Gamers love GTA IV and its gritty, realistic, and wide open world. Well, one guy likes GTA IV so much that he decided to recreate the intro to the classic Leslie Nielson comedy The Naked Gun inside of the game. The result is nothing short of spectacular.
June 8th, 2004. On that day, RF Generation went live to the world. In the four years since we've gone live, RF Generation has grown from a small community and database to a large community of collectors and gamers who have worked to make RF Generation THE classic and modern gaming databases. Today is definitely a day to celebrate.
The last few months have been hectic here at RF Generation. Last year, June 8 brought our current site design. This year, June 8 brings two weeks of smooth sailing on our dedicated host. That's reason enough to celebrate. Certainly, I am pleased.
We have a lot of people who have donated money to keep RF Generation free and ad-free for all. Without their donations, RF Generation would have to resort to using ads to support our server costs. I am extremely thankful for the donations that our donors have made. So far, we've raised more than 270 dollars for our donation drive! We're truly humbled by the generosity of our members. We have created a Donors Page to thank all those who have donated. We really appreciate their donations, and we thank them for their generosity.
Some of you might be wondering about our little submissions contest. It was supposed to have ended some 15 hours ago. Well, because we were down for much of May, I am pleased to announce that the "Pain Yourself With Submissions" Contest has been extended for two more weeks. The contest will now end at midnight (CDT) on June 29, 2008! So, get those submissions in! Swag to be had! You could win!
Four years live. what a day to celebrate. Our community is the best. From all of us at RF Generation, keep it tuned to channel three.
Oh and Blast Works for the Wii looks great as well.
There's also Nascar 09 (PS3, 360, PS2), Dragon Ball Z Burst Limit (PS3, 360), Don King Presents Prizefighter (360), Backyard Baseball '09 (Wii), Jake Hunter: Detective Chronicles (DS), and more crappy DS shovelware, but who cares? There's only one game that TRULY matters this week.
There are some games that people just think are pipe dreams. Games, in development for so long that many of you were not even Teens yet. Games in development for 12 long, painful years. A game that lends its abbreviation to imply something that is destined to never come out. You know, that game.
What? You've become so jaded that you don't believe me that there could be footage of that game on the internet? Well, you go on your merry way. Everyone else might want to search the above video, you might just find footage of that game.
Yo, sup homies? After outgrowing our previous server and temporarily moving operations to WordPress, we are finally back in action on our home base right here at RFGeneration.com. In celebration of our triumphant return, the game companies have dumped a massive load of (hopefully) great games for you to look at this week.
Playstation 3
Xbox 360
Nintendo Wii
•The Bourne Conspiracy •GRiD •The Incredible Hulk •Kung Fu Panda •Lego Indiana Jones
•The Bourne Conspiracy •GRiD •The Incredible Hulk •Kung Fu Panda •Lego Indiana Jones •Ninja Gaiden 2
•Cabela's Trophy Bucks •The Incredible Hulk •Kung Fu Panda •Lego Indiana Jones
PSP
Nintendo DS
Playstation 2
•Lego Indiana Jones •Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee 2
•The Incredible Hulk •Kung Fu Panda •Lego Indiana Jones •Paws and Claws Pet: Healing Hands •Summon Night: Twin Age
•The Incredible Hulk •Kung Fu Panda •Lego Indiana Jones
In a week with so many games, it's tough to give out a pick of the week. However, I've got to go with GRiD. The game is made by Codemasters, the same team behind last year's awesome rally racer DiRT, and attempts to bring the style of racing game presented in that game onto the streets. GRiD stands apart from most other racers in that it is neither a simulation like Forza or Gran Turismo nor an arcade style game like Burnout or Project Gotham, but somewhere in the between. It definitely has some great physics, but it isn't too overbearing for casual racing fans. Better yet, it carries over the amazing menu design philosophy as seen in DiRT, which is arguably the greatest interface ever seen in a video game. The game is available now on Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and PC. If you're interested in the game, be sure to download the demo for it on your platform of choice...it's definitely worth your time.
Check back next week where there will undoubtedly be a ton of games for me to cover.
Just today, Tomonobu Itagaki announced that he is leaving and suing Tecmo over unpaid bonuses. He claims a completion bonus for Dead or Alive 4 has gone unpaid; further stating, "President Yoshimi Yasuda chose not only to violate this agreement, but also turned defiant, telling me 'if you are dissatisfied with the decision not to pay the bonuses, either quit the company or sue it.' " So far, Tecmo has yet to respond.
Tomonobu Itagaki (via his translator, Andrew Szymanski) has contacted a number of news outlets requesting prompt reporting of this story. This news arrives the same week as the release of the highly anticipated sequel, Ninja Gaiden II. This severance of ties to Tecmo ensures he likely won't be able to work on any future Dead or Alive or Ninja Gaiden projects.
Itagaki is most known for his work with Team NINJA where he created the Dead or Alive series and the modern reincarnation of the Ninja Gaiden series. He derives his success from incorporating 'fun' into his projects to ensure satisfying gameplay. Itagaki's cognizence of Western gamers' interests also allows his hits to become international successes instead of Japan-only treasures.
Another trailer has been released since the Street Fighter IV 'debut trailer.' This 'epic trailer' shows more gameplay. Also announced this week are two fighters that will only be available on home versions of the game and not in arcades. These new fighters are Fei Long and Dan Hibiki.
Well, I must apologize for the lack of an update in April on submissions. RF Generation was sort of on an up and down swing. Unfortunately, this up and down nature of the site kept me from being able to do a submissions update for April. For that, I am sorry.
Anyways, how were submissions during the tumultuous month of April? Well, there were 1700 submissions. Not bad, given how we were down for half of the month and when we were up it was a real chore. For April, the top submitter was Fuyukaze, edging out Belgarath by one whole submission! Damn! The top non staff submitter, Darth Sidious, was not too far behind, with 183 submissions during April. Excellent work! If you're wondering who was approving all of those non-staff submissions, s1lence kicked ass and took names with approvals, soundly outdoing Fuyukaze who had the second largest number of submissions! Of course, there were plenty of people who did their part with submissions, and I'd like to take the time to thank those submitters who made more than 50 submissions in April:
Fuyukaze, Belgarath, Darth Sidious, Cobra, DefaultGen, dotDarkCloud, ApolloBoy, y2richie, Madir, and Rajaat the Warbringer.
Thanks to them and everyone else who made submissions in April!
Now, for May, well, there was this contest or something that is still going on, more on that later. We unfortunately had some downtime during May as well. Frustrating, really, but it's all sorted out now. We had 3523 submissions, which is awesome considering how we were down for half the month. We had almost 2900 image submissions in May. Damn! That's really, really impressive! Kudos to you all! Of course, there was this contest going on, and well, some people went all out in submissions. The top submitter for May was Rajaat the Warbringer. He had a whopping 1361 submissions! Damn! The second largest submitter last month was VACRMH with 867 submissions! Good job you two! In terms of the wonderful people approving your submissions, Fuyukaze kicked ass and took names in submission approvals. He's certainly been doing his part to ensure the contest runs smoothly, and I certainly appreciate everything he's done. Of course, there are many people who made submissions in May, and I'd like to specifically thank those who had 50 or more submissions:
Thanks you guys and everyone else who made submissions in May! Keep up the great work into June.
Now, there is this contest going on. You might be wondering the standings. You might also be wondering if the contest is going to be extended. Well, first, let me tell you the top three people right now. Currently, the top three people are, in order:
Rajaat the Warbringer VACRMH Voykous
There you go, the top three people in the contest. Will they continue to be the top three people, or will someone else pull ahead? Time shall tell!
So, when will the contest end? Some people wish for it to be extended because we were down for half of May. In the spirit of competition, I'd like to extend the competition's length by two weeks. Now, I'd like to do that, but I would like to see what other people think about that. We were down for quite a bit, and well, it's sort of crummy that the contest length was shortened because of it. So, shall we increase the length? Let me know.
Regardless, submit on! Thanks everyone, and here's hoping for an awesome June!
[img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/repository/61613CG5.jpg[/img]So, believe it or not, but I am actually a gamer. I know, wow! The cynical gamer is a gamer! It may frighten you to know then that I do not own a 360 or PS3. Rather, I own that technologically inferior Wii. I used to think that was a bad deal, but then I realized that when I do play the system I am absolutely enthralled. Who’d a thunk it? Thanks, Okami! (and NMH, Super Mario Galaxy, Super Paper Mario, Metroid Corruption, and Twilight Princess). Truly, in the mounds of shovel ware, there are some winners.
WiiWare – how I am excited for this downloadable medium. Games like Eternity’s Child and World of Goo, in addition to Strongbad’s Game for Cool and Attractive People, certainly have my interest. On launch day (well, the day after actually), I decided to by Lost Winds. It was a gamble for me, for it was developed by Frontier. Ugh. They developed RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, and that game crushed by top of the line laptop. (at least it was 4 years ago) So, I had low, and at the same time high expectations for the game. Turns out that the game is pretty darn good, but then, I noticed something, and it made me rather unhappy.
On the download screen, Lost Winds takes up about 250 blocks on the Wii. It was then I saw how much space I had left on my internal memory, about 500 blocks. Ouch. I guess I can download one or two more games before Nintendo, in their infinite wisdom, decides that I should start deleting things in order to obtain newer releases. I only have a few Virtual Console games on my Wii, and Lost Winds, so, this development has my head scratching.
What the hell, Nintendo? Do you really want to stifle people from spending money on your wares? Do you really wish to not utilize the SD card slot or USB for additional storage? Do you really think 512MB of internal memory is enough? If you did, then you certainly must have a clearer idea of what people like me want. I guess that I don’t actually know what I want. But, thankfully, you do, and you’re limiting me to 512MB of downloads. Bravo, Nintendo! Bravo!
So, Nintendo, is your head so far up your ass that you can’t see that people are willing to spend money to populate more than 512MB worth of space? Do you really think that everyone is going to only by NES games to populate the Wii Channel list that is horizontally expansive? Do you think people are going to want to constantly delete and re-add games whenever they want to play something? I sure hope not.
512MB is a miniscule chunk of space to bestow on a console with downloadable content. Perhaps it’s time for a larger storage solution for the Wii. Certainly, we gamers hope that Nintendo is doing what is necessary to afford us more space. Until that time, we gamers will continue to be frustrated by the prospect that we’ll have to delete something to add something new. On a console that tries to reach out to the elusive “casual gamer”, ease of operation should be paramount. It’s clear though that the ease of dealing with downloadable content is not. It’s time for that to change.
As most of you know, RF Generation recently moved to a dedicated server. Such a move is not cheap. Our costs in the last two months have increased six fold, and such an increase is no small change. To cope with this increase in prices, we've began to accept donations. These donations help us cope with the server costs, and do their part to ensure that ads stay off this site.
In the four days since we began asking for donations, we've raised $108 to cover server costs. Such generosity is very much appreciated. Unfortunately, I forgot to mention in my announcement that if you donate I'd really appreciate it if you would personal message me stating who you are so we can make note of the donation. We certainly appreciate everyone's generosity, and we want to make sure we know who to thank for these donations. Every little bit matters.
If you are interested in assisting in the funding of server costs, we'd certainly appreciate it. We have a donation page set up to assist with the drive. Every little donation counts, and we certainly appreciate any generosity given. May our little slice of the internet continue to prosper, and may RF Generation continue to be THE classic and modern gaming databases.
So, Ubisoft had their Ubidays event yesterday. Many games were discussed including Far Cry 2, Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X., Prince of Persia Prodigy and others. However, the real showstopper announcement was official confirmation of the mounting rumors that Beyond Good And Evil 2 does in fact exist. At the event, Ubisoft released a little teaser trailer showing the two main characters from the first game, Jade and Pey'j, stranded in the middle of a desert.
From a technical aspect, the trailer is just stunning. Pey'j looks AMAZING and not as cartoony as he did in the first game. Jade is also looking pretty damn good as well, but we don't ever see how she looks from the front.
Here is the trailer for your viewing pleasure. Now, keep in mind that Ubisoft has stated that this is all done in the game engine...
So, we are back! Feels good to see the homepage again. So why not start up with a new weekly article, Shadowfortes 100 Best Games of All Time. So I will post 5 a week. Here we go!
100 – Sonic The Hedgehog (Genesis, Game Cube)
So, I was never a big Sega fan when I was a kid, because Nintendo ruled my house. I think the first time I played a Genesis was after I got my PS1, so I was a bit behind. One game though that will always stick out will be Sonic. It had something that Mario would never have: Speed. It was fast and had amazing colors and graphics for it's time. And IMO, Genesis had the best controller of that time, so that helped.
99 – Phozon (Arcade, PS1)
So many things I could say about this game. The only thing the strikes me as odd though is that everyone I have asked about this game has never played it or only played it on PS1. I can also say that this is one heck of a hard game to play. But the awesome tactful game play and replay value make me keep coming back for more.
98 – Burger Time (Arcade, NES, Game Boy)
Burger Time spawned a whole new type of game play for us that played it on the NES. Who thought making burgers by walking over them could be so much fun? With funny, yet hard to fight hot dogs, falling patty's and a little chef, how could you go wrong?
97 – Rock Band (360,PS2,PS3,Wii)
What's Rock Band you say? Take the GH games, whip out four friends and Rock Band, and feel like you are on your first world tour. Rock Band steps it up to the next level with one of the best party games of all time, yet it is also a great single player game. With the options to create your band members, play online, and download new tracks each week, this game is a must have.
96 – Dig Dug (Arcade, PS1)
Dig Dug is not a game I can just pick up and play. Matter of fact, I need to be in the mood for it. So why is it on my list? Because once you are in the mood to play it, you can't put it down. This game is so much fun, you just can't get enough. I mean, whats better the blowing air into a dragon until it blows up? Priceless.
Two weeks. Damn. It’s been a painful, painful two weeks, and the culmination of a painful month of ups and downs after being kicked off our shared host. It’s okay though, we’re on a dedicated server now, and it better keep us up now. Needless to say the downtime was a harsh time for many. RF Generation was down! Oh my God! What was one to do? Where was one to get their fix? What is this… world outside of RF Generation?
Well, the site was down last weekend, and coincidentally, so was I. Friday evening, my dad and I went to work on the rental house, but I couldn't leave right when he did, so I left an hour or so later and rode my bike since it's only 4 miles, we did all we wanted to and I loaded the bike into the truck and rode home. Now is when the trouble began, I rode the bike from the driveway to the porch, and I was feeling energetic so I thought I would jump off the bike instead of getting of like a normal human being. I cleared the bike fine, but I landed kind of weird and my knee went sideways and the rest of my body went the other way. Next thing I know I'm on the ground and I know that I've twisted my knee AGAIN (this is the third time now). After laying on the porch for a while in pain and waiting for help (which never came) I hobble inside and hope I'll feel better for garage sales in the morning. But I didn't feel better at all Saturday or Sunday (so no flea market either). So I had no finds whatsoever that weekend.
Luckily, this weekend was a little better, but didn't start off well. I woke up at 8:10 to see my dad driving out the driveway, so I get up and ask my mom why I was left. She said he said he was going to a couple close ones because I apparently take too long to get ready. At around 9:30 I'm getting pissed and call my dad to see where the hell he is. He says he's at a garage sale and they have a GameCube for $20 and wanted to know if he should buy it. But, we get horrible cell phone reception here so I could only hear every other word and he could only hear every other word, so I just told him to come get me NOW. Basically, he went to an entire neighborhood sale without me. I ended up buying the Gamecube and when we were on the way to another sale, we passed a sale he had been to but it looked like a box of PS2 games sitting there but he said there wasn't anything good there, so I dropped it. We ended up going by again and I made him stop, sure enough a box of probably 50 PS2 games. After that, the day was normal, except he actually drove for once instead of me.
Platinum Game Cube with the Game Boy Player, bought mostly just for the GB Player. GameCube games Time Splitters Future perfect (no manual) NFL Street (CIB) Def Jam Fight for NY (CIB) True Crime New York (no manual) ATV quad power racing 2 (loose) 4 Mb InterAct memory card All for $20. I tried getting it for $15 and the kid was going to take it but his mom stepped in and gave the "that thing cost hundreds new" and I didn't feel like explaining the games were scratched to hell (they did end up all working though) and the systems were nearly worthless with the Wii's backward capabilities. [img width=700 height=524]http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j22/Mike_2_0_0_6/Game%20Collection/2008%20Scores/DSCN9384.jpg[/img] That sticker on the GC was one hell of a pain in the ass to take off. I spent nearly half an hour getting it off.
PS2 games (all CIB) Star wars battlefront II Cabela's dangerous hunts (GH) Godzilla Save the earth Driver Parallel Lines Jak II Paid $20 for all 5. There was an entire box (maybe 50) for $5 each but I just picked out the ones that looked the best. [img width=700 height=524]http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j22/Mike_2_0_0_6/Game%20Collection/2008%20Scores/DSCN9386.jpg[/img]
I also picked up this really weird plug n play, the system looks like a penguin and it comes with 111 in 1 Famiclone cart, the label shows games like DK64 but in reality, it's all NES era games, but there is actually 111 different games, which really surprised me. Also comes with a light gun and something I'm not sure what it is; it's a set of 2 LEDs on a little plastic bracket connected to a headphone-like plug. But there is no place to plug it into. The system also has a wireless controller which is nice. [img width=700 height=524]http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j22/Mike_2_0_0_6/Game%20Collection/2008%20Scores/DSCN9389.jpg[/img]
That's it for gaming stuff, not much, but much better than last week.
CDs Neil Young - Decade Michael Stanley Band - Right back at ya (1971-1983) WASP - Double Live Assassins Double albums were priced $2, singles were $1. But she didn't realize WASP was a double album, so I got them for $4. I debated getting the Neil Young album because I already have it on vinyl, but it was worth $2 to not do the digital conversion. [img width=700 height=524]http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j22/Mike_2_0_0_6/DSCN9387.jpg[/img]
Records $0.50 each for: J. Geils Band - Freeze Frame Meat Loaf - Dead Ringer U2 - under a blood red sky
All for $4: Poison - look what the cat dragged in Kansas - Power Cinderellla - Long Cold winter John Cougar - American Fool David lee roth - skyscraper Heart - Heart Fleetwood mac - tango in the night bruce springsteen - tunnel of love david lee roth - eat 'em and smile [img width=700 height=524]http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j22/Mike_2_0_0_6/DSCN9388.jpg[/img]
We also stopped at this new store called ReStore which is basically a GoodWill for building supplies, to look for stuff for the rental house we're remodeling. It's a really nice place with good prices, but they've got a free section run by my school and I snagged me some 3 ring binders for next semester. What was funny though is that they have you sign a paper saying that you won't hurt yourself with the stuff you take.
Flea Market was terrible, many people but no deals. There are now 3 vendors selling video games, one guy I like because he trades with me and his prices are reasonable and always has new stuff, the other two charge at least eBay prices and have the same sun faded crap week to week, but they also walk around buying anything of value before I can get there. The only thing remotely interesting I saw was a CIB Mattel Electronic Football game, the box was a little beat up, but not bad. I turned over to see the price sticker: $45. I offered $1 but he ignored me.
As you may or may not have noticed, RF Generation over the last month has had its ups and downs regarding whether or not the site was actually up. This rollercoaster ride started when our shared host realized that we are not some small site and decided that we needed to castrate the site. Well, we’re not a big fan of removing features on the site, so we looked for a new host, one where we could stay in the long run. Fortunately, we found that host, and he is one heck of a host. Now, we at RF Generation run a site that is 90% custom (the other 10% is the forum), and when we went to the new host we thought that our site would be okay on something that emulates a dedicated server, or so we thought. It turns out that an emulated dedicated server, commonly referred to as a VPS, does have issues that can affect the entire server. Turns out that we affected the server, three times, and for that reason we had make some changes.
Unfortunately, no single script can be singled out as the prime offender of our problems. If you want to get rid of the prime offenders, you’d be saying goodbye to the forum and collection tools. We’re not in the business of removing features from the site, so we decided to follow the dedicated route. What does that mean? Well, aside from the six fold increase in server costs, we’re now on our own server. That means that we have full access to the resources of the server, and when something goes horribly wrong, we’re not adversely affecting other users of the server. Of course, we hope that now that we’re on the dedicated host nothing terrible will happen, but we’ll prepare for anything.
Some of you offered alternatives to moving to a dedicated server, and we considered them greatly. Unfortunately, our site is a monster, and moving any part of the operation to a shared host would be a risky venture. RF Generation has already been on two oversellers, and we’re done with that, we felt that we needed a solution that wouldn’t lead us to worry about whether or not the site would be up the next day. Certainly, however, we appreciate the kind gestures offered by those individuals.
It might take a week or two to get things running up to speed. If the site crashes, it will be down for a few hours, rather than several days. We don’t anticipate the site crashing, but then we didn’t anticipate us crashing over the last month a total of three times. You might notice that certain things are not quite back. I can confirm that the site statistics page is currently being reworked, as it makes servers cry. Luckily, I don’t think many of you were aware of the site statistics page, so I don’t imagine many tears will be shed regarding that. The main site right bar is also slightly castrated, but then I hate the right bar with an utmost passion. I’m in the process of figuring out what to do with that to make life better. So, most things are back, while other things may be gone for a while, but all the features you know and love are still here. Who knows, there might even be new features in the future.
The future… what does that hold for RF Generation? Well, now that we’re on the new server you might see us add some new features. A game progress tracker is pretty high on my list of things to add. Eddie has his own list of things work on, but then, I must be frank about this. We’ve added lots of new features to the site. Some, like the blog, might cater to a small group of people, while others like database improvements, might be a bit more general. It’s frustrating when these new features are added after lots of requests and then they are not used. How I long for a fleshed out Euro games database. The infrastructure is there, now let’s make that happen. Using the features that we provide is a great way to encourage the programmers to add more and more features. Things like a game progress tracker don’t get coded in a day, and take a lot of planning to do. Give us some encouragement by using the features that we have coded under your request.
As you may have noted, the costs of the server have increased six-fold. You might be wondering if you can help out with the server costs. The short answer is yes, please do. $1080 a year shouldered by a few people is a lot of money to be spending, especially when two of the people are college students. We have a donation page, and we certainly hope that you’ll visit it. We’ll keep you all posted on fund raising efforts. Any money donated to RF Generation will be used solely for the continued operation and betterment of the site. If you donate, there will be placed in the donor category, and there might be some perks associated with that. We’re trying to figure that out still, but we’re trying to make it worthwhile. Because of circumstances, we are going to redefine what being a donor means. Previously, donors sort of stayed in the member group forever. Now, donors will be designated donors for a period of one year from the time of their donation. After that time, they will still be recognized as a previous donor in some form, but any extra perks of being a donor will no longer be available. Donating so much money in a calendar year might result in some RF Generation branded gear. Specifics of that to be worked out later.
RF Generation is the product of the blood, sweat and tears of the entire community. It truly is the community’s website. Look at what we’ve as a community has done. Think about what we can do into the future. Bright times lie ahead, and together, we will all make RF Generation THE classic and modern video games database.
METAL GEAR SOLID 4: GUNS OF THE PATRIOTS
In a week with so many games, it's tough to give out a pick of the week. However, I've got to go with GRiD. The game is made by Codemasters, the same team behind last year's awesome rally racer DiRT, and attempts to bring the style of racing game presented in that game onto the streets. GRiD stands apart from most other racers in that it is neither a simulation like Forza or Gran Turismo nor an arcade style game like Burnout or Project Gotham, but somewhere in the between. It definitely has some great physics, but it isn't too overbearing for casual racing fans. Better yet, it carries over the 
Just today, Tomonobu Itagaki announced that he is leaving and suing Tecmo over unpaid bonuses. He claims a completion bonus for Dead or Alive 4 has gone unpaid; further stating, "President Yoshimi Yasuda chose not only to violate this agreement, but also turned defiant, telling me 'if you are dissatisfied with the decision not to pay the bonuses, either quit the company or sue it.' " So far, Tecmo has yet to respond.
