Jeff Rubin's Articles
Native Americans and Licking Games
My guest for this week's A Winner Is You! is CollegeHumor writer Patrick Cassels. Some of Patrick's most popular articles have been about Mario and getting NES games to work.
TALKING POINT: Casting call! How would you cast a newer, bigger budget, Mortal Kombat movie?
Jeff: I'm thinking all CGI animals. Sub-Zero's a ninja polar bear, Scorpion is a scorpion, etc.
Patrick: I would cast Wilson from Home Improvement as Scorpion or Sub-Zero
Jeff: Heidely ho Raiden-rino!
Jeff: Plus he's already half-cyborg. What about comic relief? Who is Johnny Cage? For my quarters, nobody plays a movie star like Entourage's Adrian Grenier. If he can do a split, he's got the job. I'd also like Johnny Drama to play Stryker.
Patrick: One thing that disappointed me in the MK movie was the absence of the Pit.
Jeff: Maybe Louie Anderson could play The Pit! Am I right?
Patrick: I'll tell you who I wouldn't want for the role of Sonya Blade – Michelle Rodriguez. If I see her fatigues one more time...
Jeff: They should get the guys who played the characters in the original games. Those are real people in there, and them seem like they're pretty good actors. Whenever Johnny Cage hit Raiden in the nuts, I could always feel his pain.
Patrick: Quan Chi from MK4 should be played by one of the two members of WWF's Legion of Doom – but only because they both wear spiked shoulder pads.
Jeff: It'll have to be Hawk. I've got Animal pegged as Shao Kahn.
Jeff: Every fighting game needs a good Native American character. Street Fighter has Thunder Hawk, Killer Instinct has Chief Thunder, Stereotype Rumble 2000 had Chief Thunder Hawk.
Patrick: We raped their land and defiled their women; the least we can do is give them some sweet finishing moves.
Jeff: Plus, one of them will get a part in our super-sweet Mortal Kombat movie. By the way, I'm thinking it should be a musical.
Pac-Man, Banner Ads, and Racism
TALKING POINT: This week, in an announcement they called "video game history," Microsoft announced Pac-Man Championship Edition. Upgrades include gameplay tweaks, HD graphics, and the first new Pac-Man mazes in 26 years. Is this video game history?
Jeff: The game's already available for download over Xbox Live Arcade. The 360 may cost $400, but it's worth it. Finally, a console with the horsepower to run new Pac-Man mazes.
Jeff: The graphics in this new one are so sharp, you can see Pac-Man's tiny legs.
Justin: I bet the ghosts are actually translucent.
Jeff: This version has advanced AI. Instead of wandering around at random, Blinky will now patrol the perimeter.
Justin: And the fruit power-ups are just different flavors of Powerade. Actually, I bet playing Pac-Man with rumble would be pretty awesome.
Jeff: I like the idea of online leader boards. Someone out there is the best in the world at Pac-Man, and we should find out who he is so we can make him king.
Justin: I wonder what the 30-odd unused buttons on the 360 controller will do.
Jeff: One thing they were not able to develop for this version was multiple warp tunnels. The designers tried adding an extra set, but the first tester who went in never came out. He is presumed eaten by ghosts.
Justin: They should let you watch other players over Xbox live, so you can learn their strategies.
Jeff: That's a great idea. If someone has the Xbox 360 camera for some reason, you could watch an inset video of them playing the game. There would be hundred of weird dudes playing Pac-Man naked. Now that's video game history.
Expanding The Vernacular
Ex - My mom actually joked that something was "the shizzle" at dinner. Snoop-talk is so blung.
The Power Pad, Team Fortress, and Dr. Robotnik
This week's guest is CollegeHumor's intern Kevin Corrigan. Kevin has contributed headlines to the Onion and his favorite food is ice cream.
TALKING POINT: The Power Pad. Was it ahead of it's time?
Jeff: Throughout most of modern history, the assumption was that nobody wanted games with specialized peripherals. These days, games like Dance Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero are proving that assumption wrong.
Jeff: It just opens up new gameplay possibilites. It's interesting to see that, even back then, Nintendo was experimenting in different ways for players to interact with games. There were many failures along the way (Power Glove, Virtual Boy, the Edible Joystick) but it seems like all that experience paid off when they designed the Wii.
Kevin: The Wii has done an excellent job of selling us games I could be playing in my kitchen or garage. Wii Warioware? I turn off my alarm clock every day when I wake up. Why is that a game?
Jeff: When the Power Pad came out, technology had yet to catch up to it. World
Class Track Meet is fun to this day, but you can only get so good at it before it gets boring. DDR and Guitar Hero justify their cost with replay value.
Kevin: Plus, gamers are getting older. Maybe as we grow up we become less interested in saving princesses from turtle-dragons, and more interested in performing surgery and dancing at the club.
Jeff: It's only a matter of years before they're selling us genetically engineered Pikachus. Do you think a track & field game could be succesful today? It would be just like the old one, but updated with technology that knows when you've jumped off the pad
Kevin: I do. Today, it's acceptable for a bunch of guys to hang out in a dorm and run on a video game-pad all night. Ten years ago it would have been super-nerdy.
Jeff: Maybe it's more understandable than acceptible, but your point stands. Ten years from now, you'll be considered a loser if you're having sex.
Kevin: Penis-in-vagina intercourse is going to be considered lame compared to Wii Sex (the only sex that's 100% safe).
About Me
Jeff's likes - captioning CollegeHumor pictures, Parker Brother's Sorry! (preferably played with teams), pajama pants, Entenmann's Chocolate Chip Original Recipe Cookies, Arrested Development, when it suddenly starts to rain heavily on a Spring day.
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