Polygon

“We’re in a culture that doesn’t like to talk...

Thu, 09 May 2013 12:30:54 -0400

“We’re in a culture that doesn’t like to talk about hard things,” Green says, explaining why he’d make his son’s struggles with cancer into a game. “We don’t like to remember those things that have shaped our lives, even though they’ve been the most pivotal points in our histories.

“I think [the game] is important because I think my son is important. Joel may not change the world, but he changed my world. When people deal with hard things, it changes their world. If we share those things, then we can overcome struggles.”

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

Human Angle: Anatomy of a Cosplayer

Wed, 08 May 2013 12:30:48 -0400

Ger Tysk makes woodworking look effortless. As wood chips and splinters fly, sticking to her shirt and rebounding off her plastic safety goggles, her face remains as still and calm as water. Her arms move back and forth, the wooden block in her hands an extension of her limbs, pushing it through the saw and flipping it over to push again in one fluid motion.

Tysk is in her garage in the middle of Arlington, Mass., where she has banished her car in favor of a workshop. Floor to ceiling, the walls are covered with shelves and hooks sporting saws, wrenches and blades of all sizes. A pile of wood blocks and dowels sits in one corner, a dedicated station for spray-painting in the other. A bandsaw, router, lathe and two tables with half-finished projects clutter the room.

The spread on the tables is impressive: a Keyblade from Kingdom Hearts, what looks like an unfinished sword hilt, the beginning of what will become an 8-foot collapsible spear. The latter is what Tysk is working on now, recreating a weapon originally rendered in polygons with wood, plastic and paint.

“The props are the best part,” Tysk says with a grin as she flicks a switch and the saw roars back to life.

Read her whole story, only on Polygon.

Bronies Fighting Ponies: How one group of dedicated fans bucked...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 12:19:44 -0400

Bronies Fighting Ponies: How one group of dedicated fans bucked convention and challenged an empire.

Read the whole story of the My Little Pony fan game, only on Polygon.

A Dead Island Riptide video review from your friends at Polygon....

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 10:40:00 -0400

A Dead Island Riptide video review from your friends at Polygon. Read the whole review right here.

Once upon a time, Ciji Thornton was a rock star. Kind of....

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 12:14:51 -0400

Once upon a time, Ciji Thornton was a rock star.

Kind of. During the height of the Guitar Hero boom, Thornton made a name for herself as one of the hardest rockers of the plastic guitar.

“I was up on stage with thousands of people watching me,” Thornton muses about her performance at the World Cyber Games Pan-America 2009 tournament in Mexico. “How many people spend thousands of hours, days, years learning to play real guitar? And I come out with my plastic guitar and play on stage in front of thousands of people in another country.”

Though Thornton has been competing in one form or another since 1998, she didn’t go pro until 2006 at the Midnight Gaming Championship in Texas. Her first sponsor was a gaming apparel company, she recalls, who offered to customize her personal Guitar Hero instrument in exchange for her wearing their clothing. But the rock star treatment didn’t last. As Guitar Hero and Rock Band products began to saturate the market, every other game with a new plastic peripheral, the public’s interest began to fade — and with it, the money.

Read her whole story, only on Polygon.

Here’s your first and maybe only look at the Mega Man FPS...

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 09:30:21 -0400

Here’s your first and maybe only look at the Mega Man FPS that almost was: Maverick Hunter.

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

Even if you’ve tried to maintain a total media blackout on...

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 08:24:58 -0400

Even if you’ve tried to maintain a total media blackout on BioShock Infinite, it would have been difficult to remain ignorant of the extended, torturous development cycle it’s been through, or the number of major creative personnel who have come and gone during that time. You’d almost think it was hard to follow up the original game, which has been lauded and held up as one of the few conscious, authorial pieces of mainstream art that the video game industry has produced this millennium.

Read the whole review, only on Polygon.

EA disables SimCity features as it struggles to deal with server...

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 11:29:00 -0500

EA disables SimCity features as it struggles to deal with server headaches.

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

How boredom and overconfidence led EA’s Chicago studio to...

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 12:12:17 -0500

How boredom and overconfidence led EA’s Chicago studio to ditch its cash cow and gamble its future on an ambitious — but directionless — superhero game.

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

“If addiction is a freight train, then SimCity is the...

Mon, 04 Mar 2013 10:10:42 -0500

“If addiction is a freight train, then SimCity is the roaring locomotive pulling you into the night.

You may play a hundred hours of this game without noticing, but behind the curtain, SimCity is working furiously to hook you — and keep you hooked. And in my case, it was enormously successful at both.

It started with the best of intentions. I’m old enough to have played and remember all of the various iterations of this franchise. I’ve built (and destroyed) countless sim cities. I’ve perfectly zoned my little towns, entered cheat codes, then left them to bake over night and returned, triumphant, to a pile of “simoleons,” ready to reap the whirlwind.

I’ve been there, is my point.”

Read the whole review, only on Polygon.

A company other than Stern hasn’t made a new pinball...

Thu, 28 Feb 2013 13:38:09 -0500

A company other than Stern hasn’t made a new pinball machine since 2001. Now, a new player is entering the field with a Wizard of Oz machine that some hope will be the start of a pinball renaissance.

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

This is the story of how a Brooklyn bar rekindled New...

Tue, 26 Feb 2013 11:11:25 -0500

This is the story of how a Brooklyn bar rekindled New York’s interest in gaming’s fading past and trained the new Donkey Kong world champion.

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

Read the whole review for Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, only...

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 10:29:00 -0500

Read the whole review for Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, only on Polygon.

Our solar system is the playground of Bungie’s new...

Sun, 17 Feb 2013 13:13:25 -0500

Our solar system is the playground of Bungie’s new universe, Destiny.

Centuries from now, human civilization has spread far beyond the confines of Earth, stretching outward to the Moon, Mars, Venus, the moons of Jupiter and the rings of Saturn. Mankind’s Golden Age comes to an end when an unexplained cataclysmic event all but eradicates our species.

One safe city remains on Earth, shielded from harm by a mysterious entity known as The Traveler. This cracked white orb hovers silently over the last remnants of humanity’s Golden Age, protecting us from total annihilation. Knights known as Guardians, protectors empowered by the Traveler, seek to uncover the mysteries of humanity’s downfall and keep it safe from persisting threats.

This is the setting of Destiny, the beginnings of a decade-long collaboration between Halo creators Bungie and publisher Activision. It’s a world “where any story is possible,” Bungie says, and where players — as the Guardians of Destiny — will become legend.

Our first look at Bungie’s long-awaited new game, Destiny, is live. Read the entire thing at Polygon.

“Surprisingly, instead of watering the series down,...

Tue, 05 Feb 2013 09:18:15 -0500

“Surprisingly, instead of watering the series down, Visceral has instead strengthened Dead Space’s single-player roots with some of the strongest combat design the series has seen. It’s also the biggest, most ambitious game Visceral has ever made.

But Visceral’s biggest accomplishment is attaining what I thought was impossible — Dead Space 3 avoids the traps of poorly implemented co-op, while capitalizing on all of its strengths.”

Our Dead Space 3 review is now live, read the whole thing, only on Polygon.

Next PlayStation to be revealed this month, next Xbox later this...

Fri, 01 Feb 2013 10:20:06 -0500

Next PlayStation to be revealed this month, next Xbox later this spring.

Read the whole story, only on Polygon.

“It’s been more than five months since Annunziata...

Wed, 30 Jan 2013 13:15:54 -0500

“It’s been more than five months since Annunziata took to Twitter about his meeting with Sega — a hopeful message that read “now chances of a new Ecco the Dolphin [are] x100!” Yet Sega is still withholding its decision, and it seems that Ecco’s future isn’t as certain as Annunziata once believed.

In 1992, Sega of America released its first original intellectual property: a game that followed titular character Ecco, a dolphin who battled aliens and time-traveled to save his fellow ocean creatures. The brainchild of a much more youthful Annunziata, it was a successful title, notable for its sci-fi elements and beauty as much as its difficulty. It was a title that worked, Annunziata says, because of its irresistible double-take value. And for the last decade, Ecco’s creator has unsuccessfully attempted to revive the series.”

Read the story of Ecco the Dolphin’s rebirth, only on Polygon.

“Appearances can be deceiving in Skulls of the Shogun. It...

Wed, 30 Jan 2013 12:06:40 -0500

“Appearances can be deceiving in Skulls of the Shogun. It gives you the information you need to succeed, provided you’re paying attention. I wasn’t, and I had to restart the campaign before I was equipped with the knowledge to earn ultimate victory. It’s a risk that delivers a satisfying payoff.”

Read the full review, only on Polygon.

Jerome is hill giant huge, and, unlike most of the people...

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 12:06:21 -0500

Jerome is hill giant huge, and, unlike most of the people he’s guarding, he’s “internet famous,” according to Parsons. You can see him guarding reserved parking spaces with a Brute hammer in this photograph.

After checking in with Jerome, you settle on a bench to wait for your minder. Behind you is a giant Bungie logo plastered on the wall. The building stretches down a hallway to the left of Jerome’s reception desk-cum-wrestling arena and to the left of the hallway is another set of glass doors leading to a large set of stairs. You know without being told that the stairway leads to where the magic is made — where Bungie has been secretly making the game it calls “Tiger” and which everyone knows as Destiny.

A rare look into the heart of Bungie, only on Polygon.

Brian Freyermuth is nervous. He’s sitting in a conference...

Thu, 17 Jan 2013 12:19:27 -0500

Brian Freyermuth is nervous.

He’s sitting in a conference room at Junction Point Studios. Next to him is legendary game designer Warren Spector. There’s a telephone on the table; on the other end is Disney. But none of this, really, is why he’s nervous.

Freyermuth is nervous because the next few minutes will make or break what he, Spector and co-writer Marv Wolfman have spent months trying to achieve. These men from Junction Point, sitting in their conference room in Austin, Texas, huddled around a telephone, are trying to do what Walt Disney never could: They’re giving Oswald the Lucky Rabbit a voice.

Read the whole story of how Junction Point found Oswald’s voice. Only on Polygon.