Adam Bruno

People often wonder how to become playtesters. Now, while playtesting is an actual job for some people (myself included, formerly), others don’t want to fritter away 40 hours a week (plus “mandatory” overtime) to play the same crappy part of the same crappy game day in and day out. Most people would rather spend a couple of hours playing a good or at least decent game, tell people what they thought about it, and call it a day. While that’s not exactly “playtesting” in the truest sense of the word, it’s what Microsoft is offering. See below!

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Erik Johnson

During an AVN Adult Entertainment Expo crossover debate (Pornography in the age of the Internet) with the adjoining Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, ’specialty’ actor and all-around ugly man Ron Jeremy stated that his industry only caters to those 18 and older; and even if pornographic material slips through the cracks to the youth, video games are still a far worse influence.

I can see where he’s coming from, I was scarred for life during that Mario Bros. tag-team sequence on Toad after the Princess was again absent from yet another castle, and what’s up with Sonic’s masochistic golden shower?

No wait, I got a million of ‘em!

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Adam Bruno

With 2010 looming on the horizon, I can’t help but get a little excited. It’s a whole new year for video games, and – let’s face it, folks – this year kind of sucked. Sure, we had a few good releases here and there, but so many more games were canceled, and even several companies went belly-up.

Honestly, not the desired turnout. Luckily, next year’s looking a bit better, and I’ve got a list of games that I’ll be keeping an eye out for in 2010. Whether I plan on getting them or have simply liked what I saw, I’m hoping that they’ll turn out great. Feel free to comment on anything or even let me know which games you’re personally looking forward to. This goes for editors and visitors alike!

And so…my list! Keep in mind that the dates are tentative. How much do you wanna bet that half will be changed, and a quarter won’t even come out next year?

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Adam Bruno

While it does in fact seem that the country is (slowly) pulling out of its economic recession (especially with November’s successful release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2), we’re apparently not out of the woods yet. In fact, we may be looking at another double-digit drop. That’s not a good thing, but 2009 is widely regarded as an absolutely abysmal year in video game sales, so it’s not surprise. Luckily, all is not lost.

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Meredith Sweet

I was reading through a lecture for an online class of mine when I read a very interesting line: “the track record for video games derived from movie franchises typically don’t fare very well, and that’s because movies are a linear experience, whereas video games are an interactive experience.” My professor’s got a point. Movies have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Video games can be from different characters’ viewpoints, and you can often skip sections or miss scenes. Most games also have multiple endings, with two or three being a common number and 104 being the highest number of endings for a single game that I know of.

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Adam Bruno

Yesterday, I was lucky enough to interview Stephanie Sheh, a talented actress and producer in anime and video games. Her resume is extensive, and her video game credits include Odin Sphere, Tales of the Abyss, Suikoden V, and Resident Evil (she’s the current voice of Rebecca Chambers).

She’s also both produced and lent her voice to the popular anime series FLCL (Fooly Cooly), and her anime credits include Naruto, Bleach, Lucky Star, and Blood+. I also got to meet her friend Kei “K.” Yukon, who was nice enough to give her own input on some questions as well. They both even had some advice for those of us interested in voice-acting.

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Adam Bruno

Meredith’s post about Jack Thompson suing Facebook got me thinking. How much does the average gamer really know about Jack Thompson? I mean, most of us have heard his name before, but how many of us know the sordid details of this disgusting excuse for a human being? I’m not even going to pretend to be objective, here. The man’s a douchebag. Here’s why.

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Adam Bruno

Greetings and salutations! Summer’s almost officially over, and while things are drawing to a close, there are still plenty of exciting events going on. So, without further ado, let’s start some dissecting! We’ll start with the picture above.

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Adam Bruno

Playing Tetris has made you really smart, right? No? Well, blame those paint chips you ate as a kid, because I’ve played a whole lot of Tetris and other puzzle games, and now I’m a freakin’ genius!

Seriously, it turns out playing Tetris can be great for your gray matter! Read on!

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Adam Bruno

With a little bit of Disney magic, Spider-Man could appear in the next Kingdom Hearts! Okay, maybe this is an overstatement, but Disney announced today that it has agreed to purchase Marvel Entertainment for a cool $4 billion. This obviously has a lot of implications for fans of either (or both) companies, and may factor rather heavily into the future of video games. So, what does this mean for us?

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