OH F#?!: CURSEBIRD CREATOR BRINGING TWITTER TO CALL OF DUTY THIS WEEK?
This is certainly one of the most potentially interesting surprises I’ve heard in some time: NetworkWorld is reporting that 19 year old Richard ‘Fantastic‘ Henry, creator of Twitter expletive-tracking web-app Cursebird, has been hired by Call of Duty 4 developer Infinity Ward to create another “Twitter-related project.”
What could this be? Something similar, perhaps (or inspired by, even?) to friend of Offworld Tom Armitage’s Left 4 Dead Twitter-bots? In-game messaging brought directly to your mobile/desktop?
No one’s talking quite yet, but it looks like the wait won’t be long: Henry tweeted just yesterday that the project is ‘hopefully launching this week.’
A few clean words from the creator of Cursebird [NetworkWorld, via Multiplayer]
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CALL OF DUTY 4, GTAIV, LITTLEBIGPLANET TOP 2009 BAFTA NOMINATIONS
Following its announcement that ‘Pong pioneer’ Nolan Bushnell will be this year’s ‘Fellowship award winner’ for “outstanding achievement through a body of work,” the UK’s BAFTA award committee has announced the finalists for its main game awards, with Activision’s Call of Duty 4 topping the list at seven nominations.
Grand Theft Auto IV came up next with six nominations, and both LittleBigPlanet and Fable II with five, all not including the publicly open ‘Game Award of 2008’ category, which includes Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, Fallout 3, Gears of War 2, Grand Theft Auto IV, Guitar Hero World Tour, Left 4 Dead, LittleBigPlanet, Professor Layton and the Curious Village, Wii Fit, and World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King.
As with the Game Developers Choice awards, I was happy to see Mekensleep’s excellent but under-recognized Soul Bubbles get a nomination in the handheld category, and Shawnimals’ original DS tower defense game Ninjatown in the awards’ strategy category.
Hit the jump for the full list of nominations. (more…)
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DREAM TEAMS: UFC REMIX BRINGS PUNCH-OUT!! TO LIFE
I would never miss UFC fights if it was always like this: the uppercut stars totally make it. See also: ‘lookoutawhale’s similar UFC as Street Fighter II.
lookoutawhale’s YouTube channel [via VG Arts]
Previously:
Video: Real-life Mario Kart – Offworld
Super Mario in real life – Offworld
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METAL GEAR CREATOR HIDEO KOJIMA KEYNOTING GAME DEV CONFERENCE
GDC organizers have sent word that Metal Gear, Zone of Enders and Boktai creator Hideo Kojima will be giving GDC’s creative keynote this year, focusing on “conquering various development obstacles with creative game design, using the driving game design philosophies behind the Metal Gear series as reference.”
Interestingly, event director Meggan Scavio says that Kojima has been invited to keynote the conference for a number of years, but this is the first time he’s actually accepted. The announcement hints at, and I’m hoping that this will be the case via the allusion in the keynote’s title, “Solid Game Design: Making the ‘Impossible’ Possible,” that Kojima will focus on some of the fourth-wall breaking techniques he’s employed in his various games, from the original Metal Gear Solid‘s back-of-the-box and DualShock vibrating events, to the sunshine-catching solar panel in vampire-hunter Boktai‘s Game Boy cartridge.
Kojima will be joining a keynote lineup that already includes Nintendo president Satoru Iwata on “Discovering New Development Opportunities,” and ngmoco head Neil Young’s mobile games keynote on “Why the iPhone just changed everything.”
Offworld will be attending GDC this year, and will be covering all things GDC in coming weeks.
GDC Keynotes [Game Developers Conference]
Previously:
Metal Gear's December Surprise – Offworld
Metal Gear Ac!d coming to mobile phones – Offworld
Tim Schafer returns to GDC Choice Awards, Harmonix honored – Offworld
Game Dev Choice Awards topped by LittleBigPlanet, Braid, Left 4 …
The Offworld Guide to the 2009 Independent Games Festival – Offworld
Unfinished Swan, Feist make IGF Student Showcase finals – Offworld
Fieldrunners, Edge top 2009 IGF Mobile finalists – Offworld
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ACME’S MUSHROOM KINGDOM NOVELTY TOYS: THE PAPER PAPER MARIO AUTOMAT
There are times I fear what might happen if I ever get the gumption to bring my printer out of its mothball storage: the last thing I need is a room further littered with tiny paper creations, but now the urge is overwhelming.
Following his excellent and deviously complex blue Mario Kart shell and Giga Bowser, deviantart user ddi7i4d has created an automaton of paper Paper Mario which — as you’d expect — jumps up and knocks a coin out of his question box. An excellently devised creation that’d do Chris Ware proud.
Paper Mario Automat [Nintendo Papercraft, via Tiny Cartridge]
Previously:
Life-size papercraft Link hat (and hair) – Offworld
Getting crafty: Hattori's Kid Icarus diorama papercraft – Offworld
Getting crafty with Foldskool and Cubecraft – Offworld
Angles we have hung on high – Offworld
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RE-LAUNCHED BETA BRINGS BATTLEFIELD HEROES BACK ON TRACK
EA/DICE’s Battlefield Heroes is one of EA’s most noteworthy in a string of calculated risks: it’s one of the publisher’s first dips into the free-to-play/ad supported realm, particularly in the West, in an attempt to capitalize on alternative revenue streams.
It was also — though I’ve long been barred from going into too many particulars — as refreshingly accessible and fun as it looks, and one of the games that was lurking in shadows and well on its way to pounce directly onto my top games of 2008 list: if the game had made it out in 2008. Late last year, EA closed its beta and sent the game back into DICE’s ovens for a bit more work, leaving everyone to wonder when we might see it again.
Well, the answer, EA has just announced, is tomorrow, as DICE re-launch the closed beta for everyone that was previously supplied with a beta key. The developer is also opening registration for new beta players: to do so, create or login to your EA account and visit the beta sign-up page here. And I do suggest you do.
Closed Beta starts February 11th [Battlefield Heroes]
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BECAUSE HE COULD: ZELDA II: EXPIDITIO LINCI
Translator ‘tempestas_caput‘ doesn’t seem to offer any explanation as to why he’s translated Zelda II into Latin, so we just won’t ask. But it’s not the only game getting his “sleeping language” treatment: he’s also gone alone, dangerously with the original Zelda, and is making his way, even more ambitiously, through Final Fantasy III.
I’d add something profound, but it already took me too long to realize I couldn’t even find an online translator that could tell me how to say “because he could” in Latin.
Zelda II: Expiditio Linci [Romhacking, via and ‘error’ image courtesy Auntie Pixelante]
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IT DON’T MEAN A THING: ANOTHER LAST LOOK AT NOBY NOBY BOY
Namco’s official YouTube channel has updated with a last look at Keita Takahashi’s PS3 downloadable Noby Noby Boy — finally due for a release next week — and it’s as brilliantly opaque as ever. No hints at why there’s a swingy-thing, or where it came from, or why we want to be wrapped around it.
That said, one of the things I’m most excited about following its release is a flood of YouTube videos (with the game’s integrated recording and uploading) just as quietly meaningless and inexplicably amusing as this.
It’s equally amusing that the game’s official website (already in its 3rd or 4th iteration) has now switched to a checkerboard display of tomatos, green peppers, and corn on the cob. It’s full of surprises.
o–o [Namco, via Siliconera]
Previously:
It's a stretch: Explaining Katamari creator's new Noby Noby Boy …
Another new look at Noby Noby Boy – Offworld
Noby Noby Boy stretches further into February – Offworld
Happy Holidays from Offworld (feat. Keita Takahashi) – Offworld
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THE DUBIOUSLY-RELEVANT GAME-LINKS HIDDEN INSIDE MADEFOREACHOTHER
By now you’ve probably spotted the undeniably adorable ‘madeforeachother.com’ TV ads, and probably passed them off as hawking another new dating site, but the truth, it turns out, is much stranger and more wonderful. Strange: because it’s actually a quasi-viral spot for Frito Lay’s chips and dip (of all things), and wonderful, because just look at that site.
While it’s not formally games-related, there’s quite a bit here that tells me that the site’s designers (New York’s Blacklist, the best I can tell) are as well versed in games as any of us. See, especially: the little yellow ball’s vaguely de Blob-ish tale, and then scroll down t– oh, wait! Aha, you can play a little Sardine Hero via the crawdad under the sea, or play a little a S.T.U.N. Runner-lite game down the Jalapeno Highway.
All fantastically designed stuff, and a structure which reminds me quite a bit of LittleBigPlanet artist Rex Crowle’s own GoodThingsShouldNeverEnd website for Orange.
MadeForEachOther [err.. Frito Lay]
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I’M YOUR PUPPET: MEDIA MOLECULE/SONY REVEAL OFFICIAL SACKBOY TOYS
It’s an idea so obvious I’m surprised the announcement has taken this long: tucked away in a Valentine’s pack related post on the official PlayStation blog, Sony and Media Molecule have announced that toy-maker Mezco (who, most notably, are behind the official Goonies line of toys) have been given the license to create a line of toys based on LittleBigPlanet‘s Sackboy.
Sony says the company is debuting the line, “featuring an assortment of 4″ scale Sackboys in all his textured and stitched glory, displaying various characters, poses, and costumes,” at the 2009 International Toy Fair, and the first photos look well modeled and nicely articulated.
While I’m pleased, I’m concerned there might be a missed opportunity to make a Sackboy toy the official games culture Munny/Dunny, and would love to pass it up the chain of command that a blank Sackboy vinyl and accompanying custom art show is even more obvious and necessary.
Sack it to Me (Love is in the Air Edition) [PlayStation.Blog]
Previously:
LittleBigWatch: Free instructions for your Sackboy stitch-up …
New Rolito toy: Patapon X our one true heart – Offworld
The Munny shot: Earthworm Jim edition – Offworld
Reactor-88's Dig Dug Dunnys – Offworld
Nokia gaming up reality with Yamake – Offworld
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