Topic: The "Game Overthinker" Thread

[Stratos]

It makes me wonder how Kirby will get along without Sakurai. Though Nintendo did bring him back into the fold by basically making Project Sora a second party so that may be Nintendo realizing this and getting back Sakurai to work on the ill fated Kirby N64/GC game.

[Mop it up]

I think Nintendo characters fall under two categories:
- The charismatic type: These characters are cute, colorful, funny and very memorable. Even if they don't say much they shine thanks to their happy attitude, colorful dispositions and cartoony attributes.
Examples: The entire Mario cast, Pokemon, Kirby

- The enigmatic type: These characters shine thanks to their mysterious, dark stories. They don't say much and keep a lot of things secret, making the player yearn to learn more about them, seek out their past and guide them through their quest.
Examples: Link, Samus

I'd say Birdo qualifies for both of these.

They couldn't have chosen a better voice for Mario. Recently I've seen some of the old Mario cartoons of the late 80's/early 90's, and it just seemed so weird to hear him with such flat voice acting. Mario is one of the few Nintendo characters who has had the same voice actor throughout; because they got it right the first time.

the ill fated Kirby N64/GC game.

I don't recall any Kirby N64 game not being released. Kirby 64 saw a late release, and while Kirby Air Ride started as an N64 game, it was eventually released on the GameCube. There was a canceled Kirby game on GameCube though, is that the one you were referring to?

[NWR_pap64]

I think characters can cross over into the categories.

Capt. Falcon, for example. He's very charismatic, cool and strong. But his past is shrouded in mystery, and many details are left unanswered.

I think the Mother series characters fall under both categories as well. I haven't played any of the games, but from what I heard and seen the characters look and act cute, but there's a level of complexity in them, especially in Mother 3.

[Mop it up]

Capt. Falcon, for example. He's very charismatic, cool and strong. But his past is shrouded in mystery, and many details are left unanswered.

With how many Nintendo characters have vague back stories, I can't help but wonder if some of them are just because of laziness of the writers. That said, I think I prefer the vagueness over anything detailed and in-depth. What is great about Nintendo characters is that they spark the imagination, as I like to create my own theories behind their actions and motivations. Such things also ignite more conversation about a game. If every little detail of a character's story and personality is laid out, then there's nothing to wonder about, no intrigue, no nothing. It's all there for you.

In Earthbound, toward the end there are a few details of Ness's past which are revealed in subtle ways. They could even be interpreted in more than one way. Just another reason why that game is brilliant.

If there were only one Super NES game I'd say everyone needs to play, it's Earthbound. Unfortunately its high price and low availability make that impossible, but even so, you need to play it no matter the cost. You can always sell it after you are finished to give someone else the joy of experiencing it.

[Stratos]

Thats why Miyamoto doesn't like to give back stories Mop it up. He likes to leave it up to the players imagination. He didn't even want the plumber stuff to be considered cannon because he wanted Mario to be left up to the imagination. It was gamers who type cast him as a plumber.

And the Gamecube Kirby was originally planned as an N64 game that was going the RE0, Dinosaur Planet Eternal Darkness route. I remember seeing a screen shot of it in Nintendo Power back in the day. Though I will grant that the N64 one could have been scrapped and the GC one was a different project but I'm pretty sure they were connected.

[KDR_11k]

Isn't one point of Sonic's game design that the levels have many routes that you can indeed explore? Not just a linear race to the goal? Yes, all pathes lead to the goal eventually but there's still a lot of variety in the pathes you can take and thats something that only works if you keep replaying the levels instead of playing them once and then forgetting about them.

The storybook games may actually have counteracted the problems Adventure brought:
- Less secondary characters, especially in roles that directly affect the gameplay
- A change in game design that turns it into a racing platformer of sorts which means the speed makes sense now
- A story that has no continuity with the main story and that's not fixed to the US or Japanese backstory for Sonic.

While the concept of Sonic inserted into various stories is stupid at least it turns the effective backstory into a blank slate that can be filled with whatever is necessary for the game.

[NWR_pap64]

As the GO mentions, Sonic didn't have much story either, but then when Sonic Adventure they had to create a story so it made and that's when the problems began.

Sega now had to create a reason of being for Sonic and thus why we have a convoluted storyline and too many characters.

Nintendo doesn't seem to have this problem because they like to have things vague enough to be enjoyed by everyone.

Super Mario Galaxy had a story. But even then, it was about Bowser kidnapping Peach and Mario saving her.

And yes, I too thought that the Sonic storybook games did many things right and I am stunned that no one has seen this.

[KDR_11k]

Nintendo simply never bothers with keeping the story consistent (except for Metroid which is why it's turned into a trainwreck), they just rewrite anything they feel like in the new installment, other devs think that what they turn into canon remains canon.

[Stratos]

How is the Metroid story line a train wreck?

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

It's heading into Castlevania territory.

Mother Brain needs the services of THE DARK PRIEST 'SHAFT' to have any chance of being revived for Super Metroid!

[Mop it up]

Thats why Miyamoto doesn't like to give back stories Mop it up. He likes to leave it up to the players imagination.

I think I vaguely recall reading something about that in an interview, possibly in Nintendo Power.

And the Gamecube Kirby was originally planned as an N64 game that was going the RE0, Dinosaur Planet Eternal Darkness route. I remember seeing a screen shot of it in Nintendo Power back in the day. Though I will grant that the N64 one could have been scrapped and the GC one was a different project but I'm pretty sure they were connected.

I have never heard anything of it before. I'll have to look it up and see if it is true.

Isn't one point of Sonic's game design that the levels have many routes that you can indeed explore? Not just a linear race to the goal?

Some paths lead backwards. I always end up getting lost. Did you know there's a ten-minute time limit to complete a stage? Apparently I need more time.

[KDR_11k]

Yeah, I read about the 10 minute limit in the manual, I don't think I've actually hit it myself.

[NWR_pap64]

Part two of the GO's "Sonic in Crisis" episodes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YDrVRqmrLY

Funny enough, some of the suggestions he mentioned have been implemented in Sonic Unleashed. And I like his idea of a better, more refined storyline.

[BeautifulShy]

Well The Game Overthinker has a new video and it is about the RE5 race situation after the release.

[Stratos]

His racism video was pretty good. I agree, we need more diversity in game characters, but not forced diversity. It needs to flow naturally or else you end up with 'token' race characters.

[Peachylala]

While Unleashed implanted some of the suggestions GO made, it was still a bad game. The speed stages suffered from the "it plays itself" flaw that many a recent Sonic game suffered. Also, the Warehog. That FUCKING Warehog. I have to stop being speedy Sonic in order to play some beat em up that was needed to pad the game length? No, just no.

SatBK did what most of us wanted it to be: fix the flaws of the first game in the storybook series, aka Secret Rings, but keep the core mechanics intact. Imagine, the one part of Sonic Team gets it right.

[KDR_11k]

I think his "manga characters are caucasian" rant is wrong, they barely qualify as human and it's been noticed that their artists tend to add lines to the corners of the eyes that look like they're supposed to be eye lashes but don't match properly, instead appearing to be a subconscious way of adding a skin fold only found on asians.

Also if you want a serious example of America-centrism, look at how he pretty much treats it as black and white, there are tons of other races on this planet. I don't see anyone complaining about all the war games set in the middle east where all the evil guys are arabs and all the good guys are white or black. It's seen as perfectly normal that arabs are the evil guys, it's only when blacks get that role that people complain. Hell, even for America, how many games include native American characters? I can think of Turok and Prey, both are FPSes so you don't have to see who you're playing as and Turok went badly downhill. Do they even bother with the token sidekicks for native Americans? Do they bother with it for arabs? There are a few set races that Americans see as mandatory in at least a token role for every story (hence there's ALWAYS a black guy in a story) but outside of those noone cares.

[Stratos]

I think Yahtzee ridicules games for using Arabs as enemies.

A lot of people are getting sick of the typical American Jingoism in a lot of those war games.

Even though Mr. G.O. did have a slant, at least he is aware of and sensitive to the problem. Realizing there is a problem is the first step out of racism.

[NWR_pap64]

The GO did a new video. This time it has been posted over at Screwattack.com for some contest he's participating in.

Its about how realistic graphics are troublesome in a way:
http://www.screwattack.com/myvidsdontsuck/Semi1/OverThinker

To be honest, this is his worst episode yet. Even weaker than his Nintendo rant video he rambles on and on and sounds more like an angry, angsty gamer than the intellectual seen in videos like the examination of Peach as a female character. His theory is a good one, but he rambles on and on and I lost interest halfway through the video.

I also got pretty damn annoyed at his movie ramblings. I mean I KNOW he hates the Transformers movie with a goddamn passion but do we need to be reminded of it in EVERY VIDEO HE MAKES?? His rant about "Reality Bites" was pretty damn stupid, and the squirrel bit is very retarded. If I tried to make a review in which I paused to discuss something unrelated to the game I would so get a speaking from my editor.

When you are lecturing about something you have to be consistent. If you are talking about racism, stick with racism. If you are talking about Nintendo, stick with Nintendo. If you try to persuade people's attention to another subject simply because you prefer people to hear you talk about that it says to me that you are very egotistical to the point where you would rather ramble about something that pleases you or annoys you rather than committing to your cause.

This annoys me because while the GO is great with games with movie he seems like a snob, and he makes his opinion states on his GO videos which gets tiresome after a while.

I honestly hope he loses because he has done better than this, and I hate for his ego to be rewarded for stupid crap.

[Deguello]

Did you mean his "Open Letter to Nintendo" Nintendo rant?

I think it was obvious that he was doing it tongue-in-cheek because everybody kept accusing him of being a big fanboy of Nintendo.  Notice how it's only 6 minutes long, and talks about things like "What about the Nintendo seal?" and "Gee Mario Galaxy sure is like Super Mario 64." (WTF?)  And a whole minute on the "Storage issue" which has since been resolved in spades.

But yeah, this one kinda rambled, probably because of the contest he had to generalize it a bit.  But I agree with his comment about how we have the graphics to make just about any environment and scenario possible and most of the time we're still doing some kind of gun-shooty war thing.

[KDR_11k]

And we've got 24 bit color depth on the screen AND high dynamic range and all we do with it is brown, gray and bloom.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Plus shiny variants.

[Stratos]

Pap, do you think he felt pressured to sensationalize this one more because it was going on Screwattack.com? He might have felt people wouldn't have cared for it there without all that stuff.

[NWR_pap64]

Pap, do you think he felt pressured to sensationalize this one more because it was going on Screwattack.com? He might have felt people wouldn't have cared for it there without all that stuff.

Maybe, this episode was very different from the others. But if you read the comments the Screw Attack users didn't like it either and support the other guy more.

[NWR_pap64]

New video about videogame violence is up on Screw Attack:
http://www.screwattack.com/myvidsdontsuck/Final/TheGameOverThinker

Now THIS is the Game Overthinker I know and love. He goes deeper into the videogame violence issue and suggests to gamers to fight with facts rather than just be angry about it and says something that I've been saying for a while now: people should stop bitching about the Wii and casual gaming because its CLEANING up the stereotypical image of videogames.

Plus we get to see the man himself, and has a cool Bowser shirt on.