Ryo here, this will be the first post of a very sporadic series of updates about a personal project I intend to undertake. The idea behind it is I have always wanted to own an arcade cabinet since I was a kid playing Joust and Galaga. That dream is still alive, just much more toned down because those machines are expensive.

Now instead of buying one of the licensed machines, I am going to build a cabinet myself and stick a computer in it running M.A.M.E. That will let me have the look and feel of a real machine at a fraction of the cost. Another added benefit being that multiple games can be loaded up on the computer for hours of time consuming enjoyment.

The reason the updates to this project are going to be sporadic boils down to the fact I am broke quite a bit of the time. I’ll take pictures of my progress as I go along and post them here along with any building tips I happen to discover.

The first phase of the project is actually just building an arcade stick for use on my computer so I can get some practice with cutting the wood and mounting all the pieces. Wish me luck, readers, and if any of you have any tips I will definitely take them into consideration.

Last day of PAX. Our plan was to wake up early and catch the Halo 4 presentation at Halo Fest (which started at 10am). Plans fail. Especially that one. We got up… buuuut we hated the idea of walking there that early in the morning. Fortunately for us, they were streaming it live on IGN. I wish I could say it would have been better live, but I can’t. We were completely unimpressed with what they had to show, honestly. It almost felt like an apology, like they were justifying Halo 4. As if they were saying “We know we’re not Bungie, but hear us out. Here is why we made these design decisions.” All that would have been alright if it had been mixed in with with stuff we were eager to see. All they gave us was some moving concept art towards the end. That being said we were really glad we didn’t walk 45 minutes just for that.

When we finally made it to PAX we began our mission: Collect as much SWAG as we can in one day. Considering we came home with a Legendary Halo backpack full to the brim, I think we did pretty well. Though unlike our last PAX experience where we could stop by a booth and grab some swag, this time we had to jump through hoops. Wait on line, play this, sign up here, tweet this, facebook that, complete this list of objectives. They really made us work for it. I had to DANCE for some of this stuff…. Don’t ask. And, I understand that getting a t-shirt should be harder than grabbing one on the way by… but standing in line for 3 hours to play for 5 min to get a shirt kind of sucked.

Sick had set her sights on one piece of swag in particular: The coveted Skyrim Hat. On both Day 1 and Day 2 the wait was 3+ hours long. I dreaded the thought. Especially since she wanted more than one. I got in line while she wandered. I waited in this god-forsaken line for an hour and a half. When I got to the front of the line, ready to play, I asked if I could have a hat for my wife too. “Where is your wife?” the guy asked. I said, “She couldn’t handle waiting in this line anymore and sat somewhere else.” He told me to ask the girl handing them out. So she gave me a second one and I stuffed it in my shirt so nobody would question it. Now, THANK GOD they didn’t know what Sick looked like, cuz SECONDS later she walks over and waves at me with one of those damn hats ON HER HEAD! WTF?!

Apparently she had struck a deal with the chic giving out the Skyrim hats. She traded the Dance Central 2 bandana we had collected earlier for it. Remember me having to Dance? yeah, she traded THAT. And then she asks me if I could go get another bandana. WHAT?!

The best part was my 15 minutes of gametime with Skyrim after the hour and a half wait. I created my character in two minutes, ran straight through a village then 10 minutes past it, killed two wolves, passed a rock cliff, and then shit myself. On the other side of the rock wall was a Giant…Giant. There was no other descriptive word I could give it. It was a fucking GIANT. It scared me, I lit it on Fire, then it squashed me. INSTANTLY. Ahh! *Burn* Squish. Done. GAME OVER GUYS!

THIS is what squished me…

Well that was fun.

I should probably back track a little… While standing in line to play Dance Central 2, Sick asked “Hey! Isn’t that the girl that makes all the Dance Central youtube videos?” Sure enough, Mighty Me Creative was helpin’ out at the Dance Central booth. She was surprised we recognized her. We took a picture with her shortly before I got on stage.

Us with Mighty Me

Unfortunately we didn’t get a chance to play all the games, but here’s a short list of all the games we’re pretty excited about:

• Rocksmith- I didn’t get a chance to play this, it was just a presentation. It’s basically a game that will teach you how to play guitar. Being able to connect a real guitar to it is down right AWESOME!
• Orc’s Must Die- MUST buy this game. I saw this game the first day when I was on “Recon”, but I did not actually play until the third day. I played for 3 minutes… Hooked! It’s a Third-person Shooter/Tower Defense. Good Stuff. Check out SixOkay’s Interactive Trailer
• Dance Central 2- Now THIS is the #1 Game we’re waiting for, Hands Down. We dance up a storm with the Dance Central, and #2 has a MUCH better Track List. Oh, yeah…. and my dancing…. See below…
• Gears of War 3- OK, this post is a little late… aaaand I’m already tearing this up. You should be, too.
• FireFall- Now THIS game makes me want a gaming desktop. I don’t have one. I is sad panda…

I saw a great number of games that looked absolutely amazing, just to realize they were for PC only. But there were a greater number of awesome console games shown as well. It’s going to be a hard run for Game of the Year this year, indeed.

What PAX 2011 games are you most excited about?

Be sure to join us tomorrow for your chance to win the PAX swag we grabbed.

Note: Sick and I made a cameo appearance in Whisper Studio’s PAX Prime Video. Be sure to check it out.

I realize this post is coming in kind of late, but please keep in mind it’s meant to be a recounting of our experience and not necessarily reporting or coverage of PAX itself.

So many of you may know that we had a close call with us making it to PAX this year. First thing we want to do is thank everyone who helped us make it this year! But a special Thanks goes to Kete from The Running Riot and Safia from LipStick MixTapes for being our top contributors!

Even More thanks (More thanks than we can express!) goes to Christi and John for their hospitality! They showed us there’s much more to Seattle than coffee, PAX and Pho.

Yes, I said Pho… before PAX started we met up with Scott Bradford and Rukari Austin just cuz we could…. and to have some Pho. Many laughs and funs were had by all. This event would mark the first time Sick and I have ever had Pho. It would also be one of those times I learned NOT to eat a raw Jalapeno from a Vietnamese restaurant… to THEN add that “special” red sauce to my Pho. I enjoyed that meal twice…

So. The first day of our PAX experience was dampened by Sick having to finish up some crunch work for a client, but that didn’t stop me from wandering… I scoured the event to do a little recon so that when Sick and I did come back together, I knew where to go for certain things. That recon mission was short lived, though. I went up stairs, gave it a single pass, then went to find out where “HaloFest” was going down.

I realized that I’d rather find people than booths. PAX, for me, is more about the community than the games. Don’t get me wrong, the games ruled… But you guys rule more.

Sick and Christi caught up with Venom and myself at the Dragonfish, epic food was had. This was late afternoon so the PAX festivities were shutting down for the day. We made a last trip to the Convention Center lobby to collect a few more people. This is when We ran into NSSteph and Trixie360. After chatting with them and getting a LARGE GEM from Steph, We hit up HaloFest until they shut it down for the VIP shindig that evening.

This is where the REAL shit happened. 343i and Microsoft set up a party commemorating Halo’s 10th Birthday with Drinks, Memorabilia, stations to play the incoming new maps and title update for Reach, a MASSIVE cake, and a Commissary to pick up Halo essentials. The HaloFest VIP party was kicked off with a small introduction and Stepto telling everyone there what he thought of Halo before it had come to Fruition. After the intro they let everyone disperse to mingle and play.

It was here at the VIP party that we had a chance to meet MANY people including Marty O’Donnell, Steve Downes, and with a personal request from Pete Stacker to be in a picture with him. We got a chance to speak with each of them, but it was especially exciting to get the opportunity to tell Marty in person that we had a 4-String Quartet playing HIS music at our wedding! We couldn’t believe nobody told him that… and Neither did he! But the excitement we all felt at that moment when Sick told him… was awesome! It could have been a MasterCard commercial…

Incredible Halo Themed Wedding : $**,***
Four-String Quartet playing The Halo 3 OST: $*,***
Telling Marty O’Donnell this in person : Pricless!
For Everything else…

Us With Christi and Marty

Us With Steve Downes

Us With Pete Stacker

The highlight of the first day was meeting all the folks in the community we haven’t had the pleasure of meeting before.
And again, this, I think, is the greatest part about PAX…
Oh yeah, and the Pictures!

More on PAX ’11 tomorrow!

At the Open Mobile Summit in London, Peter Vesterbacka, Rovio’s head of marketing and business development recently announced that the masterminds behind Angry Birds will be releasing a Cookbook. Yes, that’s twice I said, “Cookbook.”

This particular cookbook will be heavily focused on egg dishes. Many, many ways to prepare… eggs. That means we are going to have THIS problem…

And weren’t we trying to prevent this exact thing from happening?!

Personally, I have had enough eggs. Maybe, if they were cooked differently from time to time, I could enjoy them a bit more. But, You know what I want to cook?
B-A-C-O-N! I want to see those damn pigs suffer for what they’ve put me through. I can’t tell you the amount of time wasted trying to smash each and every one of them. Also, Bacon is absolutely freaking delicious… and then there’s this.

So, if you are a fan of Angry Birds, and a fan of eggs… be on the lookout for the Cookbook that’s going to be self published by Rovio for your egg cooking needs.
And, for all we know, the bacon focused book may be on it’s way after the egg one hits the market. Let’s all hope so…… I love Bacon.

Source: Mashable.com

Portal 2 was released on April 21, 2011. I have beaten the crap out of it, and want to do it OVER and OVER again. Others have taken to different means of satisfying their craving for it…

“PORTAL” by Kurnel Porkchop on 4.29.2011

“It’s been a long time…” by eliteblade46 on 5.02.2011

“We’re in SPACE!” by Snipe Remiix on 5.06.2011

Want to be included in our next Screenshot Sunday?
Send an email to Screenshots@AMatchMadeInHalo.com with a link to your image or fileshare on Bungie.net

How could I have missed this? It must have quietly snuck by as I struggled to avoid the internet on April 1st. Watch carefully though, I’d hate for you to miss all the awesomely renamed dance moves. Let’s dance!

1, 2, 3, 4…Reach Around, Melee The Grunt, Betcha Can’t Stick it, now Plasma Dodge, Tea Bag ‘Em…… Oh you get the point.

Cruising through the net today in between matches of Firefight on Reach, it was brought to my attention that Halo Waypoint did a piece over Halo couples. Well as you can imagine, John and Des were listed amongst them. The article tells their story of how they met by pure chance.

We’ll be placing a link to the article in our Press section, but until then you can just click the link down below to read through it. I extend my thanks to the Waypoint crew for reminding us that gamers have a place on Valentine’s Day as much as any other couple.

[source: Halo Waypoint Blog]

Hello readers, I happened to sit down and flip through my usual RSS feeds of gaming related news to find an interesting article posted over at IGN. It touches on a phenomena that was tremendously common just a handful of years ago. The rush for bleeding edge graphics in games.

While I wont spoil the entire article for you, because it really is an interesting read, I will lay down a few things. Game console makers Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo (AKA The Big Three) have pulled away from their past company practices of churning out bleeding edge hardware onto the market in favor of extending the current generation of consoles. An interesting idea, and dare I say a bit kinder to the pocket book.

The whole article explains that no longer is it necessary for a company to push out a game that has the absolute best graphics anymore to be successful. The market has changed, and makes way for innovation rather than flashy presentations. This is a good step for video games, my friends, and I do hope it continues to bring us little gems to enjoy.

Check the link for the article and share your thoughts.

[source: IGN]

This past Thursday, Full Sail University’s Game Development program Graduate, Josh Hamrick the Sandbox Designer form Bungie studios, gave his Alma Mater and its current students a presentation about his life leading up to and becoming a Game Dev in the industry. His presentation was thought provoking, inspiring, humorous, and most of all… driven. To give you a taste of his humor, below is the titled theme image from his presentation…

Memoirs, yes. Josh Hamrick gave us a riveting tale of his life as a gamer. He went through each generation of console/platform as he acquired them, telling us his favorite games that he had for them, and his thoughts on each one. The timeline had a few holes in it, but I can’t blame him…so did mine. I would have to say, though, he does have good taste in games.

Josh tells us when he first decided to go into gaming, while admiring his current indulgence he realizes, “Someone makes these!” He set out on his path from there. He goes through his trials and tribulations from his personal life and professional, giving advice to the future industry professionals sitting in front of him. He also shared with us his ideas and projects he’s worked on in his career; including a game he helped create for his team’s final project- Samurai Colossus, BlackSite Area 51 and of course, his latest baby- Halo: Reach.

As mentioned above, Josh Hamrick is a “Sandbox” Designer for Bungie. That means that he deals with everything you or anything else you interact with in the game. From the way each weapon feels and acts (shotgun has been greatly improved IMO), to what each vehicle and artifact does when you mess with it. He’s also personally responsible for the Grenade Launcher and how it ingeniously works. Yes, thank you JH. See below….

Hamrick makes public speaking look easy; from the random jokes to ease his own nerves, to pointing out philosophy behind work ethics and the companies behind gaming. He even gave great advice all around. I’m sorry I don’t have any pieces to show you. I believe Full Sail may have recorded it, but I am not privy to that media.

Just like he did with the weapons in his games, he makes everything enjoyable and feel goooooood. I have been to many presentations on Full Sail’s Campus, but Hamrick’s was by far the most enjoyable and inspiring. Thank you, Josh.

Week #6 After the funk… it’s a good thing we waited. Mobile games, of course, then we take a look at “Apt. 117″ and mention that Josh Hamrick, from Bungie, will be re-visiting Full Sail soon. (That’s on our doorstep!) We also have more sad electronic news…

Update: Due to the excitement of setting up a Halo: Reach LAN party for Josh Hamrick’s visit, This podcast did not get fully edited until after his Presentation. I will have a rundown of the LAN Party and his presentation following this post.

In this Podcast:

• Desirai Labrada, GT= SickNdehed
• John Henry, GT= PsychoVandal
• Jeffrey Pia, GT= Xx InStyle xX
• Cheyne Sutherland, GT= o XEROPAIN o

Community Announcements:

• Fight Like A Girl (FLAG)
• Extra Life

Mobile Games:

• Coin Frenzy
• Flick Fishing
• Star Dunk

Other Mentions:

• 1Up’s recording of “Apt. 117″ trailer off of Waypoint
• Josh Hamrick’s presentation at FullSail

AMMIH Podcast #6