What Video Game had the most impact on you as a Child? 

What is your favorite song from a zelda game?

Moving to a different branch of geekery, and as another vs: "4th ed or Pathfinder?"

4th Edition...totally! (Sorry, no time for a longer post yet)

I scrunch my nose at 4th ed, it's totally pathfinder in my circle of geeks.

Admittedly, I haven't tried pathfinder, and I've really wanted to. UI've been told it is an improvement, but that it still feels like a a rules patch?

Going with guitar hero being cancelled untill further notice how to franchised games play in the gaming commuity and how do you feel about them.

  How about discussing video game music?

Like what defines video game music. Is Still Alive from Portal video game music? Are licensed tracks used in video games (Like the ones used in LBP and LBP2). Why and how it's different then music composed for movies or music composed just to sound good, like most of the pop songs from pop singers nowadays (Only good).

I would love to see a Weekly Wringer how the indie game scene is vital in terms of moving the industry forward.

AAA games are great and all but they cost a lot of money to produce and you need to sell a lot of them to turn a profit so publishers are hesitant find the next Call of Duty and would rather produce a game that is similar to it or produce multiple sequals of previous top sellers in order to make a profit. This stagnats the whole industry as its just the same thing over and over again and nothing new is being produced to move the industry forward.

That's where indie games come in. Indie games are games that are usually made a small number of people without the hassle corperate executives telling them which games to make. Indie games are smaller games that tend to cost a lot less to produce than bigger AAA games which makes them a lower risk in terms of creating new ways or prooving to the EA's and Activision's that these games are good and potentially be popular.

Games like Super Meat Boy, Limbo, Splosion Man and Braid proove that the platformers are not a thing of the past and that there are new ways to reinvigorate a genre that was so popular in the 80's and 90's.

I'm pretty sure that if Notch went into Activision and and proposed and showed off Mindcraft, I'm pretty sure Bobby Kotick would have laughed in his face and told im to get out of his building and we all know how Mindcraft turned out.

Heck if it were not for a couple of guys in the early 90's called ID Software making games such as Wolfenstein and Doom basically inventing the FPS genre, we may not have games such as Call of Duty and Battlefield today.

Just want to set the record straight, because I'm still having problems on how the RPG's originated from each sides. I know something about the start of D&D in the west, but at that period, what is the equalivalent of that in the east, specifically Japan.

I believe that "an idea or invention can be invented/made at the same time, in different times and places". That is all, I hope it's not confusing.

I'm all for discussions on RPGs, one thing I've always wondered was when the line between RPGs and Action-RPGs blurred. It was always my view that RPGs were turn-based battle systems like Final Fantasy and Chronotrigger, where as Action-RPGs were action-oriented games with customizable characters and/or leveling systems. Ever since the Xbox era started the Action-RPGs have become the RPGs while RPGs are now turn-based RPGs, and are becoming pretty rare on HD consoles.

My main problem with this is doesn't this broaden the scope of the RPG genre a bit too much? I mean think about it, if games like Dragon Age are the standard for RPGs, doesn't that basically make most action/adventure games RPGs? Games like Tomb Raider and God of War have character customization, story-driven gameplay, and leveling to some extent such as increasing lifebars.

What Game Series would you like to see revived?

On an idea related to Young-blood's, what about, What was the Best Series Revival in games; the Best...Game Resurrection!

Alternatively, what game series out there should die?

Along a line similar to last week's question, here's one. Squenix USA President Mike Fischer recently opined that social gaming is more or less a fad that he doesn't forsee lasting long. Is he right?

What is the future of the video game console?

It's unlikely that dedicated gaming machines are going to die any time soon but they have their first legitimate competition via services like On-Live. Given another five years to a decade, it's likely our infrastructure will advance enough to make it a viable option for a large number of consumers, and as exclusives are mostly a thing of the past the big three don't have a lot to offer in a counter-offensive if they stick with their current model.

In fact, isn't it possible that games will become as ubiquitous as DVD players and TVRs? With every third party game getting ported to every viable platform, is it conceivable that existing set-top boxes will include gaming functionality as part of an attempt to stay relevant as they straddle the line between physical and digital media? 

Of course the current console manufacturers wouldn't just bow out, so the question in my mind is this: is the Wii U essentially the prototype for the console of the future? Imagine that the main Wii U controller is replaced with a standalone portable system which makes it so you can buy one copy of a game and take it everywhere, and something like the Wii U controller would stand in for the portable system for when you want to play multiplayer at home in front of the TV. Is that an example of the unique functionality which could keep consoles on top when other devices can pose a legitimate challenge?

There's a lot of questions there but the first is the only relevant one, I just wanted to show my line of reasoning. As you can tell, I've got an essay ready if the question ever goes live. ;)

Nintendo is going through some rough spots right now. It posted around $1 billion in losses, and its new Nintendo Direct video doesn't look very promising. If the Wii U can't cater to more traditional gaming, third party companies will most likely be turned off by having to program for the tablet. Nintendo's casual crowd, the one it's been catering to for some time now, has lost interest in the Wii and has moved on to the Iphone, and now it barely has any suppport from real gamers. Third parties aren't exactly lining up to develop for Nintendo anymore, and this time there is no RareWare to save them. 

I follow the CotGW twitter but so far I don't know who actually writes the tweets... So who is it?

It's typically Roo. I know Commodore has updated it a few times, but it's typically Roo.

Ah cool.  Good to know.  Thanks.

hey there, long time listener first time poster but i have a suggestion

hows about a topic on smartphone data plans? this could relate with digital distribution and how we get our content on mobile phones cause this summer AT&T had taken out there unlimited data plan which is a bit of a step backwards in terms of advancements in telecommunication and data plans in general are still somewhat expensive. My question is were the future of wireless networking is heading if cellphone companies nickle-and-dime you to use a certain amount of data while are ever growning demand and use increases

as for a topic on gaming i agree with ShirowWolf, how about which game series has had the best revivals, cause i've been thinking about a certain blue rodent whose had a pretty good game come out recently :P

Well, what I meant was more along the lines of  what's the best series that's been resurrected from the dead! You know, a series that was really, for all purposes, just dead and forgotten, but then brought back. Duke Nukem would probably be an example of that, when Duke Nukem 3D was first released. I would'nt say Sonic qualifies as that, exactly! :P But, a Best Revived Series is also an idea I'd get behind; what's the best series that had new life brought into it and just brought back from the brink of oblivion?

Well, I heard nothing but bad news from the Duke Nukem game that came out recently, probably because the long wait for it was too hyped and the pay off wasn't anywhere close to expectations. But what do you expect when you wait years and years for something?

my question is what your favorite non-major (by major I mean atari,sega, nintendo,playstation, xbox) consoles?

How about, what top 1-3 (more than 3 might be too much for these purposes) game characters would you most want to be friends with?

Two subjects related to gaming and/or the internet that I think are endlessly fascinating, ever changing, and often overlooked, or dismissed as unimportant, and that I  would enjoy seeing used as subject matter are:

1. The validity of Internet/Gaming communities as "real" communities. E.g.: the long running LUE community originating on Game Faqs, Board based communities on text based (and other) mmo's that in some cases can be a decade old or more, social networking sites like Facebook, even the cute lil youngsters from 4chan. Do they interact, grow, change, recognize their history, undergo the same upheavals, declines, revivals, police themselves, protect (or not) their "young" in similar ways to rl communities? What are the differences? And are they great enough to dismiss them as valid institutions? If I ever got really ambitious, I would treat this subject from a Historical perspective, but frankly I find the Sociological/Psychological aspects by far more interesting but don't really have the specific disciplinary expertise to do them justice. =(

Nonetheless, I would still enjoy a chance to hear other people's opinions and experiences on the subject.

2. The other is Gender Issues in gaming and all that that entails. From guys who use anime chick avi's and cyber w/ other guys (sometimes also w/ anime chick avi's) to get free stuffs on games, to hyper sexualization of female gamers and game images (often a deliberate overcompensation to avoid the "nerd = oogly" label), to sexual harrassment/discrimination of women in gaming communities and on gaming sites, to lack of good games targeted at younger girls, to dismissal of female gamers as amateurs, tourists, etc. ("she probably is only playing this to impress her boyfriend. Ha. Ha."), to overt hostility of female gamers to one another (to curry favor with the majority, or out of a  "I was here first, and I had to put up with [X behavior]. Nut up, Buttercup" mentality targeted at younger female gamers from an individual game's female "old guard" ), to possible over sensitivity in certain instances among women gamers (e.g.: some women might be offended by someone using a term like girl gamer, while I am fine with it), to lack of parity in gender choices among character offerings in almost EVERY game in existence. This last is my 6 yr. old daughter's pet peeve. I, remembering when you were often unable to choose to have a girl character at all in many games, have tried to explain to her how much better it is than it used to be. She doesn't care. And she is the future of gaming. Barbie Dress Up is not going to propitiate her. She wants parity, not to be patronized. Whatever  game developers/companies/consoles in the future want her money are going to have to WORK for it; she isn't going to accept "there's more for girls (content/characters) than there used to be." So how is the industry and the gaming community at large going to haveto change to accomodate the likely far more stringent demands of the female consumer (My daughter beat Pokemon Diamond when she was 3 and plays everything from the new Mario game and SSBrawl for Wii, to Tekken Tag. I would love to hear someone try to call her a "tourist" when she is older.)  of the future?

Obviously this is a huge subject and any single aspect of it could generate hours of argument and discussion. I would be glad to see any of the elements of this issue offered for consideration.

(I haven't even mentioned the types of gender "reverse" discrimination that some men have experienced in games and gaming communities. Also a huge subject and very interesting, but I've already spewed forth enough of a txt wall. )

Is it the being in a game with good gameplay (like mario)?  Is good writing (like Nathan Drake)?  Is it being the pioneer for a breakthrough genre (like Master Chief)?  What made every character in Super Smash Brothers so popular?

I second this one!

  Well, the SSB games feature mainly big-name, well-recognized characters from Nintendo who are already popular on their own. I wouldn't say 'every' one of them is 'popular' though. For example, Marth hadn't appeared in any game yet when SSBB was released. Although, Fire Emblem is more popular in Japan, so he was probably already fairly popular in Japan, I suppose, but not here. I suppose he may have gained more fans since his SSBB appearance, as well as the DS game he appears in. I'm also not sure about the Ice Climbers; they only appeared in one Nintendo game prior, and well....I know a lot of people actually dislike them....