The Quixotic Engineer

This is more of an open question than a well-formed idea, so I’m hoping you all can help me out on this one.

A few weeks ago I read an article by Noel Murray over at the A.V. Club. His synopsis of indie rock band Pavement’s career is worth a read, but the opening paragraph is what that really struck me as insightful:

Here’s how it goes sometimes: A guy likes movies, initially because he’s attracted to story and spectacle, but after a while, he sees so many movies that he starts to get tired of the same kinds of structure and style repeated over and over. So novelty starts to take precedence over quality, and the cineaste starts grooving on such esoteric virtues as slowness and murkiness. Or consider the music buff, who often gets jaded quickly and starts tossing around words like “overproduced” and “middle-of-the-road” to describe songs they can’t abide, while championing acts that traffic in drone and distortion.

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Earlier this month I was contacted by one of my favourite bloggers, Michael Abbott of The Brainy Gamer, about a semi-secret project he was working on called the Gamers Confabulation. He was looking to assemble a pool of bloggers who write about video games, from which he would invite a few every week for an informal round-table discussion on his podcast. Michael described it as a “thoughtful conversation about video games in a casual, lively format aimed at adults.” The list ranged from professional games journalists to motivated enthusiasts like myself. I was thrilled to receive the invitation and hastily accepted.

The flagship episode of the Gamers Confab features Brinstar of Acid for Blood, Manveer Heir of Design Rampage and myself. In it we talk about the culture of SingStar, the big promises made by game designers and how much we love Good Old Games. Thanks again to Michael, Brinstar and Manveer, I had a blast talking with you and I hope you all enjoy listening to us.

• Download the podcast directly [mp3]
• Subscribe to the podcast via iTunes
• Subscribe to the podcast feed

There’s always been a minor niggle at the back of my mind when I played the Nintendo DS. “They’ve got it backwards,” I thought, “The A button should be on the left and B on the right. That’s how it’s always been… I think.” A speedy investigation showed that my memory was a little foggy, and that the answer was significantly more interesting than that. Therefore, I present to you a brief history of gamepad button mapping.

Nintendo: BA for Life

The NES was the first console to move away from the joysticks of the Atari generation, opting instead for what would become an iconic design in gamepads. Despite my previous complaint, note that A is indeed mapped to the right of B. D’oh!

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Last fall featured one of the strongest holiday games lineup in recent memory. Games such as Bioshock, Super Mario Galaxy, Team Fortress 2 and Rock Band were all arriving within weeks of each other and life was good. However, it’s easy to overlook the fact that there were just as many major titles that fizzled in the last year. Consider the following sampling from Metacritic:

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What do the Nintendo DS and Looney Tunes have in common? They both have a well-deserved reputation for shovelware. Since dozens of mediocre licensed titles come out every week, it’s no surprise that this one managed to skip the endless cycle of previews that plagues games journalism today. It didn’t feature any bold new mechanics, and garnered an unremarkable average review score of about 67. Heck, I wasn’t even aware of its existence until Skrud suggested I check it out. However, if you enjoy rhythm games, this is a game that is definitely worth your time.

Looney Tunes: Cartoon Conductor is a blatant Elite Beat Agents clone. Like EBA, there are notes on the bottom screen that must be pressed with the stylus in time with the music. It also splits up section of the song with a cartoon narrative, in this case featuring the familiar cast of Looney Tunes.

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