WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!
Welcome to a new edition of Best Boss Battles in Gaming History, SuperPhillip Central's long-running series celebrating the greatest encounters against some of the coolest baddies in gaming's illustrious history. With Part Eight, we have bosses from God of War III, Kingdom Hearts II, and Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, for starters. If you missed a past part of Best Boss Battles in Gaming History, no worries. We have all previous installments nicely arranged below for you.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
What’s It Like Inside a Pokémon’s Poké Ball?
What do you think is inside a Poké Ball? What doodads and knickknacks are there? Do they have air conditioning during the summer and a heater for the winter? You know you've been dying to know, and we at SuperPhillip Central thought this was cute from our friends at Movoto.
Exploring Some of the Worst Console Reveals in Recent Memory
It's always important to make a great first impression. It's especially difficult to maintain or even gain momentum when your first impression on people is a negative one. After viewing the Xbox One console reveal, we at SuperPhillip Central thought we'd list some of the worst console reveals that we can remember. Don't worry, Microsoft fans, we have a special place for the Xbox One reveal right on this very list. From five-hundred and ninety-nine U.S. dollars to The Killers, these are what we consider some (note the word some) of the worst console reveals in recent memory. After you're done reading our thoughts, write up your own and share your picks for the worst console reveal in the comments section below.
PlayStation 3
The true coming out party for the PlayStation 3 happened at E3 2006, and the infamous memes that came from it did damage that Sony is still recovering from to this day. "Five-hundred and ninety-nine dollars." "Massive damage." "RIIIIIIIDGE RACER!" All three of these are used on message boards and comment sections to this day, even by the greatest Sony zealot. The reveal and subsequent launch made it so a once dominant brand in the PlayStation struggled hard to become second place in the console wars, and that only happened recently. The millions upon millions lost by Sony and the PlayStation brand can all be traced to this one reveal and launch, and the majority of Sony's failures with the PS3 can be said to have been caused by the company's arrogance after riding off the successes of the original PlayStation and PlayStation 2.
Wii U
While the Wii U was shown with tech demos two E3s ago, the real reveal of the system was last E3. Everyone was counting on Nintendo to blow the doors off the place after many concluded that Sony and Microsoft's E3 presentations were less than incredible. It was Nintendo's time to shine and impress. Perhaps this is why the press conference is thought so badly of. Nintendo totally struck out. It started well with Shigeru Miyamoto and his translator and NoA Treehouse member Bill Trinen talking about Pikmin 3. However, the rest of the presentation quickly turned sour with showcases of Batman: Arkham City - Armored Edition (it's not the same game, it's not the same content, as famously stated by Reggie Fils-Amie) and Just Dance 4. The final insult was Nintendo Land, which to be fair, the final product is immensely fun and great, but 20 minutes showcasing it turned a lot of gamers off. Couple that will fireworks that didn't work, and you have a poor reveal. Maybe it would have been easy to predict the Wii U's current struggles just by seeing how telling the reaction (or lack thereof) of the system's E3 2012 coming out party was. Essentially no one was hyped, and that has gone on to pretty much damn the system lately.
Xbox 360
Now, we realize that a lot of people enjoyed the Xbox 360 reveal, but we take a different stance. The Xbox 360 reveal took place at a special TV event on MTV of all places. What we didn't like about the reveal was how forced and fake it felt. First off you had Elijah Wood, who is terrific guy and a terrific actor, as the host of the festivities, but even he couldn't really give a performance that excited us. Then you had the band The Killers who were there simply to promote their new album Hot Fuss. (By the way, we really like their song "Somebody Told Me.") Finally, you had a decidedly overly enthusiastic group of plants that made up the audience. O.J. Simpson was more convincing than the folks Microsoft had picked out. We have to give some credit to the Xbox 360 show as it actually showed a good amount of games-- it's just a shame that it was sandwiched between a lot of eye roll-worthy crap.
Xbox One
Let's end with the one that's fresh on gamers' minds, shall we? Gamers around the world waited with bated breath for the reveal of the new Xbox. What they got during the showing was disappointing to say the least. It was clear that Microsoft wanted to shy away from being all about games, as if they were ashamed of the industry they were supposed to be courting to. Instead, Microsoft dealt heavily on TV, a word that most likely was spoken more times than the word "games." Very telling. Throw in little gameplay footage of the actual games shown, a myriad of confusion regarding used games, always online, and Kinect, and you have an absolute mess of a console reveal. Factor all that with cheers and applause that didn't come from the members of the press but actually Microsoft employees in the back of the room, and there is our negative first impression of the Xbox One. While many gamers think the showing will put the Xbox One in a bad place sales-wise, the system could very well sell excellently, despite the awful showing, much to their chagrin.
PlayStation 3
The true coming out party for the PlayStation 3 happened at E3 2006, and the infamous memes that came from it did damage that Sony is still recovering from to this day. "Five-hundred and ninety-nine dollars." "Massive damage." "RIIIIIIIDGE RACER!" All three of these are used on message boards and comment sections to this day, even by the greatest Sony zealot. The reveal and subsequent launch made it so a once dominant brand in the PlayStation struggled hard to become second place in the console wars, and that only happened recently. The millions upon millions lost by Sony and the PlayStation brand can all be traced to this one reveal and launch, and the majority of Sony's failures with the PS3 can be said to have been caused by the company's arrogance after riding off the successes of the original PlayStation and PlayStation 2.
Wii U
While the Wii U was shown with tech demos two E3s ago, the real reveal of the system was last E3. Everyone was counting on Nintendo to blow the doors off the place after many concluded that Sony and Microsoft's E3 presentations were less than incredible. It was Nintendo's time to shine and impress. Perhaps this is why the press conference is thought so badly of. Nintendo totally struck out. It started well with Shigeru Miyamoto and his translator and NoA Treehouse member Bill Trinen talking about Pikmin 3. However, the rest of the presentation quickly turned sour with showcases of Batman: Arkham City - Armored Edition (it's not the same game, it's not the same content, as famously stated by Reggie Fils-Amie) and Just Dance 4. The final insult was Nintendo Land, which to be fair, the final product is immensely fun and great, but 20 minutes showcasing it turned a lot of gamers off. Couple that will fireworks that didn't work, and you have a poor reveal. Maybe it would have been easy to predict the Wii U's current struggles just by seeing how telling the reaction (or lack thereof) of the system's E3 2012 coming out party was. Essentially no one was hyped, and that has gone on to pretty much damn the system lately.
Xbox 360
Now, we realize that a lot of people enjoyed the Xbox 360 reveal, but we take a different stance. The Xbox 360 reveal took place at a special TV event on MTV of all places. What we didn't like about the reveal was how forced and fake it felt. First off you had Elijah Wood, who is terrific guy and a terrific actor, as the host of the festivities, but even he couldn't really give a performance that excited us. Then you had the band The Killers who were there simply to promote their new album Hot Fuss. (By the way, we really like their song "Somebody Told Me.") Finally, you had a decidedly overly enthusiastic group of plants that made up the audience. O.J. Simpson was more convincing than the folks Microsoft had picked out. We have to give some credit to the Xbox 360 show as it actually showed a good amount of games-- it's just a shame that it was sandwiched between a lot of eye roll-worthy crap.
Xbox One
Let's end with the one that's fresh on gamers' minds, shall we? Gamers around the world waited with bated breath for the reveal of the new Xbox. What they got during the showing was disappointing to say the least. It was clear that Microsoft wanted to shy away from being all about games, as if they were ashamed of the industry they were supposed to be courting to. Instead, Microsoft dealt heavily on TV, a word that most likely was spoken more times than the word "games." Very telling. Throw in little gameplay footage of the actual games shown, a myriad of confusion regarding used games, always online, and Kinect, and you have an absolute mess of a console reveal. Factor all that with cheers and applause that didn't come from the members of the press but actually Microsoft employees in the back of the room, and there is our negative first impression of the Xbox One. While many gamers think the showing will put the Xbox One in a bad place sales-wise, the system could very well sell excellently, despite the awful showing, much to their chagrin.
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
SPC Soapbox - 5/21/13 Xbox Don't One-t & the Wii U Virtual Console
Welcome to a special edition of the SPC Soapbox, hot off the trail of the big Xbox Next coming out party. On this edition I express my disappointment with the unveiling of the officially named Xbox One, and to cap things off I talk about Nintendo's apparent strategy with the slow releases of their Virtual Console games, particularly on Wii U.
Xbox One = Don't One-t
I should have been smart enough to know that the Xbox One-- that's the name of Microsoft's third home console, don't you know-- wasn't for me when the first half of the entire presentation was mostly dedicated to the entertainment features of the system instead of what a game console is meant to primarily be for-- y'know, the games. Every time the one presenter said, "Xbox, show movies." "Xbox, show TV." "Xbox, power on." I wanted someone to yell, "Xbox, show games" or "Xbox, power off." Just to make the presentation at least a bit better.
I honestly believe that the word "television" (EDIT: Or "TV) was used just as much, or maybe more so, than the word "games" throughout the presentation. Is there a good reason for this? I think Emily Rogers put it wonderfully on Twitter:
For what little games that were actually shown for the Xbox One, the only one that was intriguing to me was Quantum Break, and even then, I can't say there was gameplay footage in that. The EA Sports trailer showed off impressive models, but so did that Madden trailer some years back, and we all know that that footage was representative of the final product. Ending the conference with the new Call of Duty only further isolated me from the conference. To me so far, and pretty much everyone at SuperPhillip Central, the Xbox One is basically the Xbox 360's lineup with prettier graphics, and the Xbox 360's lineup of exclusives is the worst we've seen for a popular mainstream console-- no hyperbole intended. It's just the same games from the same genres with only new coats of paint. I like the idea of all of Microsoft's new franchises, but if they're just the same genres and games we've played last generation only with new assets, then I'm not interested.
All I know personally is that all Microsoft's event did for me was to help me decide that unless E3 is kind to Microsoft, I'm definitely going where the games are, and that seems to be the PlayStation 4, and less so the Wii U.
Wii U Virtual Console
There was rightfully a huge amount of disappointment when the North American Wii U Virtual Console lineup was revealed. The best game on the list was Super Mario World, and the rest were NES games that most people have downloaded from past Virtual Console platforms.
Some argue that the drip-feeding that Nintendo is doing by releasing a small amount of titles each week is because that emulation is so difficult. I don't believe this for a second. I'm not going to pretend, though, that I know the work involved with emulating old games so they will work on the Wii U hardware and the GamePad controller. Instead, I'm going to theorize why Nintendo constantly releases their Virtual Console titles at a slow clip instead of all at once.
This has to do primarily with sales. If Nintendo released every Virtual Console game they had on the Wii to the Wii U, you can bet that only the most popular titles would sell, most likely Nintendo's own titles. This would result in less sales for third-parties and less sales for the "bad" games. You see, by having a drip-feed release schedule, Nintendo can entice buyers to spend money on Virtual Console games they otherwise wouldn't give a second look to, especially for when there's a drought in software for the Wii U. It's ingenious, and it seems to work for Nintendo or else they wouldn't be using this business strategy for the third time in a row. It sucks for gamers and consumers, but it's definitely working for Nintendo.
Monday, May 20, 2013
Batman: Arkham Origins (Multi) Trailer
Despite possessing nothing in the way of gameplay, this trailer for Batman: Arkham Origins has us extremely hyped for the game. We'll no doubt see more gameplay footage, especially at E3, so we're not worried. Batman: Arkham Origins has a worldwide release date of October 25.
SPC's Favorite VGMs - 64-Bit Edition
Welcome to a new week here at SuperPhillip Central. As we always do on Mondays, we have five new tracks to share with you that will be added to our catalog of great game music. (You can also view all past entries in our VGM Database.) On today's edition of SPC's Favorite VGMs, we have music from Star Fox 64, Wave Race 64, and Mario Kart 64. We have but two hands to carry all of the 64-bit games!
v376. Star Fox 64 (N64) - Sector X
The mysterious secret weapon of Sector X... What is it? Where is it? These questions plague the Star Fox team as they move through the space junk and walls of Sector X. Turns out the secret weapon is a very easy machine named Spyborg, not to be confused with the Capcom Wii game of the same name.
v377. Wave Race 64 (N64) - Port Pirates
We move from one Nintendo 64 classic to another. Kazumi Totaka delivers his personal style of composition with this rocking tune for the Port Blue level of Wave Race 64. The choppy waves of this military port hides a very tricky shortcut for those brave enough to take it on.
v378. Sonic Heroes (PS2, GCN, XBX) - Follow Me
A song that one could be classified a bubblegum pop song if there were any in a Sonic game, Follow Me is a perky and peppy theme with a great groove, brilliant beat, and marvelous melody. This song is the theme of Team Rose, featuring Amy Rose, Cream the Rabbit, and Big the Cat. Team Rose's levels were meant to be the easiest of the four teams, and they, in fact, were just that.
v379. Mario Kart 64 (N64) - Highway
We just can't get away from the Nintendo 64 with this edition of SPC's Favorite VGMs, now can we? Perhaps that's a good thing as we get a lot of lovely nostalgia. Highway comes to us from the second in the Mario Kart series, Mario Kart 64, as heard in the Toad's Turnpike track. The melody would be heard again in Mario Kart 7's Neo Bowser City track.
v380. Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour (GCN) - Peach's Castle Grounds
From one Mario game to another, Mario Golf: World Tour has a tentative release period of summer. Why not look back at the GameCube version of Mario Golf with Peach's Castle Grounds, a lively tune that blends in new with the familiar sounds of Peach's Castle from Super Mario 64. We really can't get away from the Nintendo 64, can we?
v376. Star Fox 64 (N64) - Sector X
The mysterious secret weapon of Sector X... What is it? Where is it? These questions plague the Star Fox team as they move through the space junk and walls of Sector X. Turns out the secret weapon is a very easy machine named Spyborg, not to be confused with the Capcom Wii game of the same name.
v377. Wave Race 64 (N64) - Port Pirates
We move from one Nintendo 64 classic to another. Kazumi Totaka delivers his personal style of composition with this rocking tune for the Port Blue level of Wave Race 64. The choppy waves of this military port hides a very tricky shortcut for those brave enough to take it on.
v378. Sonic Heroes (PS2, GCN, XBX) - Follow Me
A song that one could be classified a bubblegum pop song if there were any in a Sonic game, Follow Me is a perky and peppy theme with a great groove, brilliant beat, and marvelous melody. This song is the theme of Team Rose, featuring Amy Rose, Cream the Rabbit, and Big the Cat. Team Rose's levels were meant to be the easiest of the four teams, and they, in fact, were just that.
v379. Mario Kart 64 (N64) - Highway
We just can't get away from the Nintendo 64 with this edition of SPC's Favorite VGMs, now can we? Perhaps that's a good thing as we get a lot of lovely nostalgia. Highway comes to us from the second in the Mario Kart series, Mario Kart 64, as heard in the Toad's Turnpike track. The melody would be heard again in Mario Kart 7's Neo Bowser City track.
v380. Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour (GCN) - Peach's Castle Grounds
From one Mario game to another, Mario Golf: World Tour has a tentative release period of summer. Why not look back at the GameCube version of Mario Golf with Peach's Castle Grounds, a lively tune that blends in new with the familiar sounds of Peach's Castle from Super Mario 64. We really can't get away from the Nintendo 64, can we?
Tearaway (PSV) New Screens
Tearaway is Media Molecule's upcoming PlayStation Vita release that sports a vivid art style and quirky gameplay. I must say that if there were more exclusives as creative as Tearaway, the system would be more appealing to more people.
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