First off, it’s important to remind you, dear readers, who Carmen San Diego is. This is especially important for those who haven’t even come across the fiendish Carmen in their video gaming lives (poor you).

Well, Carmen San Diego isn’t an actual person. The name actually refers to a media franchise of edutainment (there’s that word again) computer games, television programs, books and other media featuring a thieving villainess of the same name. Here’s a more thorough description from Wikipedia:

The basic premise of the franchise has the player getting into the role of an agent for the ACME Detective Agency, which attempts to thwart and capture V.I.L.E. ringleader and former ACME agent Carmen San Diego. The series initially focused on teaching geography and history, though it later branched out into mathematics, English and other subjects.

Originally distributed in the United States and Canada, most of the computer games are now available to international audiences. With the exception of Carmen San Diego: Junior Detective Edition, all the games in the series are aimed at preteens although the geography and history games are often difficult enough for adults since much of the trivia learned is not widely known. Many entries in the series contain elements of various genres, including mystery, comedy, science fiction, spy-fi and fantasy.

You gotta love this game. I know, I know … edutainment software usually sucks, but Carmen San Diego is a break from the mold. Before reviving my addiction for this game, the last time I played it was, hmmm, almost two decades ago. Yes, the game, or rather the franchise, is that old.

The first of the series, Where in the World is Carmen San Diego, was released way back in 1985 for the Apple II computer. Hooray for Apple II users like me! The game was later ported to other systems, thanks to the efforts of developer Brøderbund.

Here’s a list for Carmen San Diego fanatics who wish to look up one of their childhood’s fondest games:

More Carmen San Diego in a later post.

Post from: EveryJoe

Where in the World is Carmen San Diego? Apparently, everywhere

Anyway, without further ado, I present to you dear readers my answers to Aiza’s meme:

1. Name and Job/s (if I want to share it) - Joel, freelance writer and editor by day, mild-mannered father by afternoon, and video game addict hell-bent on virtual world domination by night.

2. You’re currently playing? - Perfect World, which is, in my mind, currently the best MMORPG available in this little tropical country, Drift City, MMOdom’s answer to my Need For Speed, and a plethora of old video games, including Super Mario Brothers, Adventure Island, Where in the World is Carmen San Diego, and Contra. I’m also into—gasp!—casual gaming with AstroPop, Dynomite, Zuma, and Feeding Frenzy topping my list.

3. Favorite game genre/s - It’s got to be MMORPGs and their direct predecessors RPGs and adventure games. Real-time strategy comes a close second.

4. Favorite game/s of all time - Hmmm, let’s see. There’s the Zoids series for the Gameboy, the Super Mario Brothers series for the Nintendo systems, and the Starcraft, Warcraft and The Sims series for the PC. Oh, wait, I forgot to include the totally mind-blowing Total War series. They really rock!

5. Favorite game character/s - Megaman, hands down.

6. Earliest and fondest memory of gaming? - Hundreds of hours playing Taipan on my rusty and yellowing-with-age Apple IIc. It was sooooo good, despite the lack of graphics and sounds. Incidentally, I revived my Taipan addiction by playing Tradewinds.

7. Most hated gaming moment/s - Does spending an entire day trying to get a little brown alien out of a pit count?

8. Gaming gadgets/consoles you own/owned - In order of “appearance”: Coleco Telstar Arcade, Mattel Intellivision, Pac-Man arcade machine, Galaxian Travel arcade machine, Apple IIc, Atari 2600, Nintendo Family Computer, IBM PC (the really old one that came in a very heavy metal casing), Nintendo Super Entertainment System, Gameboy, Playstation, and this computer I’m using now.

9. If you had a “gamer’s shirt,” what would the color and design be? - Hmmm, color, hot pink … with the line, “I’m wearing this because …” in front, and ” … my girlfriend (wife, lover, boo, whatever) pwned me in PvP.”

10. Gaming stuff on your wish list? - A very powerful laptop and unlimited wifi connection.

Oh, wait, it doesn’t end here. I’m going to bring this meme a bit further by tagging some friends in the local MMORPG industry. Let’s hear it from Mon, Carlo, PJ, John, Chino, and Chris.

Well, that’s it for now. Stay tuned for their answers to Aiza’s meme. I’ll make sure to repost them here. *wink, wink*

Screenshot taken by Jake Majadillas (bonAkid of Perfect World Philippines Tiger Server) and modified by Joel from the online game Perfect World, property of Beijing Perfect World Co. Ltd. Cross posted on MMOtaku.

Post from: EveryJoe

Egad, I’ve been tagged!

If you’re a regular visitor of this blog and the rest of the Video Games Channel of b5media, then you probably already know why I’ve been gone for almost a week. If not, well, here’s a short explanation (which I also posted on my other b5media blog, MMOtaku):

Whew! What a nasty week! I won’t bore you guys with details; suffice it to say that I—and I guess a hundred or so Internet service subscribers in this little town—had a hell of a boring time with little or no Internet connection.

Well, if any good came out of the sudden loss of Internet connection, it’s probably the extra time to break out some old consoles and games and play them. And I’ve played a good number of old games on my now-dysfunctional Atari 2600, Nintendo Family Computer, and Super Nintendo Entertainment System.

I tried to make my rusty and musty Apple IIc up and running, but it’s just too old and dirty—courtesy of a family of mice that have made the computer their home. And my Coleco Telstar Arcade isn’t in any better shape, with only the Pong side running—and I’m not really in the mood for Pong or any other game that emulates tennis in some form.

So I’ve stuck to playing some of the Atari 2600, Nintendo Family Computer and Super Nintendo Entertainment System’s most beloved games, including two Star Wars games, Jedi Arena and Death Star Battle, Street Fighter, and Starfox.

Okay, that’s it for now. Stay tuned to Re:Retro for more retro-gaming goodness!

Post from: EveryJoe

More Atari, Famicom, and SNES games on Re:Retro

Aww yeah! It’s time once again to welcome another blog to the b5 media games channel.

Games Industry Wire is a blog written by our newest games blogger Justin Tippins and it concerns, oddly enough, the games industry itself rather than the games it produces…

There will be interviews, analysis, news… Oh! The content… Mmmmm…

Welcome aboard Justin! Stop by and check it out, it’s already shaping up to be a great blog!

Games Industry Wire.

Post from: EveryJoe

New blog: Games Industry Wire!

That’s right folks, having not long ago launched this blog, the b5media video games channel continues to grow with today’s announcement of the addition of Play Designs.

The second blog b5 is rocking written by your friend and mine, the lovely Amber Loe.

I think you’re gonna like her, she’s into the same kinds of things as people like us… You know, games and web programming and all those geeky things we get up to. Seriously, go talk to her man…

What’s that? You don’t know her well enough? Well find out more in her profile then…

Listen, you’re totally gonna dig what she’s doing over there… It’s all about game development, you be mad crazy to miss this… Did I mention she’s also an Adventuress?

Go on man…

Go on!

Post from: EveryJoe

Play Designs, yo!

I guess I should have mentioned this yesterday when the launch was officially announced.

That’s right, Re:Retro is now a real blog that’s ready to go! If this is your first time here, welcome! My name is Jonic, and this is Re:Retro, which will become a prime source of retro gaming goodness for you to devour with your occular apparatus.

My apologies if the design looks a little shoddy, but we had to launch in a bit of a rush last night after I started getting quite a few links coming in. Many thanks to fellow b5ers Play-Girlz (twice), Kapped, Nintendo Gal, Infendo and 4cr (although I’d have liked a link back from you :P).

It appears yesterday’s post about The World of Nintendo proved rather popular (even if I did tip all the aforementioned websites off about it) so we had to launch there and then. I had about an hour to get the design working in Internet Explorer so it might look a little shakey there.

This is just the start, I’m going to work really hard on this and this website will hopefully be seen as a benchmark of retro games blogs written by me.

Thanks for stopping by, whether you’re new here or not! Now subscribe to the feed and start commenting!

Jonic.

Post from: EveryJoe

Re:Retro go!

My name’s Jonic and I’m the writer of Re:Retro, welcome!

Re:Retro is a blog that deals with, predictably enough, retro games. However, here I’ll also be covering video games that are now all grown up and have titles on the shelves today (see Sonic, Mario, Metroid, Prince of Persia, TLoZ etc), that’s what puts the ‘Re:’ in Re:Retro! That’s clever that.

Retro games (and their newer releases) are a huge market and probably the one most cherished by gamers the world over, but googling “retro games blog” doesn’t return anything worthwhile. With that in mind I’m aiming to make this the most widely read and well respected retro game blog on all of the Internets.

If you want to help out then get in touch. You can email me at [jonic at b5media dot com] to send me tips or links, and be sure to comment-comment-comment if you have something to say. Nothing brings out the fanboy/girl in a gamer than talking about retro games. We can turn this into a place for thoughtful, informed discussion about the games we all know and love.

Then I can ruin it all by proclaiming Sonic to be better than Mario. Wouldn’t that be like kicking a wasps’ nest?

This website is a part of b5media’s brand new gaming channel! Take a look because we’re rocking whole load of blogs you’re gonna love. It’s well weapon. I also write a blog about Sega within the channel. It’s called The Daily Sega. That too is well weapon.

If for some strange reason you want to find out more about me then gobble up the data at the end of the following uniform resource locator with your eyes: http://www.b5media.com/jonic-linley/

Thanks for stopping by, here’s to the future of the past!

Jonic.

Post from: EveryJoe

Welcome to Re:Retro!