Well, this weekend I went to see an off-Broadway show and a movie, but still found time to play some games... despite this stupid cold I just can't seem to shake. Nothing new, but there's stuff coming on the horizon... but do demos whet your appetite or spoil the game? Ah, the age-old dilemma...
I know a lot of people have complained when I mention some awesome upcoming launch event at the Nintendo World Store in New York City because they don't live there and can't enjoy it themselves. Well, now I have to admit that Nintendo is throwing a launch event that I can't attend!
Nintendo is teaming up with iam8bit and Giant Robot for the release of Rhythm Heaven Fever for the Wii. The game comes out on February 13, but on Friday, February 10, from 6-10 pm, you can attend a special preview party... if you live in the Los Angeles area.
The party will be held at the iam8bit Gallery at 2147 W. Sunset Blvd. in Los Angeles, California. You can demo the game while enjoying food, drinks and music. There will also be uniquely customized T-shirts, posters and other goodies given away (while supplies last, naturally!). And while you're there, you can also submit clips to be included in a special Rhythm Heaven Fever interactive video experience.
So now it's my turn to be jealous! The Rhythm Heaven DS game launch party was one of my favorite Nintendo events, and not just because I totally won the DJ contest. It's a really fun game. Not sure if the Wii version of the music-based mini-games will be as much fun, but at least if you live in LA, you can find out for yourself on Friday night!
Wow, this was a busy week, both in Narnia and out! In fact, while my other home hasn't had much snow at all this winter, I was super happy that it snowed quite a bit in Narnia, because it meant I didn't have to water my flowers. Nature did that for me. Big time saver!
But like I said, there was big doings, so make the jump for the entire scoop!
I hope your week has been treating you well. As I've said week after week my favorite thing about Audio File Friday is getting to getting the chance to showcase as wide a variety of musical genres as possible. When I started this feature nearly a year ago I never thought that I'd find even half of the music I have. But through it all one of my favorite things to see is still a full orchestra going to town on the classics.
Groups like Team Hideo and the Video Game Music Choir have taken steps to bring their fresh take on gaming music arrangements to new audiences. What a challenge it is, though, to put together such grand performances. Especially when the necessary sheet music is hard to come by.
This week I'll be taking a look at the multi-talented Mr Trent and his spectacular gaming arrangements. Somebody give this guy his own personal orchestra to conduct, because he could definitely use one.
Well, I was miserably sick last week. I mean, miserably. So I didn't do a lot of gaming. Sure, towards the end of the week, I got in a little Skyrim, and even almost killed myself trying to do a new Dance Central song. But for the most part, it was streaming cheesy movies on Netflix. And I discovered that the Xbox 360 Kinect voice controls are a thing of beauty when you're weak as a kitten!
So I've realized something that I'm rather embarrassed by: To date, Audio File Friday has only featured female artists about three times: Angela Aki, Lana Del Rey, Rebecca Black and the lovely ladies of the Video Game Music Choir. Now, considering Audio File Friday is fast approaching its one year anniversary and this is a mostly weekly feature...well, that's not exactly a great number. It's a pretty awful number, actually.
Is there just a lack of female gaming artists in the world? Or are they just difficult to find? Are we about to dust off the age old gamer-girl debate? Whatever the case, in the following weeks I promise to make a concerted effort to include more female artists here on Audio File Friday.
This week's artist just so happens to be an extremely gifted young woman who is quite the Skyrim fan and goes by the name Malukah.
Nothing too shocking to report this week. No big events, no surprising exits or anything. But that's not to say that there wasn't the usual fun and silliness!
After I finished reading "A Gay History of Gaming" from IGN UK writer Keza MacDonald, I thought to myself, gosh, that's the sort of thing we should be writing here at GayGamer.net. But then I realized that actually, no, because this kind of article on our site would just be preaching to the choir. An article like this has more impact when posted on a mainstream site like IGN or Kotaku. But I'm linking to it so you guys can check it out, too!
Basically, she runs down a brief history of homosexuality in gaming, starting with Nintendo censoring Birdo's true identity and ending with gay marriage in The Sims 3, Fable and Skyrim. We've come a long way, baby!
It is nice that as games have evolved, so too has the representation of equality. Now that we have the technology to allow us to roleplay a videogame character to the point of finessing their facial features, I appreciate being allowed the freedom to also pick the love interest I would like to pursue. If I'm going to be indulging in the fantasy of saving the universe, I'd also like to go after the out-of-my-league hunky squadmate! (Unfortunately, since I played a Fem Shep in the first two Mass Effects, I'm going to need to finish the trilogy with her, so I won't be able to take advantage of the new man-on-man action BioWare added to the third!)
Oh, and while the comments on the WOW article I linked to yesterday might not have been too bad they're downright polite compared to the few I skimmed on this one! (We've still got a long way to go, baby!)
Over at the WOW Insider, Fox Van Allen has written an interesting article examining Blizzard's LGBT policies in World of Warcraft. Specifically because over on the WOW forums, it was discussed that "transexual" and "homosexual" are censored by Blizzard's mature language filter. The forum thread was locked down, but not before someone from Blizzard chimed in that there are words that aren't profanity that will be removed from the filter in a future patch.
That's all well and good, but the article then goes on to explore Blizzard's sketchy relationship with the LGBT community in general. Being that LGBT guilds are commonplace in MMOs, it kind of boggles my mind that apparently Blizzard tried to restrict them in WOW way back when. How did I not know this? Well, probably because I don't play MMOs or WOW, but still... You'd think that kind of slight would've at least popped onto my radar at some point.
Of course, what's also sad is that while Blizzard apparently had "homosexual" included in their mature language filter, they do not consider "faggot" or "fag" mature language at all. I know those are popular terms with lots of online players (reason #1 why I don't really play competitively online with people I don't already know), but that's no reason to encourage their use in the WOW online community.
If you're not already irritated enough, you can go ahead and click this link to read the full article. (Oh, and it should go without saying that you'll probably want to avoid the comments!) Hopefully if Blizzard gets enough bad press over this, they'll change their policies and make good. And if posting this helps in any small way, I'll feel better for having done my part.
Hey, guess what! I played something other than Skyrim this week! You'll have to watch to find out what, though. And I muse about which kind of DLC I prefer and why, as well as offer you a recommendation of a book to check out and a movie to avoid! What more could you ask for?
Well, after the quiet of last week, I shouldn't have complained, because while this week wasn't what you'd call "action-packed," there was still some major goings-on!
I apologize for being MIA of late. I've been busy on some rather exciting projects, some of which concern the very site you are currently browsing. But I won't tease you, rather I'll get back to business; scrounging the net to bring you some of the best original gaming music there is to be found.
This past Winter I found myself pleasantly surprised with Sega's newest release Sonic Generations. It is a true return to form for everyone's favorite blue hedgehog, and quite the nostalgia-fest for long-time fans. Being quite the audiophile myself, one aspect of the game that really stood out was its soundtrack. The game took all the Sonic classics and presented them in both original and newly remixed versions. Being one of gaming's biggest names his unfortunate last decade aside Sonic has always had some of the best music around.
It got me thinking: There has been barely any Sonic-love happening on Audio File Friday. Well I intend to remedy that immediately, with an awesome newcomer known as Juan Abad.
• Shin Gallon on Final Fantasy X Getting A Facelift: @ vkamicht: Someone did an undub of FFX? TO THE GOOGLEMOBIEL! But seriously, FFX was the last one I really...
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