Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Rumble Roses XX Image Quality Upgrade!

I've been using my Gamebridge to capture downloaded pictures off the xbox, but it turns out there's a way to get much higher quality. The details are in this GameFAQs post, and holy hell, do the images look better using this method. All you need is a 2 gig USB drive and half an hour to download the .net framework (use 3.5 - version 2.0 barfed up a storm) and you, too, can export your own screenshots. Of course, since you just need half an hour and a 2 gig USB drive, it's now easy for you to do this yourself. Even so, I'm gonna keep posting these collections, for all you lazy people; Lazy people are my people. I'll stop tagging the image packs with "exclusive content", as if anyone's paying attention to the tags anyway. Once I get the latest 203 downloaded screenshots all zipped up and on Megabuttload and Crapidshare, they'll be on here. (And Photobucket, too, but I think it's too late to set up a password on the photobucket folder and taliban nazi Photobucfacists like deleting the racier photos). Until then, let me leave you with Reiko getting kicked right in her back (click to embiggen):


** Update **

What the hell, let's throw in a few pictures I took myself that I don't think should go in the pictures from Live collections, since they're not from Live at all (click to embiggen):









Friday, January 21, 2011

You excludin' your girl gender again, son?

In my eternal quest for games to turn into videos, I'm always monitoring my network of informants for new games coming out. Unforchies, they've really dried up over the years; I could go on all day listing the male-only series, but I have to admit that every time there's a new Fight Night or EA Sports MMA or Supremacy MMA or Lucha Libre game I always hope this will be the one to have some fucking women in it. But, of course, the death of many Bothans is always in vain as they're always sausage parties. You can probably already tell that the rest of this post isn't going to be good news, but WWE has annouced a new series of games. The short version of the news can be seen in the URL:


Here's the slightly longer version:

I checked out WWE All Stars last week, and noticed that there wasn't a single female fighter on the roster. So I asked Mike McTyre, one of the producers on the game, why we won't be seeing the lovely Divas of past and present.

"It was simply a matter of scope," Mike told me. "We really strive for quality of animation, you know, smoothness. Even though the moves are over-the-top, making them all believable, they all came from motion-capture to start with; nothing was hand-keyed. Then the animators had to smooth them out, amplify them and make them over-the-top. To do that would require a massive amount of additional tech and all-new motion capture on a female skeleton, as opposed to the male skeletons."


This is, in a word, bullshit. In the comments hidden between various HURP DURP I WOULD HAVE SEX WITH HER messages about the header image was a link to an article that sums up my feelings quite succiently - although it's talking about Brink, you could also apply it to Crackdown 1, Crackdown 2, and all the games listed above. I suggest you Read the Whole Thing (TM), but I'll quote the most important part here:

Now I can certainly understand the realities of operating under a budget and the drive to turn out the best product possible, but I have to admit that there's something very disturbing to me about having a choice between fifty different pieces of upper torso clothing or including an entire gender, and then deciding to go with the clothing. What does such a decision say about the attitude of Brink's developers, and the studio itself? What message will be taken away by female players who check out the game only to discover that they haven't been given any representation? Not including female avatar options might have seemed like nothing more than a practical choice to Splash Damage, but taking a look at the bigger societal picture and the changing face of today's gaming constituency, it's pretty clear to me that more that should've been taken into account.

Inclusion and respect, or outfits and haircuts? I'll take the former, thanks.