VGA 101: uDraw Tablet (PS3): THQ’s Folly Makes For A Really Cool Budget Artist Buy…

uDraw PS3a uDraw PS3b

When the uDraw was first released for the Nintendo Wii, it sold well enough that THQ decided to bring the tablet peripheral to both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, but took a little too long to get it to market as more functional tablet devices became hot sellers. You could say that the company greatly overestimated a few things, most importantly, the selling power of the uDraw to an a PS3 and 360 audience made up of more hardcore gamers who had little to no use for a new peripheral they wouldn’t go near with a ten foot pole (unless they were using that pole to smash the thing to bits). Needless to say, uDraw on the PS3 and 360 didn’t do well at all and plenty of retailers and probably a few distributors were left sitting on plenty unsold stock… Continue reading

CD Projekt RED Wants You To Make Your Own RPG Using Their Tools

REDKit_Mod_ScreenIn case you’ve never played it, The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is a really spectacular adult RPG with some great writing, visuals and gameplay. Developer CD Projekt RED has been cooking up a nice treat for the more creative fans of their work to play around with and the results are pretty damn impressive. Granted, you just can’t grab their REDKit beta and whip out a game in a day or two (and yes, you need to BUY a legal copy of The Witcher 2, which isn’t a bad thing to do at all, as the game is really inexpensive now and is a good way to spend about 60 to 80 hours or so), but as you can see above and on the official site, the results can be amazing.

Of course, given the game’s system requirements and what are bound to be some really complex mods, I’m gathering you’ll need a fairly powerful PC to run anything created using this toolkit. But for those gamers or artistic types with the time to play around with their own ideas in the world of The Witcher, this one’s a no-brainer to at least try out to see if it’s something you can use…

Dragon’s Crown Cover Art, Artbook Revealed: Preselling A Not-So-Hard Sell…

DC_Artworks_Glam

Lovely… and it can soon be all yours, at that. Dragon’s Crown finally gets some VERY pretty cover art for its retail versions as well as a really cool pre-order bonus in the form of a 64-page softcover art book that’s absolutely going to be snapped up by fans of George Kamitani’s work. I’d go as far as to predict the art book selling for more than the game does down thee road among those who miss out and want to pay through the pores on eBay or some other site, but that’s not Atlus’ concern what you do with that bonus item as they see not a red cent from secondhand sales of their cool goods. Anyway, check out the official site if you haven’t already for character profiles, more of Kamitani’s lush artwork and more.

DCArtCover DrgVitaRp5 DrgCrwRpPromo4a

Dragon’s Crown will hit retail and PSN on August 6, 2013. Be there or be square, I say…

A Friendly Reminder (Nightlife Version)…

They Don't Serve Beer in Hell... At some point during your lifespan, you’ve probably (OK, most likely) stayed out late and gotten a bit too full of legal adult beverages to the point that the mere act of walking home becomes a challenging task. As in staying vertical is quite hard because the gravitational pull of concrete doubles per pint consumed. That and/or you just so happened to make the amateur mistake of over-beveraging at a tavern much further than you can stagger and crawl back to that warm bed you left when the sun was happily shining in the sky.

Anyway, at a certain hour when the local transportation system goes from reliable to pumpkin coach with rotted wheels and a dead horse, the night takes a really strange turn. Sure you COULD do the stupid tourist or out of towner thing and take a taxi to your humble abode, but any decent New York tippler KNOWS that’s just MORE money for food and booze the next time you’re out (or that hangover breakfast later that afternoon) you’re throwing away. Besides, that cabbie will circle you to Jersey and through Staten Island (or vice versa) before winding up with the entire contents of your wallet because you’ll be too blasted to know the difference. Or you’ll simply lose your money in that dark cab between the seat cushions when you finally get to your place. Cabbies know this (it’s why they’re always smiling on the weekends, sucker)… Continue reading

Ken Butler @ AIRPLANE: Return of the Home-made Twang Bar King…

KB1 (Custom)OK, class: Time for some art appreciation (siddown, you in the back – you went to the restroom three articles back!). I saw some cool hybrid sculptures by artist/musician Ken Butler last weekend at Brooklyn’s AIRPLANE gallery and found his work to be pretty incredible overall. Some pics are below, but you should probably check out his site to see more and find more about him and his rather amazing work.  I also shot a bit of video of one interactive piece I forgot to write the name down of (oops), so take a look below the jump and let your imagination go wild (or back to normal) as you make up your own story to go with the projected images on the wall. The fun thing about this particular work is it’s all found objects put together and transformed into a multi-purpose art piece (that can probably call down an alien spacecraft if played outdoors, make your cat or dog crazy when they’re chasing lights around the room or perhaps give a burglar a seizure if you play the keyboard fast enough when he’s breaking into your place to steal what he thinks is a time machine)… Continue reading

Cultchah! MoMA’s Applied Design Show Brings Gaming to the Masses (Huddled and Unhuddled)…

 

Hokay, I’m sort of on an extended road trip today (and as the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions), so this will be brief (with much more to come later). The Museum of Modern Art held a press event to show off one of their new exhibits, Applied Design (in case you didn’t see the video above). In addition to some amazingly practical objects formed from the alteration of nature into things such as furniture, tools and a rather innovative mine sweeping device, a number of important video games were on display, many of them playable. I’ll post a bunch of videos later (and some may even have ME in them – oh noes!), but if you’re in the NYC area from March 2 (tomorrow!) to January 31, 2014, it’s worth checking this exhibit out.

Toy Fair 2013: A Crowded Coop: Valve’s (Other) Secret Weapon

TF2013_banner

ACC_logoIf you’re one of those video game fans who collects assorted goodies related to your favorite games or if you’re just interested in fun finds with a quirky edge, I bet there’s a nice possibility that there’s something from A Crowded Coop on a shelf or hanging on or from something you own. Based out of Monroe, Washington and made up of a couple of professional genius business types with heavy experience in all things toy related as well as being some very talented artistic types with vision to spare, the company creates its own products as well as licenses and distributes other trendy, hip gear the cool kids (and old farts like me) love through a number of retail outlets such as Think Geek and other quality online and brick & mortar emporiums.  At this year’s Toy Fair, the company showed off an outstanding line of collectibles from some of Valve’s hit games (Portal 2, DOTA 2 and Team Fortress 2), a new line of beautiful plush toys from artist Justin Hillgrove, another upcoming fun plush line called Whim Whams and more that had me smiling even as I walked up to the booth…

Continue reading

EVENTS: Babycastles Is Bringing Keita Takahashi To NYC. Maybe You Can Help Make A Game With Him.

OK, I’m feeling a bit lazy, so consider this an audience participation post (or my idea of performance art). Please pretend to see an arty image somewhere in this post, as I didn’t add one. Of course, clicking on the link below will make your eyeballs happy, as you get a nicely animated official site to pore over with the same details below:

BABYCASTLES SUMMIT

WITH KEITA TAKAHASHI
IVAN SAFRIN
KAHO ABE
NEIL FRIDD

Brought to you by:

NYU GAME CENTER
CITE Game Innovation Lab

KEITA’S FIRST VISIT TO NEW YORK CITY!!!!

✌ THREE DAYS OF ✌
BANDS ✌ WORKSHOPS ✌ TALKS

Inspired by Keita’s kid-friendly play-scape designs and Anna Anthropy’s book, “Rise of the Videogame Zinesters: How Freaks, Normals, Amateurs, Artists, Dreamers, Drop-outs, Queers, Housewives, and People Like You Are Taking Back an Art Form”

Our goal is to inspire and encourage people who didn’t think they could make games to make games.

Babycastles will be building four video game play-scapes designed by Keita Takahashi In association with Kaho Abe, Neil Fridd and Ivan Safrin. They will be on display and available for play throughout the summit at the Museum of Art and Design in 2 Columbus Circle.

NICE HAIR

The Babycastles summit is a three-day series of talks, panels, bands, hands-on workshops and custom video game installations designed by Keita Takahashi , game designer of Japan’s Katamari Damacy. The summit will be hosted by the Museum of Art and Design from August 24th through the 26th as part of the “Fun Fellowship”.

Ticket Info Coming SOON as well as BANDS AND TALKS INFO
ALL AGES

The Whitney Museum 2012 Biennial: “Well, I Don’t Know About Art, But I Know What I Like…” (I Think)

OK, I needed a break from gaming for a tiny bit, so yesterday, I took a trip down to the Whitney Museum of American Art here in NYC to check out the 2012 Biennial. It was definitely interesting to see what’s been going on in the art scene since I hadn’t been to a decent museum in a while and over the past two weeks, I’d been to a few galleries in Brooklyn poking around to see what’s what (and finding some nice surprises).  I was expecting a lot of contemporary art in the usual forms (painting, sculpture, film/video, et cetera), but after experiencing some engaging performance art (of the audience perception challenging kind, especially if you don’t “get” Jaques Tati and dislike nudity, even if it’s cleverly silk-screened on different articles of clothing), seeing a dance rehearsal work in progress (made up of dancers and non-dancers), an entire artist’s studio moved into the museum (with the artist included, happily interacting with attendees) and other stuff you’ll need to go see for yourself, I have to say my brain is cooked up pretty good.I feel like making soemthing arty, but I haven’t a clue just what yet…

A lot of other art there was a bit odd, but really interesting from a few perspectives. I’ll probably go back again next week (Friday after 6pm is a pay what you like admission) and maybe do the life drawing session, as it’s been ages since I drew anything from a live model and I’m supremely rusty. Or maybe I’ll stay home and play some more games, as I need to catch up on a few reviews as well as get through the pile of other stuff I’ve started this year. Speaking of reviews, yeah, the two I’m working on are late, but fear not. They’ll get done and posted over the weekend. Not today, though – I have one more arty stop to make, but it’s kind of game-related, too…