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Showing posts from February, 2006

Really late 2005 game thoughts

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I was going to write a reasonably big 2005 wrap-up post, but being mid-Feburary I don't see the point. I did write a couple of short reviews and I'd hate to see them go to waste. So here we go! Pheonix Wright: Ace Attorney ds Who said adventure games are dead? There's not much game there really - Capcom avoids the dreaded adventure game "getting stuck" by making a linear path with limited choices. The amusement comes from great characters and dead-on comic timing. It's 3/4ths Matlock with 1/4th of wacky Dragonball Z thrown in. Don't expect to learn anything about law, but you're sure to laugh and have a good time. Yoshi's Touch & Go ds Maligned as a throw-away tech demo, YT&G is the most refined touch-screen arcade game I've played. There's none of the structure, the bosses, the fire/ice/jungle levels that players tend to expect of platformers, but there's a surprising richness to the game in balancing the needs of clearing t

From the wilderness

My life's been interesting for a while; finally things have settled down a bit. I left my position at Big Huge Games and recently joined Firaxis to work on an unannounced title. I wish Big Huge Games the best; I'm extremely proud that I was invited to work with them on Rise of Nations and Rise of Legends. ( Rise of Legends has been getting some excellent previews , btw.) They are an exceptionally talented development team. I wish them the best of luck and I hope Rise of Legends tops the charts for a long time and my friends make a lot of money. That said, I'm thrilled to be working on this project at Firaxis and will share details as soon as I have a chance. In other news, my brother, Todd, got a job designing cellphone games at GameLoft in Manhattan. We both want to be game designers and I'm a bit jealous that he gets his shot first. It's his dream job, but he's not much of a big city guy. Seeing some hilarious stories on the horizon, I harassed him into ma