You asked for it, and now you’ve got it! Bloktonik leaderboards are online and embedded in the game as well as in their own link at Bloktonik.com.

We’ve teamed up with MochiMedia to bring you these leaderboards complete with country tracking, medals, and Day/Week/Month/All stat charting, so now you can totally represent your nation and rub your ridiculously high scores in the face of people all over this green Earth.

Aw heck, there’s even a Twitter/Facebook function to post your scores and annoy everyone you love and know personally!

Go play some Bloktonik now!

Hey all you people reading my blog out there. Been busy! Big plans set for the end of this year and into next Spring. Robotube is gonna essplode…can’t give away too much on that right now, but pretty soon.

Been working on updating Bloktonik to a ridiculous degree, prepping it for big happenings next year.

Here’s what I’ve added, for your blowin-stuff-up pleasure:

(Hit the jump for more.)

1) Not one, but THREE kinds of bombs have been added to the game! Score any kind of bonus, earn a bomb. You can store up to three, and deploy them with the spacebar. Here’s the catch: your NEXT block is changed into a bomb, so you gotta strategimize.

2) A Pause button! I know, I know, simple and probably should have been in the game since day one, but it wasn’t, so I’m lame. Now it is, so go on over and pause the game and sit there and do nothing until your heart’s content!

3) New possible secret bonuses to earn: find em yourself!

There are some other little tweaks and trinkets and what-not, but it’s not stuff that would really excite you enough to warrant me taking time to type about it here, even though I just spent quite a bit of time on this lengthy paragraph that explains why I didn’t want to waste time writing about them.

Bloktonik still needs a friggin’ high score board, so I need to get back to work. Talk to you cats later!

Play Bloktonik Now.

Go get this game right now. I don’t know how long the suits will allow this to stay at the $.99 mark, so I’d be jumping on this and rolling around in it while you still can.

Click here to get this fine product.

Yow…it’s been a while since I’ve typed words and stuff all over this blog. Been sort of busy. You guys know how it is.

Anyway, what better way to make a return than to talk about Space Invaders, only the single greatest video game franchise to ever appear on pretty much EVERY console ever conceived. I believe there’s even a version that will play on my microwave oven display.

What is it about Space Invaders that I simply have to see it played on every platform possible? I mean, the game is always the same, but I feel like Space Invaders is almost like a little diagnostic tool…something that evaluates and manifests all the little quirky nuances of each different piece of hardware it’s able to run on. Having seen the game for 35 years played on its native arcade machine, seeing it on different platforms makes playing a little comparison game so fascinating. So, it’s always a delight when Space Invaders is given a complete overhaul and I’m completely unsure of what to expect.

To call “Space Invaders Extreme 2″ an “overhaul” is an understatement. And there, my friends, is the last time I will use quotation marks in this post, I promise.

Video and more after the jump.

Space Invaders Extreme 2, out of the box, looks and feels like more of the same great stuff from the first installment released last year. Still an amazingly fun game with visuals that are absolutely delightful and dazzlingly candy-like. However, what really makes SI2 stand apart from SI1 is the addition of a more thoughtful bonus system: Bingo mode, as much as it conjures up visions of purple haired old ladies huddled in a church hall, is a fantastically addicting little sub-game that makes your choice of Invader-destruction a bit more selective and thought-out. By shooting the right colors of Invaders in the right order, you light up different spots on the Bingo card in an attempt to get 3-in-a-row. If you do, insane amounts of extra point items rain from the skies in what can only be described as a high-score nerd’s dream.

Aside from this new addition, there are loads of other intricate, complex little methods by which to earn bonuses, like a pinballesque set of lamps that are lit by achieving certain goals on each round.

Boss battles are much cooler than the first game, with enemies that take up the whole screen, and have far more aggressive and fancy attack patterns. Also, for those less seasoned, the game allows a beginner mode to be played, with infinite lives and easier attack patterns.

As always, I don’t intend to give a comprehensive review of the game here since reviews are a dime-a-dozen on these here intertubes, but for $20, Space Invaders Extreme 2 is a title you’d be absolutely nuts to pass up. Taito is really on a roll with their revamping of the SI franchise, between SI Extreme, SI Get Even (Wii) and SI Infinity Gene (iPhone).

Taito, if you’re listening, the Wii needs some Extreme action, and how do you NOT put Infinity Gene on the DS? I mean, come on ya crazy bastards! Do it!

Bloktonik!

Jay is Games, one of the web’s foremost respected indie and casual gaming authorities, has given Bloktonik a glowing review.

I wasn’t lying when I said that this game is addictive. We’ve seen matching games done in any number of ways, but Bloktonik manages to implement a lot of innovative new features that can keep you playing for hours.

Check out the full review over at Jay is Games, and then head over to Bloktonik.Com to play!

I am not that great at Street Fighter. Though, I’ve been playing the game since I was in high school. I am of the rare breed that even played Street Fighter 1, with the giant pressure-sensitive buttons and all. I enjoy the game. I like the real-time brain game that it is. I like the competition, the depth, the timing, the beautiful design….all of it. I can hold my own, maybe win 5 out of 10 matches. But sure, I lose a lot.

I’ve owned Street Fighter IV since release day in February of 2009. I’ve enjoyed every heart-pounding match, and even made a few friends along the way. But something has been happening lately: I’ve found that Street Fighter can turn people into unbelievable jerks.

I don’t use a microphone when I play. I have a simple handle on PSN, “Robotube”, and I use no icons or titles. I don’t even use taunts. I do nothing that would provoke other players, I send no messages, nothing like that. Yet, I’m finding something a lot worse than sore losers: a voluminous influx of sore winners.

Yesterday, (as usual), I was handily beaten by a skilled Blanka player. Match ends, I lose, that’s it. Suddenly a message pops up which reads “Bow down, bitch.”. I laughed at first, because I immediately had this mental imagine of some gorilla-like nutjob flipping out over winning, not much unlike his onscreen counterpart. It didn’t bother me much; I deleted it and moved on.

This evening, however, something far more eyebrow-raising happened. Before the match even started, my opponent and I are in the lobby, and he begins a tirade of obscenity toward me. Before we could even get past character select, I kid you not, I was called the n-word, a common homophobic slur, a dickhead, and a bitch. Nice, right? Being a straight white guy, I was all the more perplexed.

Again, my immediate reaction is to sort of brush it off, though I am far more troubled by the use of racist and homophobic slurs this time. Being called a dickhead or a bitch I can handle…I think most of my friends call me those things most days anyway.

I’m not 13 anymore so I don’t take any offense by being called any of those things by a nameless, tinny voice coming over my TV, however, the onslaught got uglier and more riddled with bigotry. It did make me realize something that I didn’t want to admit. Street Fighter really does bring out the ugly side of people. I know what you’re thinking….it’s shit-talking, it’s an attempt to psyche out the opponent, it’s part of the game….whatever. But a complete deluge of racial and homophobic vomit is so way beyond what I consider to be some garden-variety shit-talk. It’s really sad…it almost makes me wonder if the video game violence critics aren’t on to something.

If all it takes is a video game to bring such putrid racism and homophobia out of a person, we, my friends, are in trouble. Where did we go wrong? When did this happen? When did video games go from fun to fury? Is it the anonymity? If it is, then I am frankly scared of what lies beneath the exterior of all the random people I meet every day.

After that, I decided it was time to shelve the game for a while. I may be getting too old for this, I have to admit. I was really disappointed with the people I was playing with, and I just felt deflated…I didn’t want to “associate” with it anymore. Not for awhile, anyway. The lure of the magnificence that is Street Fighter will draw me back, but I need to step away for a while.

I’m just glad nobody else was in the room…how embarrassing it was at that moment to even be associated with gaming. I know this all sounds rather sanctimonious or preachy, so apologies for that tone, but I just had to share my thoughts on this incident. It was sort of an eye-opening moment for me.

When I said I wanted to do a Weekend Playlist regularly, I meant regularly according to MY definition. This does not necessarily coincide with YOUR definition of regularly. This weekend I played two games, pretty much. One of them is older and has been out for some time, the other is really old, but recently got a facelift for current generation consoles. Thankfully, it was rainy here on Saturday, perfect excuse to blow the entire day playing games! I love rainy weekends!

So I received Wolverine from Gamefly this past week. Yes, I still have my Gamefly account. I had played the PSN demo some time ago and enjoyed it, so I put it on my Gamefly Q. Naturally, this means Gamefly didn’t mail it out until months later. I began the game sometime last week and finished it late Sunday night. Have you ever been playing a game late at night when you have to get up the next day for work, or school? Of those times, have you ever been close to beating a game, and you are really into it, and you start having this internal dialog with yourself about whether you should stop playing and go to bed? Mine went like this:

Me: Self, it’s getting late and you have to go to work tomorrow.
Me: STFU self. You are lame. I’m fighting DEADPOOL! I almost got this game beat.
Me: Yes, but at what cost? 7:00am is going to show up real early tomorrow if you keep going.
Me: But I almost have him killed! It should only be like another 5 minutes! In the grand scheme of things, 5 minutes shouldn’t…….shit I died. See what you did? I was so close to winning, and now I have to start all over.
Me: Start all over? Are you mad? It’s gonna take you another 15 minutes to beat him, now!
Me: No, it’s cool I got the strategy down, now. See? I already have him like half dead.
Me: Yeah, half dead on the first and easiest phase, you still have phase 2.
Me: STFU noob. I’m tired of your shit. I am finishing this game tonight, and that is final.
Me: Whatever, but tomorrow morning when you are bumming. I don’t wanna hear it.

And here it is, tomorrow morning, and I am bumming. Not too bad, I have certainly had worse next-day-at-works. Yes, I called myself noob, and lame.

In any event, I really enjoyed Wolverine. For a game based on a movie, which are rarely any good, this was fun and engaging. Not the longest game I have ever played, clocking in at 10-15 hours (there is no in-game timer). Fans of the popular God of War games would probably find this game enjoyable, as the game mechanics feel very similar. I played the game on the “normal” difficulty and found it to be on the easy side. If you are a platinum trophy hunter, you will have to play through this game twice in order to get it. The second play-though will need to be on the “hard” difficulty setting. I have read that it is still on the easy side, just not quite so easy. If you like God of War, and you have yet to check out this game, I recommend it. I give it the non-official, un-sanctioned by Jason, Robotube games seal of approval.

The other game featured this week has been out on xBox for a while now, has been seen previously on SNES, and in your local Video Arcade. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time was one of my favorite arcade games when I was just a young whipper-snapper. The number of quarters I used to dump into that game is mind boggling even by today’s inflation-adjusted standards. Now, however, for the pricey sum of $10, and a few hundred megabytes of hard drive space I have a version to call my very own. It has been given a facelift, all the graphics are new and look really good. Thankfully, none of the gameplay seems to have been sacrificed by the new graphics. It feels no different to me than playing it in the arcade now almost 20 years ago.

There are even trophies to collect! Though most of them are not difficult. I managed to get all but one trophy in a matter of a few hours. The hardest one is going to be completing the entire game in “survival” mode. That is, completing the entire game without dying…..at all. Not impossible, but the best I have managed to do so far is to complete the game with Leonardo only dying twice. It will take a little more practice, but I have no problem with that. I will replay this game over and over until my thumbs bleed, and then I will play on bloody stumps. I probably don’t need to tell you to get this game, because if you enjoyed the TMNT arcade games as I did, you likely already know it exists. Even if you didn’t play the arcade games, get the game anyway. GO! NOW!

A couple people asked me if there were videos of the game being played, so I threw this video together to kind of show you what the game’s about.

Zyrx is available in the App Store, so go gitter! Click here to be taken right to it.

Note: The Robotube Games website is temporarily under major renovations, so if you want to go play the online Zyrx, the link is here.

Our pals over at Gaijin Games have finally revealed part 3 in their epic Bit.Trip WiiWare series: Bit.Trip VOID

It’s no secret that the Robotube Games team has a man-sized game crush on the fine work of the hombres at Gaijin Games, so we are pretty excited to see the first footage of this sweet-looking retroesque eyesex festival.

Prepare to rip most of your hair from its roots this Fall when Bit.Trip VOID makes its appearance on the Wii Shop Channel.

Up to 4 Player Local Co-op! Mid-Level Checkpoints! Epic Boss Battles! Nunchuk & Classic Controller Support! A Rockin’ Chiptune-Inspired Soundtrack! Special Chiptune Guest Star Nullsleep! Synesthetic Music/Art/Gameplay Interaction! Hyper-realistic Retro Cutscenes! Explore the VOID this Fall!

Check out the video below, and be sure to visit the official site.

You can have the shirt off my back!

Remember that mysterious t-shirt I wore in Bit Museum #1? That was a shirt I designed for Shirt.woot.com called “Avocado Man” back in 2007. Now, you can own one yourself! WOOT!

Avocado Man has been added to Shirt.Woot’s “Classic” roster, and is being reprinted for one week, starting today. If you’d like one of these snazzy shoits, head on over and pick one up!

Big thanks to Shirt.Woot.com for selecting Avocado Man for the “Redux” treatment…I’m honored!