Kill Screen Magazine's Blog, page 472

Why are videogames so bad at being funny, and why are Mega64 so good at it?

How thinking outside of videogames could make videogames better.

We’re 75 million dollars closer to living the dream of virtual reality

The future has gotten even rosier for virtual reality, as the Oculus Rift headgear has just received a whopping 75 million dollars in financial backing from the investing firm Andreessen Horowitz. Oculus had previously raised just 16 million. 

This will undoubtedly propel us into the virtual future even faster. Though the hype surrounding virtual reality is resonant, we know the technology is a long way from prime time. The headset can do things to your cochleas that we wouldn’t wish on our worst enemy. This is due to technical issues like latency, low resolution, and having a heavy black mask strapped to your head. 

The device has sparked the interest not only of bloggers like me who’ve seen The Matrix one too many times, but of giants in the game industry who are set on working out the kinks, such as John Carmack, the father of shooting things in first-person, and research and development teams at Valve. Now, with their coffer receiving a kick in the pants, virtual reality may finally be coming to the masses. 

(img via telepresenceoptions)

Christine Love’s Interstellar Selfie Station is Instagram meets Gameboy Camera

The key to a well-taken selfie is to do something adorably dorky and then apply a patina. Interstellar Selfie Station, by the visual novelist Christine Love, is a snapshot app that makes this easy. This is what every high-schooler would have been doing in 1998 if the Gameboy Color Camera had an internet connection and the concept of the selfie existed back then. The 2-bit filters will make you look like a lo-fi seapunk prince or princess, as you can apply two-toned color palettes themed around Gameboy classics: Kirby, Metroid, Zelda, etc. The app isn’t coming to mobile devices until 2014, but this is all seeming very familiar. Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure my first selfie was snapped on a Gameboy. 

Cristine Love’s Interstellar Selfie Station is Instagram meets Gameboy Camera

The key to a well-taken selfie is to do something adorably dorky and then apply a patina. Interstellar Selfie Station, by the visual novelist Christine Love, is a snapshot app that makes this easy. This is what every high-schooler would have been doing in 1998 if the Gameboy Color Camera had an internet connection and the concept of the selfie existed back then. The 2-bit filters will make you look like a lo-fi seapunk prince or princess, as you can apply two-toned color palettes themed around Gameboy classics: Kirby, Metroid, Zelda, etc. The app isn’t coming to mobile devices until 2014, but this is all seeming very familiar. Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure my first selfie was snapped on a Gameboy. 

Twisted Pixel on Lococycle, Night Trap, and the sordid history of the FMV

Mixing together real-life footage with just the right amount of crazy.

The New Kings of Kong documentary will make your day

Motherboard has put together a fantastic mini-documentary called The New Kings of Kong, filmed last month in Denver, Colorado, at The Kong Off 3. The heroes and villains from the 2007 feature-length Donkey Kong championship documentary are a distant memory. The diabolical Billy Mitchell and the good-hearted Steve Wiebe have been replaced by the new kings, if that wasn’t already apparent. 

Allow me to introduce you to the new guys. The current world-record holder is a middle-aged plastic surgeon from Queens. The challenger is  a younger weightlifter who does front clap pushups and wants “to beat the crap out of the Donkey Kong machine.” Truth be told, the two don’t seem to foster the same bitter animosity that was oozing from A Fistful of Quarters, but twenty straight hours of barrel-crushing tragedy has been known to bring out the worst in a man.

And watch the original in all its hammer-pounding glory:

 

How the Zen videogame Tengami destroys FPS culture

Enlightening one gamer at a time.

Can these easy-to-use dev tools may make Ouya relevant again?

The Ouya is a charming little system that hasn’t had much love. It garnered a lot of attention and excitement on Kickstarter, positioned as a console for the little guy, but it hasn't made much of a splash since then. 

It’s now getting a shot in the arm, as Google has released a toolkit that makes it easier to develop for. The demo of the Android update shows off things that only mobile game creators would care about, like swirling particles and water flowing down a chute. But this is important because the Ouya was positioned as the “indie” console—a space for those less-experienced with programming languages to hop in and create. As I know firsthand from not being able to bring to life my idea for a game like Diner Dash but set in a taco truck, the technical aspects of coding can be a hurdle to new ideas and new games. This may help change things.

The noir-ish Framed could be the Device 6 of 2014

Framed is a noir game in which you rearrange the panels of a comic so that a silhouetted PI in a fedora can proceed through the story. The fragmented narrative and cartoon-spy schtick sort of evokes Simogo's triumphant Device 6, although with a slightly less sinister vibe. 

It's a kitschy game, a thing of novelty that you’d classify as “neat.” But it also shows us the potential for interactive storytelling moving in multiple directions, forcing us to take into account alternate possibilities, instead of the plot moving in a straight line.

It illustrates the way games have potential to tells stories differently from books or film, something they share with comics. The comic artist Scott McCloud has pointed out how the length of the panel indicates the passage of time; how events left in the margins create continuity in our heads. But the interface of Framed actually allows you to dive into those marginalized spheres of thought, which is promising.

Anti-snoozing game turns waking up into a competition

Unsnooze - The Game is an app that lets players compete with strangers in an effort to cut down on over-sleeping.