and made a Republic Commando title?
    • Though that just reminds me how the Clone Wars TV show put a hard stop on the Republic Commando / Imperial Commando books, and makes me a little sad
  • But on to more hope- apparently Lucasfilm Games will also be working with Todd Howard, MachineGames (the team behind the new Wolfenstein titles), and Bethesda on an upcoming Indiana Jones title as well!
  • I’m really looking forward to what Lucasfilm kicking their gaming division into gear will mean for the next few years of releases

CD Projekt’s co-founder released an explanation this week of exactly what happened with Cyberpunk 2077’s development and release

  • In the video statement he defended the development teams and said that the decisions lay solely on his and the board’s shoulders, and promised they would work to regain the trust of gamers
  • Apparently the game was initially developed for PC and then ported to consoles, which led to many of the issues running on PS4 and Xbox One as they underestimated the difficulty of the port
    • And the big reason why review keys for console weren’t sent out until right before release was just because they were still working hard trying to iron out all the issues that they had found
  • The path forward
    • More updates are coming with bug fixes, updates and improvements
    • Once the biggest fixes are out they’ll be releasing free DLC packs aimed at the first half of the year, and the PS5 and Xbox Series optimization updates in the second half
  • So all told we should have the Cyberpunk we were hoping for before the end of 2021, which is something at least. Whether people will start trusting the developers again will remain to be seen

Citing concerns over censorship, a North Idaho internet provider blocked Facebook and Twitter this week

  • For anyone who isn’t aware, Twitter and Facebook banned Trump from their platforms due to violations of their terms of service after he incited a riot that invaded the US capitol building in an attempt to overturn the 2020 election results
    • Keep in mind that this is completely legal, and that the First Amendment only protects speech from being limited by the government
  • According to emails sent by “Your T1 WIFI” to its customers the ISP determined that this was censorship of their customers and information, so they decided to block access to the sites as of Wednesday
    • Your T1 WIFI stated that about 2/3 of its customers had called in asking the sites to be blocked because of these concerns, so the next logical step was to censor block the sites from all customers
  • They’ve since walked back the decision and made it an opt-in process instead, but the damage may already be done- a spokesperson for the Washington Governor’s office said that the attorney general’s Consumer Protection Division would be looking in to the matter because of Net Neutrality violations, which forbid broadband internet providers from blocking lawful content and services

In related news, the right-wing social media site Parler has gone dark after being pulled from not only the Apple and Google app stores but also the Amazon web hosting services that the site was running on

  • Apparently Parler was basically chock full of nazis, radical extremists, and terrorists, with much of the content focused on inciting and coordinating violence or other illegal activity
    • Daring Fireball described it as “4chan with rightwing celebrity endorsements”
    • For example Parler investor Dan Bongino, a Fox News commentator and former NYPD police officer, said in a Parler post that the company was “not done with Apple and Google” and encouraged users to “Stay tuned to hear what’s coming.” One user replied: “It would be a pity if someone with explosives training were to pay a visit to some AWS Data Centers – the location of which are public knowledge.”
  • All of this went against the terms of service of the various platforms it was connected to, so therefore it was kicked out even after being given warnings and deadlines in which to implement some kind of moderation plan
    • As it turns out, Parler was actually even in direct violation of its own terms of service
  • Some have taken to screaming first amendment and censorship, but I cannot stress this enough- freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from consequences
  • And those consequences will be coming- apparently in the wake of the US Capitol riot a researcher began archiving every Parler post to create a lasting public record for future researchers to sift through
    • Hacker @donk_enby pulled dozens of terabytes of content, including raw unprocessed photos and videos that include metadata like the exact GPS coordinates at which they were recorded

This Week In Gaming History

January 9 – 2000 – Mario Party 2 – N64 (North America)

  • Mario and a range of well known Nintendo characters, including Yoshi, Bowser, Luigi, and Wario return for some more party action.
  • The second edition includes 5 new boards, each with a specific theme, such as Space Land, Western Land, Horror Land, and Mystery Land.
    • Each board includes unique attributes in relation to the theme, but the main goal is the same: complete the board game over a certain amount of moves and be the player to have the most coins and/or stars at the end.
  • The single player story mode allows one person and 3 CPU controlled players to play each board.
    • Once you play a specific mini-game (64 in all), they become available to purchase using the coins you collected in your games to play anytime.
    • Multiplayer allows 2 to 4 people to play the game.

January 10 – 1997 – Obsidian – Windows

  • The plot of this Myst-influenced 5 CD adventure game involves issues such as nanotechnology and artificial intelligence.
    • Fortunately, the bundled strategy guide explains the basics of these subjects.
    • Gameplay is linear and largely based around puzzles.
  • Obsidian’s had an imaginative advertisement campaign.
    • Combining both printed ads as well as television spots, the campaign was unusual as it portrayed several common situations twisted in a way that defied all laws of physics, nature and logic followed by the tagline “Your rules do not apply here”.
      • For example: a printed ad showing an empty room lit by an overhead lamp, only the lamp produces darkness instead of light.
    • Yet the most impressive ad was the famed “egg” TV spot, which featured a guy dropping an egg to the floor with unexpected results.
    • This commercial became a particular object of cult among publicity buffs and won 3 Gold Clio awards and became a permanent feature on the New York Museum of Modern Art, as well as being a regular on TV commercial specials, and a runner-up for a Cannes Golden Lion award.

January 11 – 2005 – Resident Evil 4 – GameCube

  • Plot:m
    • Picking up six years after Resident Evil 2, the fourth game in the series follows former cop (now US agent) Leon S. Kennedy to Europe on a top secret mission to investigate the disappearance of the president’s daughter Ashley.
    • As Leon encounters unimaginable horrors, he must find out who or what is behind everything.
    • Old friends…and enemies…lurk around every corner as Leon attempts to find out who is truly behind the kidnapping of the president’s daughter.
  • Resident Evil 4 is a major change from the previous installments.
    • Instead of a fixed third person perspective, the game features a new “behind the back” movement camera angle and an “over the shoulder” aiming feature that allows players to control their gun movement for specific body part hits.
    • It features a brand new AI system and more open environments that allow enemies to work together to capture and corner Leon.
    • Enemies are now humans, which allows them to climb up ladders, open doors, and use weapons throughout the game.
  • The entire item system has also been revamped, so that smaller items no longer require an entire item space to hold.
    • Instead, items take up blocks of space in a briefcase according to their real life size, to allow for many more items and weapons.
    • Leon can collect treasure from enemies or from the surrounding area, and visit the infamous “merchant” to purchase bigger briefcases, treasure maps, weapons upgrades, and powerful weapons such as the one-shot RPG.
    • There is also the Mercenaries from Resident Evil 3, which allows the player to play survival scenarios as character such as Hunk and even Albert Wesker himself.
  • Development:
    • The earliest version of the game was announced for the PS2 under Resident Evil 2 with director Hideki Kamiya.
    • This build was eventually cancelled as a Resident Evil installment and became the title known as Devil May Cry.
    • Eventually, development was moved to the Gamecube console and another build emerged.
    • This was the first version to feature Leon from RE2. The game’s main menace was to sport a hook on one of its hands, and the logo for the game reflected this (this can still be seen in the final logo).
    • More versions were created and cancelled before Shinji Mikami took over and transformed the title into what it is today.
    • Of all the builds developed, only one of them was never unveiled to the public (it was the one that was being worked on right before Mikami took over).
    • Early in the development stages the game’s setting was Japan, not Europe.

January 12 – 2016 – That Dragon, Cancer – Windows, Mac, Ouya

  • That Dragon, Cancer is an autobiographical and crowd-funded game created with a small team and based on the experience of the couple Ryan Green and Amy Green, who lost their son Joel Evan Green to cancer.
    • The game consists of fourteen interactive sequences that chronicle their time with Joel, incorporating their thoughts and experiences, and voiced by themselves and their other children.
    • It represents a love letter to their son and a way to immortalize him.
    • Joel was diagnosed with an atypical teratoid rhabdoid tumor when he was twelve months old, leading to terminal cancer, but he went on to live for four more years until he passed away in 2014.
  • Each scene shows a different moment of their time together with Joel, both the highs and the lows.
    • Scenes are often abstract or involve metaphorical interpretations of situations and are played from a first-person or a third-person perspective with small amounts of interaction and exploration.
    • Sometimes there are choices for the player or optional parts that can be explored or examined.
    • There are scenes at the pond, playing with a duck, in the playground, the hospital and so on.
    • Scenes show both the positive moments such as Joel playing or the conversations with the other children, but also the couple when they argue, the moment of the first diagnosis, the conflict between science and faith and so on.
    • A part of the crowd-funded contributions also involves messages and art incorporated in the game.
  • Along with the game, a documentary called Thank You for Playing was filmed, documenting the game’s development and the last years of Joel’s life.
    • It was released in 2016. The game was released on what would have been Joel’s seventh birthday.

January 13 – 2004 – Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel – Xbox, PS2

  • Setting:
    • In a post-apocalyptic future, a society known as the Brotherhood of Steel is born, wielding powerful weapons and armor from the time before the war, they seek to bring some form of order to the wastelands of what used to be the United States.
    • As a new member(s) to the Brotherhood, you’ll soon find yourself separated from your comrades and forced to contend with a variety of missions and challenges alone.
    • Radscorpions, Super-Mutants and Deathclaws are all in the Brotherhood’s way, and bringing an end to their tyranny will certainly make the wasteland a safer place.
  • Brotherhood of Steel is an action game set in the Fallout universe.
    • The Brotherhood members are well armed and carry full clips of ammo (which does run out).
    • New weapons of various nature can be found and equipped to bring new tactics.
    • Shooting down enemies earns experience points and these points are used to improve the attributes of various individual skills.
    • Additionally, your character will have to contend with finding keys and other objects, protecting NPCs and jumping over bottomless pits.
  • Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel features a product placement for the real life Bawls energy drink.
    • This may be jarring to fans of the Fallout series, who are used to having Nuka-Cola as the post-apocalyptic drink of choice.
  • Fan response to this game was so overwhelmingly negative that Interplay actually shut down the official Brotherhood of Steel message board.
    • It is so hated by the Fallout fanbase, the game’s section on the No Mutants Allowed forums (one of the biggest Fallout forum) is called: “Fallout: Piece of Shit (PS2, XBOX, My Lower Intestine)”.

January 14 – 1999 – EA pulls Tiger Woods 99 on Playstation for bootlegging South Park

  • Company recalls PSX version of Tiger Woods 99.
  • A bootleg episode of Southpark was found on the CD in normally unused space.
  • The file was only readable via a PC, and was invisible to the PSX console.
  • Recall was issued since Southpark is offensive to some people.
  • Roughly 100,000 copies were affected.

January 15 – 2002 – Mobile Suit Gundam: Zeonic Front – PS2

  • Based on the Mobile Suit Gundam anime series.
    • Ride with the bad guys as you battle Earth Federation forces for independence.
    • Take control of three mobile suit teams. Use strategy tactics to infiltrate federation bases.
    • Use a wide variety of Mobile suits equipped to kill.
    • Strategically set your route to carry out mission objectives successfully

Tidbits

  • Samsung unveiled their new Galaxy S21 series of phones with edge-to-edge display, 120hz refresh rate, and 8K video recording
    • The Ultra model also brings a larger display and S Pen functionality for people that miss the Note series
    • Unfortunately it looks like not even Samsung staff are that into their hardware, with tweets promoting the release being marked from “Twitter for iPhone”
  • WhatsApp is now in a rush to reassure people that some of their data is still safe after changing its terms and privacy policy to include significant data sharing with Facebook
    • Backlash from those changes saw Signal and Telegram hitting the top of the free app charts on iPhone as people found other options for messaging
    • They went out of their way to list the things they don’t share like private messages, call logs, and your location, but doesn’t mention what they do share like device usage, IP address, and unspecified “other information”
  • Apple announced a set of new major projects this week as part of its $100M Racial Equity and Justice Initiative, to help dismantle systemic barriers to opportunity and combat injustices faced by communities of colour
    • This includes an innovation and learning hub both in Atlanta and online, an Apple Developer Academy in Detroit, and venture capital funding for entrepreneur POC’s
  • Roku has purchased Quibi’s old content library of about 75 shows and documentaries for well under $100M according to the Wall Street Journal, giving them exclusive rights through to the end of the year and shared streaming rights through 2027
    • Roku will be offering the content for free with ads, which likely means that a lot more people will see these shows now than would have otherwise

 

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PS2J 324 News – Facebook Game-Vertisement

Free Games

  • Twitch

    • The Occupation

      • 2019
      • Stealth game that takes place in a government building in real time over the course of four hours, advancing with or without player input, where you play a journalist researching a controversial government act threatening civil liberties in the wake of a terrorist attack

  • Epic Games

    • Blair Witch

      • 2019
      • Psychological survival horror game set two years after the events of The Blair Witch Project, following a former police officer searching Black Hills Forest for a missing child

    • Ghostbusters: The Video Game Remastered

      • 2019 remaster of the 2009 release
      • Third-person action adventure game where you play a new recruit to the team of parapsychologist ghost hunters two years after Ghostbusters II, that has you working with the original cast to investigate paranormal activities in New York City
      • The developers worked in many details from the Ghostbusters III script that Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis had been working on, leading Aykroyd to consider this as “essentially the third movie”

Facebook is jumping on the cloud gaming bandwagon, aiming at AAA free-to-play on browsers and mobile

  • The idea is that anybody can play for free, as long as they have a Facebook account (so much like Needful Things, you don’t pay with money)
  • Facebook’s vice president of play, Jason Rubin, says their initial focus will be games picked to be “latency tolerant”, so they don’t need rock-solid infrastructure or connections to be playable
  • Much like the days of Farmville, people can start playing games by clicking an ad in their Facebook timeline
  • And Rubin was quick to point out this isn’t a game streaming service, and they won’t be releasing a first-party controller. Everything will be played with mouse and keyboard, or with your device’s touchscreen
  • They also won’t be bringing in big name console titles from publishers like Bethesda, CD Projekt Red, or Ubisoft
  • And, ominously, Rubin said “No investment, no promises”, presumably meaning that there’s no monthly fee or contracts, but also seeming to imply that they’ll do whatever they want with this platform as they’ve done with all of their other products
  • And theoretically the games won’t be locked to the Facebook platform- every game at launch will allow users to take in-app purchases with them to other platforms to play elsewhere. They don’t care if you stay on their platform, because you’ve already clicked the ad to launch the game
    • Rubin said “…ultimately, we ran the ads, the ads are more effective. And we’re an advertising business. That’s how free-to-play games find people.”
    • Facebook makes money by keeping you on their platform, so if they can get you playing games there too they win regardless of if you’re paying
  • Interestingly enough, in this era of pushback on app store fees, Facebook is reportedly taking a 30% cut of purchases on the web, though purchases through the Google Play store will see that 30% going to Google instead
  • They’ll apparently be skipping over iOS this time around though, due to the rules we’ve reported on regarding cloud gaming on Apple devices
  • The Android Beta of Facebook Gaming launches this Monday

Heads up for anyone planning on taking their Control save file from the current generation of consoles to the new ones in November, you need to buy and play the current Ultimate Edition first

  • According to 505 Games support, you can’t just import your base PS4 or Xbox One save into the new Ultimate version on the PS5 or Xbox Series
  • Using the Playstation as an example, you need to buy the Ultimate Edition for PS4 and then play it at least once to upgrade your save files. At that point they’ll be compatible with the PS5 Ultimate Edition
  • So if you just own the base game on PS4 and the Ultimate Edition on PS5, you’re stuck losing progress. You need to buy the Ultimate Edition on PS4 instead so that you can update your save.
  • At least the Ultimate Edition includes a free PS5 upgrade?

CD Project Red is under fire for once again delaying Cyberpunk 2077, this time to December 10th

  • Even though the game has gone gold and has all its content, this new delay is related to day 0 patches to try and improve the quality and gameplay
  • Day 0 patches can lead to some sizeable changes and improvements, as we saw with No Man’s Sky, but can also cause issues for those without great internet that are hoping to just buy a disc and play it
  • On one hand I, like many others, want them to take the time to release a great game that they can be proud of, but on the other they probably shouldn’t keep announcing new release dates and crunch times over and over again
    • This is an especially bad look when not even a full 24 hours before the latest announcement they were on Twitter telling people that the November 19th date was fully confirmed and 100% on track
  • The game was initially announced over 8 years ago
    • A trailer at E3 2019 gave a release date of April 26 2020
    • Then it was delayed to September 17
    • Then November 19
    • Now December 10
    • And this is all even with the crunch development that they promised they wouldn’t do and are doing anyway. Developers are working upwards of 100 hour weeks, and things are still slipping
  • At this point it feels like they’ve prioritized the release date over actually finishing the game, but keep letting it slip regardless
  • That said, there have been reports of people sending death threats to the developers over these delays and that is NOT okay

Alex Hutchinson, a Google Stadia Creative Director, had a spicy take this week saying that streamers should pay developers and publishers extra licensing for the games they stream

  • Funnily enough this is a man using uncredited fanart of JackSepticEye’s Savage Planet playthrough (a game Hutchinson worked on) for his Twitter banner
    • He even cropped out the signature
  • And many were quick to point out the positive impacts that streaming and let’s play videos can have on game sales, as well as the fact that in a world where publishing executives make millions a year developers wouldn’t even see any of that money anyway
  • Plus it’s literally fair use- these people are adding commentary and personality to the gameplay, not just silently playing a movie

SpaceX is sending out the first invites for its public beta of Starlink, the low earth orbit satellite internet network

  • Currently limited to some areas of the US and Canada, it will be offering 50-150Mbps with an estimated latency of 20-40ms by summer 2021
  • It also comes with an iOS app that can help you install the antenna, check for obstructions, and help troubleshoot and test your connection if you need support
  • Initial buy-in is $500USD for the antenna and router, with a subscription price of $100/month, which honestly isn’t that bad if you don’t have cable, DSL, or fibre internet in your area- services like Xplornet offer slower speeds with much higher latency for about the same price

Following up on their huge Origins update, Hello Games has announced their next update for No Man’s Sky: Next Generation

  • Update 3.1 will being a graphically enhanced and smoother experience to the next generation of consoles and PC, with bigger bases, lusher planets, more players, faster warp speeds, cross-generation crossplay, and more
  • Xbox One saves are automatically compatible, and PS4 players can upload their save data in-game for download on the PS5
  • Best part is, it’s another completely free update!
  • I’m looking forward to loading up my original save from 2016 and trying out all this new stuff

This Week In Gaming History

October 24 – 1995 – Marvel Super Heroes – Arcade

  • Marvel Super Heroes is a 2D fighting game and the second Capcom title to feature characters from the Marvel comic universe.
    • The gameplay is very similar to X-Men: Children of the Atom, but with a simplified Super Combo gauge and the addition of infinity gems.
    • Each character starts with a set of gems.
    • These can be activated during a fight to improve speed, power and defense, or provide special abilities to create crushing stone walls, open up a rift in space, or reverse the opponent’s controls.
    • The use of the gems is inspired by the The Infinity Gauntlet comic book series.
  • There are ten playable characters.
    • Captain America, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Psylocke, Spider-Man and Wolverine.
    • The villains are Blackheart, Juggernaut, Magneto and Shuma-Gorath.
    • Anita from the Darkstalkers series is a hidden character in the Japanese version.
    • The bosses are Doctor Doom and Thanos. During the boss fight Thanos steals all the player’s gems (except for mind) and uses them with new effects.m

October 25 – 2005 – Soul Caliber III – PS2

  • In ancient times, a powerful weapon known as the Soul Edge existed, and tales of it’s power lured many.
    • But Soul Edge was an evil weapon, and when Siegfried claimed it, he was turned into a creature named Nightmare.
    • As time passed, Nightmare rampaged across Europe leaving a path of destruction, despite the efforts of other fighters.
    • One day, a mysterious man carrying a scythe confronts Nightmare and splits Siegfried from his cursed form.
    • He then resurrects the Azure Armor to carry on as the “Nightmare” creature.
    • At the same time, a young girl Tira pledges herself to Soul Edge’s dark power, and a woman named Setsuka swears to avenge her master.
    • All the while new rumors of the Soul Edge spread across the world, causing many who had searched for it before to once more venture out…
  • Soulcalibur III is a 3D fighting game featuring a variety of characters, each carrying a distinctive weapon and unique fighting style.
    • The basics of the combat is a derived, in different stances, from a combination of Horizontal Attacks, Vertical Attacks, Throws, Kicks and a Soul Charge.
    • Characters engage one another in 1vs1 fights that end when the energy of one side is lost, removed from the ring or run out of time.
  • This game added the Character Creation Mode
    • This allows the player to choose from several classes, clothing and armor, and physical features.
    • Most of the classes can use up to five disciplines, three of which are unique, and two of which are “Soul of …” disciplines: an exact replica of a main story character’s moves.
    • The created fighter’s personality can be altered, which influences their quotes and their actions during battle.
    • Unfortunately, the personality is chosen by the equipment the character wears, and not directly by the player.
  • In the first ever Spike Video Game Awards in 2003, SoulCalibur II won in the category Most Addictive Game. The original releases on MetaCritic, are 93% on GameCube, 92% on PlayStation 2 and Xbox.
  • I got some of these notes from PS2J 233, when I did the history of Soulcaliber.m

October 26 – 2000 – PlayStation 2 – North America

  • A sixth-generation console, it competed with Sega’s Dreamcast, Nintendo’s GameCube, and Microsoft’s original Xbox.
  • Announced in 1999, the PS2 offered backward-compatibility for its predecessor’s DualShock controller, as well as its games.
    • The PS2 is the best-selling video game console of all time, having sold over 155 million units worldwide.
    • Over 3,800 game titles have been released for the PS2, with over 1.5 billion copies sold.
  • The PlayStation 2 offered some particularly high-profile exclusive games.
    • Most main entries in the Grand Theft Auto, Final Fantasy, and Metal Gear Solid series were released exclusively for the console.
    • Several prolific series got their start on the PlayStation 2, including God of War, Ratchet & Clank, Jak and Daxter, Devil May Cry, Kingdom Hearts, and Sly Cooper.
    • Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was the best-selling game on the console.
  • Random PS2 Fact:
    • People in Brazil could actually boot up Netflix on their PS2 consoles.
    • This service also required a disc plus a memory card.
    • Netflix support for the PS2 was officially ended in 2012, which angered a user on the Gamespot forums.

October 27 – 2017 – Super Mario Odyssey – Switch

  • Explore incredible places far from the Mushroom Kingdom as you join Mario and his new ally Cappy on a massive, globe-trotting 3D adventure.
  • Use amazing new abilities—like the power to capture and control objects, animals, and enemies—to collect Power Moons so you can power up the Odyssey airship and save Princess Peach from Bowser’s wedding plans!
  • Thanks to heroic, hat-shaped Cappy, Mario’s got new moves that’ll make you rethink his traditional run-and-jump gameplay—like cap jump, cap throw, and capture.
    • Use captured cohorts such as enemies, objects, and animals to progress through the game and uncover loads of hidden collectibles.
    • And if you feel like playing with a friend, just pass them a Joy-Con™ controller!
    • Player 1 controls Mario while Player 2 controls Cappy.
    • This sandbox-style 3D Mario adventure—the first since 1996’s beloved Super Mario 64™ and 2002’s Nintendo GameCube™ classic Super Mario Sunshine™—is packed with secrets and surprises, plus exciting new kingdoms to explore.
      • Explore astonishing new locales like skyscraper-packed New Donk City to your heart’s content, and run into familiar friends and foes as you try to save Princess Peach from Bowser’s dastardly wedding plans.
      • Find something interesting? Toss your cap at it and see what happens! There are lots of fun and surprising ways to interact with your surroundings.
      • Be sure to bring any coins you find to a Crazy Cap store, where you can exchange them for decorative souvenirs for the Odyssey and new outfits for Mario! Some destinations have very exclusive dress codes, after all…
      • Hand a Joy-Con™ controller to a friend to enjoy simultaneous multiplayer: Player 1 controls Mario while Player 2 controls Mario’s new ally Cappy.
      • Use Snapshot Mode to freeze time while playing the game and take screenshots that you can customize using various options and filters. Screenshots can be shared via social media or uploaded to PCs and smart devices* using all of the Nintendo Switch™ system’s built-in screenshot tools.
      • A special edition Nintendo Switch™ hardware bundle will launch alongside the game. This special edition includes a download code for the full game, red left and right Joy-Con™ controllers, and a Super Mario Odyssey™ themed Nintendo Switch carrying case.
  • Controls are the best in the series. Ratings are generally perfect across the board.
  • First Mario game with a pop song as the main title.
    • Jump Up, Super Star was released worldwide on October 20, 2017, on the iTunes Store, while the short version was downloadable for free until January 31, 2018.

October 28 – 2008 – Fallout 3 – PS3, Windows, XBox 360

  • The game that made Fallout the way everyone knows it now
  • Bethesda Softworks started working on Fallout 3 in July 2004, but principal development did not begin until after The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and its related extras and plug-ins were completed.
    • Bethesda made Fallout 3 similar to the previous two games, focusing upon non-linear gameplay, story, and black comedy.
    • Bethesda pursued an ESRB rating of M (for “mature”) by including the adult themes, violence, and depravity characteristic of the Fallout series.
    • They shied away from the self-referential gags of the game’s predecessors that broke the illusion that the world of Fallout is real.
    • Fallout 3 uses a version of the same Gamebryo engine as Oblivion, and was developed by the team responsible for that game. Liam Neeson was cast as the voice of the player’s father.
  • Neat Fallout 3 things I have from PS2J 216, the History of Fallout
    • There were originally at least 12 versions of the final cutscene, but, with further development, this expanded to over 200 possible permutations in the final release, all of which are determined by the actions taken by the player.
    • Game director Todd Howard confirmed that, in addition to thematics about slavery and cannibalism, there would be the presence of splatter scenes and exposition of evident mutilations on enemies with release of gibs.
    • The inspiration to include scenes with such explicit violence came from the “crash mode” of the driving simulator series Burnout.
      • Instead of cars that disintegrated because of the damage, the idea of applying kinematics on bodies who suffered wounds and mutilations due to ballistic trauma or beatings.
    • The game fell into some controversies with a world wide release.
      • Fallout 3 was refused classification by the Australian Classification Board, thus making it illegal to distribute or purchase the game in Australia.
      • According to the board report, the game was refused classification due to the “realistic visual representations of drugs and their delivery method [bringing] the ‘science-fiction’ drugs in line with ‘real-world’ drugs”.
      • A revised version of the game had to be released without the animations of administering the drugs.
    • In light of cultural sensitivities, the game was not released in India.
      • Although the specific reason was not revealed in public, it is possible that it is because the game contains two-headed mutated cows called Brahmin, or that Brahmin is also the name of an ancient, powerful hereditary caste of Hindu priests and religious scholars in India, or its similarity to the spelling of brahman, a type of cow that originated in India.
    • The side quest “The Power of the Atom” in the Japanese version of Fallout 3 was changed to relieve concerns about depictions of atomic detonation in inhabited areas, as the memory of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki remains strong in the country.
      • In non-Japanese versions, players are given the option of either defusing, ignoring, or detonating the dormant atomic bomb in the town of Megaton; in the Japanese version, the character of Mr. Burke is absent, making it impossible to choose the detonation option.
      • Also in the Japanese release, the “Fat Man” nuclear catapult weapon was renamed “Nuka Launcher”, as the original name was a reference to Fat Man, the bomb used on Nagasaki.
      • According to Tetsu Takahashi, responsible for localizing Fallout 3 to Japan under his company Zenimax Asia, the available actions prior to localizing “The Power of the Atom” and the ability to kill civilians almost got the game banned by CERO before it received an Adult Only Rating.

October 29 – 2002 – Grand Theft Auto: Vice City – PlayStation 2

  • The follow-up to the game that changed gaming
  • Tommy Vercetti is a gangster who just got off a fifteen year prison sentence for not squealing on his friends.
    • Because he didn’t rat out his “family”, Tommy’s sent to work with Sonny Forelli, his old boss.
    • Sonny gives him an easy drug job, but everything goes wrong, and Tommy loses everything.
    • Upon returning to Sonny, he gets mad and wants his money back.
    • Unfortunately, everybody in Vice City, from gangsters and Cubans to bikers and politicians are in his way, and it’s up to Tommy to clear a path.
  • The 80’s aesthetic makes this game so special to me
    • I love the era, but love the internet so wouldn’t want to live in that time. Just visit, which this game lets me.
    • My favorite part of the description is about the soundtrack.
      • To effectively capture the mood of the 1980s, the soundtrack has been altered to fit the time period.
      • Players will listen to an estimated nine hours of music (nearly three times the amount featured in the previous game) across ten radio stations.
      • The eclectic mix features such noteworthy titles as I Ran by Flock of Seagulls, The Message by Grandmaster Flash, You’ve Got Another Thing Coming by Judas Priest, and Out of Touch by Hall & Oates.

October 30 – 2007 – The Simpsons Game – PS2, PS3, PSP, Wii, XBox 360

  • This at a glance, would the game for The Simpsons Movie that came out the same year
    • I remember playing all of it up the end, and enjoying it.
    • I do not remember finishing it or not
  • Bart Simpson goes to a video game store and buys a new ultra-violent Grand Theft Scratchy game, which is promptly confiscated by his mother Marge.
    • Suddenly, a video game manual lands right in front of him.
    • Miraculously, after having read the manual, the members of the Simpsons family discover that each of them possesses a unique superpower.
    • Toying with these, however, attracts the attention of the aliens Kang and Kodos, who decide to invade the Earth.
    • Now the unlikely superheroes must not only protect the town of Springfield from an alien assault, but also find the true reason behind their newly acquired powers, and perhaps their very existence.
  • The Simpsons Game is a 3D action game with platforming and light puzzle-solving elements, based on the long-running cartoon.
    • The game is divided into sixteen episodes, each containing cutscenes reminiscent of the original Simpsons TV series.
    • Every episode is set in a different environment; some of the scenarios are based in Springfield, while others take the player into meta-virtual worlds.
    • Some of the episodes parody a popular game or genre, having names like Medal of Homer or Neverquest. Each stage features two members of the Simpson clan working together to achieve the goal.
    • Players must switch back and forth using each family members’ unique powers to complete the level.
    • Most of the game’s versions allow two-player cooperative play.
  • The four controllable characters have their own unique abilities, which are used for combat, puzzle-solving, or exploration-related purposes.
    • Homer can expand into a rolling blob or inflate himself with helium and float for a while; later, he learns a few other transformation abilities.
    • Bart can become Bartman, using a grappling hook to access certain areas, as well as move upwards in air streams with his cape.
    • Lisa’s main ability is called “Hand of Buddha”, which is used mainly for moving around large objects; she can also play her saxophone to stun or confuse enemies.
    • Finally, Marge can gather people with her megaphone and control their actions, as well as send the little Maggie into crawlspaces only she can access.
    • Some of these abilities have limited uses and must be either recharged or replenished with special items, while others are available only at specific trigger points.
  • The PS3 and Xbox 360 versions also contain free-roaming gameplay – exclusively in those versions player characters can leave the Simpsons’ house between missions and freely wander through virtual Springfield.
    • Familiar landmarks (such as Moe’s Tavern, etc.) are present and can be explored as well.
    • These locations may contain additional dialogue and events. It is possible to use the bus to travel quickly to various destinations.

Tidbits

  • After openly mocking Apple for removing charging bricks from new iPhones being sold, Samsung is reportedly considering the exact same move
    • This isn’t really anything new, after they pulled advertising focused on Apple removing the headphone port when they did the exact same thing in the Galaxy Note 10 series
    • It kind of makes sense though- it leads to less packaging and e-waste, while also driving people toward reliable and cheaper companies like Anker for their power adaptors
  • With reports of broken Quest 2 Elite straps continuing to mount on Reddit, users are saying that Oculus Support is being overwhelmed and pushing response times further and further back
  • In a case related to the FIFA games, a judge in the Netherlands has officially ruled that loot boxes are a form of gambling, and since online gambling is strictly regulated there they have given EA three weeks to remove them or be subject to up to €5M in fines
  • Ubisoft’s UPLAY+ has morphed into Ubisoft+, launching a multi-platform subscription model with a beta on Amazon Luna and later on Google Stadia
    • PC subscribers get unlimited access to 100+ games for $15/month, including premium editions and upcoming titles like Watch Dogs: Legion and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
    • Once Luna and Stadia support are brought in you’ll be able to play all of the included games on one of those streaming services at no additional cost, so you won’t need a powerful gaming PC to play brand new AAA titles
  • As part of the antitrust lawsuit against Google that we talked about last week, it’s being reported that Google currently pays Apple an estimated $8-12B per year to be the default search engine
    • This is believed to be the single biggest payment Google makes to anyone, and accounts for 14-21% of Apple’s annual profits

Would you like to know more?

  • Gizmodo’s breakdown of the US senate’s proposed changes to the laws that protect online platforms against liability for content uploaded by their users and how the platforms moderate it

 

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Thank you for your continued support Karen, we may not be podcasting today without your drive to make a podcasting community in Alberta. Listen to her and her daughter on Thats A Thing?!

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PS2J 316 News – Super Money Printing Bros

Free Games

  • Xbox One

    • Override: Mech City Brawl

      • 2018
      • Gigantic robot mech brawler with single player and Voltron-style 2-4 player co-op, where every mech has special moves and skills, and you can fight in arenas around the world

    • Tom Clancy’s The Division

      • 2016
      • Online-only action RPG / third person shooter where you play a special agent tasked with helping rebuild Manhattan and combat criminal activity after a viral outbreak. It has a combination of shared and instanced areas that have co-op and pvp multiplayer, in addition to missions and a story that you can run on your own

    • de Blob 2

      • 2014
      • Platform puzzle game originally for the Xbox 360 that has you jumping around, mixing colours and bringing life to the cityscape. There’s also a basic two-player mode similar to Super Mario Galaxy

    • Gamepass

      • We don’t normally mention new games on Gamepass, but this month some new highlights include Resident Evil 7, Crusader Kings 3, and Destiny 2 with the Shadowkeep and Forsaken expansions
      • Unfortunately Red Dead Redemption 2 is leaving on September 7th

  • PS4

    • Street Fighter V

      • 2016
      • Fighting game similar to the other 2D style Street Fighter titles, it initially released without a story mode and only had a basic roster meant for tournament style gameplay until updates in 2018 and 2020 added in single-player modes and additional fighters

    • PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds

      • 2017
      • One of the original battle royale titles, it started life as a mod for ARMA 2 but evolved into a standalone title where you and 99 other players are dropped on to an island with the clothes on your back, and need to gather resources and take down the other players on a shrinking map

  • Epic Games

    • Into the Breach

      • 2018
      • Control powerful mechs from the future to defeat an alien threat. Each attempt to save the world presents a new randomly generated challenge in this isometric turn-based strategy game from the makers of FTL.

  • Twitch

    • Pumped BMX Pro

      • 2019
      • Promoted as a BMX trickathon, it has you mastering 60 different levels and over 200 challenges while pulling off as many stunts as possible

    • Effie

      • 2020
      • 3D action adventure game that combines combat, platforming, and puzzles with the exploration of a large, expanded world where you live a unique fantasy adventure in the style of Crash Bandicoot or Ratchet and Clank

    • Impulsion

      • 2018
      • First person platformer designed to play with your nerves and reflexes, that has you making your way through 25 levels by manipulating physics and shooting forcefields to speed up or slow down

    • Outcast – Second Contact

      • 2017 remake of the 1999 adventure game of the year and cult classic, Outcast
      • Third or first person open world shooter where you play an ex Navy SEAL stranded on an alien world trying to get home

    • Tiny Troopers: Joint Ops

      • 2014
      • Arcade-style twin stick shooter that has your tiny troopers battling evil adversaries from around the world with a multitude of weapons and specialties

    • Autonauts

      • 2019
        • Travel the universe and colonize uninhabited planets, starting with sticks and stones and going all the way up to art, space travel, and intergalactic export

Updates

  • Apple has officially terminated Epic Games’ account on its App Store, a move that won’t affect Unreal Engine but it does mean that users can no longer download Fortnite or other Epic titles for their iDevices
    • Anyone that’s already downloaded the app can still play, but can no longer make ingame purchases
    • This comes down as, despite the court’s recommendation that Epic comply with App Store guidelines while the case moves forward, they’ve instead repeatedly submitted Fortnite updates with the direct payment option in question intact
  • While Epic continues to cry foul to its users about updates now being blocked, Apple has been promoting another big battle royale title PUBG Mobile for iOS users, which is great timing as the game is also free this month on PS+
  • It seems like Facebook is trying to get their foot in the door when it comes to the Epic vs Apple payment fees conversation
    • Facebook has a new feature that lets users buy tickets for online events. Unfortunately since online events count as digital content, they’re subject to the standard 30% fee
    • Facebook tried to include wording on these purchases to say “Apple takes 30% of this purchase”, but according to Apple that’s irrelevant information and they blocked the update that would have added that wording
      • It probably falls under the usual terms and conditions that prevent developers from talking about other payment options from within iOS apps
    • Google devices were reportedly supposed to get a message saying “Facebook doesn’t take a fee from this purchase”, which makes the warning on iPhones seem really targeted, but that message doesn’t show up on the Android version either
    • Between showing the planned screens then publicizing the difference, it seems like Facebook is playing the same blame game as Epic in trying to get attention by breaking the rules and crying foul when they’re enforced

Cryptic Studios is under fire this week for “mis-advertising” content packs for Star Trek Online, something that Reddit users are saying is a common trend for the publisher

  • Apparently on multiple occasions they’ve announced content bundles that include ships, modules, and keys for lootchests, but then when the actual pack is released people purchase it to find things like the keys completely missing
  • The worst part of that is all of the blogs and advertising material have been stealth-updated to remove any mention of the missing rewards, leaving only services like the Internet Wayback Machine with proof of the change
    • Once they were called out loudly enough they honoured the missing content for people that had purchased prior to the revision, but anyone working off of old information is left out in the cold
  • According to some users, they’ve historically done the very same thing in free to play titles like Neverwinter, and each time they just apologized and moved on
  • This is apparently the same studio working on the Magic: The Gathering MMO slated for a 2021 release, but with this kind of track record it’s hard not to be worried

The US government is getting even more involved with the forced sale of TikTok, now forcing some companies to back down in their offers

  • Apparently Walmart was set to make an offer to be the majority owner, teamed with with Alphabet and Softbank to invest in minority stakes, but the United States government apparently said they wanted a tech company to buy it instead
    • Why they get a say is beyond me, but I guess they could move forward with the ban anyway if people don’t listen?
  • From the sounds of it Walmart is interested in getting into TikTok’s e-commerce and payments business, so since they were blocked they instead are teaming up as a minority shareholder with Microsoft taking the lead
    • Alphabet couldn’t take the lead of Walmart’s original plans because of a potential antitrust investigation due to its ownership of YouTube
  • It looks like now the two options for TikTok are Microsoft/Walmart or Oracle, but though a deal was set to be made already China has now made a change to its export controls list to cover TikTok’s recommendation algorithm, which means that thanks to TikTok’s “For You” page the Chinese government will now get a say in whether the sale goes through

Apple’s release the new iOS 13.7, and once you’ve got that installed you’ll be able to easily see if your area supports COVID-19 exposure notifications

  • The update has new options under Settings > Exposure Notifications (just below Emergency SOS), which include showing you if your area has an official contact tracing app and, if not, gives you a switch to be alerted once one is available
  • Just a reminder that these apps are secure, battery-friendly, and become a lot more effective in keeping people safe if everyone’s using them

Mario 35th Anniversary Direct

Game and Watch: Super Mario Bros.

  • A throwback to the old Game and Watch handhelds that Nintendo used to make
    • This version has a bright colour screen
    • You can play the entirety of Super Mario Bros
    • There are also mini games that put Mario in the place of Mr. Game And Watch
    • The clock function is very animated, more than just a static clock to watch
    • Limited Production, Available November 13th

Super Mario World + Bowser’s Fury

  • Super Mario 3D World and all the fun and frustration it included is coming to Switch
  • As well as new content titled Bowser’s Fury
    • Only shown in a brief teaser with a dark giant spiky cat bell powerup, on a rainy beach in a storm with purple lightning
  • Slated to release February 12th, 2021

Super Mario Bros. 35

  • In the vein of Tetris 99, this is Super Mario Battle Royal!
    • Exclusive and free for Switch Online Members
  • You play original Super Mario Bros in the center of the screen
    • In the UI around you, are 34 other people, racing to play Mario Bros faster than you
  • To attack other players, you defeat enemies as normal, and it sends them off to another player’s queue
    • In your queue, you see that as you progress in the level, desaturated enemies are waiting to spawn in your path
    • Everyone is racing against the clock, which you get more time by defeating enemies
    • And like Tetris 99, you can target opponents by Lowest time, Most Coins, people attacking you and random
    • And it seems like coins, not sure if they are acquired the same as in game, or some sort of bonus
      • And it appears you can buy a power-up for 20 of these coins.
  • Available October 1st
    • Will be playable until March 31st, 2021

Mario Kart Live: Home Tour

  • OMG Mario Kart in real life!
  • This is an augmented reality game
    • You purchase a Mario Kart RC Kart
      • Mario and Luigi seem available first
      • Looks like a traditional Kart, but if it had a large scoop for the engine, behind the racer, that has a camera
    • These karts must come with a kit to make 4 arches
      • You start by driving your kart through the arches, painting the track behind you
      • When you connect to the track, it paints the width of the arches to make a race track
  • The commercial shows 2 kids playing on the same track
    • On the Switch, an augmented reality race shows other digital characters racing with the 2 RC karts
  • October 16th, 2020

Nintendo Rewards for limited pins!

  • Everyone with a My Nintendo Account can complete Super Mario related missions
  • You may recieve cool rewards
    • Including a Pin set of 10 Mario’s from games ranging from 1985 to 2020
    • Will release in 2 waves, US and Canada Only
    • September 3rd to March 31st 2021

Mario Kart Tour Event!

  • Special appearances of Mario and Donkey Kong Junior from the original Super Mario Kart for SNES
    • September 8th, 2020,  11PM PST

Limited merchandise

  • Historical Super Mario items and special 35th Anniversary items
    • Only at the Nintendo New York store
    • And store.nintendo.com
    • Starting in October

Mario Maker 2 Course

  • A special 35th Anniversary Ninji’s Speed Run course
    • November 2020

Super Smash Bros Online Tournament

  • Limited to Super Mario franchise characters
    • Stages and Items
  • Later this year

Splatoon Splat Fest

  • Which Power-up would you prefer?
    • Super Size from a Mushroom
    • Invincibility from a Super Star
    • A My Nintendo reward item of a Mushroom and Super Star that got inked
      • To release closer to the SplatFest
      • Physical SplatFest shirts available online, now
  • January 2021

Animal Crossing

  • Super Mario themed furniture
    • March 2021

And Licensed Super Mario products!

  • Puma Sneakers
    • September 4th
  • BlackMilk Clothing
    • October 5th
  • Mario Monopoly and Jenga
    • Now
  • Mario Doll
    • Now
  • Lego
    • Lego Mario course
    • Lego NES with Retro TV

Super Mario All Stars

  • Coming to the Super NES collection on Switch
    • Updated to fit Widescreen tvs!

Super Mario 3D All Stars

  • Super Mario 64, Sunshine and Galaxy in one game
    • Also has a music player, like Smash Ultimate
  • Limited physical release
    • September 18th

This Day in Gaming History

August 29 – 2013 – Game Dev Tycoon – Windows

  • ”Game Dev Tycoon” is a business simulator game where you control a game company.
    • The game starts in the garage as many single video games developer did in the 80s.
    • As you release successful games, more genres, employees and options are unlocked.
    • As time progresses consoles and home computers are unlocked, but often using silly fictional names like PlaySystem and grPhone.
    • The game is inspired by Game Dev Story in both name and gameplay.
  • This is a game I really enjoy and like to go back to from time to time
    • Some of the achievements are for naming your Studio or Games based on real companies or releases.
    • And some powerful characters you can hire are references to big game developers

August 30 – 2002 – Go! Go! Beckham! Adventure On Soccer Island – Game Boy Advance – United Kingdom Only

  • It’s football with a unique twist.
    • David Beckham is called on to save Soccer Island from the evil Mister Woe, who has taken over the island by turning all of the animals into monsters.
    • Not only that, he’s stealing all of the important items for himself.
  • Using David Beckham’s football skills, you must guide your hero through each level, kicking enemies and doors down with your football to the end of each level.
    • Knock down the locks during the game to unlock the exit door and kick your ball through to complete it.
    • Boss characters then require special attacks with your football to defeat them.

August 31 – 1997 – Final Fantasy 7 – Playstation

  • The seventh installment of the Final Fantasy series takes place in a post-modern, steampunk, sci-fi world where high technology reigns and where robots and bio-engineered mutants co-exist with humans and dragons.
  • To my surprise, the site I source for a lot of these games, Moby Games, had Final Fantasy 7’s North American release as the only game for August 31st, 1997

September 1 – 1984 – Klondike Solitare – DOS

  • A mouse-only game for DOS, Klondike Solitaire is a simulation of its namesake.
    • Using the mouse to click cards, you move cards of alternate suits onto each other in an effort to move them off the tableau.
    • Cheating is technically allowed, but doing so will get you “yelled at” by the program.
  • Felt this would be appropriate, as basically anyone to be stuck on a computer without an internet connection, has played solitaire
    • And this may the first Klondike Solitare

September 2 – 2014 – The Sims 4 – Origin Windows

  • The Sims 4 is the fourth main game in the real-time life simulation / management series. Just like the previous games one or more custom characters are created through Create-a-Sim to live in a house designed by the player.
    • As their lives unfold based on the environment, relationships and specific traits, the player gets to manage the life, needs to organize activities, attend to needs, and react to moods, with non-linear gameplay and no direct control.
  • I’ve been way into it again, as I bought Get Famous on a sale, before the latest expansion Eco Lifestyle came out.
    • I reviewed that I really like the social media, and fame meter. As well as the Acting career
    • And Eco Lifestyle added Ladders, as well as ways to produce your own water and power.
      • Which you can sell back to the grid for a profit.
  • If the fanily found it interesting, I was considering making Alan and I, and doing a Twitch stream.

September 3 – 1998 – Hong Pong – DOS

  • Hong Pong is a Pong variant set in five different war zones (including one hidden) and with tanks instead of paddles.
    • Played with two tanks, one on each side of the screen, players need to prevent a spinning nuke from touching their side of the screen, while shooting missiles at the opponent or forcing the nuke to hit his side.
    • In the middle of the screen different kinds of vehicles pass and these hurt the player when touched. It is also possible to activate a shield to block the incoming missiles, but while it is up firing is disabled.

September 4 – 1998 – Dune 2000 – Windows

  • Dune 2000 is a remake of the classic Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty, updated for Windows.
    • In this real-time strategy game, you can play one of the three houses: the noble Atreides, the insidious Ordos, or the evil Harkonnen.
    • Each has different sets of units and tactics while maintaining an overall balance.
    • The Atreides have air superiority and rely on their honor and alliance with planet natives, the Fremen.
    • The Ordos rely on guerrilla tactics and superior technology, as well as mercenaries.
    • The Harkonnen just go brutal, with no care for lives of their own troops or destruction, as long as they are victorious.
  • This game made me fall in love with the Dune franchise
    • If you are interested in playing it again, I recommend OpenRA
    • OpenRA is a project that recreates and modernizes the classic Command & Conquer real time strategy games.
    • Relive the original Command and Conquer, C&C: Red Alert, and Dune 2000

Tidbits

  • Shout out to Bullfrog, thanks for saying you’ll give us a shot after our ad on Remember the Game.
    • We really like Adams podcast, and we are blown away by his glowing review of us!
    • Thanks to all our fanily, and welcome to anyone joining us from Remember the Game!
  • Good news for Rocket League players, once the game hits their free to play launch (we covered all the details in episode 310) you’ll no longer need PS+ or Nintendo Switch Online to play multiplayer
    • Unfortunately it looks like Xbox Live Gold is still needed if you want to play on Xbox One
  • If you’re about to buy a new graphics card you’ll want to press pause until you check out nVidia’s new RTX 30 series
    • The new hardware includes all sorts of fanciness like a brand new faster kind of memory (GDDR6X), low latency and high framerates even at 4k and 8k resolutions, and all kinds of ray-tracing beauty
    • According to the specs released so far, even the entry level model 3070 beats the two year old 2080ti at less than half its current price
  • Rocksteady’s upcoming Suicide Squad game, subtitled Kill The Justice League, looks like it could be pretty good
    • Featuring Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Captain Boomerang, and King Shark in a Metropolis being menaced by Brainiac and a presumably mind-controlled Justice League, set in the Arkham game universe
  • Call of Duty Warzone players will be happy to hear that Activision is suing one of the top websites where players can purchase cheats and hacks for the game, like aimbots and wallhacks (xray vision)
    • The lawsuit has forced the site in question to remove all Call of Duty content, leaving people that have previously paid for the cheats with nothing to show for it
      • Some are hoping for refunds, but the fact that people actively cheating at games are now out actual money is kind of delicious

Mini-reviews

  • The Relentless Moon by Mary Robinette Kowal
    • Perspective change threw me at first, but I was glad I recently re-read the other books because this takes place at the same time as The Fated Sky
    • Another great addition to the Lady Astronaut of Mars series, and as well written as it was well studied
  • Bill and Ted Face the Music
    • It felt like a lot of what we need right now in the world- a story about people coming together and celebrating eachother, with great acting from a lot of fantastic people, and a subtle reminder about how multicultural music has always been with so many roots in black culture, along with an ending that had me in tears
    • After serious movies from The Matrix to John Wick, it’s always good to see what a goofball Keanu Reeves can be

 

For more content, Patreon supports get access to upcoming ideas and more!

Thank you Zane, a powerful man and a super hero dad. He’s one of the best #BeLikeZane

And thanks to the rest of our ‘fanily’ that support us.
And if you want to support us too, its as easy as clicking this link!
And talk to us in the comments!

PS2J 315 News – No Oddjob, Slappers Only

Free games

  • Twitch

    • Tempest

      • 2016
      • Pirate-themed open world action RPG with hundreds of quests and countless ships to plunder. Customize your ship, trade, challenge fellow pirates and face terrible mythical monsters such as Kraken and Leviathan.

  • Epic Games

    • Hitman

      • 2016
      • Third person stealth assassination game in episodic form, taking Agent 47 all around the world to prove he is the ultimate silent assassin

    • Shadowrun Collection

      • Shadowrun Returns

        • 2013
        • Science fantasy cyberpunk turn based tactical RPG based on the tabletop RPG of the same name, with extra custom campaigns available from Steam or third-party websites

      • Shadowrun Dragonfall

        • Originally an expansion pack for Shadowrun Returns, it was released as its own game in 2015 with new missions and other content improvements

      • Shadowrun Hong Kong

        • Another expansion pack for Shadowrun, built on an improved engine and released for free for everyone that owned the original

Updates

  • In new court documents shown in the case between Epic Games and Apple, it looks like Epic has been angling for a special deal with Apple for months now
    • Emails from CEO Tim Sweeney show him asking for special considerations when it comes to the App Store’s 30%, and even going so far as to ask for the ability to make their own app store for iPhones completely separate from Apple’s
    • Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers is so far upholding Apple’s right to remove Fortnite from the App Store, leading Epic to incite their players by announcing how they’ll be missing out on new updates and events because of Apple, even though this entire crisis is all because of Epic Games and could be fixed by them just removing the direct payment option they’re trying to use to get around Apple’s payment system
      • And they are really working to incite their players. Their FAQ about the topic is full of rhetoric like accusing Apple of forcing Epic to collude to maintain their monopoly (read: making them follow the terms of their contract) and saying Apple “intentionally sabotages consumer iOS devices” to prevent them from installing apps directly from developers. Which is not sabotage so much as it is how iOS has been designed.
    • Judge Rogers has said that Apple can’t take actions that would affect the Unreal Engine though, so at the moment Epic’s developer accounts are safe since that is somewhat separate from the Fortnite app
    • A full hearing is set for September 28th, and the lawsuit is expected to run for months if not years

An ad agency decided to bypass proper sponsorships and go straight to Twitch stream text-to-speech donations to talk about Burger King

  • The agency Ogilvy tweeted a video showing the results of their campaign that had them donating the price of various Burger King menu items, never more than $5, and using the text-to-speech donation message to talk about the products
    • The streamers’ faces were blurred, and presumably for legal reasons their gameplay footage was replaced by fake games
  • One streamer hit the nail on the head when pointing out a problem with that- they asked “listen, are you gonna sponsor me or not?”, to which Ogilvy replied in the video “We gave you $5!”
    • Considering the advertising budgets that can go in to even something as small and simple as this, that’s complete bull
  • The video wraps up with streamers thanking the Twitch user for their donation, but mainly just because they’re being polite even though their platform was just taken advantage of
  • As stated by RubberNinja, it should probably be investigated by the FTC, because this was a blatant misuse of the stream footage and trying to sneak brand deals in for a pittance is just tacky and borderline illegal
    • Some of the streamers recognized themselves in the video, and have said that they were not approached for consent
    • And many have pointed out that not only does this seem to violate Twitch’s terms of service, it could also interfere with actual legitimate deals that streamers may have had with competing brands

DC and Warner Bros have announced a new Batman game coming in 2021, sans Batman

  • Gotham Knights will star Robin, Batgirl, Nightwing, and Red Hood, all taking on the Court of Owls and stepping up to take care of Gotham with Batman out of the picture
  • The title will hit the PS4, PS5, PC, XBone, and Series X, and is being made by the team behind Arkham: Origins
  • Rocksteady, the developers that made the original Arkham titles, have apparently been working on a Suicide Squad adaptation

Bungie is making interesting choices with Destiny 2, vaulting content that people have paid for as part of the Beyond Light expansion

  • About two years worth of content, including campaigns, areas and story, totalling $95, will simply no longer exist
  • They will be offering new content, but to take away stuff that you’ve paid for and treat a video game like it’s Netflix is a disturbing precedent
    • When you’re playing an MMO you can expect some content will be event or season based, but in this case they’re taking away base Destiny 2 content, two DLC’s, three seasons of content, and two expansions. None of which was advertised as transient or limited-access
  • And on top of questions of ownership, it could also leave a pretty big gap for people looking for a narrative thread. It destroys any kind of cohesive experience in exchange for Fortnite-style seasons

Facebook is warning investors that Apple’s iOS 14 could shave more than half of its Audience Network revenue (and a chorus of angels sang out: “Good.”)

  • The Facebook Audience Network lets advertisers track mobile users with a unique device ID to target ads and measure their effectiveness, but where it’s currently a manual opt-out process if you wanted to keep a semblance of privacy, on iOS 14 users will now see a prompt when they first open an app that wants to track them
    • And of course if given a popup that says “Hey, can we sell your information for advertising?”, most people will click no. And that makes Mark Zuckerberg sad. And it makes me very happy.

This Week In Gaming History

August 22 – 1987 – The Legend Of Zelda – NES

  • The start of one of the most prolific adventure series
  • The game was the first to have an open world where the player had to explore the world and learn the best route to complete the game.
  • The theme, composed by Koji Kondo, is synonyms with adventure to gamers everywhere.

August 23 – 2011 – Deus Ex: Human Revolution – PS3, Xbox 360, Windows

  • Set in the year 2027, Human Revolution focuses on ex-SWAT officer Adam Jensen, who is employed as a security officer for Sarif Industries, a company on the leading edge of advanced and controversial artificial organs dubbed “augmentations”.
    • An attack on Sarif Industries that apparently kills researcher and Adam’s ex-girlfriend Megan Reed also leaves Adam critically injured. To save him, company CEO David Sarif subjects him to an extensive augmentation procedure: six months later, now recovered and possessing advanced augmentations, Adam sets out to pursue his attackers and the shadowy organization behind them.
    • The story explores themes of transhumanism, the growing power of megacorporations, and their impact on social class.
    • It also uses the series’ recurring cyberpunk setting and conspiracy theory motif.
  • Development of Human Revolution began in 2007 with a small team within the fledgling Eidos Montréal studio, after multiple aborted attempts to create a sequel at original developer Ion Storm following the 2003 release of Deus Ex: Invisible War.
    • The two key influences were the myth of Icarus, a thematic element carried over from Deus Ex; and the artwork and ideas of the Renaissance, which influenced the story, graphics, and music, while combining with the series’ typical cyberpunk elements.
    • The open-ended nature of the gameplay was tricky for the team to achieve; as a result, the boss battles were outsourced to another developer due to time constraints.
    • The music, composed by Michael McCann, focused on ambiance and three-layered compositions over character themes and overt melodies.

August 24 – 2020 – No Straight Roads – Switch, PS4, Xbox One, Windows

  • Start a rock band & end the EDM empire in NO STRAIGHT ROADS, a rockin’ action-adventure from the minds of Wan Hazmer (Final Fantasy XV) and Daim Dziauddin (Street Fighter V).
  • Explore Vinyl City & fight musical megastars on your journey to defeat oppressive EDM empire ‘NSR’, in an action-packed adventure that mashes together rhythm-infused third-person combat with a kick-ass soundtrack!
  • Key Features:
    • Discover the world of Vinyl City, meet larger-than-life characters and lead a musical revolution to end the EDM empire.
    • Rock out solo in an action-packed single-player campaign or band up with a friend in couch co-op.
    • Master rhythm-infused third-person combat as Mayday & Zuke, members of indie rock band Bunk Bed Junction, each with their own music-based weapons and attacks.
    • Defeat musical megastars from a range of genres, including a pop-tastic boy band, a globe-spinning DJ, a child prodigy pianist and more on your journey to bring back rock.
    • Fight for your right to rock! Learn awesome new moves, upgrade your abilities and use the power of music to transform props into weapons.
    • Experience an awesome dynamic soundtrack from a line-up of musical talent, including Falk Au Yeong, Andy Tunstall, Funk Fiction, James Landino, Masahiro “Godspeed” Aoki, Az Samad, Clyde Rabatel and the Video Game Orchestra.
    • Partner up with an additional local player to take control of the Elliegator, a secret alligator assistant who can help players in battle by picking up items, transforming props and calling in useful bonuses.
    • Assist Mode lets up to three local players experience No Straight Roads’ music-based action together, only on Nintendo Switch™.
    • Touchscreen Support – Use the Nintendo Switch™ system’s touch screen to transform props and pick up items.

August 25 – 1997 – GoldenEye 007 – N64

  • This game introduced the first person shooter genre to many people
  • It was thought that FPS would never work off of PC, and this was a huge step forward for console gaming.
  • I’ve seen the game many times, and never the movie.

August 26 – 1989 – Game & Watch Multi Screen: Zelda – Dedicated Handheld

  • Game & Watch Multi Screen: Zelda is the fifteenth and last game in the fourth (and biggest) series of Game & Watch games published by Nintendo, also known as the Multi Screen Series, consisting of 15 titles.
    • Unreleased in Japan.
  • The G&W Zelda game mixes the exploration part of the first Zelda game with the combat gameplay of Zelda II.
    • The goal of your quest is to save Princess Zelda by gathering pieces of the Triforce, each hidden in one of the eight dungeons of the Hyrule Kingdom.
    • Each dungeon is crowded with monsters and ghosts.
    • To go from one room to the next you’ll have to choose between two paths, but only after defeating an armed Goblin.
    • When defeated you’ll get an randomized item: the dungeon map, extra hearts, an axe or magic potions.
    • After defeating the dragon in the last room the piece of Triforce is awarded to Link.
  • The upper screen shows all the useful information: the items you own, the dungeon map, pieces of Triforce gathered and the boss location. The lower screen shows all the action that is happening.

August 27 – 2015 – Pixel Slime U – Wii U

  • PIXEL SLIME U is a unique auto-platformer that challenges you to get the LOWEST score possible.
  • Jump, twist, and glide your way through 40 challenging levels while trying to avoid death.
  • This game will keep you coming back while you compete with others on Miiverse™ to have the LOWEST score.m

August 28 – 2000 – Mario Tennis – N64

  • My favorite Mario sports spinoff
  • Choose your favourite Nintendo character and take to the world of tennis.
    • Game types include ring shot (where you must shoot the ball through golden hoops that are suspended above the play area, gaining bonus points as you play), bomb tennis (simply put Tennis with Bombs) and Piranha Challenge (much like the tennis machines which chuck balls at you, but in this case they are replaced with Piranha plants).
    • Of course, there is your normal tournament mode, with up to 4 players in on the action, and some crazy arenas, especially Bowser’s Castle, which is suspended above a lava pit!
  • I was hoping for something more like this game with Aces, but I was sorely disappointed with how Aces felt to me.

Tidbits

  • The debut trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has been blocked in China and subsequently edited everywhere else, because it used about a second’s worth of footage from the famous Tiananmen Square protest
    • But I’m sure this has nothing to do with Chinese company Tencent’s stake in Call of Duty owner Activision
  • Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout is now officially the most downloaded PS Plus game of all time world-wide
    • The game is a fair bit of fun, too, taking the Takeshi’s Castle and Wipeout formulas and turning them into quick little 60 person battle-royales
  • TikTok parent company ByteDance is suing the US government over Trump’s executive order demanding the sale of TikTok to an American company under threat of being banned from the US
    • It seems kind of ironic that they’re suing a national government because of accusations of not being able to stand up to another national government, but it is what it is
  • The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is apparently next-gen Prince of Persia-like stealth game coming in 2021
    • The game will feature a branching narrative, which could get interesting considering we all know how the story ends for Gollum, but it aims to expand on hints given by J.R.R. Tolkien about Sméagol to make a story that fits along with the books and works in aspects of his warring personalities

 

For more content, Patreon supports get access to upcoming ideas and more!

Thank you Renée, and check out her podcast that Josh works on, Ravage Love.

And thanks to the rest of our ‘fanily’ that support us.
And if you want to support us too, its as easy as clicking this link!
And talk to us in the comments!

PS2J 313 News – Stifling Innovation

Free games

  • Twitch

    • Truberbrook

      • 2019
      • A point-and-click sci-fi mystery adventure game with hand-made scenery and stop-motion elements married with 3D animation

  • Epic Games

    • Remnant: From the Ashes

      • 2019
      • Third person action RPG shooter that borrows mechanics from the Soulsborne games with the addition of more gunplay on top of melee combat, where the earth has been decimated and overrun by an interdimensional evil called the Root

    • The Alto Collection

      • Alto’s Adventure
        • Join Alto and his friends as they embark on an endless snowboarding odyssey. Journey across the beautiful alpine hills of their native wilderness, through neighbouring villages, ancient woodlands, and long-abandoned ruins.
      • Alto’s Odyssey
        • Join Alto and his friends and set off on an endless sandboarding journey to discover its secrets. Soar above windswept dunes, traverse thrilling canyons, and explore long-hidden temples in a fantastical place far from home.

Trump has apparently issued executive orders that will ban not only TikTok but also WeChat from operating in the US if they aren’t sold by their Chinese-owned companies by the end of September

  • As we’ve reported Microsoft is already looking at buying TikTok from its parent company ByteDance, but this is the first we’re hearing about anything to do with WeChat
    • WeChat started life as a popular chat platform, especially for communicating with people in China as other US messaging apps are banned by the Chinese government, but has grown with abilities like transferring money and shopping online
  • Trump’s order alleges that TikTok “automatically captures vast swaths of information from its users,” such as location data and browsing and search histories, which “threatens to allow the Chinese Communist Party access to Americans’ personal and proprietary information — potentially allowing China to track the locations of Federal employees and contractors, build dossiers of personal information for blackmail, and conduct corporate espionage.”
    • There’s some basis to these worries, since a Wall Street Journal report found that the app tracked Android users’ MAC addresses for over a year, as recently as November 2019
      • A MAC address is a globally-unique identifier for any device that connects to a network, and is normally blocked so they had to build a workaround to even get the information
    • The order also claims that the platform censors or disseminates content in keeping with the Chinese Communist Party’s agenda, citing “when TikTok videos spread debunked conspiracy theories about the origins of the 2019 Novel Coronavirus.”
  • And the one for WeChat is pretty similar, but also includes a ban on financial transactions with its owner Tencent
  • I can see where this is all coming from, but as TikTok said in a statement it sets a dangerous precedent in forcing foreign companies to sell to American ones if they want to operate in the US
  • And you have to wonder how much of this is fuelled by the stunt organized by many TikTok users which had them registering for thousands of tickets to the Trump campaign rally in Tulsa but not showing up, which likely contributed to the sparse attendance
    • As we’ve seen before, when something hits Trump’s ego he’s likely to lash out in toddlerific fashion
  • It’s gotten to the point where TikTok is apparently planning to sue the Trump administration, challenging the executive order and arguing that the action is unconstitutional as it does not give the company a chance to respond
    • They also state that the national security justification is baseless, according to a source talking to NPR, and that it’s built on pure speculation and conjecture

Epic Games has decided to take on Apple and their App Store in a calculated move regarding in-app purchases

  • Earlier this week, Epic introduced a new direct payment option in the Fortnite app for iPhone and iPad, allowing players to purchase in-game currency at a discount by bypassing Apple’s in-app payment framework and giving the money directly to Epic Games
  • The problem with that is Apple’s App Store guidelines are specifically against that, saying that not only do purchases of in-game currencies need to go through the App Store, but also that you’re not even allowed to tell someone about other purchasing options
    • This makes sense to a point, because Apple generally gets 30% of App Store sales and if someone could say “Hey, pay on our website and it’s cheaper!” then that revenue would drop significantly
  • Epic Games knows exactly what they’re doing in flouting these regulations though, and in an FAQ they described not only Apple’s but also Google’s 30% commission as “exorbitant”, leading them to introduce an alternate payment system to offer 20% discounts
    • If you’re doing the math at home, I guess they’re grabbing that extra 10% for themselves
  • So just hours after the new payment option was brought online, Apple pulled the Fortnite app from the App Store
    • In a statement provided to MacRumors, Apple said that Epic Games knowingly violated the App Store guidelines, and just because they want to push for a special arrangement doesn’t change the fact that the same set of rules should apply to everyone
    • One thing to note, this doesn’t stop anyone from playing the game if they’ve already downloaded it, it just stops new downloads
  • Shortly afterward, Epic announced a new Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite short riffing on Apple’s 1984 ad and likening Apple to Big Brother
    • The fact that they had this ready in the chamber shows they knew exactly what they were doing when breaking those rules and how Apple would react
    • And they’re definitely going guns-blazing, claiming at the end of the video that “Apple is blocking Fortnite from a billion devices”, even though as we previously said anyone that already downloaded it can still play
  • Then Epic Games filed a pre-prepared lawsuit against Apple for pulling Fortnite, accusing Apple of being “the behemoth seeking to control markets, block competition, and stifle innovation”, imposing “anti-competitive restraints” and using “monopolistic practices in markets” against developers
    • It’s a little hard to justify this though, since Apple basically built a walled garden and made it attractive enough for people to want to play in it. Just because you break the rules and get kicked out doesn’t mean they owe you a spot inside.
  • Epic says it’s not looking for a cash payout, but instead wants to secure relief in the iOS app distribution and payment processing market for consumers and developers
    • Digging in to the lawsuit, it looks like they’re using this situation as a wedge to argue that iOS should be as open to third-party software as the Mac is. In fact, they’re almost saying it’s illegal not to be
  • At this point is feels like Epic Games is jumping on the antitrust bandwagon, protesting that Apple’s not making enough space for them to thrive, but I wonder how it would feel if this kind of thing was applied globally.
    • Look at Fortnite- it has a huge audience and I have no way of making money off of it. If I draw a gun skin and want to sell it inside of Fortnite there’s no way for me to do so. Because Epic is stifling my innovation and imposing anti-competitive restraints by forcing people to use its own currency inside the game instead of giving players a chance to give me money for my work.

Microsoft’s rumoured Xbox Series S has been confirmed by leaked controller packaging, and the controller’s pretty nice too

  • The new Xbox controller has slight design tweaks all over the place, with a redesigned d-pad, textured triggers, a new share button, and a slightly smoothed out shape
    • It reportedly even works on the current generation Xbox One, with onscreen graphics matching the updated controller
  • The packaging specifies that the controller works with the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S consoles. The Series X has already been announced, but this is the first official word we’re hearing of the Series S
    • The S is expected to run the same CPU as the Series X, but with less RAM and a slower GPU
  • Twitter user @zakk_exe managed to buy the controller from someone on the online classifieds app OfferUp who “got it from a homie”

Facebook is facing yet another lawsuit over how the company uses the personal information of its users, this time because of Instagram

  • Last month Facebook offered a $650M settlement for illegally collecting biometric data via its photo tagging feature
    • If approved, affected users could be paid up to $400 each
  • Now a new case has been filed in California, accusing Facebook of collecting, storing, and profiting from the biometric data of over 100M Instagram users.
    • The biggest problem is that there was no consent involved, and users weren’t even made away of the data harvesting.
    • Instagram apparently let people know at the start of this year, but it’s believed to have occurred for some time before that
    • The lawsuit states that the unauthorized collection of this info would be a violation of Illinois privacy law, in which case Facebook could be forced to pay up to $5000 per violation

This Week In Gaming History

August 8 – 2013 – Cookie Clicker – Browser

  • Cookie Clicker is an endless game where the entire point is to gather cookies, then use them to buy items and upgrades which do nothing but gather cookies even faster.
  • It is highly regarded as the first, at least, the most influential incremental clicker game.

August 9 – 2018 – Discord Nitro Beta Releases

  • On the Discord Blog, this was posted “Today, we’re slowly rolling out a beta test to about 50,000 of our Canadian players and will be expanding to more over time. These players will see an upgraded version of Discord Nitro that has access to a curated selection of games along with the current subscription perks. They’ll also see a new Discord Store tab in the home screen with individual games for purchase.”
  • Released on the Beta, the following games for Windows:
    • Bridge Constructor
    • Dandara
    • Darksiders: Warmastered Collection
    • Darksiders II: Deathinitive Edition
    • GoNNER
    • Kathy Rain
    • Kingdom: New Lands
    • Metro: Last Night – Redux
    • Slime-san: Superslime Edition
    • Super Meat Boy
    • System Shock: Enhanced Edition
    • Tormentor X Punisher
    • de Blob

August 10 – 2004 – Ben’s Game – Windows

  • A special 3d game designed by Ben Duskin and LucasArts. Ben is a 9 year old with Leukemia. Ben worked with the Make-A-Wish foundation to find a developer for Ben’s game. Ben wanted to make a game that would help kids battle cancer.
  • The game involves a changeable character riding a skateboard over an imaginary playing field, made of red blood cells and cartoon representations of viral infections. The character collects innoculents to shoot at his enemies. The player pivots his character in order to steer around objects and collect bonus shots.

August 11 – 1993 – Samurai Shodown – Neo Geo

  • In early feudal Japan, a man named Shiro Tokisada Amakusa preaches a heretic religion. Little does anyone know that Amakusa is really a servant of the evil Ambrosia, who had possessed and taken over Amakusa’s body, as Ambrosia wishes to shroud the world into eternal darkness. Now, the player must select from out of 12 fierce warriors and plus 3 bonus characters in order to fight for the honor of defeating Amakusa once and for all, while fulfilling a specific mission for each and every warrior in the game.
  • The Genesis version of the game does not however include the Earthquake which has been removed due to its 16-bit memory capacity and technical size limitations.

August 12 – 1981 – PC-DOS Included Game – DOS

  • Included with IBM’s PC-DOS was Microsoft’s BASICA (Advanced BASIC) interpreter and several programs, one of which was a game and hence is of interest to us: DONKEY.BAS.
  • Directing a sports car on a stretch of rural road, the player must beware of donkeys roaming its picturesque lanes. Spot a donkey ahead and the player must quickly determine whether to switch lanes with the space bar before the car’s course brings it into a messy head-on collision. With each burro successfully traversed, the car moves a little higher on the road — closer to earning a point for the player (after passing eleven mules) but also giving less response time between the appearance of the titular donkey and its potential impact.
  • The game credits two people for coding the game
    • Neil Kozen, whose other credit is for designing Forza Motorsport
    • Bill Gates

August 13 – 2013 – Papers, Please – Steam

  • Papers Please is a simulation game based on the life of a immigration inspector charged with checking passports at the border of a fictional communist state, Arztoska.
    • The game is set after the conclusion of a six year war with neighboring Kolechia, the war has moved the combatants boarded and left the city of Greznin split.
    • Kolechia controls the west and Arztoska the east. The game begins with the player being selected for border duty in Arztoska’s monthly labor lottery. He (the player character is unnamed) and his family are relocated to the city of Greznin.
  • A powerful game paralleling the Cold War in Europe.

August 14 – 1989 – Altered Beast – Sega Genesis, North America

  • You are a hero raised from the dead by the god Zeus to rescue his daughter Athena.
    • With scenery inspired by Ancient Greece, you have to fight hordes of undead and demons, with a boss at the end of each level until you meet the god Neff, who holds the girl captive.
  • Made by Team Shinobi, creators of the first Shinobi game, as well as Golden Axe
  • Fun podcast fact, the bit crushed audio from this game “Rise From Your Grave” is used as a bumper on the Last Podcast On The Left.

Tidbits

  • Researchers are rejoicing over changes to the names of human genetics, all because of Excel
    • Apparently there were genes with names like “Membrane Associated Ring-CH-Type Finger 1”, which was abbreviated to MARCH1. The problem was that Excel would automatically format that as the date 1-Mar and confuse data with no way to turn the feature off
    • There are manual options to prevent this, but they need to be applied to each spreadsheet and for many people that aren’t necessarily power users the data would just end up corrupted each time it was exported
  • Control is taking fire for how it’s unveiling the new Ultimate edition as part of the release of its second expansion
    • The Ultimate Edition will come with all updates and content, including both expansions, and see a Steam release for the first time
    • The problem is that only people who buy the Ultimate Edition will get an upgrade to the next-gen version when it comes out for the Series X and PS5
      • People who bought the game day one, or even those who purchased the season pass, will not get the free upgrade on next-gen consoles and would need to buy the game all over again
  • MIcrosoft’s new Surface Duo Android tablet finally answers the burning question “Hey, how much would it cost to slap a hinge on two 6” tablets?”.
    • The answer is apparently $1400 USD
  • Halo Infinite has officially been delayed until 2021, citing COVID-related impacts and other development challenges and saying the extra time will help them deliver the most ambitious Halo game ever
    • I’d quote Miyamoto about this, but as we’ve seen over the years with No Man’s Sky and Duke Nukem Forever development time doesn’t necessarily equate to quality

For more content, Patreon supports get access to upcoming ideas and more!

Thank you Renée, and check out her podcast that Josh works on, Ravage Love.

And thanks to the rest of our ‘fanily’ that support us.
And if you want to support us too, its as easy as clicking this link!
And talk to us in the comments!

PS2J 312 News – Domestic Spying Only

Free Games

  • Twitch

    • NeuroVoider

      • 2016
      • Twin-stick shooter RPG set in a futuristic world about brains shooting around evil robots with nuclear rocket launchers, where you can customize your brain with the smoking remains of your victims

    • Dead in Vinland

      • 2018
      • Survival management game mixed with RPG and adventure elements, about a viking family trying to survive after being exiled on a mysterious island

    • Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn

      • 2018
      • Fighting game featuring Shaquille O’Neal that has you fighting your way around the world, beating outlandish celebrity bosses, and listening to a new rap track from Shaq himself

    • WARSAW

      • 2019
      • Turn-based historical role playing game where you need to use everything at your disposal to help a team of accidental heroes survive on the streets of Warsaw in 1944

    • Treachery in Beatdown City

      • 2020
      • Retro-style beat ’em up with RPG tactics and wrestling mechanics that lets you build a custom character and go save the president

    • Blazing Chrome

      • 2019
      • Side-scrolling action run and gun that has you freeing human kind from a machine-ruled world with fast-paced single player or co-op gameplay

    • Chroma Squad

      • 2015
      • Turn based tactical RPG about five stunt actors who decide to quit their jobs and start their own Power Rangers inspired TV show, where you customize your studio, craft your giant cardboard mechas, and combine your heroes’ abilities with teamwork maneuvers

    • Baseball Stars 2

      • 1992
      • Two player sports arcade game for the Neo-Geo that also saw a home release on the NES, it was lauded as having unparalleled gameplay and “the best graphics, sound, and gameplay this side of ESPN”

    • Shock Troopers 2nd Squad

      • 1998
      • Top-down military themed action shooter arcade game on the Neo-Geo that actually has no connection to the first Shock Troopers game, you choose from four mercenaries with different abilities to take down a terrorist organization

    • Ironclad

      • 1996
      • Side-scrolling shoot ’em up that has you manoeuvring a warship and teaming up with the mighty Iron Clad in order to fight the Iron Mask Republic and save the Kingdom of Chop

    • King of the Monsters

      • 1990
      • Isometric fighting game that pits pits kaiju against eachother and humanity to discover who is the strongest Super Monster of all

    • Sengoku 3

      • 2001
      • Side-scrolling beat ’em up that has you adventuring around the world to destroy evil spirits awoken by the red moon, with armed and unarmed combos and massive Ninja Art attacks

    • Metal Slug 2

      • 1998
      • Iconic run and gun action shooting game where you fight your way through a hail of bullets to thwart General Morden’s evil ambitions and uncover the secret of his new coup

    • SNK 40th Anniversary Collection

      • Video game compilation consisting of 24 different arcade and console games published by SNK between 1979 and 1990, from Ozma Wars to Crystalis

  • Epic Games

    • Wilmot’s Warehouse

      • 2019
      • Top-down puzzle game about keeping a warehouse running in tip-top shape. You’ll need to flex your organizational muscles in arranging and grouping items so you can retrieve requests as quickly as possible

    • 3 out of 10, Ep 1: Welcome To Shovelworks

      • 2020
      • Billed as the world’s first playable sitcom, it’s a fully animated and voiced free episodic series based in the world’s worst game studio, with narratively driven mini games taking you behind the scenes in a satirical look at game development

Health Canada has released a national COVID-19 contact tracing app, and it actually uses the proper exposure notification API

  • COVID Alert is available on iOS and Android, and takes full advantage of the Apple/Google Exposure Notification API
    • One thing to note here is that because the API is only available in iOS 13, you’ll need an iPhone from the last five years or so (6s or newer)
    • That lets your phone silently record randomized identifiers for anyone that comes within range of you for 15 minutes or more
    • Then, if someone tests positive for COVID-19, they just have to enter a code given to them by health care workers and it will upload a list of everyone that was in range in the last 14 days
    • At set intervals your phone will check the uploaded lists and, if your identifier was included in one, let you know that you may have been exposed
    • No personal information is asked for or collected by the app- you’ll see a prompt asking to enable COVID-19 Exposure Logging and Notifications, and then another asking to enable notifications for the app. Other than that it just asks what province you live in
  • A lot of other apps, even some local ones like ABTraceTogether, have attempted something similar, but because they wanted to use their own systems they hit walls like your iPhone screen needing to be on and unlocked at all times
    • These apps are not only battery hogs, but also less secure as they could be accessing other identifying information while they run
  • There is a caveat here in that reporting is currently limited to a pilot program running in Ontario, but you can still download and run the app anywhere in Canada so that your contact tracing records are kept up to date. Then even on day one of reporting in your province you’ll be able to see if you came into contact with someone days or weeks ago
  • Estimates show that these apps become really effective after they reach 60% of an area’s population, and there’s literally no downside to running it, so I’d heartily recommend everyone take a moment and get that going on your smartphone

Xbox Game Streaming is going full Stadia on September 15th, but they might actually do it right

  • Based on Project xCloud, the new tech will allow Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers to play more than 100 games from the cloud on their Android devices
  • You’ll be able to play things like Minecraft Dungeons, Destiny 2, Gears 5, and Yakuza Kiwami 2, and they’ve announced they’ll be providing day-one access to new titles from Xbox Game Studios
  • Mobile users will have full access to the console experience, including friends lists, achievements, and saved game progress
  • And one of the best parts is that this isn’t limited to the States- September 15th will see the launch across 22 countries across North America and Europe
  • Unfortunately this is Android exclusive- Microsoft was running tests with iOS devices, but Apple’s App Store policies smacked the whole idea down
    • An Apple spokesperson told Business Insider that streaming services like these can’t be on the App Store because the company can’t review every single game included in the apps
    • They say that because games are interactive, unlike movies and music, they must be reviewed before being allowed to reach iPhone and iPad users
    • I think if that’s their concern they should just put the highest age-rating on the app and let it loose. There are a lot of interactive things on iPhones, like web browsers, where it’s just not feasible to review every single interaction

Samsung introduced a bunch of new tech with their Unpacked digital event this week

  • They introduced a fancy new Galaxy Z Fold 2 with a faster processor and redesigned hinge
    • The gap between the screens has been shrunk and the device is thinner than the first Fold, but the hinge also boasts improved dust elimination. We’ll see more details on September 1st when preorders open
  • The Galaxy Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra are the next flagships of the Galaxy line with 5G support
    • They’ve improved the S Pen and, for the Ultra model, set up a 120Hz screen for less latency when gaming
    • They’ve also partnered with Microsoft for three free months of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate with Xbox Game Streaming, as well as a free controller to play with
  • New tablets are coming in the form of the Tab S7 and S7+, and are the first tablets that support 5G in the US (for what it’s worth)
    • Apparently they’ll have a lot of Microsoft integrations, including the ability to use it as a second screen with your Windows computer
  • Taking a note from Apple’s iPhone X, Samsung skipped right from the Galaxy Watch to the Galaxy Watch3, with a smaller, thinner, and lighter body that still houses a larger screen
    • The new model has a cool feature that can measure your blood oxygen levels, too, which is pretty handy when we have a lung-attacking pandemic on our hands
    • Recent rumours are saying that the next Apple watch will also include this feature
  • Galaxy Buds Live are Samsung’s latest wirefree earbuds, now with active noise cancelling
  • And they’ve announced the followup to their original folding smartphone, the Galaxy Z Fold2 5G
    • This one goes back to the book-style body of the Fold, but now when it’s closed you get a full 6.2” screen instead of the giant bezels and 4.6” screen of the original
    • They’ve also switched the display from using plastic to “ultra thin glass”, to improve strength and scratch-resistance, and improved the hinge to be not only stronger but also offer more varied angles
      • It still has a slight gap in the hinge, but Samsung says they’ve added bristles to keep dirt out

It’s been a weird week when it comes to TikTok

  • With such a popular app being owned by a Chinese company, many are concerned about the data that so many are willingly uploading to the service (along with whatever it may be grabbing behind our backs) ending up in the hands of a foreign government
    • Some are also concerned about how it could pave the road for some low-grade propoganda, given how the way videos are promoted to users is a complete mystery
  • Last Friday Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that he would be banning the Chinese social media service from the United states, though given his track record who knows what he actually meant
    • He said he’d be signing the document the next day, but whether that was supposed to be an executive order or something else it never materialized
  • Then two days later Microsoft confirmed its intent to acquire TikTok in the US, Australia, Canada, and New Zealond, saying they got a window from the president to have a deal in place by September 15th but is still threatening a ban if they can’t hash it out
  • On the political side, China’s communist party tabloid Global Times called a forced sale the “hunting and looting” of TikTok, and with Trump saying the US Government should get a “substantial portion” of the sale for “making it possible for this deal to happen”, you can start to wonder if they may be on to something

This Week In Gaming History:

August 1 – 1991 – F-Zero – SNES

  • The series is known for its high-speed racing, characters and settings, difficult gameplay, and original music, as well as for pushing technological limits to be one of the fastest racing games.
  • The original title inspired the creation of games such as Daytona USA and the Wipeout series.
  • And selfishly, I love this game for putting Captain Falcon into Smash bros, so he could be cloned to be my main Ganondorf.

August 2 – 1992 – Mortal Kombat – Arcades

  • Mortal Kombat was considered as one of the greatest video games of all time by critics and audiences in 21st century and became a best-selling game and remains one of the most popular fighting games in the genre’s history, spawning numerous sequels and spin-offs over the following years and decades, beginning with Mortal Kombat II in 1993, and together with the first sequel was the subject of a successful film adaptation in 1995.
  • However, it also sparked much controversy for its depiction of extreme violence and gore using realistic digitized graphics, and, along with the home release of Night Trap, prompted the formation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), a U.S. government-backed organization that set descriptor ratings for video games.

August 3 – 2008 – The Angry Video Game Nerd in Pixel Land Blast – PC

  • In The Angry Video Game Nerd in Pixel Land Blast, you play the Angry Video Game Nerd from the web video series.
    • You are flying along wielding your NES Zapper, shooting NES cartridges that have been features on the Angry Video Game Nerd videos.
    • Do not touch a cartridge or get hit with a shot as this drains your life meter. If your life meter drops to zero, you lose a life. Hitting a spiked wall instantly loses you a life.
    • If you see a couple bottles of Rolling Rock beer, these will restore some of your life meter.
    • A six-pack is an extra life.
    • You can press a second fire button to call forth Shit Pickle, who will clear all enemies from the screen.
    • After a couple of levels, your progress will be saved so you don’t need to restart from the beginning, if you don’t want to.

August 4 – 2013 – Pikmin 3 – WiiU

  • The game centers around controlling three new characters: Alph, Brittany, and Charlie. They travel to PNF-404 (the planet featured in the first two games) to save their home planet Koppai from famine by harvesting seeds from the planet’s fruit. Upon reaching the planet, they discover the Pikmin, a servile species that’s both plant and animal, which they use to collect the fruit and battle the planet’s many fierce creatures.
  • Pikmin are super cute, and I love Pikmin 2, but the loss of control in this was devastating to my enjoyment of the game.
    • You used to be able to control Pikmin with the right analog stick, but in this game it is a camera control, and the Pikmin mindlessly follow you to me devoured, stomped or somehow caught by anything that follows you.

August 5 – 2000 – Hot Chix ‘n’ Gear Stix – PC

  • Caught my eye with the ridiculous title
  • Behind the wheels of one of the 6 mid-70s American muscle cars your only aim is to show yourself as the hottest chix around in this arcade-style racing game.
  • Tried to get more info off the developers website, but their website looks like its no longer hosted

August 6 – 2001 – Mobile Suit Gundam: Journey to Jaburo – PS2

  • An action game based directly on the Mobile Suit Gundam films and series. The game begins at the start of the series and ends at the ending of the second film.
  • The game plays in an action game format with a standard third-person view. It features newly hand animated cutscenes that depict events from the original television series as well as a CGI opening depicting a space battle from the One Year War and then a scene of the Gundam destroying several Zaku IIs before being attacked by Char Aznable.
  • A sequel, Mobile Suit Gundam: Encounters in Space, was released in 2003.
    • Which has hard to learn controls that reflect space combat well.
  • The English dub of the video game features the voices of the actors who were cast for the Mobile Suit Gundam television series as with most games subsequent to the series’ dubbing, rather than the English cast of the films.

August 7 – 2018 – Dead Cells – XBox One/PS4

  • Dead Cells is a roguelike action platformer video game inspired by Metroidvania-style games
  • Absolutely love the art style, I have no idea how to play the game. And feel like I’m bad at it.

Tidbits

  • Animal Crossing: New Horizons has officially sold more than double what New Leaf did, beating out Breath of the Wild and Super Smash Bros Ultimate to reach the number 2 spot for Switch game sales just under Mario Kart 8
  • Bethesda has announced that Doom Eternal and The Elder Scrolls Online will both be free on the PS5 or Xbox Series X for players that have them on PS4 or Xbone, respectively
  • A new brushing scam saw people in dozens of US states receive mystery seeds in the mail that they didn’t order
    • Governments are urging people not to plant them or throw them out, as they could introduce invasive species, but to contact your state plant regulatory official instead
    • Brushing scams, I learned this week, are a e-commerce trick where scammers will get ahold of people’s names and addresses and then send them some random, low-value item.
      • The idea is that once there’s a record of some kind of shipment, they can use that to legitimize fake positive product reviews that they attach your name to
  • Three teenagers were arrested this week for last month’s massive Twitter hack that had prominent users like Bill Gates and Elon Musk promoting a Bitcoin scam that earned over $100K
    • According to federal agents, they’d used their own driver’s licenses to open Bitcoin wallets that received some of the loot
    • The suspected leader is being charged with more than 30 felonies, including communications fraud and identity theft, but the hack could have been a lot worse if the goal had been to affect global policy rather than make a quick buck

 

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PS2J 311 News – Farewell To Digital Nuclear Arms

Security

  • The online alcohol retailer Drizly was hit by a data breach this week, with as many as 2.5M accounts compromised
    • Information taken includes email address, date of birth, hashed passwords, and in some cases even delivery addresses
    • Data obtained by TechCrunch also included phone numbers, IP address, and location data associated with billing information
    • Though the company said that no financial data was taken, a listing on a dark web marketplace claims to be selling a hacked Drizly account including a valid credit card
      • This may not have been part of the same breach though, as the listing is from February and according to haveibeenpwned.com the hack occurred on July 2nd
    • Quick reminder, don’t re-use your passwords and if you have an account on Drizly it’s time to change it

Free games

  • Epic Games

    • 20XX

      • 2016
      • Mega Man X inspired roguelike action platformer that you can play with a friend on the couch or online

    • Barony

      • 2015
      • First person roguelike RPG with optional cooperative play and graphics that are kind of like Doom meets Minecraft, it’s described as a love-note to classics like System Shock and Daggerfall

    • Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery

      • 2012
      • Indie exploratory action-adventure featuring an award-winning soundtrack by Jim Guthrie, that has you traversing a mythic realm, use a sword to do battle, and evoke sworcery to solve musical mysteries

  • Xbone

    • Dunk Lords

      • 2020
      • 2-on-2 basketball beat ’em up with over the top special moves, unique attacks, and abilities

    • Portal Knights

      • 2016
      • Indie RPG in a multiplayer sandbox where you can explore and build, craft items, and go adventuring

    • Override: Mech City Brawl

      • 2018
      • 3D mech brawler featuring giant robots, local and online versus modes, 4-player Voltron-style combat, and a single player campaign

    • MX Unleashed

      • 2004
      • Motocross racing game that has you racing to the finish while performing crazy stunts

    • Red Faction II

      • First person shooter based on a Mars where humankind is ruled by an evil dictatorship and only your group of elite soldiers can stand in its way

  • PS4

    • Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout

      • 2020
      • Cute MMO party game with up to 60 players in a delightful free-for-all struggle through rounds of escalating chaos

    • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Campaign Remastered

      • 2020
      • The campaign from 2009’s first person military shooter Modern Warfare 2 fully remastered with improved textures, animations, lighting, and more

iOS 14’s new security features continue to catch bad apps in the act

  • The latest culprit is Instagram, who thanks to a new indicator introduced in the upcoming software’s beta was caught using peoples’ cameras while they were just scrolling through the feed
  • According to Instagram in a statement to The Verge, they only access the camera when you tell them to, and this is a bug in the new iOS saying things are using the camera when they aren’t
    • While this is a beta piece of software, I’d tend to believe that the Facebook-owned company is getting caught in some shenanigans a lot more easily than that there’s a weirdly targeted bug saying that this one app is using your camera
  • One theory on reddit is that they keep your camera active in the background to remove the usual initialization delay when you first open it, so you’re ready to take pictures immediately, but I for one am not as inclined to give Facebook that kind of benefit of the doubt
    • And even if that was the case, then they’re still lying about this being a bug AND they’re purposefully killing your battery that much faster for a tiny bit of convenience
  • Either way, Instagram says they’ll work on fixing this “bug” in a future update

On July 27th, every player nuke was disarmed on the PS3 version of Metal Gear Solid 5, officially earning everyone on the platform a special cutscene that many believed would never been seen legitimately

  • in MGSV you run a private military corporation and are given the option to build nuclear weapons, which in a not-so-surpisingly true to reality situation many did to at least have them as a deterrent
  • This was triggered by a bug on PC a few years back where people actually had so many nukes that the counter glitched out and flipped back to zero, but the 5 year old game apparently still had a group of people dedicated to invading player bases and disarming or destroying any nukes that were left in the game
  • Unfortunately other platforms like PC may never see this happen, as some players have used hacks or exploits to do things like make other players’ games crash when they invade

Google’s taking heat in Australia over data privacy, with the country’s competition regulator accusing them of misleading users

  • The issue here is Google’s 2016 move to combine personal info in Google accounts with browsing activities on non-Google websites, which the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission says they didn’t get explicit permission to do
    • Part of the change saw Google’s privacy policy lose a statement that it wouldn’t combine advertising cookies with personal information, and replace it with one saying that “Depending on your account settings, your activity on other sites and apps may be associated with your personal information in order to improve Google services.”
  • The complaint says that linking that data together provided Google with extreme market power and was worth a lot of money, but was achieved through misleading behaviour
  • Google argues that the change was optional and that they fully intend to defend their actions
  • But the regulator believes that Google didn’t sufficiently inform consumers about what it sought to do, including information about activity on sites not actually related to Google, and is seeking a fine “in the millions”
  • For anyone more local that might be worried, you can check your settings at adssettings.google.com

Google’s announced the launch of a new Google One app for iOS, designed to let users store photos, videos, contacts, and calendars for backups

  • You can use the free 15GB of storage that comes with your Gmail accounts, or upgrade to a Google One membership for additional storage and the ability to share it with family
  • It pretty closely mirrors Apple’s iCloud offerings, but is an alternative for people using iPhones but still deep in the Google ecosystem

This Week In Gaming History:

July 25 – 2004 – I Have No Tomatoes – Windows/Linux

  • Strange name so I needed to bring it up
  • I Have No Tomatoes is a Bomberman-styled game set on an isometric playfield. The player’s goal is to kill as many enemy tomatoes as possible across ten levels, each of them 60 seconds long.

July 26 – 2010 – Gorillaz: Escape to Plastic Beach – iPhone

  • Gorillaz: Escape to Plastic Beach is a game based on Gorillaz, an English virtual band created by musician Damon Albarn and artist Jamie Hewlett.
  • It consists of four animated members: 2-D (lead vocals, keyboards), Murdoc Niccals (bass guitar), Noodle (guitar, keyboards) and Russel Hobbs (drums and percussion). Their debut album sold 7 million copies in 2001 and was accompanied by animated music videos. The band later even went on tour with projected video and later virtual characters on stage. This game was made as a promotion for their third music album, Plastic Beach, released in 2010.
  • The final chapter of the game includes an MP3 download of the band’s single ‘Superfast Jellyfish’ featuring De La Soul and Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals.
    • Super Fast Jellyfish is a song I chose to put on out PS2J Spotify Playlist

July 27 – 2010 – StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty – PC/Mac

  • The much anticipated followup to the real time strategy juggernaut.
  • Fans waited 12 years for Star Craft 2
  • This game is now a decade old and has over a million hours watched and 2300 broadcasters on Twitch, in this past week.

July 28 – 2004 – Electronic Arts acquires Criterion Software

  • Electronic Arts, Inc. – The company acquires Criterion, the studio responsible for the successful Burnout series and, most importantly, the RenderWare engine used by a great number of developers and many AAA titles. EA bought the studio from Canon Europe.
  • Criterion’s latest title of note, is Star Wars: Jedi – Fallen Order

July 29 – 2003 – Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour – Gamecube

  • The follow up to the N64 Release, I was very surprised to find that this was the last Mario Golf title for home console
  • The last golf game was made for 3DS and released May 1st, 2014
  • I find it strange as golf can be easily emulated with a Wii-mote or Joy-Con

July 30 – 1975 – Black Jack – Altair 8800

  • I like to find older game for the weekly list, and wanted to know what the Altair 8800 was
  • Wikipedia says: The Altair 8800 is a microcomputer designed in 1974 by MITS and based on the Intel 8080 CPU. Interest grew quickly after it was featured on the cover of the January 1975 issues and was sold by mail order through advertisements there In Radio-Electronics, and in other hobbyist magazines
  • It looks more like a lit switchboard than a computer

July 31 – 1996 – Virtua Fighter: Kids – SEGA Saturn

  • Virtua Fighter Kids is a modified version of Virtua Fighter 2 for the Sega Saturn. All characters were left the same, but the difference is that they are no longer adults but kids with traditional anime huge heads and short arms and legs.
  • A variety of new features has been added to increase the gameplay such as the ability to program specified moves for each character or new endings.
  • Its something that new generations will not have to deal with, a bit of a spin on a new game for a full game price. Makes me happy for DLC and updates.

Josh bought Clubhouse 51 Games for Nintendo

  • I learned a few board games I am interested in getting physical copies of
    • Hare and Hounds
    • Shogi
    • Backgammon
    • Mancala
  • Learned a few card games popular in Japan too!
    • For 2 players:
      • Speed
      • Pig’s Tail
      • Takoyaki
    • For 4 players:
      • Sevens
      • President
  • Some games feel phoned in
    • Toy Tennis
    • Toy Soccer
    • Toy Curling
    • Toy Boxing
    • Toy Baseball
  • And there is also Hanafuda
    • A complex card game, I’m sort of unwilling to learn even on this game
    • Hanafuda are Japanese playing cards that are used to play a variety of games. Hanafuda translates to “flower cards”. The name also refers to games played with the cards.
  • Cool features I’d like to try
    • There is the option for TV and Switch out with the kickstand standing it up, or laying down and players can use the touch screen
    • As well as a Mosaic Mode, there Switch consoles can be laid on a table and up against each other to extend the game past the limit of one screen. A mosaic of consoles
    • And there is a Clubhouse Games Guest Pass
      • Your friends can download this for free and play with you, without getting the full game for themselves.

Tidbits

  • Paramount has announced Sonic The Hedgehog 2 to be released April 8th, 2022
    • Confirmed by Ben Schwartz, the voice of Sonic
  • Animal Crossing bug that removed camera user interface, is now put into the game!
  • After offering more movies online while theatres were closed, Universal has set up a new deal to shorten theatrical windows from 75 days to 17
    • That means that just over two weeks after a movie comes to theatres you could buy or rent it digitally on iTunes or other online platforms
  • Spotify has launched their new Group Session feature for all premium subscribers, allowing people to listen to music and podcasts together long-distance
    • Groups of two to five people can simultaneously stream audio by sharing a Join link over messaging apps or social media
    • Once you’re in everyone can play, pause, skip, and queue up tracks for a full listening party
  • In a now-familiar turn of events, the 2021 Consumer Electronics Show has been announced as an all-digital event running from January 6-9
    • Even after borders reopen and restrictions are lifted, I can see a lot more digital events going forward just because of accessibility and budget advantages
  • Thanks to a leak via Doritos promotional material, we now know that the Activision project code named The Red Door is Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War
  • KFC is partnering with bioprinting companies in Russia to create 3D-printed chicken nuggets
    • The process uses chicken cells and plant material to reproduce the taste and texture of real meat “almost without involving animals in the process”, according to a press release
    • KFC plans to hit final testing this fall in Moscow

 

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PS2J 303 News – Screws Not Included

Security alert

  • Microsoft Security is tracking a massive campaign that installs remote access tools on your computer using malicious Excel macros, embedded in a spreadsheet purporting to show COVID-19 stats
    • The emails in question pretend to be from Johns Hopkins Center about the “WHO COVID-19 SITUATION REPORT”
    • Steps to avoid:
      • Don’t open random emails
      • Don’t open unexpected attachments
      • And most importantly, definitely don’t run Excel macros on anything you don’t know the full provenance of

Free Games

  • PS4

    • Star Wars Battlefront II

      • 2017
      • Third and first person action shooter that, as you can tell from its name, is the fourth major release in the series and seventh overall, it caught a lot of flack early on for its predatory microtransactions to the point that EA completely revamped the system to avoid gameplay advantages
      • Content based on the Star Wars movies up to and including The Rise of Skywalker

    • Call of Duty: WWII

      • 2017
      • First-person shooter following a squad in the 1st infantry division and their battles during the events of the Battle of Normandy

  • Xbox One

    • Destroy all Humans!

      • 2005
      • Action adventure game set in the 1959 United States that has you playing an alien harvesting DNA from humans to continue the cloning process of his species
      • A remake is due for release in July

    • Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse

      • 2016
      • Metroidvania-style adventure platformer that has you playing the half-genie Shantae out to save Sequin Land from the Pirate Master

    • Sine Mora

      • 2012
      • 2.5D bullet hell shoot ’em up in a diesel punk inspired world filled with anthropomorphic characters

    • Coffee Talk

      • 2020
      • Visual novel that follows a barista working in a coffee shop in a fantasy version of Seattle, as they listen to the concerns of the shop’s patrons and prepare drinks

  • Epic Games

    • Borderlands: The Handsome Collection

      • 2015
      • Improved versions of Borderlands 2 and the Pre-Sequel, the popular action RPG sci-fi loot shooters with a good sense of humor, with all their DLC, enhanced local multiplayer, and the ability to transfer save data from the PS3/Xbox 360 versions

  • Twitch

    • The Last Tinker: City of Colors

      • 2014
      • Indie developer Mimimi’s take on action adventure like Jack and Daxter or Banjo-Kazooie, minus the jump button

    • Pulstar

      • 1995
      • Horizontal-scrolling shooter, similar to R-Type, that has you defeating a hostile race of aliens threatening mankind

    • Blazing Star

      • 1998
      • Shoot ’em up sequel to Pulstar with improved graphics and less challenging difficulty

    • Fighting games

      • Samurai Shodown II

        • 1994
        • One of the first games to incorporate parrying, where you can block at the last second to deflect the attack and leave your opponent vulnerable

      • The King of Fighters 2000

        • 2000
        • 7th entry in the KoF series for the NeoGeo and the last one produced by SNK before their bankruptcy

      • The King of Fighters 2002

        • 2002
        • Ninth game in the KoF series that discarded the previous titles’ 4-on-4 striker match format and returned to the 3-on-3 battles that KoF used until ’98

      • Fatal Fury Special

        • 1993
        • An updated version of Fatal Fury 2 with tweaks to the gameplay system and an expanded roster

      • Art of Fighting 2

        • 1994
        • Set as a prequel to the Fatal Fury series, it was the first fighting series to allow players to perform a “super attack”

Trump is up in arms after Twitter decided to flag some of his misinformation as false, though the rest of his bull is still coming through strong

  • With the current COVID-19 situation, Twitter has decided to make some improvements to their platform so that incorrect information gets flagged
    • So when Trump tweeted about mail-in voting, claiming that there’s no way that they’ll be anything less than substantially fraudulent, Twitter threw a link at the bottom so that readers could “Get the facts about mail-in ballots”, and directs them to articles about his unsubstantiated claim
    • Trump’s response was to claim that they’re interfering in the 2020 election, and that Twitter is now stifling free speech. Even though that really only applies to the government, and companies are not required to give you a platform to say whatever you want
    • Then the Trump administration took to Fox News to single out Twitter’s head of site integrity, Yoel Roth, after digging up some tweets he had posted that were critical of the current US government
      • Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway called on listeners to go after him, causing a flood of abuse, harassment, and death threats online
    • So this is the government of a world power having a tantrum against a social media website because the president posted verifiably false information online
  • Unfortunately it doesn’t look like Twitter is enforcing these policies strongly enough
    • Another of Trump’s tweets has invented a conspiracy theory accusing MSNBC host Joe Scarborough of murder
      • Trump basically said that the former congressman killed a staff member in 2001 even though he was 800 miles away at the time and her death was ruled an accident (she suffered a heart condition that caused her to fall and hit her head on a desk)
      • Trump then doubled down on the accusation even after her widower pleaded unsuccessfully with Twitter to take down the posts about his late wife in an open letter, saying that they’re causing her family a lot of emotional pain
        • He went on to say that the president is perverting the memory of his dead wife for perceived political gain, and if an ordinary user was throwing around these kinds of lies they would get banned from Twitter altogether
      • Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s usual insistence that they’re sticking to the letter of their terms of use, commonly gamed by internet trolls and the president of the US, can’t even be used as armour in this case because they’re so solidly in the wrong- even by their own terms of use these posts should be removed and the account should be flagged if not banned altogether
    • This isn’t even new behaviour, after Trump used deluded conspiracy theories in 2016 against Ted Cruz, saying his father was involved in the JFK assassination, when going for the republican nomination in the presidential election

According to US courts, just turning on your phone’s lock screen may count as a search by law enforcement and require a warrant

  • While police can run a search without a warrant under special circumstances, if the phone is currently in police custody the device cannot be turned on even to take a screenshot of the lock screen. As soon as a physical intrusion is made, even just to press a button to wake up the screen, even though the lock screen is something somewhat publicly accessible, it counts as a intruding on a constitutionally protected area

Fans rejoice, you’re finally getting the Snyder Cut of Justice League

  • Joss Whedon was brought in to finish the film after Zack Snyder left the film’s production due to family tragedy, but he drastically changed the tone of Snyder’s unfinished version
  • Synder’s personal cut of the Justice League will be a long-form series coming to HBO Max in 2021, and is expected to cost over $30M in development and reshoots

More than half of Apple Stores worldwide have reopened now, and their precautions are pretty solid

  • Multiple staff are stationed around the store’s entrance to direct people to different lineups either for shopping, walk-in repair work, or genius bar appointments
  • They also have guards doing screening, temperature checks, handing out masks, and directing the use of hand sanitizer
  • In store they’re keeping physical distancing in effect by helping people across tables and continually cleaning things with sanitizing wipes
  • All in it was quite a good experience, and I felt like the store was really taking the pandemic seriously while still taking care of my laptop repair
    • If you have a MacBook with USB-C ports that just aren’t holding on to cords like it used to, you should definitely get it checked out. Just make sure they put the screws back in
    • Anecdotally, keep in mind that the Apple Store isn’t a free mask dispensary. I saw one argument while in line with a couple maintaining that, because they bought an iPad yesterday, they should get a free mask from Apple even though they weren’t entering the store at all

Fallout 76 Tips and Tricks from Foam Forge Cosplay

  • Some lessons I’ve learned about FO76 in the past 2 weeks for anyone looking to optimize their end game.
  • Start building early.
    • Pick what weapon kit out you want and start engineering yourself towards it.
    • An endgame respec right now can cost up to 50 levels of points. (ask me how I know.)
  • Auto Rifles are still viable but you need a good back pack.
    • You won’t be using power armor.
    • Charisma is a dump stat.
    • Get ready to abandon it down to 3 points once you hit 50.
    • It’s only useful for dialogue checks.
    • Grape mentats help with that.
    • The perk Glow Sight is a must have.
      • At max rank it gives +60% damage to glowing enemies.
  • A good 1  Legendary > Decent 3  Anything with armor piercing is a god send.
    • Enemies in FO4 and FO76 don’t get more health.
    • They stack “armor”.
    • This is Bethesda’s way of dealing with game balancing.
      • IE: it’s broken too.
    • VATS kills fusion cores so build your Power armor build to avoid Vats.
    • Getting a targeting hud makes enemies glow in the dark
      • Much easier to kill them when you can see them without having to “ping” them with VATS
      • Physical Damage Resistance > Any Other Kind.
  • Best end game armor is T-51B or the much coveted Ultracite armor for base game.
    • The Strangler Heart is better than both but you gotta run Vault 94 for that.
    • The total difference is almost negligible so if you want (Like me) the X-01 is still a solid set of armor to run around in.
  • Staggering opponents makes them useless and unable to fight you.
    • If you hit hard enough and frequently enough they sort of just stun lock.
    • Heavy guns and shotguns are great for that.
    • Best end game guns come from Wastelanders.
  • Farm lots of rep for both factions to get you one of the new Gauss weapon types.
    • Shotgun or Minigun. They melt enemies.
    • If you’re heavy weapon specced Becket just gives you a fantastic .50 CAL at the end of his quest chain.
    • No spoilers for his quests though. Enjoy them.

Tidbits

  • It looks like Apple has been re-issuing many app updates this week, with some users reporting 100+ apps flagged for updates over the course of a couple days
    • There’s no solid info on why, but this may have been the fix to a problem causing some apps to stop opening properly, showing an error saying “This app is no longer shared with you”
  • macOS 10.15.5 is out now, including new battery health management features to extend the overall lifespan of a Mac’s battery, especially when you keep a laptop plugged in all the time
    • It also brings options to turn off Facetime video resizing to show the active speaker, issues with Finder freezing during large file transfers and a bunch of other bugs
  • With the iOS 13.5 release last week Alberta’s ABTraceTogether contact tracing app is apparently getting an update to support the secure Apple/Google exposure notification API, but there’s still no solid word on when that’s happening
    • Unfortunately many can’t even use it in its current state, with some devices purchased brand-new even three years ago unable to run the version of Android it requires
      • The app requires Android 8 or newer, leaving about 2/5 of Android phones unable to download it
      • To contrast, more than 95% of all active iPhones support the minimum iOS 11 required
  • The new Unc0ver jailbreak for iPhones is now available, and can hack anything from iOS 11 to the latest 13.5 that was just released
    • Apparently this is the first time a jailbreak has worked on all devices on launch day since iOS 10, according to the security researcher who discovered the vulnerability
  • Facebook is reportedly planning to allow its staff to work from home on a permanent basis even after the current crisis is over
    • Zuckerberg is expecting about half of his workforce to take advantage of the new program, though salaries will be adjusted according to living costs in their location
    • Apparently they’ll be verifying employee home addresses by monitoring their access to company systems
  • Due to pandemic concerns, Blizzcon 2020 has officially been cancelled
    • The convention’s executive producer, Saralyn Smith, released a statement saying that they still want to connect with fans online but, because this is new-ish territory with a lot of factors involved like their esports competitions, rather than having anything this fall it will likely be sometime early next year

Alan finished Network Effect, the first full-length Murderbot Diaries novel, this week, and it was damn good

  • Martha Wells does a fantastic job of showing a future that is equal parts exciting, promising, and bleak, with a very realistic balance of utopian and dystopian worlds
  • For not being interested in being at all human, Murderbot is such a good example of our foibles and fallacies while also being basically super-human at times
  • If you liked the novellas you’ll love this book, and if you’re interested in solid sci-fi you’ll be in for a good time

 

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PS2J 301 News – The Boy Who Cired YouTube

Free Games

  • Twitch

    • Anna’s Quest

      • 2015
      • Point-and-click adventure game following Anna as she attempts to escape an evil witch and save her dying grandfather by solving puzzles, collecting items, and talking to characters throughout the game

  • Epic Games

    • Grand Theft Auto 5

      • 2013
      • Action-adventure sandbox game by Rockstar following three criminals and their efforts to commit heists while under pressure from a government agency and powerful crime figures
      • It quickly became the highest selling entertainment product in history, earning $1B in its first three days, and still consistently sits on Steam’s list of most popular games
      • So popular that it’s singlehandedly taken down the Epic Games Store website, even causing issues with the Epic Games launcher and Fortnite
        • As of recording the site is still down

Utah’s joined the contact tracing game with their new Healthy Together app, aimed at letting people know if they’ve come into contact with someone later diagnosed with COVID-19

  • Unfortunately they decided not to use Apple and Google’s Exposure Notification API, and instead opted for a less private GPS and Bluetooth option
  • According to the Utah state website, they opted to use their own framework because they say Bluetooth alone “gives a less accurate picture” than the combination of Bluetooth and GPS
    • I can get how the extra location information could assist in identifying transmission areas, but at the end of the day this is a government app that logs not only who you’re in contact with but also everywhere you go
    • It’s also another case of needing to have the app open and active at all times on a iPhone in order to fully function, which can not only affect battery performance but also the overall longevity of your device
  • At the moment about 45,000 people have signed up for Healthy Together, amounting to about 2% of the state’s population, and some estimates have shown that in order to be effective the apps will need to be used by 60%.
    • Hopefully once the more secure and efficient apps come onto the market we’ll start to see the numbers rise

We’re seeing another dark side to the wild west that is exposure notification- spam and phishing attacks

  • Police in Maine are warning cell phone users of a text message scam in which people are sending things like
    • “Someone who came into contact with you tested positive or has shown symptoms for COVID-19 & recommends you self-isolate/get tested. More at <link>”
    • These are not official messages and are doing nothing but spread panic and, depending on where the link is pointed, could give hackers a way in to get your personal information
  • The Better Business Bureau has also said that scammers are targeting seniors with messages posing as the US Department of Health and telling them they need to take a mandatory online COVID-19 test to receive their recently approved government stimulus payment
  • It’s tough to say exactly how to tell the scam messages from real ones, but one giveaway is if you aren’t running a contact tracing app then the government has no way to identify that you’ve been exposed, never mind text you about it
  • Once tracing apps start using the Apple/Google exposure notification features I think we’ll be in much better shape, as you’ll see proper system notifications from trusted government apps rather than a hodgepodge of whatever your area has put together themselves

Epic Games has unveiled the new Unreal Engine 5, and it’s very pretty

  • Unreal Engine is a game engine used by the developers of a lot of high-profile games from Yoshi’s Crafted World to the Batman: Arkham titles and Final Fantasy VII Remake
  • The new engine focuses on photorealism on par with movie CG and live-action video, and there’s a very pretty demo video online of it running on developer PS5 hardware
  • The coolest thing is that it’s not just for next-gen- the engine will support current consoles, computers, and even iOS and Android
  • As part of the same announcement Epic has also changed how its royalties work regarding use of the engine, retroactively taking 5% of sales only after a game has earned its first $1M in sales. And that 5% is waived for games published on the Epic Games Store
    • On top of that, any Oculus-exclusive games made with Unreal don’t start paying until they hit $5M in sales
    • So you can get access to triple-A game development tools for free and only start paying royalties if your game is a big success. Pretty solid deal!

Wink, a company that makes a smart home hub that links different smart home devices together, has decided to switch from a purchase model to subscriptions and completely screw over their current users

  • Previously Wink would work like most other smart home devices, you buy it once, set it up, and it works with no additional costs
  • Now, 5 years in, they’ve decided that hardware sales don’t cover their costs and you need to pay $5/month to continue using hardware you own
    • Even if you don’t use their cloud services, your access to the app, voice control, API, and automations all get deactivated if you don’t pay their ransom
    • Part of their justification is that they don’t make any extra money by selling your information, like other platforms might, but that’s less of a bonus and more of an essential feature
  • In response to backlash they went from a one-week notice period to two weeks, allowing an extra 7 days before users start being charged the monthly fee
  • I could see it if they introduced new devices reliant on a subscription, or maybe if they had a buy-back program for people that don’t want to subscribe and therefore no longer have any use for the product, but nothing like that has been announced
  • This seems like a fairly customer-hostile move, and I’ll be surprised if Wink manages to move forward without introducing something to justify the added cost

Apple has started reopening its retail stores and some of the safety measures it’s taking may violate EU privacy rules

  • One of the measures Apple’s taking to protect everyone includes temperature checks before customers are allowed to enter, using a non-contact forehead thermometer
  • However a data protection agency in Germany is concerned those checks violate EU privacy and data protection rules and has launched a probe, according to Bloomberg Law
  • Assuming they’re not storing the data or linking it to people in any way, I’m guessing this won’t amount to anything. It sounds comparable to nightclubs checking ID before allowing people to enter

New Paper Mario on Switch!

  • Paper Mario: The Origami King
    • Coming out July 17th!
  • Nintendo’s page is letting you know you can pre-order it now
    • If you pre-order it will install the data now
    • And at midnight for on the 17th you can play the game
  • A beautiful paper world to unfold
    • The devious King Olly has transformed Princess Peach into origami, uprooted her castle and sealed it shut with magical paper streamers.
    • Join Mario and his new companion Olivia on a comedic adventure that will take you to the far corners of a papercraft world
      • With the help of Olivia’s paper-folding powers, use the far-reaching 1,000 Fold Arms and other paper transformations to save those imprisoned by the Origami King’s henchmen, and help restore peace to the world.
    • Face off against the Origami King and his army of paper invaders, team up with some extraordinary companions and master magical powers on your quest to save the world.
    • Journey across the land – from scorching deserts to sailing the high seas – and recruit a revolving cast of wacky travel buddies, as you seek to sever these sinister streamers and save your paper pals from being turned into one of the Folded Soldiers!
    • Repair the damage done by the Folded Soldiers and rescue Toads trapped in all manner of wacky scrapes!
    • Put a stop to King Olly’s plans by engaging in battles which will put both your tactical thinking and puzzle solving skills to the test – against his origami army, as well as humongous bosses under his command!
  • From what I could tell from the video and screen shots
    • Paper Mario is teamed up with the origami Olivia for special powers
      • One featured has him with extended origami arms
      • It looks like the arms will be using joycon motions to work
      • Like pulling a cardboard tab along a perforated edge
    • It also looks like all the paper denizens are teamed up with Mario
      • Enemies pictured behind him facing the origami threat
      • Bowser looks like he got folded down to just his face to diminish his power
    • Game play looks very familiar
      • Traversing crafted 3D enviroments
      • RPG combat with bonuses for timing
      • Might have an over-world where travel is done not to scale
    • And it looks like some things are 3D papermache
      • Perhaps its different from the 2D paper but weaker than Origami?
        • The ending has a silly clip of Paper Mario with a giant papermache Samus helmet
          • He is running back and forth making a fist pretending his arm is a blaster
        • The scene also has a papermache DK head, adding more questions to how Paper Mario ties into the Nintendo franchises

Tidbits

  • The latest rumours for the expected over-ear AirPods Studio look very interesting with technology expected for head/neck detection (similar to ear detection in AirPods that pauses your media when you take one out), and automatic left-right side assignment
    • Analysts say that instead of having a specific left or right speaker, the headphones will detect which way they’re being worn and adjust accordingly
    • They’re expected to retail for about $349 USD
  • A remastered version of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 & 2 was announced this week in text messages from the man himself
    • Apparently Tony has a text message service you can sign up for to receive messages from him throughout the year, and he took to it to announce that every skating level from the two PlayStation 1 games would return, along with every pro skater in the original games, and the custom skate park feature from Pro Skater 5
    • Activision says it will be coming to the Xbox One, PS4, and PC (via Epic Games) this September for $40 USD, $60 CAD
  • To promote learning from home, Ubisoft is making their Discovery Tour series completely free for anyone with a Uplay account
    • Discovery Tour: Ancient Greece and DT: Ancient Egypt are versions of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey and AC: Origins that strip out the combat in favour of education
    • You can explore multiple regions, learn about daily life in the period, and hear about myths, legends, and philosophies of the cultures
  • In an effort to get around Trump’s ban on American companies from doing business with them, Huawei is re-releasing old phones that still support Google apps
    • Apparently the ban has worked is that any devices launched before the ban, and even some slightly afterward, can still be sold with Google apps installed
    • Since then though it’s been expected that Huawei will have a 20% drop is sales this year, and that may only be the initial impact as the Google-enabled Huawei phones become de-supported and fall off the market
    • So Huawei’s solution is to release “New Edition” versions of last year’s phones- new software and more memory, but otherwise the exact same phone
    • These can’t really take the place of their flagship line of devices, but it’s something they can put out there and see if people will buy, at least

 

For more content, Patreon supports get access to upcoming ideas and more!

Thank you to Breanne, for being so kind and helpful!

And thanks to all our ‘fanily’ that support us.
And if you want to support us too, its as easy as clicking this link!
We are a proud member of the Alberta Podcast Network powered by ATB
And talk to us in the comments!