The debate over “casual” versus “hardcore” players is an old one, but with the increasing popularity of casual games the old rules that defined hardcore as the serious gamers are fast becoming outdated. Will hardcore gaming remain the heart of the industry that drives innovation and creates lasting franchises or will casual gaming overtake it to become the voice of modern gamers? (more…)
Virtue of Reality
By Mara Poulsen
Once upon a crunch time, my team was ranged in a bleary-eyed semi-circle around a Playstation for the purpose of “research”. Our N64 fighting game, though fun (we thought so, anyway)in the four-person mode that we were so heavily touting, still seemed shallow in the regular two-person, so we were playing Dead or Alive for comparison. Either that or we were so tired of making our own damn game that we just needed to play someone else’s for awhile.
John, our “soft body dynamics” programmer was ostensibly doing a little research of his own. As the female fighters circled each other in their battle-kinis*, breasts reverberating around their torsos as if at any moment they might shotput off into the atmosphere, he whooped, “Now that’s what we need.” Alan, the artist who was playing, chuckled.
Enter me, the wet blanket. “You know, the reason why the sports bra was invented is because it hurts like hell to have your boobs jiggling around like that. Also, you have a gigantic breast moving around that much and you’re going to end up accidentally punching it.”
Alan grinned at me, as his Amazon cycloned and felled his boobalicious opponent. “Clearly, on so many levels, this game is not about reality,” he said. (more…)
