olympics
Culture
Video Games In The Olympics? Athletes Answer Hypothetically
12:00PM Owen Good | Wired asked four Olympic athletes, doing a photoshoot for Sega’s upcoming 2010 winter games title, if video games had a legitimate place in Olympic competition. At least they were polite in their replies. More »
News
Sega Does the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics
3:40AM Mike Fahey | Sega continues to milk their licence with the International Olympic Committee, announcing the development of Vancouver 2010, the Official Video Game of the Olympic Winter Games. More »
Aussie Sports Star Thanks Age Of Empires
1:38PM David Wildgoose | Ryan Tyack led out the Australian team at the Australian Youth Olympic Festival in Sydney last night. Ryan’s chosen sport is archery and he’s pretty good at it; he was a reserve for the archery team at the Beijing Olympics. What’s interesting is how he got into the sport.
“I just sat around playing Age of Empires all the time and my mum wanted me to do a sport and meet some kids,” Tyack told the SMH. “So I chose either fencing or archery as Age Of Empires had swordsmen and archers.”
More »
News
EA’s Probst To Head U.S. Olympic Committee
7:00AM Brian Crecente | Larry Probst, chairman of Electronic Arts, has been elected chairman of the U.S. Olympic Committee, the Colorado Springs Gazette reported today. “I’m extremely honored to be chosen for this role,” Probst told the paper after his election to a four-year term. “I’ve had a lot of sports experience as a CEO. I’ve had a very successful business career. I know how to work collaboratively with people. I know how to build and develop a team.” Probst replaces Peter Ueberroth, former Major League Baseball commissioner. Probst will likely spend most of energy at the USOC trying to convince the International Olympic Committee to bring the 2016 Olympics to Chicago. I wonder if Peter Moore is bummed? USOC names Probst from EA Sports as its chairman [The Gazette] More »
Two Olympic Athletes, Two Sad Wii Fit Ages (Bwah?)
3:40AM Brian Ashcraft | US national women’s team members Heather Mitts and Heather O’Reilly are two fit athletes. Or so you’d think. Hey, they’re in the Olympics! Watch as they compete with each other in Wii Fit mini-games for the chance at winning a Wii. Listen to that irritating announcer. Then scratch your head when Wii Fit says Olympiads’ balance ages are 47 and 43 respectively. Pathetic. Those ladies really need to get in shape. They need to quite that goofing off they do on the women’s national team (gold medal — ha, whatever!) and just do Wii Fit all day long. That’s the only way these slackers will get fit. If you have lots of free time today, there’s another clip after the jump. It has the hula hoop game. More »
New Olympic Event: The Xbox Put
8:00AM Owen Good | Everything is made more legitimate when described in a British accent, even when the narrator uses phrases like “video game things.” So here is British Gaming Blog’s “Summer Athletics Preview” — in which Eidos touted the release of its upcoming Summer Athletics (Sept. 30 in Europe for the Wii) with some events of its own — Xbox Put, the Wiilay, and the Gamecube Toss. Teaser only, they’ll have the full video up sometime later. But you can get a look at some Xboxes smashing on the concrete at Battersea Athletics Track. I bet they’d still work. I just realised I have a great name for UK broadcasting. And I love impersonating the broadcasts. “GMT time is twenty-two hundred. Owen Good, Kotaku World Service”. Good thing this is text only, I think Stuart would beat me senseless if I said that in his presence. Summer Athletics Preview [British Gaming Blog] More »
Olympic Gold Medalist Trained With Nintendo Wii
6:00PM Brian Ashcraft | Japanese Olympic swimmer Kosuke Kitajima took gold for the men’s 100m breaststroke. He certainly trained very hard to reach the tip-top condition he’s in. Sure, he practiced hard, ate right and all that other stuff. But what else helped him achieve Olympic gold? Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, says Kitajima! No, really. The swimmer explains: See, Mario does the breaststroke. And thus, it’s perfect mental training for envisioning the actual Olympic hall. Watch as Japanese game sales will spike and wanna-be swimmers include Mario and Sonic in their training regimen… 北島「Ｗｉｉ」で「金」予行演習 [Yomiuri Sports Thanks, Tak!] [Pic] More »
China Brings Bullshots To The Olympics
5:00PM Brian Ashcraft | “Bullshots” are nothing new for gamers. Penny Arcade coined the term a few years to describe game screenshots that looked too good to be true — and are. Photoshopping and CG graphics are nothing new to the game world — hence gamers general suspicion about pretty and shiny things — but are finding use larger than game PR. Issues like governmental state PR. Take the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics. Those 29 giant firework footprints that made their way to the Bird’s Nest National Stadium from Tiananmen Square were actually computer graphics. Apparently, the Beijing Organising Committee was worried it wouldn’t be possible to capture the fireworks over Beijing. According to The Oregonian reporter Jon Canzano: More »
‘Video Games Make Our Olympic Fingers Tired’
5:00PM Brian Ashcraft | As Fahey previously pointed out in his feature, Olympic athletes like video games. Many athletes like video games, it seems. As Olympic runner Tyson Gay points out: Olympic track athletes spend a lot of free time trying to be the best in their favourite video games. So much so, our fingers sometimes get more tired then our legs do in actual races. According to Gay, playing video games helps take his mind off pre-competition jitters. He’ll be running for gold in the 100m at the Beijing Olympics. Above, he explains his development as a runner through a painting he did of a tree trunk. Athletes play video games as Olympics go virtual [Yahoo! News] [Pic Thanks, Zhien!] More »
