I’ve just finished browsing through Arthur’s Hall of Viking Manliness’ 10 Manliest Video Games of All Time, and I have to say, yes, the list is indeed full of manly video games.
How did the guys up at Arthur’s Hall come up with the idea of giving the world such a list of video games? Shatner (yes, after William Shatner), Arthur’s Viking Assistant, gives us the details:
I had a discussion with Arthur the other day regarding the question, “Are video games manly?” While wasting your life away on a couch playing video games isn’t quite as manly as killing small animals …read more

\r\n\r\nSo who hasn\’t heard of The Three Stooges? You know, Larry, Curly and Moe? No? Doesn\’t ring a bell? Well, if you have no inkling who the three are, then you probably don\’t belong to the generation that watched the original black and white series or their voluminous re-runs.\r\n\r\nI watched a few seasons on the boobtube when I was younger, even the ones with Shemp in it. Yep, before Curly, Shemp was the one taking the beating from Moe, and sometimes Larry. Hmmm, before I go on to the gist of the story, let\’s take a closer look at The …read more

I’ve always been a big fan of stop motion animation. So it also means that I’m a fan of stop motion videos featuring our beloved retro games. In the past year, I’ve posted a few stop motion videos, including one that shows the Super Mario Brothers in Lego and one that substitutes Tetris blocks with living, breathing human beings.
For those who have no inkling of what stop motion animation is, here’s a short description from Wikipedia:
Stop motion (or frame-by-frame) is an animation technique to make a physically manipulated object appear to move on its own. The object is moved by …read more

After suffering a humiliating defeat in the hands, er, paws of Sonic the Hedgehog, Mario is back on a Mugen game, this time versus the yellow chomping machine known as Pac-Man. From the title I just posted, it’s clear that Mario should just go back to cleaning pipes of goombas and turtles.

Look, ma, no hands! It’s strange seeing Pac-Man land blows on the diminutive Mario without flailing arms and legs. It must be his, er, its big mouth.

The debate about who deserves video gamedom’s crown—Mario or Sonic—is probably getting old, but actual fights between the two video game heavyweights deserve attention. Take this video featuring Mario and Sonic beating each other up in a classic Mugen game for example:

Oh, for those wondering what Mugen is, here’s a brief description:
Mugen is a freeware 2D fighting game engine designed by Elecbyte, written in C with the Allegro library. The engine was originally released in July 1999. Beta versions of it were made to work on DOS, Linux and Windows platforms, distributed through their website. The engine allows users to …read more

You may already be sick of Tetris, especially after staring at the world’s largest game of Tetris (maybe because the blocks are of the same color?), but I’m back with another Tetris video.
This video is a classic. Made by Guillaume Reymond of the Gameover Project, the video is no laughing matter as it uses stop-motion photography and a dozen or so men and women. Yes! Live human beings!
Go check out the video and tell me afterward if it doesn’t command respect:
The Original Human TETRIS Performance by Guillaume Reymond @ Yahoo! Video
Actually, Guillame Reymond and the Gameover Project aren’t the …read more

No. I’m not the one who came up with the kooky idea of turning an entire building into a pseudo-monitor just to play what is probably the biggest Tetris game in the universe (unless there’s some alien race out there who implemented the same idea several years ago).
Here’s the description that came with the video of the World’s Largest Tetris:
Take a Linux computer, a joystick-frequency radio, 10,000 Christmas lights, a building, and you have the biggest game of Tetris in the world. Here is the largest Tetris game made with lights in a building. Amazing!
The author of the video neglected …read more

It’s funny how memory works. There are some information stored in the human brain that you can access instantaneously, while others are so deep in your subconscious that it needs a trigger—usually through one’s senses—to get them out. This is exactly what happened to me earlier today when I came across this picture:

For those who are totally unfamiliar with what seems like a Rorschach inkblot test, it is a screenshot from Choplifter, a 1982 Apple II game developed by Dan Gorlin and published by Broderbund. Yes, this image triggered a memory, of playing Choplifter almost 16 hours a day on …read more

I never thought Tetris and its different colored and shaped blocks could be used to sow terror. Check out these two images:

Creative, yes, but the idea of Tetris blocks raining from the sky and sowing terror is preposterous. Not that I don’t like the images. I especially dig the one entitled “The Geometry Revenge” featuring two plus-sized chicks ducking in fear of getting hit by L-shaped Tetris blocks.
Well, if you’re looking for creativity in using Tetris as a medium, here’s probably the most creative video ever:

Tetris: The Movie anyone?
Images courtesy of Eduardo! on flickr and Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins …read more

Raster Blaster, now there’s a great pinball simulation game. Come to think of it, it’s probably the first home computer pinball simulation game. And I had it on my archaic Apple IIc, and played with it from dusk till dawn—at least, during long summer vacations.
Of course, compared with today’s generation of pinball simulation games, Raster Blaster looks crude, with only a handful of bumpers, slingshots, and targets. We have to hand it to Bill Budge, writer and designer of Raster Blaster and its successors, though. He, and not Raster Blaster, paved the way for more elaborate and accurate pinball simulations.
So …read more