Stages: Zangief

Note: the title should be read as a parody of David Bowie's "Changes" (i.e Staaa aages)

Today we begin a new series dedicated to the individual stages of each of the original 12 characters of Street Fighter II. Why? well its simple really, the subtitle of the game was "The World Warrior" and as such it sought to define each of the fighters according to characteristics found in their respective nations, the stages are defined in the same manner.

Thus each stage captures the zeitgeist of a particular nation, as seen through the eyes of Japanese and American developers, in the late 80's and early 90's. For many of us these were the first glimpses of foreign cultures afforded to us, for a while the character became synonymous with the country and the country with the particular stage.

Zangief is unique among the original characters simply because his country no longer exist. The bear-like wrestler is one of the most famous Soviets ever. The character was an obvious image of what America, if not the world, perceived the Soviet Union to be: a strong, hairy beast with the potential to literally pick up and annihilate any and all challengers, sure he might be a bit slow but it did not take much to anger him and once that happened he could really do some damage.

It is only fitting that the USSR stage is set in a power plant where many workers are present. After all the Soviet Union was an industrial powerhouse, the factories were state owned, everybody was guaranteed a (bad) job. Its also fitting that this socialist utopia was not portrayed as particularly productive, after all the workers arent working (they dont have that drive that capitalist workers have) and they're actually drinking, on the job!

The picture portrayed is clear: sure the worker is celebrated and technically owns the factories but look at them! fuckin lazy! and drunk! the scribbly words are scary, there are shoddy made fences and the one fire extinguisher in the entire country is just standing there, unattended in the middle of two men fighting. In such context how could Chernobyl have taken anybody by surprise.

There is also that huge hammer and sickle in the middle of the stage, yes the USSR was guilty of cultivating a strong sense of nationalism (as opposed to, you know, Marxism) and that such an emblem be omnipresent is not far from reality. That it was present in a video game machine in America, in such a centric place at the end of the cold war could only inspire American nationalism, the thought that we were, in fact, better than those drunkards, after all the U.S is all about freedom and there is NO SUCH THING in poor Zangief's stage. Not only that but what a fuckin sausage fest.

As the Soviet Union disappeared and more games appeared, Zangief's nationality changed to Russian, his stage remained a power plant but the workers, the emblem and the oppression were all gone and his characterization changed from an angry bear to a carefree, lovable oaf.

The contradictions between the USSR stage and those in the United States will only become more obvious as we look at the American stages, three in fact, all of which exclaim (loudly) the greatness that is the States, though almost twenty years later many would gladly take a steady job and some vodka.

The Onion: NBA Jam

Great article in today's Onion about Michael Jordan wondering why he isnt in NBA Jam. It was a great 90's quirk that MJ, the biggest athlete in the world in his prime, was never in any NBA games because he was not a part of the NBA players association and anybody that wanted him had to pay him directly for his likeness.

It was weird but then again video games were still for kids and sports figures didn't really care if they were in games, completely different story now of course as Madden's and 2K games have become mainstream icons. Then again the 90's were also a weird time for the NBA, with the pajama uniforms and cartoony logos, maybe Jordan was right in staying the hell away from the whole thing, though I'm sure it was all about money.

A choice quote from the article:

"'Scottie being there makes sense, but Horace Grant? Seriously? And how can Tom Gugliotta be in this game and not me? I could swear they paid me a $100 million licensing fee.'"

NBA Jam, which I nearly bought the other day, was also a quirk of the 90's: a 2 on 2 arcade style basketball game in which certain button combinations allowed one to choose random celebrities, from Will Smith to Bill and Hillary Clinton, some Mortal Kombat characters and probably Spike Lee. Here's the link.

Michael Jordan Wondering Why He Wasnt in NBA Jam - The Onion

Good to see The Onion didn't actually sell off to a Chinese fish salvage consortium.

Lady Pictures

A few days ago I mentioned the Darkstalkers tribute book and how its cover ruins and potentially cheapens the quality and importance of the entire thing. I believe my exact words were:

"I realize that Darkstalkers is a franchise known primarily for having half naked cat ladies and succubi and though I dare not ask artists to tone it down did they really need to increase it?... look at that fuckin cover? way to rob the book of any dignity by featuring such a prominent thong"

Good to see copying from blogger keeps the links by the way. The point is both gaming and comic book nerds get a bad rap because their interests are so male oriented that creators often overdo it when it comes to the sexual nature of their products. This has been a problem since the beginning for comic books because art was not technologically limited in the golden era of comics as it was for video games. While I am sure that Capcom, for example, wanted to create some really realistic thunderthighs for Chun Li they simply could not do it in the 1980's.

I write this because I recently ran into an example similar to that of the Darkstalkers book. The image above is part of the cover for New Avengers: The Reunion #1. Its a very nice drawing of Hawkeye and (his wife? girlfriend?) Mockingbird, so nice in fact that it made me curious as to what the book was about, but not nice enough to make me cheat on Green Arrow.

I did my research and found the title and the complete cover. My reaction was pretty close to this:


Complete fucking disappointment. As you can see the cover suffers from the exact same problem as the Darkstalkers book: ridiculously unnecessary sexuality in the form of a female character wearing uncomfortable undergarments. Lets not get into the whole "shes a superhero, why would she wear that" argument, lets focus on the goal of the artist: get an ass shot in order to sell the book. Did it work? I can see many people (women) being insulted enough to forgo the book and the entire series (a five issue mini), I can see many going for the more subtle variant, even the stereotypical nerd.

I can also see myself not buying it and its not because I'm insulted by the site nor because I'm some sort of prude, in fact I'd argue that a well done cover girl is a good thing, but rather because I'm appalled at the fact that creators feel a need to appeal to the basest instincts of all nerds. Not to mention that, like with Darkstalkers, the inclusion of the ass focal point makes the cover very unattractive. Unfortunately with the Darkstalkers book there is no variant, the horrid cover will have to grace the bookshelfs of those of us who end up buying it, forever forcing us to explain how we're not, in fact, nerdy perverts but rather just consumers with limited choices.

As for the Avengers book, I never bought it nor I have any intention of doing so. Not just because of the stupid cover but because this whole Dark Reign is starting to become kinda grating: we get it: Norman Osborn owns the world, lets focus on improving Runaways and Deadpool now.

Communists, Blocks

I mentioned some time ago on another post that Tetris was celebrating its 25th birthday this year. Its good to see that after a quarter of a century the game is still being sold on the app store for five fuckin dollars. Jesus Christ, that has to be what? $10 in 80's money? seems like too much, specially considering that there have been handheld knockoffs for years now and old phones use to carry the game as a standard feature.

Thankfully apple isnt above allowing cheaper Tetris clones to be sold on the App store, and one will be hard pressed to find any copycat better than the $1.99 Communist Blocks. Not only is that the best name for a video game ever but the game is exactly the same as the original (with the exception of rectangular as opposed to square blocks) it returns the game to its kitschy Soviet roots, and it saves the working man a few dollars while still giving him/her much deserved entertainment, comrade.

The interface looks cheap but its that cheap that became synonymous with the Communist Bloc during the waning years of the Cold War. Even though it does not include the original Tetris song, the games soundtrack features what can only be described as Soviet opera music accompanied with Soviet (or pre-Soviet) art which serves as background. Even though I will never be against the use of old Soviet propaganda, its omission here serves the game for the best as it feels less reliant on stereotypes and explores some very distinct aspects of Russian culture.

Its ridiculous to review Tetris at this point: everybody knows what it is, everybody understands how addictive it is and this version of it is Tetris and it is therefore that addictive and that good. Its replay value is huge and there is no better way to pass a long bus ride or lunch break. The only negative? the icon, its not as kitschy as the game, the name of which is shortened to C-Blocks on the screen, but I believe the hammer and sickle is already being used by another app.

I Missed You, Comic Con

Its a bittersweet day at eightbitter this sunday. On the one hand Mexico scored five on the U.S to win the Gold Cup (wait, was that Canada?). They hadn't beaten the Americans on U.S soil since 1999, its nice to finally get that out of the way and maybe get the old self esteem up for the coming games and tournaments.

But on the other hand this is the last Sunday in July, the final day of the first Comic Con that I did not attend since 2004. We traditionally go on Sunday because there are fewer people (in theory) and everything is cheaper, this year, as I mentioned in an earlier post, no money means no Comic Con.

Now, I've tried to keep my Comic nerddom separate from the video gamer nerd that writes this blog and I've managed to be successful up until now. I'm about to break that vow so here it goes.

While I've been a Comic Book loser for the better part of my life I stopped reading them for about a six year period from 2001 to roughly 2007. There are many reasons for this, lets not get into it. The comic that brought me back was Runaways which, by the time I got into it, was already on its second volume with a grand total of issues in the neighbourhood of 40+. Not being one to miss out on stuff, and with some money to spare I set out to collect every single back issue and get caught up to the current issues.

Luckily Runaways was in a Joss Whedon phase and that motherfucker took about a year to release a five issue arc (you can really tell who wrote that book cant you?). In that year I managed to get every single issue (from different local comic shops, eBay, Comic Con, you name it) and get caught up. Why didnt I buy the trades you say? well because the hunt was as fun as the stories.

After the Whedon arc two other dudes got the book in what was a promising new volume. While the art was ok at first and the story was not horrible pretty soon it went south and the first 9 or so issues of that volume really are a dark time in Runaways history, starting with book 10, however, a new writing/artist team began work on the title and it has thus far been promising. The problem now is twofold: first my not attending the Con prevented me from buying this kickass print (which I can hopefully later buy online), second the Marvel solicits for October dont show a new Runaways issue which forces one to speculate and fear that the title might have been canceled. There is no official announcement so hopefully it was just an off month.

This obviously has nothing to do with video games, especially not old video games, but I felt like writing it down because the two worlds are vastly intertwined. Superhero games have been around forever and they continue to be made and improved. Though some have been horrible others promise to be outstanding. The very first issue of Runaways, in fact, begins with one of the characters playing a Marvel MMORPG, the series regularly features shout outs to video games, etcetera etcetera.

A Runaways game would also be some kind of nice but that probably wont happen, the series isn't as popular as the standards but there are talks of a movie in the works and that could begin some talk about a game. In the mean time what we are left with are artist interpretations of what could have been had Runaways existed in the glory days.

So, I guess that with some hesitation but a bit of excitement we now inaugurate the Comics tag.

w0ot!

Bloody Dinosaurs

In 1993 Jurassic Park (the film) captured the imaginations and blah blah blah people got really into dinosaurs blah blah animatronics blah blah blah dna splicing and cgi, it was a great fucking movie. A year later a fighting game in which dinosaurs were protagonists came out, in 2009 I drive down to the swap meet and buy said game, Primal Rage, for seven dollars. I instantly feel like I overpaid.

First some background, when this came out I was in the fourth grade right in the middle of my love affair with my Super Nintendo. In retrospect I probably shoulda been outside playing sports, instead I was at home playing my games and wishing I had enough money to buy more. Primal Rage was one of the games I really wanted and never got so when I saw it for sale last week I knew I might be disappointed but I wanted it regardless.

I wasnt exactly disappointed; if there is one thing I've learned its that fighting games do not hold up as well as platformers so the fact that this game felt choppy and slow was not because the game is bad but rather because that is as good as it could get in 1994.

The game is one big bloody, testosterone riddled MMA dinosaur gang fight. First you select from a motley crew of horrible looking dinosaurs. Horrible as in you dont want to meet them in a dark alley, design wise they're actually kinda cool, even though some are blatant copies of each other (two T-Rex, two monkeys) in a manner reminiscent of Mortal Kombats many ninjas. The characters themselves appear to be models taken out of a Jason and the Argonauts movie, motion captured to give them a 3-D feel which, again, is strangely like Mortal Kombat. So similar is this to Mortal Kombat that one cant help but feel its intentional, even wikipedia seems to think so.

Story mode is actually kinda difficult to beat, ultimately without prior experience and without a game manual one is reduced to button mashing, its effective but by the second fight the opponent is not letting anything past its guard. The character I've been using is a nightmarish snake with legs named Vertigo, the only female character, she also has the longest reach and can teleport. Of course most fights devolve into two dinosaurs (or dinosaur sized apes) throwing bites at each others necks, trying to finish off the stylized health bars all while a disembodied voice urges you to RAGE! and tiny humans run around the background.

I do remember that the game was heavily advertised and there was a line of action figures (which I never had) and are still, I assume, easily available on eBay. They might be a bit too 90's for me to really want to buy now but I did want them as a kid.

Final verdict? its a keeper, especially now that I'm getting sort of good at it. I really hope that there is some sort of closure for the dinosaurs in the end but I wont know until I get past the third battle.

Bonus!
24 more songs were revealed for Guitar Hero 5. Some highlights? Hungry like the wolf, Feel Good Inc and fuckin BULLET WITH BUTTERFLY WINGS!!! full list at Kotaku.

Update!
I received my replacement RF Switch from eBay today, it took significantly less time than I expected and it works even better than I thought it would. Who knew the SNES, N64 and Gamecube could use the same switch? its like I'm playing the SNES in HD now, amazing.

Summertime and Tribute Books

I see that Capcom is intent on getting some more of my money. Not happy with simply releasing the Darkstalkers Tribute book (via Udon) in August they have now announced a Street Fighter artbook which, unlike the previous SF tribute, features tons of official, unreleased, never before seen artwork from the first Street Fighter to the franchise's duel with Tatsunoko.

Let me navigate through this whole thing in a few different ways.

First of all the Darkstalkers book will be available at Comic Con, the biggest nerd fest of the year and a pilgrimage I look forward to every year. Except this one. Due to my extreme financial difficulties earlier in the year (read: I was poor) I wasnt able to buy a ticket, when I did have money it was sold out and I decided to go to Disneyland instead. Now not only will I be inundated by "news" stories, blog entries, and RSS overload about the event but I wont be able to get the hardcover Darkstalkers book nor any more goodies from the event. Blows.

Now lets talk about the books themselves. I'm a big art fan and theres nothing I like more than when said art is collectivized in book form, but there are a few things I dont generally care for in art books, namely bad art and excessive T & A. I realize that Darkstalkers is a franchise known primarily for having half naked cat ladies and succubi and though I dare not ask artists to tone it down did they really need to increase it? Sure I realize that most of the art will be subdued and inspired but look at that fuckin cover? way to rob the book of any dignity by featuring such a prominent thong. Its not even aesthetically pleasing.

As for the Street Fighter book...well sure it'll contain fan service but because its mostly official artwork it will hopefully be limited to character sheets, sketches and so forth.

In the end its pretty certain that sooner or later Capcom will get my money, Amazon makes it too cheap not to and honestly, despite their often excessive sexuality the art is genuinely fantastic and a great conversation starter/collection item.

Technical Difficulties

As is customary with 20 year old hardware the RF switch on my SNES gave out yesterday just a day after I bought two games, one of which is Super Mario World, so until I receive my replacement from that wonderful place known as eBay I wont be able to indulge in some nostalgia.

The days of rotating the coax cable into the winding nut thing are certainly not something I miss from my romanticized version of the 80's and 90's. Having to move the cable around so it works, having no avenue for replacing busted parts, having to deal with a shitty analog tv, having to work with these god forsaken things...ugh, good riddance.

Theres something to be said about HD and 1080 and shit and that something can be readily seen in my inability to play my Super Nintendo for a week and a half.

Green+Black X-plorer

The first musical game I ever bought was Guitar Hero II, I got it at Best Buy and I only did so because GH3 was sold out. To my surprise GH2 was the standout title at the time because of its kick ass lineup of songs and the 360 exclusive X-Plorer guitar controller. Sure the guitar wasnt as realistic as the Fender that came with Rockband and it wasn't wireless like the GH3 model but it was undoubtedly unique and its white body was a canvas which I might someday customize.

But not with the stickers that came with the game. No, that was too easy, I had to give it a custom paint job and after seeing pictures online, after getting ahold of some acrylic paints and brushes I finally did the dirty deed yesterday.

First a brief history of the guitar: When music games were still only about guitars this game took me through both GH2 and GH3, when we finally went into the complete band game I admit I first went to the previously mentioned Fender but it simply wasnt as satisfying as the X-Plorer so I went back to it, I beat both World Tour and Rockband in hard with the guitar, formed a band, played online, bought a case for it, made some house calls. Its safe to say I have an attachment with the thing.

On to the customization. I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do, something similar to the many Japanese inspired rising sun customs I've seen online. The colors came from a Celtic change kit. Not that I'm a Celtic fan but green and black is some kind of nice. I wasnt exactly sold on the design so I sketched out a few alternates. The lightning bolt motif was a nod to Rivers Cuomo (of Weezer) whose guitar strap features the bolt, in the end I decided to include the design on my guitar strap. As for the design of the guitar I went with an abstract modification of the rising sun with more pronounced geometric figures in green and black.

With that ready to go the painting began. First to slather the green in the designated areas, this created a nice green-white design which I almost went with. Not wanting to live wondering what could have been I decided to go ahead with the black, after the first layer the results were looking uneven and shiny. Luckily I was later told that acrylics require more than one coat and sure enough the second and third layers made the coloring smoother and even.

The resulting guitar is actually pretty cool, the colors came out just how I planned and the design is surprisingly similar to the original sketch. The yellow lightning bolt might not match with the green and black but its bright enough to liven up the dark colors. The custom might not be as great as those out on the internets but I am way too happy with it, I did love my white x-plorer but I like it a lot more now, probably because its now a one of a kind.

A Little Captain in Your Pocket

Yet another writeup of a game app for the iPhone. Why so many of these you ask? lets be honest, the phone as a handheld game system is limited graphically (as compared to, say the PS3) and since its games are sold as downloads it lends itself to the simpler games, the ones which beckon back to the days this blog remembers so fondly.

In Sea Captain you control a harbor with three distinct docks to which one must navigate boats that appear from offscreen. The boats are of different sizes and speeds (from subs to cruise ships) and their color determines where they must be docked, an operation done by drawing a line from the boat to the appropriate dock. Yes the whole concept is similar to another app called Flight Control but it certainly is not Flight Control "in the fucking ocean".

The game is challenging enough, the amount of boats and their varying speeds make for some clogged maritime routes and you can only crash three boats per round. There are three levels with night and day versions of each (in this version) but there is only one to begin with and the rest are unlocked through achieving set quotas for docked boats. The night missions are especially difficult as they are completely dark save for the light emitting from the center lighthouse, which also acts as an obstacle (together with icebergs and, apparently Pirates!).

Now lets get to the nerd in me. Firstly, I downloaded this thing based on the kickass app icon (and the price and the reviews of course). Its not easy to find a fair priced, fun game in the app store that also has good graphics and generally good art but that New England Captain is a good looking chap. What a great fuckin surprise did I get when I beat the New England stage and moved onto the Arctic where our Captain now sports a hoodie and a rain jacket. Straight out of Deadliest Catch. The lighthouse also changes. See thats the kind of small detail that gets tremendous amounts of points in my book, I cant wait to see what he'll be sporting once I reach the Caribbean.

Get it at the App Store, should still be on introductory sale for a buck.

More Disappointment

Someone leaked 24 more songs from the new Guitar Hero 5. This list sucks even more than the previous one. This one includes some of the artists I was most anxious to find out about, namely MMJ, The White Stripes, Sonic Youth, but the songs for each group leave a lot to be desired. No Wordless Chorus, no Seven Nation Army.

Again, not that these songs suck (at least not most of them) I mean Lithium live? thats gonna be a trip, but if we're gonna get only one song for each band lets get a consensus going, lets get the most representative song. But enough of the bitching, heres the list and heres hoping the next leak will redeem these last two, if not then we'll wait for The Beatles Rockband.

Attack! Attack! UK - "You And Me"
Bon Jovi - "You Give Love A Bad Name"
Darker My Love - "Blue Day"
The Duke Spirit - "Send A Little Love Token"
Elton John - "Saturday Night's Alright (For Fighting)"
Face To Face - "Disconnected"
Garbage - "Only Happy When It Rains"
Kaiser Chiefs - "Never Miss A Beat"
Kiss - "Shout It Out Loud"
Love and Rockets - "Mirror People"
My Morning Jacket - "One Big Holiday"
Nirvana - "Lithium (Live)"
The Police - "So Lonely"
Rammstein – "Du Hast"
The Rolling Stones - "Sympathy For The Devil"
Sonic Youth - "Incinerate"
Screaming Trees - "Nearly Lost You"
Sublime - "What I Got"
The Sword - "Maiden, Mother & Crone"
Thin Lizzy - "Jailbreak"
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "American Girl"
The White Stripes - "Blue Orchid"

Info, as always, from Kotaku, picture from Flickr.

Picture Post 6

Knowing that there is a game out there in which a girl with an umbrella can fight a guy with a huge sword on a bed of roses makes everything better. Between this and the new KOF it looks like its gonna be a good year.

Review of BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger at Kotaku.

A Closer Look at Aladdin

I've been on a Disney kick lately, mostly because I spent two days this week at the happiest place on earth and its smaller, yet surprisingly fun, sister park. When you combine the bombardment of propaganda that place launches at you with my predisposition to accept such propaganda (because I had no childhood you see) the result is a couple of weeks of watching movies, buying merchandise and playing video games.

The last time I talked about Aladdin for the SNES I complained about how difficult yet fun it was. When your technology is limited you overcompensate with difficulty and for a few months, as I refused to play the game, I continued to believe my analysis. I decided to give it a second chance and beat the game in less than an hour.

The game only has six (or seven) stages, unlimited continues (in the form of passwords) and is a pretty standard, solid platformer. Every stage consists of Aladdin jumping on moving, non moving and floating platforms while throwing apples at baddies and collecting some sort of jewels. The two exceptions to this are the magic carpet stages: one that has Aladdin flying through a cavern avoiding obstacles (which defeated me the last time) and a bonus stage in which Aladdin and the Princess ride around at night collecting goodies, to a ringtone version of "A whole new world". There is only one boss and thats Jafar, first in standard issue and then in his badass snake version, as was customary with bosses in the 90's he wasnt much of a challenge.

After that the Genie steps in and theres a final cut scene in which Aladdin proves his sincerity or whatever by wishing for the Genie's freedom (like in the movie!), when all seems lost with Jasmine the Sultan steps in and, because hes a ruthless despot, decrees that there will be a new law that the Princess can now marry whoever she damn well wants. This would be where I take a jab at how "and thats how its been in the Middle East" ever since. But I'm above that so I wont.

So......theres another game beaten, the tally is now at two. Time to get some more games I suppose.

Bonus!
Kotaku has a great story on how Toad likes to flip people off. Link.

List of Songs

The nice people at Guitar Hero have released a preliminary list of songs that will appear in the fifth installment of the series. Now, this player of old video games finds it difficult to get into the new generation games (they're way too complicated) but I have made obvious exceptions for two kinds of games: fighters (which are essentially 2-D anyways) and music games. So the initial announcement of bands to be included in GH V got me way too excited, the list released today? not so much.

The preliminary list of songs is as follows:

Band Of Horses - "Cigarettes, Wedding Bands" ?
Beastie Boys - "Gratitude"
Beck - "Gamma Ray"
Billy Squier - "Lonely Is The Night"
Blur - "Song 2"
Bob Dylan - "All Along The Watchtower"
Children Of Bodom - "Done With Everything, Die For Nothing"
Coldplay - "In My Place"
Darkest Hour - "Demon(s)"
David Bowie - "Fame"
Deep Purple - "Woman From Tokyo ('99 Remix)"
Elliott Smith - "L.A."
Iggy Pop - "Lust For Life (Live)"
Jeff Beck - "Scatterbrain (Live)"
John Mellencamp - "Hurts So Good"
Kings Of Leon - "Sex On Fire"
Queens Of The Stone Age - "Make It Wit Chu"
Rose Hill Drive - "Sneak Out" ?
Santana - "No One To Depend On (Live)"
The Bronx - "Six Days A Week" ?
Thrice - "Deadbolt"
Tom Petty - "Runnin' Down A Dream"
Vampire Weekend - "A-Punk"
Wolfmother - "Back Round"

Not that these songs are horrible (on the contrary) but its a bit disheartening to think that that is the Bob Dylan song, that that is the Blur song, that that is the Bowie song. Guitar Hero has a history of including some deep tracks but when you only get one song per artist one has to hope that its one of the artists top one or two songs. Again, not that All Along the Watchtower and Fame suck but they're most certainly NOT Like a Rolling Stone, Rock n Roll Suicide of Changes.

The list contains a lot of standards as well as songs from bands that apparently are the next big thing (that I havent even heard of to be honest) and it does leave enough room to be hopeful that the White Stripes, My Morning Jacket and Gorillaz songs will be exceptional but it also leaves room for them not, well, not be.

Fourth of July

Its America's birthday and what better way to celebrate than with a picture that encapsulates all its greatness: blatant and excessive nationalism, a reliance on excessive muscle, heavy allegiance to the armed forces and weird hairstyles. All thats missing is some Levis 501s.

REAL soccer (REAL)

I recently got a great tip about a soccer game for the iPhone that is only $.99 cents and actually plays like a soccer game. See I'm always skeptic about iPhone games because a) I dont want to play games on my phone and 2) most games absolutely sucks. But surprise surprise this game is actually pretty good.

Real Soccer 2009, which normally goes for $9.99 on the app store, features over 100 teams (both national and club) as well as real players (for most teams). The "cover" features Arsenal pretty boy Cesc Fabregas. The gameplay is surprisingly fluid, though I'm not surprised nor upset that the characters are a bit blocky they I am surprised at how agile the fuckers are. Teams and players are substantially different from one another: if you pick Kazakhstan and play against Brazil you will get your ass kicked, in effect this is not merely having a bunch of different teams with palette swaps, the little guy labeled as Kaka is Kaka and hes in your iPhone.

Its easy enough, when you dont have a license, to use the flag of, say, Serbia to represent the Serbian national team and RS09 does so as expected. But how do you get around not being able to use club team crests? well you refer to teams by their city (say Roma) and if that becomes confusing you start using colors (Manchester Red). Now that you've solved that problem what do you do about the crests? well you simply use random little flags to represent particular teams. These fake little icons have a certain charm to them too. Oddly enough the game does have a licensing agreement with La Liga La Liga BBVA so all of its teams crests are the real thing (just in case you really wanted to play as Osasuna).

The game also contains a bunch of playable leagues and cups (again, its an iPhone app) including facsimiles of Champions League, Euro, Copa America and so on. There is no American club competition but there are teams from Argentina, Brazil and the U.S (sadly not Mexico) who all participate in the faux CL. Its genius. The many cups arent easy to get (even on easy) thus the game is pretty challenging.

Lastly the controls, I had no iea how I was going to work around the fact that the phone has no physical buttons but that was fixed with the inclusion of a D-Pad and A-B buttons on the screen. This is done on many games for the phone but I had yet to encounter it. Sure its kind of annoying to have your fingers on the playing screen but the thing is responsive enough that one is able to easily play.

And its only 99 cents.