April Social Articulation
Quick! Thanks to the bank holiday weekend it’s practically June already. Let’s get this April Twitter & Facebook round-up ‘live’ on the ‘wire’.
So, last month’s key newsworthy events were our Creative Director hire and launch of the Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack, which also took up position at PAX East over the Easter weekend and as a GameStop incentive for Season Two toe-dippers. Elsewhere, the original Kinect Sports reared its head on The Apprentice here in the UK, Season Two manifested in bargainous forms across the ultrawebs and Lionhead’s Fable Heroes roped in musical shenanigans from Rare composers old and new.
It was a month of anniversaries, from SNES to Speccy, informing many of the traditional Rare list appearances (or Ultimate in the case of NowGamer’s Top 30 Spectrum Games). GamesRadar’s Week of Love stuck cartoon hearts on a whole range of systems, with some of our retro stars popping up in lists from N64 to NES. Perfect Dark took potshots at Game Informer’s Essential XBLA List and Guyism’s Video Games Ahead of Their Time, while CVG reserved several Rare-shaped slots in their 100 best videogame themes. Oh, and 1UP looked back at Jet Force Gemini while Achievement Hunter did a similar thing with Viva Piñata. The lists and features didn’t end there, but we’ll spare you further paragraph-distending distress – just a quick nod to Rareware Archives (now Rare Gamer) and their coverage of rabbits, reboots and games within games.
Amidst the rest of the social bustle, Kinect Sports: Season Two got a sport-by-sport YouTube playthrough with its predecessor appearing in the context of lectures, bets, grannies and headbutts; our own Mr. Beanland marked a service milestone while Skynet and phishers alike tried to get one over on us; and the bear and bird apparently opened a restaurant somewhere in the world even as we shared an unrequested Pie Day photo (to accompany a BAFTA/banana combo shot from the Rare hallways). To round off the month, some people got psyched up by the notion of a hypothetical all-star MS fighting game, and we probably didn’t help.
And that was the gist of April. May’s conversational wildflowers are already budding like good ‘uns; you can track the tomfoolery on Twitter or follow the flippancy on Facebook (at Rare or Kinect Sports). Catch you there or right back here in a month.
May 2012
Mini-Scribes: April 25, 2012
Mini-Scribes for every situation
Moving through the doorway of the nation…
Q: Hello and thank you for taking the time to review my question.
Last night I was playing Kinect Sports with a friend and his family. To be specific, we were bowling. During our game I started having a conversation with my friend’s dad about the difficulty of the game. My theory is that the difficulty levels are progressive within each character or “account” AND also within each individual game. I believe that if I start off playing very well and hit all strikes during the first 5-8 frames by the time I’m having to bowl the 10th frame the difficulty has increased. Is this accurate or not?
Also, if this is true, could you provide me with some details about how it is that the difficulty increases? Does the game start measuring your movements more closely, are the margins for error reduced, etc…
Thank you again for taking time to read this. I look forward to your reply.
Rene Ruiz
A: Bowling designer Paul (that’s right, we went and got a proper response, calm your fluttering hearts) says: “Thanks for the question! It would make the game very hard for players to continually get better and know how to create a consistency in their play if we did something like that. I reckon it’s more the pressure coming through when trying to get the perfect game!”
But by all means tell your friend’s dad something entirely different, e.g. 25 consecutive strikes and the Kinect sensor projects a hologram of Rare cleaners dressed as cheerleaders, or a dire downturn in performance on the tenth ball causes Sadako to crawl down the lane and out of the screen.
Q: Dear Rare,
I know, I know, it’s COMPLETELY WEIRD that one of the fans for your older game series would write you, but where is the future headed for them? Banjo and Kazooie, Conker, even the generic characters from Diddy Kong Racing. Will they fade into obscurity? You can always throw them to Retro Studios. Just an idea. 
Swifty
A: SO WEIRD. Nothing’s ruled out, Taylor (assuming it is you and not 18th century author Jonathan Swift) – we’re not making a stand against 27 years of Rare heritage. We’ve devoted time to Kinect Sports as it’s been our greatest success in years, and several million people are playing the heck out of those games just as you did with Banjo and Conker. Doesn’t mean we’ll never do anything else ever again. There’s love for every franchise both within and beyond Rare, but it’s all about opportunities and when to jump on them. The games marketplace is a vast, gnashing beast and nothing’s ever guaranteed (apart from melodrama).
Apr 2012
Basketball Challenge Pack Reaction Rundown
A couple of weeks into the life of the Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack, here’s a bundle of encouraging comments and feedback that we’ve found strewn from one end of the internet (yes, it does have ends) to the other. Showering our Basketball mascot Dunky Dino with praise and constructive criticism is all that prevents him from going feral.
Kinect Sports: Season Two add-on satiates basketball jones (XboxKinectFans)
Dunk Some Baskets in Kinect Sports: Season 2 (TrueAchievements)
New Kinect Sports: Season 2 invents a new sport called ‘basketball’ (Joystiq)
Basketball DLC added to Kinect Sports Season 2 (Capsule Computers)
‘Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack’ Review (Game Rant)
Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack DLC Review (The Controller Online)
Apr 2012
Challenge Pack #2 Reaction Rundown
It came out in March and added six new activities to Kinect Sports: Season Two free of charge, we rounded up some coverage and social media/comments thread feedback, then definitely didn’t forget to compile and post it. It’s right here. Witness: things that people said about Challenge Pack #2!
Kinect Sports Season 2 Gets Second Challenge Pack DLC (Kinectronic)
Grab the Kinect Sports Season Two Challenge Pack #2 for free (123Kinect)
Kinect Sports: Season Two Challenge Pack 2 Arrives (TrueAchievements)
Kinect Sports Season Two Gets Some Free DLC (The Controller Online)
Free Kinect Sports: Season Two DLC Adds Darts Vs. Zombies, More (Game Informer)
Zombies invade Kinect Sports: Season 2 DLC (GameZone)
Apr 2012
Kinect Sports: Season Two Achievements List
No doubt quite a few of you have made serious headway into these already. But to keep you occupied for a while longer, here’s the complete at-a-glance list of Season Two achievements. Get an idea of the ones you’re missing, decide whether to play to your strengths or break new ground, then limber up and fuel-inject that gamerscore!
Update: Basketball Challenge Pack released, adding 10 new cheevos for 25G each!
BASKETBALL CHALLENGE PACK
Party Animal: Score 75 points when playing Shot Party (25G)
Disc-Throw Fever: Clear two sets of music discs in 25 seconds when playing Shot Party (25G)
Disco Diva: Get a score multiplier x10 when playing Shot Party (25G)
Double Nickel: Score over 55 points when playing 3-Point Hero (25G)
Super Streak: Score 15 consecutive baskets when playing 3-Point Hero (25G)
3-Point Perfection: Score with four bonus balls within one single game of 3-Point Hero (25G)
Funky Dunkin’: Score 50 points when playing Alley-Oop Dreams (25G)
Dunky King: Pass to the green Dino 5 times in one game of Alley-Oop Dreams (25G)
Pass Master: Complete 15 passes in a row when playing Alley-Oop Dreams (25G)
Super Hooper: Score 200 baskets when playing the new Basketball Challenge Pack (25G)
MIDNIGHT MOUNTAIN SKI PACK
Blast Course: Blast-off time – Beat 01:50:00 on Midnight Mountain’s Backwoods Blast course (Champion difficulty) (25G)
Midnight Express: Out of the darkness – Beat 01:55:00 on Midnight Mountain’s Pitch Black course (Champion difficulty) (25G)
Opened All Hours: Clock is ticking – Beat 02:15:00 on Midnight Mountain’s After Hours course (Champion difficulty) (25G)
Gate Expectations: This is a classic – Pass a total of 500 gates on Midnight Mountain (cumulative) (25G)
Mountain Pressure: Pressure is on – You need a perfect run on each course of Midnight Mountain (25G)
Apr 2012
March Social Motivation
March, you crazy eccentric fool. What did you have in store for us this year? Never mind the BAFTA and Challenge Pack #2 and Basketball, we covered those in the News rundown. Although we didn’t specifically call out things like designer Shaun flaunting himself in front of the cameras at the Xbox Showcase where Basketball was unveiled, or the Season Two team photoshoot in the Rare grounds when the BAFTA trophies came home. So there’s that.
Other news and events falling into March’s psionic mesh of social media included word of our music team having a hand in the soundtrack to Fable Heroes, Stuff Magazine finding room for Rare in their Best of British issue, an alleged cameo for Kinect Sports in Home and Away, our very own Twycross Sport Relief mile, and licensing issues causing old gold GoldenEye to miss its moment at the Smithsonian. Bah. And two more words for luck: Cat Daddy.
A trio of slots in IGN’s Top 100 Video Game Weapons marked one of our bigger offsite old-school showings in March. Cubed3 also shared the love in its celebratory N64 Month: top soundtracks and best games in general got a shout out. GameTrailers went back further still to celebrate the ambient monkey sounds of DKC in their BackTrack video feature. Meanwhile, after last month’s provocation, Rareware Archives went mental for lists and ended up covering Sinners, Remixes, Schwarzenegger, Reveals and even a three-in-one-day list splurge.
Elsewhere amidst the miscellaneous chatter we dissed the bad habits of wildlife from wasps to rooks, made off with junkfood from strange alien realms (or at least Iceland), kept an eye on NeoGAF’s search for spiritual stablemates to Nuts & Bolts, and even noted down a few more of the standout reactions to Kinect Sports: Season Two on Amazon.
And then the cleaners started hoovering the corridors and we realised we were pretty much done for the month. If you’d care to join us before the next summary, April’s action is underway on Twitter and Facebook (under Rare or Kinect Sports). See you there. Check out how clean our carpets are.
Apr 2012
Behind the BAFTA Scenes
We’ve had the official News story on this month’s Kinect Sports: Season Two BAFTA win, but we thought it was worth complementing with a report direct from the scene. So we pinned down Simon, one of Rare’s delegates for the evening, and persuaded him to hand over a folder full of pictures and a rundown of the event from the rough vicinity of the red carpet and champagne seats….
Simon: The night started with the ten of us meeting outside our hotel, donning pretty much the same black tie attire, ready to set off to the Hilton on Park Lane. We were handed our golden tickets for the event before jumping into black cabs for the short ride.
Once we arrived, we made our way into the front entrance and then found out there was a red carpet around the back! As we realised this may be a once in a lifetime chance, we walked back outside, around the hotel and down the red carpet. No-one asked for our autographs for some reason, but it was worth it all the same…
We made our way upstairs for the champagne reception. The room was packed with invitees all dressed to the max, and we enjoyed catching up with some ex-Rareites whilst sipping the enormous amounts of champagne on offer. The room was quite large but you could hardly move, and after a couple of glasses of champagne it really started to heat up.
Mar 2012
Kinect Sports: Season Two March Records
Right then! It’s about time we rifled through the Kinect Sports: Season Two server data, identified some hard-hitting scores and times, verified their achievability against some of our testers’ best efforts and threw the resulting numbers out there for potential challengers to… challenge.
We see people on social media all the time claiming to be BEASTING at Season Two. Are you one of them? Think you could topple these scores? Fire up the game and go for it.
Note that as a general rule these performances have been logged in online games, as most offline results can’t be tracked by the servers. In some cases, if they looked impossible or we were short of data, our testers’ finest moments were substituted instead. If you’ve got proof (photographic, uploaded to Facebook or otherwise) that you’ve trumped one of these scores or times, send it to us and we’ll see if it climbs to the top of the heap! Challenge Pack #2 activities to be roped into the fun next time.
Mar 2012
