Videogame Art: Ancient Domains of Mystery (1994)Others are disturbed by the very existence of Chaos... how did it come into being if everything is Gaethra's dream? Just a passing nightmare? Or a sign of madness...? |
The result is such a bewilderingly botched abortion of a videogame that it is actually worth playing
through it once to witness first-hand what can happen when you give a lot of money and an overly ambitious mandate to a bunch of clueless losers.
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In other news: People with bad taste will continue to have bad taste.
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Sunsoft's Batman is one of my most beloved games, and one I enjoyed a lot during my early teen years when Funcoland was the shit. Now I am a 22 year old man and I must share my affair with the rest of the world.
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SNK's internal development team Saurus will not be remembered for the consistent level of quality of their small
library of games.
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Is Games Art?Conventional opinion would have it that games are not art. |
The Simulacrum is TrueThe simulacrum is never what hides the truth -- it is truth that hides the fact that there is none. |
Of ScholarsAnd when I lived among them I lived above them. They grew angry with me for that. |
Of the Sublime MenAnd do you tell me, friends, that there is no dispute over taste and tasting? But all life is dispute over taste and tasting! |
Of Self-Overcoming... and truly, where there is perishing and the falling of leaves, behold, there life sacrifices itself -- for the sake of power! |
Of the Famous PhilosophersYou are tepid: but all deep knowledge flows cold. The innermost wells of the spirit are ice-cold... |
Of the RabbleLife is a fountain of delight; but where the rabble also drinks all wells are poisoned. |
Of Old and Young WomenA child is concealed in the true man: it wants to play. |
Of the Flies of the Market-placeThey punish you for all your virtues. Fundamentally they forgive you only -- your mistakes. |
Of War and WarriorsThey call you heartless: but your heart is true, and I love the modesty of your kind-heartedness. |
Of Reading and WritingUnconcerned, contemptuous, violent -- that is how wisdom would have us be: she is a woman and never loves anyone but a warrior. |
Japan, the West, and the GeeknocratsJapan's games industry isn't dying, it's only that everyone seems to be ignoring it in favour of shoddy hardware which breaks down, and generic, cloned games with poor art direction. |
On NihilismThere is no more hope for meaning. And without a doubt this is a good thing: meaning is mortal. |
IrreconcilabilityWhereas the Good presupposes a dialectical involvement of Evil, Evil is founded on itself alone, in pure incompatibility. Evil is thus master of the game... |
I gave up on the GTA series roughly half-way through Vice City, and hardly even touched the next three
episodes.
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Shortly after Natsume finished work on Tokkyu Shirei Solbrain,
they were contracted by Bandai subsidiary Angel (Solbrain's publisher) to create another game based on the world of Toei's Japanese superheroes...
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Our AirIndeed, what one hears is, as among soldiers, mostly reproaches and harsh rebukes; for doing things well is considered the rule, and failure is the exception; but the rule always tends to keep quiet. |
Beyond its undeniable stylistic allure, Persona 3 is no more than a collection of cursorily designed mini-games
ineptly grafted onto a shoddy dungeon crawler.
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Abe's Oddysee is in essence Prince of Persia in a different setting and with lots of added features.
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While never managing to achieve the prominence of Capcom, Konami or Taito, Natsume nevertheless proved to be one of the most competent developers of action games for Nintendo's Famicom and Super Famicom consoles.
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Posting Guidelines: Last WarningPeople do not realize nor care how much time editing this forum takes from my day. |
On Insects and their LawsI am not sure how I've so far managed to avoid the subject of so-called "game politics"... |
Discussion: Gaming's Missing KaneAnd since we are on the subject of Citizen Kane x Videogames, here's Alex Kierkegaard annihilating one of Insert Credit's most widely respected articles. |
Desperation is a Stinky CologneConstantly begging people to take your hobby seriously is the biggest tell that people shouldn't take your hobby seriously. It stinks of immaturity and desperation, like a 10-year old in the throes of a tantrum because his seat is still at the kids' table. |
The "Blowback" of DualityBut the moral law can do nothing against the rules of the game and the order of evil, which takes its revenge come what may. |
Evil and MisfortuneThere is nothing immoral in this. According to the rules of the game, there is nothing immoral in some losing and others winning, or even in everyone losing. What would be immoral would be for everyone to win. |
The Easiest SolutionsFortunately there are other, more poetic ways of ridding oneself of freedom -- that of gaming, for example [...]: in gaming no one is free, everyone is both the master and the slave of the game. |
On the World in Its Profound IllusorinessGod, who once was present, but also absent, from all things, now circulates in the arterial networks of computers. |
Integral RealityThe eclipse of God left us up against reality. Where will the eclipse of reality leave us? |
Event and Non-EventOnly events liberated from information (and us with them) create great yearning. Only these are "real", because nothing can explain them, and our entire imagination is ready to greet them. |
My Death is Everywhere, my Death DreamsDeath itself demands to be experienced immediately, in total blindness and total ambivalence. |
Punctual Death, Biological DeathThe irreversibility of biological death, its objective and punctual character, is a modern fact of science. It is specific to our culture. Every other culture says that death begins before death, that life goes on after life, and that it is impossible to distinguish life from death. |
The Theorem of the Accursed ShareThe totality constituted by Good and Evil together transcends us, but we should accept it totally. There can be no intelligence of things so long as this fundamental rule is ignored. |
Whatever Happened to Evil?We have become very weak in terms of Satanic, ironic, polemical and antagonistic energy; our societies have become fanatically soft -- or softly fanatical. |
The Mirror of TerrorismHere we have a sort of surgically accurate prefigurement of the events of our future: events so minimal that they might well not need take place at all -- along with their maximal enlargement on screens. |
Prophylaxis and VirulenceIn every compulsion to resemblance, every extradition of difference, in all contiguity of things and their own image, all conflation of beings and their own code, lies the threat of an incestuous virulence, a diabolical otherness boding the breakdown of all this humming machinery. |
Discussion: Baudrillard on Death, Power, Evil and RealityThis is a series of essays I have chosen with great care from amongst Baudrillard's writings, reposting them here with a view to giving people a chance to become less stupid. |
Xerox and InfinityNothing inscribed on these screens is ever intended to be deciphered in any depth: rather, it is supposed to be explored instantaneously, in an abreaction immediate to meaning, a short-circuiting of the poles of representation. |
HateIt is because our society no longer allows space for real violence, historical or class violence, that it generates a virtual, reactive violence. |
Labour and DeathThe master confiscates the death of the other while retaining the right to risk his own. The slave is refused this, and is condemned to a life without return, and therefore without possible expiation. |
The World Without WomenWhat becomes of a master without a slave? He ends up terrorizing himself. And of a slave without a master? He ends up exploiting himself. |
On "Emergent" Game Behavior and other MiraclesAnd is there really any possibility of discovering something in cyberspace? |
Contemporary Art: Art Contemporary with ItselfFor this is where the mystery lies today: in the brain of the receiver, at the nerve centre of this servility before "works of art". What is the secret of it? |
Winners Always Use DrugsIt began with the recent unveiling at E3 of the Wii-bound sequel to 2006's New Super Mario Bros. |
Duels of the Planeswalkers is the latest attempt to bring the excitement of the popular Magic: The Gathering trading card game to the digital realm.
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Final verdict? Go play Mars Matrix.
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Insomnia's second full-length JRPG review. Enjoy.
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The Darlings of Independent Game Development: Exhibit #2.
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The belt-scroll action game (aka "beat 'em up") was quick to establish an affinity with the versus fighter.
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Basic InstinctsEvery error, of whatever kind, is a consequence of degeneration of instinct, disgregation of will: one has thereby virtually defined the bad. Everything good is instinct -- and consequently easy, necessary, free. |
Discussion: On Equality and Other ReligionsIt is obvious from recent developments that we cannot go any further without making one thing extremely clear: that the concept of equality, whether of sexes or races or individuals, or even of animals, plants, or inanimate objects, is absurd. |
Exterminating AngelThere is no difference between discourse and the essence of war. Their aim is to destroy, not denounce, the adversary. |
Cocksucking VideogamelandAnother week, another Kierkegaard smear article. |
On WomenYou need only look at the way in which she is formed, to see that woman is not meant to undergo great labor, whether of the mind or of the body. |
NEWSFLASH: VIDEOGAMES ARE A NICHEIt's true: look it up. |
How Good Exactly is Perfect?One of the issues that regularly comes up among those who pretend to care about game reviews is that of ratings. Here's a tip for picking out the idiots, next time you find yourself witnessing such a quarrel: it is the guys who are against them. |
Beyond the Videogame News RacketWherein the inner workings of the sordid business of game-related news reporting are examined and discussed, and an appeal to the communal nature of the more creatively-inclined and well-informed readers is duly made. |
Confessions of a Book ReviewerGeorge Orwell, circa 1946, exposing the humbug that is professional reviewing. |
Domination 101: Banned!A debate has recently re-erupted in the forums, and I thought it worth thinking about. |
... is what happens when moderately talented developers imbibe the artfag movement.
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SimulationsThe simulacrum is never what hides the truth -- it is truth that hides the fact that there is none.The simulacrum is true. |
Jean Baudrillard and the Definitive Ambivalence of GamingIf games attract us, for Baudrillard, the reason is clear: "Games are serious, more serious than life". |
Discussion: On Icy's Geniuslol, etc. |
Frank Miller meets casual gaming in Platinum Games' long-awaited debut.
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Discussion: On Artfags and AbstractionOne of the many complicated concepts the artfags are incapable of grasping is abstraction. |
Postback #15Editorial: Divagaciones de un videófilo (III). Reviews: Captain Silver (1987), Die Bahnwelt (1992), Gekitotsu Dangan Jidousha Kessen Battle Mobile (1993), Super Contra ~Alien no Gyakushuu~ (1988). Artwork: Phantom Kingdom. |
Intertextuality as Intertext and Bourgeois Project[Menard] thus realizes what has been the project of the literary critic since Sainte-Beuve in the 19th century... namely, the domination of the work by the critic. |
The Athlete as Buffoon: Cultural and Philosophical Considerations on Professional WrestlingDecadent literature emphasizes style and technique over content. |
Yet another venerable PC franchise gets the Xboxification treatment.
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HFD interview in N-Pro DDP: DOJ BL DVD booklet (2007)HFD says: Don't throw away games if you're losing. |
Tsuneki Ikeda interview in N-Pro DDP: DOJ BL DVD booklet (2007)Because dying is good. |
Dodonpachi: Daifukkatsu reinvents, reinvigorates, and redefines.
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Chances are, if you like Ikeda games, this one will pull you right in. And for me, it does not get much better than this.
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Are Games the Last Bastion of Manliness?Screw political correctness. |
There are a few anime series tie-ins that are almost always functional travesties when it comes to gaming adaptations. One of those has been Ryosuke Takahashi's Soukou Kihei VOTOMS.
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Domination 101: You Can Lead A Scrub To Water, But You Can't Make 'Em ThinkIn a disappointing development, it seems we have a new wave of scrubs announcing they're not only too stupid to play well, but too stupid even to watch a video. |
Stylish Little Whiny Brat Puzzle Action.
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Chaos Field is not an "original" game: it basically takes many elements from various other shooters and puts them together. This is typical, after all, of doujin games, and by no means a bad thing, mind you.
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Untold Tales of The Arcade: I Shoot, Therefore I AmChaos, death, and a world on the brink of collapse. |
Lifeless, bland, and fan-gamey, Contra 4 feels at times like a horrible slight to Nobuya Nakazato, all of whose Contra episodes were both amazing, and personable.
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The bastard child of Xboxified "achievements" and retrohipsterdom. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the avant-garde of gaming in the 21st century.
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How Cartoon Animation Steered Off CourseCan you spot the parallels? |
Discussion: BraidAttention artfags, attention artfags! Copy, copy, do you read me? |
Sakura leaves gently floating down, a few shamisen notes -- what a wonderful opening scene. Vintage 16-bit style. If only I could say likewise for the rest of the game.
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Online play at last, and a host of other welcome changes. (But try not to think of the graphics.)
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"TF2 is to TFC what Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game for the Sega Saturn is to Super Street Fighter II Turbo."
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Because "Dimensional Ninja Action Movie: Tenchu" sounds so much cooler than "Tenchu: Stealth Assassins".
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One day suddenly, you receive 12 UCHU-guided bombs. What do you do? 'Suicidal explodion' game with new feelings. Blow up self to involve enemies!
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A side-scrolling beat 'em up from the creators of Ecco the Dolphin, which is best described as the Ecco the Dolphin of side-scrolling beat 'em ups.
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Why I Hate Narrow-minded ExpertsBecause people that don't exist are so aggravating, you know? |
Postback #14Editorial: Round 2. Reviews: Actraiser (1990), Tengai Makyou: Shin Den (1995), Kyuiin (1996), Daiku no Gen-San ~Beranme-Chou Soudouki~ (1990). Artwork: Street Fighter III 2nd Impact ~Giant Attack~. |
Trash, Art, and the MoviesLike those cynical heroes who were idealists before they discovered that the world was more rotten than they had been led to expect, we're just about all of us displaced persons, "a long way from home." |
From the forumOn books on games, competition and meaning, working for the man, David Sirlin, the philosophy of videogames, artificial intelligence, sex in games, Tim Rogers, Steven Poole, hobags, N'Gai Croal, the ethics of videogames and videogame culture. |
Don't just sit there and waste your precious time. When you want to do something, do it right away. Do it when you can. It's the only way to live a life without regrets.
-- Another way is to not spend too much time with Sonic 2.
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Sakaguchi's epic travesty of a videogame finally gets the proper review treatment.
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One of the weirdest themes ever dreamed up for a shooter, but thankfully there's a great game underneath it all.
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A second take on Ibara. But is it a step forward, backward, or sideways?
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Death comes to us allIn the last couple of years I have come to feel very acutely the extremely ephemeral nature of amateur websites. |
PC Game PiracyMore than any sane person would ever want to know about this subject. And then some. |
On GeniusGreat, genuine and extraordinary work can be done only in so far as its author disregards the method, the thoughts, the opinions of his contemporaries, and quietly works on, in spite of their criticism, on his side despising what they praise. |
On ReputationThe [worthy writer] has nothing but enemies; because intellectual superiority is everywhere and under all circumstances the most hateful thing in the world, and especially to bunglers in the same line of work, who want to pass for something themselves. |
On CriticismAnd as a matter of fact, fame comes only by a slow and complex process. The stupid person is by degrees forced, and as it were, tamed, into recognizing the superiority of one who stands immediately above him... |
On Some Forms of LiteratureThus it is that all journalists are, in the very nature of their calling, alarmists; and this is their way of giving interest to what they write. Herein they are like little dogs; if anything stirs, they immediately set up a shrill bark. |
On Thinking for OneselfEvery one who really thinks for himself is so far like a monarch. His position is undelegated and supreme. His judgments, like royal decrees, spring from his own sovereign power and proceed directly from himself. |
On Men of LearningStudents, and learned persons of all sorts and every age, aim as a rule at acquiring information rather than insight... It never occurs to them that information is only a means of insight, and in itself of little or no value; that it is his way of thinking that makes a man a philosopher. |
On EducationThe fatal tendency to be satisfied with words instead of trying to understand things -- to learn phrases by heart, so that they may prove a refuge in time of need, exists, as a rule, even in children; and the tendency lasts on into manhood, making the knowledge of many learned persons to consist in mere verbiage. |
On Books and ReadingNine-tenths of the whole of our present literature aims solely at taking a few shillings out of the public's pocket, and to accomplish this, author, publisher, and reviewer have joined forces. |
On Authorship and StyleMen who think and have correct judgment, and people who treat their subject earnestly, are all exceptions only. Vermin is the rule everywhere in the world... |
Videogame Art: Tekki (2002)Nerves of Steel in Battalion Hell. |
State of the Gaming MediaYes, this again. And no, we are not quite completely fed up with it yet. |
A History of ToaplanToaplan Co., Ltd. formed largely from the ashes of the company Crux in 1984 (Crux, in its turn, had formed from the ashes of Orca). Most of the early Toaplan games were released through Taito, while a few were published by Data East and SNK. |
Videogame Art: Contra: The Hard Corps (1994)Remember when you were playing Contra Spirits and you eventually had to ask the waiter to take it back because there was too much PILOTWINGS in it? Brad Fang has the solution. |
Videogame Art: Spacewar! (1962)War is the father of all things.--Heraclitus |
The Piracy of ArtWhen Jean Baudrillard, the world-renowned French theorist, first published "The Conspiracy of Art" in 1996, he scandalized the international artistic community by declaring that contemporary art had no more reason to exist. |
The Conspiracy of ArtThe illusion of desire has been lost in the ambient pornography and contemporary art has lost the desire of illusion. |
Fuck MetroidvaniasThe apparent appeal of the metroidvania is twofold (other than the fact that it's really easy to do); first, it makes implementing something I'll call the "first law of Miyamoto" straightforward; second, it gives your game much more "organic" "structure". |
I hear people complaining that there's too many good fighting games coming out lately and too little time to play them. Well they won't be complaining about this one.
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I am on the fence about this game and it's getting on my nerves (it
always does when I can't decide if I should recommend a game or not), so I figured I might as well start writing and see how it goes.
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I first discovered this Konami SRPG (the second one to come out for the PSP, after Idea Factory's GOCIV Another Side) a few months ago through Recap, who had covered its release in his forum circa summer 2005.
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Videogame Art: Gun Valkyrie (2002)Starship Troopers meets an inspired Japanese take on the steampunk theme, and a 3D action engine that remains unrivaled. This is Smilebit at its best. |
Videogame Art: Metal Slug (1996)There is something inimitable about this work, with obvious attribution to the talent of the graphic artists, but above all in mechanics honed through long experience in the old Irem school of game design. |
The Imperishable Night dedicated cab!It takes a special kind of madness to spend $2600 to play a $15 game. Do not do this. |
Domination 101: So you want to be a Dominator? Part 1There's something deeply satisfying about seeing these games played truly well. It has a kind of beauty all its own. |
Insomnia frontpage feedCompatible with all flavors of the RSS and Atom standards. (Note that the news feed remains separate.) |
Leave ranking to the expertsSo my friends at Action Button have begun a "top 25 games ever" countdown, and I figured I might as well take the opportunity to make an effort here to explain why such lists are an astonishingly retarded idea. |
The Fake-HD EraSo apparently Halo 3 runs at 640p and Call of Duty 4 at 600p (in both its X360 and PS3 iterations). I know what you are thinking -- LOLWHAT, etc. Aren't games on these consoles supposed to be 720p minimum? Does that mean Halo 3 and COD4 are not "HD"? |
Postback #13Editorial: Los nuevos tecnócratas. Reviews: Oh No! (2000), Son Son II (1989), Lightbringer (1994), Akumajou Dracula (1991). Artwork: Brandish. |
Domination 101: 2D vs. 3D: Seth Responds! Round 2, Fight!Since I wasn't able to respond to a lot of the comments I received on last week's article, I'd like to take some time to do that here, squeezing a little more theory in along the way. I didn't want anybody to think that I didn't still care! |
Domination 101: 2D vs. 3DNotice: For the faint-of-heart, dandies, pimpernels, pretenders, hard-heads and the other subspecies of scrubs -- we're starting to tackle a biggish question this week, and the going gets a little rough. This will be your only warning. Try and keep up... |
The Death of Art and TransaestheticsRegular readers will perhaps be aware of my efforts to clear up the "games as art" confusion that often causes videogame commentators to say even more stupid things than they usually do. |
On New Games JournalismBeing profound and seeming profound. -- Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who would like to seem profound to the crowd strive for obscurity. For the crowd believes that if it cannot see to the bottom of something it must be profound. |
The second stupidest word in videogames... is, of course, the word 'retro'. Whenever you see this word used in the context of videogames, you can safely erase it and replace it with the following sentence: |
Domination 101: On CheapnessThis week's question touches on the ever-controversial topic of "cheapness": |
Postback #12Editorial: Street Fighter vs. Street Fighter. Reviews: Neutopia (1989), Stahlfeder ~Tekkou Hikuudan~ (1996), Rupupu Cube: Lup Salad (1996), The Great Battle III (1993). Informe: Scanlines: ab initio (parte I). Artwork: Final Fantasy XII. |
On complexity, depth and skillThree of the most important concepts in the field of electronic games, and indeed also of real-life ones, are "complexity", "depth" and "skill". |
Untold Tales of The Arcade: The Mighty Sword Against The Bacterians, The Story of Gradius The AlmightyTalking about Gradius is at the same time an honor and a burden. I can't think of a series with a wider base in the niche genre of shooting games. |
Mini-games are for mini-gamersLol, yeah. You know who they are. The "quirky" indie game lovers. The XBLA "arcade" game hipsters. The Mini-Yous and the Mini-Mes. Et cetera. But don't let my derisive tone fool you -- this is one of the most important articles you will ever read on this website, or any website for that matter. |
Domination 101: Prelude to a DissEver see one of those stories where some goober gets three wishes, and ends up screwing himself over? (i.e. very old folk stories, sitcoms, and from X-Files episodes to any number of movies, including the recent Bedazzled (which is infinitely inferior to the 1968 version, by the way)). |
Casual reviews are for casual gamersActually, the truth is that casual reviews are for no one; I just played around with the title of this article to match that of the previous one, for bonus cheekiness points. But what the hell exactly am I talking about here? |
Non-games are for non-gamersSeems self-evident, doesn't it? And yet good luck trying to find a single gaming outlet that gets it. |
Does anyone hate anything anymore?I found Matt's latest commentary ("Does anyone like anything anymore?", April 6) quite illuminating. |
Domination 101: Why Street Fighter Rules, Part 1If the Red Chinese invaded tomorrow and banned the game entirely, nobody would really miss it after two or three months. |
Untold Tales of The Arcade: Rays from the PastIt's one of those days. The sun shines but dark clouds are on the horizon, it's hot outside and a cold breeze moves my hair, which keeps getting longer and longer. I am listening to the Raycrisis OST and thinking on life and trivial matters. |
In February 2017 of the new Japanese era there is a man trying to rule the NEO GEO World. "I will topple Neo Geo's most
powerful warriors and put myself on the throne!" We knew that if he managed to obtain Neo Geo World's awesome power, world
domination would not be far from his reach.
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The handheld sequel to Gunstar Heroes is superior to the original in many ways, yet still carries over many flaws,
while also introducing some new ones.
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Videogame Art: Half-Life (1998)First, a bit of history. While Half-Life remains a pretty excellent game to play through, what really completes the picture is when you consider when it came out in addition to how. |
Does anyone like anything anymore?In terms of games, I mean. |
Itsuwari no Rondo ("Rondo of Lies") is the first game by Osaka-based developer Fun Unit. It's also the best SRPG on the
DS so far (and by a wide margin), and one of the best such games to come out in years.
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The Wii version of Winning Eleven 2008 reinvents sports gaming.
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One-minute reviewsReviewed inside: Deae Tonosama Appare Ichiban, Ex-Ranza, Golden Axe II, Gunforce, Gunstar Super Heroes, Hagane, Ikari No Yousai, Jet Set Radio, Kidou Soukou Dion, Kisuishou Densetsu Astal, the GBA Made in Wario games, Sword Maniac, The Super Shinobi, Ushio to Tora and more... |
Untold Tales of The Arcade: Taito Think TankI've played a lot of arcade games in my life. Most of them have been Taito games. |
Steam PoweredThere's relatively few series which I'll occasionally feel the need to just go back to and play through every single chapter just to refresh myself on them, but for whatever reason a couple of weeks ago I got it into my head to play through the entirety of the Half-Life series. |
The videogame news racketThe first thing that needs to be understood in any discussion regarding the business of videogame news reporting, is that the sources of these news are always the game companies themselves. |
Of Genocides and ReinventionsMore hints about the Americanization process of the video game, more examples of unavoidable reference. Comedy and drama in equal part. |
Untold Tales of The Arcade: The Creation of a New Style, Giant Fish and The Fight for SurvivalDarius is about the fight for life. Before human beings were the dominant life forms in the Galaxy, the Great Old Ones ruled the universe. |
PC-9800 Series Emulation GuideSince the Night Slave review was published we've had a few readers inquire about PC-98 emulation, which can be a bit tricky to figure out, at least for those who don't speak Japanese, because all the major emulators are made by Japanese people and are hosted on Japanese websites. |
The nuts and bolts are as important as the ones and zerosInsomnia is finally getting a hardware section. Here's why. |
The RPG conundrumThe point of this article is to clarify my RPG reviewing policy, in light of the astounding revelations seen in my recent article on the subject. |
Untold Tales of The Arcade: Mission SecretI've played many arcade games in my life: sometimes just for the music (before it became easy to import OSTs), and sometimes because the mechanics were so smooth and well-designed that every play was a subtle and sublime experience. |
Establishing the basicsThis is the part where I explain why I am forced to link my own articles again and again on this website, in an effort to get as many people as possible to read them. |
On role-playing gamesRole-playing games are games in which players assume the roles of fictional characters and collaboratively create stories. Players determine the actions of their characters based on their characterization, and the actions succeed or fail according to a system of rules and guidelines. |
Take the Insomnia artfag test!And to conclude our "games as art" thematic week here on Insomnia, we've devised a little test for you, which should help you determine once and for all which side of the fence (or closet, if you prefer) you're on. |
Message my ass"Never say never again." Now there's a wise message for you, from James Bond of all people. After my recent article on "artfaggotry in videogames", I thought I was through with the sorry subject, but "Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in." |
"Can games be art?" and other childish nonsenseIn certain kinds of writing, particularly in art criticism and literary criticism, it is normal to come across long passages which are almost completely lacking in meaning. |
Untold Tales of The Arcade: Episode 1I've spent most of my life in L'Aquila, a small city northeast of Rome. My uncle also lives here, and has had a successful arcade since '82. |
On "value" for "money"One of the things that never fail to infuriate me about game reviews is the way reviewers handle the subject of game pricing. |
Gunstar Heroes is best described as an awesome boss-rush glued together with shit. Shit meaning it has every design
element of one of those terrible Euro shooters (see: all of them), also known as euroshmups.
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Imperishable Night is the third in the Shrine Maiden series of shooting games on the PC, created by Team Shanghai
Alice (actually just one person, ZUN).
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It speaks volumes about the wealth of FPS titles currently available that TimeShift has been released to relative
indifference amongst fans of the genre.
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I guess, in a way, this game was bound to disappoint me from the start, and the better it turned out the greater the
disappointment was bound to be.
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In Assassin's Creed you play as Desmond, a bartender in the year 2012 who's been kidnapped by a pharmaceutical company
and forced to undergo experiments in a machine called the Animus.
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Reviewing Smash Brothers X -- what's in a label?Dairantou Smash Brothers X is the Japanese title of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, just in case anyone doesn't know. |
Reviewing Rez HDIf I was writing a review of Rez HD I would be deathly sure to avoid saying three things: 1) trance vibrator omg vibrator get it, 2) synesthesia and/or Kandinsky, 3) underneath it all it's just a rail shooter like PANZER DRAGOON but omg here it's so much more! |
No More "Parodies"Out of all the lame "arguments" I've heard so far from those trying their luck at defending No More Heroes, the only one I am willing to acknowledge as valid is, "Well, I enjoyed it." |
There is a hefty stack of Japanese Wii games on my desk as I sit down to write this review and one glance at it should tell
you this game is rather special. It is... the only one with a full color spine. It also happens to be the only one that's 2D.
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One-minute reviews: Mega Drive Special #1Reviewed inside: Arrow Flash, Captain Lang, Crying: Asia Seimei Sensou, Curse, Dahna: Megami Tanjou, Divine Sealing, Eliminate Down, Herzog Zwei, Emirin's Disney platformers, Michael Jackson's Moonwalker, Super Airwolf, Verytex and X-Dazedly-Ray. |
Videogame Art: Deus Ex (2000)When I first saw the screenshots and read the about the ambition behind Deus Ex, it seemed like one of those games with its head in the clouds and no way to deliver on all the promises it made. |
We don't normally devote too much space to reviewing ports and simple upgrades on insomnia, yet from time to time we come
across a few which deserve to be exempted from this policy, and you better believe that this is one of them.
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I don't buy music often or watch movies, so I play videogames to fill that lonely, hopeless void. Everyone who plays games
loves Mario. Anyone who says they don't just isn't doing it properly.
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Sequel: The VideogameThe issue of "sequels in videogames" seems to be a highly problematic one in the world of game reviewing, and one which, moreover, I have not yet seen anyone discuss and explore in depth, and with any degree of understanding. |
Overture and the future of Guilty GearI am going to start this off by dismissing as hogwash the notion that Overture is the true sequel to the original Guilty Gear. |
Overture joins Culdcept Saga and the Senko no Ronde port in the ranks of 360 games catering to those
looking for something beyond the Action, Sports, FPS and "RPG" formulas that dominate the current-gen console market.
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Videogame Art: Herzog Zwei (1989)A long time ago, in a country far far away, a ground-breaking new game was released for a console still in its infancy, by a company largely unknown in the West. The company was Tecno Soft, the console was the Mega Drive, and the game was Herzog Zwei. |
The open road, the dusty highway. Here today and gone tomorrow in a cloud of expensive exhaust fumes and burnt rubber. The
boyish fantasy of the road trip never tires, no pun intended.
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I really want to complain about this new Touhou game. I love the series and have spent months playing each and every
installment from PCB on, getting fairly good high scores in all of them, yet I was really disappointed by this one.
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Generic action movies give their heroes a choice; usually it's between getting the girl, killing the bad guy or both. But with
better films come better thought-out problems and dilemmas.
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PAYBACK IS A BITCH! When a routine escort mission goes horribly wrong, you find yourself in the middle of an extremist plot
aimed at throwing the world into chaos. In this dirty war against an insidious enemy that knows no boundaries, only an
underground gun-for-hire can succeed.
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The Kingdom Under Fire series is a rather perplexing one.
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Videogame Art: KororinpaThe Japanese language is a very onomatopoeic one. A huge number of "words" in Japanese are just sound effects, and daily conversation is littered with sound effects used as regular words. |
This game fucking sssssssucks and I fucking hated almost every moment I spent playing it. It's nothing more than an
ugly, gimmicky, cheap-ass, third-rate, five-dollar GTA knock-off, whose only redeeming feature is its funky comic
book vibe, and perhaps also its at-times slightly amusing dialogue.
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A collection of mini-games for the Wii! What a delightful treat! Pick from a variety of strikingly original, charming
mini-games and play for high scores in the okonomi ("preference") mode, or embark on a gripping dating sim in ikemen ("cool guy")
challenge!
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Like the Elder Scrolls series' do-anything, be-anything freedom? Like JRPGs at the same time, you fucking weirdo? Well, let's
smoosh the two of them together and see what happens!
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First off, about the graphics. I don't know why this game doesn't look too good in screenshots, perhaps it's not very
photogenic, but for some reason all the screens released by Compile Heart make it look kinda blurry and with rather dull colors.
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Death in videogames is, for some reason, an issue that seems to be more controversial in first-person ones than anywhere
else.
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Risk and reward. Whether it be in the form of sleeping with your best friend's girlfriend, or robbing a bank, or jumping off a
high bridge with a giant elastic band attached to your ankles, throughout history mankind has enjoyed taking big risks to gain an
exciting payoff.
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By night, junior high student Yoshimori Sumimura is a "kekkaishi" -- a demon-hunter specializing in creating magical
barriers around his prey. By day, Yoshimori's got some other demons to battle: an addiction to sweets and a seriously crotchety
grandfather!
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Postback #11Editorial: De genocidios y reinvenciones. Reviews: Kuroi Hitomi no Noire ~Cielgris Fantasm~ (1999), Deae Tonosama Appare Ichiban (1995), Dragon Egg! (1991), Keiou Yuugekitai (1993). Artwork: Vampire ~The Night Warriors~. |
I got thoroughly sick of this game within ten or so minutes of firing it up. By that point I had made up my mind to completely
trash it, so the only question left was how much longer to keep playing before throwing it in the garbage bin and writing the
review.
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Videogame Art: Night Slave (1996)Intense side-scrolling mech action blends with (mostly) lesbian porn in this outstanding shoot 'em up, released in 1996 for a series of computer systems the West never had a chance to experience. |
Before Suda 51's Grasshopper Manufacture made art-house-film-as-FPS Killer 7, they worked on survival horror curio
Michigan.
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Few sentences get me as worked up in the world of videogames as those containing the words 'Japanese' and 'real-time
strategy'. At the same time, few games can provoke such strong feelings of aversion in me as those whose titles contain
the words
'Final' and 'Fantasy'.
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Mukai, a member of a mysterious group, stole the Orochi seal. Taking advantage of all the confusion caused by this, Ash
stole the Yata Mirror from Chizuru. In the advent of the new tournament new faces are handed invitations while old ones, such as
Eiji Kisaragi, make their return to the ring.
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If the demo proved Sega had learnt nothing from the mistakes of Sonic Heroes, then the full game reveals they may not
even know what those mistakes were.
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One-minute reviewsReviewed inside: the ActRaiser games, Gleylancer, Alien Soldier, Bushido Blade, Cyborg Justice, Dynamite Headdy, Holy Striker, HyperZone, Mario Kart DS, New Super Mario Bros., Rhythm Tengoku, Tetris DS, Zombies Ate My Neighbors, and more... |
Why one-minute?... and whatever a man knows, whatever is not mere rumbling and roaring that he has heard, can be said in three words. |
Considering that a large part of Ash's development was done by Racjin (known mostly for working on licensed properties
such as Naruto, Hagane no Renkinjutsushi and Bleach), their name is conspicuously absent from the box, the title screen, and even
the game's official website.
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I was just about to concentrate on either Do Donpachi, which I've been playing for a long time, or Progear, which
I just recently got into after seeing some superplays and FINALLY getting what the jewelling is all about. But then I fired up a
game I thought I would hate, and then I got hooked.
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Videogame Art: Arcana Heart (2006)After the rather disappointing Tenkaichi Kenkakuden I would not have imagined that Yuki would have a game such as this in them, but that's what people can do with proper motivation. |
It's a rare game that makes me smile these days but when I first played this kooky light gun shooter I was smiling ear-to-ear.
That first credit at least was loads of fun -- I lost half my life bar before I even knew the game had started.
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The Touhou series is already almost a decade old.
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Despite being one of the fugliest arcade games in recent memory, Time Crisis 4 kept me amused for a little while.
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Don't let the number in the title fool you: this game is more of an update than a true sequel. And though I love updates as
much as anyone (and more than most), that's only true if the original game is worth updating in the first place.
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Videogame Art: Ketsui ~Kizuna Jigokutachi~ (2003)For several years Ketsui was the only Cave shooter you couldn't play without flying to Japan or dropping several hundred bucks on the PCB. |
Reviewing ports and compilationsMy reviewing policy regarding ports and compilations is not to review them -- at least not in the same way as I review the original versions of games. I'll explain my reasons. |
Six reasons to get a Japanese WiiSo the good news is that the only region-locked current-gen consoles are the 360 and the Wii. The bad news is that those two seem to be winning the console war, which means they'll end up with a ton of games you can't play. |
In the name of consistencyI often get asked -- mostly by Americans -- why I insist on referring to Japanese videogames by their Japanese titles. Many of them are offended when they see me referring to Ghosts 'n Goblins as Makaimura, or to Virtua Tennis as Power Smash. |
Arcade cultureCulture is a site of the secret, of seduction, of initiation, of a restrained and highly ritualized symbolic exchange. Nothing can be done about it. Too bad for the masses... |
Postback #10Editorial: El eterno despropósito. Reviews: Captain America and the Avengers (1991), Pulstar (1995), Gaia Master ~Kamigami no Board Game~ (2000), Kishin Douji Zenki: Battle Raiden (1995), Elemental Master (1990). Artwork: Shining the Holy Ark. |
Regarding the .ac in insomnia.acThere's a common misconception regarding this site which it is time I cleared up. A lot of readers seem to have assumed that insomnia is a website more or less dedicated to covering the arcade scene, and that my favorite genre of games is shoot 'em ups. |
Moving to FranceI've had this thing for years, where I keep a top-three ranking of the best cities I've yet visited -- 'best' here being shorthand for "most suitable for me to live in, long-term". |
The stupidest word in videogamesI don't remember exactly when this started bothering me, but it recently got to the point where I can't ignore it anymore. I am talking about the word 'gameplay', which I believe is the single most useless and misleading word in videogame terminology. But let me explain myself before you start booing. |
In G.rev's third arcade game players control robots called "Rounders" and square off against each other using a variety of
offensive and defensive techniques.
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Postback #9Editorial: Retromanía (II). Reviews: Sol-Feace (1990, X68k), Alcahest (1993), Thrash Rally (1991), Koutetsu Teikoku from Hot-B (2004). Artwork: Koutetsu Teikoku (MD). |
At this point in time, Resistance: Fall of Man defines mediocrity in the FPS genre. It's got absolutely nothing new to
offer, and the only exceptional thing about it is that it's remarkably polished, considering it was made by a company that doesn't
usually do FPSes.
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I got totally hooked on Culdcept Saga at first, putting a dozen hours in it over the space of a weekend.
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At last, the Dome ScreenThe night before the new Gundam game started hitting arcades across Japan I was going round in Akihabara, visiting my favorite joints for some Mushi Futari and After Burner Climax action. |
Before playing the new Oneechanbara I had somehow managed to convince myself that it would turn out to be a decent game. Half
an hour in and the only thing on my mind was: "How much more of this do I have to endure before I can sit down to write the
review?".
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Although D3 Publisher has so far released only a handful of titles outside its budget Simple series (most notably several K-1
fighting games), they now seem to have decided to enter the full-price market more aggressively.
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Zegapain is an anime show by Sunrise (the house of Gundam) which aired between April and September last year on the TV
Tokyo network. For an obviously manufactured series it's rather good -- at least judging by the six or seven episodes I've watched
so far.
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After the release of Ibara I had my doubts as to whether Shinobu Yagawa would remain with Cave, and, if so, whether he
would be able to keep making the kinds of games his fans have come to expect from him.
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With After Burner Climax Hiroshi Kataoka's career comes full circle. Kataoka, who is now head of Sega's arcade
division, says he joined the company just out of college in 1992 because he wanted "to make something as good as After
Burner".
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Postback #8Editorial: Presente de subjuntivo. Reviews: Edo no Kiba (1993), Genshi Tou (1989), Yakiniku Bugyou (2001), Dragon Ball: Advance Adventure (2004). Artwork: Final Fantasy X. |
Shooting and fighting game glossariesA while back I noticed that some cool guys over at the Shmups forums were putting together a glossary specifically devoted to shooting game terminology. |
In the year 2013 mankind's downfall is almost complete. A series of catastrophes, including earthquakes, wars, viruses, and
extreme weather conditions, have decimated the population and left entire nations in ruins.
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I first heard about this game back in early June while browsing the Madman's Cafe BBS. One of the site's owners who
goes by the handle "The Professor" had just attended the initial location test and was reporting back with bad news:
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Videogame Art: Espgaluda IIFor the first few weeks after Espgaluda II was released I found myself more or less beginning and ending each day with it. |
Arcsy's new fighter is the good Hokuto no Ken game that fans of the manga have long been waiting for. And though poorly balanced and glitchy, and
clearly lacking the potential for lasting high-level play, it still offers up a genuinely interesting system, and tons of style and personality
besides.
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Dynamite Deka EX ~Asian Dynamite~ location testThe way I find out about location tests for upcoming arcade titles is by keeping an eye on two Japanese websites: am-net and Ariesu no Kobayan. |
Nintendo World 2006It feels strange, doesn't it, that these days most consoles launch in the US first, and then in Japan. |
In 1991 Konami thought it had a surefire hit on its hands.
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Mushihime Tama is a sequel to Uo Poko (1998) in all but name.
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After years of producing inspired mahjong titles, Warashi returns to the STG scene in order to cash in on the genre's relative renaissance.
Unfortunately for them, it doesn't look like there will be much cashing in to be done, since players are mostly ignoring it.
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Wow, what a game. The most spectacular tennis matches are taking place across Japan's arcades at the moment, in what is surely the best versus title to
come out in years.
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