Here we have two guys reenacting Donkey Kong — complete with barrels and sound effects straight out of the 80's. This real-life simulation shows just how difficult it is to dodge a actual barrel being thrown at you.
The 'Alternate Eden' theory proves true, and it's up to you to ensure the operation was successful. You and you alone are in charge of what happens in this story. You are the final variable.
Here's a brilliant flip book of Super Mario, re-imagined as Jesus, kicking ass and taking names. Even the princess isn't safe from a brutal kick to the face.
There are a lot of things to get upset over in life. Video games are not one of them. Here are the ten best video game freak outs on the web.
Were you one of the proud few indulging in DOS adventure games in the late 80's and early 90's? Here's a video collection of some of the great moments in adventure games, from Leisure Suit Larry to Monkey Island 2.
You know you've done things while driving besides driving. Old ppl at the Times would like you to know: it's bad, shame on you, and you should play our video game to see how good at it you are.
Think the newly embiggened Jessica Simpson has it rough? That's nothing compared to the poor fat children victimized by the Nintendo cruelty machine Wii Fit, opines hysterical View hostess Elisabeth Hasselbeck.
Not but an hour ago, we solicited your classy-lite New York memories photos, to help us get through these worrisome times. Well if that's just a little too thinky of a Yearbook project for you, here are two photos of lesbian deejay Samantha Ronson (she dates a former actress named Lindsay Lohan) back when she was in high school. A little videogame playing nerdette! Who hugged boys. And... oh pish. It's a Friday. Peep away at a larger version of the above pic, and at another snap, after the jump.
At CNET, the heads keep rolling, nearly a year after Gamespot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann was sacked. Stephen Colvin, an executive who oversaw Gamespot, is out of the company, a tipster tells us. Gerstmann's firing came after a negative review of an advertiser's game, which made him a cause célèbre among gamers. What Gerstmann's fans will say: That Colvin and other suits are getting what they deserved for ruining the CNET-owned gaming site's editorial credibility. Josh Larson left CNET, now owned by CBS, in April. Colvin, a former magazine executive who was Larson's boss, joined CNET a year ago, shortly before the Gerstmann incident. His exit comes as CBS rejiggers CNET's generous benefits, our tipster says:
While conducting interviews at the VMAs yesterday, the nearby booth advertising Rock Band 2 was the cacophonous bane of our existence — though no one was more unhappy to see it than director Brett Ratner. As you may recall, the Defamer-beloved auteur (and big penis enthusiast) aspires to direct a film adaptation based on Rock Band's rival video game franchise, Guitar Hero. Since the idea continues to boggle our minds, we knew we had to venture a question, even if the resulting Defamer-on-Ratner interaction threatened to spin the world off its axis. Fortunately, the Rush Hour 3 helmer was every bit the gentleman. We blame the heatstroke. [MTV]
Grand Theft Auto IV is not so much the apotheosis of modern console entertainment as the first post-modern video game. While it provides the usual bloody entertainment, the latest installment of Rockstar's hit title is also a fully-imagined alternate world-complete with a witty satire of 21st century media. Serbian hardman Niko Bellic, the game's central character, can browse a self-mocking version of photo sharing site Flickr ("perfect for hopeless losers who like to spend days categorizing, alphabetizing and organizing their online galleries") and scour the missed connections on Liberty City's craplist.net ("sorry for checking out your 13-year-old daughter"). Most absurd of all are the mock cable shows-though they contend with their real-world equivalents. The newscasters of Weasel News are even more rabid than Bill O'Reilly and his colleagues at Fox News. If you have a friend with a Playstation, get them to show you I'm Rich, a celebrity show which in this episode profiles a cocaine heiress called Chloe Parker and as absurd as Paris Hilton. A campy British narrator-resembling that of the Daily Show's John Oliver-provides the voiceover.
Restaurants and bars in Liberty City are like other landmarks based on places in New York, the real-world city on which the universe of the latest Grand Theft Auto game is based. The names, locations and designs are all slightly off, like a riddle made for trivia-night nerds. Ed Levine has risen to the challenge. Liberty City's rowdy Steinway (here's the video) is pretty clearly based on Astoria's Bohemian Beer Garden. But Levine, a food blogger, has identified possible models for half a dozen virtual eateries and drinking holes-even this bland and Starbucks-like coffee shop which he places in a gamer's version of Midtown's Rockefeller Center. [Serious Eats via Kottke]
The Liberty City of Rockstar's crime-celebrating Playstation game, Grand Theft Auto, was always based on New York. In the videogame's fourth outing next week, the city is much more fully realized-but intriguingly off-kilter. For example, Liberty City (like the metropolis upon which it is modelled) has five boroughs. Broker is the equivalent of Brooklyn, Queens is Dukes, the Bronx is Bohan and Manhattan is Algonquin. And the fifth? Staten Island was too dull, so the makers of Grand Theft Auto have annexed New Jersey, renamed Alderney. (Both Jersey and Alderney are islands in the English Channel.) As you can see from these screenshots from the game below, Liberty City is recognizable, but altered, disturbingly. Of course, the screenshots we want are from the live gameplay. The central character of Grand Theft Auto, a tough immigrant called Niko Bellic, has in this latest version of the game the ability to perform new actions, such as calling women for dates. He can also become intoxicated, causing him "to stumble and the camera to blur and bounce about". Any GTA fans: please send video of a drunk Niko on the equivalent of the Lower East Side. After the jump, spot the differences between the real New York, and Grand Theft Auto's vision of the city.
