Should game developers and designers have their names on the boxes of the games they make?

We posed this question recently to EA CEO John Riccitiello, who explained why Steven Spielberg’s name should be on a game box and why Will Wright’s shouldn’t.

We’ve read discussions from gamers arguing for and against the idea. Those against say there’s too many people to name, that manuals and the end credits are enough and that’s it not fair to single certain people out. Those for having names on boxes, including one David Jaffe, say that games should give credit like movies do because the creative and technical folks behind the project really make the game, and the name recognition allows game makers to have the credibility and leverage while making their way through this booming industry.

You can expand the “Boom Blox” images above to test our first example.

Now let’s see what what the boxes of “Super Mario Galaxy,” “God of War,” “Halo 3″ and “Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution” would look like if their creators were given credit… Read more…

Since the last entry I…

*Brought the hot hail of Internet rage down upon my head by not just playing 10 hours of “Grand Theft Auto IV” by daring to admit that, periodically throughout the weekend, I felt the urge to stop playing the excellent game in order to satisfy a craving for “Super Mario Galaxy.”

I know how to bring more abuse upon me!

Make another comparison to another Nintendo game. Here goes: 10 hours in, “GTA IV” is reminding me of “The Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess.” How so? The first major chunks of both games are all about showing better way of presenting familiar franchise tropes, but not about adding many new things. The “Zelda” game doles out the best boomerang, iron boots and horse in the series yet. “GTA IV” presents the best wanted system, mission structure, and handling of taxi and police missions yet. As a result, both “GTA IV” and “Twilight Princess” are instantly the best games in the series to recommend to newcomers. But they both require veteran players of the franchise to re-experience a lot of familiar stuff before getting to content that feels radically new.

Speaking of new stuff, I have high hopes for how Rockstar has re-invented the cop cars and vigilante missions. It’s something I plan to dig more into the next time I play the game.

*Finished “Super Mario Galaxy.” Or at least got as far as I’m going to go. My favorite power-up was the last one in the game. My favorite boss battle was the one at the finale. My favorite galaxy, though, was Buoy Base, which appeared halfway into the game. Final star count for me: 106.

*Just started “The World Ends With You” and already noticing some neat parallels to another game set based in a real city and making heavy use of a cell phone as a design element– you know, “GTA IV.”

*Played a little bit more of “Crisis Core,” but that was Friday and I don’t remember much of what I did.

Next: More “GTA IV” of course. I want to go to Algonquin!

Since the last entry…

*Four and a half hours in, “Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII” has been making me grouchy again because of:

The writing

And I paraphrase:
Zack [angrily to Genesis]: That’s no way to use a summons! What happened to dreams and ideals?
Genesis [calmly to Zack]: We are monsters.
Genesis: Monsters don’t dream.

The main character’s peculiar values

And I summarize (this is a really small SPOILER):
On Thursday morning, while I was playing on the subway, I had the main character Zack wandering through his home base, the Shinra HQ. Zack finds a low-level fellow soldier who is afraid he will be fired if he messes up one more time. The guy is terrified. Zack steps in to offer some advice — and volunteers to do the soldier’s next mission for him. What’s up with that? The solution to one’s problems is getting someone else to fix them?

The developers’ low estimation of the player’s intelligence

And I summarize (another very small SPOILER coming):
After a mission in Genesis’ home town, the game transmits two e-mails to Zack’s cell phone from the game-world’s news service. Both e-mails praise senior soldier Sephiroth for actions in the Genesis mission, even though it was my character, Zack, who did the hard work. Seconds later, I find some non-player characters who have mention that Sephiroth is getting the glory. And seconds after that, the developers still feel the need to cue up a scene involving Zack and some other soldiers in which they discuss how Zack Is Not Getting Credit For His Heroism. Hey, I think I just got steamrolled by all that subtlety. How about a single coherent explanation of the DMW instead?

Bottom Line For Now: The story missions in this game are bumming me out. The side-missions are an entertaining quick-fix grind. Yes, an entertaining grind. I just wish the storytelling in the main game held up better. Who is impressed with this kind of writing, plot and character development?

Next: A weekend in which “Super Mario Galaxy” may be completed. As long as it doesn’t get super-hard at the end.

Since the last entry, I….

*Raced a few races in “Mario Kart Wii.” And. I. Enjoyed. It. This was a shocker. I thought I was immune to “Mario Kart”’s charms. I never had the SNES version. I played the 64 edition a lot (but almost only in single-player). I dabbled with the GCN and DS games and thought my life’s quota of “Kart” was complete before this Wii one came out.

But I discovered last night that the surprisingly smooth online service for “Mario Kart Wii” might make me a fan yet. Matchmaking with non-Friend competitors in Australia, Japan, and Germany (all for the same race) happened in the blink of an eye. A pre-race globe showing each competitor’s Mii standing atop their region offered a welcome sense of identity to otherwise anonymous and voiceless opponents. The races themselves went off with nary a hitch. I even came in third once, despite having no “Kart” skills. (I’m already down to 4760 skill points, after starting at 5000).

The “Kart” users seem evenly split about the Wii Wheel. I raced six or seven races last night, and about half of the competitors in any race were using the packed-in wheel shell. I didn’t notice any advantage among Wheel users or non-users yet, but I’ll keep watching.

Another positive: the ghost system works great, briskly downloading ghost after ghost to my Wii for me to compete against, all generated by Europeans who have had the game already.

I also really like the idea of Wii games that download channels to the system. You wind up with a stripped-down version of the game, basically a stat-checking app that feels similar to things like a Bungie.net or a Facebook application. It’s a great way to keep a gamer thinking about a game even when they have another disc in the drive.

*Claimed a few more stars in “Super Mario Galaxy.” I’m now at 87. I have to say, King Kaliente is a pushover. And, what do you know, the game still is able to surprise me, even though I thought everything had been spoiled. Red stars. Who knew?

*Played a little more “Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII” and am still wondering if anyone out there knows what determines the level of Limit Break attacks. Why do I do Octoslash Level 1 sometimes and Octoslash Level 4 other times?

Next: They wouldn’t send me “GTA IV” to play on a Thursday night, would they? Probably not. I think Thursday night is a “Galaxy” night.

Since my last entry I…

*Played “Metal Gear Online” not very well and got excoriated for it on this here Multiplayer blog. For revenge, I used my magic powers to get the beta delayed.

*Reached the 80-Star count in “Super Mario Galaxy.” Are there any good, new power-ups in this otherwise wonderful game? Because most of the ones I’ve found so far, including the bouncy one (I’m trying not to spoil!) aren’t very fun. Well, I do like ice-walking. But that’s a side-effect of just one.

*Played through all three missions of “Ghost Squad,” the light-gun arcade-shooter ported to the Wii. It’s ridiculous and ridiculously short.  Unlocked a ninja mode, which let me hurl throwing stars at ninjas on Air Force One. Fun while it lasted.

*Gave up on the campaign mode of “Universe At War,” as I got myself in a bit of a jam halfway through the Hierarchy set of missions. Decided the world conquest mode would be fun, since it lets you play skirmishes on sectors of the globe and then claim that land like it’s a game of “Risk.”I got crushed in under five minutes in a match for part of South America. In my second,a battle over the American mid-west, my every-shaky Internet failed. So even though I think I’d like playing this game online, my set-up makes that impossible.

*Played one and only one mission of “Army of Two” with Joystiq’s Chris Grant. The game looks nice, but the enemy AI is for the birds, as is the melee, the flow of the action and the existence on my screen of Chris’ health bar but not mine. This game feels like a very rough draft. Maybe they’ll get it right if there’s a second one.

*Had a torturous time playing “N+” with Chris. Pro-tip: never play a game’s multiplayer before you’ve played its single-player. I was dragging the man down.

*Grinded a few missions in “Crisis Core.”

*Played a few demos on my PSP, but can I hold off confessing about that for one more day?

Next: I will play more “Crisis Core,” more “Mario” and hope “The World Ends With You” arrives soon. 

Over the weekend I …• Played the first four levels of “Kane & Lynch“…and liked it??? Gotta re-read that Gerstmann review.

• Tackled 11 more puzzles in “Professor Layton,” approaching the conclusion.

• Collected 20 or so more stars in “Super Mario Galaxy” and reached the first part of the game that I disliked: Freezeflame Galaxy. Also discovered a great new enemy-based power-up, the Boo Bomb. Proof that Nintendo’s Tokyo development team plays “God of War“? Maybe. Mario can spin explosive ghosts by their tongues, mace-like, until the boo bombs hit something and explode. It’s Kratos-esque and a lot of fun.

• Played one level of “Turning Point: Fall of Liberty” and was intrigued by the concept of defending New York City from Nazis. But even my game-filled life is too short to play what feels like an average entry in a genre so rich with sterling greats. One level is all I can give this game.

• Became transfixed by “Universe At War,” the first real-time strategy game with readable text that I’ve played on a console since I completed one of my all-time favorites, 2004’s “Pikmin 2.” I’m four missions into the campaign and am having a fun time controlling the first of the game’s three distinct, warring alien races. But reviews I’ve read about this game claim the campaign is lackluster. Am I settling? I’ll continue to play “Universe At War” until someone can convince me there’s a better RTS for me on the 360. I wonder…

Next: Monday will likely bring more “Universe At War,” or more “Mario.” That is, if my wife and I don’t spend the evening continuing to try to catch up on “In Treatment.”

On Thursday I…

• Got stuck in “Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword,” even though I interviewed the game’s producer in the middle of the day and got a tip from him. When I talked Yosuke Hayashi I was not yet stuck, but he still spontaneously offered me the tip to daze the floating eyeball enemies in the game by blowing into the DS mic. We laughed about how embarrassing this would be for me on the subway. Then, during my ride home, I got stuck. I’m in Chapter 4 and don’t know where to go. So what did I do? I went into each of four or five rooms that I keep wandering through and tried blowing into the mic. Now this was embarrassing, because it was futile. So, since I am stuck, I went back to…

• One puzzle played in “Professor Layton,” right before the end of my ride home. As I predicted earlier in the week, I would be returning to Layton and sticking with it to the end. Only 35 or so puzzles to go, I think.

• Found a famous Nintendo character in “Super Mario Galaxy” while hunting down another yellow star. This character now hangs out in the hub area, offering me tips about stars that I missed. But the tips are so vague as to not be helpful. So I missed a star in the Good Egg Galaxy, but in which part? Am I the only person who gets really stressed by games that indicate when you miss things but don’t then guide you to the right places to search? I know questing is supposed to be fun, but I need a map of some sort.

• Ended my day playing games I can’t talk about in a diary that might be read by the public — though later this afternoon, my lips will be unsealed.

Next: I hope my weekend is filled with “Mario.” It will also feature me trying to see if “Universe At War” is finally an RTS that actually displays okay on my standard definition set. I’m holding out hope, even though all others have failed this generation…

On Tuesday I…

• Turned my back on “Professor Layton.” Didn’t play it all, because I was….

• Swept away by “Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword,” my new subway obsession. I try to play one portable and one console game at a time. So I know I need to return to “Layton” and finish it. But I have a developer interview with a “Ninja Gaiden” developer on Thursday and need to binge. It’s not a bad binge, at that. While I haven’t been able to get into the recent console games in the series, the DS one is hitting me just right. Graphics are detailed, combat is smooth, and, best of all, the controls are fun.

A promise of the DS was that the banality of pressing buttons could be at least partially displaced with the enjoyable flourishes of penmanship. We gamers could go from being telephone operators to orchestra conductors, from launchers of nuclear missiles to swashbuckling swordsmen. But how many DS games accomplished that? “Dragon Sword” makes it fun to fight like a ninja. Slash, slash, slash, like I’m a celebrity signing an autograph. The down-up-up pen-stroke to perform an Izuna Drop physically feels good to perform. A thing of beauty. I logged 50 minutes of the game, completing two chapters.

• Fetched one more star in “Super Mario Galaxy,” the lone yellow star in the Buoy Base Galaxy, to be precise. Best level of the game so far, a wonderful mixture of deap-diving and tower-climbing, literally topped with a floating, swimmable, spherical pool of water.

Next: More “Dragon Sword” for Wednesday, I’m sure. And maybe more “Mario”?

From Friday through Sunday night I…

• Batted through 18 more “Professor Layton” puzzles and suffered a crushing psychological blow. I got stumped on puzzle #67 even after unlocking all three of the puzzle’s hints. I pondered asking anyone else who had played the game for help. I thought that would be a purer way to retain a genuine intelligence-attesting total puzzle score.

But, dear diary, I cheated. I went to GameFAQs and got the answer there. Words can’t express the stress I felt at not being able to solve this one puzzle.

I went through the Nine Stages Of Being Stuck In A Game:

1) Trying a solution, failing
2) Trying a second solution, failing
3) Trying the first solution again, convinced that the game just didn’t register it
4) Blaming the game
5) Blaming the designers
6) Convincing myself I ran into a bug
7) Attempting to will myself into not thinking about the part I was stuck at, assuming that, like lost keys, a solution would only present itself when I wasn’t trying to find it — and failing to accomplish such mental self-trickery
8 ) Going onto GameFAQs
9) Feeling like a chump for having tried Everything But The Solution Mentioned In The GameFAQs Walkthrough

So be it. I am 94 puzzles in, with 94 puzzles solved, one of which I needed to cheat on. “Needed” to cheat? Well, that’s debatable.

Read more…

(UPDATE: More Outlets Added)

Are you also tired about reading other people’s 2007 Game Of The Year lists?

Do you yearn to learn something of greater significance?

Well then I’d like to tell you what the Game Of The Game Of The Year is for 2007. See, in gaming, all accolades are measured as averages. So it is with Metacritic. So it is with the GOTGOTY. It matters not what any single outlet chose as the 2007 Game Of They Year winner was. It matters what, on average, they picked as GOTY.

You will find that out below. And then you will commend us on the wisdom of this new system.

So never mind that everyone isn’t done naming their GOTYs. I am sorry, Game Developers Choice awards, but I can’t wait until late February. I apologize, Interactive Achievement Awards. Early February is too soon as well. My best wishes to the Game Critics Game Of The Year Awards, for which even I participated. EGM, I’m sure you’ll announce your winners someday.

But time’s up and the law of averages is kicking in.

So, which 2007 video game was awarded GOTY status the most times? It was a close call…

Read more…

Yesterday morning one of my co-workers sent me a note about a Digg link to a so-called “Real Life Super Mario Galaxy.” I may have been busy, but this was something I couldn’t resist clicking.

What I saw were dozens of photos, all the work of Paris-based photographer Alexandre Duret-Lutz, who writes on his Flickr page that he’s been taking these kinds of shots since 2006. He calls this photo series “Wee Planets.”

I shot Duret-Lutz an e-mail, asking him if he’d heard of the “Super Mario Galaxy” comparisons, and if that game had served as an inspiration.

He wrote me back last night, saying: “Sorry. I’ve heard the name of that game a couple of times, but so far
I’ve never tried to check it out. I’m not really interested in video games.”

Fair enough, my friend. When you’re doing work this cool, you probably don’t have time to play video games.

But we here at the MTV Multiplayer blog do have time for video games. I asked our crack production team to test something out. Could the “real life” part of the Digg headline really apply? Could these images really serve as a foundation for a “Real Life Super Mario Galaxy”?

The answer came as a picture.

(Click the image for a larger view.)

Now I know Mario still doesn’t look that real. But you get the idea. Something to look forward to on a Wii 2 or a 3wii?

All spherical panorama images on this page are the work of Alexandre Duret-Lutz. See more of his “Wee Planets” series here.

UPDATE: For those interested in comparing scores, I’ve started a new group called on the Desktop Tower Defense” leaderboards called “GOTY” I’ll post any new scores there.

What are the top 10 games of 2007, as determined by one Stephen Totilo? (That’s me).

Over at MTVNews.com, we’re letting my opinion be known.

Yeah, I left “Assassin’s Creed” off. Sadly, I had to leave my beloved “Picross DS” off too.

My 10?

My number one is the free, browser-based “Desktop Tower Defense.” Seriously. Play it for free in your web browser right now.

You tell me why I’m wrong. But the fact is, I’m not.

Also charting are: “Crackdown,” “Halo 3,” “Rock Band” (ka-ching!), “Geometry Wars Galaxies” on the Wii and more.

Full list here.

(And for the record, this list does not reflect the judgment of MTV Games, the MTV Multiplayer blog, TRL or Tila Tequila)