GeekiN Episode #78 – GeekiNput: E3 Discussion
Wednesday, July 16th, 2008
Alright, I have to apologize up front. The evil podcast faeries came along and stole 2 hours of this episode from my computer. I went into the living room, and came back to an 11 minute episode. I don’t know what happened. One minute it was there, the next it was not.
So, what you are about to hear is the live version of the show. For the most part, it is decent quality. There are some sections where it has bad echos though. My apologies. Again, I have no idea what happened to the good version. If the echoing gets too bad, it fixes itself after a little bit. Hope you enjoy!
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Like I said in the comments to one of the many new E3 articles, I think this show is going to be the best one yet. We’ve got quite a bit to talk about, maybe even enough to rival the Lost discussion from last time. I’m definitely looking forward to it.
Now all I have to do is get away from work in time for the show…..
Oh curses… I missed it :( I had to work tonight.
Ack, I missed it again. I was babysitting my niece all day and totally forgot. This wasn’t a topic that I have a lot of knowledge on anyway cause the latest game system I have is PS2. But I’m still sorry I missed it. I think I’m just not meant to come to these things. I’ll try to come to the one after comic con. I can’t wait to listen to this one anyway.
I’ll probably arive late for next weeks show since I have rehearsals, but I’ll definitely show up near the end.
I ended up going to an event that I thought was going to be rained out, and didn’t get to call in. Well maybe next week. To answer questions as if I were on the show: I have a DS, PS3 (that we use mostly for streaming video,) and a Wii. Honestly, the only one I’d miss in a robbery would be the PS3. Hey how else are you gonna watch a d/l Doctor Who episode w/o a 360?
On a separate note, I did log in and chat with my iPhone. It wasn’t ideal, I was totally geeking out.
As a matter of fact Randy or more accurately Wayne should have an iPhone (free of course) of the week. It could be an iPhone app or an iPod touch or even a web app. The week before everyone could submit ideas and Wayne & even Randy could name their favorite. What do you guys think?
Sorry
I meant they should have an iPhone *app*
Now that was an omission
Woo, I was so worried you guys were going to rip apart Mamma Mia, but honestly, it is nothing like Across the Universe (then again I found that film to be awful). Mamma Mia really knows not to take it self seriously and that’s a good thing, it’s a comedy centred around Abba music. Mamma Mia is the only musical I’ve ever found to be enjoyable without original music, it’s awesome, I highly recomend to all, not as good as Hairspray but better than so many of the bad musical adaptations coming out lately (I’m looking at you “The Producers” and “Rent”)
Oh crap i forgot that it was last night
I never expected that I would get to talk so much. That was awesome.
I forgot to mention how much I like the look and feel of the new Prince of Persia game. It has a nice “illustrated” feel to the textures that I like, and it looks like they are incorporating a lot more acrobatics into the combat, which is a good thing. The acrobatic platforming sections of the previous games were the best parts, so if they can work that into the combat as well, it would make it that much more fun to play.
I am really hoping to be able to afford a 360 this year. There’s just so much on there that I want to play that’s already out, let alone all the cool stuff that’s coming in the future.
For those of you who already have a 360, what version do you have? Do you find yourself running out of HD space at all? What version of the 360 do you recommend? I want to get a 360 Elite, but I don’t think I’ll be able to afford it, so I want to know what to expect with the cheaper versions.
I just wanted to share something I posted in the chat last night during the Geek Jerk Reaction segment of this show:
Space Chimps = Vomit
as an animator myself, Space Chimps = Double Vomit
Seriously, how can something that cheaply animated (at least the textures look okay) with an equally crappy looking story get into theaters?
For anybody wondering what The Conduit is, here’s a demo of the game from E3:
Part 1: http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36424.html
Part 2: http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36548.html
I think they are working towards releasing the game in early 2009, but they don’t have a publisher yet. I think the graphics look pretty good already, especially for a Wii game. They have plenty of time to polish them even more. Hopefully the actual game will be fun. I’m looking forward to seeing how it turns out, especially since the Wii in general doesn’t have a whole lot of stuff coming out soon that I am interested in, and certainly not any good FPS games. Metroid Prime 3 had a great control scheme, but it’s not really a shooter.
Jack- I super can’t wait to see Mama Mia. You can’t go wrong with Abba, singing, dancing, and Colin Firth. You simply can’t. I did really like The Producers though. But I see it this way: I’m a poor schmo, I would’ve never of dreamed of getting Producer tickets those first runs with Nathan Lane and Mathew Broderick. That’s who that movie is for- at least we get to see what the fuss was about with them. Was is groundbreaking? No, but fun none-the-less. I like the music, the book and Mel Brooks’s cameo. And watching John Barrowman sing and dance is divine… DIVINE.
Rent was crap- but than I’ve always hated that show, ever since it opened and my Rent-head friend dragged me to it (curse free ushering)
Across the Universe was one of the worst musicals I have ever seen. And the worst part about it? Now I can’t make the Beatles musical I wrote. (Though if it woulda come out looking like that than that’s probs a good thing.)
Thanks again for the fun ep last night!
Ditto on Prince of Persia – that does look rather awesome and Space Chimps . . . someone PLEASE explain how this kind of crap keeps getting made. And Serenity can’t get a sequel. Grrrr.
On the musical front, I too was happy to not hear a total slamming of Mama Mia – I am kinda psyched about that one! – Agreed on the Colin Firth-y-ness, Sun!
I couldn’t stand the film version of the Producers – Broderick was still trying to act for the stage and it was too much. The only person that impressed me in the film was Will Ferrell – which is surprising because I thoroughly can’t stand him.
Rent – haven’t seen it – don’t ever plan to. I just think it’s a remarkably overrated show.
Across the Universe – I think that’s a love it or hate it thing. I loved it. But considering I’m more an Elvis gal than a Beatles gal, hearing other folks singing Beatles classics rocked for me.
@Polygon: I have a Pro 360. I am constantly running out of space on it. Like, every time I go to download stuff on it, I have to go delete something else. And it’s getting worse and worse. The XBLA games are getting bigger and bigger these days, and I generally get one every month or two. Add in downloadable content from the games. Halo 3 maps, for instance. I do have like 3-4 demos on the system at a time, never have any TV shows or movies (As I just stream those from my computer). So yeah, I don’t even store as much stuff on there as I’d like, and I’m already majorly out of space. The more I play games, the worse it gets. Rock Band slaughters my free space. I can’t imagine how it’s going to be when I import my Rock Band 1 disc to my HDD.
@Everyone: Thanks to everyone for attending (And listening, if you didn’t make it. You still got 3 more tries! :) ). A lot of good discussions, and we got to discuss a majority of highlights quite a bit. I was afraid we wouldn’t have a lot of video game fans show up, but it was a pretty solid turnout. I’m just disappointed that I ended up having to put up the live version of the show. Especially with it’s echoing going on. Hopefully that wasn’t too bad though.
@WonderJenn- becuase I don’t think a CG animated film has ever tanked at the box office, which Serenity kinda did.
Its a sad world, I know.
@Nick: http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=happilyneverafter.htm
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=antbully.htm
I would consider those tanks. But they probably still made their money back. Still, you are right, most CGI movies do at least decently.
Hey, I hear ya. Not just stupid CGI movies though. Even crap like Meet Dave, etc. And while I know Serenity wasn’t by any means a blockbuster, it did open at number 2 its premiere weekend which isn’t horrible for a niche film. It’s also still doing apparently well enough to constitue a Special Edition, and Fox is even working on a new edition Blu-Ray Firefly set. ::sigh:: I’m just gonna keep my fingers crossed that perhaps one day it will happen.
And in the mean time do my best to avoid crap films like Space Chimps and Meet Dave.
I think the ending of Serenity should be the ending of the story, at least in movie form. Perosnally I would much rather have Joss try out new IPs rather then continue to dip into Firefly well becuase fans won’t let go. Like the man himself once said, give them what the need, not what they want.
Jack and Sunshineyness- I am way excited about Mamma Mia as well. I love that show on stage and it looks really well done from the previews.
You see the thing about The Producers is that it is an amazing stage show, probably one of my favorites and the film is just the stage show, nothing different and that’s the worst part, they might as well have filmed the stage show, that would have been much better because it really didn’t work on screen (I don’t blame the musical itself, I think somebody could probably make a great movie of it but Ms Stroman failed on that acount). Across the Universe seemed so kitsch to me, it seemed like such a loose story based around these songs, same problem with the Queen musical, Mamma Mia has a great fun story and the music fits with it so much. I like my musicals to use original music though, otherwise it just seems like karoke, and when on film they need to look like a movie, The Producers failed at that, Hairspray succeeded so well and even though it’s not as good as it’s songless original it is still probably the best musical we’ve had in years (some might say Sweeney Todd, and it is great but damn it can be depressing). Again I’m going to say go see Mamma Mia because it’s obviously going to suffer in the box office due to Dark Knight, and I’m not saying it will be better than Dark Knight coz it obviously won’t be but if DK is sold out, don’t feel bad seieng Mamma Mia, or if you’ve seen DK three times already, go see Mamma Mia, it is fun and I would hate to see it suffer.
Across The Universe had great visuals and music, but the acting was…not great.
Across the Universe soundtrack = awesome
Across the Universe movie = just okay
Space Chimps is made by a place called Vanguard Animation. They are a pretty small animation studio, and they pretty much got lucky. They make their movies for a pretty small amount of money, so its pretty easy to get it back. Add in the fact that they came along at just the right time with their first movie, Valient, when CG movies were booming. They got a pretty good deal out of that movie, regardless of quality, which allowed them to get their foot in the door. This means they have connections that have allowed them to release Happily Never After and now Space Chimps.
It is much harder to get a CG movie released now than it was when Vanguard first came along. I work for a very small studio, and we are struggling to get our first feature out there. Vanguard is considered “small”, and they still have hundreds of employees. The studio I work for had 20 employees at the peak of production.
Our movie isn’t perfect by any means and we aren’t anywhere close to Pixar-level of quality, but we are pretty proud of what we’ve been able to do with only 20 people. Anyway, if you want a small taste of our movie (including two different trailers), check out our website at: http://www.themagistical.com
Let me know what you think.
@saberj: Thanks for the info. I’m sure that 20GB will still seem like a ton of space compared to the measly 512MB the Wii has. ;)
I’ve purchased a few things from the virtual console (yay Mario 3!), and a couple WiiWare titles, and my memory is starting to get full. I was hoping Nintendo would reveal some sort of storage solution at E3, but they didn’t. They should at least let use play virtual console stuff directly from an SD card.
@The Watcher: Perfect analogy!
Jack- I see your point with Producers, although Mel Brooks already made a great movie out of it… in the 60′s, lol. Give me Gene Wilder any day. No one does that fountain scene better. But like I said: I was never gonna see the stage show, it’s nice to have a record of it.
To be honest, I think the best movie musical in the last few years was “Reefer Madness: The Musical.” Hairspray is too cloying for my taste. I just love the original movie so much and I could practically hear John Waters groaning over the family friendliness of it all. I still think “Moulin Rouge” is one of my favorite musicals of all time. And I have such a soft spot for Phantom of the Opera. And yeah, Sweeny Todd is depressing as hell, I still loved every minute of it. Romance and Cigarettes was pretty interesting. “8 Femmes” had AWESOME 60′s pop French music.
I am so super psyched for this “Repo! A Genetic Opera” thing. Amen, the return of the rock opera. This means we are all this much closer to my dream project: “Oedipus Rex: The Rock Opera.” I’m not kidding. I have an outline. And a friend who’s working on the music. LOL.
I really wish they’d make the Assasins movie they’ve been grumbling about for years. And that Neil Patrick Harris crosses over to play Lee Harvey Oswald/Narrator (too bad Victor Garber is too old to play Boothe) and I’d LOOOOVE to see Evil Dead: The Musical translated (though I know it’ll never happen.)
I am now an XBox 360 owner…..even though I don’t actually have it yet. :D
I just ordered it online from Best Buy (mostly to get a ton of points on my reward zone card), and I will go pick it up at the store tomorrow. I decided to finally bite the bullet now in order to take advantage of the temporary $50 price drop. I figure it will take me a little while to fill up 20GB, and thanks to the BB product replacement plan, I can probably it replaced with a better model if it ever breaks (since the 20GB version will soon disappear). Even if it doesn’t, I’m pretty sure I’ll be happy with it for a long while.
I also bought the VGA cable since I plan on hooking the 360 up to my widescreen computer monitor. I also got the stuff to hook the audio up to my computer speakers and a new surge protector as well.
Now all I have to do is figure out what game I can afford to get with it (maybe two if I can find them cheap). I’m not sure whether I want to get one of the bigger games I want and stick with that for a while, or if I want to get a couple of the cheaper games so I have more than one thing to play. All I know is that I’ll probably be visiting GameStop after work tomorrow in addition to Best Buy.
I am interested in getting things like Bioshock, Mass Effect, The Orange Box (even though I have HL2 & HL2:Ep1 on PC), Burnout Paradise, Assassin’s Creed, Lost Odssey, Eternal Sonata, and Beautiful Katamari (I like quirky stuff). I might consider Call of Duty 4, even though I don’t normally go for war-type FPS games. I might eventually get Halo 3 since I like sci-fi shooters a bit better, but I think I’ll hold off on it a while since I’ve played it a few times at a friend’s house, and I’d rather buy something I haven’t played right now. I like a lot of different types of games, but I am partial to adventures and RPGs.
Game purchase suggestions anyone?
I really like my Wii (I’ve got a dozen games for the system), but I’m glad I’ll finally be able to get ahold of some of the more hardcore games you can’t get for Nintendo. Viva Wii60! ;)
Moulin Rouge is AWESOME!!! I love that movie!
@Sunshineyness
The musical project I’ve spent my whole life working on is Speed 2 – The Musical, I’ve got 4 songs finalized for it and a pretty decent plot line (of course it’s in no way serious, it just takes the piss out of one incredibly bad movie)
@Polygon – Congrats on your 360! Kinda warms the heart, no? I’d really recommend Bioshock, Mass Effect, and Assassin’s Creed of the three. If you’re a big Veronica Mars fan, then go Assassin’s Creed first – there’s lots of Kristen Bell and the visuals are amazing.
Personally, I’m a big fan of Oblivion (I’ve run two characters at around 100 hrs combined). It’s kind of my go-to game – when I need some time to kill, but I don’t want to get too in-depth, it’s perfect. I’d go for the “Game of the Year” Edition thought to get all the bells and whistles.
@Sunshineyness – ditto on “Repo!” I am too excited to see how that one will come together.
Shouldn’t there be a batman thread about now.
nah, it usually comes like a day or two later.
a day or two late?!?!?!? If I wanted to talk about old movies I’d be over at the Turner Movie Classics board! Good grief!
I know this is gonna sound pretty crazy. But I’m gonna go out on a limb and suggest that Heath Ledger was quite good in the film. I know what your thinking isn’t his performance based on that of a comic book character?. And you’re right [ trivia] The Jester is originally from a comic book. But none the less I think you all might be surprised to find that his performance is quite impressive. Just trust me on this one and check this movie out.
^^^ Wow, I really committed to that joke. What it lacked in humor and originality it made up for in persistence.
I’ve been wondering about the lack of a Dark Knight post too. I think on the E3 episode Randy said Scott was on vacation and he himself was going to avoid the internet so as not to be spoiled until he sees it tomorrow.
Argh… I so want to talk about Dark Knight right now. I literally just saw it and I have a few comments I want to know if anyone else thought but I won’t post here because I don’t want to give spoilers. *holds it in until thread is up*
Jack: I’d pay to see Speed 2: The Musical. For serious. I’d pay real money for that.
Just say Spoilzzzzz and write what you want to say.
I bet five internet quid that we get a Dark Knight post before the end of the day
Don’t post about TDK yet, it’s not released over here til Friday, it’s the one film I’m trying to keep away from spoilers…
I’ve go my 360 set up now, and it’s pretty sweet. :D
I wandered around GameStop for quite a while before forcing myself to finally decide what to buy. Whenever I shop for games or DVDs, I tend to pick up and carry a bunch of stuff before I narrow it down and put most of the stuff back on the shelf. I think I picked up just about every game I mentioned earlier before I could decide what to get. I ended up getting the Orange Box, Burnout Paradise, and Arcade Unplugged vol 1. I got the Arcade pack because it was cheap and has Geometry Wars in it. I got the Orange Box because I really like the Half-Life universe, and there’s a ton of content that will last me a long time. I got Burnout because it looked like a ton of fun (and it has been so far), and I wanted a racing game that leans more towards the arcade side of things, rather than simulation.
@Polygon: I kept wanting to respond to your comments while I was gone on my trip. But I didn’t have a computer, and my phone wasn’t going to cut it for all that I wanted to say. But now that I’m back, let me begin.
I see you got Orange Box. Terrific choice. And I say that not as a Half Life fan, because I’ve never been able to get into the series. But since you are, that’s all the better. But don’t over look Portal and Team Fortress if you haven’t played them yet. Two fantastic games for two different reasons. Team Fortress is my go-to online game for when I have some time to spare. I generally have to end up hosting my own games to get games that aren’t laggy/un-reliable. But once I do that, I have a ton of fun. Portal is just great. That’s all there is to it. It’s a bit short, and I was annoyed that it goes from a puzzle game to too much of a platformer for the second half of the game. But still, great experience, wonderful story, and painfully mind bending at times.
Burnout Paradise is a game that I enjoyed quite a bit. But once I put it down, I couldn’t bring myself to pick back up. It’s a very packed game though, and it makes good use of achievements and online features. For instance, when you get tired with missions, you can do time trials and crash runs. It will actually tell you in the game who amongst your friends has the highest score on each and every street in the game. Plus, I hear they are still pumping out content packs for the game. Apparently motorcycles, night time, and air vehicles are either in or coming soon.
Those two games alone should give you more than enough content to keep you going for quite some time. Ultimately, Bioshock is the game I would have recommended the most. I tend to get bored with large games before I finish them, so the smaller package of 14-16 hours is a wonderful story and wonderful experience. But if you only have 2 games, that would run out of content pretty fast. At most, you could play through it twice (Once saving the little sisters, and once to harvest them). But even that is a stretch for most people.
As an RPG fan, I can’t recommend Lost Odyssey enough. I still haven’t managed to beat it, because I got a bit bummed at being stuck in a particular dungeon for far too long. But what I have played of it, I’ve loved it. Eternal Sonata was also a beautiful and fun game to play through. Ultimately though, they are two completely different play styles. ES plays with a more action based combat system. LO plays with a traditional turn based system. Mass Effect is a lot of fun too, but I rank it well below KOTOR. While it had a good story, it was hidden well into the game, behind a bunch of bland side missions. And honestly, I can’t remember what happened already. But still, it was a lot of fun.
I guess that’s enough comments for the moment. Enjoy your system :)
I almost got Eternal Sonata when I was at the store, but I decided to only get a couple games right now. I think I might wait to see if Mass Effect, Bioshock, Lost Odyssey, and a couple other games get a little bit cheaper before I get them. One funny thing when I was at GameStop was that the brand new copy of Assassin’s Creed was about $20 cheaper than the used copies, at least according to the stickers.
Does anyone here use Gamefly? I was thinking it might be a good way to try some games that I’m not as sure on, but I don’t know anyone that has used it. I wish I could get games through my Netflix account.
Gamefly is great as long as you can set aside the time to play the games and have enough that you want to play to make it worth it. Even better, if you get a game and it looks in good shape and you have fun with it, you can tell them you are going to keep it, pay for the game, and they will send you the case and manual for free.
Yeah, that’s a pretty cool feature.
I think I’ll probably wait until I’ve played through the Orange Box and Burnout quite a bit more before I decide if it’s worth it or not. At this point, I’m leaning towards not using it. Only because there are a ton of games that I am 95% sure that I will like, and I’ll probably just go buy them without playing them first.
are there any good ds games?
other than lego indy and uh… mario kart?
Zelda is awesome :)
oh yeah zelda. i knew i was forgetting one. that was very fun but no reply :( oh well i am gonna trade it in for a replacement, unfortunately i missed this discussion so i thought i’d see if anyone had any suggestions…
Replay value**
There are a ton of good DS games. It just depends on what you like. Picross, Professor Layton, Hotel Dusk, The World Ends With You, Puzzle Quest, Meteos, and Elite Beat Agents are all titles of various types that I have really enjoyed playing.
thanks for the suggestions… don’t suppose any of those are rpgs?
Puzzle Quest is a quasi-RPG.
If you want RPGs, look it’s Square’s offerings. there are a bazillion games from them now. Final Fantasy Chrystal Chronicles, Final Fantasy III and IV, Reverent Wings, Tactics A2, etc, etc, etc. All likely very solid.
Also, Bioware (KOTOR) has a Sonic the Hedgehog RPG coming out on DS that looks awesome!
ok i love the original kotor (the second one was gyped, confusing and kinda blew, not to mention all the glitches…) but anyway… sonic? seriously? like dr egg sonic?
Bioware didn’t do the 2nd KOTOR, only the first. But yeah, Sonic, as weird as that sounds. It looks like a lot of fun too :)
oh well in that case i will probably check it out.
any news on when the buffy game takes place in the series?
The developers are saying that it’s in post season 7 continuity, but… there are multiple levels that are in Sunnydale which would kind of be impossible. So no one really knows for sure.
oh… that is weird…
random note to randy (i think?) someone on twitter and imdb goes by the sn darthrosenburg so maybe yours is catching on o.0
” My daughter went missing over a year ago and the police closed the investigations. I used your gov-records-search missing people search and instantly had leads on my daughter. Thank-you so much! “