Hai! I’m here in Tokyo visiting the Tokyo Game Show, the 3rd DiGRA conference and boozing and smoozing at game publisher parties. I’m with a great group of people (Dutch developers, industry people, students, academics, artists and some who totally suck at playing Mario Kart DS ;). If you are in Tokyo as well and we did not meet-up yet, drop me an email! Hai.

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Two consultants, of all people, wrote an open letter to the Dutch Financial Times about the lack of support for the Dutch game industry.

“Nederland is een spelletjesland. Maar zolang de Nederlandse overheid niet overtuigd is van het nut van ondersteuning van de game-industrie, is het nog maar de vraag of onze traditionele spelletjescultuur voldoende zal zijn om onze concurrerende positie in de groeiende digitalespelletjesmarkt uit te bouwen.”

Needless to say: /agree.

A small story today in the paper on the Wii line-up for this fall. They got a strong one but third-party publishers won’t be happy with it. I played Metroid 3, the new Super Mario Galaxy and Wii Fitness. Three vary different game. I would my money on Mario. I really want to play that one while Metroid is well implemented and has a good design I would rather play a platformer on the Wii than a shooter, but that’s personal. Talking about shooters, I am curious about the reception of Enemy Territory: Quake Wars. I played the demo a bit and I don’t think it will be the hit I hoped it would be (I looked forward to the title but the gameplay is a bit ‘choppy’).

The article is in the newspaper on page 15 or online here.