That guy's a Maniac...

Recently all of the Guild serie s titles were on sale on the Nintendo eShop for 3DS. Before we go on it seems like Nintendo have been watching the rest of the gaming field and taking bits and pieces to significantly up their own online shop to maximise success. In the last couple of months there have been a number of good titles on sale. A worrying amount. A potentially bankrupting amount. We snapped up Resident Evil Revelations with 50% off. But with titles like the Guild series, Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D and 3D classics like Super Mario Brothers 3 and Sonic the Hedgehog being discounted to mere pounds, to less than the price of a standard measure of whatever beverage you prefer to drink, then what the heck. Why not? Weirdest of all is that retailers are matching the eShop prices or perhaps the eShop is matching retail prices. Either way we're a million miles away from when your average decent game cost upwards of £50 and you had to go to a fucking brick and mortar s...

We know, we know . Yes you can touch it.

Fortunately, Alcamoth Citizen our journalist from Xenoblade Chronicles is in a place where the press can't touch her. She truly has freedom of speech. So Alcamoth Citizen, lay it on us. What's the haps? I think that that says it all. I hope we haven't implicated anyone directly or indirectly with this post....

ANNOUNCING In October last year the TGAM board of directors met to discuss how Second Greatest Video Game Blog On The Internet, That Guy's a Maniac (TGAM) was performing. We've listened to our consumers and things are going to change around here. First off, there's going to be no more features that we startand don't finish (like TGAM top 50 ultimate TGAM top games best list of best games of all time ever , Unit of the Month  or That guy's Interviews ) also we've listened to you and what you want is more Resident Evil coverage. We are called That Guy's A Maniac and should honour that legacy. So we'll be seeing some changes around here. Changes we think you will both like. Also, stakeholders have been complaining that TGAM is a it of a sausage fest when we aren't pretending to be women and we need to be covering video games from the female perspective a bit more Which brings me neatly onto OUR BRAND NEW FEATURE: INTRODUCING.... Yes, we know we do...

I was really struggling to recall any stand out gaming experience this year. There were plenty of polished experiences but nothing that particularly blew my mind. UNTIL LAST NIGHT! We treated ourself to Wii Play Motion, partly for a sexy red controller to match our sexy red classic controller but also to finally get on the Wii Motion train almost two years after it came out, now that Zelda makes the accessory worth owning. Before, this list didn't seem to justify the purchase. We were big fans of Wii Play especially Tanks!, in fact we think there are only 41 games better than it in existence . So we were quite looking forward to Wii Play Motion. Don't get us wrong there are some rum games in the pack and the experience is severely hampered if you don't have more than one Wii Motion Plus controller. Sometimes rather unnecessarily, a number of the games could easily have been pass the controller multiplayer. However, Star Shuttle is phenomenal and we wish there was...

Yes they be. SEE OUR PICTURES. See them. That is all we ask. Super Smash Brothers is a game that just keeps giving. We've been hard at work taking snapshots to remake the Bible as a webcomic only using Nintendo characters. Suffice to say it is a lot of work. In the meantime here's a bunch of stuff that may or may not make the final cut. Angel Land or something. Coming soon to a 3DS near you. INSERT CAPTION HERE. She's giving birth to a zero suit Samus. Which makes sense. I wonder how many bells Tom Nook will pay for this? Despite the hundreds of Zero Suit Samus photos on our Wii, we don't play her that much. TELLING. (:( ) HA HA HA JUST LIKE REAL HEDGEHOGS. This is for my illustrated fan fiction set in a Universe where Slippy isn't a massive prick. It's just like the film I imagine because it has never been released in Europe. IN OTHER GAMING NEWS: Nothing. Nothing of note is happening in gaming.

Most proper gamers would probably not engage with those silly little channels on the Wii menu like Everybody votes or the Mii Contest Channel. We do though and this piece of machinimart is the direct result of such engagements Is the contest channel really a game? Is it machinimart? Or just art? It's neither. This is high art. WANKY BOLLOCKS. The digital image depicts an angry Albert Wesker standing over a prostrate Paedo Stu. Wesker, a super human cunning soldier and scientist stands over a fallen Stu. Or is Stu enticing Wesker? Either way, Wesker seems to be shouting PlayStation QTEs at him. How will Stu react? MORE NONSENSE This image is from the game Little King's Story and really examines age appropriation and how well games are tested. Is bewbies really a suitable term for seven year olds? Will Worhar ever make its way into the OED or is that just for serious words like Zig-a-zig-ah and ugh LOL ? These images and others by the TGAM Art Collective willn't be on disp...

As I mentioned previously, I was dead over Christmas and confined to games I could play without moving too much, specifically, I could only play games whilst only moving my index finger and thumb right hand. Aside from Final Fantasy III this also meant that it was time for me to face up to the Battle Tower in Pokemon SoulSilver. For those of you who ain't in the know, the Battle Tower is a very challenging tower of battles. Who'd have guessed? Basically you take some of your best dudes and try to beat as many CPU dudes in a row as possible. Challenges can be done with 3 pokemon in mano a mano type affair or with four pokemon in 2 mano a mano affairs or if you have a willing friend you can try and do the tower with a mate over wifi. If you beat 20 trainers in a row you get to fight the tower tycoon. If you beat the tower tycoon you get a schmancy ribbon for all the pokemon in your team. If you beat 48 trainers in a row you get to face off against the tycoon slightly pimped and i...

Nintendo are pushing DQIX so hard and via the various channels that we consume all things video games we run the risk of getting Dragon Quest indigestion. Both EDGE magazine and ONM have run DQ retrospectives and articles in addition to those horrid PROMOTIONAL FEATURES that look like NON-PROMOTIONAL OBJECTIVE FEATURES. There have also been a couple of DQIX videos on the Nintendo Channel and a number of prime-time TV spots. Even the bloody real-life newspapers were carrying reviews and previews on Sunday. There was no escaping it. And yes, we know how they all go. "DQ sold a bagillion copies in Japan". "Nobody is interested here". Except for the PS2 version. That was quite good. Yet, for all this rhetoric and the unanimous glowing reviews we aren't even going to bother buying it, here's why. Firstly, and least importantly, there just isn't the culture of ad-hoc multiplayer play here that there is in Japan. I lose count of the games that have these 'n...

A Tweakquel is a sequel to a video game which is essentially the same as the original except with some marginally game improving new features. Common tweakquel features are: You can now dual wield weapons (e.g Halo) There is a vehicle section (Tomb Raider) You play as another character for part of the game (Devil May Cry, No More Heroes) The torch and gun are no longer mutually exclusive (Dementium) Two player co-op (Resident Evil) Some of the best levels are removed from the game (SW Battlefront) You get some decent songs licensed (Wipeout) Live action is left out (Resident Evil) Everything is shiny. So shiny (Perfect Dark) Remember, you heard it here first.

Click the title for the link. Some nonsense about a lady off the telly going on about violent video games again. Which reminds us we wanted you all to have these links if you are genuinely interested: The Byron review . 2007-2008 review into keeping children protected online. A full report, a summary report and a report for young people are available so no excuses. Review of research on the impact of violent computer games on young people . A DCMS review of the research up until 2006 on the link between violent videogames and young people. With interesting conclusions as to the nature and quality of that research. How to set parental controls on the Wii , Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 . That awful Susan Greenfield woman again. Digital Britain 2009 report into Brits and what they get up to online. Some interesting stats here. Don't Shoot a 2007 proper look at violence and video games links and you know, proper research. Lastly and we're being naughty here Atro...

Over the weekend we watched the first episode of The Virtual Revolution . A series all about the history of the web innit. Presented by I'm-A-Doctor-Now-Former-Bits-Presentertator-Aleks Krotoski. Anyway here's the breakdown just in case you missed it: 10% Gratuitous shots of Dr Al's breasts and butt. Really gratutitous. 5% Aleks nodding/glowing/gushing in the presence of an old San Franciscan. 15% Dr Aleks walking around looking pensive. 15% Dr Aleks walking around looking pensive with her shades on. 30% 5 of the richest men in the world celebrating how the web is the great 'leveller' specifically their software. 5% Bitter hippies claiming it's all gone to shit now. 7% Aleks looking into the camera and flicking her hair out of her eyes. 5% Aleks typing away on her laptop WITH HER MAN HANDS in the street near a famous landmark. 3% HIPPIES! 10% Some pointless graphic which was being 'unveiled' for the first time ever. Episode two i...

Yes readers. Everyone is doing unboxing these days and pretending it is an interesting thing to do. So much like our Dead Rising unboxing we're going to go through the motions with the new Resident Evil Darkside Chronicles although this time in one big fat update rather than separate blogs for the box, disc and book and eventually game. So we got Darkside Chronicles off the internet so no bag this time. But it did come in cellophane which is nice. Sometimes in GAME you buy a new game and it doesn't have the wrap which makes us sad. This time we know we're the first ones to see it outside of China as you might be able to make out from this image: We got a new phone so you can see things better in this update. So the box looks good. It has shattered glass on it which is a theme throughout the game. A nice theme mind. Naturally, once you've seen the front you have to flip her over and pretend she is a boy: Tasty, tasty and you've got to love the unprovable...

Okay, okay, who had 1.14 on the 8th of January for Peter Molyneux to start making big huge bullshit hype claims about big games that will ultimately never be realised upon release and end up as 7/10 this-game-had-some-great-ideas-but-totally-cacked-up-the-rest? Did anyone have that late in the year? No? Looks like 2011 will be a rollover! To be fair to the guy, as much as we kid , Civilisation was an awesome game.