Conference Call

GWJ Conference Call Episode 204

Dragon Age 2, LittleBigPlanet 2, Hoard, Spy Party, Bastion, NBA JAM, Games in 3D, Steel Battalion, Mortal Kombat, Our Show Live From PAX 2010! and more!

This week Shawn, Elysium, Cory and Julian record the show live at PAX in front of an audience of amazing GWJ community members. Momgamer also sets us straight on the importance of PAX.

To contact us, email [email protected]! Send us your thoughts on the show, pressing issues you want to talk about or whatever else is on your mind. You can even send a 30 second audio question or comment (MP3 format please) if you're so inclined. You can also submit a question or comment call in to our voicemail line at (612) 284-4563!

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Show credits

Music credits: 

Intro/Outtro Music - Ian Dorsch, Willowtree Audioworks

Comments

Hoard, not Horde

*runs back to his mausoleum*

Your mom's a hoard.

Can't wait to get home today.

Downloading the episode. Won't get a listen tonight. To tired. Sad thing is I missed the Live episode around my birthday last year and repeated the same thing this year.

I hope it doesn't become a habit. I'd love to catch a live show during PAX.

I'll have to check out Bastion, missed that one. See, this is why I don't go visit the expo hall, someone else I know will hand-pick the good stuff and put it all on a convenient website for my perusal

Edit: tweets baleeted.

I can close my eyes and watch you guys record this all over again in my memory. Good times, glad I was there for this.

Mickey (both the section about Epic Mickey in the first part, and the offshoot from talking about Warren Specter in the second): It's really clear how little time you guys have spent playing Kingdom Hearts between you, and I think that's a real problem here. A lot of the stuff you claim they never do or won't do or worse happened there, and did it five years ago.

Mickey has lost friends in games before. That wouldn't be new. Just because a character is obscure doesn't mean they don't use it. Clarabell the Cow is from that era and isn't exactly common vernacular and she's in Kingdom Hearts II - there's a whole level devoted to these characters. Mickey is a huge part of all the Kingdom Hearts game; he's literally the King of the whole universe. If Square had a lock on the Disney characters, then he wouldn't be in Epic Mickey.

And we have an updated comparison for when Epic Mickey ships. I just picked my copy of Birth By Sleep (the latest one exclusive to the PSP) this evening and I'll let you see how that goes.

Even if it's just "binary", I bet the good/evil choice isn't going to be any thinner than anything else. Who has implemented a good one? Maybe Fable II? Then add the giant baggage of The House of Mouse. No bueno.

PAX DVD: I don't think there's going to be DVD this year, so your hair is good. Watch PATV for possible content, though.

A GWJ Panel: I say heck yeah. Let's do some community feedback betwixt now and PAX East and see what our collective can come up with.

Dress Code: Blazer and T-shirt is referred to as the "Khoo-niform" at PAX. IMHO you could do worse than to emulate him if you're trying to come off as professional and yet approachable.

Scale Issues:I feel I need to try to make what I said when interrupting Rabbit (which I hope didn't offend him) in a human tongue. You guys were sozzled like boiled owls, and I hadn't slept for three days and I showed up to Jonman's not expecting to get dragged in so I wasn't prepared.

To quote someone from the Who's Afraid of PAX thread:

Seraph wrote:

A friend summed it up succintly: PAX is the ultimate nerd slumber party.

Exactly. Or to quote Tycho,

...For us, PAX succeeds to the extent that we stay out of your way...

It seems weird to a lot of people because it's the exact opposite of the other game trade shows. E3 is a monolithic entity. Whether you're in Kentia or South Hall, the point is you're there to see marketing. That's the framework the whole thing is based on, and there are whole flocks of suspiciously well-groomed individuals to drive it and structure the "story."

PAX has a very different story. It was started by the two guys hosting a party, and the point of it was to hang out and play games. They gathered together all the different stuff they like to do, and then the party's guests grew it from there. The event is just a framework that everyone hangs their own fun off of. In effect, it's a Rabbitcon that got seriously out of hand.

If you're going into it expecting that monolithic experience but when you get there you find the party, it is going to seem weird.

The PAX experience is in the people you talk to and interact with. It's going to Steel Battalion Boot Camp and then taking your squad down to get something eat and plan your strategy for the campaign session later that night. It's the game of "Win, Lose, Banana" played with the barrista on the 4th floor Tully's at midnight. It's playing Cthulu Dice with Steve Jackson HIMSELF. It's you and three friends or, even better, three strangers on the Rockband Freeplay stage belting out "Eye of the Tiger" in front of 100 people standing around and just nailing it and having the crowd stand and cheer at the end.

The multiple murders of douchebags are what happens when something becomes too cool. These guys haven't bought into the community, and when enough of them show up it makes it more difficult for that community to function.

They are aware that this thing loses something when it gets too big. PAX East was supposed to be a safety valve, but instead it just became the same problem in one year flat. I do know they are working on the problem, but I don't know what they're going to do about it.

Beach Ball: And while I am a mom and part of job description is to ruin people's fun, I wasn't trying to dis the beach ball. As an attendee it was awesome and we've found ways to make it work now. We had that Metroid at the concert this year. But that year in Maydenbauer Center it was expensive in terms of camera equipment and light bulbs.

Collections and Older Equipment: Girls do collect, and we do have old hardware. You may not be aware of this, but over 200 of my games are brought in for the Console Freeplay Library every year (that's just the "this gen" stuff). I have two working original Xboxen. And my daughter's Genesis and my Dreamcast are going to be in Classic Console next year.

Awesome Mech Action: Maradine is the pagan deity of Steel Battalion, and they do work hard all year 'round on that. I know he'd be glad that you enjoyed yourselves this much. If you want some more info about this, I can put you in touch with the guy who runs Classic Console and he can talk about O'Reagan and generally how the classic collections are managed and maintained.

Oh, and there is a reason for the switch flipping. If you knew why the regular pilots flip those switches it would make more sense. The "UI" for these sorts of very specialized vehicles does not waste time on pretty consumer-type idiot gauges.

I had an awesome time meeting everyone and I can't wait to do it again. It is hard work, but this is really one of the things that I do for fun. All this said, I gotta go to bed. I gotta be at work at 5am. Back to the real world until PAX East.

Did you guys discuss The Old Republic in the end? I heard Cory mention that he wanted to talk about it next, but I don't remember anything after that.

Sonicator wrote:

Did you guys discuss The Old Republic in the end? I heard Cory mention that he wanted to talk about it next, but I don't remember anything after that.

We missed it (and a few others) so we'll probably follow up on that next week.

Just getting to the Warren Spector part now, but a few thoughts...

Can someone punch Cory every time he says "Gimmick"? I am so sick of him throwing that around any time some developer tries something new.

For a Goodjer PAX Panel: Community Building. This is, bar none, the best on-line community ever. Certis and Elysium deserve a lot of credit for setting a standard of behavior and sticking to it - I wish every community would follow your example, and I think it would be really interesting to get the CEOs from here on a panel with someone from XBox Live and Blizzard (maybe toss someone from Penny-Arcade's forums on there to fill up a room) discuss the different approaches to building a community.

Momgamer - I just want to chime in from an East Coast perspective, that you and your daughter, along with the rest of the Enforcers, really did a great job, and your volunteering was appreciated.

Atras wrote:

Can someone punch Cory every time he says "Gimmick"? I am so sick of him throwing that around any time some developer tries something new.

It means candy!

still working through the podcast...

Dragon Age : I believe currently the official situation with the PC version is still that the combat gameplay is going to be identical to the first game, with possibly some minor alterations to the distance you can pull out with the camera.

Of course, it would be nice if they bothered to actually SHOW this so that people can stop fretting over it.

Man, first Warren Spector and then the Steel Battalion thing. Certis might get the PAX banhammer.

Oh, and to the lurkers out there: hello, ladies.

So, Mortal Kombat is rock-sauce and tight but not "the bomb?"

PAX sounds like so much fun. I may have to jump on a plane and join you guys next year.

Coolness just found!

The guy you mentioned with the ZX Spectrum has a blog and has posted a nice writeup about what it took to get the thing up and running here in the US at PAX. Take a look at this!

Certis wrote:
Sonicator wrote:

Did you guys discuss The Old Republic in the end? I heard Cory mention that he wanted to talk about it next, but I don't remember anything after that.

We missed it (and a few others) so we'll probably follow up on that next week.

Great, thanks.

Too late, I suppose, but I vote for a colostomy of douchebags as the collective word

Great conference call guys! Made me sore I missed PAX east when I was in Boston.

Calling it the bomb would have been going to far. We do have standards you know!

rabbit wrote:

Calling it the bomb would have been going to far. We do have standards you know!

To be fair, you did call something "the bomb" later in the show. Standards indeed, sir. Indeed.

Oh you teases! I think I heard Elysium briefly mention being disappointed in SWTOR, but you guys never got back to it. Anybody care to elaborate?

From the way you all were talking about 'the Spector Encounter' I'd begun to think Certis had thrown up on his blue suede shoes and cast aspersions on his cat.

I would just like to point out that I supported Elysium's assertions on Twitter.

If there is a place where glasses on 3D makes sense for gaming, it's on the PC. One person looking at a relatively small screen and controlling the action for their own benefit makes it workable. I'm not completely convinced, but I do see the possibility of it working.

I had so much fun on the way to work and on the way home listening to your live from jonman's house podcast and I vow to be in attendance next year.

The problem as I see it with 3d on PC, and to a lesser degree console, is the variable frame rate.

harrisben wrote:

The problem as I see it with 3d on PC, and to a lesser degree console, is the variable frame rate.

As long as the refresh rate is constant, I don't know that this would be a huge problem.

Chairman_Mao wrote:
harrisben wrote:

The problem as I see it with 3d on PC, and to a lesser degree console, is the variable frame rate.

As long as the refresh rate is constant, I don't know that this would be a huge problem.

Yeah, for the PC the hardware would have to be good enough for a constant 120 fps, so definitely not low end. But as soon as you can pin it there there possibility is real.

MrDeVil909 wrote:
Chairman_Mao wrote:
harrisben wrote:

The problem as I see it with 3d on PC, and to a lesser degree console, is the variable frame rate.

As long as the refresh rate is constant, I don't know that this would be a huge problem.

Yeah, for the PC the hardware would have to be good enough for a constant 120 fps, so definitely not low end. But as soon as you can pin it there there possibility is real.

Well what I'm wondering is whether the way it works on a PC is that it would update the screen at 120hz regardless of the framerate--so even the game starts chugging at 30 or 40fps, the screen would still be refreshing at 120hz to keep the 3d effect going. Obviously it'd have to still render at a framerate that creates a factor of 120, but I bet the video card could compensate.