Press Start!: Ice-T Thinks New Vegas Sucks, But Loves It Anyway. Me Too.
Welcome to Press Start! It’s the column that brings you the top five things that caught my eye in gaming every week. This week? This week I’m fucking tired. I’m sorry if everything seems rushed, incoherent, illogical, or poorly written this week. Why does that seem that way? Because it is! Excelsior and shit!
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#1: Apple Tried To Buy Bungie; But Microsoft Ganked Them
Some of the most intriguing news that came out this week was that Bungie originally asked Apple if they were interested in buying them. Bungie, without the monster hit Halo underneath its belt, was financially shitty. They needed someone to take them home at night to a safe place. Lay with them under the sheets, and care for them, if you get my meaning. You don’t? Shit. I was making some weird allusion to one company fucking another somehow.
Anyways.
Apple turned them down initially, only to reconsider. When they went to inform Bungie that they would, in fact, take them home and bed then, Bungie was all: fuck you guys, we found ourselves a new suitor. Oh shit! The double dick-slap? It was Microsoft. Boom! It is written in the deep sea scrolls of Apple that upon hearing this, Steve Jobs went insane. Slaughtered his entire family, and had to have them cloned and vat-grown to replace them. No seriously, he was pissed.
It’s a fascinating bit of corporate uppercutting that’s fun to think about. Consider that Halo pretty much salvaged the original Xbox, and has been the teat that Microsoft has continually milked the last nine years. But what if Billy Gates and his pack of warriors never got a hold of Halo? What would that have meant for Microsoft? For the Xbox? Or how about if it would have reshaped the gaming landscape in favor of the Mac’s favor?
Bananas shit right here.
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#2: At Blizzcon, Awesome Beefy Kid Owns The Creators On Their Own Lore
It’s long since been known that us dorks, generally, actually have a better grasp on the lore of particular universes than the people who write it. This is obviously a general statement, but I believe in it. Why? ‘Cause shit like the World of Warcraft universe is being written by tons of people, overlapping and stretching into infinity. They don’t have time to know the stories that others are contributing to the same universe as they, or maybe they do, and they don’t give a shit. I know I wouldn’t.
That’s where this awesome kid comes in. Let’s call him Maxwell. At Blizzcon last weekend, Maxwell stepped up and shredded the continuity of World of Warcraft in front of two dudes who I can only presume are lead writers of either the game or the novels. I could research it, but I’m lazy. What’s important is this: Maxwell, in all his svelte and gorgeous glory, picks apart inconsistencies in a world these two dudes are in some part responsible for crafting.
It’s awesome.
It doesn’t help that Maxwell is beyond awkward, and in that way, glorious. I want to get Maxwell drunk, and blow mouth farts on his rotund, surely hairless belly. I want to get totally hammered with him at Hooters, eating an insane amount of boneless buffalo wings and making him drink his first beer. Then after a sweet night, we’ll be chatting in the parking lot. He’ll be telling me how its ludicrous that Warcraft Character X did Continuity Breaking Action Y, when I’ll slap his nutsac. He’ll puke all over his shoes, we’ll both laugh, and then I’ll drive him home.
I think I’m in love.
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#3: Keiji Inafune, Father of Megaman, Leaves Capcom
Keiji Inafune is a god damn legend. And today he announced that he was leaving Capcom. Even if you don’t know the dude by his name, if you’re a decent gamer whose life is worth something, you’ve experienced some of his work. Not only is he considered the father of Megaman, but he’s also the creator of Onimusha, and the shit hot Dead Rising. After twenty-three years with Capcom, he announced that he is parting ways with them at the end of the month. And according to my math, that means he’s gone really, really soon.
Bummer.
Dude was essential to Capcom, and more than that, hearkened back to a day when I used to fap vigorously to Japanese developers. Capcom’s experienced a serious talent drain the last few years. With the loss of Kamiya, Mikami, and now Inafune, they’ve parted ways with the minds behind Resident Evil, Megaman, Okami, and not to mention other games. I don’t know about you, fellow gamers, but my enthusiasm for gaming has been channeled into much different directions than that of Capcom, Konami, and Squaresoft like it used to be.
Fare thee well dude, may you find a new comfy home soon enough.
#4: Ice-T Succinctly Breaks Down Fallout: New Vegas
I say without any sort of irony: Ice-T is fucking awesome. While I was too young to listen to his profanity-laced cassettes that sat in the back of my cousin’s car, I am now old enough to appreciate the man he has become. He doesn’t just hold it down on Law & Order: SVU. He married a wife with an ass that simply won’t quit. But more importantly than any of that, the dude is an avid gamer. Naw dude, not one of those celebrities that shows up at gaming premieres or whatever. He’s fucking legit. And hilarious. You only need to watch him play Borderlands to figure that out.
So when I say that Ice-T summed up my feelings about New Vegas in a recent tweet of his, I’m being completely serious.
Fallout: New Vegas shipped broken and mediocre. There was an offensive amount of glitches in the game at launch, and it still ain’t much better. Like, was there any play testing done? I don’t fucking know! The quests are all boring-ass fetch bullshit that Obsidian probably thought up while taking a collective shit. The engine is old as fuck, and looking more dated than it did in Fallout 3. The very city of New Vegas that the game takes place around fucking sucks.
For the strip, there’s fucking no one there. It’s empty and boring and retarded.
What a fucking disappointment to a Fallout 3 fanboy like me.
And yet? I’m fucking addicted. There’s something ineffably addictive about this mediocre rehash of one of my favorite games of the generation, Fallout 3. Try as they must have to fuck up something this bad, Obsidian couldn’t blow the entire thing up. Sorry guys! You fucked up the sequel to Knights of the Old Republic up beyond recognition for me, but this game still has some residual awesome. I’m assuming it is bleeding through from the entire fucking skeleton Bethesda gave you to work with.
You fucking hacks. No wonder fucking Alpha Protocol sucked.
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#5: [UPDATE] Oprah Has Mindcontrol, We’re All Fucked.
Last week, I lamented that Oprah’s audience was a bunch of easily-lead, empty ladies. I used video evidence of them freaking out over being given an Xbox 360 and a Kinect to drill home my point. Well, this week, things got bleaker. Since being displayed on her show, Kinect preorders on Amazon have risen 42fucking%. That’s eerie. It has become obvious to me at this point.
Oprah is a Queen Mindcontrol Zombie Lord.
Much like indoctrination in Mass Effect, simply viewing her is enough to begin inculcating in you a desire to follow her every whim. I swear to god, these woman will give themselves mastectomies if Oprah ordered them to do so. It doesn’t even matter the reason! New style? Cutting-edge (literally) preventative medicine? They’re sold. It doesn’t matter. And then I’d come home and be like “Mom, why is your shirt so bloody, and why does the meat loaf taste so weird?” and I’d look at the uncleaned knife she was using to cut it, after she hacked off mammary gland.
Kinect is in the hands of the Queen Mindcontrol Zombie Lord.
We better get used to motion controls.
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That’s my five things. What caught your eye? Have a happy Halloween you pieces of filth, and I’ll see you next week.