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• Up All Night: Dino Crisis

  When a refined sort decides that it is time to once again stay up all night, they must make certain preparations to ensure that their endeavor goes smoothly and that they will arrive at the dawn richer having survived their trials. They must ensure the room is properly lit, that they have sustenance to last the long hours, and they must make sure that they have chosen a game that is either appropriately terrible or admirably trashy in its content. They must also make sure to say a quiet prayer to the reining deity of trashy videogames: Shinji Mikami. Shinji Mikami’s reputation is impeccable, no doubt. The man created Resident Evil. Remember though, that even though the original Resident Evil was a genre warping success and Resident Evil 4 was one of the best games ever created, they’re also prime candidates for Up All Night. I mean, hell, the plot and dialogue alone are enough to qualify them. The rest of his resume is an even better fit; Mikami’s Gamecube debut, P.N.03, was Up All Night’s very first subject. After finishing Resident Evil 5 last month, I found myself hankering for Shinji’s distinct flare for the absurd premise and awkward control scheme. Lucky for me, there was an enormous Mikami-shaped hole in my gaming history: I had never played Dino Crisis. So, I journeyed to eBay, walked away with a shiny black Playstation disc and prepared to stay up all night. Read More... Posted Apr 14 2009, 12:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, pn 03, up all night, shinji mikami, resident evil, dino crisis, resident evil 2, resident evil 5

• Up All Night: X-Blades and the D-List Preservation Society

  “We need new pornos!” – “Spaghetti Western” by Primus Les Claypool was right. We do need new pornos. We need new trashy entertainment that borders on the pornographic. It’s essential. No, seriously. Come back. For all my highfalutin talk about the creative potency of games, I relish those games that might be a little base. A little crass. Sometimes, those games are terrible. That’s a good thing. I’ve been suffering a weird fascination with Gaijin Games’ X-Blades ever since it first popped up on Kotaku way back in November 2007, when it went by the name Oniblade. Its origins got me curious. There are hundreds of games out there that, even if you’re a rabid fanboy or a member of the press, you’ll never hear about. Korean MMOs, unlicensed Brazilian Genesis games, and, yes, weird action games from the Eastern Block; it’s impossible to follow everything. There’s just too much. So when something like X-Blades, some Russian paean to Japanese action games, pops its head far enough out of the ground you take notice. Especially when it’s coming out for consoles notorious for exorbitant development costs and marketing budgets. Read More... Posted Feb 24 2009, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, playstation 3, up all night, xbox 360, PC, sega, ds, golden axe, simple 2000, x-blades, gaijin games, southpeak interactive, onechanbara, transformers, ninjabread man, transmorphers, golden axe beast rider

• Up All Night With Jaleco: Never the Best, But Never Forgotten

  Despite the solid gold righteousness of Barack Obama’s inauguration, this day’s still a little sad. As Joe noted, Jaleco Holdings has sold off their game developer/publisher subsidiary Jaleco to Korean MMO house Game Yarou and taken their leave of gaming for good. Ducking out of the videogame business because of "increasing competition (…) in the videogame market" isn’t an especially surprising move for a c-list – close to d-list really – publisher, but it’s still disconcerting to see a member of the old vanguard get shut down. Joe’s timeline of Jaleco is pretty thorough, but I wanted to make special note of a few other games they brought to the world. Let’s be honest: no Jaleco game, whether it was one they just published or one they created, could be considered one of the all time greats. But many of them were a hell of a lot of fun, and others were just plain freaking weird. All four of the following are perfect Up All Night candidates: they may or may not play that well, but they are trashy as all hell. Here’s to you, Jaleco. Tuff E Nuff – SNES Like Totally Rad, Tuff E Nuff is notable for its totally sweet name alone, but it earns extra points for being a decent one on one fighter in an age lousy with Street Fighter II wannabes. Tuff E Nuff is unassuming at first, revealing its merits slowly. The quality music, the solid character design, and the game’s story mode – which actually includes some character and skill leveling – are all charmers. It's story is suitably absurd and awesome. Read More... Posted Jan 20 2009, 03:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, up all night, street fighter ii, namco, ridge racer, joe keiser, carrier, jaleco, speed racer, gundam wing, tuff e nuff, vampire hunter d, cowboy bebop, illbleed

• Up All Night: Blackthorne

  Blizzard doesn’t need to make games in a timely manner. They finish games when they’re finished. This is because Blizzard are masters of their craft. They are unimpeachable purveyors of the best the medium has to offer. Got something bad to say about the Warcraft trilogy? Best keep your trap shut, pal. Think World of Warcraft is a cunning way of enslaving free minds? Keep it to yourself. And heaven forfend if you question the merit of Starcraft, Diablo, or either of those series’ impending sequels. Indeed, Blizzard are new gods for the 21st century. But this was not always the case. Once upon a time, Blizzard made trash. Fun trash to be sure, but trash nonetheless. That is to say, once upon a time, Blizzard stayed up all night. Of the multiple Up All Night candidates from Blizzard’s catalog – and believe me, The Death and Return of Superman and Justice League Task Force are prime subjects – none are so deserving as Blackthorne. Read More... Posted Jan 13 2009, 06:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, up all night, world of warcraft, starcraft, diablo, diablo iii, blizzard, out of this world, flashback, oddworld, starcraft 2, the death and return of superman, blackthorne, justice league task force, warcraft

• Up All Night: Doritos Dash of Destruction

  Thanks for the free game! I've been going through bags of Doritos like they are going out of style lately. It's funny too, because I hate cheddar and I hate corn, but I love Doritos. -Sadness courtesy of the Major Nelson comments section I know, I know: technically, to play this game between its release and now, I would have had to play it in the daytime. And yes, this was a mistake. But it wasn’t a mistake on the same level as, say, the heated Yaris achievement contest I got into last year that resulted in way too much playing of Yaris. This is because Doritos Dash of Destruction knows several things about itself. It knows you don’t actually want to play it, for example, so it keeps things short. It knows that you are only playing it for the GamerScore (it actually acknowledges this in multiple text boxes in the game), so it keeps the achievements flowing constantly. It also knows that it is just a stupid game about being a dinosaur that wants to eat Doritos trucks, or being a Doritos truck that wants to make its deliveries but doesn't want to get eaten by a dinosaur. So it keeps things stupid. Really stupid. Embarrassingly stupid. And it’s not terrible, not in the same way that the abstract abomination that was Yaris was terrible. The top-down driving is competent, but that’s a subgenre that had its heyday in the NES era so of course it’s unexciting. Being a T-Rex is just as banal as you’d expect being an unstoppable killing machine would be, because it’s not actually all that much fun to be unstoppable. It’s a game that’s designed the way Doritos are designed—it’s easy to start consuming it, and kind of enjoyable while you’re consuming, but there’s no nutritional value and at the end you feel kind of empty and gross. That’s kind of impressive, that a game about Doritos could mimic that product so capably in its design. Read More... Posted Dec 17 2008, 11:00 AM by Joe Keiser with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: up all night, xbox 360, xbla, joe keiser, doritos, processed cheese food, ninjabee

• Up All Night: Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe

  Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe is the touching story of a portal to Outworld that fell in love with an inter-dimensional Boom tube. And though their love was star-crossed, they nevertheless had a child: a totally ripped jack-o-lantern that they named Dark Kahn because they were exceptionally lazy. Dark Kahn has a secret fantasy: he wants to make two universes into a single worthless universe full of planet shards. To do this, he uses his magical power: the ability to make people who fight a lot already fight even more. Yes, Dark Kahn does lack a basic understanding of the relationship between cause and effect. This is my interpretation of the endless wave of nonsense that Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe spews at the player in the mode it has the gall to call “story.” And it gets worse, attempting to explain hours upon hours of violent misunderstandings as a result of ill-defined “Kombat Rage”. That’s probably not an excuse to try at your next court hearing, but hey, Superman will believe anything. So yeah, this is a game that was seemingly crafted for enjoying after a 3AM all-eggnog bender. It’s brightly colored, made for playing with others, and relentlessly stupid from beginning to end. It’s a stupid that goes much deeper than insane plot, too—for example, I would dare you to explain how Scorpion and Sub-Zero are able to get along, or anything about the character design of Booby McCantUseZippers…I mean, Catwoman. Read More... Posted Dec 09 2008, 04:00 PM by Joe Keiser with | with no comments Filed under: up all night, mortal kombat, wonder woman, dc comics, joe keiser, superman, catwoman has a terrifyingly masculine chin

• Up All Night: Power Blade

  Somewhere in upstate New York, on a chill night in April 1991, a television glows ominously in a family living room, illuminating the suburban setting in an uneasy, blue light. A boy sits before the television, knees tucked beneath him, with an NES pad in his hands. He is transfixed, his stare one that betrays nothing but a devoted concentration and perhaps a hint of desperation. This war against the despotic computer mainframe has gone on too long. It is taking its toll on his small mind. From upstairs comes a slow thumping, the sound of weary parental feet shuffling in the dark. A call rings out. “If I come down there and you’re still playing videogames, I’m going to throw that stupid box out the window.” A whisper. “Can’t talk. Final level.” “GO TO BED!” “No! No, I cannot go to bed! I must defeat these godless machines! I MUST STAY UP ALL NIGHT!” Yes, Friday’s Chiptune got me thinking about that true Up All Night classic, Power Blade. One of Guy Wearing Tank Top and Sweatpants’ last great hurrahs on the NES, Power Blade is, unlike some UAN candidates, a legitimately good game, chock full of tight platforming and robot murdering in the grand Mega Man tradition. It also has an interesting history: Power Blade actually started, as Kurt Kalata puts it, a literal Mega Man clone called Power Blazer. Read More... Posted Oct 27 2008, 06:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, up all night, nes, taito, bad dudes, hg101, chiptune friday, mega man, square-enix, kurt kalata, power blade

• Up All Night: Cannon Spike

  Come with me. Let us prance about at all hours and let us indulge in things not meant for polite society. Let us revel in exploitation, bask in the thick glow of trashy characters, ribald stories. Bring us busty, lusty babes and muscle-bound meatheads with pecks bigger than their brains and guns bigger still. Let these things be good. Let them be bad. Let us stay up all night. It certainly has been awhile, hasn’t it, since we indulged in a bit of the ol’ UAN? Sure, but it’s been longer still since arcades ruled the land. It’s been even longer since Capcom was slinging quarter munchers at gamers across the world from their Japanese stronghold, slaving over 2D fighters, brawlers, and all kinds of licensed goodness. I’ve stayed up all night with Capcom many, many times: sharing a laugh over Aliens vs. Predator, political discourse over some 1942 (awkward!), and some serious bonding over Street Fighter. The good old days have come back, in a way, with Street Fighter IV and Tatsunoko vs. Capcom hitting arcades, but all the reminiscing has me looking backward at those final years we shared together and the serious lunacy they bore. Way back in 2000, two things led me to believe that Capcom had lost its mind. Read More... Posted Oct 08 2008, 07:22 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, up all night, street fighter, capcom, 1942, cannon spike, aliens vs predator, marvel vs capcom

• Trailer Review: Golden Axe

  In the grand pantheon of beat-em-ups, brawlers, hack-and-slashers, kiss-your-mother-with-that-mouth-ya-jerk, dick-punching games, Golden Axe is a middleweight. Hell, it started as a welterweight in 1989. The fantasy setting, magic powers, and ride-able dragons and chicken-salamanders were novel, certainly, but how could it compete with Final Fight, a game that let you be a pro-wrestling mayor who compulsively took off his clothing? How could its triumphant trio of sword-guy-in-underpants, little person, and Red Sonja-cosplayer compete with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Golden Axe was plain outclassed for its first couple of games. That is, until arcade-only sequel Death Adder’s Revenge came out, a game so gorgeous, strange, and playable that it stands as the best beat ‘em up ever made outside of Capcom and Konami (yeah, that’s right. It’s better than Streets of Rage. All of them.) Right when the series started showing its mettle, it all but disappeared. Death Adder’s Revenge’s legacy lived on in a cruddy Genesis sequel, a Saturn fighting game, and a bizarro PS2 remake of the series debut. Until now! Read More... Posted Sep 04 2008, 05:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, trailer review, up all night, devil may cry, capcom, konami, sega, god of war, heavenly sword, golden axe, conan, teenage mutant ninja turtles

• Up All Night: Parasite Eve

  Welcome back to Up All Night, the only place on the internet where you can be subjected to the trashiest videogame fun you can have at 2am on a Saturday night! What’s that you say? You can get that all over the internet? Well, screw you, pal. The difference here is that these are games you’re only supposed to play after drinking two liters of peppermint schnapps out of a Hello Kitty sippy-cup and after you tried to convince that chick at the bar that you’re related to Tom Selleck. Games so bad, they’re really bad. But awesome. To celebrate the franchise’s impending return on the PSP, we’re taking a look at the 1998 dollop of joy known as Parasite Eve. It’s the story of New York City cop and babe Aya Brea fighting a psychotic opera singer named Eve who’s leading a revolution on New Year’s Eve in 1997. The Shyamalan-worthy twist is that the revolutionaries are mitochondria! That’s right, cells are evil in Parasite Eve. They turn normal folk and rats into disgusting monstrosities or orange goo, depending on their mood. Read More... Posted Aug 04 2008, 01:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, up all night, final fantasy, yoko shimomura, parasite eve, square-enix, tetsuya nomura

• Up All Night: Trojan

  Capcom’s early NES games had pretty clear premises. Commando tapped the throbbing Stallone-Schwarzenegger vein of the one-man army shooting faceless baddies on a foreign battlefield, Section Z was the same thing in space, and Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins was the same thing but with, um, ghosts and goblins. Then there was Trojan. Twenty-two years after it’s release and I still have no idea what the hell was going on with Trojan. You’re a guy wearing overalls who, I suppose, is named Trojan. Despite the fact that Trojan is carrying a sword, he is not a soldier of the ancient city, Troy. He is also not a spokesperson for male contraception. Read More... Posted Jul 07 2008, 03:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, up all night, nes, commando, ghosts 'n goblins, section z, trojan

• Up All Night: Dark Sector

  Dark Sector was one of the very first games for “next-gen” consoles ever seen by the public. When it was revealed in 2004, everyone was saying, “Oh, man. Look at those hot, hot graphics.” They were also saying, “What’s up with all the idiotic Guyver rejects hanging out in space?” Yes, despite its bleeding edge technology, Dark Sector was looking generic from the start. It’s cool though. Digital Extremes spent the next few years playing a ton of Resident Evil 4 and made some important changes to Dark Sector’s look and play before it came out this past March. First on the list of changes, dark-and-tortured protagonist Hayden only looks like the Guyver for half the game. Instead, he looks, controls, and moves exactly like Leon from Resident Evil 4 (he’s got darker hair and no leather jacket. Big differences!) Second, Dark Sector would no longer take place in space but in an evil future Russia overrun with some techno-plague that makes regular dudes into zombies (making it Easter Europe instead of Western Europe is hugely innovative. Hugely.) Finally, they added a smear of kill.switch’s duck and cover mechanics that are all the rage these days to compliment the Resident Evil controls. The final result of all these changes? Dark Sector came out as what it looked like: a silly generic mess of a game. But what a silly generic mess it is! Read More... Posted Jun 23 2008, 06:30 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, up all night, resident evil, dark sector, kill.switch, krull

• Up All Night: Ex-Mutants

  Mmm, yes. Licensed games. One of the true go-to places for trashy goodness, especially during the halcyon days of 8 and 16-bit. You never had to look farther than whatever movie was coming out to get an idea of just how many shitty platformers would be released in any given month. I’m not even talking big name action stuff. I’m talking about Home Improvement. Cool World. Bebe’s Kids. Comic book games, however, have always been more of a tributary of the licensed-game shitriver as opposed to part of its central flow; the overwhelming majority of them are terrible but there are many that are perfectly playable, fun games. One of the Genesis’ most visually stunning games was 1993’s X-Men, a prime example of a license put to good use. 1992’s Ex-Mutants, today’s dollop of joy here on Up All Night, is the exact opposite. It’s an awful license – if you too were fooled by the clever name, Ex-Mutants was a mid-‘80s rip off of the X-Men – used to make a bad platforming action game. Read More... Posted Jun 09 2008, 11:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, up all night, ex-mutants, genesis, x-men

• Up All Night: Nightmare Creatures

  Welcome back to Up All Night, FPSers! I’m your host, John Constantine, and tonight we have a ghoouuulish delight for your playing pleasure. So we’re clear, by ghoulish delight, I actually mean a game of trashy, garbage-like, and horrendous quality. We’re looking at a game so delectably bad that my mouth is actually watering in anticipation of it foul flavors. Our subject is the best-forgotten hack-and-slasher, Nightmare Creatures. Unlike many other Up All Night candidates, Nightmare Creatures has a discernable plot. Back in 1666 – a year which would undoubtedly be more infernal if not for that pesky “1” - the Satan-worshipping Brotherhood of the Hecate make some evil monsters and fail to take over the world. It’s not especially clear why; monsters are useful for world domination. In 1834, Adam Crowley is the new leader of a resurrected brotherhood, and he makes a bunch of new evil monsters that could, arguably, be called nightmare creatures. Enjoy this narration for more! Read More... Posted Jun 02 2008, 10:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, up all night, nightmare creatures

• Up All Night: Bad Dudes

  Ah, yes. The action star. Bruce the Willis, Sylvester de Stallone, the Marquis Schwarzenegger; rulers of a vast and glorious domain. Some of their work on the silver screen is considered by many to be classic, even respectable. Films like Terminator, First Blood and Die Hard. But the lot of them also made a considerable amount of Up All Night fodder. Cobra, Commando, Hudson Hawk. During their reign, the action heroes of film had a notable peer in the world of videogames: Guy Wearing Tank Top and Sweatpants. GWTTS did much loved work in games. He played twins Bimmy and Jimmy in Double Dragon and even aped Schwarzenegger and Stallone in his seminal work on Contra. But GWTTS also slummed it in the halls of Up All Night. His masterstroke of trashy goodness? Bad Dudes. The premise? Why, just look at this screen: That’s right. Fucking ninjas have kidnapped the leader of the free world. Read More... Posted May 19 2008, 11:00 AM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, nintendo, up all night, ninjas, cobra, arnold schwarzenegger, bad dudes, die hard, bruce willis, first blood, terminator, double dragon, rambo, hudson hawk, commando, sylvester stallone

• Up All Night: P.N. 03

  Once upon a time, in the hallowed days of the mid-90s, there was a show on USA called Up All Night. Up All Night aired, as you might expect, in the dead of night and was little more than truly crap movies – typically violenceploitation, sexploitation, pretty much any kind of movie that might end in ploitation – hosted by Gilbert Gottfried. It was always a special treat when you’d drunkenly channel surf your way into Gottfried surrounded by bikini clad women and telling you how you were about to watch C.H.U.D. II: Bud the C.H.U.D. Over the last twenty years of saving princesses and whatnot in the wee hours, I’ve come to realize that there are many, many games that fit the Up All Night formula. All they’re missing is a shrill comedian. Dear reader, let me be your Gilbert Gottfried! Tonight on Up All Night, 61FPS presents P.N. 03, an all but forgotten piece of trash from Capcom starring Vanessa Z. Schneider. Read More... Posted May 12 2008, 03:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, pn 03, up all night, gilbert gottfried