Joystiq

Mr. Driller Online's lag-tastic online play

Alexander Sliwinski — 2008-04-03T19:00:00+00:00

We've received some tips indicating that Mr. Driller Online for XBLA is having a problem with the, er, "Online" portion of the gameplay. It seems that while the person hosting an online game is just fine, the connecting player can't drill anything. X3F put together a video of the bug, which we've placed after the break.

Another test of Mr. Driller's online capabilities was done today with the same broken result. No word on whether a patch is in the works. Best to save your 800 MS points for the moment, as there's no sense in supporting broken titles.

Gallery: Mr. Driller Online (XBLA)

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Three-year old smashes TV after losing Wii Sports

John Bardinelli — 2007-05-25T18:59:00+00:00

Filed under: Culture, Nintendo Wii, Exergaming

Anti-video game pundits, here is your proof that video games are the violent tools of the devil. After playing outside on the trampoline, UK resident Brian McConnell left his three-year old alone to play Wii Tennis while he fetched the boy a drink. While in the kitchen, Brian heard two loud bangs. He returned to find Adam using the controller to smash the 42-inch plasma TV screen. Needless to say, Adam won't be touching a video game console for a very long time, and his father will be keeping an eagle-eye on the boy from this day forward. Not even a beefed-up wrist strap could have saved this poor TV.

[Via Engadget]

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What's broken with MMOs and their combat?

Alexander Sliwinski — 2007-03-09T09:56:00+00:00

Filed under: Online, RPGs, Simulations, GDC, MMO

Do DPS, crafting, tank, and the future of aggro management make your heart go a flutter? Damion Shubert has been doing MMO design for ten years and is currently working on an announced project for BioWare. He held a roundtable on the next generation of MMO design and the big issue was: "Why does combat suck" in MMOs?

Thoughts revolved around the idea that combat is overused, simple and easy for people to grasp. Shubert says, "Our combat models right now are asking people to enter no risk situation ... Players choose their own challenges and bore themselves to death ... then they bitch how the games aren't challenging enough. We force them to play cautiously, can you imagine if Gears of War told you not to take risks?"

After years of watching MMO players and having access to background statistics of game he says people's penchant for exploitation is key. Player's will try to find the easy way out of anything. He also says one of the greatest innovations of World of Warcraft was how they rewarded their quests. WoW gives substantial rewards for completing quests and leads players down a path rather than having players camp and repeat the same single action over and over again. Shubert emphasizes that combat MMOs are not the only type out there and Korea makes us look pitiful, "They have MMO dance games, golf games and everything else." So, why haven't those types of MMOs caught on in other places and what other types of massive online game would we like to see?

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Today's hottest game video: Wii-mote plus sweaty hands = SMASH

Kevin Kelly — 2006-11-25T00:00:00+00:00

Filed under: Nintendo Wii, Sports, Video

The top slot on YouTube is occupied by the DIY-erless Wii sensor bar video that we've already covered today, so we're sliding down to number two. Although the video tells us something we already know -- Wii-motes love to fly out of hands due to shoddy wrist straps and break things -- we love their Zapruder film-esque replay of the alleged event over and over. While people haven't started duct-taping these to their wrists yet, Nintendo can expect a brisk business in replacement straps sales.

That's where the real money lies in these consoles, and we've finally uncovered the bitter truth. Check out the video after the jump while you scrounge for strap change.

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PS3 broken straight out of the box

Alexander Sliwinski — 2006-11-23T16:00:00+00:00

Filed under: Sony PlayStation 3

Punch Jump received their 20 GB Playstation 3 only to discover it has a malfunctioning disc feeder. The sound that the Playstation 3 makes while attempting with absolute futility to consume the disc is what really makes this video pop. No launch is without its batch of faulty systems, Nintendo is currently dealing with fatal error 110213 on the Wii. After attempting every troubleshooting trick Sony said they would replace the defective unit. No word yet from Punch Jump the timeframe they were quoted it taking to receive a replacement unit. With any luck the guys over at Punch Jump will get their replacement before the New Year.

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A postmortem on Accordion Hero (with a little info on Guitar Hero, too)

Dan Choi — 2006-03-18T00:30:00+00:00

Filed under: Culture, Sony PlayStation 2, Rhythm

Just in case you missed the Guitar Hero parody Accordion Hero reported here on Joystiq a week or two back, Gamasutra has now posted a tongue-in-cheek postmortem on the squeezebox simulator. It's cheeky.

You'll learn not only "that accordion players get all the girls" (with female players, of course, getting all the guys), but you'll also get a handle on some detailed developer data such as the number of accordions broken during development (none) and the number set on fire during the same period of time (twenty-three).

For those of you who'd rather learn the real history behind Accordion's obvious inspiration, you can check out the relevant Behind the Music feature on Guitar Hero with its creators Harmonix and RedOctane below. At least that'll give you a better idea of how many controllers from "a Japanese guitar-playing simulation [presumably Guitar Freaks]... ended up in an impromptu parking lot bonfire" before all was said and done. (Hint: it's a number a lot closer to one hundred.) Glad the new controllers work.

See also:

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