With Metroid: Other M just having come out for the Wii, now seems like the best time for Nerdy Show to devote a whole episode to one of the greatest game series’ of all-time, Metroid, and it’s bounty hunting protagonist – Samus Aran! But something’s gone awry for the strong, silent, space pirate-slayer… the same thing that plagues every woman as they near the big 3-0… she’s gone baby crazy… METROID BABY CRAZY! Our review of Other M elaborates, as do the Nerdy Show gents. You know their strange little minds tend to wander.
Not only does this episode weigh the pros and cons of this new game-changing installment to the legendary series, but it explores Metroid’s past. The gang share stories of their first time on the planet Zebes and delve into the series chronology and its real-world origins – the games’ influences and the men who created it. The episode also features a playlist of stupendous Metroid-influenced music and an interview with Metroid Metal- the band that screw attacks nerd music like no other. All that plus some suped-up sci-tech that’ll hit ya – pow! Right in the baby-maker!
Though this is the last episode of Season 3, we won’t be gone - no, no, no, no. Listen to this episode for some hints to what we have in store and some cool things we’re going to be bringing to you in the interim. Nerdy Show.com will still be quite “bumpin”, as the kids say, so be sure to check back with us often to see what we’ve cooked up, and keep an eye out for announcements for what awesome may come!
My fellow Nerds, a crisis is upon us. As some of you may have heard, a recent high court ruling in the UK has greatly jeopardized the future of the Chiptunes movement. The hardware integral to creating music from current and retro gaming systems is now illegal. This aggression will not stand, man – and we won’t sit by idly while our bothers and sister across the pond cannot pick up their Gameboys and bleep bloop in public. …Did that come out wrong? NEVERMIND.
In response to this ruling, Nerdy Show has created Fight the Power, an organization and movement dedicated to fighting for the rights of nerd musicians and the right to make nerd music of all kinds. Read the Fight the Power Manifesto, join the Facebook Page and find out what you can do to join in the fight.
In this episode we elaborate on the plight in the UK and talk with British chiptune musician, Pixelh8 about his feelings on the ruling, what he’s doing to turn the tide, his upcoming projects, and how BBC America butchers British television. We’re also joined by chiptune beatsmith: DJ RoboRob, calling all the way from Iraq, and yo-yo master and chiptunes rapper: Doctor Popular. All that plus a surplus of cool video game news, Mike gets weirdly (and disturbingly) political, and crackpot Russian conspiracy theories – oh boy!
As though we needed to further emphasize their relevance Chiptunes just recently got its own showcase at PAX Prime!! We also want to give a shout-out to a handful of WPRK DJs who are taking up the Fight the Power cause and dedicating their radio shows to Chiptunes awareness: Flying High in the Mushroom Kingdom, Marc with a C‘s radio show, the Real Congregation and the Freaking Geek Show are doing a combo show for five hours of pixelated political partying! You can catch Flying High in the Mushroom Kingdom in the taint of this Friday night/Saturday morning at 1 AM – 3 AM, and the Freaking Geek and Real Congregation mashup next Monday night/Tuesday morning from 1 AM – 6 AM. These are, of course, Eastern time, so plan accordingly!
This won’t be the last you see of Fight the Power! We have big plans including not just for fighting hate on the chip community, but also fighting big corp wherever they stick their head in the nerd’s world.
…Star Wars Celebration V came to the Orlando Convention Center! How convenient! Cap and Hex bravely ventured into that wretched hive of scum and villainy to get the low-down on this intergalactic hoedown. This year’s Celebration honored the 30th anniversary of The Empire Strikes Back – a momentous occasion, and it also marked the Last Tour to Endor, the closing of the classic Star Tours ride.
Four days of non-stop Star Wars, countless hours of waiting in line, and a fair amount of pent-up aggression have led to a Lucas-sized BLOCKBUSTER of an episode. It’s too big to be a space station and will definitely rip your arms off , but hold your Tauntauns kids, this is STAR WARS – how were we ever gonna contain it in a normal-sized episode? You could be waiting sixteen years before we do a follow-up to this one
In this episode we share the highs and lows of the Celebration and relive myriad panels including secrets of the NEW Star Tours, season 3 of Clone Wars, the EXCLUSIVE videos Warwick Davis showed, inappropriate jokes from Anthony Daniels and Carrie Fisher, TOR and The Force Unleashed 2, Seth Green and the Robot Chickenpanel, and of course, The MAIN EVENT: George Lucas and John Stewart, which Hex stood in line overnight to see! Since we’re such Fettophiles we also hit up BOTH Boba Fetts for interviews – the original Jeremy Bulloch and young Boba Fett, Daniel Logan! Perhaps you remember back in Episode 10: Geek Mythology when we interviewed Jabba the Hutt’s right-hand man, Dave Barclay? Well now we’ve got his left-hand man – Toby Philpott and the man behind his sultry figure and gorgeous eyes, John Coppinger. They share with us what it’s like being so close with the baddest gangster in the Star Wars universe as well as their other illustrious exploits in the world of movie creatures. We also had a chat with Julian Glover who portrayed one of the Empire’s greatest tacticians and leader of the AT-AT attack on Hoth, General Veers as well as the scheming Walter Donovan in Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade and Bond villain Aristotle Kristatos. All that plus frequent rants about the prequels AND a kick ass contest to win EXCLUSIVE Star Wars Celebration goodies (see below)… something in this episode will get you excited about Star Wars, even if your heart has been frozen in carbonite.
Bioware’s Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic games, wowed players with a new precedent in multi-layered decision-based action RPGs. When gamers judge the quality of a game with dynamic story choices these games are still a unit of measure. Bioware went on the set the complexity of their story telling methods even higher with Dragon Age and the Mass Effectgames, the latter of which famed game designer, Cliff Bleszinski called “Star Wars for this new generation”. Excitement is building for Bioware’s return to The Old Republic, but this time you won’t be returning alone – the game is an MMORPG, and everything Bioware has ever done has been leading up to it.
Cap and Mike passed the interview duties off once again to Colin, whose experience with Bioware’s titles runs deep. Join Colin for an in-depth interview with Bioware lead writer, Daniel Erickson, and find out why this game will revolutionize MMORPGs, interactive storytelling, how it fits into the Star Wars cannon, and how they’ll finally bring the depth of tabletop role playing to video games. (Cap’s note: Not only is this guy super-cool, but he sounds kinda like Henchman #24 from Venture Bros).
Part 1:
Part 2:
And don’t forget to also check out our E3 coverage of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2:
Brian Lee O’Malley‘s series of Scott Pilgrim graphic novels are awesome. They take video game culture and smoosh it inside comic books! In Scott’s world, the nonsense logic of video games are part of reality – you beat up hipsters and generic dudes and they turn into coins – THAT ROCKS! Now that Scott Pilgrim is a movie written and directed by Edgar “Shaun of the Dead” Wright all that geeky goodness is exploding IRL in a nerdgasm the likes of which has never hit the big screen before. In this episode the gang is joined by nerd comedy musician, Insane Ian, to talk about the coolness of Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, the differences between the books and the film, and the super-stars behind the soundtrack and score.
PLUS we dialed up Pete of Anamanaguchi, the chiptunes rock band that are providing the score for Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World: The Game. Together we fight mediocre cellphone reception, dodge the cops, and find out how they scored this sweet gig. We also talk to Reid, Ryan, and Charlie from Starmen.net and Fangamer, about the currently running Mother 3 Fanfest, their upcoming release of chiptunes documentary, Reformat the Planet on DVD as well as chiptunes-inspired merch, and the origins of their prolific fan communities. There’s lots of old school video game conversation including some truth-bombs about River City Ransom, one of the games that most influenced Scott Pilgrim‘s world. So strap on your power glove… and then take it off ’cause it’s useless- But play some cool games and listen to this episode. It goes a little something like this:
Triforce Mike’s Formspring is pretty amazing – you can ask him ANYTHING there and he answers – sometimes with Internet gibberish, sometimes with profound mico-essays packed with intense geekitude. Well, the rest of us are tired of him having all the fun, so we decided to do one better! We invited our fans to call in and ask us anything or geek out with us about whatever comes to mind. The call was answered! You reached out to us, Fandom, just like a glowy E.T. finger and touched us in a way that makes a boy a man and Stephen Spielberg very rich.
Along for the whole ride we have not just the fabled Nerdy Show four, but some of our comrades in arms: Nerdy Strip writer/artist, Tony Baldini, video game correspondent, Gina Lockwood, and sci-tech correspondent Jon West - for the whole show, not just a segment. Together we conquered many a harrowing phone call!
In this episode we discuss Nerdy Show’s secret, and not-so-secret origins – how the team formed and how Brain joined up. Fans ask hard-hitting questions, like just how much of Red Hulk is in continuity? what kind of characters are we going to play in DC Universe Online? And when the hell is Brain returning to Dungeons & Doritos? That plus MORE including a way-cool call-in from super-duper remixer, Klopfenpop, our first impressions of Starcraft 2, Cap’s review of Alan Wake: The Signal, and a call from Dean Wallace’s… son!?
You know how we’ve been inviting you to Ask Triforce Mike Anything on Formspring? Now’s your chance to ASK NERDYSHOW ANYTHING – LIVE!
This Monday, August 2nd between 7pm and 9pm EST
We’re holding a call-in show. Dial us up in to ask the gang anything you want or strike up a conversation about your favorite nerdy topic! Is there something you wish we’d talk about that we never have? Ask us about it!
(321) 332-7906 in the U.S. or via Skype at nerdy.show
Triforce Mike, Cap, Hex, Brian will be there as well as other Nerdy Show peoples:
+ …More?! Maybe! You never know who you might be sharing the line with!
Check back here for the full roster of who’s gonna be in the studio. What’s gonna make this episode awesome is you, you, you! So reach out and geek out with us. It’s gonna be crazy!
This summer has been fat-packed with events and they keep coming. Riding on the heels of Nerdapalooza is the mother of ‘em all – San Diego Comic-Con. In recent years the convention has become so much more than comic books – it’s the nerd media event with EVERYTHING: movies, teevee, video games, comics, action figures – the whole savory enchilada of pop culture smothered in a verde sauce of geeky juices. It’s a lot to handle!
Nerdy Show has tasted the many flavors of Comic-Con’s meaty soup and picked out the most delicious nuggets of news including the Marvel films, the Green Lantern movie, and other outstanding comic film showings like The Goon! Joining us to talk about his first hand V.I.P. experience in San Diego is A Comic Show and Bleeding Cool‘s Aaron Haaland. Plus: stabbings, protests, and cosplay bank robberies, hurray!
We also talk about the forthcoming release of PC Gaming blockbuster – Starcraft 2 and Cap give his review of the epic new X-Box Arcade game Limbo and more more more!
The first Force Unleashed took gamers and Star Wars fans alike by surprise. Vader’s secret apprentice, Starkiller, massive twists and turns in the plot, and the destructive capabilities of the Force like never seen before… This game was off the charts! But Starkiller died in the end, so how’s there a sequel? Clones, baby! And you thought Starkiller’s wielding of the Force was brutal before – you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!
Mike and Cap have become totally jaded by Star Wars so they passed the mic off to stalwart videographer Colin Peterson to aptly wield his expanded universe knowledge… but will he use his powers for good… or evil?
Oh yeah, AND we’ve got a video for BioWare and LucasArts’ Star Wars MMO The Old Republic so check that out below:
When was the last time you played a game like Gauntlet Legends, Zombies Ate My Neighbors, or Smash TV? No, not on an emulator, a NEW game. …Uh-huh, that what I thought. Well get ready kids, ’cause co-op arcade monster slayin’ is back!
High Voltage Software, the guys who brought you Conduit and Hunter: The Reckoning are cooking up something amazing. The game’s called The Grinder, no, it’s not a delicious Italian-style sandwich, it’s a mining machine that’s burrowed straight to hell and it let something nasty out. Now you, as one of four comic book-style bounty hunter miscreants must save the day for cash and glory and leave a pile of otherworldly corpses in your wake. Check out our hands-on demo of the game and see why it’s one of the forthcoming titles we’re most excited about:
The Nerdy Show SEASON 3 FINALE!
My fellow Nerds, a crisis is upon us. As some of you may have heard, a recent 
A short while ago… Somewhat nearby…
