Back in the Saddle again/Why I do it.

Welcome to 2013! As I get back into the swing of everything across the internet, its time once again for Chachi Plays. If you are unfamiliar with it, http://www.chachiplays.com is the place.

Its like Childs Play but focuses on art programs in the Pittsburgh area. It’s my way of giving back to the area in which I live, work and play. I love it here and wanted to give back in a way that is normally overlooked. So once a year I sit down in a public place for 24 hours and invite people the opportunity to come down, share a love of video games and art at the Toonseum while helping out.

Heres a couple pics of me and a few friends playing games:

Here are a few facts about why art programs in education are important:

* Numerous studies affirm that students who receive music education in school improve their SAT and ACT scores in math, foreign language and creative writing.

* Nationally, the nonprofit arts and culture industry generates $166.2 billion in economic activity every year.

* The not-for-profit arts and culture industry generates 5.7 million jobs every year.

Why help by playing video games?

Well, ultimately its something I’m passionate about and goes hand in hand with raising money for local art programs. This also made me thing about why I play video games overall. I also posed the same question to my followers on twitter.(@chachisays) The responses were same and different at the same time. Here is what they said.(names withheld)

* honestly it relaxes me and puts me in a super creative mood as i immerse myself. I love it!

* bored. Challenging. Adventure. Story. (I normally play puzzle or RPG, can you tell?)

* Why? Because. It’s simultaneous escapism and RL skill training. And fun. And requires hand eye coordination. And… Because.

* video games are a great way to escape from reality. And to shoot fictional guys in the nuts. – (I cringed)

All great responses. I play because of all of the above. Its what I know, and what I’ve grown up with. Video games are a part of who I am now.

Thanks for reading and please consider helping us out!

PS: Chachisays.net and Insertcointobegin.com are going to be back up and running normally as well.

Chachi Says 68: Insert Coin to Begin

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Chachi launched a new gaming site this week at www.InsertCointoBegin.com. What’s in store, and who’s involved?

Send in your comments, user questions, requests, video voicemail links (YouTube posts preferred) and more to csvidcast@gmail.com or connect directly on his Twitter by follow @chachisays!

You can check out the show on YouTube and Blip.tv and subscribe to Chachi Says on iTunes! Be sure to leave a comment where ever your watching it.

Trouble viewing? Try on YouTube

3DS to add Game Gear games in March.

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Where you a Sega fan boy growing up? Have a crush on Sonic and his trusty multiple tailed friend aptly named Tails? Was it hard for you to turn in that out dated system, sadly putting the devices into a box and hiding them in the closet? Don’t worry I won’t tell your fellow fan boys that you have since switched to another system.

However, if you happened to have picked up the Nintendo 3ds then you may just be in luck! Nintendo announced that coming in March you can go back and relive your golden age in video games. That’s right folks available in March Sega Game Gear games will be available for download on your very one Nintendo 3DS.

The March release will be in Japan to start with Sonic 2, Shinobi, and Dragon Crystal to start at about 3.75 a piece. Don’t fret it wont be long until those games make their way here to the good ol’ us of a.

Breaking Pokemon News!

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Breaking Pokemon News!

Yesterday Gamefreak Pokemon producer Junichi Masuda teased that he would be making a huge announcement during his appearance on Japanese show Pokemon Smash today. Well as promised today at around 5:30 pm est. Masuda made that announcement along with the launch of a new Japanese website. Masuda announced that there would be yet another set of games in the Pokemon series!

Now at this time the games have been referred to as Pokemon Black and White 2 and the website shows the following image:

The image shows updated versions of the legendary Pokemon Reshiram and Zekrom but there is mention that an appearance will be made by “Mysterious Legendary Pokemon”.

As of right now the games will be released in Japan in June of 2012 for the Nintendo DS there have been no other details released just speculation. Will these games feature the same areas and stories of the previous entries or will it continue the adventure? Only time will tell! I can tell you that im quite excited as long as there isn’t a completely new set of Pokemon 649 are plenty!(source: Ign.com)

Great Adventures await you….. On the Go!

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So I don’t know about you but I have experienced problems when trying to load up and revisit old computer games and finding that it’s not as easy as just loading it up and play.

For example, trying to load up “ToonStruck” , I found that it wasn’t as simple as it once was. The equipment is more advanced and has trouble loading up the slow enough combination to get the game to run. However using Dosbox corrected these issues and I was quickly reliving the oddness of “ToonStruck”.

Well it seems that there has been an open source project to allow you to play some of your favorite Bioware games where ever you want! Heading to work? Load up some Baldurs Gate and adventure it up! Gemrb allows you to run these games (Baldurs Gate, Icewind Dale, and Planescape: Torment) on your windows, OS X, Linux, Android, Ios and much much more!

Install the program and copy the the game files to the device and you are good to go! This software is completely open source and it made improvements and removed some bugs from the Infinity Game Engine. Implementing fully touch capability. Can we say true toilet adventure? Don’t stay seated too long! (source: 1up.com)

Okla. State Rep proposed tax on violent games…Denied.

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Well, Once again an uppity State Representative from Oklahoma tried to attack video games. State Rep: William Fourkiller introduced a bill(HB 2696) and sub committee to support his bill entitled ” Oklahoma Task Force on Video Games’ Relationship to Obesity and Aggression” However luckily once again a bill of this type was defeated in the House. A vote of 5-6 shot down this horribly worded and bad idea bill before it even got out of the gate.

Under HB 2696 games with a rating of Teen, Mature and Adult Only would be considered violent video games which under this bill would impose rise in cost by 60 cents. The problem with this particular bill other than it being not cool at all is the fact that because its so poorly worded games like Zumba Fitness 2, and Dance Central 2 both rated Teen would be subject to the tax. Now I could be wrong, and I’ll admit it I’ve never played either of these games but i’m pretty sure there is no violence in dancing. (unless there is a break dance boss fight at the end. In which case sign me up) A bill of this nature has been attempted before in other states. (New Mexico in 2008, California in 2007 - California’s was overturned last year as unconstitutional)

So luckily good prevails over evil. and We can go back to gaming and not worrying about our states being next on the lock down of video games. (sources: http://techland.time.com, http://www.mcvuk.com)

Ubisoft and Demiurge Studios announce “Shoot Many Robots” Release date!

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Ubisoft and Demiurge Studios announce “Shoot Many Robots” Release date!

I love when I’m able to follow up on stories that excite me like this one!

Back in October Sorgatron and I ventured to the Big Apple for the New York City Comic Con. While there we spent 4 days running the floor filling up tapes with all kinds of interviews. One of which was with Al from Demiurge Studios who just happened to have a playable version of “Shoot Many Robots”. Let’s revisit that interview shall we?

Shoot Many Robots Interview

Shoot Many Robots will be a downloadable game for Xbox 360 and PS3. It’s a 4 player shooting game. Run around destroying as many robots as you can to upgrade your character and weapons. They also teamed up with Penny Arcade for the use of an item of two but I won’t spoil that for you. (FF) (Source: g4tv.com)

Being released on March 13th and 14th respectively, it’ll run you $9.99 or 800 ms points and believe me when I tell you this. It’s worth every penny or point.

So as Al said, Crack a beer, Grab some friends and let’s shoot some robots!

Chachi Says 67: Aftermath

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Chachi Plays for Kids is done and Chachi is back with new Vidcasts!

Send in your comments, user questions, requests, video voicemail links (YouTube posts preferred) and more to csvidcast@gmail.com or connect directly on his Twitter by follow @chachisays!

You can check out the show on YouTube and Blip.tv and subscribe to Chachi Says on iTunes! Be sure to leave a comment where ever your watching it.

Trouble viewing? Try on YouTube

Capcom and IGN Team up for “Cross Assault”

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Starting today(2-23-12) Capcom and Ign team up to do what they are calling the first ever “Fighting game reality show”, Cross Assault will be streamed daily online at the website linked above from 10-10:30 am (PST).

The show will bring together 10 contestants consisting of 5 Street Fighter experts and 5 Tekken Experts all competing for a grand prize of $25,000. In addition to the live online showings of the show there will be highlight videos available daily. The IGN Pro league will bring the Top 2 finishers to compete in its tournament that will be broadcast live online from SXSW. (Source: ign.com)

While we can agree that this may be the first Reality Fighting Gaming show, it is not the first video game based reality show. I’ll be checking out the highlight videos and the episodes when I can to see how it differs but a little over 2 years ago Syfy teamed up with the World Cyber Games for a Show called “WCG Ultimate Gamer”.

The show lasted for two seasons and entailed a lot more than just video games. Each episode the contestants were pitted up against each other in real life challenges that matched the game they were playing that week. So this truly added a reality aspect to the show. Not saying that they won’t be doing the same in this series that is yet to be seen however I don’t see them making these contestants beating each other every day.

You can check out Cross Assault over at http://crossassault.ign.com and if you are curious to see what WCG Ultimate Gamer was like for the 2 seasons they have some episodes up for free at Hulu. Here’s a direct link so you don’t have to search for it. Its not a bad show just didn’t have the right audience/timeslot. http://www.hulu.com/wcg-ultimate-gamer?c=Reality-and-Game-Shows

Chachi Says 66: Close to the Action

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Chachi Plays for Kids update and Chachi tells us about his first gig shooting ringside at a wrestling show.

Send in your comments, user questions, requests, video voicemail links (YouTube posts preferred) and more to csvidcast@gmail.com or connect directly on his Twitter by follow @chachisays!

You can check out the show on YouTube and Blip.tv and subscribe to Chachi Says on iTunes! Be sure to leave a comment where ever your watching it.

Trouble viewing? Try on YouTube