Mystery of Game Balance
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| "Mystery of Game Balance" (Game Balance no Nazo) | ||||||
| Airdate | March 3, 2015 | |||||
| Writer | Kotaro Ishidate | |||||
| Director | Kotaro Ishidate | |||||
| Animation studio | DLE | |||||
The group ponders whether Mystery of Convoy meets arbitrary criteria for being a crappy game.
Synopsis
[edit]Tracks reports to Optimus Prime having done some requested research into "shovelware" games. Optimus believes what's been discovered will establish that Mystery of Convoy does not fall into the category. Lockdown's demand that they admit just admit the game sucks is, as usual, ignored. Tracks announces he's examined four criteria. When Bumblebee suggests that if the game meets at least one of the criteria, it can be considered terrible, Optimus tries to up that to two, much to Lockdown's disgust. The first criterion is being monotonously boring, which they eliminate straight away. The second is a proliferation of bugs, which Optimus proudly points out the game doesn't have. Lockdown tries to dampen their joy by pointing out if it is still a crappy game despite not having bugs, that's probably worse. Number three is terrible graphics and music, but consensus is both were fine for the period. The fourth is game balance and that few people can manage to beat the game. Lockdown finally thinks they've found something no one can deny, but Optimus and Bumblebee suggest maybe not many people have beaten it because not many people have played it. Lockdown again points out that it sold over 61,000 copies. They decide to consider what bad game balance actually means.
Optimus Prime suggests maybe if the controls aren't buttons at all, but a microphone in the controller that the player has to make noises into to control the game. Bumblebee's idea is using a motion controller, which makes Optimus think of CT scan. The others are confused by this until Optimus realizes he actually meant motion capture and claims the error was due to him short circuiting. Tracks comes up with the concept of a messed up map, where the overworld is tiny but the player takes far too long to get anywhere when inside locations. Optimus jokes that Tracks has read his mind, leading to confusion and/or laughter.
Featured characters
[edit](Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Decepticons |
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Notes
[edit]Animation and technical errors
[edit]Continuity notes
[edit]Transformers references
[edit]Real-world references
[edit]- This episode takes place at the Nasu Kogen service area in Nasu, Tochigi.
