GAMING NEWS
What a State… of Play
There was a lot of wares on display at Sony’s State of Play 2022 the announcement thing it started doing when people couldn’t have an E3.
I find it hard to get too excited about StreetFighter 6 cos meh and Final Fantasy 16 I didn’t even make it to the end of the trailer because I felt like I’d heard every single sentence uttered by RPG characters a million times before.
“In a world ruled by tyranny and turmoil… there are those who would fight to take back control of their fate.”
Again? Didn’t they do that… oh I don’t know… 15 times before at least?
Here’s a clip.
“The chaos you would reap would sweep all of Valishthea into the abyss!”
That is soooo Final Fantasy for characters to talk like that.
But what can you do with such an established mainstream RPG franchise? You can’t mess with the moneymaker too much. It’s like that time Bowie went Jungle. It freaks people out. So, you can’t suddenly have them suddenly talking like they DON’T have a stick up their arse in Final Fantasy, can you? Can you? Can you?
“The chaos you would reap would sweep all of Valishthea into the abyss!”
“Would it fuck, sire. Calm the fuck down. We’ll just take on a lot of side missions, get tore into these pricks.”
StreetFighter 6 appears to have a career mode that is completely lifted from Yakuza, a game I really wanted to like but I felt was more jarring than hitting a cricket ball off the vibrating bottom of the bat. There you go. Just wanted to show you I don’t just do football analogies. I can do any sport. Wait til I get into my kabaddi metaphors.
But what DOES look cool is Rollerdrome, a skating shoot em up. Yes. Basically, Jet Set Radio with guns instead of graffiti. Though here is my question, and this may just be my particular brand of OCD here – why call it Rollerdrome rather than the more obvious RollerDome.
It could be a nod to the classic David Cronenberg movie with Debbie Harry, which was VideoDrome with an R too, also RollerDome is already used by – quote unquote – a family friendly skate park in Richmond, Virginia. So, they probably didn’t want to endorse a game with roller skate shooting in it because it’s difficult enough for America to get through a day without some fuckwit shooting up some place as it is.
And don’t say “well putting shooting in video games doesn’t help that” because we all know that’s utter shite. Things in video games do not lead normal people to repeat those things in real life otherwise Super Mario would have heralded a new generation of plumbers.
THE TIP OF THE COLUMN
Now like a lot of you, I sit there every day with Contra III The Alien Wars on my Super Nintendo. The Japanese import version, obviously, because I’m that hardcore OG RETRO MLG. And don’t get me wrong. I love it. Running and gunning with Jimbo and Sully and their plethora of unfeasibly large multi-bullet spunking weapons. But, as you know, it’s not enough, is it. You want a bit of variation, a bit of a change from the breathlessly intense superfun adrenaline overloading action. Well, I am the answer to all your prayers.
At the title screen quickly press Right, Right Down Diagonal, Right and X. Lo and behold you will access the sound test and you can just sit there and slowly work your way through every sound effect from the game instead. Brilliant.
Who ever did that by the way? Sat and listened to the Sound Test in games? How bored did you have to be. Well, do you know what – I’ve nearly completed Final Fantasy VII, I’ve got up to Shao Khan on Mortal Kombat and I’ve taken Accrington Stanley to the European Cup Final in Championship Manager but no – forget that. I’m going to settle down and go through that fucking sound test for Sonic the Hedgehog.”
You know how you would call your friends and say, “Hey Frank, get your arse round here NOW, I’ve got a cheat code for Mega Turbo in Street Fighter 2 Turbo.” And Frank would be knocking on the door in seconds, even though he lived in a different city, sweating like Tom Cruise’s divorce lawyer.
“Let’s do this!”
Even calling up and saying, “Hey Tommy, you know that you can actually play with the polygons on the opening screen of Starfox!” would get someone sprinting round.
But did anybody ever phone anyone up and say, “come round, I’ve unlocked the Sound Test in Contra 3?”
No.
You might save it for awkward gaps in a conversation. Like on a first date with someone. Sitting there, nursing your burger and fries. “So… eh… you know there’s a cheat code to access the sound test in Contra 3.”
“Whoa!”
So yes. More retro game tips next week!
ESPORTS REPORT
All eSports and game streaming were cancelled this week in memory of legendary games streamer, BlastroTrout - real name Barnaby Trout – arguably the planets most legendary content generator of content. In 20016 he took the streaming world by storm, becoming the 47 billionth person to film himself opening FIFA packs. But he really broke the mould because he had that little animation thing. Didn’t he? You know. The animation thing. That was compelling content. And who can forget how he described each card he got from his FIFA packs as either good, bad or something in between.
But it wasn’t just about himself, oh no. BlastroTrout was also much loved for his charity stream marathons, where he once livestreamed for 30 hours without saying anything remotely interesting. An incredible feat and a record that stood for many years until that bloke who streams Fortnite did it for 31 hours even though controversially his feed was buffering for twenty-two of those and nobody noticed.
BlastroTrout leaves behind a wife he never saw once in real life and fourteen hi energy drink sponsors.
If I know BlastroTrout? And he was someone I consider a friend because even though I never met him, he once liked a comment I made under a tweet of his. If I know BlastroTrout? He is sitting up there now. Next to God and he’s saying to him. “Yeah, God, you weren’t bad at content generating yourself, were you? But when did YOU pack Prime Icon Rudd Gullit, eh?”
Rest in peace.
Still to come: an update on how a massive game I slagged last week might not be as bad as I said it was because of something I found out, a heart-rending story of how a certain video game nearly meant there was NO Gamesmaster, the first of my beat poems about classic arcade machines AND the game I’ve been playing this week that I am so into I am waking up every morning wanting to get into it before I even do my MMA work out with my North Korean masseuse.
All that – an extra 3000 words worth of jocular gaming highjinks is in the paid version, which also gets you into the chat section of this AND the prize draws. But for this week’s free edition of Dominik’s Little Old Purple Column thanks. Keep it little, keep it old, keep it purple!
Dominik's Little Old Purple Column #6 FREE