I’ve never really understood the internet’s fascination with animal videos. Often enough, they’re cute, but I’ve always been fairly disinterested. This though… this is something else. 

The Dtoid show went live at the San Francisco Vita Social Club today, Wesley reviewed SoulCalibur V, Journey is finished, THQ is still definitely in a lot of trouble, and more happened on 2/3/2012.

Destructoid Original: 
LOL SPORTS: Why I don’t like sports games anymore
Friday Night Fights: The Simmmpsonnnnns
This weekend on Twitch TV: Sup’ Holmes?
Rhythm Heaven Fever special edition unboxing

Community: 
Forum thread of the day: The Stock Market
Community blogs of 2/3

Reviews: 
Review: SoulCalibur V
Review: The Simpsons Arcade Game

News: 
Mortal Kombat Kollection comes to Steam
Metro: Last Light delayed to 2013
DoDonPachi Blissful Death coming to iOS
Sony: PS Vita does not have any problems in Japan
NCsoft’s first iOS game is tower defense, free today
EA loves COD Elite, wants more subscriptions in games
Journey is finally done, waiting on release date
Scribblenauts Remix gets a celebratory update
The Last of Us takes place in Pittsburgh
Twisted Metal delayed and censored in Europe
THQ blames $56 million loss on uDraw
Escape Plan screens feature leather sheep beasts
Wow: Check out these Gravity Daze whiteboard drawings 
Dance Central 2 Facebook app lets you track your scores
Game changer: NPD to receive Walmart sales data 
Madden NFL 13 cover opened up to 64-player fan vote
Xbox 360 is now the top-selling console worldwide
Test Drive: Ferrari Racing Legends gearing up for spring
PS Vita now playable at over 3,300 GameStop locations
Recap: 1st Annual NY Videogame Critics Circle Awards
FFXIII-2 levels up, equips Facebook
GameStop’s Retro Game Vault is ridiculously stupid

Offbeat: 
This is exactly how you’re supposed to play Saints Row 3
Scarface is the highlight of these Arkham City figures

Media:
Gaia’s Moon for DSiWare is a neverending story
Game of Thrones’ site is overflowing with new content
Natural Selection 2 still exists, looks better than ever
Here’s the arcade opening for Persona 4: The Ultimate

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Not unlike the situation Nintendo was faced with in the months after the launch of the 3DS, there has been talk of doom and gloom regarding the Vita. Sales of the new handheld have not been particularly mind-blowing in Japan since launch, and Sony has not attempted to portray its launch as anything it is not. More importantly, it has not yet begun to panic — and nor should it.

After 325,000 units were sold in its opening week, Vita sales in Japan have declined week-over-week more often than not. 3DS, PlayStation 3, and even the PlayStation Portable have routinely outsold it, although this finally changed last week when the Vita sold almost 3,000 units more than the PSP. Still, that’s nothing to write home about, which is perhaps why Sony CFO Masaru Kato didn’t go as far as it seemed he was going to when describing Vita’s sales.
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Metal Gear Solid isn’t the only series getting some action figure love from Square Enix. The Rocksteady Batman games are also marching in the Play Arts Kai toy line parade.

To celebrate the recent release of Arkham City, Batman and Joker figures made their debut. Next in the set comes a battle armor Batman and Harley Quinn — you can check out their action poses in the gallery below. The battle armor Batman reminds me of those goofy action figure-exclusive costumes that manufacturers concocted to sell more merch, a sentiment share by Jonathan Tubbs of Tomopop. Then there’s Harley, looking positively slutty. Her original skin-tight spandex suit from The Animated Series was a lot sexier, I think.

But never mind that! There’s one more character rounding out the lot — Scarface! Scarface has always been one of my favorite Batman villains. The manifestation of a psycho ventriloquist’s id inside a puppet modeled after Al Capone? Brilliant!

The regular Batman and Joker go for $59.99 each, and I assume the next figures will run similarly (Scarface comes bundled with Harley) once they’re released in May. That may sound like a lot of cheddar, but Scarface is worth it.

Batman and Harley Quinn admitted to Play Arts Kai [Tomopop]

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Any gamer of a certain age will be able to bore you extensively talking about two particular arcade games: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and The Simpsons. The classic TMNT game arrived on Xbox Live Arcade years ago, but as with many licensed arcade games, it seemed unlikely we’d ever see The Simpsons hit a digital platform. 

Sometimes, however, the legal red tape can be cut through, and nostalgia wins the day. The Simpsons Arcade is back, and gamers of a certain age can once again bore the world.

The Simpsons Arcade Game (PlayStation Network, Xbox Live Arcade [reviewed])
Developer: Konami, Backbone Entertainment
Publisher: Konami
Released: February 3, 2012 (XBLA) / February 7, 2012 (PSN)
MSRP: 800 Microsoft Points (XBLA) / $9.99 (PSN)

The Simpsons Arcade first hit bowling alleys and leisure centers in 1991, back before the TV show got legitimately funny. The highly contrived plot sees Maggie replace her pacifier with a diamond, which Waylon Smithers is trying to steal for Mr. Burns because of reasons. Rather than remove the diamond, Smithers decides to steal an entire baby, prompting the rest of the Simpsons clan to give chase. 

Part of the joy of The Simpsons Arcade is in just how ridiculous it is. When we were children, nobody considered the implications of a bespectacled man (wearing an inexplicable cape) joyfully kidnapping a child, or the randomness of Mr. Burns having an entire army of goons that try to kill a whole family — including an eight-year-old girl — for want of a diamond that he could likely have easily afforded. In fact, with the amount of money he wasted on trying to actively murder one of his employees, Mr. Burns could have bought the diamond outright for a lot less. 

Not to mention the fact that both Smithers and Mr. Burns sound like Peter Lorre as opposed to themselves. Oh, and Marge’s weapon — a vacuum cleaner — looks woefully sexist in a modern light. It’s a true highlight of this game to examine just how insane it actually is, despite us all taking it for granted back in the day. 

Using the same engine as TMNT, Konami’s classic coin guzzler is a straightforward, simplistic beat-em-up, and some players may be surprised by just how rudimentary the action is. Playing as either Bart, Lisa, Homer or Marge (who is still the best character, thanks to the reach of her vacuum), the only real commands are walking, jumping, and hitting. Pressing jump followed by attack creates a diagonal kick, while pressing the two buttons together causes a more powerful maneuver. There are also rare weapon drops, such as a slingshot or bowling ball, and a few trash cans to pick up and fling, but otherwise the eight stages consist of walking, punching, and getting punched a lot. 

It almost seems redundant to say that a twenty-year-old game has aged, but it’s a warning players need to be reminded of. This was a game designed around killing the player as cheaply as possible in order for an arcade machine to grow fat on quarters, so the simplistic combat is married to frustratingly overwhelming odds that were designed to test patience and pockets instead of skill. 

To counteract this on a console, Konami has allowed players to customize their own virtual credits. The default is forty, which is more than enough to beat the game, and a team of players can either share a single credit pool or have their own. There are also difficulty settings and a one-life survival mode, and a stage select screen is added as new levels are unlocked. 

Other extras include sound tests and character screens, as well as the ability to unlock a Japanese ROM of the game once the American version has been beaten. There are also options to smooth over the traditionally blocky graphics and toggle the screen size, though I much prefer the defaults. The game is nicely presented in a virtual arcade cabinet, which looks better than the screenshots in this review imply, and you can choose to remove it if you wish. Once you add online play and leaderboards into the mix, you’ve gotten a definitive version of a game still beloved by many gamers who fondly remember it. 

Fondly remembering The Simpsons Arcade is the caveat, though, as nostalgia is a key component to enjoyment. Objectively, by today’s standards, The Simpsons Arcade is not very good. It’s a brainless button-masher that is beaten through sheer attrition, and is so numbingly repetitive that one’s thumb will feel arthritic despite the incredibly short length. To anybody playing this game for the first time, it’s not going to be looked upon favorably in the least. 

However, Konami didn’t release it for people new to the game. This is for those who lost their pocket money trying to get past that infuriating Krusty balloon, who made it all the way to Smithers before being obliterated by one of his thousand bombs, and who still remember Princess Kashmir as a legitimate Simpsons reference. For them, this is a loving HD re-release of a game that’s very dear to their hearts. For such people, playing The Simpsons Arcade is a joy that no amount of aging can quite take away. 

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Reflecting the fact that last year’s Supreme Court decision, which reaffirmed videogames qualify for First Amendment protection in the United States, wasn’t quite clear enough for everyone, Oklahoma state representative William Fourkiller has introduced a new piece of legislation sure to draw the ire of gamers.

HB #2696, as reported by Gamasutra, would see an excise tax of one percent levied against the sale of any and all violent videogames in the state of Oklahoma. That immediately raises the question of what constitutes a violent videogame — Call of Duty is undeniably violent, but would a game where bears can punch each other count as violence? Fortunately the proposed bill provides specific criteria: a violent videogame is considered to be any game to have received a Teen, Mature, or Adult Only rating from the ESRB.
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Here is a sugary-sweet game that quietly slid under the door. Released on January 19 in the States and arriving on February 9 in Europe, Gaia’s Moon is an auto-scrolling fight game for DSiWare. That’s right! I can’t believe DSiWare content is still trickling in!

You play a young magician named Atreyu who soars through the skies on a flying cane — sorry, no Falcor here — while dodging strange baddies and flying dolphin thingies. It’s very simple, requiring only a single button to keep Atreyu aloft, and there seems to be plenty of variety in the obstacles you’ll encounter. In addition to the endless adventure mode, there’s a multiplayer mode in which two people can play on the same machine at once. I love it when DS games do that!

If you don’t mind the absence of Luck Dragons, you can grab Gaia’s Moon for 200 points ($1.99 on eShop).

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If you thought Valve was simply going to put Team Fortress 2 out to the free-to-play ranch in 2012, then think again. A new blog post has announced a wealth of new content coming this year including the last “Meet The…” video in the series for the Pyro. Will we finally have the Pryo’s gender confirmed? My bet is on Valve pulling a neat swerve on the issue just to confound us even more.

Also announced is the new Steam Workshop blog that allows players to keep up with all the new developments in the Mann Co. Store. Then there’s the 2012 Saxxy Awards where we’ll see some great replays that will make me jealous of my lacking TF2 skills.

The final announcement is maybe the most interesting because it’s the one we know the least about. Valve is teasing a secret TF2 project, which is probably not the “un-Godly map/hat hybrid” they talk about in the post. Will TF2 have a new play mode? New characters? Some new ultra-free-to-play mode where Valve pays you to play TF2?!? Speculate … NOW!

TF2012! [Team Fortress 2 Blog] [Image] 

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MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic continues to grow, now coming in at 1.7 million active subscribers since its launch in December. EA says that over 2 million gamers have purchased a copy of SWTOR in these past six weeks, and they’ve been playing the sh*t out of it ever since. Right know we stand at about 239 million game hours, or over 27,000 years of in-game time. Over 20 billion NPCs have been killed, and more than 148 billion credits have been spent in the past month or so.

EA credits early success to their uptime record, which stands at 99.5 percent outside scheduled maintenance. They say that the next game update, which will bring new content, systems and guild features, is scheduled for release in Spring 2012.

Okay, we’re done here. Back to SWTOR.

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