I would provide context but I feel that telling you Satan made this is good enough.

I then graduated to getting TF2 and for the first time in my life have fallen in love with a multiplayer FPS that has me actually doing well against others while still having no real idea what the hell I am trying to do about 70 percent of the time. The reason I bring all of this up is because I just bought the Humble Indie Bundle 4, for an undisclosed amount that I chose to pay that was above the average. For all of the people that used to be like me and have no idea what I am even talking about I shall explain. If you go to www.humblebundle.com you will see an offer to pay whatever you want for 5 games that are all on steam for much more than what you can pay if you decide to go this route. You offer what you want for the games, and the money goes to the site hosting, the developers, and charity and the best part is you can adjust where you want the money to go. If you feel that the devs deserve it more than breast cancer awareness than you can do that. If you are like me you just split it the best that you can right down the middle. Right away I had to get it for Bit.Trip Runner, and Super Meat Boy alone, and I can tell you that every single cent I threw towards this noble cause was worth it about 30 seconds into me playing Super Meat Boy for the first time.

Seriously after playing this for a while I know the price I paid was highway robbery.

I even got introduced to what is already my third favorite birds eye view Shoot-em-up of all time in a games named Jonestown. I mention all of this because my next few reviews I will focus on this bundle I have picked up and I will pour my heart out into the reviews. I keep making promises about me and how I will post very soon, and I keep fumbling over and over again like Peyton Hillis in the second half of the 2010 season for the Browns. You the reader deserve more for me as a writer and with the ideas being thrown around on how we can give you guys more just like you deserve, a change will hopefully soon happen. I will have a post up about one of these games probably around the holiday (I hope to make it a post on Christmas just for the sake of making puns and calling it a gift.) I promise it will be worth your while if you stick around.

Martyr Out.

This post is in response to the wonderful post over on Engadget about the latest release of NPD numbers concerning portable gaming.

http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/10/timber-ios-and-android-take-60-percent-cut-of-mobile-gaming-dol/

Saw an interesting story fly across the wire on Google Plus. Apparently, nearly 60% of all portable game software sold is on Android or iOS. This shouldn’t really come as a surprise, most of the world’s high-tech industries are seeing major changes as mobile platforms become the dominate form of computing, business, and entertainment. Gaming is just one of many industries being completely changed from the ground up.

In the classic system, becoming a game developer on a console or handheld system is extremely difficult and expensive. First, you must contact Sony, Microsoft, or Nintendo to obtain a very expensive development kit for your particular system. This is a hard enough barrier to entry. If you have the creative ability and development skill to put a game together, but don’t have the funds for the development kit, too bad. You don’t get to create a game. Even worse than this though is the fact that game companies can deny you the sale of the developer kit for just about any reason, especially if you are just one guy who wants to make a game. Its happened before and it will happen again. The next thing you need to worry about is licensing fees. Can your game make enough money to pay the console manufacturers off so they will sign off on your game and allow people to play it on their console? Hopefully. This is why games today have publishers and game publishing has become an industry of its own. Just like artists used to need record labels before the internet music scene changed everything. Video game developers need someone to pay the bills for all the big fees and purchases. As an indie developer who wants to put out a boxed copy of your game, the barriers to entry make it almost an impossible reality.

Game companies have been attempting to help the small guys out with online stores such as Xbox Live Arcare and Xbox Live Indie Games, the PlayStation Store, and DSiWare and WiiWare. These stores have helped a great deal, but it doesn’t help capture the one thing that will make an indie game endlessly profitable: Market. Yes, all of these stores have huge numbers of users, but for the most part, people are tied to a device that are tied to a wall. In the case of the PSP or DS, indie developers run into many of the same licensing and dev kit cost issues that console developers do. The price of entry is too damn high.

Enter: The Smartphone. With the meteoric rise of smartphones and powerful always-connected mobile devices, it was only a matter of time before games on these devices took over the industry. Recent NPD numbers indicate that iOS and Android mobile game sales account for 58% of the total revenue of U.S. Portable Game Software. 58% of the industry’s revenue is because of iOS and Android games. Even the once-proud king Nintendo is down to 36%. Nintendo has always had a very cocky attitude towards competition in the mobile space after they launched the original Game Boy in 1989, always quashing the competition without so much as a second glance. Even the PSP, their biggest competition yet, stood no chance against the DS’ onslaught of sales. Nintendo has always battled against other gaming companies, but they’ve never battled against a different business model entirely, and they’re losing the game. For the first time since 1989, Nintendo isn’t winning the mobile games race.

One point to consider: These numbers signify revenue, not sales numbers or profits, but actual money brought in from sales. Some may claim that the statistics are unfair to Nintendo and Sony, its two companies versus the entire world of developers, but that’s exactly the point: Smartphone developers have no barriers to entry (aside from the $100 or $25 developer fees depending on platform) to get into the market and sell their game to the world of smartphone users. People who want to develop for the DS or PSP need to jump through rings of fire to do so. The old theory from the IBM and Microsoft days stands true, if you make it easy for developers, that’s where the programs will go, that’s where the people will go, and that’s where the money will go. And that’s exactly what’s happening in today’s smartphone-powered world. Great games can be created with small teams and put out for sale in the public market for the cost of a developer account and the time it took you to make your game, nothing more. No publishers, no additional licensing fees, no hoops. Just you, your game, and your potential customers. At this point, the developer doesn’t need to worry about making enough money to cover fees (if you make a game for $1 on either platform, 30% is taken from that, not up front like most manufacturers require), they don’t need to worry about playing politics with exclusivity, they don’t need to find a publisher for their game, they only need to worry about one thing: Reviewers. Just like its always been, the great games rise to the top. The thing developers need to concern themselves with making a great game and making sure bugs are fixed. If that happens, if the game is good enough, it can make an incredible amount of money, with almost no overhead costs, and end up fueling their bank account for the next several months.

One of the reasons that people are buying games on smartphones instead of handhelds is that the smartphone markets offer better choices for consumers, a better buying experience, and a better way of treating your customers. When I buy a Virtual Console game on the Wii, I can’t play it on my 3DS. It doesn’t work that way, Nintendo wants me to buy it twice. No thank you. If I buy Fruit Ninja, however, all I need to do is download it onto my tablet, and I’m gaming in no time. Its that easy. I buy it once and I have it forever. I upgraded my phone to the Nexus S and all of my games re-installed, it was so simple. When I bought my 3DS and the e-store opened, I couldn’t have been more disappointed. Even though I had bought games on the Wii, I thought a few would allow me to re-download them and play without being tethered to my Wii all the time, but no. They wanted me to re-buy them. The e-store on the 3DS is slow, buggy, crashes, sometimes downloads don’t complete successfully. All in all, its a bad buying experience. Because the e-store is so slow, I never open it, I check for new games every two months, if that. The e-store is simply awful to use. Now, with Android, I can read a game review of Angry Birds Rio, go to the Android Market website, and have it download without ever having to touch my phone. I get up from my computer and the app is right there on my phone. Seamless, easy, simple, helpful. These are the things I, as the consumer, should think of when I use an online store.

On Google Plus, Darnell Clayton shared this link with me and said, “Apple and Google are killing the gaming industry.” This got me thinking, are Apple and Google killing the gaming industry. Yes, but only this chapter of the industry. Here’s my response (which was a comment on the original post):

Actually Apple and Google are becoming the gaming industry. The gaming industry itself is just fine, alive and well, its just trading out cards, just like what happened with the fall of Atari. The big companies aren’t Atari and Commodore, and it isn’t going to be Microsoft and Nintendo anymore, with platforms that support open development without the need for hugely expensive SDKs and hardware, just about anyone can make a game in a few weeks that could become the hottest thing ever (see Angry Birds). Sony is in an interesting position because they aren’t only accepting this change, they are embracing it. With the release of the Xperia Play and their official PlayStation app, they wholly admit that the best gaming device is the one you have on you (like the best camera is the one you have on you), and they are making moves to thrive in that market.

If existing gaming companies don’t get a handle on the changing market, they’re dead. They will be killed by companies like Gamevil, Glu Mobile, and Halfbrick Studios. These tiny dev houses haven’t just survived the harsh gaming industry, they’ve thrived in it. Even EA Games, classically one of the more stubborn and un-inventive publishers, has made moves to exist in emerging markets like social network games (Facebook and Google+) and smartphone games. The games industry is like any other industry, when your industry is undergoing rapid change, you either evolve with it or die.

The next few years will be interesting. With Nintendo claiming that they’ll never embrace the future, clinging to their rotary phones and cassette tapes, and Sony jumping headfirst into the mobile phone space, things are going to get very interesting very quickly.

Disclaimer: I’m a total Nintendo fanboy.
Another, more embarrassing disclaimer: I own Nintendo stock.

Nintendo just doesn’t get it, and it may be too late. People don’t like static contact anymore. Having a mostly-static library of downloadable games, virtually no online presence, a convoluted friending system, and very poor social integration, Nintendo doesn’t just ‘not get’ online, they utterly fail at competing in the modern era.
Take a look at any competent online marketplace (Xbox Live, PSN, Steam, Android Market, App Store), what is the most common thing between all of these? Micropurchases. One dollar games, 5 dollar games, brand new games at $30 flat, instant download. Sure, there are more expensive games out there, but any gamer can tell you that Steam Sales and Xbox Live weekend deals are the wallet-destroyers of this day and age. Nintendo wants you to drive to a store, plunk down $40 on a new 3DS game, then appear satisfied. Aside from the fact that most 3DS games are complete shit (buyer’s remorse talking, here), its way too much to charge for a handheld game, even a damn good handheld game. I’m of the thinking that Ocarina of Time 3DS should have been $30. Its bad enough that Nintendo essentially admitted that the first hardware iteration of the 3DS was complete shit, but who didn’t see that coming after the release of 3 different Game Boy Advances and 4 different variations of the original DS.
Star Fox 64 3DS released without many of the promised (and most exciting) multiplayer features. The 3DS launched 7 months ago and has 5 good games.

I may be a little bit biased, just a little bit prejudiced… a little…

Here’s where Steam and Smartphones come in. Over the weekend, I informed my friends about a great Steam sale Rockstar was putting on for the GTA V announcement, they were selling the entire GTA collection for about $20. Incredible. Needless to say, I bought one and gifted it, then 4 more of my friends bought theirs. $20 bucks for what amounts to 7 games?!? Yes, please. But Nintendo me to pay $7-$8 for an emulated Game Boy Color game on my 3DS? Excuse me? No. I’ll tell you what, Nintendo, I’ll start paying for your virtual console games (which costs you nothing, by the way) when you can sell me the “Zelda Collection” of all NES, SNES, GB/C, GBA, and DS games for $50. That’s a good deal, that’s worth it in my opinion. And you know what would make me buy it outright without a second thought? The ability to play the virtual console games on my Wii too. Early on, I paid for the emulated Virtual Console games, but was later taken aback when I realized Nintendo wasn’t going to let those purchases transfer to any other system. With systems like OnLive and Steam in place, Nintendo needs to change their old-school thinking and fast, if they don’t, they’ll die. Simple as that.

I bought Minecraft yesterday on my Motorola Xoom tablet. It was $7 and still in development. I then wanted to play it on my Nexus S. Did I have to re-purchase it? Hell no. I just went to the market and re-downloaded it. Its really sad when I think about the fact that I just paid $7 for one of the most fun gameplay experiences I’ve ever had, but I also paid $40 for Pilotwings, for what amounted to little more than a tech demo.

Next topic: Online play with Nintendo consoles. Or, as I like to call it: Nintendo thinks you have no friends. Is the 3DS better at online? Sure. Was Brawl online? Yes, but it sucked. When you look at Steam, PSN, or Xbox Live, you realize how engrossing an online-rich social world can be. Oh look! My buddy is playing Team Fortress 2! Right click, Join Game. “Hey, dude! Yes, I just shot you in the dick. My bad.” That’s just cool. Its easy, everyone can do it. Everyone except Nintendo. I’m convinced that Nintendo is still forwarding paper memos written on typewriters. Nintendo is one of the most innovative, but least technologically advanced game companies in the world. Its really sad to see them do their best fish-out-of-water act every time someone brings up the idea of a Nintendo console playing games over this newfangled internet. Need more proof Nintendo doesn’t get it? Two words: Friend Codes. Who the fuck decided it was a good idea to go against convention and not have handles/usernames? Whoever that was should be publicly flogged. Hell, entire websites exist solely dedicated to the purpose of tying that long-ass number to a username and community.

Been on Nintendo’s website in a while? No. Don’t worry, the functionality is pretty much the same as it was in 2001. Nothing to see here. Move along. Real video game companies have websites where you are able to log into your account, pay for the downloadable game/theme/widget, and by the time you get home, the game has been auto-downloaded to your system, ready and waiting for you.
Nintendo doesn’t understand gaming anymore and it breaks my heart. I love Nintendo. Hell, even after all they’ve put me through, I’m going to buy the new Mario 3DS game, I’ll even be at the Skyward Sword launch, you know… I may even buy a Wii U. But I’m not gonna be happy about it. There will be a day when I tell everyone that I called it, Nintendo has become Sega. The once-upon-a-time king of the video game industry, dead now because they’ve refused for far-too-long to grow up and start living in this decade.
The bottom line is this: Nintendo doesn’t care. And that will ultimately be their undoing.

During the years 1998 – 2004, PC Gaming was at its peak. With Half-Life, Unreal Tournament, Deus Ex, The Sims, and Half-Life 2, among others, PC gaming had never seen better glory days since Doom came out. It was a good ol’ time, as they say. In the years since then, PC gaming has taken a rather forced backseat to console gamers, endured shitty ports, and had even the most basic of PC gaming rights removed.

I’m happy to report that this is no longer the case. PC gaming isn’t dead, its only been sleeping. With recent releases like Deus Ex: Human Evolution (which fared much better on the PC), Infinity Ward changing their minds about dedicated servers, and Team Fortress 2 picking up more steam (get it?!?!?!?) since it became a free-to-play game, PC gaming has never looked better. Also, did I mention that I’m really excited about the new Borderlands? Oh, also: DotA 2.

To be honest, I was re-energized about PC gaming after playing through 20 hours of Deus Ex: Human Evolution. This game symbolizes a golden-age of PC gaming long forgotten, and I urge you to pick it up. Full review coming when I get around to completing the game.

Side note: Like Brett said, we aren’t dead. Really.

I understand that somehow we fell off the deep end when it comes to writing new things but I am going to tell you right now that this is changing. I personally am going to write at least 1 new article a week to get back to the glory days of what we once were. We may not have some of the older members that we did during our days of the pod-casts but I would not be shocked if they popped up once in a blue moon. I know it has been a long slow lull when it comes to our posting, but I promise the people that stick around will be rewarded with new content. This website is not dead and I will make sure that it damn well keeps a pulse.

With much gaming love,

Martyr

PS: I figured this picture could not hurt I do not care what anyone says….Cammy is totally real.

The first was simply put as the Iron Man fighting game tournament. I was in a group of 6 people and I had to face each of them in each of the following games- Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, Capcom vs SNK 2, Street Fighter Alpha 2, Breakers Revenge, and last but not least Vampire Savior which is the 1997 version of the Darkstalkers series. To be honest I was completely outmatched by damn near everyone that I had to go up against. Each game you played two out of three out of five rounds and I learned a few things right off the bat.

1: No matter how good I think I am or how decent I may be at a game someone will and can kick my ass no matter what I do.

2: Breakers Revenge is full of broken shit that allows me to do nothing all the while the people I go up against keep coming at me with an onslaught of terror.

3: Apparently I am a lot better at Vampire Savior than I ever would have thought (Felicia FTW!).

Yea shes a cat, whatever she kicks so much ass.

4: That my combo of Cammy, Ryu, and Sagat are hard to beat if in Capcom vs SNK 2 if I just remember how the hell to use sagat as a spam/distance fighter.

5: Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure might be up there for the best fighting game I have ever played even though I cannot imagine what the hell the people were on when they made the comic and the two fighting games based off of it.

Regardless of all of that I went 5 out of 25 and did not advance to the next round. It was a huge learning experience and one of the many I had throughout the day. The best part was I started to realize that all these guys were like a community of friends and when they watched each other they wanted to give tips on what they could have done to do better. Even without knowing any of them I was quickly accepted and was involved in a lot of discussions with the overall group of people. Jesse also participated in this tourney but did not do as well…although I cannot recall his record.

Ok time for tourney two of the day and of corse as luck would have, it turned out to be a “Mystery Game” tournament. Essentially I was forced to play some of the worst titles I can ever imagine.You played two out of three rounds…if it was a fighting game and if you lose twice you are out of the tournament.

The first game I played was entitled: Joy Mech Fight. This game was a fighting game made back in 1993 for the famicom. We played it on a top loader and I have to be honest, if you look at this game for a second you will say “Wow this game has to be one of the shittiest games I have ever seen.” Honestly I loved it, they had a lot of diverse fighters for a game that was released on Nintendo. I also just found out that it had a 38 player roster, which if you can your math most games in 1993 had roughly 15 so that is astounding. I won my fight using a character that was named Tiger and did it using his diving kick attack.

To me he is a cross between Sagat from Street Fighter, and Rax from Eternal Champions. Oh in other news the attack is called the eagle kick, and was my weapon of mass destruction.

The next game was DX Hird…which I would love to provide you with a good review or picture but it has been so long the only thing i remember is that it played like Battle Arena Toshiden 3 and was terrible looking. It is so obscure that I spent 10 minutes on google looking up and down for it and I have nothing but one man talking about how bad it is in a forum…I was unaware that a game could suck that bad that no physical evidence exists.

Next up was Masked rider Agigo, which is a game based off of the Japanese television series Kamen Rider. This game was one of the prettiest games that I can remember from the tourney and the actual movement from the characters looked great. This game was not responsive at all and even if you wanted to use one of your strong attacks it would take about 4 seconds to load the damn thing up before you could go and use it. None the less I won this game as well. Once again I cannot get a picture of the game I am referencing so deal with it.

After that came Heaven’s Gate which is a game so bad that wikipedia does not have an existing article about it. I remember it being for the PS1 and kinda reminding me of Virtua Fighter except way way worse. All I know is that I won this game as well but honestly I cannot remember anything about it upon seeing pictures other than what I just told you.

THIS GAME IS BAD! I also realize Jin looks like Hanzo from World Heroes.

The next game was Sailor Moon S, which as you could guess was a Sailor Moon fighting game. The control and response to this game are some of the saddest I have experienced. I mean they could actually be worse but holy god, I really think they just liked to rush fighting titles based on random cartoons in Japan because they know people would buy it. Think about it Sailor Moon was/might still be that popular over there so this makes sense. Once again this game was another win for the Martyr.

This game is a lot worse than it looks.

The only game I played that was not a fighting game was a heated match of Frogs and Flies. You are a frog who jumps in the air and tries to eat the dots they call flies that are on the screen. Two people go at the same time and it starts off as day and after every 30 seconds or so it gets darker and darker until it goes black and a winner is determined. This was the closest game I actually played during the entire Mystery Game match-up. It was also a great game to shout expletives as my frog would jump like a huge pussy or just jump way too hard off his lily pad due to the great controls of the Atari that we played it on. Chalk up another win.

This game is actually more fun because the controls suck so bad. I have never cussed more at a game in a short amount of time then I did at this one.

The final game I would win at was Natsuke Crisis Battle and it was for the Super Famicom. After getting my ass kicked the first round I had the misfortune of picking the female version of Zangief and somehow pulled off some of the biggest bullshit moves once I figured out she was just like him. I do not mean in the spamming lariat sense, but the 360 degree rotation while jumping to throw my opponent into the ground type of character.

Very obscure never heard of game of good god damn reasons.

Finally I was able to play a arcade game for the tourney and it was Karate Champ. This game has one of the least responsive controls I have ever seen in a fighting game. You play until you get two full points or the time runs out. Points are given based on the attack you use and where you inflict the attack. You use two joysticks, one moves you and the other helps attack. Depending on the two directions you move the joysticks, you can do front flips, jump kicks, and other crazy karate shit. Biggest problem with this game is that the hit detection has to be really perfect. If you are off by 1/18th of a second or if you are kinda too close to them the move will not be  completed. None the less I had a hell of a fight but still lost by a half a point.

There is not a better feeling than executing the jump kick for the full point. TO THE FACE.

The last game I was able to play for this was the very creatively named FIST. This by far was the worst thing that I played the entire day. I really wish I could get a picture of it just to show you how bad it is. The controls were terrible, the game play was worse. It was on the PS1 but I swear it looked and felt like a blind man made a game using random code that sounded good to him in his mind and he turned it into FIST. 

Yep this is all I could find. Thank you Ebay.

After my two losses I had to get ready for the final tournament of the night and I am not sure where I finished exactly I just know that I did really damn good and came pretty close to actually getting to the final. I then had to prepare myself to be entered into the King of Iron Fist Tournament, or at least the sixth edition of Tekken anyway. As fate would have it I had to go up against my buddy Jesse in the first part of a round robin event. Each match was 3 out of 5 rounds and 2 out of three fights. The first match I decided to use Bruce and after Jesse dominated the shit out of me I looked him in the eyes told him I was sorry and picked Eddy Gordo. I do feel bad that I had to use one of the cheapest characters against a guy that never really plays Tekken too much but I needed to get that first (and only win of the day) so I chose him and beat Jesse’s ass. I decided that after the fight Jesse and I had that I had to pick a character I was good with that was not someone people knew how to defend well. I thought about Eddy again, but he is a beginner character so I knew I stood no chance with him…after several minutes of debate I said “Fuck It” and I picked Jack 6. Jack is slow as all hell but is very powerful and has great reach and the ability to put the opponent into the air to juggle…slight problem is that I am not good enough with him to know how to consistently keep the person in the air. Overall I faced about 10 different people and lost to all of them. Most of my matches were very close and I met a few people that will be at the Power Up event at the end of the month that I plan on attending.

While playing against all these great players I was told a few different things from some of the participants.

1: The fact that I chose Jack when almost no one really is comfortable with him, threw most of my enemies off because they did not know what to expect.

2: I am very good at blocking and anticipating low attacks which is key to keeping a match as close as it can be given most juggle attacks start from a low to high position.

3: That for it being my first tournament that apparently I was skilled a lot higher than anyone thought I would have been when I told people it was my first tournament.

4: That the word Perfect, is described as “The seven golden letters” and you better not let that shit happen to you.

Like I said before this was one of the best things I had ever done and I learned a lot from it. Met a lot of awesome people who seem to want me to go back, and I earned the respect of people I have never met because I had the balls to pick a character that no one plays with while trying to compete with people much better than my sorry ass. If you ever have the chance to go to Arcade Legacy you need to. It is 10 bucks to play all night, and all the games are free and set up so all you have to do is hit the start button to enjoy some classics such as Killer Instinct, MVC2, Point Blank and many others. For further understanding check their website.

http://arcadelegacy.wordpress.com/

Man! Am I excited about the 3DS! First off, this is Nintendo’s ball park. They know the industry, they are one of the oldest players in the industry, renowned for their innovation, hated for going against the grain, and in some cases, completely ignoring industry trends (Online gaming, anyone?). In the past couple years, Nintendo has completely and utterly missed the ball when it came to online content and gameplay, targeting older gamers, and multiplayer. I really doubt that much (if any of that) is going to change, but for some reason… I’m really excited about the 3DS.

That’s exactly what Nintendo is good at. Sometimes I feel that Nintendo should be a PR firm instead of a gaming company… but lets get down to what we know: The 3DS is going to sell, and sell big. Just like the original DS, Nintendo is betting on people jumping on a new and unique bandwagon, then dragging all of their friends, relatives, and co-workers with them on a journey they will never forget. They will succeed at that, without a doubt, but some nagging part of me feels scared for Nintendo. The Wii, while hugely successful for its first two years as Nintendo’s main console, has seen better days. The Wii was old technology when it came out, the only thing that saved it was re-inventing the industry once again (again, something Nintendo is damn good at). Nintendo must be pretty damn proud of themselves now, being copied by Sony and (although to a lesser extent) Microsoft. Still, even to this day, no one does motion control better than Nintendo.

The 3DS has quite a few things in common with the 3DS from a system-launch perspective:

First off: Its main feature isn’t really the main focus. With the original Nintendo DS, the main feature was the fact that the system had two screens. While this was the most publicized and pronounced feature (it was the name of the system), it was hardly the most, dare I say, game-changing. What was amazing about the Nintendo DS was the ability to directly interact with what you were seeing on the screen: Touch Gaming. While this has been done before in the past, it wasn’t well done, it didn’t have the level of polish that Nintendo gave the DS. Touch gaming changed what people thought was possible on a handheld system, it paved the way for smartphone gaming as we see it today. Now, we have the 3DS, with the most touted feature obviously being the 3D capabilities of the handheld, this isn’t the feature most likely to change gaming as a whole. What is most likely to change the way we interact and perceive games as in the future is the way the 3DS implements Augmented Reality games (AR games). Again, like the DS, this isn’t the first time that AR games have popped up, the industry has seen these games in multiple forms, from multiple publishers, on multiple systems. AR games have been around for a while (like touchscreens and games on them), but none of them have ever been this beautifully conceived. Just like Apple takes an MP3 player and turns it into the sleek, sexy, must-have consumer electronics device of the holiday season; Nintendo takes gaming concepts and fully realizes them, then takes that a few steps beyond what people think is possible. I believe that Nintendo’s AR games hold the next ‘big thing’ for the industry. Just like the Wii was a massive hit with casual gamers and innovative gameplay, I believe that Nintendo has changed the industry once again, and things will never be the same. I can’t wait.

In Japan it was known as Street Fighter Zero 3 so this picture is still accurate

I personally remember seeing this at the local video store the day the game came out and losing my shit. The day was April 30th 1999, and I remember being the first person to rent that game to this day. By now you can tell that I am a huge fan of fighting games and there are so many that I need to review so why would I choose this one to follow Killer Instinct you might wonder? This is the best game in the entire series that changed the genre of fighting games forever. This game boasts the biggest roster for a street fighter game to this day with a whopping 34 fighters when it hit the home consoles. The entire reason everyone is fighting is because Bison has something called the Psycho-drive, he of course being the level headed man he is wants to use it to destroy the world as we know it to basically make it a wasteland and blowing away all the people he has met in the process. Slight problem is that even though he is the second strongest person in the world he cannot power it himself so he needs the body of a “Fighter” to throw into the Psycho-drive and power the unholy hell out of it until it makes the world a’splode. Depending on who you choose to fight with the story will change and you even have dialogue set ups before certain matches to give you a little insight to what the hell is going on. Even better is the fact that if you do get to what you assume is the final showdown with M. Bison you have to fight a sub boss consisting of Balrog or Juni and Juli (Both the girls are actually clones of M. Bison and basically copycat Cammy the whole time.) Once you get through all that and you finally get to face the man himself…you only get one opportunity. You either win two rounds, or lose two rounds and waste all that time getting to him because it will just show a cut-scene of your character being thrown into the Psycho-drive and chaos ensues.

Another unique thing about this game is how there are several different styles you can use for your super combos. You have the normal A-ism combo system which basically just gives you three different levels to get your meter up to and depending on what button you press that determines the amount of damage you can inflict with your super combo. The second is the X-ism which is basically just one big ass meter you have to fill before you can pull of super combos and then there is finally the V-ism which gives you the ability to actually make up a combo using certain buttons presses on the fly so pick your poison and either way if you know what your doing then you should be good. Back to the characters for a minute. Like I previously stated there happen to be 34 of them but in all honesty I pretty much pick the same five or six all the dame time.

First and foremost when it comes to Street Fighter games in general if this person is in it I must play with them. Cammy White is single handedly the hottest thing that the series has ever had (Fuck Chun Li and her huge offensive lineman like thighs) and is the first girl I ever had a crush on which 1: Is sad to admit that a video game character that could kill me in like 1,000 different ways is the first thing I had a crush on. 2:Is completely plausible because shes hot as hell and I will defend that (along with her honor) to my dying day.Lastly 3: Is probably the exact reason I decided to start playing as her and kicking ass all the fuck over the place. She is fast but not strong, which is really not too hard to compensate for if you just have a good strategy and hell her special moves help her avoid projectiles so shes good against characters that throw random shit. Also the fact that she is not a charge character even if her moves seem to be that of a person who would require a charge is a good thing so you can just use the same rolling motions some of your favorite characters have and completely dominate.

Cammy Fucking White is dressed up as a soldier promoting one of the best games Capcom has ever made holy shit I don’t think my brain can handle the awesome. Quick question is it a little odd that I now want to fuck that plane because of Cammy being near it?

Second there is Rolento. Rolento is a military genius that is fast yet stronger than most fast characters and has what might be the second strongest super combo in the game. He throws out a trip wire to lynch the opponent when a man from the sky dangles a god damned metal hook to assist you. His attacks overall are kinda iffy at best but if you can get used to his style he is a very good character to use. By the way Capcom I am not calling you out for being Disney-esque when it comes to overt racial prejudice, but if anyone has the opportunity to play as Rolento and do the trip wire lynching to Balrog…all I have to say is that I have not seen anything as blatant as the expression Balrog’s face has when he gets the attack done to him since the civil rights movement existed. Seriously Capcom, I have never once doubted you or questioned at least to a serious degree but holy fuck.

Third is Balrog. I remember playing Street Fighter II Championship Edition in the arcade and picking him simply because he looked just like Mike Tyson. He is a slow but amazingly powerful charge based character and I honestly think he is one of my better people to play as in any of the games he has appeared in. Mind you he is a little harder to use due to his sluggishness, but honestly if you get good with him he is a serious contender in any match you can throw him in. Plus his throw consists of him just throwing headbutt after headbutt into the persons concussed skull.

Forth is Ryu. Yes hes the poster boy for the series and yes he is a bad ass.

Fifth is undoubtedly Akuma. For starters his name means Devil in Japanese, and you cannot get much more over the top than just being named after the demon-man himself. Second he is the most powerful character in the game and is very fast as well so you simply cannot lose when you are using him, or well if you do lose you should probably just quit your life as you have failed harder than most people ever could. His best and most powerful ultra combo is the “Shun Goku Satsu” which translates into Instant Hell Murder. There is not a move in video game history with a better name. There just simply is not one. When it comes to Akuma he only fights people that he actually thinks pose a threat to him and can test his skills as a warrior. He will never fight an unworthy opponent because of his “moral code”. Hell the man has even stopped fights (in the actual storyline) when he knew the person he was fighting was not up to their 100 percent top form. My question is that if he only fights people that are worth it and people that can test his skills as a warrior…then why the hell would he ever face a person like Dhaslim or Dee Jay when we all know for a fact that Yoga and Jamiaca are not known for their warriors. Akuma was and still is banned from most tournaments in America which just shows how dominant he really can be.

BAD ASS MOTHER FUCKER

There were several different game modes when you were playing this on the home console. You had your standard Arcade mode, and Survival mode but you also had the “Final Battle” mode which let you skip all the way to the final fight with M. Bison so you didn’t waste all that time fighting the first 8 rounds if you ended up losing to him, and Finally the most awesome mode was World Tour. World tour had you choose one character and you had to fight certain people under certain circumstances  and sometimes it would even make you fight multiple people at the same time. Stipulations could be anything from you only being able to damage your opponent with ultra combos, to you having to face two different people at the same time but only one of them takes damage. The final battle (if you are bad ass enough to meet certain requirements) has you face 2 different people per match for three matches. It starts out with Shin Akuma and Evil Ryu (basically the two toughest characters in the game) then you face M. Bison and Shin Akuma, and then you fight them again. It is so damn hard because they will constantly throw projectiles and random moves at you and God help you if you get stuck between the two of them. if you are in the middle of them attacking you have lost this fight and there is nothing that will save you from certain death. This game is hard but so rewarding when you actually do kick some ass.

The art in this game is simply one of the best for a game ever made by Capcom, the music is fantastic and the announcer is amazing. If you do not lose your shit or get amped when he first says the words “Go For Broke!” then you are seriously a huge huge pussy. Simply put this game kicks ass and you need to play it. I do not care if it’s the arcade, the console or emulating it through your computer. Whatever you have to do you simply must do it for the sake of your video game life. If you disagree with me in anyway you can kindly direct your hatemail to me and you will probably recieve a nice cool glass of Fuck Off in return.

Martyr out.