Archive for the ‘News’ Category
Resident Evil 7 Buyer’s Guide (Spoiler Free)
Resident Evil 7 is only a handful of days away (January 24th in North America and Europe, 26th in Japan) and it’s safe to say there’s justified anticipation for the title. Gameplay and plot aside, longtime fans of the series have already noticed little nods to the series as a whole down to the clever title of Resident Evil VII: Biohazard in the West and Biohazard 7: Resident Evil in the East. Unfortunately, we didn’t feel Capcom has done a great job about centralizing the things you need to know about buying the game. This is spoiler free as we are not receiving a review copy and have chosen not to view any coverage outside of public demos Capcom has released on various services. If you have pre-ordered, hopefully it was a tangible version so that you can change your mind now should a detail in this post sway you to a different format (digital/tangible) or platform. If you pre-ordered digitally, please take our strong advice to not pre-order digitally as there is no benefit, often no refund opportunities, no inventory and therefore no need, and pre-loading doesn’t need more than a day or so lead time with even some of the slowest speeds. With that, here’s what you should know when going out to purchase Resident Evil 7.
A Quick Breakdown of 2017 at Gaming History 101
2017 is here and we’ve got big plans for all of you, but instead of writing a huge post Fred decided to throw it into a video. Enjoy!
Fundraising 2017: When and How?
It’s that time of year again: fundraising. We love to do this show but it costs a bit of money and we need all of you wonderful listeners/readers/community members out there help us pay the dues. Fred goes into the many ideas we have going into this year’s fundraiser and when to have it, along with the potential vision for next year’s content. Please give this a quick listen and shoot us your feedback either at contact@gaminghistory101.com or our Contact page.
The Big Gaming History 101 Halloween Post
Halloween is here! This weekend many of us will celebrate by playing games that scare us, watch horror movies, and depending on lifestyle/age either be getting drunk at parties where people are dressed in slutty outfits or taking kids in much more appropriate outfits out to get candy. To get you in the mood, here are a bunch of items from our archive that you should definitely check out:
Articles
Halloween Rarities: Check out our list of a handful of little known horror titles that we love. Be sure to click on the various links in the article as all of our links are for additional content only found here on our site.
Great Retro Halloween Games That Aren’t Scary: Don’t like to be freaked out and jumpy all Halloween? Here are a handful of themed titles that won’t have you up late at night or turning on all of the lights.
Castlevania Retrospective: Are you familiar with the Belmont family and one of Konami’s most beloved franchises of all time? This article will get you caught on up on the origins, the titles, and even offers sub-articles on each game.
The Countdown Horror Obscura: Jam runs through a bunch of obscure horror titles you may either not be aware of or don’t necessarily consider of the horror genre. Learn about a bunch of games you may have never heard of.
Podcasts
Silent Hill 2 Game Club: Fred isn’t great at re-telling this story, as many fans have justifiably pointed out. Despite this fact, listeners claim this is a great club to listen to because it’s purely from the perspective of a person who had never played Silent Hill 2 and was recounting it’s effective moments fresh and for the first time.
The History of Survival Horror: Learn the roots of probably the strongest gaming horror genre.
Obscure Survival Horror: You’ve played Silent Hill and crushed Resident Evil, but have you ever played Overblood? This and a handful of other more obscure survival horror titles are accounted.
I Have No Mouse and I Must Scream: We bring in guest Kole Ross from the Watch Out For Fireballs podcast to discuss point-and-click horror titles.
Scared Stupid: Games that scared the s**t out of us.
Videos
Retro Game Night – Splatterhouse: A 2D brawler platformer set in a haunted house where you play as basically Jason Voorhies? What, there’s also a chibi version for NES? Check them out.
Retro Game Challenge – Ghosts’n Goblins:Fred tries to beat Ghosts’n Goblins for the NES, one of the hardest games on the console. Can he do it?
Condemned: Criminal Origins Longplay: See the entire game, commentary free, in 1080p.
Resident Evil 2 Version Comparison: The most popular Resident Evil title is dissected in its many ports.
Let’s Play Michigan: Report from Hell: Developed by Grasshopper Manufacture, led by Suda51, and exclusive to the PS2 only in Europe and Japan. This ultra rare title has some unique ideas.
The Silver Case Now Available in English on Steam
Suda 51 (Goichi Suda) is a developer who, as his name suggests, thinks outside the box. His notable titles include Killer 7, No More Heroes, Shadows of the Damned, and Lollipop Chainsaw. I am also personally a big fan of Michigan: Report from Hell and Sine Mora as well. One of the first titles he wrote and directed was a visual novel/mystery title called The Silver Case that released on the Playstation. Unfortunately it never got localized (or fan translated) and thus has never been available in English, until now. I’m told the gameplay is similar to Snatcher or Policenauts (without shooting sequences) but that Suda’s distinct sense of style and crazy plot are present. It also has a fantastic soundtrack, which is also available on Steam.
This localized and overhauled title is available now on Steam with a retail price of $19.99 (and 10% off for an initial block of days). There is a free demo available and we hope to get you a quick look in the upcoming days.
Disney 16-Bit Platformers Hit Good Old Games
Today Good Old Games, a web site dedicated to making older PC titles playable on modern platforms, released a triple pack of Disney platformers from the 16-bit era. The three titles are Aladdin, The Lion King, and Jungle Book. For savvy and knowledgeable gamers, you may be wondering if these are based on the Genesis/Mega Drive port or the SNES ports. These are all based on the Genesis/Mega Drive versions, which are slightly different from the SNES on Lion King and Jungle Book, but drastically different with Aladdin. While few debate the quality overall of the SNES is higher than the Genesis, Aladdin was one of the few titles that is largely regarded as looking and playing better on Sega’s console. Each game is currently $8.99 as an introduction sale, $9.99 normally, and you can get all 3 in a bundle for $19.99.
UPDATED: Now You Can’t… ORIGINAL:You Can Now Read and Download the First 145 Issues of Nintendo Power
UPDATE 8/8/16: And now you can’t read them anymore. Game Informer was the first to post about the removal today and the archivist who posted has yet to respond as to why. If you go back to Fred’s take below, perhaps Nintendo wasn’t as open to sharing as we originally thought. It’s a terrible shame. Some of us managed to download the whopping 12 GB library before it got pulled, but for legal reasons there’s no way we can post them here. Stay tuned, there may still be a way to share the great Nintendo Power content.
Original Story: Nintendo Power is one of those magazines that has forever resided in the underground of the Internet. Since Nintendo published the magazine and thus owns the rights to this copyrighted material, it is illegal to post and distribute it without Nintendo’s permission. Often times items like these are simply posted online, the reputable parties involved will go to places like archive.org to display the interest of preservation, and it’s up to the content holder to file a claim. This did happen with archive.org and Nintendo did file a claim, thus rendering the magazines unreadable without hunting down the tangible items in the wild. This all changed yesterday and it seems Nintendo is now allowing these relics of our gaming past to be read by all. You can find the archive of the first 145 issues spanning 13 years of content here.
Fred’s take: It was frustrating to know that there were quality scans of these magazines I grew up reading and had long disposed of floating around on the web and I had to visit torrent or piracy sites just to see them. Nintendo has every right, both legally and ethically, to preserve its content and I take no issue with that. If you are going to exercise those rights, however, I do think a company should make these items available to its customers. Nintendo could have charged for these magazines and distributed them in an encrypted app on your phone, Nintendo device, or simply through a web site. You may groan, but that is the way these items come back from the dead. Content often has never and will never be free without a setback. On the other hand, to ban anyone from making these items available and also to do nothing yourself is to let content die on the vine and it saddens me to think that Nintendo was willing to do this. The fact that it allowed the distribution on archive.org further back the reality that Nintendo had no plans and probably didn’t even know how it would go about getting the content to customers. It’s documented that even virtual console roms have been taken from hacked roms on emulation sites, so I’m betting that if Nintendo had decided to sell these items we would discover that they would be the scans that exist on this now live archive. If you’re going to seek financial gains for your content, you have to do the leg work, all of it. This decision instead makes these Nintendo-centric magazines that a majority of the 80s and 90s kids grew up reading readily available to all for free. I don’t like the process, but I love the outcome.
Nintendo Announced the NES Mini and Here’s the Important Details
Update 09/30/2016 at 12:45 pm: Nintendo has released more information on the NES Classic Edition in conjunction with the announcement of Japan’s Famicom Classic Edition. The Classic Edition models will contain multiple visual modes: CRT Filter, 4:3, and Pixel Perfect. CRT Filter adds scanlines, 4:3 presents the game in its original aspect ratio, and Pixel Perfect upscales everything in a perfect square (which seems to suggest 720p output). In addition you can have up to 4 suspend points that act just like save states in emulators. You will also get a QR code on the screen with each game that will allow you to access the original manual. Bob Mackey at US Gamer also just did a write-up that claims the controller cords are short, like 3 feet or so short. You also have to reset the console to pick a new game, although those of us with flash carts should be used to that. This probably won’t change your opinion, but it does get closer to finally finding answers to these early questions from the summer.
Update 07/14/2016 at 12:45 pm: A reader (TeenNick) has mentioned that Nintendo Life has reported the device will not support additional games, either in cart form or other alternative forms. This better explains the list being so strong and varied. Not sure if this is still going to be of value to me, but for most fans of the NES as a child this is a quick and dirty solution for your favorite classics.
Original Story:
First of all, Nintendo, 5 am? Really? Clearly Reggie and the gang are up much earlier than I am – and for the record I work in healthcare so I have a bit earlier of a schedule than the typical games media writer. Either way, the great news came down with this announcement from Nintendo of America (NOA) that this November we will be getting the NES mini. I have an NES and I have a lot of games for it, not to mention the 100+ titles I also have on the Virtual Console, and lets not forget that a dozen or so clone consoles are just a used game store away, so why care? Well, on the surface of this announcement, you don’t. It’s not until you get the details, which I do have below, that suddenly this is an intriguing endeavor.
Thanks to Gamespot’s Eddie Makuch, who appeared to be equally inquisitive with Nintendo as opposed to most other sites who merely said “mini NES with games, isn’t that cool?” we have some important details. It will cost $60 in the US, releases November 11, and includes 30 games (the list is below). From what it sounds like the cart slot will support any NES game you put in there, but I have yet to see that actually stated, however you would hope. That will also be significant in the next paragraph. Nintendo confirmed that the console has HDMI out and uses a USB power adapter for AC, which is free and included in the US but not in Europe (and probably not in Japan as we traditionally see). The controller is a classic NES style and one is included in the box, but more can be purchased for $10 apiece. These use the classic controller port like we see on the Wiimote. Also Nintendo confirmed that “suspend points” will be available. This means a lot of things, so lets break down what this information seems to indicate and why you may want to purchase this, even if you own an NES.
The Podcast Archive Is Live!
You asked for it, you got it: we have an official podcast archive with every episode, topic descriptions, searchable guests, numbering of episodes, and stream/download links. It’s not quite complete, we’ve got everything up to June 2015 and the only missing episodes can be found in the official feed. You’ll also notice the link to the archive is in the toolbar at the upper right in place of what used to be simply labeled “podcast.”
We hope this makes finding episodes to be a quicker and easier endeavor. The entire season bundle pack downloads are coming soon, as are the two missing episodes that don’t have links. Enjoy, share, listen. Thanks from GH101!
Fans of Ocean Software Need to be Checking Out Retro Gaming Round-Up
Simon “Dinosaur Pie” Butler
Retro Gaming Round-Up, a podcast about the classic days of early gaming often pre-dating the NES, has a new section that I’m finding just wonderful. It’s hosted by Simon Butler, a well known developer during the microcomputer days that worked at the beloved Ocean Software. Some use the term “legend” and he’s credited with over 260 releases on Giant Bomb and Moby Games, not to mention his personal claim of around 300 games. It turns out he’s a somewhat angry, off-putting, foul mouthed, hilarious storyteller. That’s why Butler getting his own segment on Retro Gaming Round-Up, dubbed “Dinosaur Pie,” has me hooked.
Gaming History 101 