One of the most surprising films in the sort of "Holy crap? What the heck?! This is cool!" vein to come out of SXSW film festival earlier this year was Blip Festival: Reformat The Planet. It's all about chiptune music and the performers, and is beautifully shot. It's hard to imagine Nintendo thinking people would be hacking into their Game Boys in order to create full-fledged concerts, concerts that would one day spark a feature documentary and an entire genre of music.
For one week, you can watch the impressive documentary at Pitchfork.tv. It's even broken up into bite-sized chapters for you. Give it a looksee and you'll find yourself toe-tapping along to the addictive 8-bit music throughout the film. It's beaten Wizard Rock as our current favorite geek music of choice.
The Spy Hunter movie based on the Midway arcade hit that we talked about more than a year ago is hitting the skids, crashing through the guardrail, and plummeting off the cliff that is called "development hell" in Hollywood. Looks like director Paul Anderson (W.S., not Thomas) is being taken off the project, which will spin it out into limbo.
You can also read Latino Review's review of the script right here. They seemed to like it, saying it was better than The Fast and the Furious 3 ... which ain't saying much. In fact, the best thing Spy Hunter has spawned as far as filmed entertainment goes is the Pontiac commercial above. If any of the game sequels had looked like that, we might still be playing them.
Now, we ask you... is this such a bad thing? Sure it had Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson attached to it, and John Woo was supposed to direct it at one point. However, it's had a slew of different writers and now with two director replacements, do we really need a Spy Hunter movie? We hope no one hits "Continue" on the Spy Hunter movie, and that it just dies a merciful death. What say you?
Thanksgiving this year will include both turkey and time travel, a magical cocktail made possible by Square Enix. The company said that it'll ship its DS throwback to SNES favorite Chrono Trigger in North America on November 25, just two days before families sit down for the annual feast.
Giving players plenty to keep them busy while fighting off the adverse effects of tryptophan, Chrono Trigger's DS debut promises new dungeons, touchable controls and an arena mode. Additionally, as the RPG keeps with the original's pixelated sense of style, Square Enix has all but ensured that Thanksgiving 2008 will play out much the same way as it did some thirteen years prior, as we ignore seldom seen family members in favor of the more interesting trio of Crono, Lucca and Frog.
The Virtual Console just got its weekly nostalgia injection, offering fans of all colors -- but mostly blue and green -- something else to download and play as we wonder where the weekend went and why exactly there is a receipt for a Magnet Beam on the kitchen table.
Mega Man (NES, 1 player, 500 Wii Points): With the Blue Bomber set to don pixelated pajamas next month, his freshman adventure marks this week's most noteworthy addition to the Wii's window into the past. Assuming you haven't bought the original Mega Man in one of Capcom's many other compilations, Guts Man and company are waiting ever so patiently for you to drop by.
Neo Turf Masters (Neo Geo, 1-2 players, 900 Wii Points): This is 133 megs of hot golf action right here, straight from 1996 to your living room. You don't have even to admit to your friends that you like video game golf. We'll keep your dirty little secret.
Tossing aside the standard temporal ocarina for something a little more complex, a "Flute Link" cosplayer performed on stage at this year's Masquerade show at the Otakon 2008 in Baltimore, bringing Navi in tow. It's a great performance, although it's hard to tell when she's playing live and when it's pre-recorded (for demonstrationg of her live performance, we also embedded a video of Flute Link performing Tetris with an Otaku band.
And for anyone who ever wished Navi would get her what for, keep watching until about the 4:25 mark. Video embedded after the break.
While not as funny as Circuit City's "$10,000" Madden PSP bundle, Amazon has listed every Rock Band 2 game, bundle, peripheral and the Rock Band Track Pack as coming to Nintendo 64. While we were quick to assume this meant an overindulgent revival of the best Nintendo console ever, we quickly came back to reality after we noticed the box shots were showing the correct consoles (Xbox 360, PS3, etc.). Revival averted.
Nothing sounds quite as satisfying as disintegrating ninjas and zombies with a stylized 8-bit bazooka. That's probably why THQ's upcoming XBLA Worms clone, Rocket Riot, remains on our radar. First announced last October, the game, developed by Dutch dev CodeGlue, evokes a retro feel that speaks directly to our aging hearts with its 80 "completely destructible" pixel-laden levels. Unlike some recent digitalofferings, Rocket Riot also promises to support up to eight players over Xbox Live, or four for those wishing to hash out their differences on the same couch. Rocket Riot is expected to send us diving for cover when it drops like a bomb onto XBLA this fall.
You know that bit in Antitrust when Milo Hoffman discovers that NURV (Never Underestimate Radical Vision, natch) is stealing source code from its employees and having them contract killed? SEGA's Julian Mehlfeld recently had the exact same experience except 1. SEGA isn't an acronym, 2. There's no way Mehlfeld could match Ryan Philippe's smoldering charisma and 3. What he discovered was actually a room in the company filled, not only with every SEGA game, but every game that had ever appeared on a SEGA console ... and murder contracts. No, no, we kid.
Check out more of this incredible collection right here and if any of you other companies have rooms like this we request, nay, demand pictures ... and keys.
We're hoping you'll just watch the video and not really bother with any of the padding we've surrounded it with. But in case you're wondering, we think Mega Man 9's intro sets the tone for the blue bomber's retro-vitalized return just perfectly. Requiring very little in the way of reflexes, it's also the only section we think we'll have mastered by the time the game hits PSN, XBLA and WiiWare.
Oh, and did you catch the cute news reader cameo? How about that wascally Dr. Wily's "Swiss Bank" number?
If there's one thing you'll see a lot during your stroll through Mega Man 9's trap-laden, pit-filled and exceedingly deadly memory lane, it's the poor little robot boy exploding into a booming bloom of pulsating energy. Unfortunately, there appears to be no achievement for dying one billion times -- at least not in the list of in-game gongs posted by Inside MGC.
So, how about beating the game without dying? Or without using energy tanks? How confident are you about defeating every boss using only the standard buster ... or without taking damage? Well, it looks like we'll be going for the WiiWare version of the game after all. We just can't deal with Capcom giving us a retro-wrapped gift with one hand and plucking Xbox 360 Achievements (or PSN Trophies?) out of our grasp with the other. Those meanies!
We wouldn't blame you if you'd forgotten that Capcom was likely to bring the first in its Alpha series of 2D fighters over to Sony's digital playground. Honestly, we have trouble remembering what we had for breakfast last week. Nevertheless, Capcom has confirmed that Street Fighter Alpha (or Zero if you swing that way) will be the latest classic PSone game to hurricane kick its way over to PSN when it debuts this Thursday. So, yes, PS3 owners, you may not be in on the SSFIITHDROMGBBQ beta, but at least you're getting something, right? Don't be so greedy.
Whether you're a fan of shmups or wish to throw a pile of dictionaries at us for using such an egregious portmanteau, you could learn a thing or two from DS Fanboy's tribute to the shoot-em-up kings at Treasure. From 1993's Gunstar Heroes (released last year as a Virtual Console title) to this year's Bangai-O Spirits, the piece covers all of the developers' projectile-favored games (sorry Dynamite Heddy fanatics). Click here and get edumucated.
Also coming out this week is Fable 2's XBLA gambling counterpart Pub Games, which will let you earn money now before the game's October 21 release. Entry fee to ye olde casino is 800 MS points (US $10), or free if you pre-order Fable 2 at a participating retailer.
Break it to Make it! Did you hear? This week's Virtual Console update includes a video game adaptation of 80s dance flick, Breakin'. Finally we can live out our closet fantasies of break dancing in the shoes of Kelly, Ozone and -- personal fave -- Turbo. Oh, wait, that's not what the game is about? Monday mornings are so cruel.
Break In (TurboGrafx16, 1-4 players, 700 Wii Points): No, there's no fancy footwork here. Instead, Nintendo offers up this decidedly break dance-free game of pool. So, yeah, it's pool.
Star Parodier (TurboGrafx16 CD-ROM, 1 player, 900 Wii Points): Well, at least this is something to get excited over. A parody of Hudson shooter Star Soldier, here you'll be able to fly about and shoot down colorful bad guys as Star Soldier's Paro Ceaser, iconic pyro Bomberman, or a giant flying PC Engine that shoots cards and discs at enemies. That almost makes up for this morning's dissapointment.
Here's a way to show you care: an Atlanta, GA schoolteacher (and obsessive knitter) is recreating World 1-1 in scarf form (based on this map from Ian Albert). The plan is, once she finishes, she and her boyfriend will get engaged. You can follow along with her progress at the aptly-titled The Mario Scarf Blog, with an FAQ found here. Now, if only there was a World 1-2 belt to go along with it ...
_thumbnail.jpg "i am 8-bit: 2008")
