You bring up a really good point actually. It's weird to have the male Barbarian running around with exposed skin like a classic barbarian, but the female is fully clothed. Like women are more delicate and can't handle the cold, or worse, that they can't handle the sight of their own flesh and its up to us man…

Nice history lesson. I hope peeps don't start coming down on Frank Frazetta for not being "realistic" and "practical."

Man, you are so right. FFX just can't compare to modern masterpieces like Far Cry 3 which push the limits of technology and art:

They're not just both space Westerns. They're both space westerns in a Chinese dominated future involving a rag tag group of rebels who transport goods across the galaxy and get mixed up in a big conspiracy when they pick up a strange traveler carrying a suitcase which at the end of the first episode is revealed to…

Disgaea is a game with a sense of humor. It celebrates and subverts lots of long standing RPG conventions. The ridiculous numbers in the game are a reflection of that. Suikoden is based off of the classic Chinese story 水滸傳, aka The Water Margin, aka Outlaws of the Marsh (and a ton of other names), a story about 108…

Damn, great analysis. I didn't realize the themes of Pokemon had such a tight and consistent progression from game to game until I read this. Way more interesting than the original post, haha.

Still a better story than harvesting sea slugs from little girls.

"Surely it'd make more sense to just build them into the body or attach them directly to the arms."

It looks cool.

Imagine you're an American artist working on a horror game that takes place in a burnt out school. Imagine how giddy you and your buddies get when you throw out the idea "wouldn't it be funny as $hit if we put references to the 1990 Classic Comedy Kindergarten Cop in here? It'll blow some stoner's mind some day!"

Haha thanks. If you enjoyed that please (shameless plug) check out my blog! Where I write unironically about games:

Haha, that heart warming comment, combined with your screen name made me LOL.

I believe this is evidence that Kindergarten Cop was actually Detective John Kimble's personal journey through Silent Hill. As a hardboiled detective, he's fearless in the face of conventional danger, so his own personal hell actually involves taking him out of the mean streets and into the sunny and fragile lives of…

I think they just had a good sense of humor. This is exactly the kind of dumb silly stuff that artists like to sneak into games.

Have you played the Berserk game for PS2 developed by Yukes? It's excellent.

They did a much better job making a licensed Naruto game than Ubi soft, who are a AAA developer and probably had a much bigger budget.

I know, what's with all these JRPGs where people are barely wearing any armor?

They're going for a more classic Western Fantasy look along the lines of the original covers for the Dragon Lance novels from the 80s. Capcom's got a great history of working in this style since their early days with gems like King of Dragons and their Dungeons and Dragon's Arcade games. In fact, I kind of wish…

It was a joint effort. The designs were done in Japan and adopted by a Filipino artist named Floro Dery (look him up, he's amazing and amazingly unsung). Lots of talented people all over the world put their blood and sweat into Transformers.

Persona 3 and 4 are very fun and accessible (but still very very off the beaten path for games). If you want something more fun play those. If you want something more moody and dark play Persona 1 or 2 (both rereleased for PSP) or Shin Megami Tensei for PS2. There's also the Digital Devil Saga games for PS2 which…