Rock, Paper, Shotgun

God, this probably says too much about my priorties. When one of the biggest and more credible sites get gutted in a dumb corporate buy-out, it gets mentioned in The Sunday Papers. When a virtually-unknown outside-of-UK internet videogame TV show calls it a day in their final episode though? Front page post. Like, obviously. I dunno. The slow machinations of advance capitalism leaving human tragedy behind it is just life. Consolevania were unique, and their passing just as unique as their coming. And my short eulogy continues herein…
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Clearly the biggest news of the day is the fact Consolevania have managed to get their installation of WAR working after it not doing so last time. Which involved Project Lead Paul Barnett calling up and having a yabber at them, which I suspect is a technical support offer which won’t be extended to the rest of WAR’s playerbase. The full exchange is immortalised in the video beneath the cut, plus lingering footage of a bond girl.
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Following yesterday’s Consolevania post there was some in-thread discussion around Kevin Leddins. Which prompted Cheeba to actually put the first part up on Youtube too. which means we can present the Complete Kevin Leddins. Kevin Leddins is… well, it was kind of in response to the fallout around (“Don’t mention the War!” - Ed). It’s mocking several people, but, mainly – I fear – me. To be honest, the first time Jim saw it, after watching the end he said “Yeah – that’s pretty much what it’s like”. We fucking reviewed the game. Both vids beneath the cut…
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Another one of our favourite things has sort of come back into life. We’ve only mentioned consolevania in passing before, but the web-TV show (which sprouted TV spin-off Videogaiden) has returned for a series 4. Except rather than their traditional shows, they’re doing a rolling-feature model, with youtube videos added as and when they’re finished. Thankfully, one of the first three is PC-game related, thus justifying a linkage. Rab is embedding himself in Warhammer Online to return in the world’s most long-form review. That he seems to be even more of geek than yours truly bodes well, but… well, surely nothing can go wrong?

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For those wondering if it’s abstractly possible for a developer to be owned by the largest third-party publisher in the world yet still be involved in Indy game development, then we have an answer for your troubled brow: Yes! Abstractly. If they make an Indy game*, anyway. Which they won’t. It’ll be Star Wars again, and everyone knows it.

It seems that Electronic Arts purchasing Bioware (and Siamese-twin developers Pandemic) recently hasn’t put an end to their long standing relationship with Lucasarts. Bioware and Lucasarts have announced they’re working together on an undisclosed game. What sort of game will this be? Our inside sources (that is, sources inside our head) tell us that it will prominently feature graphics and sound and gameplay. It will also come out on the PC, as we’re perennially optimistic. And for a more serious educated guess: A Star Wars MMO from their Austin Studio, maybe? And for further baseless speculation, head thee to the comment thread.

*(Oh – Indy/Indie game joke courtesy of Consolevania.)

Here’s a rather excellent thing you probably didn’t see yet.

We heart Consolevania. And sometimes they even mention PC games, which makes anything they do completely relevant to this blog. Phew, eh?

As a part of the Edinburgh Interactive Festival, evil PR man Brian Baglow (he’s lovely, but it’s very important we maintain that everyone in PR is evil) was asked to do “something” about the games industry in Scotland. His idea – to make a film about the business. Using his cunning, he roped in the Consolevania guys to create a 45 minute documentary, filmed over three days, visiting some of Scotland’s games developers. And asking them questions like, “What’s the longest word you know?”

At first glance it may seem to primarily be about people making games for mobile and Xbox Live, but look closer. They’re making them on PCs, see? And some of them even mention that they make some games for PC sometimes. Outerlight! They made The Ship. Thank the baby Jeebus. See – there’s no question this should be on RPS. Also, we love Consolevania best, and are posting it anyway, so screw you.

Engagingly titled Fluff Piece, you can watch it below, and pretend to your friends that this is the primary source for watching it so we get all the hits, or get your own copy to keep forever from here.