Rysenikia still won best pop culture timeline in 2019 for Massivley Multipalyer. He would have a good chance of wining with massiley multiplayers predecessor ready player 2 if the pop culture catoery existed before 2016. A good chunk of me is routing for battle royale to win the 2022 turtle dove for best pop culture time but I wouldn't mind if a hippie in the house of mouse or dreams come ture when at well. However i do belive Battle royale is pefer choice of winner because the other two time will be around for the 2023 turutle doves and battle royale won't.
Battle Royale: The Last Generation Of An SNES-CD Saga
- Thread starter RySenkari
- Start date
I only discovered this timeline last year, but seeing it all come to an end after nearly a decade is really something.
Same. I loved reading through the TV Tropes Recap page and then reading those bits in the story itself.
We already won one, we should give others TL a chance, but if people think Battle Royale deserves one, would be a great pleasure, I considered all part the same tale, with actors coming in and out.
Thanks, that is what we wanted with this Timeline, write something different, unique yet people feel like an unique mirror sort of. no better or worse...just different
AeroTheZealousOne
Monthly Donor
Can't blame you! Even if you were to revisit what I'm admirably calling your magnum opus I wouldn't know where'd you start or what'd you do. It's been a hell of a ride even if I jumped in around halfway through, narratively speaking. I'm glad to have been a part of it. Hopefully I got to be less annoying as time went on.
Of course, all good things must come to an end. It's probably for the best, given [insert numerous comparisons to OTL here], not to mention the fact that almost a decade has been put into writing about thirty years, from mid-1991 all the way to the early 2020s. It's difficult for me to imagine myself writing something with that much scope and depth, and to have the time and dedication off and on since then to write it all, proofread it, and post it? Nothing short of amazing. Heck, if I put my heart into something like this for nine years off and on I'd want to focus on something else, too!
Now i thought about submitting ideas for the timeline but between lacking self-confidence and being too much of a PC gamer to really contribute to a timeline focusing mainly on console games, that... didn't happen. I'm tempted to say it's for the best.
It's a fine series, and one of about two or three timelines as to why I bit the bullet and joined AH.com. A story set before and during my formative years with everything affecting the person I might be? Count me in!
...that was (sort of) my thought process back in 2017 when I was still in high school. Needless to say it still stands, largely due to some needed escapism.
Such is the essence of pop culture timelines, especially on this site. Some things are better, some things worse, but overall things for the most part balance out. The uniqueness definitely comes with the mirrored reality, so to speak. You both have done a fantastic job with that, I must say.
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August 2020 - From The Earth And Back Again
With most of Rockstar's creative energy fully focused on the next Grand Theft Auto game, the company's plans for the next generation are starting to become clearer. Grand Theft Auto IV is set to be released in 2022, with Grand Theft Auto Online updates likely to continue until then and beyond. Though many fans are curious about the potential for a Doggerland sequel, it's not likely we'll see a sequel to that game for a long time, if ever, as Rockstar has been quietly working on a brand new IP, even as they also work tirelessly on Grand Theft Auto IV. This would continue the pattern of the company choosing to focus on an original IP between major Grand Theft Auto releases (Valdoza came between Grand Theft Auto II and Grand Theft Auto III, while Doggerland came between Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto IV). While we haven't had much in the way of hints about this new IP, and likely won't get even a teaser until after Grand Theft Auto IV is released, we can draw some information from statements made by Dan Houser in interviews conducted at E3 and shortly afterward, where he discusses that Rockstar has been working on a new IP. Houser has expressed a desire to work on a "gritty fantasy title", taking heavy inspiration from the Song of Ice and Fire series. It's also been stated by Houser that he enjoyed playing The Boiling Isles, and that the game's focus on character development blended with inspiration is something he'd like to focus on in a future project. Finally, the codename for Rockstar's new IP is rumored to be Project Parapet, which could possibly be referring to the fortification around a castle. It's likely to be well into the 2020s before we'll be able to play this new IP from Rockstar, but the early indications of a gritty medieval fantasy title do seem like a project the company might consider. As for whether we're getting a fourth Bully game in the future, Houser says that it's "almost certainly a no", but indicated that if we ever did get one, it would be something that could see release exclusively on handheld systems.
(...)
It's been a good month for Take-Two Interactive, with The Lobotomized: Violent Mind selling over 400,000 copies in its first week. The game, an intense survival horror title in which the protagonist is forced to escape an asylum populated by dangerous inmates while questioning their own sanity didn't do quite as well with critics as some of the games in the series (we gave it a 7.5 out of 10, and you can read our review here). The company has seen its shares soar after the announcement of Grand Theft Auto IV, and is also in negotiations to acquire Retro Studios, which Nintendo spun off last year. Take-Two hopes to make a bid for the rights to produce NFL titles, and may use Retro (which worked on the Peyton Manning Play Action series for Nintendo) if they're able to acquire the rights. Electronic Arts, which has seen tremendous success with the Madden series, is expected to retain NFL exclusivity for another five years, but NFL owners are said to be considering opening the rights up to more than one company if that company bids highly enough, and Take-Two may well have the resources to make such a bid. Negotiations are set for October, and if Take Two is able to acquire the NFL rights, the company could produce its first NFL game as early as 2022.
-from an August 23, 2020 article on IGN.com
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Rubio Sees Noticeable Convention Bump, Closes On Kennedy After VP Pick
Marco Rubio selected South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham as his running mate at last week's Republican National Convention, surprising some who believed he would choose someone younger such as Nick Freitas, John James, or even Stacey Dash. However, Rubio's selection of Graham was made with the goal of pleasing old guard Republicans, while also bringing social conservatives who have reported feeling alienated with the party's recent "economics first" messaging over the past decade. This could well be important, especially in the wake of last month's 5-4 Supreme Court decision that dealt a harsh blow to abortion rights opponents, when the high court ruled that states could not impose "undue restrictions" on abortion, including zoning requirements that states had used in recent years to reduce the number of clinics. The ruling is expected to lead to the return of clinics in many areas where they had left before due to laws put in place since 1992's Casey vs. Planned Parenthood decision, which upheld Roe v. Wade but opened the door for a variety of restrictive new laws. Social conservatives have been demanding that Rubio put a social conservative on the ticket, and though Rick Santorum was considered, Rubio chose Graham, a choice that so far has appeased the far right of the party. Though Graham is generally considered a moderate on reproductive rights issues, he strongly opposed the Court's recent ruling, and has also come out strongly against transgender rights, another issue on which the Supreme Court has recently issued consequential rulings. Rubio and Graham's speeches at the convention were also highly praised, particularly Rubio's keynote speech in which he railed against the economic policies of the current administration. Rubio has also gotten a polling bump after recent inflation increases and an uptick in unemployment, both of which Rubio is heavily blaming on Kennedy's policies. The polling bump for Rubio has largely erased the gains made by President Kennedy after the Democratic National Convention early this month, in which he and his vice president Stacey Abrams were unanimously chosen to run for re-election. This year, there will be four presidential debates between Kennedy and Rubio, and two between Abrams and Graham. The first presidential debate is scheduled for September 16th, and will be held in Chicago, Illinois, on the campus of Northwestern University.
-from an article on Yahoo! News, posted on August 30, 2020
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"Deathborn Tears Up The Track!"
-from the second of three Super Smash Bros. Ultimate character reveal videos, revealing that Deathborn, the antagonist of F-Zero: FIRESTORM, would be joining Ultimate, posted on Nintendo's Videocean and Youtube channels on August 21, 2020
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(Authors' Note: Ideas for Kingdom Quest V were contributed by the reader HonestAbe1809!)
In the years between the release of Kingdom Quest IV and Kingdom Quest V, a lot had changed at PC Games (PC being short for Princess Calypso, the new name the company had adopted in the past few years, owing to the character's popularity). Development on the game had taken several years, and by the time it was ready for release, it was nearly time for a new generation of consoles... but the company decided that Kingdom Quest V would make a strong send-off to the current generation, and in addition to releasing the game on the Reality and Virtua, also released it for both the Stadia and the Nexus, which was still seeing a decent number of major third party titles released on it. In the intervening years, the company had also released Rage Rabbit, and Kingdom Quest V would use the same engine, allowing the two games to be released about a year apart. Kingdom Quest V would also be released alongside a remastered compilation of the first four games, and you could buy all five in a bundle for a reduced price ($99.99, compared to $59.99 for buying them separately). The bundle would also release with an exclusive "Timebreak Mode" that wouldn't be released as DLC for several months after, introducing a character called Princess Marigold, AKA Dahlia, to the first four games, who replaces Calypso in an attempt to fix things in the original four adventures, but causes things to go off the rails completely. As it turns out, Marigold is actually Calypso in disguise, returning from the future to set things right, but accidentally creating an alternate timeline that has major ramifications for the events of Kingdom Quest V. This Timebreak mode serves as a sort of "Extra Quest", shorter than the first four games played together, but about the length of two games mashed together when played on its own, allowing players to play as Marigold/Calypso in a brand new quest with brand new bosses and characters as she tries to fix things in the original four games.
The antagonist of Kingdom Quest V is the mysterious cloaked sorcerer who was introduced near the end of Kingdom Quest IV, though he doesn't surface until midway through the game. The first half of the game sees Tony and Louie return as the main protagonists, alongside Calypso who is also playable throughout, but somewhat sidelined as the heroes once again battle their way through various game parodies, including a game that parodies gritty, post-apocalyptic works with a dark protagonist who does horrible, evil things "because he has to", a return to the strange creepy village from Kingdom Quest IV, but with the characters replaced with evil robots (one who eventually turns good and joins your party, but does so not knowing she's a robot the whole time, and the characters deciding to humor her by pretending she's human), and a parody of games such as Strikeback and After Time in which Tony and Louie are recruited into an army battling aliens, only for one of the aliens to be friendly and Calypso has to help bring the hardcore army sargeant and the alien woman together in romance. These parodies are supposedly building to a climax in which the characters have to defeat an evil entity known as the Gamemaster who claims to be controlling everything, but in the climax, the Gamemaster is revealed to be the evil sorcerer, who, as it turns out, is obsessed with Calypso, to the point of thinking that she's still an evil villain and has tricked Tony and Louie into letting their guards down. When Calypso denies this, and Tony and Louie try and stop the sorcerer, he activates a chrono calamity that causes everything to be reset to the beginning of the original Kingdom Quest, in which Calypso now rules everything... but even though the world is supposedly under her control, she has full memory of everything, and she's still a hero who doesn't want to rule. The problem is that the world is now a dark parody of itself, and Tony and Louie are leading a rebellion as her mortal enemies. Calypso has to go around and do a whirlwind tour of various lands from the first four games in order to snap the heroes out of the sorcerer's spell. The second half of Kingdom Quest V is thus a "greatest hits" of the first four games, from the perspective of a heroic Calypso, battling dark versions of various heroes from the games, as the sorcerer continuously tries to contact her and tell her how great she is. Finally, Calypso confronts Tony and Louie, and they have a knock-down, drag out battle with each other until Calypso is finally able to snap them back to reality. It's then that the sorcerer tries to show Calypso how devoted he is to her by killing them, but she takes the fatal blow instead, sacrificing herself, which snaps Tony and Louie back to their old selves. Furious, and grieving, the sorcerer takes the comatose Calypso back to his castle, forcing the heroes to mount a rescue mission. Though it seems things have come full circle, with Tony and Louie venturing to rescue Calypso, it's only that way through half of the final mission... before Calypso awakens, weakened but fully aware, and you get to play as her, assisting the heroes through the castle before Tony and Louie confront the sorcerer. He tries to bring out Calypso, but she's nowhere to be found, and Tony and Louie defeat his first form before Calypso finally shows up and tells him off once and for all, causing him to go into an insane rampage. Tony and Louie try to stop him, but are easily defeated, setting up the final boss battle between the sorcerer and a powered up Calypso. She defeats him, saving the others and ending the sorcerer's tricks once and for all, imprisoning the sorcerer forever. Despite the sorcerer's defeat, the timeline isn't restored to normal, there's now a brand new timeline with elements of both the old and the dystopian timeline, though Calypso has found peace, and Tony and Louie are ready for another adventure. PC Games would use this new timeline to ultimately reboot the franchise with a game that would be released beyond the scope of this timeline.
Kingdom Quest V would achieve strong review scores, not quite as good as those for Kingdom Quest III (widely viewed as the peak of the series), but higher than IV, and sales would be stronger than that title as well. Though Kingdom Quest isn't quite a top-tier video game series, it remains quite popular and successful, with a big fanbase and some of the most memorable characters in gaming, especially with Princess Calypso continuing to represent the series in Super Smash Bros. Following the game's August 2020 release, it would be ported to the Hyper Nintendo and the Quest in 2021, with some new features and included DLC (including the Timebreak DLC).
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Game Spotlight: Awakened From The Earth
Awakened From The Earth is an adventure/mech combat game developed by Hideo Kojima's production studio and published by Ubisoft. The game sees an Earth under siege by enormous monsters that can only be defeated by giant mechs buried deep underground, which are infiltrated by seven different pilots and used to battle the monsters. Based both on Kojima's own writings and also ideas pitched by Kojima's friend/collaborative partner Guillermo del Toro (who gave Kojima some ideas from an old spec script that became Pacific Rim IOTL but ITTL never got off the ground), the game is best described as a blend of The Legend Of Zelda and Zone of the Enders, with some Metal Gear Solid-esque philosophizing thrown in. The game is divided into eight chapters, with each chapter featuring one of the mech pilots discovering their mech, entering the mech, and venturing through it much like one would a temple in Zelda, in order to build trust with the mech that will allow them to pilot it. The game's bosses are the massive creature battles that take place after each "dungeon", as the pilot takes control of the mech and uses it to take down the monster. Each of these temple journeys is not only a dungeon crawl, with combat and various puzzles, but also a personal journey in which players find out about each pilot via context and storytelling.
There's a mech in each of the seven continents, and as the game progresses, the relationship between the seven pilots is also slowly established, as each chapter takes place in chronological order and as some of the later pilots make their journeys, they'll communicate with and even sometimes meet the other pilots, as there are doors in each mech that can transport the pilots between each of them.
The seven chapters/mechs/pilots are as follows:
Chapter 1: Asia: Hanako: Hanako, a high school student from Japan, is the first to find her mech, discovering Asia's mech deep beneath the streets of Tokyo as a Godzilla-like creature ravages the city. Hanako must overcome not only her fear of the unknown, but her crippling depression, which we learn has led to at least one suicide attempt in the months before her journey.
Chapter 2: North America: Rick: Rick is a 20-something drifter who discovers his mech beneath the streets of a small town in the American Midwest. As he tries to venture through the mech to gain its trust, we learn about his drug problems and fear of commitment, and how it's destroyed his relationship with the only woman who ever loved him.
Chapter 3: South America: Quetzali: Quetzali is a teenage girl from Peru, who discovers her mech while trying to hold down a job in Lima. As she ventures through the mech and learns its secrets, we discover how Quetzali has been denied various opportunities in her life due to her indigenous status, and how she struggles with even wanting to save the people on the surface. This mission also gives us our first interactions between a pair of pilots, as Hanako and Quetzali meet near the end of the dungeon.
Chapter 4: Australia: Jake: Jake is a somewhat lazy and aloof teenage surfer in Perth, and his journey to the mech is largely accidental, as he accidentally causes the death of a much more qualified Australian Special Forces soldier who initally ventured into the mech before Jake arrived. However, even as Jake struggles with his own lack of focus, he gathers strength and finds the courage within himself, even forming a sort of mentor relationship with Rick, who counsels him through part of the dungeon, while Hanako also pops in at one point (and Jake develops a bit of a crush on her.
Chapter 5: Africa: Edwain: Edwain is a young man living in Ethiopia and working as a cab driver when one of the monsters attacks his city. He and a group of his friends are forced to flee the monster attacks, and there's a bit of an adventure before you even make it to the dungeon, with Edwain and his sister both making it inside, but Edwain's timidity causing his sister to suffer a seemingly fatal accident (though, as it late turns out, she ends up okay). Edwain must deal with his own trauma in order to make it through the temple, being helped out along the way by Jake and Quetzali.
Chapter 6: Europe: Jacques: Jacques' journey takes place in the French countryside, as the lumbering titan that's already crushed Paris makes its way across the land. Jacques is a hostile and bigoted individual, but is forced to confront these personal biases when a young woman saves his life, and then he makes it to the underground mech and meets up with several of the pilots, each of whom help him along the way.
Chapter 7: Antarctica: Katherine: Katherine, in her early 40s, is the oldest of the pilots, and is working in Antarctica as a doctor at the research station there when the station is attacked by the most vicious monster yet, and Katherine is hurled into a frozen lake, barely making it to the mech alive, and needing help from all six other pilots to make her way through. Her cold and analytical nature has left her somewhat emotionally oblivious, though, as it turns out, she's covering up a tragedy, the death of her husband and young daughter. When she discovers Edwain's sister and has a chance to save her life, she's able to achieve some measure of redemption.
Chapter 8: Earth: This final chapter sees the grand final battle against a massive, miles-high monster (think something akin to the monster shown at the end of The Cloverfield Paradox, just towering above the clouds, easily the biggest thing ever fought in a video game). The seven pilots must learn to meld their minds and overcome their lingering mental traumas in order to merge their mecha into one massive robot, the only thing capable of saving their world.
Awakened From The Earth features an excellent voice cast, with Norman Reedus headlining as Jake, Q'orianka Kilcher as Quetzali, and Mary Elizabeth McGlynn as Katherine, among others. The game features a wide variety of combat mechanics and gameplay styles, with each of the seven protagonists and their mechs controlling somewhat differently, allowing the player to learn their individual strengths and weaknesses during their chapters. The mech combat isn't quite as fast-paced as Zone Of The Enders, with the towering behemoths moving a bit more slowly, making fights somewhat of a blend between a fighting game and a puzzle, and, like the individual characters, some of the mechs move differently than others. These epic fights are the climax of the game, taking place in a variety of different environments, with each one set to different music, making each fight its own memorable experience.
Awakened From The Earth is released on August 17, 2020, to a strong reception from critics, with some proclaiming it to be one of the year's best games, and others having some criticisms but genuinely enjoying the game, and review scores averaging in the mid to high 8s. The mecha exploration/dungeon crawls are a bit polarizing, compared to the dungeons in the Zelda series, they're not quite as memorable and some critics see them as being overly broken up with long cutscenes. The mech fights are also a bit polarizing, though, for the most part, these are the game's highest praised segments. With Kojima's games always getting plenty of hype, Awakened From The Earth would see excellent sales at the time of its release, making it one of the year's most successful new IPs overall. Its sales would also be helped along by a real-life event occurring very shortly after the game's release...
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Other Significant Titles For August 2020:
Enter The Holograph: Published by Sony, this new IP blends elements of platforming and world creation, and gives the player control of a white blob named Holo which is able to transform at the player's command, which also causes the world around it to transform into a variety of different environments. Compared somewhat to the Polymorph series, though this game is a bit more of a tech demo and also shorter than many of the Polymorph games, it allows a lot of creativity for the player (you can become a hamburger and fight dragons, or a knight flying a jetplane, or a princess superhero), but not a lot of substance, and the underlying story is extremely weak. Receives tepidly favorable reviews for being an interesting concept but just not enough of a substantive game, and sales fail to meet expectations for this late Reality title.
Betwixt: A Naughty Dog North developed turn-based RPG for the Game Boy Zero, that takes place in the modern world and focuses on a young woman who one day learns she has magical powers, causing her to get caught up in a rather crazy adventure with her friends. Inspired by The Darkest, but more lighthearted, this game combines the feel of an Earthbound-type game with the humor of an Uncharted game to create something quite fun and unique, or at least something different from the typical fantasy RPG. It's definitely not a best seller, but being a rather low budget game for a Naughty Dog North title, it makes back its budget thanks to good word of mouth and reviews.
Death And Taxes 2: After the success that the original game had on the Google Nexus, a sequel was greenlighted and developed fairly quickly, and is released in August 2020 for both the Nexus and Stadia. It sees Grimelda and John return after a massive clerical error in the underworld forces Grimelda to kidnap John and bring him to the world of the dead to help with the accounting, leading to a crazy adventure that blurs the lines between heaven and hell. The familiar Diablo-esque action RPG gameplay returns, with new abilities and quality of life upgrades galore, and while it's a very good game, much like the previous title, reviews aren't quite as good, averaging in the mid to high 8s rather than the mid 9s. It's still good, it just doesn't get the high praise of the original game.
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August 20, 2020
Hideo Kojima is sitting at his desk, a phone in his hand as he talks to a potential game development partner. Having just launched a very successful game in Awakened From The Earth, he's already hard at work on his next collaboration, even as he juggles a number of other projects his studio has been working on, including a new Metal Gear game, a potential Policenauts reboot, and another new IP. Now, as he discusses a future project with a producer at a Japanese indie studio, he's grateful that his continued success has given him the opportunity to work with so many fantastic people, both in the video game industry and outside it.
"So when Kazai dual-wields, he gains the power of both his own sword and the powers of the god inhabiting his other sword?" asked Kojima, as the developer discussed his ideas for the future game, which was tentatively called Demiblade.
"The powers and the memories," the developer replied.
"Ah, yes! So when they wield the blade, they temporarily become the other world's god!"
"We're exploring that concept, but yes, that's what we're leaning toward."
As Kojima rubbed his hand on his chin, that nagging headache that had been plaguing him for most of the afternoon suddenly flared up. He lurched forward in his chair, dropping his phone on the desk.
"Hello?"
"..."
"...hello? The idea you mentioned earlier, about Kazai's memories being lost to him..."
"..."
"Kojima-san?"
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BREAKING: Hideo Kojima Dead At Age 56
Hideo Kojima, one of the most renowned game developers of all time, has died at age 56, from what has been described as a massive stroke. He was found unresponsive in his Tokyo office by paramedics who were alerted by a contact who had been speaking to him on the phone when he suddenly went silent, and rushed to the hospital, but was declared dead on arrival. Described by some as a "video game auteur", Kojima's works have not only been pioneering in terms of gameplay, but in terms of narrative complexity, exploring ideas of life, death, and the human psyche, and creating some of the most complex characters in the medium. His death comes just three days after the release of his latest game, Awakened From The Earth, and the fact that he had been working on several new games at the time has led some to blame overwork for the video game legend's passing. He had been juggling several projects at a time for a number of years, rarely stopping to take a break or take any downtime between game releases. The news has shocked many in the game industry, with numerous individuals including Apple's Steve Jobs and Doom creator John Romero expressing grief and praising his work. Super Smash Bros. creator Masahiro Sakurai, who was a close friend of Kojima's, expressed his feelings in a series of heartfelt tweets where he thanked Kojima for inspiring him. Even outside the industry, Kojima's death is hitting many hard. James Cameron, director of the Terminator films, Titanic, and the Metroid film adaptations, said in a statement that Kojima's death was an "immense loss" for the entire video game industry, and called him "one of the most brilliant creative minds of the last 30 years". Guillermo del Toro, another friend and occasional Kojima collaborator, was said to have been briefly "inconsolable" following the news of Kojima's death, and expressed regret that the two wouldn't be able to work on another project together.
-from a Games Over Matter article, posted on August 20, 2020
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"When Kojima-san died, it was a wakeup call for me. I have always prided myself in being an extremely hard worker, and before his death, I spent a great deal of time on the Super Smash Bros. games, especially as the release date of Ultimate approached. We encouraged each other to take breaks from time to time, but always in jest, as we knew neither of us would ever take that advice seriously. After learning that Kojima-san died as a result of too much stress, I realized that I needed to try and rest a bit more, even though I loved working on Super Smash Bros. and wanted to please everyone who loved the games so much. It was at that time that I began delegating a bit more, taking some more time for myself, and trusting that the people working on the game with me would be able to achieve the same results as I would have. Since I planned to retire from the series anyway, it would also give me a chance to teach the new generation in the making of a Super Smash Bros. game. I would still work very hard on Ultimate and all the DLC, but this was the thing that pushed me to at least give myself the breaks I needed from time to time, and for that final lesson, I am very grateful to my dear friend."
-Masahiro Sakurai, in a developer diary blog post released on April 4, 2024, a few months after the release of the last Super Smash Bros. Ultimate DLC character
(...)
It's been a good month for Take-Two Interactive, with The Lobotomized: Violent Mind selling over 400,000 copies in its first week. The game, an intense survival horror title in which the protagonist is forced to escape an asylum populated by dangerous inmates while questioning their own sanity didn't do quite as well with critics as some of the games in the series (we gave it a 7.5 out of 10, and you can read our review here). The company has seen its shares soar after the announcement of Grand Theft Auto IV, and is also in negotiations to acquire Retro Studios, which Nintendo spun off last year. Take-Two hopes to make a bid for the rights to produce NFL titles, and may use Retro (which worked on the Peyton Manning Play Action series for Nintendo) if they're able to acquire the rights. Electronic Arts, which has seen tremendous success with the Madden series, is expected to retain NFL exclusivity for another five years, but NFL owners are said to be considering opening the rights up to more than one company if that company bids highly enough, and Take-Two may well have the resources to make such a bid. Negotiations are set for October, and if Take Two is able to acquire the NFL rights, the company could produce its first NFL game as early as 2022.
-from an August 23, 2020 article on IGN.com
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Rubio Sees Noticeable Convention Bump, Closes On Kennedy After VP Pick
Marco Rubio selected South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham as his running mate at last week's Republican National Convention, surprising some who believed he would choose someone younger such as Nick Freitas, John James, or even Stacey Dash. However, Rubio's selection of Graham was made with the goal of pleasing old guard Republicans, while also bringing social conservatives who have reported feeling alienated with the party's recent "economics first" messaging over the past decade. This could well be important, especially in the wake of last month's 5-4 Supreme Court decision that dealt a harsh blow to abortion rights opponents, when the high court ruled that states could not impose "undue restrictions" on abortion, including zoning requirements that states had used in recent years to reduce the number of clinics. The ruling is expected to lead to the return of clinics in many areas where they had left before due to laws put in place since 1992's Casey vs. Planned Parenthood decision, which upheld Roe v. Wade but opened the door for a variety of restrictive new laws. Social conservatives have been demanding that Rubio put a social conservative on the ticket, and though Rick Santorum was considered, Rubio chose Graham, a choice that so far has appeased the far right of the party. Though Graham is generally considered a moderate on reproductive rights issues, he strongly opposed the Court's recent ruling, and has also come out strongly against transgender rights, another issue on which the Supreme Court has recently issued consequential rulings. Rubio and Graham's speeches at the convention were also highly praised, particularly Rubio's keynote speech in which he railed against the economic policies of the current administration. Rubio has also gotten a polling bump after recent inflation increases and an uptick in unemployment, both of which Rubio is heavily blaming on Kennedy's policies. The polling bump for Rubio has largely erased the gains made by President Kennedy after the Democratic National Convention early this month, in which he and his vice president Stacey Abrams were unanimously chosen to run for re-election. This year, there will be four presidential debates between Kennedy and Rubio, and two between Abrams and Graham. The first presidential debate is scheduled for September 16th, and will be held in Chicago, Illinois, on the campus of Northwestern University.
-from an article on Yahoo! News, posted on August 30, 2020
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"Deathborn Tears Up The Track!"
-from the second of three Super Smash Bros. Ultimate character reveal videos, revealing that Deathborn, the antagonist of F-Zero: FIRESTORM, would be joining Ultimate, posted on Nintendo's Videocean and Youtube channels on August 21, 2020
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(Authors' Note: Ideas for Kingdom Quest V were contributed by the reader HonestAbe1809!)
In the years between the release of Kingdom Quest IV and Kingdom Quest V, a lot had changed at PC Games (PC being short for Princess Calypso, the new name the company had adopted in the past few years, owing to the character's popularity). Development on the game had taken several years, and by the time it was ready for release, it was nearly time for a new generation of consoles... but the company decided that Kingdom Quest V would make a strong send-off to the current generation, and in addition to releasing the game on the Reality and Virtua, also released it for both the Stadia and the Nexus, which was still seeing a decent number of major third party titles released on it. In the intervening years, the company had also released Rage Rabbit, and Kingdom Quest V would use the same engine, allowing the two games to be released about a year apart. Kingdom Quest V would also be released alongside a remastered compilation of the first four games, and you could buy all five in a bundle for a reduced price ($99.99, compared to $59.99 for buying them separately). The bundle would also release with an exclusive "Timebreak Mode" that wouldn't be released as DLC for several months after, introducing a character called Princess Marigold, AKA Dahlia, to the first four games, who replaces Calypso in an attempt to fix things in the original four adventures, but causes things to go off the rails completely. As it turns out, Marigold is actually Calypso in disguise, returning from the future to set things right, but accidentally creating an alternate timeline that has major ramifications for the events of Kingdom Quest V. This Timebreak mode serves as a sort of "Extra Quest", shorter than the first four games played together, but about the length of two games mashed together when played on its own, allowing players to play as Marigold/Calypso in a brand new quest with brand new bosses and characters as she tries to fix things in the original four games.
The antagonist of Kingdom Quest V is the mysterious cloaked sorcerer who was introduced near the end of Kingdom Quest IV, though he doesn't surface until midway through the game. The first half of the game sees Tony and Louie return as the main protagonists, alongside Calypso who is also playable throughout, but somewhat sidelined as the heroes once again battle their way through various game parodies, including a game that parodies gritty, post-apocalyptic works with a dark protagonist who does horrible, evil things "because he has to", a return to the strange creepy village from Kingdom Quest IV, but with the characters replaced with evil robots (one who eventually turns good and joins your party, but does so not knowing she's a robot the whole time, and the characters deciding to humor her by pretending she's human), and a parody of games such as Strikeback and After Time in which Tony and Louie are recruited into an army battling aliens, only for one of the aliens to be friendly and Calypso has to help bring the hardcore army sargeant and the alien woman together in romance. These parodies are supposedly building to a climax in which the characters have to defeat an evil entity known as the Gamemaster who claims to be controlling everything, but in the climax, the Gamemaster is revealed to be the evil sorcerer, who, as it turns out, is obsessed with Calypso, to the point of thinking that she's still an evil villain and has tricked Tony and Louie into letting their guards down. When Calypso denies this, and Tony and Louie try and stop the sorcerer, he activates a chrono calamity that causes everything to be reset to the beginning of the original Kingdom Quest, in which Calypso now rules everything... but even though the world is supposedly under her control, she has full memory of everything, and she's still a hero who doesn't want to rule. The problem is that the world is now a dark parody of itself, and Tony and Louie are leading a rebellion as her mortal enemies. Calypso has to go around and do a whirlwind tour of various lands from the first four games in order to snap the heroes out of the sorcerer's spell. The second half of Kingdom Quest V is thus a "greatest hits" of the first four games, from the perspective of a heroic Calypso, battling dark versions of various heroes from the games, as the sorcerer continuously tries to contact her and tell her how great she is. Finally, Calypso confronts Tony and Louie, and they have a knock-down, drag out battle with each other until Calypso is finally able to snap them back to reality. It's then that the sorcerer tries to show Calypso how devoted he is to her by killing them, but she takes the fatal blow instead, sacrificing herself, which snaps Tony and Louie back to their old selves. Furious, and grieving, the sorcerer takes the comatose Calypso back to his castle, forcing the heroes to mount a rescue mission. Though it seems things have come full circle, with Tony and Louie venturing to rescue Calypso, it's only that way through half of the final mission... before Calypso awakens, weakened but fully aware, and you get to play as her, assisting the heroes through the castle before Tony and Louie confront the sorcerer. He tries to bring out Calypso, but she's nowhere to be found, and Tony and Louie defeat his first form before Calypso finally shows up and tells him off once and for all, causing him to go into an insane rampage. Tony and Louie try to stop him, but are easily defeated, setting up the final boss battle between the sorcerer and a powered up Calypso. She defeats him, saving the others and ending the sorcerer's tricks once and for all, imprisoning the sorcerer forever. Despite the sorcerer's defeat, the timeline isn't restored to normal, there's now a brand new timeline with elements of both the old and the dystopian timeline, though Calypso has found peace, and Tony and Louie are ready for another adventure. PC Games would use this new timeline to ultimately reboot the franchise with a game that would be released beyond the scope of this timeline.
Kingdom Quest V would achieve strong review scores, not quite as good as those for Kingdom Quest III (widely viewed as the peak of the series), but higher than IV, and sales would be stronger than that title as well. Though Kingdom Quest isn't quite a top-tier video game series, it remains quite popular and successful, with a big fanbase and some of the most memorable characters in gaming, especially with Princess Calypso continuing to represent the series in Super Smash Bros. Following the game's August 2020 release, it would be ported to the Hyper Nintendo and the Quest in 2021, with some new features and included DLC (including the Timebreak DLC).
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Game Spotlight: Awakened From The Earth
Awakened From The Earth is an adventure/mech combat game developed by Hideo Kojima's production studio and published by Ubisoft. The game sees an Earth under siege by enormous monsters that can only be defeated by giant mechs buried deep underground, which are infiltrated by seven different pilots and used to battle the monsters. Based both on Kojima's own writings and also ideas pitched by Kojima's friend/collaborative partner Guillermo del Toro (who gave Kojima some ideas from an old spec script that became Pacific Rim IOTL but ITTL never got off the ground), the game is best described as a blend of The Legend Of Zelda and Zone of the Enders, with some Metal Gear Solid-esque philosophizing thrown in. The game is divided into eight chapters, with each chapter featuring one of the mech pilots discovering their mech, entering the mech, and venturing through it much like one would a temple in Zelda, in order to build trust with the mech that will allow them to pilot it. The game's bosses are the massive creature battles that take place after each "dungeon", as the pilot takes control of the mech and uses it to take down the monster. Each of these temple journeys is not only a dungeon crawl, with combat and various puzzles, but also a personal journey in which players find out about each pilot via context and storytelling.
There's a mech in each of the seven continents, and as the game progresses, the relationship between the seven pilots is also slowly established, as each chapter takes place in chronological order and as some of the later pilots make their journeys, they'll communicate with and even sometimes meet the other pilots, as there are doors in each mech that can transport the pilots between each of them.
The seven chapters/mechs/pilots are as follows:
Chapter 1: Asia: Hanako: Hanako, a high school student from Japan, is the first to find her mech, discovering Asia's mech deep beneath the streets of Tokyo as a Godzilla-like creature ravages the city. Hanako must overcome not only her fear of the unknown, but her crippling depression, which we learn has led to at least one suicide attempt in the months before her journey.
Chapter 2: North America: Rick: Rick is a 20-something drifter who discovers his mech beneath the streets of a small town in the American Midwest. As he tries to venture through the mech to gain its trust, we learn about his drug problems and fear of commitment, and how it's destroyed his relationship with the only woman who ever loved him.
Chapter 3: South America: Quetzali: Quetzali is a teenage girl from Peru, who discovers her mech while trying to hold down a job in Lima. As she ventures through the mech and learns its secrets, we discover how Quetzali has been denied various opportunities in her life due to her indigenous status, and how she struggles with even wanting to save the people on the surface. This mission also gives us our first interactions between a pair of pilots, as Hanako and Quetzali meet near the end of the dungeon.
Chapter 4: Australia: Jake: Jake is a somewhat lazy and aloof teenage surfer in Perth, and his journey to the mech is largely accidental, as he accidentally causes the death of a much more qualified Australian Special Forces soldier who initally ventured into the mech before Jake arrived. However, even as Jake struggles with his own lack of focus, he gathers strength and finds the courage within himself, even forming a sort of mentor relationship with Rick, who counsels him through part of the dungeon, while Hanako also pops in at one point (and Jake develops a bit of a crush on her.
Chapter 5: Africa: Edwain: Edwain is a young man living in Ethiopia and working as a cab driver when one of the monsters attacks his city. He and a group of his friends are forced to flee the monster attacks, and there's a bit of an adventure before you even make it to the dungeon, with Edwain and his sister both making it inside, but Edwain's timidity causing his sister to suffer a seemingly fatal accident (though, as it late turns out, she ends up okay). Edwain must deal with his own trauma in order to make it through the temple, being helped out along the way by Jake and Quetzali.
Chapter 6: Europe: Jacques: Jacques' journey takes place in the French countryside, as the lumbering titan that's already crushed Paris makes its way across the land. Jacques is a hostile and bigoted individual, but is forced to confront these personal biases when a young woman saves his life, and then he makes it to the underground mech and meets up with several of the pilots, each of whom help him along the way.
Chapter 7: Antarctica: Katherine: Katherine, in her early 40s, is the oldest of the pilots, and is working in Antarctica as a doctor at the research station there when the station is attacked by the most vicious monster yet, and Katherine is hurled into a frozen lake, barely making it to the mech alive, and needing help from all six other pilots to make her way through. Her cold and analytical nature has left her somewhat emotionally oblivious, though, as it turns out, she's covering up a tragedy, the death of her husband and young daughter. When she discovers Edwain's sister and has a chance to save her life, she's able to achieve some measure of redemption.
Chapter 8: Earth: This final chapter sees the grand final battle against a massive, miles-high monster (think something akin to the monster shown at the end of The Cloverfield Paradox, just towering above the clouds, easily the biggest thing ever fought in a video game). The seven pilots must learn to meld their minds and overcome their lingering mental traumas in order to merge their mecha into one massive robot, the only thing capable of saving their world.
Awakened From The Earth features an excellent voice cast, with Norman Reedus headlining as Jake, Q'orianka Kilcher as Quetzali, and Mary Elizabeth McGlynn as Katherine, among others. The game features a wide variety of combat mechanics and gameplay styles, with each of the seven protagonists and their mechs controlling somewhat differently, allowing the player to learn their individual strengths and weaknesses during their chapters. The mech combat isn't quite as fast-paced as Zone Of The Enders, with the towering behemoths moving a bit more slowly, making fights somewhat of a blend between a fighting game and a puzzle, and, like the individual characters, some of the mechs move differently than others. These epic fights are the climax of the game, taking place in a variety of different environments, with each one set to different music, making each fight its own memorable experience.
Awakened From The Earth is released on August 17, 2020, to a strong reception from critics, with some proclaiming it to be one of the year's best games, and others having some criticisms but genuinely enjoying the game, and review scores averaging in the mid to high 8s. The mecha exploration/dungeon crawls are a bit polarizing, compared to the dungeons in the Zelda series, they're not quite as memorable and some critics see them as being overly broken up with long cutscenes. The mech fights are also a bit polarizing, though, for the most part, these are the game's highest praised segments. With Kojima's games always getting plenty of hype, Awakened From The Earth would see excellent sales at the time of its release, making it one of the year's most successful new IPs overall. Its sales would also be helped along by a real-life event occurring very shortly after the game's release...
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Other Significant Titles For August 2020:
Enter The Holograph: Published by Sony, this new IP blends elements of platforming and world creation, and gives the player control of a white blob named Holo which is able to transform at the player's command, which also causes the world around it to transform into a variety of different environments. Compared somewhat to the Polymorph series, though this game is a bit more of a tech demo and also shorter than many of the Polymorph games, it allows a lot of creativity for the player (you can become a hamburger and fight dragons, or a knight flying a jetplane, or a princess superhero), but not a lot of substance, and the underlying story is extremely weak. Receives tepidly favorable reviews for being an interesting concept but just not enough of a substantive game, and sales fail to meet expectations for this late Reality title.
Betwixt: A Naughty Dog North developed turn-based RPG for the Game Boy Zero, that takes place in the modern world and focuses on a young woman who one day learns she has magical powers, causing her to get caught up in a rather crazy adventure with her friends. Inspired by The Darkest, but more lighthearted, this game combines the feel of an Earthbound-type game with the humor of an Uncharted game to create something quite fun and unique, or at least something different from the typical fantasy RPG. It's definitely not a best seller, but being a rather low budget game for a Naughty Dog North title, it makes back its budget thanks to good word of mouth and reviews.
Death And Taxes 2: After the success that the original game had on the Google Nexus, a sequel was greenlighted and developed fairly quickly, and is released in August 2020 for both the Nexus and Stadia. It sees Grimelda and John return after a massive clerical error in the underworld forces Grimelda to kidnap John and bring him to the world of the dead to help with the accounting, leading to a crazy adventure that blurs the lines between heaven and hell. The familiar Diablo-esque action RPG gameplay returns, with new abilities and quality of life upgrades galore, and while it's a very good game, much like the previous title, reviews aren't quite as good, averaging in the mid to high 8s rather than the mid 9s. It's still good, it just doesn't get the high praise of the original game.
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August 20, 2020
Hideo Kojima is sitting at his desk, a phone in his hand as he talks to a potential game development partner. Having just launched a very successful game in Awakened From The Earth, he's already hard at work on his next collaboration, even as he juggles a number of other projects his studio has been working on, including a new Metal Gear game, a potential Policenauts reboot, and another new IP. Now, as he discusses a future project with a producer at a Japanese indie studio, he's grateful that his continued success has given him the opportunity to work with so many fantastic people, both in the video game industry and outside it.
"So when Kazai dual-wields, he gains the power of both his own sword and the powers of the god inhabiting his other sword?" asked Kojima, as the developer discussed his ideas for the future game, which was tentatively called Demiblade.
"The powers and the memories," the developer replied.
"Ah, yes! So when they wield the blade, they temporarily become the other world's god!"
"We're exploring that concept, but yes, that's what we're leaning toward."
As Kojima rubbed his hand on his chin, that nagging headache that had been plaguing him for most of the afternoon suddenly flared up. He lurched forward in his chair, dropping his phone on the desk.
"Hello?"
"..."
"...hello? The idea you mentioned earlier, about Kazai's memories being lost to him..."
"..."
"Kojima-san?"
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BREAKING: Hideo Kojima Dead At Age 56
Hideo Kojima, one of the most renowned game developers of all time, has died at age 56, from what has been described as a massive stroke. He was found unresponsive in his Tokyo office by paramedics who were alerted by a contact who had been speaking to him on the phone when he suddenly went silent, and rushed to the hospital, but was declared dead on arrival. Described by some as a "video game auteur", Kojima's works have not only been pioneering in terms of gameplay, but in terms of narrative complexity, exploring ideas of life, death, and the human psyche, and creating some of the most complex characters in the medium. His death comes just three days after the release of his latest game, Awakened From The Earth, and the fact that he had been working on several new games at the time has led some to blame overwork for the video game legend's passing. He had been juggling several projects at a time for a number of years, rarely stopping to take a break or take any downtime between game releases. The news has shocked many in the game industry, with numerous individuals including Apple's Steve Jobs and Doom creator John Romero expressing grief and praising his work. Super Smash Bros. creator Masahiro Sakurai, who was a close friend of Kojima's, expressed his feelings in a series of heartfelt tweets where he thanked Kojima for inspiring him. Even outside the industry, Kojima's death is hitting many hard. James Cameron, director of the Terminator films, Titanic, and the Metroid film adaptations, said in a statement that Kojima's death was an "immense loss" for the entire video game industry, and called him "one of the most brilliant creative minds of the last 30 years". Guillermo del Toro, another friend and occasional Kojima collaborator, was said to have been briefly "inconsolable" following the news of Kojima's death, and expressed regret that the two wouldn't be able to work on another project together.
-from a Games Over Matter article, posted on August 20, 2020
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"When Kojima-san died, it was a wakeup call for me. I have always prided myself in being an extremely hard worker, and before his death, I spent a great deal of time on the Super Smash Bros. games, especially as the release date of Ultimate approached. We encouraged each other to take breaks from time to time, but always in jest, as we knew neither of us would ever take that advice seriously. After learning that Kojima-san died as a result of too much stress, I realized that I needed to try and rest a bit more, even though I loved working on Super Smash Bros. and wanted to please everyone who loved the games so much. It was at that time that I began delegating a bit more, taking some more time for myself, and trusting that the people working on the game with me would be able to achieve the same results as I would have. Since I planned to retire from the series anyway, it would also give me a chance to teach the new generation in the making of a Super Smash Bros. game. I would still work very hard on Ultimate and all the DLC, but this was the thing that pushed me to at least give myself the breaks I needed from time to time, and for that final lesson, I am very grateful to my dear friend."
-Masahiro Sakurai, in a developer diary blog post released on April 4, 2024, a few months after the release of the last Super Smash Bros. Ultimate DLC character
Dang, RIP Kojima. Strange how TTL's industry treating him better was a big catalyst for his death.
Remember when I said that there will be tears? And that you should stock up on tissues?
Well, you'd better have some to share now...
(sobs uncontrollably)
Well, you'd better have some to share now...
(sobs uncontrollably)
I will, as part of the game's coverage in the Hyper Nintendo launch post.
Oh god… oh god… first Miyamoto, then multiple notable figures in the anime industry, and now this (plus the fact that Iwata still met his OTL fate)… Anyone who claims that P2S is a utopia should really be directed to posts like this.
At least TTL Sakurai is safe now… OTL Sakurai is having a break now that the last Smash DLC has been released, right? …right?
On a lighter note:
I must have missed something; exactly when last year, and why, did Nintendo let Retro Studios go?
Retro wasn't doing much for Nintendo anymore in this timeline, and really didn't own any significant IPs either, over the last few years they'd been doing mostly digital stuff and most of their key figures had left, so Nintendo cut them loose at the beginning of 2019.
I guess this means that Retro Studios's cancelled games remain cancelled, such as Raven Blade?
If so, since they no longer make Metroid, Donkey Kong, or Mario Kart games, perhaps those old concepts can be brought back to life for their new owners while simultaneously making basic sports installments.
Okay. Is there even a single non-zero chance of it getting resurrected for Take-Two, since they own Retro now? Or do they now have the same fate as OTL!Toys for Bob?
Technically there a copy of the old demo and code in otl Michael office so who knows...
How getting more and more passion projects ended up with a unique side effects when you have a natural perfectionist and Japan style of overwork. The ironies of life and time