On the fifth day of Christmas, Pocket Gamer gave to me...
It's the Olympics, so don't expect too many gold rings from Team GB
August 8-24th, Beijing 2008. 'One World, One Dream' apparently. Sadly dreams also include nightmares so whatever happens on the track, we should also expect discussions concerning whether the stadia will be completed in time, the sporting implications of China's poor environmental record, not to mention human rights violations, performance-enhancing drugs and the generally murky processes which decide the hosting of international sporting events. Oh, and London 2012, too. What fun.
Or, of course, we could just get lost in waves of enthusiasm thanks to the high quality Olympics and sporting-related pocket games that are currently limbering up for our benefit.
For example, Nintendo and Sega have buried the hatchet, resulting in the first official pairing of Mario and Sonic (and chums) in the prosaically titled Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. Atari also seems to be attempting a similar cartoon tie-in with Asterix at the Olympic Games.
Perhaps more interesting though, will be the return of old fashioned button-mashing titles, which will see us frantically rubbing our fingers in frenzies of RSI-inducing technique. Konami has the greatest claim over such activity, thanks to the refreshing of its Track & Field brand in the form of New International Track & Field for DS, a game that will boast 24 different events.
We also expect mobile publishers to stretch their design muscles with full-on experiences such as Mr Goodliving's Summer Games series, through to more bite-sized chunks of athletic endeavour; after all, there are 35 Olympic disciplines from archery to wrestling to choose from. BMX is included as a full event for the first time, too.
So Dave Mirra's BMX Olympic Challenge then? We hope not, but stranger things have happened. And on that basis, Pocket Gamer will happily award some sort of medal to any company that manages to out-perform the imagination displayed by Morpheme's Jeremiah Manford's Athletics – Jeremiah Manford, of course, being the best athlete Team GB never had.
