08/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #156
"Baby Bio Freak."
N64 Magazine returns with some kooky mutations of its reviewing staff. This time: inanimate objects!
Paul's Plant probably deserves an explanation. It was yet another of those absurd recurring features in the magazine, usually filling space in one of the top corners of the news pages, enlightening readers on its journey of growth. That... that's about it, as far as I know. I don't know if it was a jab at ONM's uncouth way of filling space, or just N64 being N64. I'm not even sure what happened to it; it was one of those features you could very easily miss, so Paul's Plant might very well have met an untimely end. That, or management gave it a better position. Who knows! Paul's Plant is just one of those delightfully weird footnotes that made N64 Magazine that bit more charming.
10/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #157
"The swashbuckling action won't be lonely this time"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 118 (July 2002)
Featured on this page is a brief interview with one of the fine men behind
quality assurance at EA. And he hadn't lost the will to live by the time of the
interview, so good on ya, Tim!
Games testing and quality assurance is a mysterious business, isn't it? The
entire industry is a mystery to me, honestly, but testing in particular. It's a
vital part of a game's development, to make sure there's no crippling bugs or
oversights... but some games make you wonder if anyone had their eyes open while
testing.
My big question is: does the testing department or quality assurance have any
sway over the game's design or mechanics, or is their responsibility solely to
watch out for bugs and glitches? The modern game industry is so keen on easing
players in, teaching them the mechanics and keeping them clued in on what to do
and where to go.
I ask because Alone in the Dark for the Xbox 360 is a fascinating
game. It's like an interactive guide on what not to do to ease the player
in. It starts on the dodgiest sequence possible, where it'll kill the player for
minor faults like getting stuck in a doorframe. The automatic camera is most
unhelpful in pointing you to your next objective. Its love of physics puzzles
are often obtuse, implying one answer but actually expecting something
completely different. And that's just the game design! There's some hilariously
bad glitches in there, from the minor to the maddening. My favourite is having
the character get stuck walking off a sidewalk, the game believe he's falling
off a cliff, and then splat on the road a whole four inches beneath him.
I'll spare you the review, but the game has so many baffling design choices and
obvious glitches that I can't imagine nobody mentioned, "this would make so much
sense if they went about it this way." The credits has dozens and dozens
of people listed in the testing and QA departments... so what happened? Was
there enough money for people to report problems, but none to pay the
programmers meant to fix them? Or was it simply down to pushy management and
impending deadlines?
(it was probably the deadlines)
(it's always the deadlines)
... testing aside, I suppose most folks are looking at the Zelda: Four Swords
coverage, huh? It's from back in the game's early development, when a totally
different sprite was used, before they opted for the Wind Waker stylings.
One of my many unfinished projects from years ago was an attempt to
recreate the sprite, using what few screenshots and videos were available as
guidance. It's something I'd love to finish, but looking at videos with tiny
resolutions and working out the shading is never as fun as I think it is.
12/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #158
"If I were a Bond villain I'd be..."
Don't suppose you remember how the good ol' days of ONM had those
zany group shots
of everyone trying to look as insane as possible?
Well, once the GameCube came
around they dropped that in favour of the generic look-happy-or-you're-fired
office photo. Rich retains a bit of his old kookiness, but only because he's a
loveably kooky-lookin' guy, and nothing could take that away from him.
15/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #159
"They say that, in the event of a nuclear holocaust, cockroaches will most likely be the sole survivors. I take issue with this, and am certain that both Tamagotchi and the Toki Meki Memorial babes will be around to keep the roaches company."
from N64 Magazine issue 7 (October 1997)
Max Everingham takes a gander at some of the N64 mags littering the shelves of Japan, highlighting all that's unique about each of them, and even conducts brief interviews with their respective editors. It's a pretty unique feature, I'd say!
Similar to his remark about how hands-off and impersonal the Japanese reviews are, though, there's only so much you can learn about a magazine from one guy summarising them. Likewise, there's only so much you can experience of Official Nintendo Magazine from scans and half-witted commentary alone - nothing can quite beat flipping through one of those bad boys and embracing all the stupidity firsthand.
... is that a cue for me to start Dengeki Nintendo 64 Remembered? (no, it's not.)
17/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #160
"EVERYBODY'S FAVOURITE SUPER-POWERED SPEED HERO EMBARKS ON HIS MOST EPIC AND DARING ADVENTURE YET ON NINTENDO GAMECUBE!"
DON'T MISS THE BUGGIEST SONIC GAME YET!
19/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #161
"The solid 3D characters are miles better than the flat ones you get in the cartoon."
South Park gets a video game!
The show was mad popular in its early years, with a whole heap of
print advertisements in UK magazines, though that popularity seemed to disappear
rather quickly. I know I missed out on it for many, many years when it was either
relocated to satellite channels, or put on at dodgy timeslots. I can't remember.
It's fair enough, but it took a while to make a niche for itself, even if that
niche is "the show that comes on when VIVA runs out of Fresh Prince
repeats".
Having tie-in material made so early in a show's lifespan is always a recipe for absurdity, especially if it's a video game. I mean, South Park's initial claim to fame was the novelty of cardboard children uttering obscenities. I'm not sure how they took that and made it about battling evil turkeys. Was there some one-off joke I missed out on, and the developers just latched onto it? See, that's why I'm not a games designer. I'd probably have just invented Nega-Cartman.
22/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #161
"REVIEWED: SUPER MARIO LAND - THE GAME THAT LAUNCHED THE PLUMBER'S CAREER ON THE GAME BOY"
Another good reason N64 Magazine stuck out from the crowd was, being an unofficial Nintendo magazine, it found the time to talk about the unofficial-est of unofficial Nintendo magazines - fanzines! And this wasn't just some one-shot ordeal - they reviewed these fanzines every month for a fair while.
I'm afraid fanzines is one of those phenomena that I'm not quite familiar
with. Like, my dad worked on a few fantasy and sci-fi zines in his heyday, but it's a bit of
culture that's effectively eluded me. Pardon my cynicism, but some of the
unofficial Nintendo magazines on newsagent shelves were well and truly cack, and one can
assume those magazines had editors and news hounds and whatnot - what quality
can you expect from some blokes operating out of their own house? That Super
Mario Land review better rock my goddamned world, man.
(having said that, i gotta respect the gusto to produce such
unrewarded labours of love. big ups, '90s 'zine guys!)
Retro Gamer (no relation to Retro Gamer) still has an online presence, it seems, and still based in the same location! No idea if he still ships out mags to ordering customers, but hey, nice to see the chap still around.
24/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #162
"Look, an ungodly David/Mario mix!"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 68 (May 1998)
Of all the dumb accessories Nintendo made for their consoles and handhelds, I always thought the Game Boy Camera was one of the best. I got fat stacks of mileage out of that stupid little gizmo, even if it was just to see different people's faces in the Ball game. You'd be surprised how much replay value there is from using different people as bosses in space shooters!
I believe early on, the hype for the Game Boy Camera and Printer seemed to suggest plans for Nintendo to make 'grown-up' utilities for the Game Boy, almost turning it into a micro-sized office, with word processors and goodness knows what else. I don't know if that was true or just wild speculation, but I'll say it was a pretty ambitious idea. Completely whack and no doubt a colossal failure were it to proceed, but I respect the attempt to turn the Tetris machine into a legitimate PDA. It'd have a way better battery life than any real PDA of that era, I imagine.
The contest might as well spell out its answers, but can YOU guess who the five musical maestros are?
26/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #163
"(trust the French)"
A series of amusing letters!
N64 Magazine was unique in that it didn't just accept fan-made game ideas - it
printed fan-made peripheral ideas! Sadly, they weren't always
balls-to-the-wall insane; yes, a handheld console with the power of the N64 in
1997 would be utter madness, especially if it were battery powered, but come on, buddy,
get inventive! The tilt controller is amusing. Back in those days, gamers were
thinking up all manner of amazing new ways of playing games - now we just want a
way to play games that works!
One letter proposes an incredibly be-laboured way of milking more entertainment out of
Super
Mario 64; abusing penguins, holding sports contests, and using it in a
remarkably convoluted manner to choose lottery numbers.
It is kind of amusing, and the sort of thing if I were still a dumb youngster
with friends who all had more spare time than sense I'd be willing to try... but
man, Super Mario 64 is neat and all, but when a game is done, it's done, man.
There's only so much more you can squeeze out of it.
(though that never stopped me from endlessly replaying 100% save
files of Mario and Banjo-Kazooie, doing naught but run aimlessly
around the levels, accomplishing nothing. childhood, eh?)
France was caught in Donkey Kong fever in late 1997, thanks to the bizarre CGI cartoon that I've managed to successfully avoid for over fifteen years now. The one mentioned in the letter seems to be La planète Donkey Kong, a show I'd only just learned about, which seems to be a variety show with sequences involving DK characters dancing in front of live-action footage. It's rather odd.
Andrew Mills from the last letter speaks about visiting the N64 Magazine as
work experience, and defends the hard-working men and women behind the scenes
against the crass demands of the letter-writing public. It's a very unique
letter, and a well-appreciated one. There must be mountains of pressure working
in a magazine office, and the fact N64 Magazine delivered quality material ever
month, as well as complete stupidity just to lighten things up, is to be
commended. Hats off!
I actually highlighted this letter because I was almost sure an earlier issue
had a contest to visit the N64 offices, and I'm wondering if Andrew was the
winner of that or not. I could be remembering complete nonsense, though. See,
this is why I'll never be an internet historian, if I say things like "I think
I saw it, but
I can't be buggered to scan it again".
29/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #164
"MAKE NOSE EXTRA PURPLE"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 148 (January 2005)
Storyboards from Mario Power Tennis! It's not often you get to see internal documents from Nintendo's big franchises, so even doodles like this are a neat little luxury.
31/October/2013
ONM Remembered - #165
"By all means chill out, but try not to crush that horse."
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 122 (November 2002)
EYYY IF IT AIN'T MY MAIN MAN DOSHIN
SLAP ME SOME SKIN BABY
SEE YOU ON THE FLIP SIDE BIG MAN
Surprise! I've never played Doshin the Giant. Neither have the
majority of gamers in the United States! It's one of those funny ol' titles that
got referenced in a big-name title, Smash Bros. Melee, but only saw an
English release in Europe.
It sounds cute and interesting, with a unique concept going on. I can't imagine
the game would be my cup of tea, though. However, I always the amount of
weird crap that actually managed to reach shelves in this era, though. I
remember looking around game stores around the time this was published, and you
had Godzilla, you had Bomberman, you had Doshin... all
sorts of weird and wonderful, colourful crap! I probably wouldn't have played
it, but I respected that games like this were on the shelves, visible to any
outdoor shopper passing through, rather than tucked away in the poorly organised
downloadable marketplace of some console you'd otherwise never touch.
... yeah, I haven't much to say about the game itself. You know why I highlighted this? I wanted an excuse to doodle a little dude high-fiving the giant dude. Can you blame me?
02/November/2013
ONM Remembered - #166
"with over 600 SOUNDBYTES of REAL DIALOGUE"
from Official Nintendo Magazine issue 61 (October 1997)
Wasn't Lylat Wars just the hypest thing ever? RUMBLE PAKS! HEAPS OF
DIALOGUE! A SPACE OPERA WITH FUZZY FOXIE-WOXIES!
I never got behind the name, though. Despite Nintendo stumbling around
the Star Fox copyright in Europe for a number of years (or
whatever their lousy excuse was), I still only knew it as Star Fox.
These magazines had a knack for getting you more acquainted with games and
titles seen only across the pond, so when someone in school ever wanted to talk
to me about Lylat Wars, I had to ask them if they meant Star Fox.
Every time.
No, I'm serious. Every single time.
THE SECRET ORIGIN OF WHY RAGEY HAD NO FRIENDS?!
Conversational incompetence aside, it's a neat ad! The movie poster stylings were really unique at the time, and played in nicely with the then-relevant Star Wars: Special Edition posters. Back when pretending a video game was a movie was a cute idea and not the sign that video game development is a consolation prize for uninspired wannabe film directors.
05/November/2013
ONM Remembered - #167
"Pikmin oozes innovation and originality but don't let its cutesy style fool you as there are plenty of brain-busting puzzles."
from Nintendo Official Magazine Issue 118 (July 2002)
A complete walkthrough to the first Pikmin game! A guide! An FAQ! Tips and tricks and what-have-you! The tasks and actions one must perform to be rewarded the privilege of viewing the credits! SYNONYMS!!
While scanning these mags a year and a half ago I always kept an
eye open for walkthroughs. Partly because I'm a sucker for any and all maps, and
it never hurt to have a personal copy of these should I ever try to beat
Pikmin sometime in the near future.
It's a game I'd love to see through to the end, but the maddeningly dense AI on
the little skitters has always put a damper on that. The guide may offer the
finest tactics on how to fell a Puffy Blowhog, but it doesn't tell you how to
stop the little shits walking into lakes. I lost good men on those extremely
wide bridges.
07/November/2013
ONM Remembered - #168
"Lylat Wars? I'm glad I'm not responsible for that. N64's a great read, though. I get it every month."
from N64 Magazine issue 11 (January 1998)
N64 Magazine provides a summary of Shigeru Miyamoto and Hiroshi Yamauchi's speeches regarding the future of Nintendo, at Space World 97.
Around this time, their idea of the future of the N64 mostly lay in the 64DD, and a hope for occasional unique, oddball titles to be the console's draw rather than "bulging release lists." One of their big pushes seemed to be on user-generated content, which tied into their believed-successful traits of Pokémon and the 64DD; making content for the game and the content growing, both in a literal and nurturing sense, and sharing it all with friends. User-generated content being the future of gaming seemed to be their eventual plan.
User-generated content always sounds cool, but the two factors setting
it back are quality control, and the impractically of sharing it, be it finding
local gamers who are participating, or trying to share it on an impersonal web
space. It can work in the right environment, but that environment is vital to
its success.
I get the impression Japan has a big thing for "social gaming" - arcades are (or
were) big on meeting people, challenging one another or helping each other out.
It's only in that kind of environment that something like Tower of Druaga
could've become a wild success. Other countries have had arcade scenes, of
course, but I don't think the social aspect has been emphasised so much.
A friend once told me of a complete stranger joining him in an arcade game, and
he spoke of it as if it were the strangest thing he could have encountered. I
want to say playing games with strangers should be an engaging part of the
arcade experience... but finding an arcade is such a rare discovery
(and so thinly populated, if at all!) that it falls by the
wayside. Woe!
Social gaming in the sense of people gathering in a central location just
isn't well suited to the American and European markets, unless you want to count
those Pokémon tour buses. Nintendo have been aiming for better online social
gaming, though, what with the Wii finally getting decent online connectivity,
its monthly challenges in certain games, and the Miiverse on WiiU.
I appreciate the sentiment, but it's never meant a lot to me - mingling with
strangers in games just doesn't do a lot for me, especially if I don't know if
they're a cheating, snaking son of a bitch. Then again, would I want to meet a
crowd of gamers in real life? Would you want to meet me in person?
I don't think I would! The fickle nature of gamers - you want to meet
people, but you don't want to meet people.
... in lighter news, look, you can win Miyamoto's autograph! Pity is isn't 1998, though. :(