Wasteland! By now, everybody who has ever been a fan of this game knows about Brian Fargo's Kickstarter project to make the sequel. So, naturally, I decided this week to take a look at the hallowed original. While not everything has aged gracefully, I must say it still holds up rather well today, with a particularly gritty storyline and great writing (printed in the manual, of course). It's also a remarkably violent game, going so far as to have the player slaughtering "cute little animals" and even babies! This game would definitely get an M rating today and probably arouse the ire of our good friend Hillary Clinton. At any rate here's the video!

You can download the mp4 here.

Rob Daviau in Mortal Peril!Attention all Armchair Arcaders: Rob Daviau, YouTube sensation and longtime friend of the site, has suffered a terrible accident! Foolishly modding a badly wired ColecoVision he received in a mysterious box from "The Doctor," Rob has been ripped out of our spacetime continuum and projected into a terrifying alternate reality! The photo you see here was sent just before the portal vanished; apparently Rob thought it was more important to alert us to his predicament than to use the portal to return! As you can see from the agony on the man's face, this is not a realm he wishes to be, and we must do all we can to save him. Please, if you have a ColecoVision and a Sonic Screwdriver, Rob needs your aid to bring him back home.

Wait, what's that? Another transmission! Transcript follows (breaking news!):

(begin transcript)
Rob: "Matt, DO NOT BRING ME BACK!"
Matt: "Hold on, Rob, we can't just leave you there. I know you must be worried that you'll bring back a strange germ or something from that other dimension, but don't worry, we'll be sure to hose you off good when you get here."
Rob: "Matt, NOOOO!"
Matt: "That's right, Rob, just hang in there, we're working as hard as we can here."
(end transcript)

As you can see, the situation is becoming more serious by the moment. Get to work, folks!

Bill is a winner!Well, you guys probably heard the news--I, like so many other millions of eager people, got caught up in the huge excitement of the $640 million New Jersey state lotto. Since Bill lives in the state, he casually bought a half-dozen tickets, and--quite unbelievably--the Loguidices are one of the three winners! Unfortunately, they're naturally too excited to post about it here, so they left it to me to summarize what you're gonna see changing around here.

Perhaps the most exciting thing is Bill's Armchair Arcade Museum. Both of us feel it's only right to build it in New Jersey since that's where the winnings came from--and it's where Bill lives, who will of course be contributing the bulk of the exhibits. They will be paying each of the AA staff a great wage just to work there full time, educating the public and, of course, playing as many retrogames as we can stomach. Admission to the museum is free, but you'll have to pay twenty five cents per game. And there will be NO, repeat NO, redemption machines anywhere. Well, except the little crane one where you can win plush Bill and Matt dolls (hey, we have to give something to the ladies!). The museum will also feature a full-service gym equipped with all the latest exergaming equipment (where you'll find Bill most of the time) as well as a full-service microbrewery called Pour of Radiance (where you'll find me most of the time). Somewhere down in the basement will be a TRS-80 programming area (Shawn's hangout). Mark Vergeer will be most likely found in the SHMUPS Emporium, which, as you can guess, will feature all the best SHMUPS in Dutch, of course. You just haven't played Gradius until you've played it in the original Dutch.

Pencil me in!I'm back from St. Louis with a big new podcast! Topics covered include the gaming events on the trip, Magic the Gathering vs. DLC, the lingering canker sore that is ME3's ending, Gameplay Forever news, the Matt Chat book project, and Orbliterator, the new game I'm working on. Enjoy, and please, lemme know what you think of the game and book ideas.
Download the MP3.

Orbliterator Sketch 2Well, here we go again. I've been thinking about what I'd tackle for my next game project, and have decided on a project I'm calling "Orbliterator." This project is a combination of an old game my dad and I used to play called "Gravity Wars" and a bit of real-time strategy and shoot'em up action. Ideally, this will be an online multiplayer game, probably 2-player but possibly more if it turns out to be feasible. Alternatively, I'd like to have a one-player version, though that will of course require some AI--though cheaply, I could see offering a "Practice Mode" with dummy targets.

Okay, so maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here. Let me break down the gameplay.

A desperate duel to the death...

In Armchair Arcade's fun new series, we ask the provocative question, "What makes a particular videogame sexy?" Each week's feature will explore some of the many intriguing approaches game designers have taken over the years to make their games more sensual, not just with increasingly detailed graphics, but also with romantic and seductive gameplay. While some of the games we'll be looking at are unabashedly low brow, displaying their raw sexuality like a badge of honor, other games in contrast are remarkably subtle, often downplaying their suggestive themes.

This week's entry, written by Matt Barton, is on perhaps the most obvious game in our ongoing series, the legendary action adventure, Tomb Raider. Enjoy, help spread the word, and of course, let us know what you think:

This week's episode is focused mostly on David's later career, which includes the FMV game Cadillacs and Dinosaurs: The Second Cataclysm, which he'd probably rather people forgot about. ;) Still, the story of its creation is definitely worth listening to. David also talks about his news and iOS projects with Electric Eggplant. Finally, the ale of the week is perhaps the ultimate vintage gamer's ale: 8-Bit Pale Ale!

Download the mp4.

Wasteland 2Hi, folks, I'm back this week with a new podcast. Topics include Wasteland 2 and Kickstarter funding, brainstorming Matt Chat DVDs and documentaries, Baer vs. Bushnell, and a closer look at the Mass Effect 3 ending fiasco. Don't forget to visit the Wasteland 2 Kickstarter page.
Download the mp3 here.

Mass Effect 3I was having such a good time this morning WRITING about Mass Effect 3 that I decided to do a 40 minute podcast about it, too. In addition to elucidating why I like the ending, I also jabber on about why gaming NEEDS this sort of thing--indeed, why sheltering kids from unpleasant realities may do them more harm than good in the long run. I also nitpick about the game and why it needs a lot more variety in its gameplay. (Note: I don't address the internal logical inconsistencies of the story here; I admittedly don't pay enough attention to this kind of thing to care if plot point A in the first game doesn't jive with plot point B in the second and makes utter nonsense of plot point C in the third. I'll leave that kind of thing for the alpha nerds.)
Download the mp3 here.