Geek on Stun

Goods Invasion

We were pretty bummed out to read mention of the new Space Invaders entry, known as Space Invaders Revolution. Series creator Tomohiro Nishikado looks so tired, as does his latest "re-imagining" of the classic Taito franchise. Underwhelming screenshots help underscore this point.

Whatever. It's just another shitty, uninspired Nintendo DS game, we suppose, and we've become quite used to that. We've got ours up on the shelf until Meteos ships.

But Space Invaders doesn't really matter so much as a game anymore. It's a set of design cues. It's the visual definition of video games to millions of people and thousands of graphic designers. We actually love that about Space Invaders, way more so than the tired old gameplay.

That's why we love this:

The Space Invaders Watch

That sweet piece of wrist-worn kit is limited to a run of 500 and will set you back 18,690 Yen (about $175 US). The watch is part of the "Space Invaders X Ships" series of game-themed goods. Much of the line is average at best, but it also features this extremely lovely (and questionably useful) calendar that we'd love to get our pasty hands on:

The Space Invaders Calendar

You can check out the other goods at Taito's online shop for "good more life style".

Haven't We Suffered Enough?

We're pretty amazed when someone -- anyone -- thinks that wearing a video game on your head even remotely resembles a good idea.

Shame on you.

Queen of Iron Fist

We really don't like Tekken. Not that it's a bad fighting game or anything like that, we just can't get past the clownish, oft-homoerotic character designs and the mind-numbing combo memorization. It's the little things that bother us, like the neon-colored explosions that occur when you kick your opponent to, well, the existence of King.

We shouldn't be so petty, because it is graphically impressive from a technical standpoint and we hear that the game plays really well. But it's pretty much guaranteed we'll never pick up another Tekken as long as we live. Unless...

Well, shit, Namco. Even we can't deny a pretty cosplaying model playing Tekken in Akihabara. You got us. We'll buy a copy of Tekken 5. Yes, we'll even buy the limited edition with the Hori fighting stick. Fuck! Beaten by women again!

Attention marketing departments: This is how you get the job done; send a handful of wholesomely foxy young ladies to geek central and have them play Tekken with Tokyo's loneliest. In the US of A, send strippers.

Here's a quick example of how not to handle a Tokyo-based marketing effort:

This is from the recent Rumble Roses launch event in Akihabara (if you aren't familiar with the game, its an excuse to have barely dressed, impossibly proportioned women beat eachother up and be placed in poses normally reserved for gynecological exams; it's a wonderful work of art). Let's break down the three main issues with this in-store promotion.

1. Akari Uchida is your main attraction. No one wants to come see a balding game producer! This sort of thing is depressing.
2. The store rep is clearly overdressed. Anyone emceeing the event should be either a scantilly clad female or a pear-shaped/bespectacled male that will make us feel better about ourselves while we purchase a wrestling game with half-naked girls.
3. You let a girl near this display! How are we supposed to discuss the mud wrestling mode with a real girl in earshot!

This sort of thing really should be simple, but clearly people who are paid to understand this business do not get it. We do. And we're available for hire!

Evil PodFAQ

Here are a few things we'd like to never see again.

1. Jet skiing in a "survival horror" game
2. The term "survival horror"

Nitpicking aside, we loved the stuffing out of our Resident Evil 4 experience and we rate it at one billion shiny stars. It should be noted that we're birdchested milquetoasts when it comes to harder games and we relied heavily on GameFAQs to help us finish the damn thing. During our playtime, our underdeveloped body began to give out on us, as we were forced to actually stand up, walk over to the computer and move the heavy wireless mouse around as we searched for answers. After doing this at least a dozen times, we thought "There must be a better way!"

Then we had an idea. Okay, it was a half-idea. We decided to convert our FAQ of choice to iPod Notes format. That way, we can always have our FAQ with us and the only act of physical exertion we were forced to perform was that of rotating our bony thumb around the scroll wheel.

Here it is (with permission from the author, natch):

• Resident Evil 4 podFAQ (136 KB)

It actually worked out fairly well for us, so if you're an iPod owner and want to have a Resident Evil 4 FAQ handy, we recommend it. If you're not familiar with how iPod Notes work, we suggest you go to podSites.

We practiced with our Mortal Kombat II podFAQ which you can also download if you're so inclined.

• Mortal Kombat II podFAQ (4 KB)

We'll be working on more (mostly for ourselves), but if you're interested in a conversion, let us know.

Keita Takahashi! Oi! Oi! Oi!

Direct yourself to the wonderful world of Impress Game Watch and click on the lovely, blurry pictures between all the funny characters. Keita Takahashi, the visionary behind Katamari Damacy, recently presented at the GDC, showcasing the game's early prototypes and concept sketches.

Other highlights include his transforming robot coffee table, his hippopotamus tissue box and his goat flowerpot... that urinates.

We love you, Takahashi-san (in the most non-sexual way possible). Your art and game concepts complete us. We love it when you say things like "Video games have to be rock; sometimes they have to be punk. If not, there is no meaning for their existence".

Oh... my God. Exactly!

We've long held the belief that we're entering the video game punk rock era. While J. Allard and Microsoft may try to force feed the "HD Era" mantra down the collective throats of the masses, we reject him and his kind. They are the Doobie Brothers, nay the Foreigner of this industry. We want the Ramones! We want the Dead Boys! The Takahashis and the Mizuguchis!

We don't have the attention span or even the simple interest in bloated tactical shooters, bland third-person military games, dry Western action software with "Ops" and "Project" in the title. We proudly denounce the colon!

We welcome our punk rock video game future with you, Takahashi. Burn, HD Era fascists!

Playing Games In the Dark

We had a dream. We had an awesome dream. I'll show you.

Our dreamself was playing Nintendogs with our nice lady friends and, let us tell you, the game was sheer dog-raising bliss. Right after this shot was taken, we heard a muffled cry from the internet and became concerned. We remembered our bear suit had flying powers, so we sped ourselves home to check on the internet.

We cleared out the naughty comment spam from this Web site and visited 1UP. Much to our relief, they had redesigned it, without a bit of Flash. We were happy. We had a blurred vision of Sega announcing a Sonic the Hedgehog title featuring handgun toting, edgy gameplay. The vision began to fade and disappeared into the ether. We giggled, thinking how silly it was someone would ever dream of such a thing. We entered a Zen-like state, where everything began to appear cel-shaded.

We heard the cry again and this time it was louder. It was a booming voice that sounded like Reggie Fils-Aime speaking the words "We're doing some things with the hip-hop community". We became frightened, knowing that he had actually said that in the waking world and awoke in a chilly sweat. We stared at the alarm clock, waiting for the display to tick over to six-thirty, trying desperately to return to our dream world, losing more and more detail along the way.

We Will Never Forget

We've been slaving away on exciting text documents all week (and exploding the skulls of hundreds of Spanish peasants... virtually, that is) but we just couldn't contain our excitement due to the recent updates to Namco's Namco X Capcom product page. A few characters have been added to the already impressive roster, including Dig Dug and the Nameless Ones. We've spent a few weeks of our lives playing Forgotten Worlds, so any glimpse of our favorite satellite sporting space shooter team makes us geek-swoon.

The Nameless Ones have made a few guest appearances in Capcom games over the years, but the company is more focused on shitting out another Devil May Cry than properly revisiting the Forgotten Worlds mythos. Come on, Capcom, this shit is cool. Look at Nameless One hitting on Shop Girl.

We already explored this in our Forgotten Worlds erotic fanfic.

And yeah, we are excited about Dig Dug's inclusion in Namco X Capcom. Just look at him!

Fucking bad ass, Dig Dug.