Hideo-Kojima

When this was being made by Kojima’s team I thought it was more interesting. Now I worry that, unlike most other MGS games, I won’t be able to progress without killing anyone…

It all started with Metal Gear Solid. Hideo Kojima is a pacifist. How do I know this having never spoken to him? It’s the only logical explanation behind Metal Gear Solid. Big whoop, I mean, the games themselves are about as overtly in support of pacifism and nuclear non-proliferation, but I’m not talking about the overt, obvious messages. Anyone can put hours and hours of cutscenes in a video game (although few can get away with it like he can), but Kojima is special because he emphasizes the holiest of modes of expression for a game designer: mechanics. ...

You may notice some games that are missing from this list and are on every other list. Well, I didn’t play everything because I didn’t have the time or the money, so that accounts for some of the big misses like Pyschonauts or Resident Evil 4. Other games are deliberately omitted :cough: HALO :cough: This list is also way long, but I didn’t want to limit myself to an arbitrary number like 10 or 20, so here it is: ...

Apotheosis- 1. The fact or action of becoming a god; deification 2. Glorification, exaltation; crediting someone with extraordinary power or status. Do you know who Tim Schafer is? When I still lived at home, my dad used to ask me, “When are you gonna grow up and stop playing video games?” He tells my mother that he’s sure I’m addicted to the medium. It’s true that I spend the vast majority of my free time playing games. I can name developers, producers, writers, designers, and even composers for games from my favorite series of games. This vast information age enables me to know everything about a game, down to its minutia, just by checking an online database. If there’s not enough information there, I can almost guarantee there are five or six fansites devoted to uncovering every last detail. It must be daunting for developers nowadays to produce in this environment. ...

I like being surprised by a narrative. Too often, especially when it comes to video games, it’s always the same predictable plot twists and points. This was a point where Dan, the player, and Dan, the character, were both stunned at a convention being broken. It seems that Dan is most definitely not the hero of legend. The Zenithian helmet doesn’t fit Dan and Cleohatra is not willing to just loan it to him with the hopes that he’ll eventually run into the hero of legend. She sends Dan off to his previously unknown hometown of Gotha with the intent to track down the leads that Pankraz was following. ...

When we last left off, young Dan had arrived on land in Littlehaven after dreaming that his father was a king. Exciting! Except Pankraz seems to just be a wanderer, but a well-respected guy. Almost everyone Dan can talk to seems to think that Pankraz is the finest specimen of a man they’ve ever met and that he’s bound to grow up to be as great as his old man. As Dan continued to wander around, he eventually found his way outside of the city and onto the world map. Here he got into his first random encounter with monsters! Before Dan even has a chance to get worried, Pankraz shows up to save the day and WRECK SOME MONSTERS. Holy cow, Pankraz is a tough guy. Nothing seems to faze him and he mows through monsters with ease. If Dan starts to dip in HP, Pankraz will heal him up. He takes control and walks Dan back over to his hometown, Whealbrook. ...

Not as much Fat Princess news as I would have liked so far, but we’ve had a lot of Nintendo news hit the wire. First we’ve got the announcement that the SD card slot has finally been unlocked on the Wii, despite Nintendo’s initial, strong reluctance to do so. This will definitely help with storage woes on the system. They also announced a new Zelda game: The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. It revolves around trains and appears to be using the Phantom Hourglass engine. Also announced were some DSWare games and a balance board game which interests me so little, I won’t even drop its title. ...

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: ...

It’s time for the moment many of you have been waiting for: my review of Hideo Kojima’s epic masterpiece: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. SPOILER ALERT: This review may contain story spoilers. Read at your own risk! Operating mostly on the basis of a promised beautiful, cinematic, amazing future of games, the PS3 launched back in November of 2006 with many of its purchasers anxiously awaiting the arrival of one specific game: Metal Gear Solid 4. Arriving quite some time later, is this the game to finally make the PS3 a worthwhile purchase? Let’s have a look. ...

Deep from the trenches, it’s time for your Monday video feature: Embedded Reporter. After a week of mentioning Metal Gear Solid 4 at least once in every post, I’m sure you’re getting damn near sick of hearing about Kojima’s latest masterpiece (or so I hear, can’t play yet :sob:). Let’s close off the MGS4 references for the short term with the video reviews posted by both Gametrailers and IGN. Enjoy! ...