Eye of Judgement - Sony's unbearably compelling CCG, played with the upcoming Playstation Eye peripheral - may be the most niche product ever conceived. A constructible deck card game that requires a custom camera and a six hundred dollar gaming console to interpret it, "niche" may be insufficient to describe the tight, sunless, deep sea crevice such a product might reside in. Not that it matters to me, of course: I am the pale white lobster that makes such cracks his home.
Webcams always make me slightly uncomfortable, though. They aren't so much evil as they are, well... cameras, pointed constantly at my face. I've never been able to determine if I'm worried about being surveilled through them, or if I think the device itself houses some prurient intellect. I needn't worry in this case, as Eye of Judgement comes with a special stand - a kind of personal Barad-dûr - which makes the camera gaze down upon the battlemat. In "judgement," presumably.
If you find the basic ideas presented here interesting, you need to make it a point to stop by Gamespot today - they just posted the most robust preview available for the game, along with a couple videos that reveal the play mechanics. It's really something else. Games that combine deck dynamics with tabletop positioning liquefy my will, making resistance impossible. Culdcept Saga, the Magic/Monopoly hybrid I have extolled in the past, is appealing for many of the same reasons - minus the physicality of actual cards, for which I will admit a shameful fetish.
I find it appealing and would enter into a Faustian bargain to acquire it, placing my eternal soul on equal par with a USB digicam and a few sealed boosters. The equipment required to even get in the door of this thing represents a material investment, but for the right product, cost is irrelevant - as we have discussed in previous installments, desire and perception warp our ideas of acceptable pricing. Is this game worth the cost? How about this game plus Final Fantasy XIII? This game plus FFXIII plus the fully constituted social online experience which must, even now, be in development?
The new Gears maps available this Thursday throw this principle into brutal relief. Epic has claimed that these maps should be free, and so for many any price over zero is unacceptable. I would prefer to pay zero for the things I want - but then, I've wanted maps based on the Garden, Imulsion Processing, and Swamp themes from day one. A map - an engineered play space - has a value which is, for me, substantially greater than a simulated rock song. As the map is learned, its entertainment value increases. I will remember that it was there, near that statue, that Kiko managed two enemies while I took the flank. I've only played the new Rainbow Maps for six hours thus far, and already there are stories worth telling the next day.
I don't endorse every scrap of content that populates the service. The first GRAW pack was a knife in the ribs and the Guitar Hero II content was the work of a throbbing parasite. I am roused to violence when I believe we are being robbed. I just don't happen to believe this is one of those times.
(CW)TB out.
PAX 2007 is creeping up on us and I’ve got another batch of info about this year’s show to share with you.
First off I can finally announce our keynote speaker. You probably know him best as Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: The Next Generation. That’s right it’s writer,actor,geek icon Wil Wheaton! Wil has been in a bunch of movies but he’s also written a couple books, Dancing Barefoot and Just a Geek. He of course maintains his mega popular blog at wilwheaton.net and he contributes to a handful of other tech and media blogs. Tycho and I are both really excited to have Wil on board this year. Maybe too excited in fact. I had to sign some paperwork promising to never refer to him as “Wesley” or ask him if he and the Daledian princess Salia ever “did it”.
Something I look forward to every year is the Omegathon. We’ll actually be taking a lot of steps this year to make the Omegathon a more important and interactive part of the show experience. I can’t say much more about those ideas right now but I can tell you what this year’s Omegathon prize will be. I think each year we’ve been able to out do the previous year’s prize and this year is no exception. The winner of the 2007 Omegathon will receive a trip for two to the Tokyo Game Show along with $5,000 is spending money. We’ll be taking care of everything for you from airfare to hotel and giving you some cash to spread around once you get there. The Tokyo Game Show will be held Sept. 22-23 at the Makuhari Messe convention complex just outside Tokyo. This is honestly something I’ve always wanted to attend. Just a heads up, if you win this I expect a full report.
I can also finaly announce this year’s headlining band The Minibosses. They’ll be joining The OneUps, MC Frontalot, Jonathan Coulton, Freezepop, The Neskimos and Optimus Rhyme. You can get info and listen to tracks from all this year’s artists on the PAX site.
PAX 2007 is really shaping up to be a show you don’t want to miss. We’ve got a massive new venue, a projected attendance of 30,000 people, more than fifty exhibiting companies, and the greatest line up of geek music ever assembled under one roof. Plus everything else you expect from PAX like Console free play, arcade machines, a huge Lan Party, panels with industry pros, the Omegathon and a ton of other shit I can’t think of right now. There’s just no other way to say it, this show is going to be fucking nuts.
-Gabe out
Welcome to the show notes for Downloadable Content 05/02/2007, "The Lidless Eye." The episode is available for direct download at this link, or feel free to subscribe to our iTunes compatible feed here. This guide will help you navigate our frequently insane and often rambling conversation.
2:59 - (Long, pronounced sigh.)
4:45 - He never wrote back.
7:00 - Here is the website for Mantel Global Industries, the fictional site that is tied into Haze. Free Radical for President in '08! Or Prime Minster, or whatever. Here's the link about them doing the next Battlefront, if you're interested. I don't know if it's official official yet, but I did read it on the Internet. I'm sure that's sufficient!
16:48 17:35 - We had this conversation before David Jaffe's second and third posts, where he grows increasingly distant from reality - we refer instead to the original post, which - although a little tendentious - is a portrait of what it must be to be a human being who also happens to create interactive entertainment. We were moved by it.
26:52 - Working on an actual videogame has been a profoundly humbling experience that we would like to write about, but (and I think you will agree) Penny Arcade isn't the best venue. So we're working on another site to do that kind of stuff on.
28:55 - Here's that E3 floorplan we were talking about.
30:05 - Here is a link to Brad McQuaid's post about Vanguard. Technically, it's a link to a link about Vanguard. I have faith you will not be thwarted!
31:33 - The "Buggy Saint's Row" guy is Cabel Sasser. I think he might have written my FTP client? I'm not sure.
38:47 - It's probably apparent from this conversation that we're still freaking out about Odin Sphere. Don't throw your lamb bones as weapons! I guess that's today's lesson. By the way, we did talk with Nippon Ichi about advertising Grim Grimoire, and it's a go. It's a real-time strategy game executed in 2D, platformer-style terrain, and it's from Vanillaware - the same developer who made Odin Sphere. Probably best just to link you to more information.
43:45 - Here's a link to the comic Gabe is talking about, the one about the Starcraft MMO.
46:42 - Ah, Evil Avatar. Penny Arcade's silent partner.
51:19 - Here's that Aquarian Age Alternative video again. I posted the wrong link before, sorry about that.
53:25 - Okay, maybe a little shame.
(CW)TB
