Selling Just Cause 2.

This week we're very proud to welcome back to the show; Comunity Manager for Eidos, now a label of Square Enix, to talk about Just Cause 2. I had the privelege of getting some hands-on time with the game last week in London and it's looking pretty exciting.

With the game effectively wrapped and release less than two months away, Mike is here to discuss some of the changes that have occurred since the first one, the bits we can look forward to the most and most importantly the challenge of bringing awareness about it to potential audiences in a crowded Q1, 2010.

After that, we discuss our 24 hour charity gaming marathon, which is happening on Saturday the 20th through Sunday the 21st of February and how you, our community can help us.

We finish up with a spoiler-free discussion about Mass Effect 2 and how the gaming mechanics have changed since the stellar original.

You can find the official website with all you need to know about Just Cause 2 here: http://www.justcause.com/home There's also a competition on this episode to win a Just Cause 2 T-Shirt and a rare promotional ID card connected with the Alternate Reality Game on the official website.

And the page to go to, to donate to our Haiti fund is here: http://www.justgiving.com/Digital-Cowboys-Haiti-Relief-Challenge

 

 

 

Why Don't Square Remake FFVII?

Having just completed FFXII, restarted VII and in anticipation of FFXIII we decided to pose the question to our community as to why Square Enix don't cash in and make a contemporary version of Final Fantasy VII, one of the most beloved JRPG's of all time for current gen systems.

To help us tackle your responses we brought in Carolyn Sonnek of Pink Ninja productions and Snark Fu. You may also know Carolyn as Blogkitten and the better half of Commander Tim.

Carolyn lives and breathes JRPG's. When she bumps her knee, hit points come off her. So we delve into her mind and ask why she has so much time for this most life-consuming of all gaming genre's.We also examine our own relationship with RPG's both Eastern and Western.

Many thanks to all the listeners who contributed. We did not have time to cram in all of your responses, but we hope we did you justice.

 

A Question of Morality.

We've brought in Daniel Floyd once again, this time to discuss the topic of his latest animated lecture, based on an article by James Portnow on the challenge of designing games with ambiguous moral choice.

The situation so far has been Renegade/Paragon; being a total arsehole or a goody two-shoes and somewhere in-between an under-powered and frustrated player of games trying hard to make decisions that seem realistic. Portnow's article argues that it's possible to achieve more and in this episode, we look at the supreme design challenge that this represents. We also assess the difference between problems in a game and choices and how rarely the latter ever show up.

Many thanks to Daniel for joining us and adding his usual brand of classiness and incisiveness and also to Mr Portnow for the inspirational article. More people like these please.

Stay tuned at the close of the show for a fantastic Tim Minchin song and a cherry on top.

Live Twittercast.

This evening we decided to open up the floor to our community and let you guys pick our topics. Edie Sellers of Gamehounds joins us to field your questions on Twitter and the forums.

We cram into 100 minutes all of your questions about what's coming up in 2010 including Natal and the Sony Gem, 3D technology, Final Fantasy XIII, God of War III, new handhelds and many many more.

My Generation.

Since the Xbox 360 was launched in 2005 we've all come to embrace the many changes that it brought to us, along with those of the PS3 and Wii, launched a year later. But now that we've become complacent with the advantages and internet connectivity they delivered, we can barely imagine a world where we can't see what our friends are playing every time we're online and never find ourselves unable to walk further than two meters from the television with our controllers.

Tonight, let us explore that world by looking back on just what innovations we've been party to that would be impossible to abandon now. To chat with us, we have Dan Illson, a man with close links to Some Other Castle. We finish off with what we've been playing over Christmas; many RPG's.

Note: During the show I call Final Fantasy XII "Ugly", I realise that this clearly isn't the case, it's quite beautiful in fact, but that statement does speak volumes for how inured I am to HD gaming. -Alex.

End of Year Awards 2009.

To close out the year, we look back on the last twelve months of game releases and name our nominations in a multitude of categories. Every nominee is a winner and deserves your attention.

To give us a balanced perspective we're joined by Neil "Xibxang" Brooks and Leon "Ratso Albion" Cox of GamerDork.

To close out the show we announce the winner of our T-Shirt design challenge. The lucky entrant will receive a $40 gift voucher for Casually Hardcore, purveyors of fine geek, nerd and gamer-friendly clothing.

Happy New Year to all our listeners.

Christmas Video Gaming Quiz.

To celebrate the holiday season we've thrown an inter-podcast quiz on the subject of video games. Tony is quizmaster (and a very strict one) and I'm competing against Chris O Regan from Superhappyfuntimeshow, Ratso Albion of Gamerdork and Sinan Kubba of Big Red Potion.

Find out who among us is the king of gaming knowhow.

Also as a special treat we had a bit of a Christmas sing-song at the beginning, the video of which can be found here.

Retro Review: The Sony Playstation.

This week, Commander Tim joins us to take a close look at the original Sony wonder machine. We examine how it came about, how Sony made it it THE console to own and the legacy of game franchises it left in its wake.

We were originally going to talk about the Playstation 3, but considering last weeks show, we wanted to wait until we had a stronger angle, so that episode will be coming in the new year.

Remember for the next week there's still a competition on to win a $40 to spend at Casually Hardcore. To be in with the chance of winning check out this thread on the forum.

Many thanks to Commander Tim, who came on at relatively short notice and made this a mature and entertaining debate, rather than the playground scrap it would have been without him. You can find Tim's website here, Gamehounds here and The Widget here. 

Xbox 360 Explored / Borderlands

This week we continue our console focused episodes in the run up to Christmas and take a look at the Xbox 360. So that we don't come off like fanboys we tear into its flaws first, before taking a look at the strengths that make it worth buying.

Following this we give a full review of one of the sleeper hits of the year; Borderlands. If you haven't played this yet then find out why you should. If you already have then enjoy the warm, fuzzy feelings associated with people saying nice things about a game you like.

But how do you follow up on an episode where you get to interview Dominik Diamond? It's almost impossible folks and I will tell you truthfully now, that this episode was one of the hardest to edit in our long run of shows.  The original recording was 135 minutes long so rather than giving you a boring, long show I cut it to the bone and then, inspired by the podcasts of Robert Ashley and Kevin Smith I filled every inch of it with interesting, mood-setting music, employing a few unusual editing styles along the way. The result took me more than ten hours to edit, twice as longas the average show, so you may love it or hate it, but I won't be doing it again.

There's an Easter Egg at the end. I hope I made this show worth the wait.

Alex

Dominik Diamond on Gamesmaster.

We're immensely honoured this week to bring you Dominik Diamond, presenter of the greatest show about games ever to grace television screens; Gamesmaster.

For nearly seven years (barring one brief hiatus) Dominik presented this classic British production with a mixture of wit, charm and innuendo sending challengers, both unknown and celebrity into gaming tasks set by a techno-wizard played by Patrick Moore and commentating on their progress as though it were the most exciting sports action ever. The formula worked and Gamesmaster consistently drew audiences from the 16-Bit era all the way through to 1998 when the Playstation held full sway.

Dominik has been a journalist, and a DJ for XFM simce then and has moved to Nova Scotia; Canada with his family. He very kindly gave us two hours of his time to reminisce about his experiences, and the interview we now have here is probably one of our favourites in all our long years of podcasting.

You'll definitely find out some things you didn't know, learn behind the scenes tidbits and see how Dominik got in and out of the show. For those new to it, YouTube is a vertitable treasure trove of clips and if you'd like to see shows recommended by Dominik himself, that followed in Gamesmaster's footsteps, check out Consolevania and Video Gaiden.