The Definitive, Absolutely 100% Petty Complaining and Pointless Digression-Free Guide to Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3

With the recent release of Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, the Marvel vs. Capcom roster is now bigger than ever before. (Provided one defines “ever” to exclude Marvel Vs Capcom 2.) With 48 characters to choose from and no ability to select multiple iterations of the same character so that you can just pick three Sentinels and crush everybody like in Marvel vs. Capcom 2, selecting your team of three can be a daunting task. Fortunately, my friend and guest co-author Kevin Folliard- screenwriter of the Press Start Adventures online animated series and the two Press Start live-action films from Illinois-based independent film company Dark Maze Studios and an innovator in the field of video game parodies that have actual jokes instead of nostalgic references standing in for jokes- and I are here to provide guidance with this piercingly insightful look at some of the characters, both new and old, who will be doing battle in Ultimate Marvel v. Capcom 3: The Fate of Two Worlds. So, without further delay, let us begin, starting with perhaps the only character renowned and fearsome enough to march in the vanguard of so mighty a host:

Tron Bonne


John: A returning character from Marvel vs. Capcom 2, Tron Bonne appeared in the Mega Man Legends games and her own spin-off, The Misadventures of Tron Bonne. Tron Bonne was one of four Mega Man characters to appear in MvC 2, along with Servbot, Roll, and Mega Man himself. In Marvel vs. Capcom 3, the developers had a great idea- make Mega Man's red-armored, sword-wielding, and still-reasonably-masculine-despite-that huge-blond-ponytail comrade-in-arms Zero playable. Alas, this time they could only dedicate two playable character slots to characters from the Mega Man universe.

So, they did the obvious thing: Ditched the central character of the franchise and one of the most iconic characters in the history of video games so that they'd have space to keep one of the secondary antagonists from a short-lived Mega Man spin-off series that last had a game released over a decade ago. Which makes sense, because... because... Kevin, help me out here.

Kevin: I think that.... Well it makes sense due to her…. Mega Man has always been loathed and….. I’m afraid I’m of no help to you. Not only is Tron’s inclusion over Mega Mann a bonafide headscratcher, it has also opened a Pandora’s Box of outrage from scores of pissy Mega Man fanboys throughout the internet. The level of self-importance and immaturity from the E-outcry has been growing exponentially since the Blue Bomber was snubbed yet again in Ultimate MvC 3, and a growing cesspool of childish pouting and image spam has begun to suck out what little shreds of dignity might have existed in the fan community. For God's sake, Capcom, please give us Mega Man. It’s not about his iconic status at this point. We need to quell this embittered mass of negative emotion before it becomes sentient.

Wesker

Kevin: Albert Wesker, the main antagonist of the Resident Evil series, has finally made it into the Marvel vs. Capcom universe. But like some other characters, he has something of a complex. Wesker seems concerned with maintaining an image of intimidation. With every teleport and counter he implores: “Do I frighten you?! Do I frighten you?! Do I frighten you?! Do I frighten you?! Do I—Do I—Do I frighten you?”

“Yes, Mr. Wesker,” I want to reply, “you frighten me very much. It’s going to be okay.” My current theory is that the machines of Wesker's Tricell Genetics Laboratory are somehow fueled by fear, like the society from the movie Monsters Inc.

John: Insert lazy political joke about the politician, political party, or socioeconomic system of your choice here.

Kevin: In any case, however, at this point the motivation behind his obsession with frightening his opponents remains unclear.

John:Well, I'm not ashamed to admit he frightens ME. The combined effect of Wesker's all-black clothing, coldly disdainful expression, and pale ultra-Nordic blondness always makes him look like he ought to be in some sort of creepy German electronic band that Dieter from Mike Myers' old “Sprockets” sketches would listen to. I half-expected his victory quote to be, “Ve believe in nothing, Redfield! NOTHING!”


Phoenix Wright

Kevin: The heroic Capcom Lawyer Phoenix Wright is perhaps the most controversial addition to Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. It seemed like half the fans were psyched to see what form his play style will take, while others feel slighted that a legal professional has been invited to go toe to toe with some of the most powerful fighters in fiction. I say, lighten up! Marvel characters have been getting beaten up by lawyers for decades. There’s She Hulk, there’s Daredevil. There’s that little-known story in which the Carnage Symbiote got on Johnnie Cochran. And who can forget when Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor got her hands on the Ultimate Nullifier?

John: I was never a big fan of that issue, to be honest. Sandra Day O'Connor was so overexposed in the early 90- she had her own series, she was a member of the Avengers, she was in what seemed like half of the X-books, she kept popping up in The Punisher for reasons that never really made sense, the whole Sandra Day O'Connor/2000 AD/Stormwatch crossover... Just got tired of it after a while.

Phoenix Wright makes his closing argument before the United States Second Circuit Court of Appeals during the historic case of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms v. von Doom.

Kevin: Honestly, they can make Phoenix as goofy as they want for all I care. This is a game that asks questions like “Who would win in a fight: Tron Bonne or Dormammu?” At this point, adding a clumsy lawyer to the mix can only make it more serious.

John: I mostly just enjoy the fact that there's a character in the game with a “projectile “attack- for lack of a better term- that consists of some girl running in from offscreen while flailing her arms like a 5-year old. I also like the move where she rushes out in front of you to create a defensive energy barrier; “hero who uses a woman as a human shield” had always been an underutilized design niche until now.

Akuma

Kevin: You can’t have a Capcom Fighting game without Akuma! Why… why can’t we please have ONE god- forsaken game without him?

Akuma was introduced in Super Street Fighter II Turbo as an overpowered hidden fighter who throws fireballs down from the air, growls at everyone, and performs the highly questionable “Raging Demon Attack” which is censored for some reason by those little exploding flicks that happen when Street Fighter characters punch one another. Since then, he has continued to be both “hidden” and overpowered in nearly every appearance he makes. For almost two decades, he has caused the expression “Here Comes a New Challenger” to grow and swell exponentially in its irony.
In MvC 3, they’ve tweaked him quite a bit to distinguish him from the already-included Ryu. Akuma now has a fireball, a hurricane kick, and a shoryuken uppercut. Which makes him a worthwhile inclusion because....

Son of a bitch!

John: Agreed, Akuma was a very poor choice for inclusion. The Tron Bonne of contemporary East Asia, if you will.

Strider Hiryu

John: My all-time favorite 1980s action game character named after a mode of ambulation makes his return in Ultimate Edition. My favorite thing about Strider has always been his weapon. It's basically a tonfa, an old Okinawan weapon with a short handle perpendicular to a long wooden shaft- already inherently cool because the hero in Suikoden II used them- except instead of a long wooden shaft there's a giant sword blade. Because, well, why not?

More weapons need to take a cue from Strider and incorporate swords. Flail? Sword on a chain. Handgun? Swordgun, even though I have no idea how the hell that would even work, or whether it would be a sword that can fire bullets or a gun that fires swords, or what. Nerve gas? Cloud of microscopic swords that enter the bloodstream and dismember the enzymes in people's neurons on the molecular level. Plasma cannon? Fires blasts of highly energized copper ions produced from vaporized bronze swords. And so forth.

Kevin: You're forgetting Strider's best weapons of all: his army of robotic birds and sabretoothed tigers! What is not to like about this guy?

John: Those robotic birds need to be replaced with motorized winged swords immediately. The sabretoothed tiger is fine as-is.

That's all for now. Join us next week- that's right, you're not getting off that easy- as we delve deeper into Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3: The Fate of Two Worlds. Will Mike Hagar's ability to hit people over the head with a pipe be enough to fell the all-powerful Galactus, devourer of worlds? Will I resist the temptation to go for the obvious joke about Dr. Doom's “hidden missile” attack? Will Kevin's loathing of Akuma fill him with so much rage that he succumbs to the dark power of the Satsui no Hado and becomes the very thing he hates most? Will either of us ever say anything with any sort of actual gameplay relevance? Join us next week to find out!

Reggie’s shiny chin, Japanese monetary policy may fall victim to Nintendo’s desperate measures to cut costs

(Note: The original version of this article appeared at Kuribo's Shoes, so if you like it be sure to check them out. Like everything at Kuribo's Shoes, this article is completely fictional. Which is too bad, because if somebody actually made Kirby’s Feast of Souls I'd probably watch it. ) 

Faced with devastating financial losses approaching $1 billion over the past six months, Nintendo is now reportedly planning drastic measures to cut costs. According to sources inside the company, the massive success of the Nintendo DS and Ninttendo Wii has bred what one source called a “culture of excess” among many of Nintendo’s high-level employees that, combined with other factors such as international exchange rates and costs associated with the Nintendo 3DS and forthcoming Wii U systems, was a major contributor to Nintendo’s recent losses.

“Building a 30 foot tall sapphire-encrusted platinum statue of yourself can seem like a perfectly reasonable executive perk when you’re moving tens of millions of Wiis and DSs every year,” said a Nintendo employee speaking on condition of anonymity. “But now, that sort of thing just isn’t sustainable.” Other sources at Nintendo have also indicated other areas where the company is exploring possible money-saving measures, such as the production costs of Nintendo hardware.

According to the most recent reports, new measures to cut costs currently being considered by Nintendo include: 

• Significantly reducing the volume of Nintendo President Satoru Iwata’s office money-swimming pool, which has been described as currently being of “Scrooge McDuckian proportions,” to a more manageable Olympic-standard 2.5 million liters.
• Simply ignoring the pleas of American gamers for an American release of RPGs like Xenoblade and Last Story, instead of Nintendo of America’s current policy of finding the addresses of disappointed RPG-loving Wii owners and sending mocking singing telegrams to their homes just to rub it in.
• Phasing out production of the current version of the Nintendo 3DS and introducing a new version, tentatively called the “Nintendo Ultra 3DS,” which replaces the current version’s autostereoscopic 3D upper screen and PICA200 graphics processing unit with more cost-effective View-Master technology licensed from Mattel subsidiary Fisher-Price.

Just one of the many exciting titles that will be available at launch for the Nintendo Ultra 3DS.

• A 50% reduction in NoA President Reggie Fils-Aime’s chin polish budget.
• Addressing the current high strength of the yen against other currencies, which has severely cut into the profitability of foreign sales because revenue from those sales now yields fewer yen when converted from foreign currencies. The precise details of how Nintendo intends to affect the exchange rate are unclear, though a recently leaked set of internal documents containing floor plans and security schedules for the Bank of Japan’s headquarters in Tokyo, a report from Nintendo’s legal department about extradition treaties, and dossiers and contact information for several private military contractors operating out of the former Soviet Union has raised concerns among some industry analysts.

In addition to cost-cutting measures, Nintendo is a;lso exploring new sources of revenue, such as licensing Nintendo characters and other intellectual properties for use by other companies. Licensing deals currently being negotiated include the use of Mario’s dinosaur friend Yoshi as the official mascot of the Creation Museum in Peterburg, Kentucky and a crossover fighting game to be produced by NetherRealm Studios entitled Earthbound vs. Mortal Kombat. Nintendo has also sold the film rights for several Nintendo IPs to American low-budget direct-to-video horror/sci-fi film company The Asylum, which plans to release its first Nintendo-themed films, Donkey Kong vs. Mega Shark, Kirby’s Feast of Souls, and Donkey Kong vs. Crocosaurus, in late 2012.

One day I would know what my special purpose was for: New releases for the week of 11-9-11

Power Rangers Samurai

(Nintendo Wii) I hadn't realized Power Rangers was still an ongoing thing, but I suppose that as long as there is special effects footage from Japanese action shows that can be grafted together with completely unrelated new American footage so that episodes of the resulting hybrid can be churned out like so many hot dogs there will always be Power Rangers. Mhis is the tie-in game for a new iteration of the Power Ranger series that started this year, Power Rangers Samurai.

I was exposed to far too much of the original Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers show as a kid, despite thinking that it was silly even then, because 1. it was on right before Batman: The Animated Series, which I always made sure to catch after school because a cartoon that wasn't written by people who thought their audience consisted of utter cretins was such a novelty back then, and 2. I was in 5^th or 6^th grade at the time, and I found the girl who played the Pink Ranger oddly fascinating for reasons I couldn't quite put my finger on.

(And still can't. Hi-yo!)

In any case, I just hope for the sake of kids who like Power Rangers that this is better than the typical kids show tie-in games of the 80s and 90s. I've generally thought motion controls were an annoying gimmick, but in this case I can see it actually adding to the game; a lot of the kids I knew growing up probably would've given their right arm for a motion-controlled Power Ranger game. Which would have rendered the game itself useless to the very person who made such a bargain, sort of like the ending of O. Henry's "Gift of the Magi" if Henry had been a morbid child-hating psychopath, but it's not as if elementary schoolers are typically known for their foresight.

The Black-Eyed Peas Experience

(Xbox 360 Kinect, Nintendo Wii) Remember the time I said that I consciously try to avoid being the sort of person who complains about how he doesn't like something that he was obviously never part of the intended audience for anyway, because it's unreasonable to treat something as if it were objectively bad because it failed to fulfill a set of standards and expectations that aren't relevant to it?

That policy is hereby rescinded.

Mega Man finally speaks out about his troubled career: “Tron Bonne? Seriously?”

(Note: The original version of this article appeared at Kuribo's Shoes, the wordl's greatest gaming-related fake news site, so if you like it be sure to check them out. ) 

In the aftermath of Capcom’s cancellation of  the long-awaited third game in the Mega Man Legends series, the reclusive star of the long-running franchise has finally emerged to give his side of the story.

“I knew they were getting ready to fuck me,” Mega Man said in an interview conducted at his home in Santa Clarita, California. “I knew after Marvel vs. Capcom 3. I mean, they decided to have two playable characters from my games in it. They included Zero for the first time. And hey, he deserves it. He’s a good kid. And then for the second slot, they decided to use Tron Bonne? Seriously?

“I’m the most iconic character in the company’s history. They’ve got Viewtiful Joe in the game. They’ve got three Resident Evil characters in there. They’ve got Akuma, because Lord knows Capcom won’t be satisfied unless they've shoehorned that glorified palette-swap into every fighting game they ever make. They’ve got some one-armed has-been, they’ve got a Japanese dog that doesn’t even talk, they’ve got Zero and  freakin’ Tron Bonne, and I hear that for the Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom expansion they apparently have some damn lawyer fighting in it. How the hell did that happen? Did he win a contest, or something? Was Capcom running some sort of  ‘Send in five hundred cereal box tops for a chance to appear in Marvel vs. Capcom 3′ promotional bullshit that I never heard about?”

Inside sources at Capcom say the decision was motivated by Mega Man’s increasingly erratic and unprofessional behavior, which had started making him a liability to the developer. Mega Man has been involved in several high-profile conflicts with other characters in the Mega Man series over the years. Well-known examples including his tumultuous marriage, divorce, remarriage, and second divorce with co-star Roll, an acrimonious offscreen relationship with Dr. Light that reportedly culminated in a drunken, cocaine-fueled fistfight in Light’s dressing room on the set of Mega Man 10, and a long-running media feud with Proto Man for allegations made against Mega Man in Proto Man’s controversial tell-all book Sex, Drugs, and Steel: A Shocking Look Behind the Scenes of Capcom’s Most Beloved Series.

In 2009, Capcom reached an out-of-court settlement for an undisclosed sum after a sexual harassment lawsuit was filed by Splash Woman, the Mega Man series’ first- and to date, only- female Robot Master, due to what Splash Woman’s attorneys described as Mega Man’s “lewd, offensive, and unprofessional conduct” on the set of Mega Man 9.

The last straw was apparently during the production of Mega Man Legends 3: Prototype Version, a prologue for Mega Man Legends three proper. Planned for a release on the 3DS eShop as a teaser for the main game, MML3: Prototype Version suffered repeated production delays while Mega Man attended a series of court-ordered rehabilitation sessions after being arrested for driving while intoxicated and misdemeanor narcotics possession in April 2011, which violated the terms of his probation for several similar previous offenses during the previous year. This ultimately led to Capcom’s decision to pull the plug on the beleaguered project.

Mega Man says he is considering a number of offers from other companies, which are rumored to include roles such as ED-209 in the video game adaptation of a possible reboot of the Robocop franchise, one of the Reapers in Mass Effect 3, and the title role in future Bomberman games. He is also in negotiations to star in a planned remake of 1994 fighting game Rise of the Robots, tentatively entitled  Rise of the Robots: Not the Most Godawful Game Ever Crapped Out Edition.

Though he insists that he has already put his acrimonious split with Capcom behind him, it’s clear that some resentment still lingers. “The first time I even heard there was going to be a Marvel vs. Capcom 3 was when Zero called to give me the news that he was in it,” he said. “They never even asked me if I wanted to be involved! You’d think they’d want Marvel vs. Capcom 3 to include the man who made Capcom what it is, but apparently they couldn’t be bothered with me because they had to make sure that there was enough space for TRON FUCKING BONNE to be included.”

Ace Combat thoughts

I've been looking forward to Ace Combat: Assault Horizon for a while now. My anticipation has only been heightened by the fact that Ace Combat 6, cruelly, was an Xbox 360 exclusive that I've yet to play. (You broke my heart, Namco. You broke my heart.) This is one of those rare times in which I attempt actual commentary on a game, so you've been warned.

Some longtime fans of the series of lamented the fact that this game is set in the real world rather than the imaginary planet, Strangereal, that has been the setting of most other Ace Combat games. I sympathize with that. I've always liked the alternate world of the ace combat games, especially because it was a setting that allowed the developers to set stories in a world where military technology was mostly recognizable from our own modern day and then throw in the occasional  orbital coilgun or undersea aircraft carrier. It's harder to get away with that sort of thing in a game about modern combat aircraft that's actually set in our depressingly coilgun-impoverished real world.

Note that I haven't yet played the new game and have avoided spoilers, so for all I know the plot of Assault Horizon involves fusion-powered flying aircraft carriers that can cloak like a Klingon Bird of Prey or a lens in outer space that can set cities on fire with focused sunlight or aircraft being burned out of the sky by nuclear-pumped x-ray lasers. In which case the above is moot.

On the other hand, I think the change might be a good idea. One of the problems with having more and more games set in Strangereal is that having (mostly) recognizable modern military technology creates a fairly limited window in Strangereal's history for games to be set. With the exception of Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere, all of the Ace Combat games have been set between the years 1995 (Ace Combat: Zero) and 2020 (Ace Combat X: Skies of Deception). We already know the planet's geography, more or less, and so there are also a limited number of places in Strangereal for wars to be fought and a limited number of countries to be belligerents in them.

Every new Ace Combat game needs a war placed within those constraints, preferably- especially if it's in the mainline series and not some spin-off- in a conflict of respectable size that has not yet been the focus of a game so that the player isn't sitting in the shadows of previous heroes. There's a reason the destruction of the second Death Star and the death of Darth Vader and the Emperor in Return of the Jedi wasn't followed up by Star Wars Episode VII: Boring Post-War Outer Rim Peacekeeping Operation. (Unless you count the Jedi Academy Trilogy, anyway.)

The problem with this is that for each additional game you have to cram another large conflict into that same few decades. There are reasons, in the Ace Combat back story, for Strangereal to be suffering a much greater degree of large-scale warfare in its late 20^th and early 21^st centuries than our own has had, but the overall tone is generally hopeful. There's only so much unpleasantness you can cram into that quarter-century before the overall tone of the setting shifts from “a world much like our own wracked by conflict and upheaval as people fight for a better future” to “blood-soaked abattoir where the only escape from the unending violence and horror of existence is death,” and I'd rather see Strangereal stay on the brighter side of that line.

Oddly- because the appeal seems so obvious in retrospect- it was only just now, as I started thinking about the implications of the time frame of the Ace Combat series that it occurred to me how much I would like to play an Ace Combat game set in Strangereal's early-to-mid-twentieth century. If you're a fan of the series, just imagine it: Zeppelins. Biplanes. Triplanes. Quadruplanes. Massive bombers bristling with gun turrets as tiny fighters dart around them. Gigantic artillery. Sub-orbital bombers. Ornithopters. Autogyros. Ridiculously large tanks. Zeppelins, because they're cool enough to mention repeatedly. Rocket-powered fighters. All in the same alternate world where wars fought in the 1990s involved, among other things, batteries of railguns capable of shooting down objects in outer space and a gigantic laser that could hit targets over the horizon by reflecting off of giant orbiting mirrors.

This must happen.

Duke's in his development Hell, all's right with the world

In news that seems almost aggressive in how utterly unsurprising it is, plans for a fan-made but officially authorized remake of Duke Nukem 3-D are now on indefinite hold.

This comes as sort of a relief. Not, I hasten to add, because of any antipathy towards the guys behind the Duke Nukem 3-D: Reloaded, or towards fans of the game that were hoping to play the remake, or- I should hope it goes without saying- towards His Grace personally. It's just that the universe is back in balance now.

Gearbox's success (for a certain value of “success”) in actually making and releasing Duke Nukem Forever shattered one of the fundamental law of  nature, without which a comprehensible or even coherent universe would become impossible. Nothing can travel faster than light. The combined internal angles of a triangle on a two-dimensional plane always equal 180°. The Chicago Cubs will not win the World Series. And, last but by no means least, the next first-person Duke Nukem game is always trapped in an endless series of production delays from which it is doomed to never escape, forever bound in unbreakable adamantine chains of iron and copper and abandoned code made unusable by engine changes. And yet, somehow, back in June, Duke Nukem Forever actually came out.

But now the natural order reasserts itself, and the world makes sense again.

Cliff Bleszinski responds to Gears of War 3 reviews: “Is worship as a living god somehow too much to ask for?”

(Note: The original version of this article- which is fictitious, just in case that somehow isn't obvious by the point where Cliffy B demands a formal apology from the Queen and the delivery of a severed human head to Epic headquarters- appeared at Kuribo's Shoes, so if you liked it be sure to check them out.) 

Epic Games designer Cliff Bleszinski has recently become the target of a storm of criticism over his complaint that reviewers at Eurogamer were “haters” for giving Gears of War 3 a rating of 8 out of 10 in its recent review. After an initial response insisting that the “haters” remark was a joke taken out of context,  Bleszinski has now issued further clarifications on his remarks. In a recent statement to the press, Bleszinski said:

I don’t expect everyone to like every single thing I do. But when a major publication like Eurogamer says that much of the game “shines,” that the game’s weak moments are “rare” and greatly outnumbered by “superbly judged action sequences,” how could I not be offended? When [Eurogamer reviewer] Johnny Minkley said that the single-player campaign is “a mostly rousing and memorable spectacle,” called the multiplayer “all you could have reasonably asked for,” and gave a score that the Eurogamer scoring policy defines as merely “Very Good,” I was aghast. The time is not long past when men fought duels to the death upon the field of honor over insults like that.

I firmly believe that Gears of War 3 is the best game in the series to date, and that the game and the people who made it should be given the recognition they deserve. I don’t believe I’m being unreasonable. I’m simply asking for a few simple acknowledgments of the work Epic Games has put into creating the most exciting Gears of War experience yet, such as:

An official written apology from Eurogamer editor Tom Bramwell, the owners of Eurogamer Network Ltd,  Her Britannic Majesty Elizabeth the Second, and Mr. Minkley himself.

The establishment of a new rating scale to replace the 1 to 10 format commonly used at present. Changes in this new scale are to include raising the minimum possible review score from 7 to 9 and expanding the scale through the addition of a new possible score representing games that surpass the current maximum score of 10, which will simply be called “Cliff.” Even higher scores, such as “Double Cliff,” “Treble Cliff,” and “Cliffgasm” will also be possible.

The delivery of the severed head of the calumniator Johnny Minkley, impaled on a pike or some similar sharpened implement, to Epic Games headquarters no later than October 1st.

The construction of a solid gold statue of myself,  at least 40 feet in height, depicting me as the almighty Zeus enthroned upon Olympus. The statue is to be unveiled at E3 2012 and prominently displayed at all significant gaming industry press events thereafter, where mortals shall be permitted to offer burnt sacrifices unto it that they might seek my favor.

All members of Eurogamer’s senior editorial staff shall don sackcloth and penitential ashes and embark on a pilgrimage in which they shall walk barefoot from Eurogamer headquarters in the United Kingdom to Epic Games’ office in Cary, North Carolina as a mark of their contrition. No, I don’t know how they’re going to walk from Europe to North Carolina. They should have thought of that before they let some loose cannon say that Gears of War 3 had “occasional moments that sag in addition to the many that soar.”

None of the persons named by Bleszinski in his demands could be reached for comment at the time this article went to press.