Amazonys – Wii Games

Last year, EA tried something new: they released a number of titles based off brand new intellectual property. Perhaps, in hindsight, too many.

In an interview with Gamasutra, EA’s Frank Gibeau has said:

I think in the spirit of your question, I think we launched too many new IPs all at once in Q3.

I would have spread them out and found better windows for them. I would have had longer marketing for them. The marketing cycles were fairly short. We didn’t have enough assets to really build the fanbase, build the community, and get that long lead demand built.

So I probably in hindsight would have picked a couple different windows for Dead Space and Mirror’s Edge.

In hindsight, yeah, I bet you would have. But you know, for all the people getting down on both those games…in the 6-9 months since their release, word has spread. Both were, for their quirks, excellent games (probably my two favourite from 2008, even). So when the sequels roll around, things will be different. People will be ready. Ready with money.

A Different Track: Frank Gibeau Talks Strategy [Gamasutra]

SEGA has started holding “hostess” auditions for an upcoming Ryu Ga Gotoku (aka Yakuza) game.

Between May 8 and June 19, there were over 1,500 applicants. Those screened from that pool auditioned at SEGA’s headquarters. Groups of 2~3 applicants were interviewed by the game’s creators, including Ryu Ga Gotoku designer Toshihiro Nagoshi, in a 30 minute audition.

Besides getting a screen test, the applicants were quizzed by Nagoshi. The girls also had to do line readings of bar girl game dialogue like: “Wooow!”, “So mean…”, “You’re already going home?” and “Hey sweetie, let’s sing a duet”.

Questions included their current profession, whether or not they have worked as a hostess and for how long, and if they liked karaoke. The ladies were also asked if they played video games and if they were familiar with the Ryu Ga Gotoku franchise. Many of the female applicants were familiar with Ryu Ga Gotoku 3 because fashion models from Koakuma Ageha appeared in the game as hostesses.

“The motivation for these auditions,” says Nagoshi, “was to create an opportunity to participate in this title.”

セガ、PS3「龍が如く」次回作キャバ嬢役オーディションを公開 名越総合監督「予想以上の内容で採用者を増やしたいと思っている」 [Game Watch]

My single biggest problem with the PS3? The loss of backwards compatibility. It’s a gaping hole in the system’s feature set. Then again, it may also be one that’s on the way back.

Some background: when the PS3 first launched, it was backwards-compatible, meaning you could play PlayStation 2 games on your new PlayStation 3. The 20GB and 60GB units released in North America and Japan featured hardware emulation (they literally had a PS2 chip inside), while those released in PAL territories featured software emulation (similar to how the 360 handles original Xbox games).

Later, though, this feature was removed. Anyone buying a 40GB, a later model of the 80GB or the 120GB PS3 can’t play a single PS2 game on them. It was a stupid, stupid move on the part of Sony.

A patent discovered by Siliconera, however, suggests that Sony might be re-thinking this stance. Filed in December 2008, it’s basically a patent for a method that would allow the PS3’s Cell chip to translate code from the PS2’s Emotion Engine. Not half-assed software emulation (which in previous PS3 models couldn’t run some games), full, total replication of the functionality of the Emotion Engine.

Which means, theoretically at least, you could play any PS2 game on any PS3, regardless of the model or year of release.

Whether this would allow you to play actual PS2 discs, or would just be the advance party for the sale of PS2 downloads on the PlayStation Store is unclear. We’d like the former, but with Sony being a business and all, would expect the latter.

Sony Patents Emotion Engine Emulation Technology For Cell Processors [Siliconera]

The big erotic game trend these days? Block foreign access of your website. Why? Because foreigners have been making a big deal about ero games.

Joining the likes of PC developer Minori, Yuzusoft’s website sends up a standard 403 forbidden to those trying to access the page outside of Japan. And while the VisualArts Visual Antena website cannot be accessed by foreign IPs, the site does carry this amusing message: “PLEASE PLAY THE GAME OF YOUR COUNTRY IF YOU PRAY FOR THE WORLD PEACE!:-)」”

This is less xenophobia, more we-are-scared-of-pissing-people-off. It’s just that a lot of those pissed off people live outside Japan. These recent defensive measures from erotic game makers come in the wake of the Rapelay controversy and subsequent rape game banning. Other measures include changing the titles of upcoming releases.

VisualAntena! and Yuzu_Soft [Official Sites via Canned Dogs]

One of the reasons Starcraft is still such a big hit at LAN parties is that, like most “older” PC titles, it supports multiplayer over a local network. Starcraft II will do no such thing.

A Blizzard rep has told Kotaku:

We don’t currently plan to support LAN play with StarCraft II, as we are building Battle.net to be the ideal destination for multiplayer gaming with StarCraft II and future Blizzard Entertainment games. While this was a difficult decision for us, we felt that moving away from LAN play and directing players to our upgraded Battle.net service was the best option to ensure a quality multiplayer experience with StarCraft II and safeguard against piracy.

Several Battle.net features like advanced communication options, achievements, stat-tracking, and more, require players to be connected to the service, so we’re encouraging everyone to use Battle.net as much as possible to get the most out of StarCraft II. We’re looking forward to sharing more details about Battle.net and online functionality for StarCraft II in the near future.

Which will no doubt be crushing to LAN party fiends…if, that is, they still exist.

StarCraft II Developers Talk [IncGamers]