THE RUNDOWN

• Mass Effect 3 deal from Origin (any platform) includes an exclusive AT12 Raider Shotgun –Large pellet spread ensures maximum coverage for close-range targets. Designed for superior rapid fire, optimizing the recovery time between shots.
• Planning to buy a PS Vita? Best Buy has games, accessories and bundles. Check out all their PS Vita items at tiny.cc/tfsvita.
• Plus, we talk about what we’re playing, take your calls, have a chatroom beta code giveaway, read an e-mail and talk a lot of PS Vita!

THE BIG TALK

• This week, we talk a lot about Nicole’s new PS Vita… How the games look, how much they cost, a few non-game apps available and more! We also talk with a listener from Sweden who purchased a PS Vita for another perspective.
• We gave away a Tribes beta key to the chatroom… were you listening live?
• We even get a call from none other than Eric Van Skyhawk himself at the end of the show to talk about his experience with his new XBox 360!

OLD SCHOOL

• Alex Kidd in Miracle World – Sega Master System
• “Alex Kidd in Miracle World is a platform game for the 8-bit Sega Master System video game console. It was first released in Japan on Saturday, November 1, 1986, and then was distributed to Europe, Australia and the United States in 1987. It was arguably the most recognised game in the Alex Kidd series, partly due to it being built into most Master System II consoles.
  It is the first game in the Alex Kidd series created for this character, and the most popular of all Alex Kidd games.
  Alex Kidd in Miracle World is primarily a platform game, which also incorporates strategy and roleplaying. The player must finish levels and overcome obstacles and scenarios in a 2D atmosphere. Throughout the eleven stages of Alex Kidd in Miracle World, Alex Kidd faces many monsters, plus the three henchmen of Janken the Great, before facing Janken himself.”

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THE RUNDOWN

• Mass Effect 3 deal from Origin (any platform) includes an exclusive AT12 Raider Shotgun –Large pellet spread ensures maximum coverage for close-range targets. Designed for superior rapid fire, optimizing the recovery time between shots.
• Planning to buy a PS Vita? Best Buy has games, accessories and bundles including the First Edition Bundle available on Feb 15 — a week before the official release. Check out all their Vita items at tiny.cc/tfsvita.
• Plus, we talk about what we’re playing, take your calls, read your e-mails and more!

THE BIG TALK

• DoubleFine gets over one million dollars for adventure game funding, and they still have 30 days left!
• Discussion – What are the worst mechanics and systems in games today?

OLD SCHOOL

• Superfrog – Amiga
• “Superfrog was developed in 1993 and released for the Amiga in the same year by Team17, acting simultaneously as developer and publisher. The releasewas popular enough to spawn an Amiga CD32 version, which could also be played on some Amiga computers fitted with a CD drive. Due to its enduring popularity, it was then converted for the PC by Bubball Systems in 1994, running as an MS-DOS program. The Amiga version was re-released by Islona Software in 1999, with slightly different box art. In 2012, Superfrog was, along with other games by Team17, released as a legitimate digital download from GoodOldGames.com, this version being the first compatible with Windows.

  The story, present in the game’s manual but mostly conveyed through the introductory animation by Eric W. Schwartz, concerns an unnamed prince, who is turned into a frog by a jealous witch, in homage to the Frog Prince fairy tale. His princess girlfriend is then abducted by the same witch. Subsequently sulking by the “River O’ Despair”, the prince chances upon a floating bottle of Lucozade, which confers upon him super powers.
  The game features an overt commercial tie-in with the energy drink Lucozade as a health-boosting powerup, similar to the Chupa Chups sponsorship of Zool, 7-Up’s sponsorship of Cool Spot and Quavers’ sponsorship of Pushover.

  The objective of the game is to find and defeat the witch, then rescue the princess, while achieving smaller objectives throughout, such as finding a golden key or escaping from captivity through a circus. When the player has defeated the witch, a quick end sequence shows the frog and the princess kissing, but – rather than the frog turning back into the prince – the princess is turned into a frog instead.”

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THE RUNDOWN

• Mass Effect 3 deal from Origin (any platform) includes an exclusive AT12 Raider Shotgun –Large pellet spread ensures maximum coverage for close-range targets. Designed for superior rapid fire, optimizing the recovery time between shots.
• Planning to buy a PS Vita? Best Buy has games, accessories and bundles including the First Edition Bundle available on Feb 15 — a week before the official release. Check out all their Vita items at tiny.cc/tfsvita.
• Plus, we talk about what we’re playing, take your calls, read your e-mails and more!

THE BIG TALK

• Zynga copies Tiny Tower and everyone flips out… is this really anything new?
• Sony plans on $2.9 billion loss for the year.
• Email Topic – Would companies ever consider releasing “light” versions of games for the PC?
• Email Topic – What game console and three games would you carry with you to a desert island for a year?

OLD SCHOOL

• Spider-Man and Venom: Maximum Carnage – SNES
• “Spider-Man and Venom: Maximum Carnage is a scrolling fighting game for the Super NES and Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, developed by Software Creations and published by LJN (a subsidiary of Acclaim) in 1994. The game, based on a sprawling comic book story arc of the same name, featured numerous heroes, including Spider-Man, Venom, and their allies from the Marvel Comics fictional universe like Captain America, Black Cat, Iron Fist, Cloak and Dagger, Deathlok, Morbius, the Living Vampire, and Firestar, all teaming up to battle an onslaught of villains led by Carnage, including Shriek, Doppelganger, Demogoblin, and Carrion.
  The game featured a colored cartridge. Both the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis and Super Nintendo versions were red. They were later released in the normal cartridge colors (black for Genesis, gray for SNES).

  The game was followed up by a sequel called Spider-Man & Venom: Separation Anxiety.
  In this single-player side-scrolling beat ‘em up (with a format similar to Final Fight, and Streets of Rage) the player controls Spider-Man and Venom through various levels to stop the supervillain Carnage and his gang, as well as hundreds of criminals they inspire in their wake, from taking over the city. The two 16-bit versions are virtually identical, aside from the quality of the sound and music.

  Other Marvel heroes can be summoned by collecting appropriate items hidden within certain levels. Their effects vary greatly, and some of them have different effects depending on who the player is. Of note is the rarity and set locations of the power-ups necessary to summon aid, and that each character has a unique set of music to accompany their appearance. In order of appearance: Cloak, Black Cat, Dagger, Firestar, Spider-Man/Venom (depending on the player character), Morbius, Deathlok, Iron Fist, and Captain America.”

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THE RUNDOWN

• Microsoft going away from space points, Mass Effect 3 has a new trailer multiplayer available to watch, some good points about bandwidth in a digital word, BlizzCon not happening in 2012, and finally a look back at Paper Mario!
• Plus, we talk about what we’re playing, take your calls, and more!

THE BIG TALK

• Are Microsoft Points going away by the end of the year?
• Mass Effect 3: Special Forces Trailer (Multiplayer mode)
• What sort of impact will bandwidth restrictions on ISP’s have in the new digital only world?
• There will be no BlizzCon in 2012. However, Nerdtacular is still happening!!

OLD SCHOOL

• Paper Mario – Nintendo 64
• “Paper Mario, known in Japan as Mario Story, (originally known as Super Mario RPG 2) is a role-playing video game developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo 64 game console. It was first released in Japan on August 11, 2000, in North America on February 5, 2001, and in Europe and Australia on October 5, 2001. Paper Mario was re-released for Nintendo’s Virtual Console in 2007.
  Paper Mario is set in the Mushroom Kingdom as the protagonist Mario tries to rescue Princess Peach from Bowser. To do so, he must locate seven “Star Spirits” to negate the effects of the captured Star Rod, which grants invincibility to Bowser. The player controls Mario and a number of partners to solve puzzles in the game’s overworld and defeat enemies in a turn-based battle system. The battles are unique in that the player can influence the effectiveness of attacks by performing required controller inputs known as “action commands”.
  Paper Mario is the first installment for the Paper Mario series and is the predecessor to the GameCube game Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, the Wii game Super Paper Mario, and the upcoming 3DS game Paper Mario. The game received a positive reaction from the media, attaining an aggregate score of 88% from Game Rankings and 93% from Metacritic. It was rated the 63rd best game made on a Nintendo system in Nintendo Power’s “Top 200 Games” list in 2006.
  It was first of the post-SNES Mario games not to feature the voice-acting of Charles Martinet.”

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THE RUNDOWN

• Great interview with Curt Schilling of 38 Studios on Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning at the end of the episode!
  Wanna play Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning? The demo is available NOW for PC, X360, and PS3… go get it now.
  Ready to pre-order Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning? Use the link tiny.cc/reckoning to pre-order from Origin to support the show AND get 9 “Fate-Touched” weapons!
• Plus, we talk about what we’re playing, take your calls, and more!

THE BIG TALK

• Thoughts on game patching with next-gen consoles…
• ESA withdraws support for SOPA…
• Resident Evil 6 announced… are you excited?

OLD SCHOOL

• Battletoads – NES
• “Battletoads is a platformer video game created by Tim and Chris Stamper and developed by Rare. Starring three anthropomorphic toads named after skin conditions (Rash, Zitz and Pimple), the game was created to rival the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games.
  The first game was developed by Rare for the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1991. It was subsequently ported by Mindscape to the Amiga in 1992, by Arc System Works to the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis and Sega Game Gear both in 1993, by Rare to the Game Boy in 1993 retitled as Battletoads in Ragnarok’s World, and by Mindscape to the Amiga CD32 in 1994. Ports for IBM PC and Atari ST were planned by Mindscape but never released.
  It is arguably one of the most graphically advanced video games ever released for the NES, at a time when the video game market was turning to the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis and Super Nintendo Entertainment System. The game became famous for its extreme difficulty and humorous ways of beating enemies, as during finishing attacks, the character’s body parts transform into gigantic, exaggerated appendages for devastating attacks and comic effect.”

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