Our community chest is firm, yet supple.
I'm up against a deadline folks, so I will have to keep this description of Nerds Without Pants brief. See what I did there? Ahem.
A considerable improvement from the first.
After NES Remix, I badly wanted a sequel. My main concerns with the first Remix were that developers EAD Tokyo and indieszero focused on Nintendo’s 1983-1986 Famicom line-up, which has not aged well. This second Remix, like all good sequels, takes what made the first game so great and improves upon the flaws. They also threw in backwards Super Mario Bros. with Luigi physics and a Nintendo World Championship mini-game if you own the first NES Remix -- how can you say no to that?
The best angle to solve a problem is the WATAAAA-angle.
Even if you can never remember what it’s called, you’ve messed with tangram before. Probably in elementary school when it improved your understanding of geometry so extensively that your mind zipped out of your body to an ethereal realm of triangles and squares where you were truly at peace. Or, you used it once, decided it was boring, and stared at the carpet instead. Well, now tangram is back! And attacking!? That’s right, the set of shapes that can be formed to sort-of look like anything you can imagine is the center of the fast-paced, mind-challenging Tangram Attack! that found a way to make those simple shapes into a pretty good game – for a while.
The greatest art makes you look within.
Even though the transition into the newest generation of gaming consoles has been a gradual, whimpering affair so far, it’s pretty clear that the previous generation is wrapping up its final encore. To look back at how the PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360, and Nintendo DS thrilled us for years, PixlBit brings you our Game of the Generation series. Our staff has picked their personal favorite, most influential, most impactful games to highlight as we bid adieu to what was.
Color me neutral
Once upon a time, your average big budget game was expected to be bright and colorful with more realistic looking games being the exception. Today, however, a realistic look is more prominent and colorful games stand out more than ever. The Last Tinker: City of Colors feels like an attack against the loss of color - personified into a game - where the objective is to literally stop an evil force from removing all of the color in the world using the power of the red, green, and blue gods.
This episode is a super rare limited edition that will be worth big bucks some day. Trust us!
They said we’d never make it! They said we’d fail after a couple episodes! They said we wouldn’t survive, and yet here we stand, defiant! Okay, maybe nobody ever said that, but I sure as shootin’ didn’t expect to be posting the 50th episode of Nerds Without Pants! We do things in style with the biggest assembly of pantsless nerds yet. Fan favorites Erika Szabo and John Gholson join us to celebrate this huge milestone.
Not Bad for a Rookie
Alright, let’s get the obvious out of the way: Yes, Metal Gear was originally released on the MSX in Japan. Yes, it looked and played better than the NES version. And yes, the NES version is riddled with typos, inaccurate plot elements, and a counter-intuitive menu system. But let’s be honest-- few, if any of us were aware of the MSX version before internet gaming sites came into full blossom. Be that as it may, the NES version was respected as one of the most innovative (albeit frustrating) games of its time, and rightfully so. Despite the many differences from the MSX version, Metal Gear still provided a unique experience you couldn’t get elsewhere.
Yacht Club Games kickstarts an instant classic.
When you think of side-scrolling platformers, it’s hard not to recall old-school classics like Donkey Kong, Super Mario Brothers, and Mega Man. Shovel Knight, a modern day 8-bit 2D side-scrolling platformer, feels like a blast from the past. After an incredibly successful Kickstarter campaign, Yacht Club Games’ first release is a grand slam.
This could be the “Doom Clone” you've been hoping for.
If you’ve tried Wrack in its current early access version on Steam, you’ve no doubt realized that this isn’t another shooter marching lockstep behind Halo and Call of Duty. Wrack is an intentional throwback to the sensibilities of Doom II, and its lead designer, Brad Carney is hoping there are enough people out there looking for that classic experience. Carney sat with me at QuakeCon and talked about the good and bad of having an early access game on Steam and how a six-year (!) development cycle can really benefit an indie game like Wrack.
Get a real feel for Doom's stunning visuals!
Anticipation was high heading into this year’s QuakeCon, and the excitement was all due to the planned reveal of id Software’s upcoming Doom. Without any cameras allowed in and no demo videos or screenshots released, letting you get a good feel for what was shown in two separate demos will be a bit tough. Through the high-tech wizardry afforded us by MS Paint, though, you’re sure to have a full grasp on the dark, brutal, and intense segments shown on stage.
