Have you ever wondered where Mario learned how to double jump, where Fox picked up the barrel roll, or where Link found out how to throw a boomerang? Turns out they all went to Nintendo U [via CollegeHumor]:
P4KO is the man behind the brilliant opening theme to the Mobcast, but he’s not a one-trick pony. In fact, he has an entire YouTube channel devoted to his music. It’s no surprise that much of his work combines his love of video games with his musical talents.
While you never know what game will inspire P4KO, you can always be sure that the resulting music will rock. I’ve compiled several of his songs into one article, so you can enjoy the fruits of his labor.
Though its intro sequence is the biblical apocalypse, Darksiders doesn't make a good first impression; the beginning areas of the game don't differ much from the standard God of War levels, the combat feels much too simple, there's all of one combo to dispatch enemies, and the story sounds like something a fourteen-year-old has been kicking around in his head until he had the chance to apply it to some form of media. The character models look nice and stylized, but look a bit too much like Warcraft characters. Had I reviewed the game after playing it for only an hour, I would've called it derivative and uninspired, and been done with it.
The game's Zelda-inspired aspects don't reveal themselves until an hour or two later; you'll be in a large, multi-floored complex, get stuck on opening a door, look at your map, and realize you're playing that sort of game. Calling it knockoff would be accurate, but ultimately demeaning for two reasons: first, it successfully emulates what makes those games fun -- puzzle-solving, humongous, multi-staged bosses and creative use of various gadgets -- and second, it knows when to deviate from that established formula; the collectibles, while plentiful, have a direct impact on your character, it doesn't rely on a gimmick to make the game seem new, and not every dungeon uses the same tired setup.
The combat also reveals its depth after a couple of hours. You'll buy more moves for your main sword, unlock weapons to use with the secondary attack button, use your gadgets in battle, and learn to dodge and counter at the correct times. And by the time you learn to use all of these things in battle, you'll juggle enemies in combos, dodge an enemy attack, pull yourself towards them with your grappling hook, and knock them back some fifteen feet with another attack. The combos remain simple, but it's how you use the weapons and gadgets at your disposal that make the combat fun, not in what order you press one of two attack buttons.
This trivia-riddle-jumble has two parts: First, answer the video game trivia questions below. Each letter of the correct answer will take up one blank space. Second, when you have answered all of the questions, take all of the letters with numbers below them and list them in numerical order.
If you have all of the answers right, the correctly ordered letters will spell out the answer to this riddle:
“What did Willie Nelson say to the Half-life headcrab?”
This week on Hit or Miss: Little Big Planet doesn't get to the PSP Go; Nintendo plans some Zelda surprises for E3 (fingers crossed for a Tingle figure-skating mini-game!); Sony plans to remove the one talking point they have over Xbox Live; and Spike TV's VGA nominees actually kind of don't suck. The awards show itself, however, almost certainly will.
Video game costumes do not have to be confined to conventions. Slobs of Gaming have pieced together this collection of 31 amazing displays of video game cosplay.
It might be a bit too late to run out and piece together your own Mega Man costume, but it is never too early to get a jump on next year, right? Just think, you could be Grey Fox from Metal Gear Solid [via Slobs of Gaming]:
Click here to see the full list or hit the jump to see our favorites.
It's about time someone made a Rubik's Cube we might want to solve instead of find creative ways to cheat just to look smart. (Why did they make those color stickers so hard to peel off anyways?) [via Geekologie]:
Dark Void Senior Producer Morgan Gray is trying to take his game to new heights. Sure, that's easy when main character Will Grey has one of them gravity-defying jetpacks. But take away the fancy pseudo futuristic gadgets and things drop down to an even playing field. Perfect for our five random questions. So let's see if Morgan's gaming knowledge will rise above our expectations. Or simply fall flat...
Link's so popular in video games that it's easy to overlook certain aspects of his backstory. (We're looking at you, Philips CD-i's Zelda: Wand of Gamelon!)
Yup, those are some Street Fighter 2 tokens. We'd totally buy them, too, if we didn't already blow our $15,000 on that Zelda plate. Damn. Oh well. We're waiting to blow our wad on these rare specimens anyway. If they ever appear on eBay. Any day now...
Continue after the break to see more $15,000 token shots.
eBay is great because you can sell a bunch old crap for cheap. Oh my -- did we say "cheap?" We meant expensive. Really expensive. Like this $15,000 Legend of Zelda plastic plate stupidly-named eBay user homisydal is selling [via technabob]:
Music and video games have gone together since the conception of the latter. Better technology has advanced the music in video games from beeps and boops, to full blown orchestral music.
Yet, just as films can still have bad music, so can video games. But some video games have amazing music, and, coupled with immersive gameplay and a good story, can evoke emotions in the player that are very much like the emotions that a great film or opera produces.
With this in mind, I present a few of my favorite musical pieces from video games past and present:
I'm not happy with the current state of video games. Don't get me wrong, I love the games that our new technology has brought us. I wouldn't of been able to play games like BioShock, Yakuza, or BlazBlue without it.
It's puzzle time? It's puzzle time!
I'm not happy with the current state of video games. Don't get me wrong, I love the games that our new technology has brought us. I wouldn't of been able to play games like BioShock, Yakuza, or BlazBlue without it. 
