Lara Croft’s Evolutionary Spreads
August 26, 2008
The real-life models who’ve embodied Lara Croft over the years have never disappointed, giving video game fans plenty of beautiful eye candy — whether it be in video game form, advertising, and…Angelina Jolie.
Unfortunately, her video game form hasn’t always been as nicely, umm, shaped. Go Nintendo found an interesting collage of her evolutionary process from blocky, first iconic female game protagonist, to the much hotter, and looser (as in well animated), model in Tomb Raider: Underworld:
Talk about a purely cosmetic, but entirely necessary, upgrade!
Gaming Culture = Misogynistic Culture
August 26, 2008
Just a few observations made by quickly browsing through the web for gaming content. It will undeniably lead you to places dominated (no pun intended) by boobs and babes.
PCGH has all the best booth babes from the Games Convention in Leipzig!
That Gaming Site has collected the best girls that promote consoles well. I’m buying a PS3!
Gametrailers and Spike decided they should create an entire site dedicated to the beauty of gaming!
Games Radar needs no introduction when it comes to depicting women in questionable ways. But it is great to hear how much this editor loves women despite what the Internet says about his site.
So, these are just a few observations that might be wise to take into consideration the next time you proud and rightfully proclaim gaming as a matured art form on the rise. Remember, we are as much of the culture as the products, objects and experiences we consume. It is an ever spinning spiral of give and take between consumers and producers; just don’t let it become a downward spiral.
Chicago Game Store Burglars Ask Cops For Ride Home…
August 19, 2008
The title pretty much says it all. Five teenagers were arrested in Chicago for breaking into a video game store and looting merchandise. The strange part is that two of the criminals nearly escaped the scene, but they asked police officers for a ride home and that’s how they were caught.
I’m not sure if these guys were gamers or not, but they ceratainly need to play a little more Grand Theft Auto IV. They could probably learn a thing or two from our good friend Niko Bellic when it comes to the proper way s of evading police. These guys may actually make our list of “world’s dumbest gamer criminals”.
We decided to use the Beta image of Niko above because these guys don’t deserve the real thing.
Via Destructoid
Half of Kezins’ Staff Afflicted by the “Red Ring of Death”
August 16, 2008
It happened. The fatal “red ring of death” came in and swooped this writer’s Xbox 360 away. The system might have sensed the excitement over beating people online in Soulcalibur IV with Maxi-inspired “Carissa-foo” and shut down.
We gathered up a bit of info from around Kezins HQ and found out that half the staff has suffered from the dreaded “red ring.”
Will’s Xbox 360 crapped out after eleven (11!) months in use, Jesper’s is still up and running (or it should be, last we heard of him), and this writer’s took a dirt nap after a year and ten months of service. Juan? His can’t “red ring” because he doesn’t have one, but we’ll give his phantom system the benefit of the doubt and say it’d be living the good, gaming life.
What about you guys? Is your system still up and running? Or have you stayed away from the problematic Xbox 360?
Gamestop’s Kratos, Amazon’s ‘Miniguide’ for LittleBigPlanet
August 12, 2008
We’ve been seeing this story making the rounds online, but we decided to hold off on said postage from the lack of info. Well, for now at least, we know that GameStop and Amazon have kicked off their pre-order program for the upcoming LittleBigPlanet on PS3.
Those of you going with the lesser of two evils (in this case, Amazon) will get a Brady Games-sanctioned “LittleBigPlanet Creator” miniguide when the game ships out to you. GameStop patrons will be able to get their hands on an in-game Kratos, of God of War fame, which is actually split in four different parts: skin, goatee, blades and clothing.
As much as we adore GameStop’s “excellent” customer service, we have to hand it to them…they have the better deal — plus, no waiting to get your create-a-level on with shipping shenanigans.
What pre-order bonus are you guys going for?
Kezins Writer Guest Stars on The Gamers Garage Podcast
August 5, 2008
While we’ve been working hard on getting our own Kezins podcast up and running for a while now, you can get a taste of what’s in store for you lucky readers now. This writer got a chance to guest star over at The Gamer’s Garage podcast last week enjoying the lively conversation.
Tune in to listen to us ramble on about some of the contests the guys have coming up, Madden’s divisive IQ system, Xbox 360 price drop rumors, and other newsworthy items.
Check out the podcast here.
Audiosurf: Dylan Fitterer Interview
July 30, 2008
“Tune Racer”? Audiosurf on consoles? Metal Gear Solid or Half-Life? We talk to Audiosurf creator Dylan Fitterer about what spawned Audiosurf, why interactivity is so beautiful and ask why cutscenes are still around in the industry.
What was your main inspiration for the concept of the game? What made you want to do it?
Well, it mostly just sort of grew out of other things I was trying. The idea stuck around because I loved the concept of a music visualizer that was worth giving your whole attention to for an entire album. One where you could really focus on the music and the experience instead of just having it on in the background.
Back when Audiosurf was Tune Racer (an early prototype) there was very little gameplay. It was then a big challenge to come up with a game that enhanced the musical experience instead of just getting in the
way.
Yes, but gameplay evokes different emotions than music. That’s part of the reason they go together so well.
Playing a little MGS2 was enough to convince me that I didn’t need any more of that. It’s surprising to me that cinema games are still popular at all. I expected them to die with 7th Guest. Comparing that to Half Life 2 (one of my favorite games) is completely unfair 
Yes, but to me this question is too broad. Can games evoke emotions in players? Yes. Can creators express themselves through games? Yes. Can playing a game change how you look at a real-life situation? Yes.
I think that’s already happening and will continue as our populations shift to younger generations. Also, maybe we’ll find better ways to overlap the skills you learn in games with the skills you need everyday.
Yes, I think there’s some interesting possibilities there for manual edits to generated rides. The more players can make the experience their own the better.
It does take a lot of time so it can be hard to keep up, but it’s well worth it. There’s no better way to stay in touch with what players want. I’ve even learned new strategies from the players who outscore me.
I don’t see growth in casual games as detrimental to core games. It’s just growth for games. It turns out there’s a lot of people who like to play games, but have no interest in combat, camera control, cinematics, or framerates. I doubt casual games will ever be as large on XBLA or PSN as they are on PC. Strictly casual players probably have a PC for other reasons, but why would they have a console?
Have you been in talks with Microsoft, Sony or Nintendo to bring Audiosurf to consoles? Why would/wouldn’t it work on consoles?
Consoles are definitely a possibility, but as music platforms they’re not as strong as PC.
Is there a sequel planned?
We’ll see. I’m open to a lot of possibilities and am taking some time to experiment.
I’ve got a lot of ideas. The ones where I can mentally see the finished game aren’t very interesting to me though. I’d rather start on something that seems to have promise and eventually find the fun.
Team Fortress 2: Accessibility to get you going and depth to keep you there. I didn’t think any game would get me interested in playing a shooter with random people again, but it did.
Heroscape: A tabletop wargame with simple rules, custom armies, and high amounts of both skill and luck. Everybody has a good time whenever we play.
Name a couple of your favorite songs to play Audiosurf to.
Now That’s Sacred: Jack Conte
Sunspots: Nine Inch Nails
Galvanize: The Chemical Brothers
Eternal Life: Jeff Buckley
Paramount Announces ‘Clueless’, ‘Mean Girls’ & ‘Pretty In Pink’ the Video Games
July 22, 2008
We just received an interesting press release announcing ‘Clueless’, ‘Mean Girls’ & ‘Pretty In Pink’ the video games. I guess this is something we didn’t see coming, so it’s certainly interesting news. Check out screens from ‘Clueless’ and ‘Mean Girls’ below along with an early shot from ‘Pretty In Pink’. Full press release follows the images…
LOS ANGELES—July 22, 2008—Paramount Digital Entertainment and Legacy
Interactive announced today that they are developing titles based on the
popular Paramount Pictures’ films Clueless, Mean Girls and Pretty in Pink.
