I sometimes wonder how used games get all dinged up like this.
Streets of Rage 2, a Sega Genesis classic, for $5. Initially I passed on this, but then I realized it’s Streets of Rage 2, a freakin’ Genesis classic. That Yuzo Koshiro soundtrack! Who could pass that up? The dummy writing this. Thankfully, I was able to correct my mistake and grab it as a wonderful addition to my Genesis collection, along with a Sonic cartridge compilation called Sonic Classics.
Granted, it’s just a cartridge copy and it isn’t in the best of shape, but it’s nice to have. There’s something special about this cartridge: The giant “NOT FOR RESALE” label on it. Anyone who’s into collecting Sega Genesis stuff may have also seen the big “NOT FOR RESALE” stickers on copies of Sonic the Hedgehog. My Sonic the Hedgehog 2 came with my Sega Genesis long ago also with a “Not for Resale” sticker on it. Many pack-in games on the Genesis also came with the “not for resale” sticker on them. It made me wonder: Why is this ugly text on there, and what was its purpose?
At first, I thought this meant so that these couldn’t be resold at second-hand shops, but that wouldn’t make any sense, even when this was new. After doing a bit of research and asking a friend, it turns out it’s a much more sinister story.
Remember True Crime: Streets of LA? It was a decent Grand Theft Auto clone developed by Luxoflux (RIP) and published by Activision in 2003. While it didn’t reinvent the wheel, it was a decent shooter, driving game and beat-em up. While I was doing my Game Fuel hunt a few weeks back, I had stumbled upon this mysterious gem in the DVD section at a Goodwill.
This is True Crime: Streets of LA Uncovered. A promo DVD for the game, presumably given to GameStop employees or people who pre-ordered the game. For $3, I couldn’t pass this up.
This promo DVD is chock full of interesting videos that highlight the game’s mechanics, a few behind the scenes features, even a video advertising the (now-defunct) truecrimela.com. There’s even a trailer for the original Xbox version of the game, which looked somewhat better than the other versions of True Crime.
Half-Life is my most favorite game of all time. How I got to experience it for the first time is a story for another time, but one thing that really caught my eye was the mod scene for Half-Life. Much like Quake and Doom before it, people were messing around in WorldCraft making maps for the internet masses. Some were interesting, others were bizarre, then there’s the classics. The mods that did really interesting stuff for Half-Life, and end up being the must-play mods for the game. Such as today’s entry. Since Halloween is around the corner, let’s look at the zombified single player mod They Hunger.
They Hunger was originally released in 1999 as a PC Gamer demo disc freebie, followed by two additional episodes in 2000 and 2001. Neil Manke, who had made the Half-Life mod USS Darkstar for PC Gamer earlier in 1999, was already familiar with game modding for promotional purposes such as Coconut Monkey Adventures for Quake II and Soldier of Fortune, Inc. for Quake. (This is not to be confused with Soldier of Fortune by Raven Software, this SOF was based off a TV show.) Naturally, They Hunger looked to do something most Half-Life mods didn’t do at the time, and it definitely succeeded.
Guess what’s back? I’ll give you three guesses, first two don’t count.
This time we’re doubling up on the special promotions!
Yes, returning for the fifth time, Mountain Dew and Doritos collaborate with a video game company for a limited edition soda. This time around, Microsoft comes back to the well for the third time, advertising the forthcoming Xbox One with Mountain Dew Game Fuel. This time, we’re given not one, but two flavors of the wonderful special edition drink. This is the third year in a row that the specialty drink has been available, which quashes my previous theory that they’d only push this out every other year, as they did in the past. Looks like this might be a yearly thing now.
While I was at PAX, Mountain Dew was fairly prominent at the show. Spread around the convention hall were QR codes that you could scan in to redeem points, either for small prizes like Game Fuel or to win a chance to get an Xbox One early. Alas, while I did scan codes like a goof, I did not redeem a single point, which probably screwed me out of getting Game Fuel three months early. So I got this stuff at a 7-Eleven like an ordinary person who buys promotional drinks advertising video games.
The two flavors are both infused with Dew, one with a burst of Citrus Cherry, the other with a charge of Electrifying Berry. These nicknames are so extreme that I wonder if I’ve jumped back into the ’90s. On each bottle is a promotion for a forthcoming Xbox One game (Forza Motorsport 5 on the Citrus Cherry, Kinect Sports Rivals on the Electrifying Berry), and have codes to enter at every2minutes.com for a chance to win various Mountain Dew and Xbox One prizes. Including a tacky-looking Mountain Dew-branded One.
Citrus Cherry is a repeat of last year’s flavor, so I didn’t do a taste test this time. For those who are curious how I thought about it, here’s the link to last year’s entry. The short version is that it tasted like Mountain Dew with a tinge of cherry and a punchy citrus aftertaste that I wasn’t expecting. So this time around we’re just gonna try the new Electrifying Berry flavor.
This looks like the kind of stuff you would mix cough syrup in to make purple drank.
Lately I’ve noticed how much video games are penetrating our food and drink. Last year I had covered Mountain Dew Game Fuel, which made its triumphant return. While I haven’t found this year’s model of Game Fuel yet, I found something just as interesting:
Until recently I didn’t realize those are meant to be claw marks in their logo and not giant spikes.
Monster Energy has decided to team up with Infinity Ward and Activision to advertise Call of Duty: Ghosts on cans of Monster. Ah yes, Call of Duty: Ghost Dad, the tenth major installment in the Call of Duty franchise. Unfortunately my interest in Call of Duty waned years ago, mostly in part due to how over-the-top Modern Warfare 2 got, along with releasing a new game every year just made me fall behind. As of this writing, I still haven’t played Black Ops II. Thus, I am not at all hyped for Call of Duty: Ghosts of Sparta.
Another year, and another PAX has passed by. I played a bunch of games, met with some people I know, and got to see some of the sights and sounds of Seattle. Thankfully this year I’m not recovering from some nasty post-convention flu, just sleeping a bit more.
Alas, unlike last year, when I went to the Final Fantasy 25th Anniversary event — you can see that blog entry I made of it here — there wasn’t any big outside-of-PAX events that I was aware of. What I did notice around the Seattle area was a flood of gaming-related entities. From seeing ads for games, to seeing retail stores show their slight understanding of video game culture. So I took a few pictures of them while I was around Seattle.
This is a bit too easy of a maze.
The coffee’s probably worth 2000 points.
Most people who were walking to or from the convention center saw this one from the nearest Starbucks. I have to give credit to the sign-maker for making a Ms. Pac-Man reference.
I don’t drink coffee that much, so I didn’t go in and try it. It was probably alright, but when it’s from a Starbucks and there’s about 50 of them within walking distance, it kinda loses the appeal.
A quest… with Mario? I doubt they were referencing Paper Mario or Mario & Luigi…
About a block or two down near Pine St had a Timbuk2 clothing store with this Super Mario Bros. reference. Chalk drawings of Mario and Bowser, plus something that resembles the castles of the old game. The other side, which I regrettably didn’t take a picture, had a Question Block on the other side, also talking about quests.
I like how they were trying to shoehorn in RPG references, but since they thought something like Final Fantasy would be too obscure, they went with Mario. Must’ve been a manager’s call. Gotta give the guys credit, even if they got confused which games they wanted to refer to.
Saw another games-related related thing at a bar a few blocks away from where a Karaoke event sponsored by Destructoid was happening. Surprise, it’s more Pac-Man! Since this was several blocks away from the main convention center, I’m surprised they even bothered to throw a video game reference in, not many people were gonna be heading up this way.
I actually prefer the Strife that’s an FPS, thank you very much.
Even by the Convention Center, video games were all over the place. The Daily Grill, the restaurant next door to the convention, had banners and ads for the MOBA game/DOTA clone Strife. PAX 2013 seemed to be the year of the MOBA as there were about a dozen different kinds of MOBAs being shown off. I bet most of these never took off, especially this one. I’m more a fan of the shooter that’s also called Strife, but that’s just me.
Update 7/15/2020: It turns out the MOBA Strife shut down in late 2018 with no announcement. Meanwhile, the classic FPS Strife eventually got an updated version and seems to be what Google searches lead you to now compared to the old MOBA. I wrote about the FPS Strife in early 2020, which you can check out here.
I also saw ads for Total War: Rome II and Project Diva F: Hatsune Miku on taxis and buses, but sadly I could not get good quality pictures of either. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if I missed a few other games-related things in the city to take advantage of PAX happening, but this is what I saw while I was out and about.
I like PAX, it’s a cool convention. It’s too bad it’s being partially ran by two guys who have constant foot-in-mouth syndrome. Hopefully we’ll start seeing other conventions show up in response, I want to make sure my money’s going towards people who aren’t complete dicks.
2020 Update:
This would end up being my final PAX to date. Since I don’t have a lot of money, traveling to Seattle was a rather costly endeavor for me, especially in the last few years I went.
In the years since, both Penny Arcade creators Mike “Gabe” Krahulik and Jerry “Tycho” Holkins would turn out to be massive jerks, with Krahulik saying he felt immense regret for backing down on making T-shirts about Dickwolves, which some people took umbrage to because the original comic was a thinly veiled rape joke.
I bet the convention is still alright in spite of the Penny Arcade involvement, but I honestly can’t say I really miss it. The process to register was rather nerve-wracking for me in the past, and I wasn’t really up for going through the stress-inducing process every year, combined with me having the lack of funds needed.
I wouldn’t mind going back to Seattle again someday, but probably would be for a smaller gaming event, or to just visit friends. Maybe visit Pink Gorilla again, or some of the other mom’n’pop game shops in Seattle.
Alternatively, I’d love to do the common Tourist Garbage and just see all the popular sights and sounds of the city. I feel that’s a necessity if you’re visiting a city. While I did that one day towards the end of one PAX, one day isn’t enough. I figure a week-long excursion of that would be more fun than being around hundreds of sweaty nerds who want to play Dishonored early for a whole weekend.
It’s really fascinating how popular licensed music in sports video games have become. For a good while in the 2000s, there was a sense of hype if your song got into the next Madden NFL or NBA 2K title. Nowadays we tend to gloss over it, being just another thing about these games that exist. They’re not particularly exciting these days, unless you’re like me and like cataloging every time Snoop Dogg’s been in something.
While EA and 2K Sports have become the big-name players for sports games these days, there are many companies willing to throw their hat in the ring and try to carve their own niche. For example: Sony with their MLB The Show series are considered by many to be the gold standard for baseball video games. Other times, some of this competition falls flat and ends up in the annals of obscurity, like the many times Midway tried to re-invent the wheel by making stuff like NHL Hitz. This time, we’re gonna briefly talk about Microsoft’s failed attempt at a sports video game brand called “XSN Sports.”
In 2003, Microsoft tried to make their own sports brand to rival then-competitors EA and Sega. They introduced XSN Sports as their flagship sports game brand, to make sports games for their exclusive Xbox console, much akin to what their competitors were doing. Under the XSN Sports banner, Microsoft’s sport-focused games featured tournaments and leagues that players could make in-game to share on the respective XSNSports.com website.
Microsoft’s sports games debut included XSN Sports titles like NFL Fever 2004, Links 2004, and Rallisport Challenge 2. Sadly, they couldn’t make a dent in the competition, and the XSN Sports brand was folded one year later, with only Amped and Rallisport Challenge lasting beyond the brand. The XSN service itself was later shut down in 2006, presumably to shift focus onto the then-new Xbox 360.
What does that say when half the cover is dedicated to the artists featured?
As a promotional tie-in for these games, they released a soundtrack, under the “XSN Sports Soundtrack CD Series,” featuring various songs that come from the game’s soundtrack. NHL Rivals 2004 was the featured soundtrack for Volume 1, and what turns out to be the only volume, as there was no Volume 2 that I could find online.
The soundtrack CD also comes with a bonus DVD, featuring some NHL highlights from the 2002-03 NHL season, some Wayne Gretzky promo videos, and some DVD-ROM exclusive features. Not much to say about all this, as my experience with hockey games begin and end at Blades of Steel.
I guess this looked good for 2003. The expression on his face is quite off-putting, though…
The main reason I’m covering this is primarily because of the track listing. Outside of two tracks, the rest of the album is… rather off-putting. Stuff like Boston’s “Long Time” (apparently the “Foreplay” half wasn’t available despite being the better part of the two), Joe Walsh’s “Rocky Mountain Way,” REO Speedwagon’s “Keep On Loving You.”
As someone who has only been to one or two hockey games ever in their life, these songs seem rather out of place for a hockey game. Most of them are too slow, not evoking the fast-paced nature of ice hockey, or missing the sort of jock jam enthusiasm that you kind of need at a sporting event.
But what about those two interesting songs, you may ask? Well, they may not be that interesting, but they are to me, at least.
Man, when’s the last time I did an entry on the stuff I bought? Back in January, to be exact. I thought a video would be an interesting way to document them, but then I lost motivation and it took me months to finally sit down and make said video. I’m more of a writer, and making those videos, even for something like these, felt like a lot of work, so this will be the second and final one.
There’s a lot of stuff I’ve gotten in the months in-between. A bunch of PlayStation games, cheap magazines, games from across the ocean, and undeniably some of the most interesting stuff I’ve found yet.
2021 Note: I eventually went back through the video and transcribed most of the video to make this post here in text form. You can see the original video here if you’re curious, but I don’t think it’s really worth watching.
Free! – Katamari Damacy (PS2)
One of the rare things I didn’t buy but felt like highlighting here. An old friend, Veronica, who draws the cool webcomic Bittersweet Candy Bowl, was doing a bit of a spring cleaning and was offering some games to give away, and I requested for this, since I had heard of the Katamari series of games, but never played any of them.
It even came in a fancy packaging envelope showing Veronica’s absolutely awesome art. As for the game itself, maybe I’ll get around to playing it someday and seeing what all the fuss is about.
You should check out Bittersweet Candy Bowl alongside the Sonic the Hedgehog fancomic series Not Enough Rings, as they’re really good art. Just wanted to give a shoutout.
The disc was initially in pretty bad shape, I had to go to my usual mom’n’pop game shop Video Game Wizards to get it resurfaced, and it works good as new.
– $20: God of War Saga (PS3)
– $10: Injustice: Gods Among Us (PS3)
– $5: Band Hero (360)
– $5: Guitar Hero II (360)
– $7: Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros’ Treasure (Wii)
A bunch of fairly current-gen stuff that I got for deep discount. With the exception of Guitar Hero II, all of these were snagged at various GameStops, which is surprising considering how many horror stories I’ve heard from others.
I couldn’t pass up five God of War titles on PS3 for $20. Unfortunately two of them — Chains of Olympus and Ghosts of Sparta — were digital download only codes that I found out only when I removed the plastic wrap, and the code had expired. Thus I have three God of War games instead of five. Oh well, God of War: Origins Collection, which is the PS3 remasters of those PSP titles, is probably worth the $10 or so asking price.
I may not be into DC Comics or fighting games, but a fighting game by the Mortal Kombat people at $10 was a pretty good steal. (2021 note: They eventually gave this game away for free on Steam. While the PC port has poorer netcode, I realized I no longer need this game on the PS3. I probably will get less than half of what I paid for it if I trade it in anywhere, but that’s the way game trading goes sometimes.)
With Band Hero and Guitar Hero II, I now own every game in the Guitar Hero franchise that was released on the Xbox 360. When it comes to rival Rock Band, I still got a ways to go. Plus I’m still asking myself: do I really need stuff like Green Day: Rock Band? At least Lego Rock Band has bangers on it like “Ghostbusters.”
Zack and Wiki is one of those Capcom games on the Wii that I’ve heard is one of those underrated gems. Seeing as how I barely use my Wii, I’d love to try something that’s not a schlocky shooter like Red Steel or The Conduit.
Okay, it doesn’t fit one-to-one, but you get what I’m going with this, right?
There’s two things that I love fondly that I grew up with: Video games (natch), and game shows. I’m not exactly sure what gravitated me towards game shows: Could be the flashy sets, the catchy themes, the thought of people winning $25,000 in mere seconds; but whatever it was, I was hooked. I still enjoy the classic game show every now and then, even though my interest in the genre has waned in recent years.
The rare sunburst logo. The common white and blue logo wouldn’t show up ’til the 1990s.
Since I like game shows and video games, having the two come together sounds amazing. It’s my version of a peanut butter cup. There were a whole bunch of them on the ol’ NES, almost all of them published by GameTek, a US-based software company. I think the game show games were their only hallmark, though they did publish games like Frontier: Elite II and Corridor 7: Alien Invasion, as well as working on publishing Robotech: Crystal Dreams before filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 1999. There were some NES game show games published by other companies, such as Hi-Tech Expressions, but the less said about those games, the better.
Now, there’s a fair share of game show games on the NES by GameTek, including four different editions of Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!, as well as Double Dare, Hollywood Squares and many others. What most people don’t know is that some of these were developed by Rare. Yes, that Rare. Donkey Kong Country Rare. Banjo-Kazooie Rare. Kinect Sports Rare. For those who don’t find that as surprising as I do, Rare is a games company based in Twycross, England. All the game show adaptions that they had made weren’t as well known on British TV at the time, so to have a company based in England to do American TV game show video games is funny. I would assume the production companies would send them episodes of the show as well as the rules of the game so they understand what they’re trying to make.
David Wise is one of my favorite European composers, next to Tim Follin, Richard Jacques, and Simon Viklund. You could consider this post part of the “David Wise Appreciation Station,” if really you want to.
Since Rare was a small skeleton crew throughout the ’80s, they only had one composer: Dave Wise (pictured). Wise pretty much composed all of Rare’s games solo up until the early ’90s, and seeing him try to recreate some of game show’s iconic themes on the NES sound chip sounds intriguing. Let’s see how well he did on each of them…
Jeopardy! (also includes Jeopardy! Junior Edition and Jeopardy! 25th Anniversary Edition)
Guys, the globe goes *behind* the logo, not under it!
The NES version:
COMPARED TO:
“Think!”, Jeopardy!‘s theme from 1984-1991 (originally composed by Merv Griffin):
There really isn’t much to say about Jeopardy! as a show. Surprisingly, there were several NES adaptations by Gametek, with new editions out about a year apart from each other.
The theme to Jeopardy! is undeniably the most well-known and iconic game show theme. Merv Griffin’s little think tune eventually became the show’s hallmark theme since the show’s revival with Alex Trebek. Being one of the earliest Rare/GameTek collaborations, this is probably one of the closest. However, the intro – used during the contestant selection in the game – goes up three keys rather than two like the actual theme does.
Mutant David Letterman faces off against two random ladies in this exciting game of Jeopardy!
The rest of the game has random little ditties that play throughout, and none of them resemble cues from the show. The theme is the closest they get, and it’s surprisingly passable.
Now who ever seen a kid with a beard? Especially on Jeopardy! of all shows…
The two later releases of Jeopardy! by Rare, 1989’s Junior Edition, and 1990’s 25th Anniversary Edition, have the same exact music. 25th Anniversary adds a little ditty during the copyright screen, which would also appear in Wheel of Fortune: Family Edition.
There really isn’t much difference between the three editions besides new clues — the Junior Edition might be even harder than the other editions unless you know a lot of 50s-60s stuff — even the 25th Anniversary edition recycles the contestant sprites from Junior Edition, except giving one of the kid models a mirror-universe beard for some reason.
These are alright versions of Jeopardy!, especially by 80s standards. You could do much worse.
Wheel of Fortune (also includes Wheel of Fortune Junior Edition)
This title screen looks so… plain, even by late 80s standards.
The NES version:
COMPARED TO:
“Changing Keys,” Wheel of Fortune‘s theme from 1983-1989, originally composed by Merv Griffin:
While Jeopardy! is a fairly straightforward game, Wheel of Fortune is a bit more elaborate. Spin a wheel and play hangman, and try to win cash. The 3 (!) versions GameTek released are identical in every way, and are particularly backwards by not having prizes on the wheel, the top dollar value never going higher than $1,000, that sort of thing. Otherwise the game’s pretty spot on to the nighttime “playing for cash” format that started becoming the show’s standard by that point. (Sorry, no shopping for ceramic dalmatians here.)
Welcome to the *WHEEL VORTEX*. Don’t ask what the Boo and Moo spaces are.
Wheel’s theme was another Merv Griffin-composed tune called “Changing Keys,” which was made to replace the original theme composed by Alan Thicke when the show entered syndication in 1983. The theme was arranged a few times over the years by Griffin and later Steve Kaplan, before being completely replaced with a Kaplan composed tune in the early 2000s. A shame, as the later themes are rather generic-sounding.
This is where most of the action takes place. Rather simple looking these days.
In the NES game, Wise opted to use the bridge that played during the show’s credits as the theme, rather than the introduction that was associated with the show at that point. It’s only something the game show diehards like me would notice, but it’s close enough to the main theme that it’s not a bother. Plus you’re likely only gonna hear a few seconds of this before you go into the game itself anyway.
Like Jeopardy!, Wheel had two additional releases done by Rare: Junior Edition in 1989 and Family Edition in 1990. Oddly, Family Edition completely changes all the music to completely original compositions such as this:
It sounds okay, but for a Wheel of Fortune game to lack the famous theme song is a strange omission, especially since the show had still had Changing Keys as its theme by the time Family Edition was released. Maybe this was music for an unfinished Rare game that they didn’t want to go unused? It definitely matches the sound of later Rare NES titles like Cobra Triangle and Battletoads…
Anyone who follows the blog may know I collect large amounts of video game-related crap. (For those who are visiting the site for the first time: I collect large amounts of video game-related crap.) Most of the time, it’s video game trinkets and items from press events, magazines, and demo discs, among many other things. This time, I’m gonna look at a preview DVD.
Oh no Samus is bursting out of my gamecube
It’s a Nintendo Preview disc from about mid-2002. Mostly an ad for the forthcoming Metroid Prime, it also features other flagship Nintendo GameCube games like Super Mario Sunshine, Mario Party 4, Animal Crossing, and Star Fox Adventures, along with some advertising for the Game Boy Advance, including the ill-fated e-Reader add-on. One of these days I’ll get around to covering that e-Reader, it’s a strange part of Nintendo history.
I remember this DVD being available at a Game Crazy (RIP), and took one home to watch at all the reasons for me to ask for a GameCube that Christmas. Nowadays the only reason I still have my GameCube is because my Wii doesn’t support the Game Boy Player add-on, one of the best damn hardware add-ons out there.
The most information about three Metroid games that you can pack onto a DVD.
Each of the highlighted Nintendo games get a few trailers for the games, most with typical sizzle reel fare. One for Star Fox Adventures is voiced by freakin’ Don LaFontaine for crying out loud. There’s also bonus features for each of them. Super Mario Sunshine and Mario Party 4 have tips and tricks videos. Metroid Prime has a feature called “The Metroid Legacy” which covers the history of the franchise – weird, considering that Metroid had only three games by the time of this DVD’s release – and Animal Crossing comes with a special set of commercials that are parodies of The Real World.
