61 Frames Per Second

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• Trailer Review: Fez

  Fez? Come here a second. Let’s talk, you and I, of the way the world is. The world is a cruel and indifferent monstrosity, full of danger, heartbreak, joy, and satisfaction. The sun rises and sets on the just and unjust alike. We wake, every morning, guaranteed of but one thing: there will be a new Madden game this year. Chances are it will be good and people will buy it. Other things are not guaranteed but are most likely going to happen. Someone will make a game with a gun in it and you will shoot things with that gun. Some kids will trade Pokemon and they will laugh together about it. And, I hope, and I pray, that you will come out and we can finally, after so long, be together. Fez, the world can be a lonely place. Come away with me, Fez. Anyways. Yeah. Fez came out of its hibernation den at GDC last week. It looks fan-flippin-tastic. Delight in its wares! Read More... Posted Apr 01 2009, 04:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, trailer review, pokemon, madden, Fez

• Henry Hatsworth Prototype Not as Awesome as Final Game, Still Awesome

  A few weeks ago, I saw a trailer for Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure. Then I freaked out. Because it looked fantastic. Last week, Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure came out. Turns out it isn’t fantastic. It is totally fantastic in every possible way there is to be fantastic and sweet. Okay, in fairness, I’ve only played the first few levels, so I’m not sure how deep it is or how good it is overall. (Derrick tells me it gets hard near the middle. We’ll see.) From the start, though, the platforming’s methodical and silky smooth, the puzzling simple but oh so satisfying. You already know the music’s great. Its sense of humor is everything the trailer promised as well. Hatsworth is a funny, funny game. I want to tell you about Tea Time in the game, but I also don’t want to ruin it for you. Tea Time made me laugh out loud on a crowded subway. I can, however, show you what the prototype of Tea Time looks like without ruining anything! Read More... Posted Mar 27 2009, 07:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, nintendo ds, ea, trailer review, ost, madden, prototype, Tiburon, henry hatsworth in the puzzling adventure, henry hatsworth

• Trailer Review: Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure

  Videogames do bad things to your brain. Not games themselves, but the business and marketing that surrounds them. Familiarity, as they say, breeds contempt. When I see a name like Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure, I immediately think of poop. It’s bound to some terrible Professor Layton clone, right? Surely, it has to be Data Design Interactive’s latest abomination. You don’t expect it to be some awesome 2D platformer/puzzle game hybrid. You especially don’t expect it to be coming from EA’s Tiburon studio. Tiburon makes Madden! Watch this trailer and get excited. Read More... Posted Mar 02 2009, 03:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, nintendo, nintendo ds, ea, trailer review, wii, madden, tiger woods, professor layton, Tiburon, henry hatsworth in the puzzling adventure, ncaa, data design interactive, henry hatsworth

• The Super Mario Bandit Strikes Again

  It's a pretty slow news day, so I fired up Google News and searched for "video games" by date. Usually, I'm awash with old curmudgeons bemoaning kids today with their "electronic gizmos", alarmist reporters talking with their local hospital director about "Wii-itis", and star athletes dishing on how they like to unwind with a game of Madden. Fascinating, right? But today, I stumbled on something that gave me a few giggles: Read More... Posted Jan 28 2009, 02:00 PM by Cole Stryker with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: comedy, cole stryker, madden, wario, mainstream media, super mario, waluigi

• The Madden IQ and The Future of Competitive Gaming

  I’ve said it before here at 61 Frames Per Second, but the Madden series baffles me. The game’s massive popularity here in the states — three Madden titles are among the ten all-time best selling titles in America — makes sense. Football is awesome and people love it. It’s the game’s popularity in spite of monumental difficulty that makes my brain itchy. Sometimes, you just need a different perspective on things. Hooksexup’s own Joseph Lazauskas is an old school Madden-ite. In this 61FPS guest spot, he gives us some insight into why Madden ’06–’08 are three of the best selling games ever made and why the just released Madden ’09 represents not just the future of the franchise, but the future of mainstream competitive gaming. – JC Written by Joseph Lazauskas There once was a time when John Madden’s illustrious football video game was my crack; I’d be in a sleepless fit the week before it’s release, and oh yes, I was a proud participant in the midnight-Madden release “parties” at the Wayne, New Jersey Gamestop for years. I’d run home and play all-night with the other Madden junkies in online “sim” leagues. From 2003 to 2006, Madden catered to us obsessives, and we were eternally grateful for the increasingly complex control. I played enough to be ranked in the top 100 online at one point (a stellar feat, if I say so myself). But Madden’s switch to the current console generation found the game significantly dumbed-down, and my interest in it dropped as a result. Starting college, embracing substance abuse and entering a relationship didn’t help. I go to a very liberal arts school outside NYC, with a 3:1 girl to guy ratio. No one there, as you can imagine, really wants to play Madden. Even when I found someone that would play, the difference in our skill levels was too great for the game to be any fun. That’s why, unlike a lot of hardcore Madden-ers, I think the mainstream-focused — but re-balanced — Madden 2009 is fantastic, and it might be the future of head-to-head games thanks to the Madden IQ. Read More... Posted Aug 22 2008, 12:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: mario kart, madden, smash bros, joseph lazauskas, nba live

• This Just In: Olympians Play Video Games

  Did you guys hear? Michael Phelps is a gamer. He loves hip-hop music, video games and watches DVDs endlessly while relaxing between races. He's also kind of a jerk about it. One week, he played so much Tiger Woods PGA Tour Golf on his Nintendo Wii, he came to practice with a sore shoulder, and Bowman said if that ever happened again he was taking the video game console away. Video games are one of his favorite escapes, and if he wants to play them, no one is going to stop him. This is especially true of girlfriends or potential girlfriends. "If I want to play video games, I'm playing video games," he says. Amanda Beard is a gamer, and she's totally jazzed about being on the cover of that new Olympics video game. Read More... Posted Aug 18 2008, 06:00 PM by Cole Stryker with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: cole stryker, halo, madden, olympics, tiger woods, mainstream media, michael phelps

• Brett Favrerererer Wins: The Inexplicable Popularity of Madden

  You may or may not have noticed this whilst reading 61 Frames Per Second, but we don’t talk about simulators that often. Personally, and you’ll most likely find this true of the rest of the team, I don’t play Gran Turismo or Microsoft Flight Simulator. If I’m playing a videogame, I want my cars going too fast and defying physics a la Burnout. If I’m playing a videogame, I want my airplane to be shooting many other planes while looking awesome and defying physics a la After Burner. The same goes for sports. Tecmo Bowl, NHLPA ’93, and Hot Shots Golf are fun because they don’t provide authentic football, hockey, and golf experiences. This is why I’ve always been somewhat mystified by the Madden franchise’s massive popularity; in its modern incarnations, it is a brutally realistic simulation of football. In order to play Madden well – not competition level, but actually using the game’s mechanics properly – you need to have both a deep understanding of the actual sport’s rules as well as the game’s incredibly complex controls. Football rules, sure, but how did a game so hard become so damn popular? Read More... Posted Aug 07 2008, 04:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, ea, gran turismo, madden, after burner, brett favre, hot shots golf, nhl, burnout

• Guns and Football: The Ten Best Selling Games in America

  It’s one thing to hear people in the international community exclaim that Americans are loud slobs who don’t care about anything except violence and football. It’s another to see it spelled out in raw numbers. Brian Caulfield of Forbes, using data provided by the NPD Group, wrote an article early last week looking at the ten best selling videogames in the US as of April 2008. The list, after the jump. Read More... Posted Jun 09 2008, 12:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, top ten, call of duty, guitar hero, halo, grand theft auto, madden