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Mobcast 91: Sony's NGP, location-based gaming, HD remakes, and more

Brett_new_profile
Monday, February 07, 2011

In this week's episode of the Mobcast, Chemical Bun Production's Carlos Rodela and GameZone's Ben PerLee join Bitmob's Demian Linn and Dan Hsu. The group discusses Sony's recently announced Next Generation Portable project; location-based, GPS-centric handheld apps; which games they think most deserve high-definition remakes; and Dead Space 2's controversial "your mom's gonna hate it" ad campaign.

Want to weigh in on next week's topics? Be sure to check twitter.com/Bitmob or facebook.com/Bitmob to find out how your voice can be heard.

 

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Tags: Dead Space 2, Prince of Persia, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4, Mobcast, Final Fantasy 13, PixelJunk Monsters, Okami, Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, Earthbound, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Final Fantasy 7, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Ice Hockey, Skies of Arcadia, Splinter Cell, Advance Wars, Panzer Dragoon Saga, Grandia, Loco Roco, Halo: Combat Evolved, Killer 7, blades of steel, Thief: The Dark Project, Patapon, Xenogears, SSX, Mother 3, Bonk: Brink of Extinction, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, God Hand, Mass Effect 3, god of war: chains of olympus, Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, Angry Birds, Persona 3 Portable, Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, Their Finest Hour: The Battle of Britain, Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth, God of War: Ghosts of Sparta, Star Wars: TIE Figther, Body Harvest, M.U.L.E., Hellboy: The Science of Evil, Napoleon Dynamite, The Golden Compass, Funky Punch, Winx Club: Join the Club, Hat Trick
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Matt Giguere
February 07, 2011

I think a mash up of Blast Corps and Bio F.R.E.A.K.S. would make for an insane game.

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Robert Chang
February 07, 2011

 

Great episode! But I must comment on the whole NGP thing. I think the guy was very disingenuous when talking about how NGP's games are designed as consoles in comparison to 3DS games. Looking at the lineup, I think the comparison is closer than you think. The Yakuza, Lost Planet, MGS are tech demos not game announcements. The Uncharted game is built with portable design in mind (brand new Uncharted from a brand new team). And looking at the past PSP, you can clearly see that critics love console style games in portable design (top 4 on PSP are God of War, Persona, GTA, MGS on metacritics). And looking at the DS, you actually see a lot of console games on the DS as well like the enormous amount of Mario games, Final Fantasies, etc. So in my opinion, both platforms are equally focused on all different types of games (DS just has more of everything). Also, the NGP has already announced many new NGP specific IPs like Little Deviant and Gravity Daze. And personally, I think the dual touch screens + dual analog sticks are more evolutionary to the portable scene than a 3D screen. Lastly, I'd just like to say the hypocracy of every gaming experts in the light of criticizing Sony for packing too much into their devices to "confuse" their consumers, while Apple is laughing all the way to the bank with the iPhone/iPad.

Anyways, this was a really thought provoking episode.

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EK Thomson
February 17, 2011

I still don't get the fascination with phone based gaming. Of course, until recently all I had was a Blackberry, but now that I have an android, I have to be incredibly careful about my remaining batterylife on the unit. It seems that when playing a complex game like Spectral Souls, the battery could drain out completely in just a few hours. Once that happens, I can no longer check my email, nor receive phone calls, etc. Thus, I only play phone based games when I'm near a place where I can charge my phone. It's also telling that a game that managed a mere 43% metacritic score on PSP is one of the top games on Android getting a 4.5/5 on the Android Marketplace...

But my PSP3000 and DSiXL both are too bulky to carry around when I have no plans to play a game, so I only bring those when I know I'm going to have a bit of downtime wherever I'm going. 

My solution to portable gaming? I have a PSP Go and DS Lite, both of which are small enough to toss in my pocket with my phone. The PSP Go is smaller than my phone, and the DSLite isn't much bigger, so I can carry both the phone and one gaming system comfortably even if I don't plan on playing games. When the unexpected downtime happens, I grab the tiny portable and play. The Go has terrible battery life (~2 hours) but that's plenty for unexpected gaming, and I don't have to worry about not being able to get that emergency call from work if I completely drain the battery out. 

For those long trips with known downtime, the PSP 3000 with extended batteries can't be beat. with both batteries, I can go 16 hours between charges. The XL can do nearly 10 hours as well.

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