I have returned from Seattle tired but super happy that I was able to attend PAX Prime this year. Going back to Seattle is extra special for myself as that is where I grew up, so being able to see family, friends, and geek out over a long weekend is awesome.
I was fortunate to be able to join two panels at PAX Prime this year both on community. Both were great fun. I have to thank James Stevenson of Insomniac Games and Alli Thrasher of Harmonix for letting me jump in last minute. Being on the panel and hearing how people and your counterparts view your work was really rewarding. All the shoutouts for #HireCollin were extra nice as well. I hope to have video soon of both panels, you can actually listen to The Various Roads to Becoming a Community Manager panels right now over at The Writer’s Bloc.
As for games, there were lots of them. My highlights include Duke Nukem Forever, Mortal Kombat, Dead Space 2, and NBA Jam. My pocket book is already starting to hurt.
Last year I moved from the lovely Seattle, Washington out to Boston, Massachusetts for at job at Irrational Games. Leaving Seattle behind was difficult as my entire family is in Seattle, all my friends, all the great friendships I have developed while living out there, and a great game development community, but the project was too good to pass up. And now I can publicly show everyone what exactly made me move 3,200 miles away. BioShock Infinite.
Rock Band has been out for a while now with expansions and the sequel and a nice constant stream of downloadable content, yet the albums aren’t being released very frequently. There are some albums out there that would make for some awesome drunken Rock Band enjoyment, and here are a couple albums I think should at some point be released on Rock Band.
Capcom released a demo for Resident Evil 5 in Japan a couple days ago. With the help of the guys and girls at NeoGAF were able to figure a way out to burn the demo to DVD and play it over here in the US, and that is what I did.
The demo itself is fairly short. You have two areas to play in. The game feels very much like Resident Evil 4, but with pretty graphics. It was a little odd getting used to the controls on the 36o controller as I played Resident Evil 4 on the PS2. The game is very action heavy in the demo, with lots of reloading and trying to fend off countless enemies. I haven’t tried it co-op yet, but it seems to be pretty cool with the branching areas and teamwork moves similar to Army of Two.
So what will probably be the biggest game for the Playstation 3 game out a couple weeks ago in Metal Gear Solid 4. I have been holding off on buying a Playstation 3 for sometime now, but due to Walmart giving $100 gift cards with the purchase of a 40 GB PS3, I decided to pull the trigger and get a PS3 right before MGS4 came out.
I did the midnight sale for MGS4 at the Bellevue Best Buy and was shocked of how many people were in line. I figured PS3 exclusive there would be 60 or 70 people show up. 100 would have shocked me, but there probably was 200 people that showed up that night. I stuck around talked games with some people, got my copy and went home. Only to then have to install the game, which sucks. At least I didn’t have to do a firmware update.
So the game is straight up Metal Gear. The humor, the weapons, the story. It is all there. The cinematics are amazing. They are in such a different leauge it isn’t even funny. Truely amazing work done by the team at Kojima Productions when it comes to the cinematics in the game. The gameplay is alright. I just played the game Rambo style not concerning myself with saving ammo or sneaking around. It made it pretty fun just to blow stuff up. I won’t spoil anything in the game, because I do think that people should play through it. I ended up beating it in 18 hours or so. So most people could probably finish it in a long weekend.
So today was the day I flew into San Fran for GDC 2008. I got in, checked into my hotel, got some dinner, had some drinks. Met up with some people from various companies. Nothing special. Tomorrow is when the real stuff starts. I should have something to post about tomorrow. Must get sleep now.
So I am off to GDC 2008 tomorrow morning. This year should be great with lots of great talks lined up. Also seeing lots of people I really never get to see and hopefully meeting a whole bunch of new people as well.
So every website and their mother is doing a big ol’ list of games that they are all hot and bothered to play for 2008, and rarely update the blog, so I decided to make one myself. Now these games are in no order, but just a list of games I am looking forward to getting my hands on. Lets begin… [...]
So for the holiday break I got a hold of a Playstation 3 and decided to try out all the hot games for it. My number one game to play was Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune from Naughty Dog. Really the game is just Tomb Raider meets Gears of War, but that really isn’t a bad thing. The graphics are amazing, the story is probably one of the better character based stories I have played in recent years, and the gameplay is fun. What more from a game do you want? If I had the cash I think this might be a game, or at least one game that could make me actually buy the Playstation 3. Perhaps when I get an HDTV in the next couple months.
