It’s probably too early to start calling me Nostradamus (we’ll have to wait until the regular season of baseball ends to know just how good I am), but if you remember this post I mentioned that Mario RPG’s launch on the VC in PAL territories would spearhead a US release. Lo and behold, Mario RPG, one of the greatest Mario games, SNES games, and RPGs in gaming history. It’s too bad that Square Enix won’t be releasing any of its other landmark SNES RPGs on VC, preferring to milk tons of money out of players with remakes ( which we like) and ports ( which we find a bit annoying, but kind of like anyway). Go out and buy Mario RPG and let’s hope that Earthbound hits the system soon. ...

You’ve probably heard the saying that hindsight is 20/20 on Monday morning, so just imagine how well I can call ’em two days later on Wednesday. That’s right, it’s time for Wednesday Morning Quarterback, your weekly sports round-up. All Arrested Development jokes aside, we are actually at the final countdown of the baseball season and a few teams have got very little time left to make it to October. Foremost amongst those teams, at least in my mind, are my Florida Marlins. At a huge 10.5 games back from the NL wild card, their only chance at this point is to catch up in the NL East where they are eight(!) games back. As great as a Marlins/Rays world series sounded back in May, it’s unfortunately looking like it’s not going to happen. ...

Deep from the trenches, it’s time for your Monday video feature: Embedded Reporter. One of my absolute favorite comedians, Mitch Hedberg is about to come out with a new, posthumous album later on this month (09/09). Having just found out about this today, I must say that I’m absolutely delighted. Mitch was an amazing comedian, able to see joy and laughter in the mundane and seemingly ordinary. We will always miss his comedy. ...

Insert another credit, because it’s time for your weekly video game news and you’ve just hit the Game Overview screen. (SPOILER NOTE: Tim’s review, my review, and some of this post have MGS spoilers. Read at your own risk) I’ve taken a few excerpts from Tim Rogers’ brilliant review of Metal Gear Solid 4 and I’m going to talk about them a bit. He totally threw us for a loop, revealing the game that is NOT ABDN’s best game of all-time, but revealing a game he firmly believes not to be. Let’s get started: ...

In what is probably the most interesting news story I’ve seen in a while on Kotaku, it seems that there is a new game called Guitar Praise - Solid Rock that revolves around the Guitar Hero concept, retooled to have a tracklist of entirely Christian music. It’s both a hilarious and good, I suppose, to have such a popular gameplay mechanic ripped off (stolen, if you will) and put in play for God. It’s (religious games) been done before with hilarious result and mocking by the AVGN here and here. ...

You’ve probably heard the saying that hindsight is 20/20 on Monday morning, so just imagine how well I can call ’em two days later on Wednesday. That’s right, it’s time for Wednesday Morning Quarterback, your weekly sports round-up. I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to be able to talk about the official end of the NY Yankees as the dominant force in the AL East. We’ve already seen them start losing to the Red Sox over this decade as the Sox have ended their long drought and started putting together some really impressive seasons, but should this season continue in the same vein it’s been going so far, this might be the first time in a long time that the Yankees do not make the post-season. At six ( SIX!) games back in the wild card race, the Yankees realistically have no chance to catch up, even though they’ve got thirty games left. The AL wild card will most likely go to the Red Sox while the AL East pennant will go to the Rays. ...

Todd Levin of the Morning News has written a great set of articles highlighting how video games have shaped and affected his life. I love articles like this detailing the way that these things that I love, these things that I’m so often told are a waste of time, are written about in a way that shows that they really do have an effect, both good and bad, on our lives. ...

Deep from the trenches, it’s time for your Monday video feature: Embedded Reporter. What you just saw was what will most likely be the opening cinematic for the upcoming total conversion game Sid Meier’s Civilization IV: Colonization. With how much I played the original Colonization, it’s only a matter of time before I find myself awake at 0500 simultaneously thinking “One more turn” and “Holy cow! Is the sun really rising right now?” ...

If you know me or read this site regularly, you know that I’m a huge fan of Tim Rogers of ActionButton.net. I don’t universally agree with him, but I do universally love how the things he says about game design and video games in general make me think critically about games both as entertainment, as examples of good design, and even as an art form. Today’s quote isn’t really all that thought-provoking, but it does bring up a rather good point: ...

Insert another credit, because it’s time for your weekly video game news and you’ve just hit the Game Overview screen. Rock Band 2 It may technically still be summer, but we’re right on the cusp of the most exciting game season in the year, the Fall release schedule. Did you realize that Rock Band 2, a game I’d say might be the first official big Fall release, comes out on 14 Sept. for the Xbox 360? That’s only tree weeks and a few days away. I can’t believe that one of my most anticipated titles for the year is so close to release, but I’m also a bit disappointed. Rock Band 2 is coming out a bit too soon. The 360 version is coming a bit early, but the others and the instruments should be coming out either just before or just after the year-old mark for Rock Band. I know it’s not their fault. I know that Guitar Hero: World Tour is the real reason that the game is coming out too soon. I just hope that Harmonix is able to make this release complete enough that they can get by with their actual dream of releasing a music platform sustained by DLC. ...