There’s a fairly intriguing “food for thought” article over on Aeropause right now that looks at the prospect of pensioner gaming. It’s surprisingly something I’ve never really thought about before, and now that I’ve sat down and done so it’s quite a surreal mental image. I mean, what do you think of when you let oldies fill your head? Chances are it’s not of people talking about the latest video games, laughing out loud while gathered around a game of Mario Kart as one bloke wrecks another with a blue shell, and sitting in a circle playing wireless multiplayer on their handhelds. But that could be exactly what we’re all destined to become.

I mean, look at the picture of the bloke above that I’ve stolen from the article. What would you imagine that guy doing throughout his day? Sitting on his armchair reading the paper and watching some TV classics, perhaps going down to the shop for some milk and bread? But imagine him instead walking up to you and going on about how he spandoozled some 14-year-old newbie in Team Fortess 7 last night, then proceed to discussing the upcoming Unreal Engine 9.

Yes folks, this is our future. And personally, I’m quite looking forward to having retirement dosh to spend on gaming and filling my days with fun rather than rotting away in some manky room sleeping throughout the day due to sheer boredom, hoping my family will give me the gift of half an hour of conversation every week or so. Plus we’ll all get to wave our old gamer status in the faces of the new blood — finally we can act like war veterans!

Although Sam & Max certainly isn’t the focus of the interview that The International House of Mojo has seen fit to conduct, it’s probably the title that most are familiar with. The developers I speak of are of course none other than Telltale Games, who’ve created two games in their episodic Bone series and are to push out the first Sam & Max episode by the end of the year.

There’s really not much to say about the interview other than that it’s well worth a read if you’re interested in game development, any of the games Telltale is responsible for, or just generally enjoy reading about how a studio works. The team touches upon a number of different topics, including how the script and dialogue is developed, the voice casting process, artwork production, gameplay implementation, programming, a whole page dedicated to the sound and music, getting into the games industry yourself, and even Telltale internships.

In short, it’s a very interesting read! So go read it to pieces, and if you feel so inclined you might also wish to give it a digg so the whole world can enjoy it. Does it show that I’m looking forward to Sam & Max Episodes?

It’s not very often that video game culture creeps into areas outside of its own, so when you get TV ads for things like Coca-Cola clearly based upon a video game it’s usually worth talking about. Those who visited my old website may remember my post about Coca-Cola’s World of Warcraft advert (now available here).

I thought that might have been a bit of a one-off, but it looks like Coca-Cola has followed up with an advert based on Grand Theft Auto, even if there’s nothing that directly ties it to the series other than the style: quirky animations, similar angles, to what you see ingame, and of course all the stereotypical elements of a GTA game. Except without the violence.

It’s pretty tongue-in-cheek and really well done. It’s also sure to strike a chord with many of the Western world’s youth, most of whom are familiar with the series.

Ah, Lego. Something I spent countless hours with as a child, doing everything from building spaceships to acting out imaginary scenes from Monkey Island (thanks to the pirate themed Lego stuff being released at roughly the same time). Yes, Lego is a good thing. My entire bedroom was at one point a Caribbean island — as far as I was concerned anyway.

So when somebody takes a good thing and then does something even better with it, naturally I feel obligated to post about it. In this case, I’m talking about a small project that one R. LeFeuvre has undertaken: reproducing scenes from classic video games using Lego and a camera. A simple concept, but the results are oh so sweet.

It really is the simplicity of the idea that impresses me the most. I mean, we’ve all (re)created scenes from our favourite games or movies using Lego, right? So why hasn’t it occured to anyone to turn them into faux screenshots? Don’t ask me. Or perhaps they have and I’m simply too blind to have seen them. Either way, this guy has done it and I like what I see.

The games LeFeuvre covers are Metal Gear, Duck Hunt, Excitebike and Bionic Commando. Note the way that he’s recreated the interfaces of the games. Click on the images to bring up a giant version so you can see how every last piece of Lego slots together. Yes my friends, this is the kind of thing that is making you want to dig out your Lego from the attic right now. You never know, we might see a whole cult emerge dedicated to the recreation of video game screenshots in Lego.

View the whole gallery and be inspired.

As British Gaming Blog has helpfully pointed out, the upcoming DS title Yoshi’s Island 2 is to have some kind of online play if the box art is anything to go by. Coming to this conclusion is a fairly simple affair: the box has the blue “Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection” logo in the top left corner.

But how could multiplayer fit into Yoshi’s Island 2? According to the article the original Yoshi’s Island does actually have a multiplayer mode, only available by entering an inconveniently complicated code on the save select screen — apparently you need to hold SELECT and then hit X, X, Y, B, A. I never had any idea about this so I’m not sure what you actually do in the multiplayer, though I presume it’s some kind of co-op or versus mode like in the older Mario Bros games where you simply take it in turns to do levels.

It’d be awesome if there were something more inventive for Yoshi’s Island 2’s multiplayer though. Seeing as this is indeed Yoshi’s Island there’s clearly loads of potential for interesting gameplay: perhaps a simple mode where you have to shoot down X with your eggs N times before your opponent. Or maybe a reinterpretation of the boss battles in the original Yoshi’s Island where one person plays as the giant magic-infused enemy and the other as Yoshi. First to die loses.

What I’d really like to see though is some kind of racing mode, especially after seeing the Super Mario Bros race. The concept would be simple: you both play through separate versions of the same level at the same time, and the first to get to the end wins. Your own version is shown on the top screen, your opponent’s on the bottom. You could feasibly play through the whole game this way, each level ending when someone reaches the finish line. The one with the most wins at the end of the session is the victor.

If anyone else has some crazy thoughts about what types of multiplayer could be created for Yoshi’s Island 2, please leave a comment! I’m sure there’s pretty much zero chance of any of them being implemented, but it’s always fun to dream about what could be.

According to Destructoid, somebody claiming to be the Nintendo 64 kid’s dad has contacted them via eBay and proclaimed that his son is in fact a hardcore gamer after all. The message which can be alternatively read in .jpg form reads as follows:

“The N64 Kid lied. He played the game and still played it up until the video hit the web. He even had to have and we bought him PS2 when that came out. Don’t let me son kid you. I’m sure he doesn’t even play as much as some people but his interview was very misleading and I told him how I felt about it. Yes, I am his dad. It is obvious to everyone that his emotions expressed in the video from 1998 were genuine and that is eternal and this video clip will never grow old to anyone.”

If that is indeed his father than he’s clearly not a man who paid much attention during English classes. I’d be inclined to call it phoney, but I’ve not really much else to go on. I guess it does have that fatherly “No, my son loves games! Keep talking about him!” instinct to it.

Note: This post is a follow-up to Nintendo 64 kid interviewed; is no longer a gamer.

I was kind of hoping the fanboy guy I posted about last week would remain the worst case I’ve ever seen of obsession, and… well, he still is. But somebody started a thread on the Mojo forums today that’s quite a contender!

That is two people dressed up in Day of the Tentacle costumes at a cosplay convention, where basically a bunch of people dress up as video game characters. You’ll also notice black man Mario and Wario in the background, plus various others.

Think that’s some dedicated fandom? Then check out this second picture to the right. You’re looking at a picture of two guys in Day of the Tentacle costumes, in turn dressed up as Link and Princess Zelda from the Legend of Zelda games. Eep!

Update: I was a little harsh when I first wrote this post over a year ago, for which I apologise. In my book, if you’re passionate about something then you’re entitled to show that in whatever way you please; clearly a lot of effort went into these costumes, and I should have focused on that rather than what I thought of the people in them!