Up late talking games & writing? You're...

Games: If you're interested in reading more about female representation in customizable games, Kotaku reposted my recent blog about Brink’s sausagefest status and there are quite a few comments following after. I haven't read the entire thread, but it seems pretty clear that there are a lot of opinions out there… in any event, I'm not going to get back into that whole issue right now but I will say two more quick things on it:

1> I’m fully aware of the technical requirements in creating 3D models of different genders. If you wrote in to ‘educate’ me, let me just say now that illustrating this issue in great detail does not alter my opinion even a bit. You can stop now. Why? Because...

2> At whatever point in the development process the decision had to be made, Splash Damage decided that having female models was less important than having the other features that were included. There is no denying this -- the developers have said it themselves.

Ultimately, that's where I get stuck… in the current environment and with so many other customization-heavy games offering the choice between genders, the fact that female models were seen as expendable just doesn't sit right with me. It’s just as simple as that.

(Oh, I guess I have one more thing to say… if you left me a rude comment and have now noticed that it's no longer present, I've deleted it. This isn't a public forum, this is my personal blog. If you can't keep a civil tone, then I don't feel any obligation to leave your message up. Just sayin’.)


In other news, my review of Blue Toad Murder Files, Episodes 4,5, & 6 is now live at GameCritics. Click here and read up on this episodic murder mystery/multiplayer puzzler if you’ve got a minute or two.


Moving on, there were quite a few things in the inbox today. Since I'm already half-asleep, I'm going to post a bunch of these here and then get myself to bed…



Uber Entertainment sent in a link to a video for their upcoming XBLA game titled Monday Night Combat. I love the art style, and it seems like a great mash-up of elements. I can't say that I'm the biggest shooter fan out there, but I've always been fascinated with the combat-as-entertainment concept, and it seems like this one covers quite a wide range of bases.



My good friend Matt sent in this link to a video of MGS: Peace Walker. I hadn't actually seen this particular one before, and it's fairly long. It goes into quite a bit of detail about the game's different modes and although I was already going to play it regardless, I can honestly say that it seems a lot more interesting after having watched this clip.


Ninjabee, the folks behind one of my favorite XBLA titles (Cloning Clyde) have come up with a new entry that will be hitting Microsoft's service in the near future. Titled Ancients of Ooga, it seems to share a few elements with its predecessor, while being substantially different. Don't have a lot of info on this one at the moment, but I will be keeping my eye on it.



I've talked about Section 8 before, both here at the blog and at GameCritics, but it still seems as though not very many people have tried it, or even know about it. If you want some specific info, you can read my main review or Trent Fingland’s second op. If either of those pieces raised your interest, you might want to know that the game is 50% off between May 11-18 on Sony’s PSN service. There’s also a tutorial video here, if you'd like to see more. Like I said before, I'm not the biggest shooter fan, but I will say that I had a really good time with this game, warts and all.