A few days ago Rockstar's newest offering, Table Tennis, hit the shelves.
[color=#999999]Source: Gamespot [ more info ][/color]

Now, I knew about the game before its release, but I think I'd honestly dismissed it as a practical joke. I mean, how could I expect a company responsible for games like the GTA series, Warriors, and the upcoming Bully to produce a Ping Pong game? And now that it's been released, and I've been forced to acknowledge that it's NOT a practical joke, I guess I expect something more Rockstar-ish to happen in the game.

What I have to wonder is, did all the pressure from game legislation, smacktards like Jack Thompson, and the Hot Coffee debacle cause the higher ups to choose such an innocuous title to sit in the laps of the Rockstar Dev team. Meh, we'll never really know. All I can say is: despite my surprise at its actual existance, response to the game actually seems to be pretty good. **shrugs** Way to go Rockstar... I think.

Very nice comic today.

In terms of Rockstar, i imagine they're keen to prove they're capable of more than simply GTA-esque games. No-one likes to be pigeon-holed, and just like actors, the only way they can jump out of that pigeon-hole is to do something totally new and unexpected!
Lets Hope it wasn't a product of the 'Jack Thompson' looney brigade though.

I'd be surprised if there wasn't ... just something in Table tennis though!

Darkslider raises a good point.

I just sort of assume that this will be much more successful on the forgien market than here in America.

Watch, they made this game that looks innocent and pure, yet there will be a mod on the internet in 6 months that unlocks something in the game to make it worse than the hot coffee debacle

My opinion:

I think they just wanted to show that they can, in fact, write something that doesn't include sex, drugs and blood... so they chose something like ping pong, heh.

Either that or it was a huge "F YOU" to people like Mr. Thompson and the like? Who knows.

Yes 6 months from now Jack Thompson will be up in arms about two characters slapping a balls at each other.

Six months from now a hot coffee mod will be released making it possible to strip all the clothes off the in game characters and have them do various sex acts on the table with the equipment.. *rollseyes*

They took a nasty hit in the market and lost a lot of money so now they are just trying to recoup their losses because of all the stupidity.

I honestly doubt anything Jack Thompson could do might affect Rockstar's sales that drastically. Granted, his little crusading got the rating changed (for GTA) from M to AO, but the difference between those two ratings is minor enough... Most likely it only makes stores a bit more likely to ask buyers for ID. Of course, it'll also devilify the franchise a bit to the eyes of the general public, but GTA already has acquired enough of a reputation that the usual fans of the games will be more than enough to profit on the next game in the franchise.

I think Rockstar just wanted to go for something different for a change, something a bit simple given the amount of production time a GTA game usually must require... That, and the market for table tennis games was absolutely clear -- I mean, what other game lets you play table tennis?

I think it's still a joke ....

Although those character modles do look pretty nice ... hmmm

dont you see it?

Rockstar is trying to grab that elusive title of Best ping pong simulation ever curently held by PONG. I mean after all those crazy great titles since the 80's that have tried like... um... er... nevermind


/all I gots

The one where the hot chicks from the fighting game, stop fighting.

They instead put on bikinis, and play beach volleyball with each other.

This ping pong game will probably have a secret play mode where something similar can occur, heh.....