Mailbag - D e t s t a r . c o m

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Island of
Rejected Toys

Horribly Twisted Gifts... Like Baby's First
Table Saw

Grand Theft OTTO: Springfield

Snake... Wiggum... Homer... They're all here!

Episode 134

Lifeguard Opportunity at Bayview Beach

Rastafarian Homer

Pass the Dutchie on the left side, mon.

Episode 131

Dexter & Marley...
Forever borowing stuff that ain't theirs.

Star Whores

Looks like Han is sleeping solo tonight

Episode 128

Dexter takes a cheap shot at Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney

Episode 127

Mary & Dexter discuss the American flag

Episode 126

Dexter & Marley go shopping for female hygiene products

Episode 124

Marley goes Easter shopping

Bill Gates
Goes to Hell

Dexter's rant about
Windows Vista

Mailbag

Ah, the joys of answering e-mail. Actually, I wouldn't wish this task on my worst enemy. So many questions, so little time... I do answer as many e-mails as I have time for though, and I've posted a few of them below.

Mailbag Archives:

Current Mailbag: May 2, 2008
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April 9, 2007
March 20, 2007
March 14, 2007
March 5, 2007
February 26, 2007
February 5, 2007
November 29, 2006
October 25, 2006
September 25, 2006
July 4, 2006
June 21, 2006
June 5, 2006
May 29, 2006
May 15, 2006 (F-Zero GX Special)
May 13, 2006
>>More...

October 3, 2005

Smashing-Gold Time..
Many messages about many different games... My Detstar mailbox looks a bit like Nintendo salad. It's always fun when people have something new or unusual to tell me. If you have a question or comment that you haven't seen mentioned before on the website, feel free to send it in. That's what the Mailbag is for. DetErest@detstar.com

In Super Smash Bros Melee, I have seen my friend use the star rod, firing two stars at once.
I don't know how, and he won't tell me how he did this.. Can you help me??

The ability to shoot double stars with the Star Rod depends on your choice of character. Offhand, I know that Sheik can fire two stars with a charged up smash attack. As for other characters doing this, none of them jump immediately into my mind. If you discover another character with this ability, let me know.

Hey dude whats up. I have a question involving depot in Goldeneye. On this level you find much graffitti, but i noticed a bunch of boxes have the name Karl spray painted on them. What significance does this have? Is he a game producer like Ken Lobb? Btw, your site rocks! I appreciate what you have done.

I never noticed this before, but it's a cool find... Someone by the name of Karl Hilton was the scenic art director for the game, so it's quite fitting to find that he left a tag on a train car.

It's about Sheik, and that first Email in the September 20th Mailbag. I just want to point out that Nintendo contradicted itself. Here's a picture from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time:

Definitely states that Sheik is a man. I wonder if the discrepancy was accidental or intentional....

I don't think it's so much of a contradiction, than it is based on what was known about Sheik in that screenshot... Nintendo does refer to Sheik as being female later, after "his" true identity is revealed. But in this Ocarina of Time screenshot, the speaking character would likely not be aware of Sheik's true identity, and assumes that he truly is a young man.

On average, how long does one episode of the Comics take to get from sketch board to release?

Some episodes just naturally flow together, and don't take long... But many episodes are under construction for weeks before they are published. I'm always working on several different episodes at a time, and it's a great way to unwind at the end of the day... A perfect escape from the horrible illusion of reality that is my computer screen.

Just for kicks, here's a rough sketch of the boys enjoying some Go-Kart fun, with fireworks and a shotgun.

In Super Smash Bros Melee, I found that if you zoom in on Ness during giant melee right when he is holding his yo-yo at the end of a down-A smash attack that you can see his yo-yo says "Dolphin Loop" on it.

I went into the trophy gallery, and I was able to zoom in close enough to read the text on Ness' Yo Yo. It's amazing that they decided to include such a tiny little detail.

Hey, i love the Goldeneye website! I was looking through your interesting stuff (part 1) page and saw the two pictures of the Russian letters. The left one says 'Banana.' I guess they need to import bananas into Russia. The one on the right I am not sure about, but I think it says 'stop.' I think they spelled 'stop' by directly replacing "s-t-o-p" with Russian characters, because that is not how it is spelled in Russian. (Though I may be wrong-my Russian is a little shaky)

Most players don't speak Russian, so Rareware could have gotten away with quite a bit of creativity... Perhaps Janus is pretending to import bananas, so officials won't discover his illegal weapon dealings... As for "STOP", the literal translation of each letter kinda entertaining. Thanks for sharing.

When are the forums coming back up? Why did they go down? I was a member on your forums and I am eager to get back.

The other question is, why is the caption contests page taken down? I know they came from the forum but you could of at least saved the winners or have made an archive. If you could, could you find the pictures and the captions and e-mail them to me? Thanks.

Winning Caption (Caption Contest #8)
"This is gonna be messier than Clinton's limo on spring break."
-Darklord555

Runner Up:
"Another drunken frat party, full of drugs and sexual experimentation."
-Wreck7

Due to heavy usage of the forums, they had to be closed when they became too expensive to operate.
Although the future of the Detstar Forums is uncertain, several of the moderators have since created their own website, with many former Detstar Members posting on their forums. Their website is Sixwinter.com, and you can have a look at their forums if you're looking for something similar to the Detstar Forums.

The Caption Contest info is still intact, but it's still part of the inaccessible forums database. The database is backed up on my computer, and I can look up anything inside... But rebuilding a page is a tedious process, and it takes forever just to extract every single bit of info and turn it into an easily accessible webpage... And because my free time is quite limited, I need to spend my extra moments working on new content for the website.

Dear Det,
What's your favorite weapons in Goldeneye, because I noticed some guns were ranked below others because they were either only accessed as cheat codes or only in one level of the game, but I'd like to know exactly where you think each gun should rank.

It'd take way too much time to develop a list... But for cool weapons that can only be found using cheats, I'd have to go with the special shotgun... It's louder than the one from the missions, and I'm personally fond of shotguns... The Gold and Silver PP7s are cool, but they're a bit too lethal... It's fun to wound a guard with a partial shot, then blast him at point blank range. Hmm... That method of thinking can't possibly be healthy...

You have the picture of a reflection inside the metroid trophy in Super Smash Bros Melee. I found out that it is the top part of the containment section where the metroid is being held in Super Metroid. I have attaches a picture of the containment and the top section that appears in the trophy. If you look at the top of the metroid trophy you will see it. Thanks!

That's a great screenshot for comparison purposes... It looks like a great match for the reflection on this trophy... Especially the "checkerboard" columns on either side. I wonder if the team who designed the trophies ever imagined that someone would find this hidden detail...

Hey, I've been a fan of your Goldeneye and Perfect Dark sites for years, they are both excellent, in-depth resources. I was discussing Goldeneye with a friend and I was telling him about a music video that reenacted the Goldeneye video game, (not the movie), with real people. Real people dressed as Bond, Natalya, and Xenia ran around with guns with both arms straight out in front of them, just as they do in the game. I think at one point it is even split into 4 screens to look like multiplayer. The music sounded like a young, pop/punk band, similar to Sum41. I saw the video once, I think on Much Music, and it was years ago. Searching the web, I can find no reference to it. I was wondering, with all your knowledge on the subject of Goldeneye, if you know the name of the band and their song. I know it's a long shot. Just hoping you can help!
Thanks

Now that you mention it, I seem to remember hearing something similar to this a while back... I don't know if it's the same thing that you saw, but a band called Puddle of Mudd may have done some kind of tribute to Goldeneye 007 in one of their videos. I'm posting this message, and maybe someone reading it will be able to provide some more info.

This strategy for Super Smash Bros Melee only works in point mode (The default setting for vs. melee). Basically you just use Donkey Kong, and get the opponent by the edge, grab them and carry them (z and the direction you are facing) off the edge. Right before you fall into oblivion throw the opponent. First, you will lose a point, and then you will gain a point and they will lose a point. In other words, your points remain 0 and theirs go down by 1. Just repeat this over and over and you'll win very easily. It works best in relatively small, flat arenas, such as final destination and battlefield. In game and watch level, you can just walk them over to the edge and throw. You wont even die. It'll work in stock mode too.

It's a cheap tactic, but it can also put you ahead in a tightly fought match... It's much more acceptable when you do it to a computer controlled character, however...