Well, that escalated quickly. In just a couple short years Angry Birds has gone from an obscure iOS game to a huge money-making, licensing machine. The funny thing is, I don’t mind at all. Rovio seems to be doing everything with right Angry Birds. They haven’t put out a crappy game yet and I’ll be eagerly waiting for November 8th to download Angry Birds Star Wars.

I can’t wait to see some gameplay and level design from this one. The art looks awesome; those little birds actually look great as Star Wars characters. The Rebel and Empire logo redesigns are pretty cool too. I’d totally rock a Pig-themed Empire logo on a t-shirt, and I’m sure I’ll get the chance, because they’ll be launching a huge merchandise push when the game hits the App Store. From Rovio’s blog post:

In addition to the game, this fall will also see the unveiling of a massive retail launch for Angry Birds Star Wars. Merchandise ranging from Halloween costumes and apparel to action figures and collectible plush toys will be available at select retailers, starting October 28.

I want some PVC figures from this game, and wouldn’t mind having something with those pig TIE fighters, because come on, pig TIE fighters!

Also, how is there not an Angry Birds cartoon yet? I know they’ve been talking about it forever, and when you think about some of the weird crap we grew up watching the concept doesn’t sound that crazy.

I’ve got a secret that I’m not sure I should confess.

OK, OK. I will. This will be a rather short story if I don’t share. Here goes… Manufacturers, if you make special packaging for your product in a cool, 8-bit design there’s a 99% chance I will buy it. I’m such a fan of old school video game design that I’ll fork over all kinds of money for your product if it features cool pixel art. Yes, I mean it. Any product. I’ll even buy a box of Tampax tampons once they make the wise choice to switch to 8-bit packaging.

Nestlé has somehow learned this deep, dark secret of mine. I recently fell victim while perusing the aisles of my local supermarket. There’s where I saw their Wreck-It Ralph commemorative packaging for Nesquik chocolate drink powder. They had turned their iconic Nesquik bunny and logo into eye-catching video game designs. There were three different package designs, each with a different scene from Wreck-It Ralph. I snapped up my favorite of the three.
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I’m willing to bet there are at least 23 video game websites created every day. What doesn’t happen every day is that the amazing Pendleton Ward decides to make a video game website. Ward is the creator of the super-awesome Adventure Time cartoon series. He announced the launch of the Tumblr-based site Friday on his Twitter account @buenothebear.

The site is named I LOVE GAMES YOU GUYS. There’s not much of substance there yet besides a note of his intentions. With his first post he said, “My name is Pendleton Ward. I want to interview people who work on games.” He seems to have pretty lofty goals as he followed up with a question about interviewing anyone involved with the Mario games.

Besides just the notion of Pendleton creating a game site, it’s nice to see that he’s including some simple animation on the site. He’s got three Adventure Time-esque Mario cartoons posted. Each is a black and white line drawing of four frames each. Simple yet effective.

Here’s hoping Pendleton gets his wish to interview someone from the world of Mario, perhaps even Miyamoto himself. I hope that he takes time to interview the people of the smaller, indie games as well.

Come on, seriously, they’re going to make a billion dollars with this game. Actual movie dialogue? Brilliant, because the minifigure pantomime was getting a little old, and you really can’t have Gandalf facing down a Balrog and grunt instead of saying ‘You shall not pass!’

That reminds me, where’s my LEGO Balrog? How is that not a thing yet?

Via The Mary Sue

I’ve been such a bad gamer the past few months. I let my Xbox Live subscription expire, I haven’t even turned on a game console in four or five months, and now I rarely ever even play a game on my iPhone. I think I’ve been to preoccupied with work, blogging, and trolling ebay or something, but I need to get back into gaming.

Seeing the Jurassic Park logo pop up in the iOS App Store for a free game that has thousands of positive reviews was just the boost I needed. I’m a hardcore Jurassic Park fan, and I’ve at least tried almost ever JP video game that has ever been released, so I couldn’t pass this up. The game is called Jurassic Park Builder, and unsurprisingly it’s a game where you build your own Jurassic Park.

So is the game fun? Hold on to your butts and lets find out.
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