Space Channel 5

What Is It?: Originally released on the Dreamcast in 2000, the premise of the game is as space reporter Ulala you have to save a space station from alien attacks by dancing. You press buttons at the rhythm of what they say, essentially throwing it back at them. Throughout as you save people, they become part of your constantly dancing posse, looking similar to a Michael Jackson music video or a performance from the musical Stomp.

Speaking of Michael Jackson he actually has a small role, with a much bigger one in the Part 2 sequel of the title that came to PlayStation 2. In both titles he provides his likeness and voice, helping out Ulala overcome evil with the power of dance. If it sounds strange, it is. The game had a decent amount of appeal however, especially in Japan where the Japanese didn’t much pay attention to any of “Space Michael’s” real life problems as we did in America. That combined with the simple but catchy music and premise, along with a game with quite a bit of panache and sex appeal thanks to Ulala helped it enjoy a decent PlayStation 2 and GameBoy Advance title.

Why we haven’t seen it: Japanese rhythm game of all types fell out of favor with the advent of American created games such as the Guitar Hero series and now the American rhythm genre also seems to be falling out of favor. Sega’s restructuring in 2001-2005 had a hand in it as well as Michael Jackson being unpopular amongst many people kept them from pursing the title fueled by the star power of the Moonwalker.

Will we ever see it again?:Yes, at least when it comes to the original, or rather it’s sequel Space Channel 5 Part 2 that made its way to PlayStation 2 originally. The title is now coming to Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network complete with updated HD visuals and of course the late Michael Jackson will reprise he role as Space Michael. Still the simple mechanics of the game are dying for the developers to take advantage of every single consoles motion-sensing offerings.

What alternatives do we have?: Dance Central, Dance Dance Revolution to get your dance on however the game’s quirky premise of stopping evil and defeating enemies by dance hasn’t really made its way into any other title.

Seaman

What Is It?: Possibly playing off its name’s double entendre, 2000’s Seaman was an incredibly strange and suggestive game. Released on Dreamcast, it was a virtual pet game that you controlled by talking to him with a microphone peripheral and by doing actions to watch him grow from a strange fish creature with a Japanese man’s face to a eerie frogman. He would respond and remember basic information that you told him, carry on simple conversations and even insult you as he saw fit. The virtual pet simulation was unforgiving, if you missed feeding and interacting with him to many times he would die and weeks of progress would have to be restarted, making it more suitable for the older hardcore audience.

Adding on to the incredible weird game’s allure was a introduction by Leonard Nemoy, most famous for his role as Spock in the sci-fi series Star Trek and his own penance towards doing strange work in entertainment.

Why we haven’t seen it: It is a pretty darn weird game. Usually when you think of virtual pets you think of cute, big-eyed cuddly animals, not creepy monotone-voiced half fish/half middle aged Japanese men introduced by Spock. Also most virtual pet titles are geared towards children for a reason; they have relatively little responsibility so artificial responsibility can be used as a teaching tool and be fun at the same time. For many adults it can just feel like more work, especially due to the games unforgiving nature.

Will we ever see it again?: I would file this one under highly unlikely. While Seaman and references to the title might make there way into other Sega titles, the latest release of the game was the 2007 Japan only PS2 release Seaman 2.

What alternatives do we have?: It definitely is not the first virtual pet title out there, but it was unique in that it was voice controlled. Since then, Microsoft published N.U.D.E. a simulation for the original Xbox for the Japanese market only. The game gave you a female humanoid robot to take care of and talk to similarly to how Seaman worked. It was also strange but for obviously different reasons. The recently released Kinectimals for Xbox 360 allows you to talk to your animals as well as interact with them via the Kinect motion-sensing but the game is a very lose virtual pet. It is very possible however, we will see a virtual pet title for Kinect in the near future, but it would be hard pressed to meet the endearing weird qualities that came with Seaman.

Jet Set Radio Future

What Is It?: The Jet Set series was initially released on Dreamcast in 2000, with a sequel released on the original Xbox in 2002. The game has a simple enough premise; you are part of a Japanese graffiti skate group that sprays over other groups graffiti tags in increasingly harder to reach areas, while outrunning the evil and condemning police force of Tokyo. The simple and addictive skate and tag gameplay isn’t what made the game though.

What made the game was the incredible artistic lengths developer Smilebit went to. Aesthetically the game was a visual master piece. It popularized the cel-shaded graphical style that became cliché by the end of the last console generation and still lives on today. The sound design and soundtrack are regarded as some of the best still today in the gaming of music with an ecliptic mix of acid-pop, techno, and funk that seamlessly blended together and meshed well with the colorful underground inspired visuals. The funky and “to cool for you” vibe the game gave off with the hipster story was the cherry on top.

Why we haven’t seen it: Like many of the titles on this list, despite massive critical acclaim, it didn’t fair well commercially. The developer behind it, Sega internal studio Smilebit also was merged back into the corporate culture of Sega following their merger with Sega and has since been delegated as managing Sega’s sports offerings out of Japan.

Will we ever see it again?: It isn’t likely we will ever see a full fledged Jet Set title ever again although it is great to imagine what possibilities motion controllers hold for graffiti spraying mechanics. Sega has renewed the copyrights for the titles recently, and characters from the game have made it into Sega Superstar Tennis, and Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing. It is possible we could see an Xbox Live Arcade version of JSRF, although I wouldn’t hold your breath. Until then you can typically find JSRF for the original Xbox used for under ten dollars, and it is backwards-compatible with Xbox 360.

What alternatives do we have?: Really as stated above, nothing much has been able to touch the Jet Set series. The Tony Hawk series has gone towards the adventure route in the past, but ultimately failed after doing it for a few games.

Let us look for example at the music genre and sports genre the hardest hit by the over saturation of software in their respective areas. The music game genre industry was doing very well but was so quickly over-saturated that when developer Activision did try to branch off into games such as DJ Hero they fared poorly.

EA, perhaps in response to consumers frustration of having to purchase a product with lack of variety over the previous title is now the subject of a class action lawsuit with being anti-competitive despite it being the NFL granting EA the exclusive contract. EA even canceled its annual NBA Live title to retool it, perhaps knowing there was little new about it. There is a bevy of titles that are over-saturating the market right now and if publishers aren’t careful like the music genre, the popular first-person shooter genre could grow stagnant and without warning. Here are some of our top games and genres we need to see less of below.

Call of Duty

An amazing franchise that was initially crafted for PC, it focused on World War II and its conflicts. While not the first developer to create a WWII FPS, many of the staff did help develop one of the best WWII shooters, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault for Electronic Arts before going on to do their own series.

After the success of Call of Duty and later Call of Duty 2 and, selling over six million combined on several systems, Activision worked quickly to create an annual franchise. A few games later, they realized they had done the subject of WWII to death, moved into the near-future with Modern Warfare, and into Vietnam-era with another alternating every year.

Ultimately, publisher Activision realized that they could plaster the name on anything and it would sell well over 10 million every year, tapping into gamers insatiable need to blow things up with air strikes, and mow people down with high-power scoped weapons they spent hundreds of hours to unlock. Pumping out of these games got so bad, that according to nearly half of the developers that left Infinity Ward, Activision withheld compensation just to ensure they would develop Modern Warfare 3 before the end of 2011.

What resulted is there are a total of three development houses working on Call of Duty series; Sledgehammer Games; creating a new third-person adventure, Treyarch; creating the non-modern based games, and Infinity Ward which most assume is still developing CoD:MW3, despite losing half of their original staff. Even more horrifying is rumors of a CoDin space, a Call of Duty Future Warfare, and a CoD MMO which of course, will require you to pay a monthly fee to play.

Every Game in the Music Genre

The music genre has its roots in Japanese titles such at BeatMania, Dance Dance Revolution and Guitar Freaks created by Konami. However, Harmonix has created the genre as we know it today with the first two Guitar Hero titles and later Rock Band, setting the bar for all developers after. Once again, Activision saw a great cash cow and decided to milk it dry. Between the time Harmonix had left the series to do Rock Band and now, there have been a total of thirteen titles in the series within four years time including Band Hero.

$60 Green Day game? No thanks.

While not as bad as Activision with the GH series, MTV Games along with Harmonix and distributor EA mustered out six titles in three years time. The end result of the over-saturation of the market is despite efforts from several other publishers as well as the usual players to continue, its to little to late; or enough already? The games remained mostly the same during their height of popularity, adding more music, keeping the same rock instruments the same, and only adding slight improvements overall to the gameplay experience. More recently, Harmonix has added a keyboard to RB3, and Activision has created the DJ Hero title but both have sold poorly compared to their offerings not even two years ago.

MTV Games now sees Harmonix more of a liability, and has reportedly sold off the developer for fifty dollars—less than a videogame, including their music royalty pay-outs. There is a silver-lining at least for the king of music games in Dance Central. The game has been called the best use of Xbox 360’s Kinect to date, fun, entertaining, and good thing for Harmonix has sold over a million copies.

Halo

I remember when part of the joy of the Halo series was anticipating what it was going to be like when it came out and feeling like I was going crazy they didn’t release enough of them. In between that time we were enticed by to-good-to-be-true trailers, and a novel here and there for the hardcore fans that helps us feel all “brainy”. Then the Xbox 360 happened. In the span between the release of Halo 3 in 2007 to now, we have had our wallets, time, and social life assaulted. Halo 3 and all of its DLC, the real-time strategy Halo Wars and the “expansion” of Halo3: ODST and finally for now Halo Reach and all of it’s upcoming DLC.

Here we see Master Chief trying to take a break.

Then there is the merchandising assault with everything from Mountain Dew, Burger King, apparel, animated movies, comic books, action figures, and even building blocks shaped around the franchise. All of this shameless merchandising is made possible by Microsoft internal 343 Industries studio, created specifically to whore out Master Chief and friends. Where has Bungie been through all of this? Ready to get Reach done and over with Halo all together. I’m sure there is not one person at Bungie that doesn’t love the franchise to death but when you have the higher-ups breathing down your neck to pump out a labor of love, it likely gets old quick. That is why in a strange, but likely beneficial move for Microsoft in the future, they allowed Bungie to go out on their own, only owning a minority share in the company while retaining the rights to the Halo franchise. Now Bungie is presumably hard at work at their next big thing, in a contract they signed with third party publisher Activision for a ten-year exclusivity agreement. This time however Bungie will fully retain rights to their new intellectual property.

Throughout gaming history there have been many innovations, events, and choices that ultimately lead the industry to where it is now. While it is obvious that innovations such as Nintendo Wii’s motion control centric system influenced how the industry behaves, some older innovations aren’t as apparent. Some may surprise you, while others seem like obvious choices, these are indeed the most influential systems since the invention of the home gaming console. I hope you enjoy the list and the funny, sometimes strange commercials that go along with each console.

Atari Pong

What it is: In case you haven’t played flash games, or don’t own a cell phone that can play black and white games, Pong started out as a stand alone arcade game in 1972 and  three years later made it’s way to people’s homes as a stand alone game system based solely on the game. The home version of the game is also known as Tele-Games Pong, a branding decision by Sears as they were the initial suppliers of the system.

How It Was Influential: Pong revolutionized the way we look at interactive entertainment and specifically brought the arcade experience into the living room. While technically Maganox Odyssey was the first gaming system beating the Atari products to the market three years before, Pong inspired a lawsuit between Magnavox and Atari over the games simple and addictive design, and spawned several clones most notably launching Nintendo into the industry with their Color TV Game for the Japanese market; a collection of Pong variations.

The Pong consoles proved that the home gaming business could be profitable, launching Atari further into creating numerous systems, as well as several other companies, and eventually Nintendo expanded into creating the Nintendo Entertainment System something Atari originally was to have a hand in distributing in North America. Even today the basis of the tennis ping-pong gameplay can be found in simple and addict titles such as Mario Tennis and 2K Sport’s Top Spin series. The impact Pong has had on pop culture is pronounced, with several references to the console and game in today’s game offerings, and who could forgot the episode of That 70’s Show where Kelso and Red Foreman mod a Pong game system?

Nintendo Entertainment System

What it is: I’m 25, it’s 25. It is many 20-something’s first memory of gaming, and who could forget cheating Duck Hunt and just pressing the light gun on the screen to get all those darn ducks? Chances are someone in your family has one buried under a bunch of boxes and just dying to be hooked up for some good old fashion “Your Princess is in another Castle!” fun. Just make sure you have some Q-tips or something to clean those cartridges out.

How It Was Influential: If Pong was the creator of the gaming industry as we know it today, NES was the savior. The gaming industry went through a series of crashes as many people tried to cash in on what was perceived as fad. Nintendo itself had a string of popular arcade titles such as Donkey Kong and following the model created by Atari, decided to create a home system.

Despite a few shortcomings and mishaps initially, the system had an attractive, easy to store design similar to a VCR, and a price point typically of around $200 USD that packed a lot of value including two controllers, a zapper gun, Super Mario Bros. and Duck Hunt. The controller design also has been the foundation of every controller since, most notably with how the buttons are placed and the directional pad design. The system has introduced several franchises and characters still seen in the industry today, including Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Metal Gear, Castelvania, Mega Man and more. Its impact on the industry and on pop culture is undeniable spawning cartoons, apparel, comic books, trading cards, a few questionable movies and more.

Sony PlayStation 2

What it is: It’s the first console your parents would let you keep in the living room. It was so hyped, so technically powerful, that Saddam Hussein was apparently buying them up for nefarious means at it’s 2000 launch. Despite lackluster software at launch, the system propelled franchises such as Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy, and Gran Turismo even further while introducing current PS3 favorites like Killzone to the masses.

How It Was Influential: While the PlayStation may have introduced 3D gaming along with the Nintendo 64 and impressive production values with games such as Metal Gear Solid and Final Fantasy VII, PlayStation 2 achieved several goals that other companies tried for nearly twenty years to accomplish. Unlike the CD-i it truly was a digital media hub, allowing you to connect several peripherals normally reserved for traditional PCs, CDs, original PS1 games, PS2 games, and most notably DVD. At the time of PS2’s introduction, stand alone DVD players were going for far more than it’s initial $300 price point, and while BD may not have the same draw, during the systems 2000 launch the idea of having higher resolution media that didn’t need to be rewound, nor would deteriorate in quality over time, and was the physical size of a compact disc was very attractive.

Even before the pending release of PlayStation 2 was announced in 1999, rumors of what it was going to be capable of (most notably by including a DVD drive) prompted Microsoft to support the Sega Dreamcast early on. When Sony began to actually show the machine and marketed it as “PlayStation 2 Computer Entertainment System” along with the possibilities of modems, hard drive, keyboard, and mouse this prompted Microsoft to enter into the market with their own announced the following year in 2000. The end result is fierce competition forcing each company to spend up their vast sums of money at the benefit of you the gamer.

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