There’s a Man Who, Positively CAN’T Do…

This is fan-service wrapped up in the false pretense of being entertainment. An unplayable mess of a pile, nothing more than a compilation of smaller games that the developer couldn’t be bothered to make into bigger games or at least somewhat polish. The tiny playable sections that punctuate Family Guy: Uncensored are not great—no, they’re not even good. This game is nothing more than poorly implemented ideas tied together by a thin piece of string I wouldn’t dare call a narrative.

I cannot be bothered to summarize the story; it would take about as much time just to run through the game on its own. After the first minigame (which happens to be the only one worth a snort), you get a Quagmire-themed stage where he is half-naked and swinging from vine to vine. So far, so giggity.

I have trouble accepting that this is the most vivid image Quagmire could think up.

All the Things That Make Us Laugh and Cry.

Less than six minutes in, we’ve had two really poor minigames dispersed by dry banter. The third minigame, which I am intentionally jumping forward to, is even more disconnected from the whole plot. Chris Griffin’s Sketch Arcade is easily one of the worst. With controls based on the iDevice’s accelerometer, how can it not be frustrating and poorly made?

After this, Stewie appears and decides he will do one of those “like the time we did this” cut-aways from the show. This particular cut-away focuses on the time he defeated his half-brother Bertram.

Robo Stewie is one of the few slightly pleasing moments.

Robo Stewie is an homage to the Mega Man X series. The controls, the enemies, their movements and patterns are all in the vein of the classic Mega Man titles, while the visuals are clearly inspired by X. This minigame also includes a rocking soundtrack alike the music from X. There is even a mid-stage boss for you to clobber, featuring another cameo from the television show.

You can’t say it isn’t trying—the game is trying my patience. Does Stewie have to move this slowly? Really?

Straight after the Mega Man stage, you get a flying level called Rocket Brian. As with Sketch Arcade, the controls are awful here. This is the worst game of the bunch. After you complete this section, you get to return to Mega Man mode for a slightly taxing boss fight, Stewie vs. Bertram.

Well, I do say, Brian. I appear to be in some manner of game.

(Un)lucky There’s a Family Guy!

Now you’re just one minigame away from beating the story mode of Family Guy: Uncensored, a woefully short “story” indeed. Peter Griffin gets into a fight with the chicken from the television show. After that, there are two cutscenes, and the game is done with.

There are extra stages to unlock for each of the minigames, but they’re just so passable that I could only bring myself to complete one more before passing the gauntlet. There are supposed to be extra games included through patches, but I don’t see them anywhere.

Uncensored used to retail for $4.99, which I believe is far too steep. Reduced to just under $1, it might sway Family Guy fans into purchasing out of ignorance. I don’t think the game is particularly worth a dollar, not even for the two vague homages to Mega Man.

This piece of shit Uncensored should have been Robo Stewie with a coat of polish applied and a bit of tinkering done to make it less offensive. Either that, or ignored altogether.

Pixel-art females your thing? You’re better off with Poker Ladies.

I hope Glu thinks again before releasing another terrible–nevermind.

Forum posters and bloggers for other, less-exciting websites have been saying that 2011 was one of the best years ever for videogames—and they are absolutely, unconditionally right. Let’s look at the facts:

FACT: 2011 saw direct sequels to not one, not two, not four, but three former GameCola Games of the Year: Batman: Arkham Asylum, LittleBigPlanet, and Lego Star Wars 2: The Original Trilogy. (Yes, somehow we didn’t give Portal Game of the Year back in 2007, despite the fact that it topped our Top 50 Games of All Time list a few years later.) This is completely unprecedented, unless it’s happened before.

FACT: The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise finally broke its years-long dry spell by releasing a game that was, as many put it, playable.

FACT: For the first time in a decade, we got to know Jack. We also got the closest thing we’re ever going to get to a new Chrono Trigger, and the closest thing we’re ever going to get to a Final Fantasy VII remake.

FACT: Some popular shooting games were probably released, maybe.

FACT: Fans of the Back to the Future franchise were delighted to play as Marty McFly once again in a game that in no way involved giant balls of poop (at least, until the inevitable DLC comes out).

We gather here today to celebrate these games. Well, not these games. None of the games I’ve mentioned so far (save for one) actually won any GameCola awards this year. But others did, and we’re here to discuss the crap out of them.

Who are we? Well:

• Matt Jonas, news reporter, reviewer and video-er,
• Kate Jay, author and illustrator of “The Gates of Life,”
• Mark Freedman, reviewer and author of “What the Crap?“,
• Elizabeth “Lizo” Medina-Gray, editor as well as occasional reviewer,
• Vangie Ridgaway, author of “Gamer Girlfriend” and occasional podcaster and reviewer,
• Christian Porter, artist, blogger, news reporter, podcaster, reviewer, video-er and organizer, as well as author of “Poor Player’s Paradise,” Top of the Heap,” and “Power Gloves & Tinfoil Hats,”
• Alex Jedraszczak, the podcast master,
• Jillian Dingwall, reviewer,
• Michael Ridgaway, reviewer, podcaster, and former author of “Quantum Geek,”
• Nathaniel Hoover, editor, reviewer, podcaster, video-er, YouTube administrator, artist of “Sprite Flicker” and author of “Flash Flood” and “Impaired Closed Captioning,”
• Daniel Castro, author of “Don’t Be That Guy,”
• And, finally, me.

So join us today in celebrating 2011: the year that was, and, as always, be sure to tell us in the comments exactly where we went wrong. Here, I’ll start:

Where the hell is Gunstringer?!

Best Licensed Game

Batman: Arkham City

Christian Porter: The Batman: Arkham (Progressively Larger Geographic Location) series has been full of surprises. Arkham Asylum not only shirked convention by being a good superhero game, but it was actually an amazing game to boot, winning GameCola’s coveted 2009 Game of the Year title. Now Arkham City shirks convention by turning the sequel into a sandbox without making the game seem crammed with filler, and the game is still just as fun as the original. The same high-quality writing and voice acting also return, with tons of Batman villains around every corner, but somehow not feeling like they’ve all been shoehorned in. It’s an amazing adventure and, any other year, would be a shoo-in for Game of the Year.

Honorable Mention: Back to the Future: The Game
Last Year’s Winner: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game

Best Remake/Re-release

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D

Daniel Castro: What else can be said about this game? It’s freaking Ocarina of Time, a game remembered as one of the best games ever made—and now it looks so damn awesome that we won’t feel at all embarrassed showing it off to future generations. It’s not the perfect remake, since there aren’t any new additions besides prettier aesthetics, but I guess not everyone was waiting for newer mechanics or anything else for the game that they cared about and loved so many years ago. And, hey! The 3D effects are gorgeous, it’s portable, and you can aim by tilting your Nintendo 3DS in front of your face, which means I can finally play Ocarina of Time on the bus, drunkenly trying to aim at anything with the slingshot, while other passengers play shitty music on their cell phones. It’s fun!

Honorable Mention: No More Heroes: Heroes’ Paradise
Last Year’s Winner: Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck’s Revenge

Best Use of Motion Controls

Child of Eden

Jillian Dingwall: Child of Eden is an arcade-style shooter in which you use your hands to target and destroy various enemies. It’s set in space, and the object of the game is to rescue a super-hot fairy girl who has been eaten by what appears to be the Internet.

This game is HARD. It’s quite confusing to begin with, and the enemies come flying at you from all angles resulting in flailing arms, sweaty armpits, unattractive facial expressions and frustratingly continuous failure. As a “game,” it’s not that great; however, you can switch off the super-death mode and play the game in the much less challenging  ”Feel Eden” mode (Eden being the name of the environment, not the fairy—that game would be called Child of Molestation), and this is where you begin to appreciate the genius of the game’s concept.

Child of Eden combines its  surroundings, music and motion controls beautifully, and when you remove the fear of death, the game becomes a highly enjoyable, exciting and ethereal experience. Shooting different enemies produces different effects which blend together seamlessly to create your very own, unique sound. The motion controls are impressively responsive and make you feel as though you really are in control of the celestial surroundings. I agree with those who feel it may not be the best game in the world, but as an experience, it’s definitely a worthy winner. Motion control is still in its infancy, but if Child of Eden is anything to go by, we have a lot to look forward once it hits puberty.

Honorable Mentions: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword; The Gunstringer
Last Year’s Winner: N/A

Best New Character

Wheatley
(Portal 2)

Christian Porter: Homer Simpson, Rose Nylund, Jenny McCarthy—everybody likes a lovable moron. In Portal 2, Stephen Merchant fills the moron shoes perfectly. (I mean that in a good way.) Valve really hit the nail on the head by letting Merchant ad lib to his heart’s content, with some of the best comedy in the game coming from standing around and waiting to see what Wheatley will say next. No matter how many awful situations his rampant stupidity gets you into, Wheatley is simply impossible to hate.

Honorable Mention: Cave Johnson (Portal 2)
Last Year’s Winner: Sheep Man (Mega Man 10)

Most Innovative

Bastion

Alex Jedraszczak: To say that Bastion is the most innovative game of 2011 is a little odd. The game itself is a pretty solid action/adventure type game, but that genre has been around long enough to be fairly finely tuned. The innovation is all in exploration and storytelling.

The world literally drops from the sky as you explore. More than a cool visual effect, this leaves you always knowing when you’ve been someplace before. It’s pretty obvious where you’ve been, and this guides you where you need to be without needless exposition.

The game’s main claim to fame, however, is the storytelling. Rather than reading through boring text before getting to play the game, the story is told as you’re playing. The end result is a game that flows very well, and can be pretty entertaining when the narration is tailored to your in-game actions.

Honorable Mentions: Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective; Catherine
Last Year’s Winner: Heavy Rain

Best Story

Portal 2

Portal 2

Nathaniel Hoover: Hmm…Portal 2, you say? Is it really the funniest game of the year? Absolutely. Unless you’re adopted. Or obese. Or a sympathizer to either demographic, for that matter. However, we here at GameCola are horrible, insensitive people, so we think it’s pretty hysterical. Eminently quotable. From the mad ramblings of Cave Johnson to the moronic assertions of Wheatley to the sarcastic barbs of GLaDOS, there’s no shortage of creativity in the humor. Throw in a prophetic talking turret, legions of its dimwitted cousins, a droll male computer, outrageous personality spheres, a few wonderful sight gags, and all the hilarious situations afforded by portals, springboards, and bouncy goo—especially in (un)co-operative multiplayer—and you’ve got pretty much the only game we could have voted for this year.

Honorable Mention: No More Heroes: Heroes’ Paradise
Last Year’s Winner: No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle

Best New Peripheral

3DS Retractable Stylus

Paul Franzen: Oooh. Oh, baby. Come here, my baby. Let me slide this thing in. And slide it out. Slide it in. Slide it out. Over and over. Aren’t we having fun, my baby? You can touch it, if you’d like. Just don’t scratch up the screen; this thing cost me $250 and still doesn’t have any games.

…Wait, what? What did you think I was talking about? I’m talking about the new stylus that comes bundled with the Nintendo 3DS! It’s retractable! That means you can make it whatever length is most comfortable to you! Stop it; there’s nothing sexual about that. And it’s fun to play with, too, while you’re playing with yourself. I mean, playing games! With yourself. Phew. I can’t believe I got through this whole thing without any innuendo.

Honorable Mentions: Wappy Dog; Pop Star Sparkle Gloves
Last Year’s Winner: Pokéwalker

Best Multiplayer

Portal 2

Vangie Ridgaway: In the Portal 2 co-op mode, GLaDOS has finally found a more self-sufficient mode of conducting her scientific testing at Aperture Science. Her latest creations are P-body and ATLAS, a modified turret and personality sphere, respectively, who are now possessed of arms, legs, and portal guns of their own. Together, the two of them explore a completely new set of testing areas, which are specifically designed for two players, and require both guns (meaning a total of four active portals!) to complete. The new puzzles require a fair bit of cooperation on the part of the players, which ironically seems to annoy GLaDOS, as she is constantly trying to set her two new testers against one another through her unique brand of “encouragements.” Expect more cleverly designed puzzles, a fun twist on the original portal gun mechanic, and more of the humor that the Portal series has become famous for.

Honorable Mentions: Trine 2; Gears of War 3
Last Year’s Winner: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game

Best Indie Game

Bastion

Michael Ridgaway: I could go on and on (and have) about Bastion’s fun Diablo-style gameplay, its beautifully vivid graphics, the poignantly shattered apocalypse it centers around, the amazing use of narration in the storytelling, or the awesome soundtrack that I find myself listening to at least once every few days. I could talk about those things, and they’d all be true, but for the moment I want to focus on how earnest the fans are and how keen Supergiant Games is to return that affection. For instance, one gentleman wrote to them asking for help in making his wedding ceremony extra special, and they delivered. A soldier in Afghanistan was not able to get a digital version of the game, so they specially made and sent him a physical copy of the game. Bastion really is the full package here, folks: an awesome game with awesome people behind it.

Honorable Mention: Orcs Must Die!
Last Year’s Winner: Super Meat Boy

Best PC Game

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Mark Freedman: If someone says the name Elder Scrolls to you, and all you can think of is your grandpa trying to figure out how a mouse wheel works, it’s time to get on the Skyrim bandwagon. I can’t think of any other game where, after playing 60 hours, you can still feel like you’ve only scratched the surface. Compared to other open-ended worlds, this game has the scale of an entire galaxy. Even if you’re not interested in combat, there’s so many beautiful mountains, lakes, caves, and forts to discover. With over 60,000 lines of dialogue and hundreds of hours you can spend playing, you’re definitely getting your money’s worth here. Kill some bears, craft your own armor, learn some spells, betray some townsfolk, or reanimate the dead…it’s all up to you. Despite its many bugs, this is truly a breathtaking adventure.

Specific to the PC version, some really great mods are finally coming out that make it feel more like a PC experience. There haven’t been a whole lot of beards in videogames, but Skyrim majestically integrates the tenacity and allure of beards in to such an epic quest as ever you’ll see.

Honorable Mention: Star Wars: The Old Republic
Last Year’s Winner: Mass Effect 2

Best Console Game

Portal 2

Kate Jay: The original Portal made its mark on the gaming world with its witty dialogue, innovative concept, and fast-paced gameplay. Fans asked for a sequel, and Valve gave us everything we asked for and more: Portal 2 took that theme and ran with it, releasing with a fully-fledged story with actual character development, backstory, and, of course, more snarkiness. Playing through Portal 2, we learn more about the history of Aperture Science and the men and women who made it what is was (before GLaDOS killed everyone, that is). Valve added new Aperture Products, including three types of gel, robots for the multiplayer levels, and defective personality cores. To add more frosting on this delicious, theoretical cake, Valve also provided players with plenty of free—yes, FREE—downloadable content for the multiplayer and single player campaigns. Portal 2 is clever, quirky, and charming, and it most definitely takes the cake.

Honorable Mention: Batman: Arkham City
Last Year’s Winner: Super Mario Galaxy 2

Best Portable Game

Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective

Elizabeth “Lizo” Medina-Gray: What if you were dead, but you didn’t know how or why you died, and you couldn’t remember who you were? And then what if you found out that you could manipulate objects in the world, and even go back in time and save other peoples’ lives? And what if you learned of a mysterious conspiracy tied somehow to your murder, and you had only until dawn to figure everything out before you disappeared forever? Then you’d be the main character in Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective!

Ghost Trick is a new game from the creator of the Ace Attorney series (and we all know how well-loved those games are here at GameCola). Fortunately for all of us Phoenix Wright fans who were hoping for another great portable game, Ghost Trick delivers in full. The characters are quirky and well-developed, the graphics and music are awesome, and the mechanics are unique, challenging, and fun. But, like the Ace Attorney games before, the thing that really made Ghost Trick stand out for me was its story. Many times, I’ve played a game and found myself disappointed because it didn’t surprise me in a big way—sometimes I feel like the ideas I have and the guesses that I make while playing a game are more interesting than what the writers actually do. With Ghost Trick, though, I had the exact opposite experience. I didn’t come close to guessing the ending, but beyond that, the story went places that I never saw coming, and that was a great thing for me. Plus, the story’s just really cool!

With awesome characters, a compelling story, only a couple of annoying puzzles among the many good ones, and probably my favorite graphics on the DS to date, Ghost Trick is definitely a winner.

Honorable Mentions: Pokémon Black/White; Super Mario 3D Land
Last Year’s Winner: Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth

Best Downloadable Game

Bastion

Kate Jay: It’s not often that I download Xbox Live games, but then, it’s not often that games like Bastion come along to entice me. At a glance, this indie games seems like your typical RPG: a young hero sets out to save his world from destruction. However, Bastion takes a different approach to the whole “rebuilding the world” theme—the world literally rebuilds itself around you as you move around the richly colored isometric map. To make the experience even more unique, your adventure is narrated blow-by-blow in the mellow tones of Rucks, an NPC voiced by Logan Cunningham. Gameplay is fast paced, if a little repetitive, but the story moves pretty quickly, keeping the experience fresh. A sensational soundtrack rounds out this refreshing game, making it a must-buy for any RPG fans.

Honorable Mention: Trine 2
Last Year’s Winner: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game

GameCola Staff Member of the Year

Alex Jedraszczak

Paul Franzen: A lot has changed since Alex (real name: Jeddy) first won this award in 2007. GameCola changed formats, from a monthly e-mail newsletter to an actual Internet website. All of our writers decided to grow magnificent beards. Our site started having actual fans. But while he won last time because he was the only person who consistently submitted his articles in on time, this year, he won because he helped bring GameCola to an all-new level in 2011—and the fact that we have actual fans now is due in no small part to him.

The GameCola Podcast, under the Jedraszczak regime, has way more listeners now than ever it had before. I mean, it has actual listeners now! Listeners who send us e-mails, ask us questions, record covers of our theme song on their saxophones, and draw pictures of us as the cast of Phoenix Wright. (Note: This hasn’t actually happened yet, but here’s hoping.) Kevin Leacock won this award last year for making the site much more accessible to new fans; this year, Jeddy’s winning for drawing those new fans to the site. Whether he’s role-playing as Metroid, singing the theme songs to old Nickelodeon shows, or just sitting back and letting us argue the merits of Ace Attorney Investigations, you can bet that, if you’re listening to a Jedrazcast, your next hour is going to be awesome.

And he still gets everything in on time, too. You can set your calendar by it.

Honorable Mentions: Matt Jonas, Christian Porter
Last Year’s Winner: Kevin Leacock

Game of the Year

Portal 2

Michael Ridgaway: Man, what was it with 2011 and awesome storytelling?

Portal 2 refined and added a lot to the platformer/puzzle elements from the first game for yet another amazing quantum-tunneling exploratory experience, but where it really shined was the story. In addition to the ever delightful GLaDOS, players were introduced to Wheatley and Cave Johnson, voiced by professional actors Stephen Merchant and J.K. Simmons, respectively. I’m not sure I ever stopped laughing while playing the game, and it very squarely fell into the category of “games I can only play with Vangie around or she will straight up cut me.”

Portal 2 proved that it was possible to tell an exciting, entertaining story in the context of an excellent game, and it raised the bar not just for videogames, but all other forms of media, as well.

Honorable Mention: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Last Year’s Winner: Heavy Rain

I’ll believe it when I see it–

TOO CUTE. DAY ONE PURCHASE.

Well, this isn’t really news, is it? We already know the game features full-motion video, because we’ve been bombarded with it in each trailer.

It was revealed at said VIP party that these animated sequences are the work of BONES. That’s the studio responsible for Full Metal Alchemist, which just so happens to be one of my favourite series ever made.

Past triumphs clearly show that BONES can deliver truly beautiful animation, but that is the clincher: we want animation, damn and blast it.

Kind of makes you wish this was coming out for a good system.

I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say, “What we really want to see is a whole series of Phoenix Wright anime episodes.” Get on the blower to Capcom and let them know just how you’re feeling.

In other news, Capcom announced a fifth game in the series without confirming whether or not it would have a U.S. release. At the very least, there is no excuse if they don’t bring the iOS trilogy overseas. Running games from another region has never been a concern for mobile devices, and the games have already been translated before, so think of another excuse Capcom before CANCELLING THAT, TOO!

Why does Capcom like playing with us? In between ruining our lives and imitating infamous movies, Capcom should climb back up to the middle ground and offer us more of what we actually want. Face it, their recent output hasn’t been great, so they can start by bringing the Mega Man Legends 3 prototype to the Nintendo eShop as originally promised. Then we can work from there. Put your back into it, Capcom! SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

Dodge this.

From first peek, Girl’s Dodge Ball looks like Dead or Alive Xtreme. This should have been ample reason to stay as far away as possible.

One interesting feature you may notice is that Girl’s Dodge Ball simply cannot be played. This game crashes before you can even imagine doing anything, as though it were a sentient lifeform ashamed of its own quality. It crashes constantly, consistently, in the same place. User reviews that point this out seem to vaporize from the AppStore. I doubt any company would hide their failures and fiddle with the scores to make themselves look better. It would be just as easy to fix the problems…right?

On the plus side, at least Girl’s Dodge Ball has the decency to stop all by itself. Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 expects you to press the guide button and quit of your own accord.

Who is Gilr, and does he mind me using his select?

There are constant spelling and grammatical mistakes, though nothing on par with the atrocities seen in Dino Cap 2. I didn’t know that illiterate teenagers crafted games these days.

Whatever “achivements” are, they sure sound exciting. The game tries desperately to cover the spelling mistakes by having advertisements appear at the top of the screen. All of the advertisements I’ve seen might have been for games I don’t want to play, but at least you can play those games.

Well, I’ll just select which “gilr” I want to play as. You know what? Maybe “gilr” isn’t a spelling mistake. These characters certainly do not look human. There’s also only two to pick from. It isn’t possible to unlock the others; doing so requires spending virtual money.

You can earn the virtual money just by playing, but whenever I go to start the game, a remix of Chris Rea’s “On The Beach” plays and the iPod crashes back to the springboard. You can also buy the fake currency by spending real currency. If I discover that anyone has actually done this, I will forcibly remove their brains through their arsehole. It sounds really painful, but it shouldn’t be too hard to do, seeing as their  brains must already be swimming in stools to begin with.

“Funny App Game!” Try again—it’s neither funny, nor a game.

Aren’t there any nice things I can say about this game? No, not at all; there is absolutely nothing that even remotely springs to mind. While we’re talking about reasons why this game is flawed fundamentally, might I draw your attention to the title, which should be written as Girls’ not Gilr’s or Girl’s? Unless it is about one particular specific girl’s “dodgeball,” which it isn’t. The game doesn’t even function, so it could be about a magical ball for all we know.

It doesn’t matter any that the game is free to download; if it doesn’t work, then it doesn’t work! I find this ironic, considering that the latest update “fixes some bugs.” And now, for the score…

But wait! I recently came into acquisition of an iPad 2. As if by a Toca’s Miracle, Girl’s Dodge Ball actually runs on that system (while in iPhone App mode). Unfortunately, it operates poorly and has a graphical error that makes it hard to read your score.

The game is surprisingly entertaining, though. Collecting the unlockables is fun, although everything can be won in about half an hour if you put your mind to it. You have to avoid multi-colored dodgeballs thrown at you by pink shiny robot ladies. The ease in which you earn virtual money destroys the whole point in spending real money anyway, which is good, because buying virtual currency is a sin.

When I play this game on the platform it was intended for, though, it crashes every time. So the score still needs to reflect this. I hate to be a spoil-sport, but I am sticking to my guns with this rating.

Pricing details will be available either before or after E3, but obviously some time before the system actually comes out. Many developers, press packers, and a few homeless people claim to have played or developed for the system, spreading rumors like a raging wildfire.

The Wii U may even be powerful enough to run Pac-Man, or Joust!

One anymous source claims that the Wii U will be twice as powerful as the Xbox 360, while another anonymous source (that I have totally just made up) claims that the Wii U will crap out rainbow cookies. I’m all for the latter. If the Wii U is only just capable of trumping consoles of this generation, I don’t have much faith in Nintendo to do any better than they did with the Wii.

So what does the Wii U have to offer us, besides an opportunity to “Taste the Rainbow” in HD? Capcom soot-sprite Yoshinori Ono seems to think that the system will do quite a few amazing things, some of which they won’t even be able to show on TV or print on the back of the game box! What, does it bleed all over your hands, or something? I can see why they’d keep that hush-hush.

Nintendo took their first annual loss in 30 years, last year. The 3DS must have been a flop then, seeing as the Virtual Boy and Pokémon were released in the last 30 years also.

Whatever Grin are planning to do with the Wii U, they will have to be cautious of the market and make the right moves. So long as those rainbow cookies are guaranteed, I don’t think we’ll ever need another console again.

With all the quality reviews, delightful columns, and hard-hitting game journalism you can find here at GameCola, it’s sometimes hard to believe that the site’s written by regular people like you and me, and not a race of evolutionarily advanced superhumans. To help bridge this divide between staff and reader, we’ve set up this column so you can get a look at our staff’s personal opinions on serious issues. Serious issues like the following:

This month’s question was submitted by our own Jillian Dingwall, and it is:

What movie would you like to see turned into a videogame?

Matt Jonas
The Neverending Story

It would be a wide, open world role-playing game laced with J-RPG elements. You play as Atreyu, following the guidance of AURYN, as you quest to save Fantasia from The Nothing. What would be ironic, though, is that the film is concerned with the growing problem of children not reading books or using their imagination as much as they used to, something that videogames themselves are partly responsible for. Therefore, the game should focus on using complicated puzzles to tax the mind of the player. The game should also shatter the fourth wall at the end, but in its own fashion, different from the film.

(Matt is a staff reviewer and news blogger.)

Stuart Gipp
Indecisive Bastard

I’ve been throwing a few suggestions around, nothing too in-depth, but a broad succession of brief pitches that may interest.

Perhaps a PC title based on Nicole Kassell’s challenging piece, The Woodsman? Gameplay could take the form of QTEs in which Kevin Bacon sees small children off in the distance, and must rhythmically press “B” to fight his urges and re-integrate into society.

I also feel that there are real financial prospects for a game based on the seminal stage musical-turned-film, Mamma Mia. The main character must investigate three potential father figures to determine which one is, in fact, her father. Investigation mechanics are handled through a mixture of basic deduction and Bemani song and dance routines. A secret bonus mode would take the form of a reverse tower defense game where the player is a male attempting to leave the movie theatre without being stopped or noticed by his wife.

A game based on Last Tango in Paris, where gamers take the role of Marlon Brando and use the Kinect to apply butter to Maria Schneider’s anus before simulating rough anal sex.

Finally, it’s always been obvious to me that, though critically savaged, 1993’s Bob Hoskins-starring Super Mario Bros. would make for a compelling videogame, given a few small changes.

(Stuart Gipp is a staff reviewer and the author of “Ctrl-Alt-Del: The Animated Series: In Review: Diary of a Madman.”)

Kate Jay
Return to Oz

I’d like to see the old Return to Oz movie turned into a game. But developers would have to keep the creepy, dark feeling to it, including the part with the hall of screaming heads. It would adapt pretty well to a game format, with plenty of potential sidequests, explorable areas, and twisted humor. All in all, nothing like the actual Oz books, but then again, neither was the movie.

(Kate is the author and illustrator of “The Gates of Life.”)

Paul Franzen
Super Mario Bros.: The Movie

Imagine, if you will, an alternate-universe edition of the Super Mario games, where Goombas are giant lizards with little tiny heads, the mushroom power-ups are sentient, and the giant fish that eats you in Mario 3 is, instead, an enormous black woman with Thwomps strapped to her feet. Also, you’re playing as Bob Hoskins, digitally inserted into the game ala the characters in Mortal Kombat, and Yoshi is a goddamn tyrannosaurs rex. And in the final boss battle, Bowser (as portrayed by a digitally inserted Dennis Hopper, of course) has a gun that can turn you into a monkey.

Just tell me that wouldn’t be the best Mario hack ever.

(Paul is GameCola’s Editor-in-Chief as well as author of “Minus the Pudding: The Best of Xbox Live Indie Games.”)

Mark Freedman
Spaceballs

Spaceballs: The Video Game. I got the idea when someone made a multiplayer character mod for Jedi Knight 2 where you could play as President Scroob with a purple lightsaber. (I would have much prefered to play as Dark Helmet, though.) The Star Wars franchise has made so many great videogames like Knights of the Old Republic and the Super Star Wars series on SNES, so it should be easy to do the same with Spaceballs and add in a hearty helping of comedy. Unfortunately, Rick Moranis is fully retired and didn’t even make an appearance in Ghostbusters: The Video Game, so we’d need a suitable replacement for Dark Helmet. Keep firing, assholes!

(Mark is a reviewer and the author of “What the Crap?“)

Christian Porter
Battle Royale

I think the Japanese splatterfest, Battle Royale, would make a perfect multiplayer shooter. Even the film’s tagline—“Could you kill your best friend?”—encompasses what people who play shooters like doing best. The short version of the plot is that Japan has decided kids are too unruly and violent, and the best way to solve this is to dump one class per year on an island to brutally kill each other with no rules until only one is left standing. No, I don’t understand the rationale, either. My pitch for the game is that the island is procedurally generated—different every time, weapons are assigned to people at random (sometimes you get an Uzi, and sometimes you get a GPS and a frying pan). Also, the teacher calls out certain areas of the map every few hours where the students aren’t allowed to be. If they’re still there after a given period of time, then the exploding collars they were fitted with are set off, solving the problem of camping rather quickly. It’s pretty perfectly suited for a videogame.

(Christian is a reviewer, author of “Poor Player’s Paradise” and “Top of the Heap,” and creator of the video series “Speak American.”)

Jeff Day
The Wizard

If playing NES games is fun (which it undoubtedly is), then playing a game about playing NES games must be fun, too! Though it might be difficult to get the various publishers to cooperate, can’t you just picture it? Each level requires you to go to a different location in the United States and play a level from a classic NES game. Castlevania? Ninja Gaiden? Double Dragon? Friggin’ Rad Racer? You know it. (Good luck getting the rights to that last one.) The grand finale comes when you have to complete the first stage of Super Mario Bros. 3—what a challenge! And when Lucas Barton shows up to cause trouble, the game switches to a Street Fighter II format where you can beat the living crap out of each other. Haley is an unlockable character whose special powers include Irritable Scowl and False Molestation Accusation. And running from that creepy old guy who’s been hired to catch you turns things into a knockoff of Home Alone for the NES. *shudders* Now let’s just see if we can get Jackey Vinson to do a few voice-overs. You know he’s not working much ever since…well…you know…the incident…

(Jeff is the author of “Gamera Obscura.”)

Daniel Castro
The Terminator

More than any one movie I’d like to see in videogame format, I have a lot of movie-based videogames I just want to see done right! Among those I’d love to play is a well-made Terminator videogame.

Remember the first shots in the original Terminator movie? That post-apocalyptic future is the perfect setting for an awesome action game. That said, the game based on Terminator Salvation was horrible—not only because it was merely the cash-in movie-related videogame we’re all used to, but because the Terminators in that game are way too easy to defeat compared to their big-screen counterparts.

I don’t want to fight hundreds of useless Terminators—I want to face just one. I want to be scared shitless being chased by an almost invincible T-800. That is the trademark this movie is well remembered by, and it’s something no videogame has been able to pull off.

(Daniel is the author of “Don’t Be That Guy.”)

Jillian Dingwall
Deliverance

I have long felt that the movie most overlooked when it comes to videogame potential is Deliverance. There really is a whole world of variety involved in bringing such a timeless classic into your living room. The game would be divided into three sections: character design, motion control, and handheld control. Let’s begin with character design. In some games, like Tiger Woods Golf, for example, character creation is a game in itself. Deliverance would have all the time-consumption of Tiger Woods Golf, except you would have nothing but 250 moustaches to choose from and four outfits, all of which would consist of different shades of double-denim. Once your character is ready to hit the canoe, the game would move on to the motion control stage. Here you would row yourself down the river, contending with a few rapids along the way, before picking up your virtual banjo and spending the next thirty years trying to learn how to play “Dueling Banjos.” Finally, the violent sodomy scene. This is where the hand-held controller comes in. I’m not going to go into too much detail, but let’s just say that it would work in a similar way to lock-picking in Skyrim. In short, Deliverance would combine all the versatility of 21st century gaming with the excitement of ’70s facial hair. What’s not to love?

(Jillian is a staff reviewer and blogger.)

Nathaniel Hoover
Serenity

I’d love to see a videogame adaptation of Serenity, Joss Whedon’s 2005 space western that follows the hit (read: cancelled) TV series Firefly. A depressingly serious wisecracking third-person role-playing adventure game with a handful of first-person vehicle missions and a mix of real-time, turn-based, and event-based combat would not only make for the most difficult-to-classify game of the year, but also the only game with enough variety and nonstop challenges to properly capture the essence of Serenity. There are enough characters to pull off a Knights of the Old Republic-style rotating party system, and Heavy Rain’s open-ended story structure would still allow all your favorite characters to get killed off unexpectedly, without impaling them in a contrived, prescripted cutscene. Throw in a few bonus missions where you can play as the bad guys—including a horrifying Dress-the-Reaver character customization screen—and I swear to you, I will get very choked up. Honestly, there could be tears.

(Nathaniel is a reviewer, author of “Flash Flood“ and the “Sprite Flicker“ webcomic, and creator of fine videos.)

This classic GameCola post was originally published in January 2011.

It’s always interesting to find creative new ways to replay older games. Here, we see staff writer Matt Jonas (yours truly) trying to play Sonic the Hedgehog with his eyes closed. Watch as he somehow pulls off miraculous stunts you’d think were staged (but weren’t):

We’re all quite shocked by how far he gets.

Food For Thought

The best way to explain HungryMaster is to just get on with it. You play as a cute girl named Delica who usually spends her time foraging around for food. One day she stumbles across a talking cat named Saten. She signs a contract with him and, in return, is bestowed with magical powers.

What kind of contract did she sign? We may never know, but signing a contract with the Devil almost never works out in your favor. Saten’s name is based off of the word “Sate,” which means to quell your appetite, and Delica’s name is based off of the word “Delicious.” That is clever, I must admit.

Delica now has the power to turn monsters into food. She must collect this food and deliver it to houses. Again, I’m not quite sure why, because it isn’t explained properly. On the journey, there is plenty of poorly written dialogue. Most of it is about eating or drinking things. You will discover that Saten is an alcoholic, and that Delica is embarassed about her flat chest. Such is the quality of writing in Japanese games.

We’re almost in Matt Gardner territory, but it needs more bodily functions.

The game itself (besides the drawn out, poorly written dialogue) is unique. I see a lot of games on the AppStore that are focused around launching angry animals at styrofoam castles, or cutting up various types of fruit or vegetable. HungryMaster is entirely different, and therefore it deserves a mention.

You have to move Delica around the play area, searching for enemies. When you discover them, you must draw a line starting from Delica that then overlaps with the monsters. When you let go, the line turns into a magical spell and transforms the monsters into food or drink items. Depending on how long you charge your spell for, the monsters become different types of food or drink.

You need to collect these items and then make your way to one of the houses. You have to provide the amount of food that the house has requested. Either giving them just the amount that they requested, or filling your bag entirely, will reward you with a temporary health bonus.

When you have collected 20 items or more, you can convert them into a bomb attack, somehow. This destroys all enemies on screen, but they do not drop any food. To defeat the bosses in the game, you need to use the bomb attack.

That’s all you need to know. It won’t stop you from sucking, but it’s a start. All of the control schemes are horrid.

They love the laughter and they love the living.

To Top it All Off

HungryMaster is a really pretty game. The character artwork by artist Hanikura is sweet and charming, with beautiful large eyes and mellow colors. The sprite-work within the game is reminiscent of 16-bit RPGs, especially with the top-down perspective. The game screen has a subtle scanline filter applied, which gently implies the game to be a homage to traditional arcade games.

This is one of the few things that brings me back to the game.

The soundtrack is simple, and has a recurring theme. There is only one piece of music for most stages, but it doesn’t grow old. The soundtrack is free to download from the official website, and includes a song written and sung to promote the game, using the game’s recurring theme music.

There is full Game Center integration, with leaderboards and unlockable Achievements. Collecting Achievements will also unlock hidden equipment and items in HungryMaster, mainly magical spells.

What does this even mean…? I don’t know anymore.

The official website doesn’t have much faith in the game, saying that the game is full of crappy content. On the other hand, I really dig it, since it’s available for free. I recommend that you download HungryMaster right away, because you might as well do so. It’s difficult to play, but it’s worth a shot just to see if you feel it. This is a neat little jewel that you may have otherwise overlooked.

Just an extra little note: When I first downloaded HungryMaster, there was a crippling control bug. A mere day after I reported it, the bug was fixed, and the game worked as it was previously intended. That is commitment to your craft.

Happy new year. I’ve been catching up with all the gaming I’ve missed over the last few months, and what better way to do that than with my iPod Touch?

I no longer make those day-one Green Day: Rock Band- or Sonic Unleashed-style purchases. Since becoming a casual gamer, I refuse to spend big money on games. Previously, I would’ve been the first one through those GameStation doors for Beautiful Katamari; now I’m just scouring for freebies, gifts, or those one-day gaming deals you just have to take advantage of.

This is entirely because of the “AppStore,” the place where dreams are born and destinies are fulfilled—or something equally as fucking trite sounding.

You can access the AppStore from any iOS device (that is, any device running the touch-driven Apple operating system). The AppStore is an easy to use system whereby the user can purchase and download games and applications to their iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad.

Some of the games are incredible. From a glance, Gameloft titles could easily be mistaken for Xbox Live Arcade games. Eternal Legacy and Tintin are the most impressive that I have seen. Tintin actually looks better than its console counterpart.

Games are often discounted on the AppStore. Some are free—well, more than just “some.” There are a lot of free games on the AppStore. How many games has Microsoft given you for free? Maybe two a year, if you’re making a list and checking it twice.

You’re seeing new freebies on AppStore every other day. Normally they’re supported by adverts or by purchases within the game, but you never really have to buy anything to get a sense of enjoyment. A game like Blood & Glory is fine to play until it gets hard, by which point you can just delete it and find something else to play.

Gameloft’s latest free game, Six Guns, allows you to complete the whole game without making any purchases. You’re getting a 5+ hour game for what is effectively no cost. You can augment the experience with purchases, but they are not necessary, unlike in a brutally difficult game such as Blood & Glory.

Mediocre wild west-themed game? Boring. For free? NOW YOU’RE TAWKIN’!

Getting these games for free has turned me into a really picky sod. When I walk into dedicated gaming stores, I just get so disgusted. Why should I pay excess of $15 for a game when I can have hours of fun on my iPhone for just $1? If a game appears on an official Apple advertisement, you’re thinking…give it a few weeks; it will be free. Sure as night turns to day, it happens.

So you’re sitting like Lord Muck with all these free games and you don’t know what to do with yourself. You’ve hardly the space on your device for all of them, and you’re never going to play more than twenty minutes of each of them because your attention span is shot from all the festive booze. …Unless the game is triple distilled addiction.

Jetpack Joyride, snapped up as a freebie. Seven hours playtime and counting…

Becoming a casual gamer has really colored my judgement on game prices. Enjoyment cannot be given a price, and there is nothing I value more than having a great time. So why should I be so picky about having to pay for the things I want? First of all, it’s my money, and I think I deserve to have some say in how much of it I spend. Secondly, publishers still insist on releasing the new console blockbusters for $60, while the AppStore still remains a very small and developer-based market.

I undercut the big companies and help the smaller developers. The games are cheap, they give me hours of satisfaction, and some of these games even rival what I have seen consoles achieve.

A Scribblenauts game that you can actually play?

So many great games also get ported to iOS, with added features and improved visuals (like Scribblenauts Remix). You can grab a large library of games for under $20, and it will last you for weeks and weeks.

You may have noticed that I’m mostly reviewing iPhone games now. They’re short, easy to write about, and don’t scathe the wallet. There is always something else to play. Although the games are cheap, these Apple devices are still mega expensive. With that understood, the library of games is ever growing, and there’s always something free or cheap right around the corner.

You get “deals” on the Xbox Live Marketplace or the PlayStation Store, but they’re not deals, are they? Yeah, Call of Duty map packs a dollar off, fucking derp. Grab yourself one of these shiny Apple things and start enjoying fair-prices for a change.

In a move I could have only anticipated in my dreams, Taxman has reworked my favorite Sonic the Hedgehog game for Apple’s various mobile devices. How does it stack up against the original? To be blunt, you have not played Sonic CD until you play this version.

A floating planet appears once a year above a giant lake. It is called the “Miracle Planet.” Nobody can explain how or why it appears. This is probably why it is called the “Miracle Planet.”

Planets, how do they work?

We may never know, but what definitely works is the game’s new time-travel feature. This is the extra element that sets Sonic CD apart from other Sonic the Hedgehog titles, by actually being good. In my most gracious and humble opinion, no game has yet to better time travel.

The player is no longer simply concerned with finishing each stage by traveling in a straight line. You can now travel back in time to complete objectives that result in achieving a Good Future, if you feel like it. Creating a Good Future for each Act, or collecting all of the Chaos Emeralds Time Stones, results in the Good Ending.

Imagine how many minds this blew in 1993. It still blows my mind in 2011.

I don’t think I have ever traipsed through the game’s levels so thoroughly until I played this version, through. Testament to the truly spectacular age-old design.

One advantage to being a more modern version of the game is that you can finally choose between either the Japanese or the American soundtracks. Both soundtracks contain looping level audio, courtesy of sound samples extracted from the original game. This feature was planned for the Sega CD version, making the new remake closer to the game’s original intent.

I do have one gripe, though: “Cosmic Eternity” and “Sonic You Can Do Anything” are now instrumental only. This is due to a copyright disaster concerning the use of the lyrics, which could have been cleared up were the original copyright holder only still alive. Why not write new lyrics, or make “Sonic Boom” the main song in both versions? I can live with that if it means not having to hear “Cosmic Eternally” so horrendously butchered.

This rendition of Sonic CD is faster than all of its predecessors, running at what I can only presume to be a solid 60 frames per second. It takes up your whole screen display without stretching, looking incredible through Retina Display. I cannot imagine going back to any other version of the game from now on. I would have never imagined that “perfect” could be made better.

The physics are spot on, too. Even that bizarre “tube” effect has returned, where Sonic goes insanely fast should he even tickle a tunnel of any description. The added Sonic 2-style spindash can be “revved up” to achieve incredible boosts, which makes getting around more exciting than before. The camera has been modified so that it swings back when Sonic is going faster, allowing you to see more of the stage ahead of you. All of the returning sprites are clean, crisp and pop out at you.

Wait, hold back on the fangasm. Let’s find another gripe before I start to sound suspect. I am disappointed with the new sprites for Tails during the Special Zones, which are blatantly horrible. I feel really akward saying this, because whoever penned the new art is probably really proud of their work. On the plus side, the sprites lifted from Sonic 2 do not look out of place, despite my fear that they would.

The menus are nicely integrated within the iPhone, with the natural finger-scrolling that you’ve come to expect on the hardware. The in-game interface, though on-screen during the action, does not obscure the play-field too much.

I say grab Sonic CD on iOS devices if you can, unless you’ve got your heart set on the Xbox Live Arcade or PlayStation Network version. That version is a port of Taxman’s engine, resulting in a few little problems here and there. On the plus side, Sonic CD still feels more comfortable when played with a gaming controller, because the on-screen buttons from the iOS version are awkward to use when you’re trying to make the tricky jumps.

I purchased Sonic CD on Xbox Live Arcade and fully completed it twice. I have also purchased the game for iOS devices and beaten that version. I can say, without the tiniest shadow of doubt, that the iOS version is superior. I have also played the iOS version of Sonic CD on an iPad and I was entirely blown aback. There is the added distance between buttons, creating extra space for judging jumps. The game still maintains that perfect synchronized framerate. The graphics take up the whole screen but remain in the correct aspect ratio and still look incredible.

This is an extremely solid remake and the ideal opportunity to return to this classic game. Sega, please let your fans develop more of your games; they seem to know what they’re doing.

Sonic Team, that’s a DOUBLE HINT. Please re-hire Christian Whitehead so that he can add that extra level he was designing. 

I want to play this level NOW!

I will pay for it! A life-long Sonic the Hedgehog fan demands the lost R2! Release this level in some form and the score for this game goes up.