03/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #141
"(rather like arguing over whether a postcard of Waterhouse's Lady of Shalott truly captures the original painting's Pre-Raphaelite attention to detail. Um, quite.)"
from N64 Magazine issue 12 (February 1998)
They may have talked plenty about them, but how is your everyday English Eddie meant to actually get their paws on these fancy-pants import video games, let alone play them on their funny old PAL setups? Zy Nicholson shows us the score!
Admittedly, this feature hasn't aged quite as well as other N64
Magazine features. Compared to their exposés on games development, the Japanese
market and sumptuous homemade pastries, this one is a little bit boring. It is
practical, yes, if you happen to find yourself stranded in 1997's Scotland and
in dire need of playing Tetrisphere - but it's not exactly great reading
material.
It does, however, let all you folks on the western hemisphere know the shit PAL
gamers had to go through. No S-Video ports! Huge freakin' borders! Slow frame
rates! Long delays! Having played the N64 a lot in the past few months, the
speed isn't quite as bad as I remembered it, but some cases are really
woeful - they say Goldeneye got a good conversion, but man, when it's hit
with slowdown, it's hit hard. All the fog in the world can't stop Cradle
from suffering
rendering lag.
05/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #142
"We tell you why GameCube rocks"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 110 (November 2001)
MY NAME'S OFF-MODEL LUIGI
AND I'M HERE TO SAY
THE GAMECUBE'S GONNA ROCK YO SOCKS
IN A M-M-M-MAJOR WAY
If an angry video game character leaping at you from an exploding console doesn't get you wetting your pants in anticipation, then I don't know what will!
07/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #143
"FEATURING: FAST, FURIOUS, FUNKY, FELINE FREEDOM FIGHTERS ON A MISSION TO ERATICATE A PLAGUE OF RAMPAGING RODENTS READY TO TAKE OVER THE PLANET"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 86 (November 1999)
I never played it much, and I've never exactly been in a rush to go
back to it, nor have I ever held it in high regard while playing it... but for some reason, I've always had a soft spot for Rat
Attack.
As an action-puzzle game, it's pretty simple - you've got these rats zoopin'
outta every hole and tryin' to chew the living room a new butthole, so you trap
them in magic grids and deposit them in rat deposit pads. Do that enough times
and the exit appears. Sure, there's traps,
obstacles, time limits and gimmick mice to impede your progress, but that's the
game in a nutshell. It's fair enough!
You also go to ancient Egypt for some reason. The explanation eludes
me.
Perhaps what intrigues me most about the game is its promotional website, that included gameplay information, character bios, development updates, and for some baffling reason, is actually still online and mostly functional! The updates have amusing remarks from the staff, and there's also a series of animations that allegedly provide back-story for each of the playable cats, though being Flash cartoons from before the turn of the millennium, they're not exactly works of art. I appreciate the thought, though!
10/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #144
"Here's one we really, really want, though..."
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 63 (December 1997)
Today would have been Gunpei Yokoi's 72nd birthday.
His tragic death was announced in this December issue of ONM... sharing a column with somebody's bizarre Donkey Kong Jr. fanfiction.
Keep it classy, ONM.
12/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #145
"Tiger Woods 2005 should have more commentators and what about some classic golfers, too?"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 147 (February 2004)
Gamers have a bit of a reputation as privileged, whiny little shits (guilty as charged, guv!), and this short-lived feature in Official Nintendo Magazine probably didn't help alleviate that: a page dedicated to people's complaints over what the games' developers should have done. Because what every hard-working, deadline-challenged programmer needs is an army of entitled British teenagers telling them what to do.
Bug fixing and design tweaking is an aspect of video games that sounds particularly joyless, but in my view is vitally important in the long run. I've played some fair games that could've been excellent had they touched up a few faults or modified some dodgy features, and it's so disappointing acknowledging it can't offer the enjoyment it should be delivering.
That said, some of the complaints are more than a little unjust. F-Zero GX
is a crackin' game, but it's very much an arcade game. It's a racer built around
improving your skills, beating old records and learning new tricks. The story
mode is a luxury at best! Heck, it's hardly even trying to tell a story; it's a
glorified challenge mode with some movie scenes offering a bit of context. I would
certainly have appreciated something longer or more in-depth, but that's simply
not what they were aiming for.
The same stands for Metroid; it's about exploring a harsh alien
landscape. The hell is it going to let you save whenever you want just so you
can have dinner.
I do agree with the remarks on Mario Kart: Double Dash!!,
though I have no concrete ways to improve it. I mean, it's a functionally sound
game. It's got heaps of items and racers, the usual sixteen courses, smooth
controls and lovely visuals. It's good... but not good enough. My pals
had a fair time with it, but Mario Kart 64 still brought the most
satisfaction. It's a bit croaky in comparison, and some of the courses were
duds, but the good courses were really good, and the battle mode has yet
to be equalled by any of its sequels.
But that's just stating that I like the old one better. Nintendo are always
trying to innovate (well, usually, sometimes, maybe), and
Double Dash is an example of doing something different. I respect it, but it
simply wasn't to my taste. The same applies to Smash Bros. Brawl for a
lot of folks - it tried to do its own thing, but people were just looking for an
expansion pack. Which is a concept they've finally caught on to with the New
Super Mario Bros. series... in the most unsatisfying manner possible.
There's no winning, is there?
14/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #146
"Who is Lucy Skyboarder?"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 92 (May 2000)
What I assume was once a rhetorical question ("Who's Lucy Skyboarder? She's the one on the hoverboard. No, over there. She's got dotted lines and everything. You can't miss her.") is now a profound mystery for the ages. Who IS Lucy Skyboarder? And what "fab prizes" could you possibly have been awarded for correctly answering?
I'm a sucker for some cyberspace sleuthing, so I got investigating.
Sadly, the Royal Mail's "/breaktime/" address was not recorded by the Internet
Archive, so I had to find some second-hand sources.
A
press release states that Tim Vincent of Blue Peter fame launched the site
to get kids writing in letters, particularly on the theme of what life would be
like in the year 2050. Lucy Skyboarder is mentioned, but her identity is not
revealed. The names of her polygonal pals are revealed, however! From left to
right, we've got Cyber-Pup, Virtual Vinnie, and Robbie Rocker.
Apparently an eight year old girl from Hartlepool was among the top participants in the Break Time 2050 contest with her design for a flying skateboard, and got a stamp from Richard Branson for her efforts.
Heck, there's even a trademark on her name! It expired back in 2010, though, so unless there's also a copyright on her, I do believe it's fair game to start pitching Lucy Skyboarder branded merchandise to your nearest shopkeep.
...I'm not sure what exactly I accomplished with this small bit of cyber sleuthing (who still don't know who IS Lucy Skyboarder!), but I find it's always an entertaining little distraction to dig up history on totally unremarkable events.
17/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #147
"Real combat. Plastic men."
SARGE'S HEROES, THEY'RE PROBABLY BATTLING EVIL,
"BUY ALL OUR SEQUELS AND GAMES!!"
19/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #148
"Rumours grow about Capcom's bloodfest"
Man, isn't that glossy Nintendo 64 the classiest thing? That's the sort of thing I'd put on my mantelpiece.
Also highlighted is really early speculation on Capcom releasing Resident
Evil on Nintendo 64, something they apparently flip-flopped on until RE2 saw
release nearly three years later.
I was about to say that Yoshiki Okamoto's idea for a ninja-themed
Resident Evil is totally wack, and whatever happened to that? But then I
read up a bit on Ominusha, that franchise that I swear had never touched
European shelves, but apparently totally has... and it's pretty much exactly
like Okamoto described. It sounds pretty neat, actually. I wonder why they never
publicised it?
To go on a bit of a tangent, Ominusha befuddles me. It's allegedly Capcom's sixth biggest franchise (though I can't sure as heck
find a concrete source on that), and their online questionnaire from last
year had a whole page loaded with queries about the series... but for its supposed
popularity, I definitely haven't heard people talking about, nor have I seen it
on any store shelves in the past ten years. Is it an actual product, or
is it some bizarre phantom franchise, an incorporeal entity that absorbs
fat profits into Capcom's pockets, all the while keeping audiences completely
oblivious to its existence? Enquiring minds want to know.
(also all this time i was under the delusion it was a series of 3D fighting
games. guess not?)
21/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #149
"Oh yes, I almost forgot... In this bag are the bones of your arch nemesis."
Jonathan Davies takes a look at Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub Zero... well, I say "a look", it's more of a quick gander, given how he drops it before finishing level 2 and scores it a hilarious 9%. Can you blame him?
Although I'm definitely not a fighting game or Mortal Kombat
aficionado, the idea of dropping a fighting game engine into a platforming
game environment intrigued me even when I read the previews in other mags. The idea of a
platform game with a greater depth of combat (excuse me,
kombat) skills just seems like a concept that could work in the right
hands, you know?
Then I saw it being
played from start to finish. Haha,
wow.
It's a hokey idea to begin with, but the fact no one in development
apparently said, "y'know, maybe we shouldn't be making this exactly as awful as
everyone thinks it's going to be" is a feat that deserves appreciation.
24/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #150
"The fastest, most powerful shoes in videogame history."
from N64 Magazine issue 23 (December 1998)
It's disappointing to realise that I never gave N64 Magazine the respect it
deserved when I was collecting it. It had great features, great writers, and
completely insane nonsense like this.
Honestly, hats off to Tim Weaver. The magazine wouldn't the same without him
being asked to fill a page or two with off-the-wall absurdity.
Official Nintendo Magazine got their hands on him during the GameCube years, but
they rarely put the man's talents to proper use. For shame.
26/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #151
"The Universe is back in safe... hands?"
Well, it's not as outright terrifying as that other ad, but Jim is just one shit-eating grin away from having a Dreamworks Face.
28/September/2013
ONM Remembered - #152
"Her hunky alter-go, Jake, must then learn how to behave like a man, negotiating such everyday laddish hazards as dating, bragging and public urinal etiquette."
from N64 Magazine issue 17 (July 1998)
This headline always caught my eye, but I must never have actually read it, because it's basically a load of guff about Nintendo dropping product placement in some off-beat sex comedy, Virtual Sexuality. I couldn't find any other mention of Nintendo's involvement in the film anywhere else, and I didn't see many people talking about the movie online... so you know what I did? I sat down and watched it.
... who's up for a film review?
Virtual Sexuality stars Justine, a seventeen year old virgin, and very much
hung up about it. She's constantly angsting over her social status, the ins and
outs of how to woo a man, and how unfair it is that any old lout thinks they
have a chance by shouting come-ons at her. Believing she's going on a date with
the regular hot bod Alex, she ends up attending the Virtual Reality 2000 expo
with his geeky pal, Chas.
Justine samples Narcissus, a virtual reality body modifier, intended to make
the ideal you, or the ideal partner. While creating her perfect man, an explosion
rocks the expo, and she shambles from the wreckage to find herself... a him!
After some initial confusion, male-Justine is dubbed Jake and shares a room with
Chas, as the two try to figure out what happened, how to resolve it, and teach
her the intricacies of male relationships. Things get complicated when not only
are the inventors of Narcissus looking to kidnap Jake, but Justine is still at
large, and has her eye set on her male self!
"I don't think I could face it. I mean, mum'll go nuts. Can you imagine?
ʽHi mum, I'm back, oh, and by the way, I now
shave twice a day and I've got nine inches of sausage stuck permanently down my
pants.ʼ"
"... nine inches?!"
It's a teenage sex comedy, so you can't come expecting sophisticated material
- especially after that hokey plot summary. The first twenty minutes are
neck-deep in the teen sex comedy chasm, dredging out clichés most dull, but it
becomes a fairly enjoyable watch once it settles into its absurd premise. The
plot has been done hundreds of times (and the director did it
again seven years later),
but it remains entertaining enough, thanks to the bumbling interactions between
Jake, Chas, and their male peers. Some characters are literal props of the
genre, but the acting is decent enough to make everyone relatively likeable and
charming. Perhaps because the film settles into its niche so easily, but each
plot twist comes as a real game changer, and make for a very entertaining climax
- which has several explosions and at least one
guy crushed by a truck, by the way. It's a bit surreal.
Perhaps the most charming bit of the film for me is its snapshot of 1998 in
technology. Chas's computers are constantly running Windows 98 screensavers, and
every instance of technology is represented by whopping big CRT monitors. The
film introduces characters and concepts by printing labels in a suitably techno
font, which is a cute touch and the source of some dumb jokes. One early
recurring point is Justine wishing she could analyse people like "reading a
barcode" to find her perfect man, a theme that pops up in dialogue a lot. It's a
fitting term, but feels a little archaic; then again, it's better than anything
they'd write for a modern version. She's probably wish she could "scan their QR
code". Spare us all.
It's an entertaining if brainless little watch with amusing technological
artefacts, some nice sightseeing of London, and token scenes of boobs and
willies, so there's something for all the niche audiences. Further proving I'm
the most inadequate reviewer, I sum up by saying "Virtual Sexuality tried to make
a dumb teen sex comedy, and it did that just fine, I guess, so mission
accomplished, right???" Because if you can't wrap up a review efficiently, just
loudly and proudly exploit the nearest cop-out.
BUT WHAT ABOUT THE VIDEO GAMES???
Or I could segway into those, that works!
I mention the tech a lot, but thematically, it's probably the most minor
theme of the film, moreso than the sub-plot of Chas's parents worrying that he's
gay. And to be gossiped about in bloody N64 Magazine, you'd be hoping to see a
movie absolutely drenched in Nintendo gamer-nerd fanservice, right?
You get three minutes of video games. Tops. None of it is Nintendo.
:/
The Virtual Reality 2000 expo is basically a huge PlayStation commercial
immortalised on film. Sony's logo is shoved into the corner of most shots,
there's games, stalls, banners, and all sorts of magical artefacts from
promotional campaigns. Among the games displayed
or promoted, there's Battle Arena Toshinden...
V-Rally, Tekken...
Time Crisis, and the one PlayStation game we all love and
remember, Jersey Devil (which I'm pretty sure was really
old news in 1999).
Games I can't identify include a racing game with
a Union Jack emblazoned Mini Cooper, and some sort of FPS about blasting big
nasty
spiders.
And finally, Chas completely fails at WipeOut during the ending
for the sake of a romantic metaphor.
A square-headed Mario does make a walk-on cameo during the expo, and a
Goldeneye standee can be seen like a million miles away for a split second,
but that's the extent of Nintendo's input. Disappointing, isn't it?
Going back to the scan in question for a second, it proposes a November 1998 release date for the film, but it didn't come out until the Summer of the following year. I sure as heck don't remember a Bond-level marketing campaign for it, and most of the product placement was probably incredibly outdated by the time of release.
...
Well, that's over two hours I've spent watching and writing about something
for the sake of a small magazine snippet. It was an amusing and unexpected
diversion, I think!
Having said that, I've just learnt that the film is subsequently based off a
book, and now I'm curious if it's got any video game crap in it as well. Will I
take the plunge and spend £0.01 (plus £2.80 shipping and handling) to read it,
or will I instead dedicate my precious and valuable time to refreshing Tumblr
every five minutes in the dire hope of someone entertaining me? I think we all
know the answer.
01/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #153
"ALMOST TOO REAL"
In between commentating on stuff nobody cares about, I like to highlight random images now and again if just to show how neat they are. It's not often I highlight fanart! This showed up in issue 58's letters page, and I always thought it'd be a great image for an ad campaign: very much in the vein of the old Mortal Kombat ad with Kano and Raiden strangling the kids from the inside of the arcade monitor. How'd you like to see a Purlin reach out and squeeze your torso to a pulp?
... I don't suppose this is ever gonna be get identified? I'm always a bit skittish of posting reader-submitted material just out of common courtesy, but dang, I think it's a neat pic.
03/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #154
"Don't panic."
Nintendo, like FOOLS, printed pre-production screenshots on the back of their game boxes, and have confused the masses! What is with these ballin' colours? Do I need a button code to get the Feather? Where on earth did this magic metre go? And won't someone clean the blood out of that man's safari t-shirt?!
That said, the early footage of Mario Kart 64 is relatively tame compared to other titles. Have you seen the very first screenshots of Super Mario 64? It's like the game ate everything in the medicine cabinet.
05/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #155
"You wouldn't have any lives, just £1000 to spend on repairs or fines."
The Star Wars idea is cute, but I think by now we're well aware that nothing will quite live up to the imagination or expectations of what's in these guys' heads. Besides, I can't help but dread that if they were to retell the story, Lucas would realise he had even more ideas he couldn't incorporate into the films.
The realistic driving game sounds pretty neat, actually. Something like
that's probably already been made, actually. I'd love to try Responsible
Motorist Simulator 2013, because I sure as heck wouldn't trust myself on the
road. I wouldn't trust myself with a website, for that matter!
Also on the same letters page is this strange newspaper article apparently
hijacking some viral marketing for Star Fox 64, and turning it into celestial
support for Leicester Football Club. I rather foolishly forgot to scan the whole
answer, but it can only be the work of some skeezy fly-by-night journo. Who else
are we to blame? Andross? That guy's got better things to do, man.
Like gate crashing the conclusion to a dodgy spin-off.