VG247’s The Best Games Ever Podcast – Ep.21: The best dead game you’d buy a console for if it came back
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The PlayStation 3 was a strange thing. The console, late to the party that the Xbox 360 kicked off brilliantly, was a big deal. Certainly in Sony-owned countries like the UK, it seemed like everyone was waiting for it. It didn’t really matter that the launch lineup was a little weird, that the console itself looked awful, or that it was ridiculously expensive. The follow-up to perhaps the greatest console of all time, the PS2, was a big deal.
But what exactly was it that people were desperate to play on their new PS3? I was at the launch in March 2006 in the UK, somewhere in London, probably in a store that no longer exists and is now a Greggs. While we were there, we interviewed now Stadia-failer Phil Harrison, who is essentially a giant. He had never before spoken to a man so intimidatingly large. Phil, as important as he was in his PlayStation days (lots of ducks etc) wasn’t the highlight of the night. Oh no. It was the public. More specifically, the real reasons some of them were buying a new PS3 for a billion pounds.
One person, a young man with a pencil-thin mustache, excitedly told me, “Sonic.” This took me by surprise, so much so that I almost laughed for the first time since BBC2’s comedy show “Fist of Fun” aired in 1995. But I digress. This person was queuing for hours to spend £425 (plus game price) to play an absolutely terrible Sonic game, which everyone knew was terrible as it had been released on Xbox 360 the year before.
Many people in the queue couldn’t even name a single game they were buying, just saying something about Blu-ray and FIFA, even though the first FIFA on PS3 was about six months away. Do not bother yourself.
Ridge Racer 7 was right there at launch. But no, of course no one mentioned it. However, of all the reasons I was told why people were buying a PS3 at launch, one took the crown as the weirdest, most nonsensical accounting I’d ever heard of.
“Yeah, I realized I can save money I was going to spend on a laptop just by buying a PS3,” one man told me. “I’ll do all my work on the PS3. I just need to plug in a keyboard. I have a printer ready to go,” he added. I nodded politely and walked away.
To my knowledge, no word processor was ever released in any form for the PS3 (not unless you have Linux installed). I hope you’ve installed Linux and worked your little heart out, man. i really do
In any case. Welcome to VG247’s The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.21 – The best dead game you’d buy a console for if it came back.
Let us know what you think of the show, and if this is your first time listening to it, check back for previous episodes. If you have suggestions on topics, we’d love to hear them. To be clear, no one here has submitted a single suggestion. I’m starting to think no one reads this. Which is pretty sad.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask as you ponder how awful the PS3 launch lineup was and how it was all saved by being a Blu-ray machine. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you’re on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel where people (me and a few others at VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That is all. It’s good. listen to it
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading into the comments to make a wonderful and thoughtful post or if you don’t want to listen but want to know which games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t overlook this fan-made creation of what Chris Bratt would look like if he had a PS3 for a head, but the soul of his real head was trapped inside it. (Support VG247’s friends, People Make Games, at patreon).
The best dead game you’d buy a console for if it came back
This is the theme of the twenty-first episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever podcast. Here’s a rundown of who chose what.
Tom – Ridge Racer
Is there another game series that screams a launch title more than Ridge Racer? It wasn’t just a launch game for the original PlayStation; was THE launch game for the original PlayStation. It showed what that console could do and sold an entire generation of the new console in a market that had been dominated by SEGA and Nintendo.
Alex – Time Crisis
I chose Time Crisis, but I have to be honest with you: this choice is really about an entire genre, which is the homeports of light gun arcade shooters. These things have been around since the days of the NES and Duck Hunt, and came into a bit of a heyday during the PS1 and PS2 eras, but then in the PS3 era it seemed to die out. For my money, it also went extinct through no fault of its own.
Small arms games fell victim to a variety of circumstances. For starters, they’re incompatible with modern LCD and LED flat screens without a bunch of cumbersome sensors, which is how Time Crisis 4 launched on PS3. I’d also wager that the genre suffered as a result of the great Guitar Hero crash, i.e. the period when, after years of plastic guitars, drums, fitness boards, skateboards, and even Wii Remote shells in the shape of guns to play pointer-based shooters that feel awful, people got bored of buying plastic tattoos. All of that went in the trash and took Light Guns with it.
But now it’s time for his return. A technical solution to the hardware incompatibility problem has been created, and there are plenty of thirtysomethings with a huge nostalgia for light pistols. I’d buy any machine that managed to get a new Time Crisis, Point Blank, Virtua Cop, or even remasters of the classic games. I would randomly pay a king.
Connor – Def Jam
Look, let’s not mess around here. Def Jam was only really good once. However, he was very good with Def jam: Fight for NY. It was the complete package, a crazy idea executed to perfection. Sure it’s a little dated, but it’s really old, man. Which is why if they made a new one, with a new cast of modern artists, updated gameplay, and the same slick style, I’d buy a whole new console before you could throw Snoop Dogg out a three-story window. I would even buy a Nintendo console.
What’s even worse, more so than the other good suggestions, is that every once in a while some guy on the official Def Jam Twitter account will post something like “Hey, where would you like to see the next Def Jam game take place, Chicago or Philadelphia? They’ve already done it like 10 times. It has gone from generating enthusiasm to rubbing it in our faces. Make a new one, please.
Check back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever podcast.
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