Massively Multiplayer: Gaming In The New Millennium
- Thread starter RySenkari
- Start date
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I think that only applies to landlords, and we own our house. I'm pretty sure the company would love to come out here and get our thousands of dollars right away, but they physically don't have the parts they need since it's the hottest part of the summer and pretty much everyone's AC decided to crap out at the same time
AeroTheZealousOne
Monthly Donor
I'd suggest heading over to the local library in an effort to stay cool. Even if you don't write perhaps you could find some inspiration for less fleshed-out parts of the tineline, or heck, just call it a week-long hiatus and do whatever it takes to stay cool.
And the U.S. State of Ohio. Not particularly pleasant here but there are worse places on Earth to be.
Ah we can wait. Time to re-read Player Two Start all over again .
Nintendo Direct - October 6, 2011/TGS 2011
(Author's Note: Managed to cool down the house enough to have some time to write and post this. Can't promise I'll be resuming my regular update schedule this week, but hopefully I can crank out a couple more updates before the repairman gets our AC fixed this weekend.)
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"Hello. I am Satoru Iwata, and this is Nintendo Direct, where we will be communicating directly to you, Nintendo fans, about the games that we have planned for the future. I would like to start by thanking each and every one of you for playing our games. Here at Nintendo, we love games and being able to bring the joy and excitement and fun of Nintendo to all of you is a great privilege, and one that I am very grateful to be able to provide for you. I would like to begin this Nintendo Direct presentation by discussing our newest handheld game device, the Nintendo Connect. The Nintendo Connect will allow you to enjoy our games like never before, both at home and wherever you are. It will also allow you to connect to a wide array of electronic devices, including our very own Nintendo Sapphire. Please watch this brief video where we will show you just what Nintendo Connect can bring to you."
-Satoru Iwata's introduction to the October 6, 2011 Nintendo Direct presentation
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Nintendo released a 40 minute video to their website and to Videocean, Youtube, and Okuma today, called the Nintendo Direct. Somewhat similar to their E3 presentation, but in a more intimate, "direct to the viewer" sort of fashion, the Direct presentation showed off numerous games, some of which have already been revealed, some of which are new. The Direct was primarily presented by Satoru Iwata, who gave a brief introduction in which he thanked the viewers, and then segued into a brief (about two minute long) Nintendo Connect video. The video didn't show off a lot of new features, but was pretty slickly produced, showing off people using the Connect not just to play games (including Mario and Zelda), but to connect to various music devices, and even showed off someone playing Super Mario Laboratory, the Sapphire Mario planned for next year, on the Connect in the middle of a park, demonstrating the device's connectivity. After this brief video, Iwata returned with Katsuya Eguchi, to show off some of the games planned for the device. We got a nice new look at The Legend Of Zelda: Tower Of Sentinels, planned for release at the Connect's launch. We saw a lot more of the tower, and some truly big rooms were revealed, as big as any in the console Zelda dungeons and proof that this was a serious Zelda title every big as big and complex as the console games even though it takes place in one giant building. We also got some looks at the game's emphasis on vertical movement, revealing that a lot of the items Link would be picking up would help him move vertically through the tower. Iwata discussed Parcels: Special Delivery next, and was somewhat giddy as he showed off a couple of the game's new tricks, including scooter stunts and the ability to recruit different people to deliver packages for you. Footage from Wave Race and Infinitia was also briefly shown, before we got a brand new game reveal: Snap!, a game utilizing the Connect's camera in order to take pictures of real life things and using the Connect's AR capabilities to allow players to manipulate real world objects in a virtual landscape. The game also seems to hearken back to the old Game Boy Camera peripheral, with many of the same wacky functions and mini-games. Iwata then showed off how Snap! could use the Connect's connectivity to allow players to connect to certain models of Sony digital cameras to import those pictures into the game. Iwata gave the Connect's price and release date one last time, then introduced Mark Cerny to talk about Pokemon: Legend Quest.
Cerny's Legend Quest segment, which lasted about five minutes, focused mostly on two things: interactive battles and the game's main story. Battles looked more beautiful than ever, with amazing Pokemon animations only possible on the Nintendo Sapphire. Battles have never looked closer to their appearance in the anime series, and though not every move looks perfect in Legend Quest, no Pokemon game has ever looked this beautiful. Then, we got some story teasers, in which the Collector appeared to be bringing legendary and mythical Pokemon together, and we even saw a glimpse of the brand new Pokemon, which appears to be some kind of humanoid creature with spikes surrounded by floating rings. We only saw the creature in silhouette, but it was a captivating tease as the segment ended and things went back to Iwata. Iwata gave a brief introduction for a brand new Yoshi Sapphire game, which focuses on underwater exploration. The gameplay/story video showed Yoshi swimming underwater and turning into things like a submarine and a shark, and even introducing us to Meryoshis, Yoshis with mermaid tails. The game looks to be a 2-D platforming adventure title, and while it will focus on underwater gameplay, there's plenty of land exploration to be had as well. Yoshi And The Mysterious Lake is currently targeting a Spring 2012 release date. We then segued right into the next Sapphire preview with no introduction from Iwata: Midia And The Gift Of Aqua, Fumito Ueda's upcoming epic adventure game, which we've only been getting snippets of information about (and which was absent from Nintendo's E3 keynote, though it was playable on the floor). This preview showed off Midia using water to solve puzzles and progress downward through the tower, and while the game looks almost as if it could be Zelda: Tower Of Sentinels in reverse, there was plenty to distinguish it, including an emphasis on mystery and stealth, with much less combat than Zelda (in fact, the preview showed off no combat at all). After the Midia segment, we returned to Iwata, who discussed the Game Boy Supernova and its success, thanking the people who've played Supernova games over the years, and then promising more games to come. We then launched into another narrated video segment which showed off three upcoming Supernova games, including Final Fantasy: Dissidia II (showing off no real new information but some neat gameplay scenes), Code Of Princess (a sidescrolling hack and slash title from Atlus in which a princess and her friends battle monsters and zombies), and most intriguingly, a story/gameplay video for Fire Emblem Echoes: Fall Of The Shadow Dragon. The trailer focuses on the two protagonists, Jughart and his sister Claudia, forced to flee after their kingdom falls. The trailer promises a darker, more mature Fire Emblem game than previous titles, with lots of dramatic and tragic scenes shown and an increased level of violence from previous games. The in-battle graphics rival anything yet seen on the Supernova, and the trailer made it clear that this game looks to send the Supernova out in style. It and Code Of Princess will be released in 2012, while Dissidia II comes later this year.
Iwata then briefly introduced a quick "sizzle reel"-type segment for upcoming third party titles, in which brief, narrated video clips of about 30 seconds in length were shown for a succession of games. These included Call Of Duty: Nightfall, Assassin's Creed Revelations, Thrillseekers: Motocross, Max Payne 5, and International Rally. The most intriguing preview was of Diablo III, confirming that Blizzard's latest dungeon crawler will be headed to consoles and that the Sapphire will be among them. The Diablo III segment took the form of a brand new, minute long trailer, and this concluded the sizzle reel, after which we were then shown a slightly fuller trailer for the next Twisted Metal game, Twisted Metal Chaos 3, coming next year to the Sapphire. This trailer gave more details than the E3 trailer, focusing on characters other than Sweet Tooth, and then showing off some gameplay in which cars chased each other through fantastical environments. Twisted Metal Chaos 3 will seemingly feature stages a bit less realistic than those of the previous two games, perhaps introducing some fantasy elements into the series for the first time (though it could just be one of Sweet Tooth's twisted fever dreams). After the Twisted Metal Chaos 3 trailer, Iwata introduced Tetsuya Takahashi, and we cut to a video of Takahashi discussing Final Fantasy XIII, which was said to be entering the final stretch of development in preparation for a 2012 release. We got more footage from the game than ever before, showing off the familiar espers Ifrit and Titan as massive beasts erupting from the Earth to wreck futuristic cities. The protagonists are among the brave soldiers who fight these beasts, riding mechs known as Guardian Skells. Unlike the Guardians featured in Final Fantasy VIII (which themselves were based on classic espers/summons), these Skells must be assembled from parts, much like the mechs in Mechatos, which this game seems to take some inspiration from. Like Final Fantasy XII, Final Fantasy XIII will take place in a massive, open world, with battles fought on the map in real time. Final Fantasy XIII looks even more epic and grand than XII, and will be coming to the Sapphire sometime next year. After this, we went back to Iwata, who once again thanked the player for watching the Nintendo Direct, but then promised one more game to show. We then saw a trailer for a new game that takes place in the depths of space. A ship lands on a desolate world, and as soon as Samus emerged from her ship, we knew this was another Metroid trailer. She radios to Phiria, one of her companions from the previous game, but the call is interrupted as Samus is crushed to the ground by an invisible force. Samus looks to see a massive black hole in the sky. The rest of the trailer intersperses gameplay and cutscenes together, and shows Samus on a planet tormented by the force of gravity, which she herself must utilize to battle the monsters she finds and escape the planet. We see Samus using a gravity gun, and even flying through the air as she flees a dragon-like beast across a shattered moon. The game's title is shown as Metroid Gravity, and the release window of 2012 is given. After this trailer, Iwata once again thanked the audience and told them to expect more Nintendo Direct presentations in the future, with even more games and some interesting surprises as well.
Overall, the inaugural Nintendo Direct was short, sweet, and to the point, giving viewers a nice roadmap of where Nintendo games are headed into the next year. It'll be nice to get these periodic updates about new games and potentially new hardware, and one has to expect that the Sapphire's successor, whenever it's released, may be introduced to the world via a Nintendo Direct presentation.
-from Super Nintendo CD Chalmers' Nintendo blog update on October 6, 2011
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Tokyo Game Show 2011 was surprisingly light on new game announcements, with the two biggest games of the show being ones we've already seen introduced before: Final Fantasy XIII and Metal Gear Solid III: Angels Fall. The two games were both playable at this year's show, and lines stretched past many other booths despite the large number of kiosks set up to demo these two games at Square and Konami's displays. Final Fantasy XIII, which plays much like Final Fantasy XII but in a futuristic setting and with a fresh coat of paint, introduced us to the Guardian Skells, and there were two playable scenarios: a human party and a human party decked out in these new mechs. The human party, consisting of primary protagonist Gash and his two female squadmates, Lune and Ilayna, explored a slum connected to a large city. This slum area was full of vagabonds and small monsters, and the whole time we explored, we could see the glowing towers of the city nearby. We can't emphasize enough how much this game feels like Final Fantasy XII, with Takahashi likely going with the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" approach. However, magic seems to be replaced mostly with weapon and "ether" techniques, and we found ourselves utilizing firearms more often than swords in battle. The Skell combat scenario, which saw Gash and Lune joining a male character, Hanto, in piloting mech suits through a dense jungle area, showed off the fighting techniques of the Skells, which can be equipped with a wide assortment of weapons, including your standard guns and energy swords, but also a battle orb and a giant chainsaw. Skells and their parts level up from combat, but can be damaged as well, and if the player's Skell is destroyed in combat and not recovered quickly enough, the player will actually have to pay to replace it, which isn't cheap (though it is possible to buy insurance for one's Skell, which is regularly deducted from the in-game bank account). The game is much more free and open than even Final Fantasy XII, with it being possible to visit a large segment of the entire world map quite early into the game, though the powerful enemies found in those parts of the game may well wreck underleveled or underprepared players. Final Fantasy XIII looks and plays awesome, and Metal Gear Solid III was equally fun, and most of the playable segments of the game focused on Vapor Snake, who is still searching for answers about her mother's fate while attempting to stop a nefarious terrorist plot and get to the bottom of a conspiracy led by the remnants of the Patriots. Vapor Snake fights with a close and personal style and much less focus on stealth than Solid Snake. We did get to play some Solid Snake segments as well, and while he's clearly aged from previous games, with gray hair and an equally gray mustache, he's still a highly capable fighter and uses a wide variety of firearms to take out his enemies (or in some cases just incapacitate them). Both Snakes move with a realism and fluidity unlike any previous game in the series, with this game running on a whole new engine from Metal Gear Peace or Outer Heaven. Konami also confirmed at the show that the game would be coming to the Apple iTwin as well as the Nintendo Sapphire, though that was pretty much a foregone conclusion already (Outer Heaven also came to the iTwin). Apart from the two big games, we did see some intriguing smaller titles, including Suda51's crazy Lollipop Chainsaw, the Gemini exclusive Resident Evil title Revelations, and another fun looking Gemini game, Deva Station Icosa, which reboots the series by cutting down on the number of playable Devas and introduces brand new gameplay mechanics and a new city to mix things up. Speaking of Apple exclusives, we also got a good look at the new Genji: An Old Man's Story, the spiritual successor to the beat 'em up adventure title Dasho: A Young Man's Story. Featuring the same mix of character-focused gameplay and open world sandbox exploration, we expect a lot from this game, and the demo available at TGS showed that the protagonist Genji has even more combat moves than his predecessor, proving the adage "beware an old man in a land where men die young". Interestingly, Google had somewhat of a big presence at the show, presenting numerous Android games by Japanese developers, and also showing off its new tech, which will be utilized in the expected Android-based Samsung collaboration console expected to launch sometime in the next two years. Google even partnered with Konami to demo Metal Gear Solid III on the new tech, though no actual announcement of a port was given. While Google was more of a sideshow than a star at TGS 2011, the company's announcement of plenty of third party support for its upcoming console shows its continued commitment to challenging its rivals in the gaming industry and providing plenty of content for prospective players.
-from a Games Over Matter blog post on TGS 2011, posted on October 14, 2011
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"Hello. I am Satoru Iwata, and this is Nintendo Direct, where we will be communicating directly to you, Nintendo fans, about the games that we have planned for the future. I would like to start by thanking each and every one of you for playing our games. Here at Nintendo, we love games and being able to bring the joy and excitement and fun of Nintendo to all of you is a great privilege, and one that I am very grateful to be able to provide for you. I would like to begin this Nintendo Direct presentation by discussing our newest handheld game device, the Nintendo Connect. The Nintendo Connect will allow you to enjoy our games like never before, both at home and wherever you are. It will also allow you to connect to a wide array of electronic devices, including our very own Nintendo Sapphire. Please watch this brief video where we will show you just what Nintendo Connect can bring to you."
-Satoru Iwata's introduction to the October 6, 2011 Nintendo Direct presentation
-
Nintendo released a 40 minute video to their website and to Videocean, Youtube, and Okuma today, called the Nintendo Direct. Somewhat similar to their E3 presentation, but in a more intimate, "direct to the viewer" sort of fashion, the Direct presentation showed off numerous games, some of which have already been revealed, some of which are new. The Direct was primarily presented by Satoru Iwata, who gave a brief introduction in which he thanked the viewers, and then segued into a brief (about two minute long) Nintendo Connect video. The video didn't show off a lot of new features, but was pretty slickly produced, showing off people using the Connect not just to play games (including Mario and Zelda), but to connect to various music devices, and even showed off someone playing Super Mario Laboratory, the Sapphire Mario planned for next year, on the Connect in the middle of a park, demonstrating the device's connectivity. After this brief video, Iwata returned with Katsuya Eguchi, to show off some of the games planned for the device. We got a nice new look at The Legend Of Zelda: Tower Of Sentinels, planned for release at the Connect's launch. We saw a lot more of the tower, and some truly big rooms were revealed, as big as any in the console Zelda dungeons and proof that this was a serious Zelda title every big as big and complex as the console games even though it takes place in one giant building. We also got some looks at the game's emphasis on vertical movement, revealing that a lot of the items Link would be picking up would help him move vertically through the tower. Iwata discussed Parcels: Special Delivery next, and was somewhat giddy as he showed off a couple of the game's new tricks, including scooter stunts and the ability to recruit different people to deliver packages for you. Footage from Wave Race and Infinitia was also briefly shown, before we got a brand new game reveal: Snap!, a game utilizing the Connect's camera in order to take pictures of real life things and using the Connect's AR capabilities to allow players to manipulate real world objects in a virtual landscape. The game also seems to hearken back to the old Game Boy Camera peripheral, with many of the same wacky functions and mini-games. Iwata then showed off how Snap! could use the Connect's connectivity to allow players to connect to certain models of Sony digital cameras to import those pictures into the game. Iwata gave the Connect's price and release date one last time, then introduced Mark Cerny to talk about Pokemon: Legend Quest.
Cerny's Legend Quest segment, which lasted about five minutes, focused mostly on two things: interactive battles and the game's main story. Battles looked more beautiful than ever, with amazing Pokemon animations only possible on the Nintendo Sapphire. Battles have never looked closer to their appearance in the anime series, and though not every move looks perfect in Legend Quest, no Pokemon game has ever looked this beautiful. Then, we got some story teasers, in which the Collector appeared to be bringing legendary and mythical Pokemon together, and we even saw a glimpse of the brand new Pokemon, which appears to be some kind of humanoid creature with spikes surrounded by floating rings. We only saw the creature in silhouette, but it was a captivating tease as the segment ended and things went back to Iwata. Iwata gave a brief introduction for a brand new Yoshi Sapphire game, which focuses on underwater exploration. The gameplay/story video showed Yoshi swimming underwater and turning into things like a submarine and a shark, and even introducing us to Meryoshis, Yoshis with mermaid tails. The game looks to be a 2-D platforming adventure title, and while it will focus on underwater gameplay, there's plenty of land exploration to be had as well. Yoshi And The Mysterious Lake is currently targeting a Spring 2012 release date. We then segued right into the next Sapphire preview with no introduction from Iwata: Midia And The Gift Of Aqua, Fumito Ueda's upcoming epic adventure game, which we've only been getting snippets of information about (and which was absent from Nintendo's E3 keynote, though it was playable on the floor). This preview showed off Midia using water to solve puzzles and progress downward through the tower, and while the game looks almost as if it could be Zelda: Tower Of Sentinels in reverse, there was plenty to distinguish it, including an emphasis on mystery and stealth, with much less combat than Zelda (in fact, the preview showed off no combat at all). After the Midia segment, we returned to Iwata, who discussed the Game Boy Supernova and its success, thanking the people who've played Supernova games over the years, and then promising more games to come. We then launched into another narrated video segment which showed off three upcoming Supernova games, including Final Fantasy: Dissidia II (showing off no real new information but some neat gameplay scenes), Code Of Princess (a sidescrolling hack and slash title from Atlus in which a princess and her friends battle monsters and zombies), and most intriguingly, a story/gameplay video for Fire Emblem Echoes: Fall Of The Shadow Dragon. The trailer focuses on the two protagonists, Jughart and his sister Claudia, forced to flee after their kingdom falls. The trailer promises a darker, more mature Fire Emblem game than previous titles, with lots of dramatic and tragic scenes shown and an increased level of violence from previous games. The in-battle graphics rival anything yet seen on the Supernova, and the trailer made it clear that this game looks to send the Supernova out in style. It and Code Of Princess will be released in 2012, while Dissidia II comes later this year.
Iwata then briefly introduced a quick "sizzle reel"-type segment for upcoming third party titles, in which brief, narrated video clips of about 30 seconds in length were shown for a succession of games. These included Call Of Duty: Nightfall, Assassin's Creed Revelations, Thrillseekers: Motocross, Max Payne 5, and International Rally. The most intriguing preview was of Diablo III, confirming that Blizzard's latest dungeon crawler will be headed to consoles and that the Sapphire will be among them. The Diablo III segment took the form of a brand new, minute long trailer, and this concluded the sizzle reel, after which we were then shown a slightly fuller trailer for the next Twisted Metal game, Twisted Metal Chaos 3, coming next year to the Sapphire. This trailer gave more details than the E3 trailer, focusing on characters other than Sweet Tooth, and then showing off some gameplay in which cars chased each other through fantastical environments. Twisted Metal Chaos 3 will seemingly feature stages a bit less realistic than those of the previous two games, perhaps introducing some fantasy elements into the series for the first time (though it could just be one of Sweet Tooth's twisted fever dreams). After the Twisted Metal Chaos 3 trailer, Iwata introduced Tetsuya Takahashi, and we cut to a video of Takahashi discussing Final Fantasy XIII, which was said to be entering the final stretch of development in preparation for a 2012 release. We got more footage from the game than ever before, showing off the familiar espers Ifrit and Titan as massive beasts erupting from the Earth to wreck futuristic cities. The protagonists are among the brave soldiers who fight these beasts, riding mechs known as Guardian Skells. Unlike the Guardians featured in Final Fantasy VIII (which themselves were based on classic espers/summons), these Skells must be assembled from parts, much like the mechs in Mechatos, which this game seems to take some inspiration from. Like Final Fantasy XII, Final Fantasy XIII will take place in a massive, open world, with battles fought on the map in real time. Final Fantasy XIII looks even more epic and grand than XII, and will be coming to the Sapphire sometime next year. After this, we went back to Iwata, who once again thanked the player for watching the Nintendo Direct, but then promised one more game to show. We then saw a trailer for a new game that takes place in the depths of space. A ship lands on a desolate world, and as soon as Samus emerged from her ship, we knew this was another Metroid trailer. She radios to Phiria, one of her companions from the previous game, but the call is interrupted as Samus is crushed to the ground by an invisible force. Samus looks to see a massive black hole in the sky. The rest of the trailer intersperses gameplay and cutscenes together, and shows Samus on a planet tormented by the force of gravity, which she herself must utilize to battle the monsters she finds and escape the planet. We see Samus using a gravity gun, and even flying through the air as she flees a dragon-like beast across a shattered moon. The game's title is shown as Metroid Gravity, and the release window of 2012 is given. After this trailer, Iwata once again thanked the audience and told them to expect more Nintendo Direct presentations in the future, with even more games and some interesting surprises as well.
Overall, the inaugural Nintendo Direct was short, sweet, and to the point, giving viewers a nice roadmap of where Nintendo games are headed into the next year. It'll be nice to get these periodic updates about new games and potentially new hardware, and one has to expect that the Sapphire's successor, whenever it's released, may be introduced to the world via a Nintendo Direct presentation.
-from Super Nintendo CD Chalmers' Nintendo blog update on October 6, 2011
-
Tokyo Game Show 2011 was surprisingly light on new game announcements, with the two biggest games of the show being ones we've already seen introduced before: Final Fantasy XIII and Metal Gear Solid III: Angels Fall. The two games were both playable at this year's show, and lines stretched past many other booths despite the large number of kiosks set up to demo these two games at Square and Konami's displays. Final Fantasy XIII, which plays much like Final Fantasy XII but in a futuristic setting and with a fresh coat of paint, introduced us to the Guardian Skells, and there were two playable scenarios: a human party and a human party decked out in these new mechs. The human party, consisting of primary protagonist Gash and his two female squadmates, Lune and Ilayna, explored a slum connected to a large city. This slum area was full of vagabonds and small monsters, and the whole time we explored, we could see the glowing towers of the city nearby. We can't emphasize enough how much this game feels like Final Fantasy XII, with Takahashi likely going with the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" approach. However, magic seems to be replaced mostly with weapon and "ether" techniques, and we found ourselves utilizing firearms more often than swords in battle. The Skell combat scenario, which saw Gash and Lune joining a male character, Hanto, in piloting mech suits through a dense jungle area, showed off the fighting techniques of the Skells, which can be equipped with a wide assortment of weapons, including your standard guns and energy swords, but also a battle orb and a giant chainsaw. Skells and their parts level up from combat, but can be damaged as well, and if the player's Skell is destroyed in combat and not recovered quickly enough, the player will actually have to pay to replace it, which isn't cheap (though it is possible to buy insurance for one's Skell, which is regularly deducted from the in-game bank account). The game is much more free and open than even Final Fantasy XII, with it being possible to visit a large segment of the entire world map quite early into the game, though the powerful enemies found in those parts of the game may well wreck underleveled or underprepared players. Final Fantasy XIII looks and plays awesome, and Metal Gear Solid III was equally fun, and most of the playable segments of the game focused on Vapor Snake, who is still searching for answers about her mother's fate while attempting to stop a nefarious terrorist plot and get to the bottom of a conspiracy led by the remnants of the Patriots. Vapor Snake fights with a close and personal style and much less focus on stealth than Solid Snake. We did get to play some Solid Snake segments as well, and while he's clearly aged from previous games, with gray hair and an equally gray mustache, he's still a highly capable fighter and uses a wide variety of firearms to take out his enemies (or in some cases just incapacitate them). Both Snakes move with a realism and fluidity unlike any previous game in the series, with this game running on a whole new engine from Metal Gear Peace or Outer Heaven. Konami also confirmed at the show that the game would be coming to the Apple iTwin as well as the Nintendo Sapphire, though that was pretty much a foregone conclusion already (Outer Heaven also came to the iTwin). Apart from the two big games, we did see some intriguing smaller titles, including Suda51's crazy Lollipop Chainsaw, the Gemini exclusive Resident Evil title Revelations, and another fun looking Gemini game, Deva Station Icosa, which reboots the series by cutting down on the number of playable Devas and introduces brand new gameplay mechanics and a new city to mix things up. Speaking of Apple exclusives, we also got a good look at the new Genji: An Old Man's Story, the spiritual successor to the beat 'em up adventure title Dasho: A Young Man's Story. Featuring the same mix of character-focused gameplay and open world sandbox exploration, we expect a lot from this game, and the demo available at TGS showed that the protagonist Genji has even more combat moves than his predecessor, proving the adage "beware an old man in a land where men die young". Interestingly, Google had somewhat of a big presence at the show, presenting numerous Android games by Japanese developers, and also showing off its new tech, which will be utilized in the expected Android-based Samsung collaboration console expected to launch sometime in the next two years. Google even partnered with Konami to demo Metal Gear Solid III on the new tech, though no actual announcement of a port was given. While Google was more of a sideshow than a star at TGS 2011, the company's announcement of plenty of third party support for its upcoming console shows its continued commitment to challenging its rivals in the gaming industry and providing plenty of content for prospective players.
-from a Games Over Matter blog post on TGS 2011, posted on October 14, 2011
Fall 2011 (Part 2) - Open World, Open Crime
True Crime: Hong Kong
True Crime: Hong Kong is an open world sandbox game initially released exclusively for the Nintendo Sapphire. IOTL, this game was dropped by Activision and eventually saw release as a Square Enix game called Sleeping Dogs, but ITTL, Activision decides to keep the rights to the game and publish it themselves under its original title. IOTL, most of the game's development was completed before the name change, and so there's actually not a huge amount of differences from OTL's Sleeping Dogs, with an identical protagonist to OTL's game and fairly similar gameplay that introduces a three-pronged level up system and enhanced melee combat. The game does feature a few differences from OTL, primarily in the form of its relationship system, which runs parallel to the game's XP system (which allows the protagonist Wei Shen to level up in three different categories: cops, civilians, and criminals). The relationship system also allows Wei Shen to befriend cops, civilians, or criminals, so for example, if Wei Shen is friends with more cops, he can get more police help on missions and cops will also look the other way on smaller crimes (or even major crimes if Wei Shen is really friendly with the cops). If Wei Shen is friends with more civilians, he can get better discounts, get help from civilians in fights, people will cooperate with him more, and he can also date girls more easily. If Wei Shen is friends with more criminals, he can walk through dangerous parts of town more easily, intimidate civilians, and level up his fighting skills more, but he will also draw more heat from cops. This relationship system, inspired by various visual novel/dating sim titles, is at the heart of the TTL True Crime: Hong Kong's gameplay, and affects the kinds of missions the player can participate in and even what ending they get. It also heavily distinguishes the game from previous True Crime titles, making it more like an RPG than previous games were. Like IOTL's game, Shen is a Hong Kong police officer transferred over from San Francisco and assigned to investigate the Triads, though the game's plotline has some differences from OTL's, with Shen given more options to fraternize with criminals and even join them. Shen has six primary love interests in the game, with one being a detective, three being civilians, and two being criminals, and which of these women Shen ultimately decides to date has a major effect on the game's ultimate ending (which can be one of three, seeing Shen helping the police, rising to the level of a Triad leader, or retiring from the force and entering civilian life). However, there's more to the game than just Shen's love interests: he can also make plenty of friends amongst the cops and criminals, with some of his friends, like Shen himself, blurring the lines between the law and a life of crime. Whether Shen chooses a path of law and order or criminality, he'll get caught up in a massive gang war between various triad groups, with Shen himself forced to play kingmaker between them. While the cops favor the existing Triad gang (while they don't like the gang, keeping them on top creates normalcy and predictability, and reduces violence in the streets, sort of a "the devil you know" situation), Shen finds himself potentially able to help three other Triad gangs take power. The only way to topple the current top gang is to unite the other three warring gangs, which is easier said than done, but is the only path to obtaining the "criminal" ending of the game. In the end, whatever gang comes out on top, Shen is able to find some level of contentment as either an officer, a gang leader, or a retired young man, while the streets of Hong Kong, as they always have, remain a mostly safe but sometimes dangerous place. True Crime: Hong Kong, like the OTL Sleeping Dogs, features excellent graphics and a strong voice cast featuring a wide variety of both Asian-American and Hong Kong-based actors and actresses, giving the game one of the strongest voice casts in the series. It's probably the series' best reviewed game to date, and on the strength of those reviews, achieves very strong sales when it's released in October 2011, even managing to steal a bit of thunder from the upcoming Valdoza. Activision's gamble to keep the True Crime series alive has paid off, and they decide to make the next installment of the series a major priority for the next console generation.
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Yakuza 4
Yakuza 4 is the fourth game in Apple's Yakuza series, and is exclusive to the iTwin. In contrast with True Crime: Hong Kong, which has a more serious storyline and more polished graphics and gameplay, Yakuza 4 plays a bit fast and loose, almost like an arcade title, with more classic beat 'em up style combat and a wider variety of characters, many of whom have different comedic quirks and silly mannerisms. The game stars a young man named Rakoda, who is living in Kamurocho with his younger sister Kiryu. Kiryu is a bit of a spoiled girl, with expensive tastes in fashion, and Rakoda eventually finds himself in debt to the Yakuza to pay off his sister's expensive habits. Like True Crime: Hong Kong, as well as previous Yakuza games, this game has RPG elements and Rakoda is able to befriend many different people on both sides of the law. There are plenty of arcade-style minigames, much like previous titles in the series, and there's even an elaborate dress-up minigame for Kiryu in which the player can style her and enter various beauty contests, while also trying to find her wealthy dates to take the financial pressure off Rakoda. Kiryu frequently finds herself in trouble, so depending on what the player does with her, Rakoda might need to save her fairly often, which can at times be annoying. Yakuza 4 also features a real estate mechanic in which Rakoda can buy up various shops and businesses, which potentially can make it less expensive to buy clothing for his sister (for example, if he buys up a fashion boutique). These establishments can frequently be targeted by Rakoda's enemies, so he'll have to either defend them himself, pay protection money, or hire security to watch and keep them safe. Yakuza 4 is quite deep with its mechanics, but unlike True Crime: Hong Kong, the game's main story is fairly shallow, with much more weight placed on side quests than on the main game. While some players might like this, it could turn off others looking for a more sophisticated and epic story. Overall, Yakuza 4 is considered a decent game, maybe the best in the series thus far, but reviews average about a full point lower than True Crime: Hong Kong, and despite improved sales over its predecessor (due to the lack of competition from a similar game like the last one had with Dasho), it's not nearly as successful as True Crime either. Still, it's a moderate hit for Apple during the last quarter of 2011, released in November 2011 in North America. Its production budget is significantly less than True Crime, so it makes about a similar level of profit, or maybe very slightly less, and is considered a successful game overall.
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"Development delays and expenditures on Valdoza have pushed Grand Theft Auto III back again, and now it's almost certain that Rockstar will delay release of the upcoming game until the next generation consoles are out. Already, it appears that the game is being retooled for the next generation machines, and though Rockstar tried to have the game ready for release in early 2013, where it could be the last major current-gen game, too much attention and effort has been given to Valdoza for the company to be comfortable releasing Grand Theft Auto III so quickly afterward. Valdoza, which is set for release in just a few weeks, is said to have a scale 'unlike any game Rockstar has ever released', and it's rumored that the game's territory will literally span an entire country. Rockstar is also looking to scale up Grand Theft Auto III 'in a manner similar to San Andreas', which would mean that the game would include either two or perhaps three large cities. With an extensive DLC schedule planned for Valdoza over 2012 and 2013, Rockstar will be continuing to devote much of its time and attention to that game, and though 'a lot of work' has been completed on Grand Theft Auto III, we're now confident in reporting that the game's release is still three years away. Despite the news, Rockstar will continue to promote Grand Theft Auto III heavily, especially after Valdoza's release next month. We're likely to see at least two years of massive hype leading up to the release of a game that for all intents and purposes could be the most highly anticipated video game ever made, and expected to have the biggest release in the history of the industry."
-from a report on 1UP's rumor column, posted on October 15, 2011
True Crime: Hong Kong is an open world sandbox game initially released exclusively for the Nintendo Sapphire. IOTL, this game was dropped by Activision and eventually saw release as a Square Enix game called Sleeping Dogs, but ITTL, Activision decides to keep the rights to the game and publish it themselves under its original title. IOTL, most of the game's development was completed before the name change, and so there's actually not a huge amount of differences from OTL's Sleeping Dogs, with an identical protagonist to OTL's game and fairly similar gameplay that introduces a three-pronged level up system and enhanced melee combat. The game does feature a few differences from OTL, primarily in the form of its relationship system, which runs parallel to the game's XP system (which allows the protagonist Wei Shen to level up in three different categories: cops, civilians, and criminals). The relationship system also allows Wei Shen to befriend cops, civilians, or criminals, so for example, if Wei Shen is friends with more cops, he can get more police help on missions and cops will also look the other way on smaller crimes (or even major crimes if Wei Shen is really friendly with the cops). If Wei Shen is friends with more civilians, he can get better discounts, get help from civilians in fights, people will cooperate with him more, and he can also date girls more easily. If Wei Shen is friends with more criminals, he can walk through dangerous parts of town more easily, intimidate civilians, and level up his fighting skills more, but he will also draw more heat from cops. This relationship system, inspired by various visual novel/dating sim titles, is at the heart of the TTL True Crime: Hong Kong's gameplay, and affects the kinds of missions the player can participate in and even what ending they get. It also heavily distinguishes the game from previous True Crime titles, making it more like an RPG than previous games were. Like IOTL's game, Shen is a Hong Kong police officer transferred over from San Francisco and assigned to investigate the Triads, though the game's plotline has some differences from OTL's, with Shen given more options to fraternize with criminals and even join them. Shen has six primary love interests in the game, with one being a detective, three being civilians, and two being criminals, and which of these women Shen ultimately decides to date has a major effect on the game's ultimate ending (which can be one of three, seeing Shen helping the police, rising to the level of a Triad leader, or retiring from the force and entering civilian life). However, there's more to the game than just Shen's love interests: he can also make plenty of friends amongst the cops and criminals, with some of his friends, like Shen himself, blurring the lines between the law and a life of crime. Whether Shen chooses a path of law and order or criminality, he'll get caught up in a massive gang war between various triad groups, with Shen himself forced to play kingmaker between them. While the cops favor the existing Triad gang (while they don't like the gang, keeping them on top creates normalcy and predictability, and reduces violence in the streets, sort of a "the devil you know" situation), Shen finds himself potentially able to help three other Triad gangs take power. The only way to topple the current top gang is to unite the other three warring gangs, which is easier said than done, but is the only path to obtaining the "criminal" ending of the game. In the end, whatever gang comes out on top, Shen is able to find some level of contentment as either an officer, a gang leader, or a retired young man, while the streets of Hong Kong, as they always have, remain a mostly safe but sometimes dangerous place. True Crime: Hong Kong, like the OTL Sleeping Dogs, features excellent graphics and a strong voice cast featuring a wide variety of both Asian-American and Hong Kong-based actors and actresses, giving the game one of the strongest voice casts in the series. It's probably the series' best reviewed game to date, and on the strength of those reviews, achieves very strong sales when it's released in October 2011, even managing to steal a bit of thunder from the upcoming Valdoza. Activision's gamble to keep the True Crime series alive has paid off, and they decide to make the next installment of the series a major priority for the next console generation.
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Yakuza 4
Yakuza 4 is the fourth game in Apple's Yakuza series, and is exclusive to the iTwin. In contrast with True Crime: Hong Kong, which has a more serious storyline and more polished graphics and gameplay, Yakuza 4 plays a bit fast and loose, almost like an arcade title, with more classic beat 'em up style combat and a wider variety of characters, many of whom have different comedic quirks and silly mannerisms. The game stars a young man named Rakoda, who is living in Kamurocho with his younger sister Kiryu. Kiryu is a bit of a spoiled girl, with expensive tastes in fashion, and Rakoda eventually finds himself in debt to the Yakuza to pay off his sister's expensive habits. Like True Crime: Hong Kong, as well as previous Yakuza games, this game has RPG elements and Rakoda is able to befriend many different people on both sides of the law. There are plenty of arcade-style minigames, much like previous titles in the series, and there's even an elaborate dress-up minigame for Kiryu in which the player can style her and enter various beauty contests, while also trying to find her wealthy dates to take the financial pressure off Rakoda. Kiryu frequently finds herself in trouble, so depending on what the player does with her, Rakoda might need to save her fairly often, which can at times be annoying. Yakuza 4 also features a real estate mechanic in which Rakoda can buy up various shops and businesses, which potentially can make it less expensive to buy clothing for his sister (for example, if he buys up a fashion boutique). These establishments can frequently be targeted by Rakoda's enemies, so he'll have to either defend them himself, pay protection money, or hire security to watch and keep them safe. Yakuza 4 is quite deep with its mechanics, but unlike True Crime: Hong Kong, the game's main story is fairly shallow, with much more weight placed on side quests than on the main game. While some players might like this, it could turn off others looking for a more sophisticated and epic story. Overall, Yakuza 4 is considered a decent game, maybe the best in the series thus far, but reviews average about a full point lower than True Crime: Hong Kong, and despite improved sales over its predecessor (due to the lack of competition from a similar game like the last one had with Dasho), it's not nearly as successful as True Crime either. Still, it's a moderate hit for Apple during the last quarter of 2011, released in November 2011 in North America. Its production budget is significantly less than True Crime, so it makes about a similar level of profit, or maybe very slightly less, and is considered a successful game overall.
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"Development delays and expenditures on Valdoza have pushed Grand Theft Auto III back again, and now it's almost certain that Rockstar will delay release of the upcoming game until the next generation consoles are out. Already, it appears that the game is being retooled for the next generation machines, and though Rockstar tried to have the game ready for release in early 2013, where it could be the last major current-gen game, too much attention and effort has been given to Valdoza for the company to be comfortable releasing Grand Theft Auto III so quickly afterward. Valdoza, which is set for release in just a few weeks, is said to have a scale 'unlike any game Rockstar has ever released', and it's rumored that the game's territory will literally span an entire country. Rockstar is also looking to scale up Grand Theft Auto III 'in a manner similar to San Andreas', which would mean that the game would include either two or perhaps three large cities. With an extensive DLC schedule planned for Valdoza over 2012 and 2013, Rockstar will be continuing to devote much of its time and attention to that game, and though 'a lot of work' has been completed on Grand Theft Auto III, we're now confident in reporting that the game's release is still three years away. Despite the news, Rockstar will continue to promote Grand Theft Auto III heavily, especially after Valdoza's release next month. We're likely to see at least two years of massive hype leading up to the release of a game that for all intents and purposes could be the most highly anticipated video game ever made, and expected to have the biggest release in the history of the industry."
-from a report on 1UP's rumor column, posted on October 15, 2011
Ah so it’s the opposite of OTL where GTA V was the last release on the 7th gen consoles.
Permission requested to also have preview for my next TTTE post.
Fall 2011 (Part 3) - Not So Thrilling Seekers
Thrillseekers: Motocross
Thrillseekers: Motocross is an extreme sports game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision. The latest main title in the Thrillseekers series, it focuses on bike-based sports, including the titular motocross as well as BMX biking and dirtbiking, and also features a unicycling sidegame/minigame that can be unlocked. Like previous games in the series, it includes both an extensive campaign mode and a variety of freestyle modes that allow for both local and online multiplayer. The campaign mode focuses on the character of Vivian Martinez, the Thrillseekers' BMX specialist, who takes up the sport of motocross in an effort to win fame and fortune and also to prove to herself and her friends that she can take even more extreme risks. Thrillseekers: Motocross can be best compared to the Excitebike games, though there's not as much gameplay variety involved in the motocross modes, with no creation feature like the Excitebike games have. BMX functions quite similarly to the BMX riding in previous games, while dirtbiking sort of combines the gameplay of the motocross and BMX modes and features more lightweight, wilderness-oriented riding. The game features both "race" modes and "stunt" modes. In the former, you compete against other racers to try and cross the finish line first or to achieve the fastest times, while in stunt mode, you perform stunts, similar to previous games in the series. The campaign mode focuses primarily on racing, a first for the series, with Vivian competing against a variety of other characters, most original to the series, to win competitions. The game's motocross involves both traditional motocross as well as supercross, with players needing to familiarize themselves in techniques for both. Thrillseekers: Motocross features some of the series' best graphics to date, comparable in some aspects to the graphics in Thrillseekers 2 and superior to the graphics in Roller Derby. Like previous games in the series, Thrillseekers: Motocross features a variety of licensed music, most of it contemporary. The game features a few tracks performed by male vocalists, and features more Latin tracks than other games in the series as well. All of the series' primary voice actors return, including Avril Lavigne as Alex, while Brittany Saldita stars as Vivian in the game's campaign mode, the first of two video games she would feature in as the primary protagonist before the end of her life. The game's campaign mode focuses on Vivian, and is probably the shortest campaign mode to date in the series, but still featuring a decent combination of races and stunt segments, featuring almost entirely motocross, with only a couple of dirtbiking segments and a single BMX segment. The campaign sees Vivian take up motocross racing, in order to distinguish herself amongst the group. Alex is against Vivian's decision, believing motocross to be too dangerous even for her (especially after seeing Vivian take a nasty fall in an early segment that she doesn't immediately get up from). Alex ends up taking up motocross herself, while the other girls in the group remain spectators during the campaign (but do feature in cutscenes and dialogue), and much of the campaign, in addition to chronicling Vivian's rise through the sport of motocross, also shows off the Alex/Vivian friendship, with some flashbacks to their early friendship together. We're introduced to a few new characters, some of whom are friendly to Vivian, like champion motocross racer Hayne (while fans sometimes ship Hayne with Vivian, Hayne is married in the story and even has a one year old daughter, and plays more of a big brother mentor role to Vivian) and fellow rookie Shana. Others are not so friendly, including the punk-inspired Mae and the somewhat sadistic Beck, who ultimately becomes the game's main antagonist. While Mae eventually comes to have a grudging respect for Vivian, Beck despises both Vivian and Alex, who both end up qualifying for the game's final race. Beck ends up badly wrecking Alex, who looks seriously injured (but ultimately turns out to be okay), and Vivian wants to fight him, but decides instead to beat him in a fair race. Despite Beck's best efforts to cheat, Vivian manages to beat him, winning an invitation to the pro supercross circuit next year. However, Vivian decides to decline the invitation to remain a BMX biker, though she's still shown to occasionally compete in motorcycling events from time to time. Beating the main campaign and accomplishing certain challenges in free-for-all mode unlocks the ability to race and perform stunts on unicycles, which have their own unique handling manner. There's even an homage to Uniracers buried in the game for players to discover. Overall, the game doesn't have nearly as much content as Thrillseekers 2 has, but does still have quite a bit of content that the player can unlock and discover. The game has some DLC, but it's limited to cosmetic outfits for the game's single player mode and a few unlockable music tracks, as well as some optional arenas (most of them official supercross arenas).
Thrillseekers: Motocross is released on October 25, 2011, for the Sapphire, iTwin, Xbox 2, Supernova, iOS, and Android, with the Connect and Gemini getting ports at the launch of those systems. The Supernova, iOS, and Android versions are somewhat compromised graphically, but have all the content of the console games (though the Android version can only be played on high-end phones such as the Galaxy S2 or the Microsoft Phone). Reviews, while good, are somewhat low compared to other games in the series, averaging in the low 8s. Reviews criticize the lack of content compared to other games in the series and the somewhat stale BMX racing (BMX was always considered one of the weaker sports in the series). The motocross racing is praised for the most part, but most critics believe the Excitebike games to be slightly better in terms of overall gameplay, and the lack of any real-life motocross racers is also seen to somewhat hurt the game. The voice acting and presentation are the most highly praised aspects, with Brittany Saldita and Avril Lavigne's performances both lauded, and most of the new voice actors, including Troy Baker as Hayne, Kelly Hu as Mae, and Peter Giles as Beck all receiving praise as well. Sales ended up being a disappointment, among the lowest for any game in the series and even less than sales for Roller Derby in 2010. Despite some in the industry thinking that Brittany Saldita's ongoing cancer battle might bring some attention to the game, it actually worked the other way around: the game's release brought attention to Brittany's cancer battle, with many of the interviews with her surrounding the game's release touching on the subject (by this point, she'd already finished her first round of cancer treatments, and the disease had started to go into remission). The game's disappointing sales and critical reception were a bit alarming for fans, who were still coming off the highs achieved by Thrillseekers 2 in 2009. However, perhaps the series could turn a corner going into a new console generation...
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Thrillseekers: Extreme Dream
A creation-based spinoff of the series, Extreme Dream is released for the Supernova and the iPod Play (the last Thrillseekers game for the iPod Play) on October 11, 2011. The game allows players to make their own skate parks, snowboarding slopes, or surf beaches (along with a few other types of courses) and then ride them with a variety of characters from the series, and incorporates a lot of the gameplay elements and sports from Thrillseekers 2, making it an updated version of Build It And Ride It!, but for handhelds only. As far as extreme sports maker suites go, it's actually really complex and packed with content, allowing a huge variety of courses to be made (and also shared and uploaded online). Presentation-wise, it's a bit lacking. The original voice actors do reprise their roles (including Avril Lavigne as Alex), but don't have as much to say as they did in Build It And Ride It!, no longer commenting on players' creations or doing much more than narrating a few instruction tutorials and offering some sound effects during gameplay. Overall review scores are quite good, owing to the level of content that can be produced, but sales are lower than those of almost any other handheld Thrillseekers game, and it becomes mostly forgotten.
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The critical and commercial failure of Thrillseekers: Motocross would be seen as the start of the series' nadir by many longtime fans. Activision's annualized schedule for the series had finally led to the overall reduction in quality that had plagued so many annualized game franchises, with the same bug also biting Blackheart: Bring Down Savage Maestro early in the year. Meanwhile, on the media front, material for fans had also dried up: there was still a book series and the comics were still going, but both had also seemed to hit creative snags in 2011. After seven years, the series had come to a screeching halt. Merch sales, media sales, and game sales had slowed to a crawl. The continued strong sales of Thrillseekers 2 were a bright spot, with the game actually outselling Motocross during some weeks of the holiday season, but such an enormous success had raised a high bar, and it was clear that subsequent material was failing to cross it.
There was somewhat of a ray of hope on the horizon. Avril Lavigne, who had mostly skipped out on promoting Thrillseekers: Motocross to train for the 2012 Summer Olympics, was now becoming one of the most popular athletes in the world as those same Olympics loomed, and pretty much everything tied to her, including the Thrillseekers series, was drawing increased attention. Many believed that Activision might capitalize on this to do a Thrillseekers 2012 Olympics tie-in game. It seemed to make perfect sense, with skateboarding the hottest new Olympic sport, surfing rumored to be not all that far behind (it would eventually be confirmed to debut at the 2016 Olympics in Rio), and BMX racing already an Olympic sport, the Thrillseekers would have plenty to do and it would be a promotional goldmine. However, Activision ultimately decided against a Thrillseekers Olympic game, instead choosing to return to winter sports for their 2012 title. The Olympics tie-in rumors did polarize the fanbase somewhat (said one message board post: "Yeah, maybe Alex and Marina are athletic enough to compete believably in the Olympics, but STACY?!"), but most fans would have been happy to see their favorite characters going for the gold.
Instead, "Alex Levesque, Olympic gold medalist" would remain an idea confined to fanfiction, one of the few parts of the Thrillseekers fanbase still as strong as ever during this time. Fanfics and fanart, both safe for work and otherwise, were posted daily all over the internet, making the Thrillseekers fandom one of the most active in all of gaming, behind only the Sonic The Hedgehog, Pokemon, and Kingdom Hearts fandoms in terms of overall activity. However, despite the continued fanbase activity, tough times would still be ahead for Thrillseekers fans as Thrillseekers: Winter Challenge 2 loomed as the first game in the series to see release on an eighth generation console.
The fandom had survived Alacy vs. Malex, the end of the animated series, countless awful fanfics and Rule 34 art, and even the disappointing Thrillseekers: Motocross, but could it survive the introduction of... figure skating?
-from a Thrillseekers fandom retrospective article posted on Games Over Matter on December 9, 2015
Thrillseekers: Motocross is an extreme sports game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision. The latest main title in the Thrillseekers series, it focuses on bike-based sports, including the titular motocross as well as BMX biking and dirtbiking, and also features a unicycling sidegame/minigame that can be unlocked. Like previous games in the series, it includes both an extensive campaign mode and a variety of freestyle modes that allow for both local and online multiplayer. The campaign mode focuses on the character of Vivian Martinez, the Thrillseekers' BMX specialist, who takes up the sport of motocross in an effort to win fame and fortune and also to prove to herself and her friends that she can take even more extreme risks. Thrillseekers: Motocross can be best compared to the Excitebike games, though there's not as much gameplay variety involved in the motocross modes, with no creation feature like the Excitebike games have. BMX functions quite similarly to the BMX riding in previous games, while dirtbiking sort of combines the gameplay of the motocross and BMX modes and features more lightweight, wilderness-oriented riding. The game features both "race" modes and "stunt" modes. In the former, you compete against other racers to try and cross the finish line first or to achieve the fastest times, while in stunt mode, you perform stunts, similar to previous games in the series. The campaign mode focuses primarily on racing, a first for the series, with Vivian competing against a variety of other characters, most original to the series, to win competitions. The game's motocross involves both traditional motocross as well as supercross, with players needing to familiarize themselves in techniques for both. Thrillseekers: Motocross features some of the series' best graphics to date, comparable in some aspects to the graphics in Thrillseekers 2 and superior to the graphics in Roller Derby. Like previous games in the series, Thrillseekers: Motocross features a variety of licensed music, most of it contemporary. The game features a few tracks performed by male vocalists, and features more Latin tracks than other games in the series as well. All of the series' primary voice actors return, including Avril Lavigne as Alex, while Brittany Saldita stars as Vivian in the game's campaign mode, the first of two video games she would feature in as the primary protagonist before the end of her life. The game's campaign mode focuses on Vivian, and is probably the shortest campaign mode to date in the series, but still featuring a decent combination of races and stunt segments, featuring almost entirely motocross, with only a couple of dirtbiking segments and a single BMX segment. The campaign sees Vivian take up motocross racing, in order to distinguish herself amongst the group. Alex is against Vivian's decision, believing motocross to be too dangerous even for her (especially after seeing Vivian take a nasty fall in an early segment that she doesn't immediately get up from). Alex ends up taking up motocross herself, while the other girls in the group remain spectators during the campaign (but do feature in cutscenes and dialogue), and much of the campaign, in addition to chronicling Vivian's rise through the sport of motocross, also shows off the Alex/Vivian friendship, with some flashbacks to their early friendship together. We're introduced to a few new characters, some of whom are friendly to Vivian, like champion motocross racer Hayne (while fans sometimes ship Hayne with Vivian, Hayne is married in the story and even has a one year old daughter, and plays more of a big brother mentor role to Vivian) and fellow rookie Shana. Others are not so friendly, including the punk-inspired Mae and the somewhat sadistic Beck, who ultimately becomes the game's main antagonist. While Mae eventually comes to have a grudging respect for Vivian, Beck despises both Vivian and Alex, who both end up qualifying for the game's final race. Beck ends up badly wrecking Alex, who looks seriously injured (but ultimately turns out to be okay), and Vivian wants to fight him, but decides instead to beat him in a fair race. Despite Beck's best efforts to cheat, Vivian manages to beat him, winning an invitation to the pro supercross circuit next year. However, Vivian decides to decline the invitation to remain a BMX biker, though she's still shown to occasionally compete in motorcycling events from time to time. Beating the main campaign and accomplishing certain challenges in free-for-all mode unlocks the ability to race and perform stunts on unicycles, which have their own unique handling manner. There's even an homage to Uniracers buried in the game for players to discover. Overall, the game doesn't have nearly as much content as Thrillseekers 2 has, but does still have quite a bit of content that the player can unlock and discover. The game has some DLC, but it's limited to cosmetic outfits for the game's single player mode and a few unlockable music tracks, as well as some optional arenas (most of them official supercross arenas).
Thrillseekers: Motocross is released on October 25, 2011, for the Sapphire, iTwin, Xbox 2, Supernova, iOS, and Android, with the Connect and Gemini getting ports at the launch of those systems. The Supernova, iOS, and Android versions are somewhat compromised graphically, but have all the content of the console games (though the Android version can only be played on high-end phones such as the Galaxy S2 or the Microsoft Phone). Reviews, while good, are somewhat low compared to other games in the series, averaging in the low 8s. Reviews criticize the lack of content compared to other games in the series and the somewhat stale BMX racing (BMX was always considered one of the weaker sports in the series). The motocross racing is praised for the most part, but most critics believe the Excitebike games to be slightly better in terms of overall gameplay, and the lack of any real-life motocross racers is also seen to somewhat hurt the game. The voice acting and presentation are the most highly praised aspects, with Brittany Saldita and Avril Lavigne's performances both lauded, and most of the new voice actors, including Troy Baker as Hayne, Kelly Hu as Mae, and Peter Giles as Beck all receiving praise as well. Sales ended up being a disappointment, among the lowest for any game in the series and even less than sales for Roller Derby in 2010. Despite some in the industry thinking that Brittany Saldita's ongoing cancer battle might bring some attention to the game, it actually worked the other way around: the game's release brought attention to Brittany's cancer battle, with many of the interviews with her surrounding the game's release touching on the subject (by this point, she'd already finished her first round of cancer treatments, and the disease had started to go into remission). The game's disappointing sales and critical reception were a bit alarming for fans, who were still coming off the highs achieved by Thrillseekers 2 in 2009. However, perhaps the series could turn a corner going into a new console generation...
-
Thrillseekers: Extreme Dream
A creation-based spinoff of the series, Extreme Dream is released for the Supernova and the iPod Play (the last Thrillseekers game for the iPod Play) on October 11, 2011. The game allows players to make their own skate parks, snowboarding slopes, or surf beaches (along with a few other types of courses) and then ride them with a variety of characters from the series, and incorporates a lot of the gameplay elements and sports from Thrillseekers 2, making it an updated version of Build It And Ride It!, but for handhelds only. As far as extreme sports maker suites go, it's actually really complex and packed with content, allowing a huge variety of courses to be made (and also shared and uploaded online). Presentation-wise, it's a bit lacking. The original voice actors do reprise their roles (including Avril Lavigne as Alex), but don't have as much to say as they did in Build It And Ride It!, no longer commenting on players' creations or doing much more than narrating a few instruction tutorials and offering some sound effects during gameplay. Overall review scores are quite good, owing to the level of content that can be produced, but sales are lower than those of almost any other handheld Thrillseekers game, and it becomes mostly forgotten.
-
The critical and commercial failure of Thrillseekers: Motocross would be seen as the start of the series' nadir by many longtime fans. Activision's annualized schedule for the series had finally led to the overall reduction in quality that had plagued so many annualized game franchises, with the same bug also biting Blackheart: Bring Down Savage Maestro early in the year. Meanwhile, on the media front, material for fans had also dried up: there was still a book series and the comics were still going, but both had also seemed to hit creative snags in 2011. After seven years, the series had come to a screeching halt. Merch sales, media sales, and game sales had slowed to a crawl. The continued strong sales of Thrillseekers 2 were a bright spot, with the game actually outselling Motocross during some weeks of the holiday season, but such an enormous success had raised a high bar, and it was clear that subsequent material was failing to cross it.
There was somewhat of a ray of hope on the horizon. Avril Lavigne, who had mostly skipped out on promoting Thrillseekers: Motocross to train for the 2012 Summer Olympics, was now becoming one of the most popular athletes in the world as those same Olympics loomed, and pretty much everything tied to her, including the Thrillseekers series, was drawing increased attention. Many believed that Activision might capitalize on this to do a Thrillseekers 2012 Olympics tie-in game. It seemed to make perfect sense, with skateboarding the hottest new Olympic sport, surfing rumored to be not all that far behind (it would eventually be confirmed to debut at the 2016 Olympics in Rio), and BMX racing already an Olympic sport, the Thrillseekers would have plenty to do and it would be a promotional goldmine. However, Activision ultimately decided against a Thrillseekers Olympic game, instead choosing to return to winter sports for their 2012 title. The Olympics tie-in rumors did polarize the fanbase somewhat (said one message board post: "Yeah, maybe Alex and Marina are athletic enough to compete believably in the Olympics, but STACY?!"), but most fans would have been happy to see their favorite characters going for the gold.
Instead, "Alex Levesque, Olympic gold medalist" would remain an idea confined to fanfiction, one of the few parts of the Thrillseekers fanbase still as strong as ever during this time. Fanfics and fanart, both safe for work and otherwise, were posted daily all over the internet, making the Thrillseekers fandom one of the most active in all of gaming, behind only the Sonic The Hedgehog, Pokemon, and Kingdom Hearts fandoms in terms of overall activity. However, despite the continued fanbase activity, tough times would still be ahead for Thrillseekers fans as Thrillseekers: Winter Challenge 2 loomed as the first game in the series to see release on an eighth generation console.
The fandom had survived Alacy vs. Malex, the end of the animated series, countless awful fanfics and Rule 34 art, and even the disappointing Thrillseekers: Motocross, but could it survive the introduction of... figure skating?
-from a Thrillseekers fandom retrospective article posted on Games Over Matter on December 9, 2015
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