GameStarz: SPOnG catches up with pop music uberbrain, Phill Jupitus

This week SPOnG caught up with pop music uberbrain, Phill Jupitus, to pitch him some standard games company questionnaire like questions and quiz him a bit about videogames.

As well as putting together the UK's best national breakfast radio show each weekday on BBC 6Music - see http://www.bbc.co.uk/6music/shows/phill_jupitus/ - Phill's also well known for starring on TV's "Never Mind the Buzzcocks" and has been around the UK comedy scene for, oooo, as long as SPOnG can remember (formerly known in his earlier pre-celeb days, affectionately, as performance poet and cartoonist 'Porky the Poet').

We heard, through our special and very exclusive celebrity news channels that Phill was a keen gamer. Well, in fact the truth is that its fairly obvious he's a gamer as he talks about games a lot, and even has a weekly games slot on his radio show. And on top of this SPOnG knew someone who knew someone who worked at 6Music, so we fired our questions at him and Phill kindly deigned to reply. Check out what the man has to say about drinking and old school arcade gaming, being matey with Jonathan Ross, God-Botherers and all kinds of other malarkey here.


SPOnG: What are your favourite games of 2005? And why?

Phill Jupitus: Destroy All Humans, Crash Bandicoot Tag team racing because Destroy was very funny and Crash I could play with the kids.


SPOnG: What are your top three favourite games of all time?

Phill Jupitus: Battlezone, Sonic the Hedgehog, Banjo Kazooie. I remember that a mate taught me that going in reverse got you better scores in Battlezone as long as you kept an eye on the radar. Sonic is just one of those classics I adore, and Banjo Kazooie was a fun platformer where you didn't have to be a bloody plumber...


SPOnG: What’s your earliest memory of playing video games?

Phill Jupitus: Pong in 1974, my uncle had it in his pub. Then my brother got a system with a very rudimentary tank game we all enjoyed. I loved Galaxian when I started drinking.


SPOnG: Xbox, PlayStation, PC or Gamecube? Any preferences, and if so can you say why?

Phill Jupitus: Cube and PS2 tied... Cube has more games I like, Mario Double Dash, Mario Baseball and Rogue Squadron 1, I'm not all that on the shoot em ups or the whole drug dealer chav market. I love silly games that look
like a laugh. PS2 has all the games my kids like... never really got on with the Xbox... I didn't like the controllers.


SPOnG: Unless you are one of the lucky few who already has an Xbox 360, will you buy a next-generation console in 2006? And if so, which one? Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 or Nintendo Revolution?

Phill Jupitus: Will look at the Revolution, and I dare say the kids will insist on the PS3.


SPOnG: When you are buying a new game, how do you make the decision what to buy? Magazines? Word of mouth? Pot luck?

Phill Jupitus: I wait at least 6 months and ask my mate Vinny and Jonathan Ross who are game sluts. I remember going round to Jonathan's when he got the first UK copy of House of the Dead...


SPOnG: Do you play games alone, online with others or multiplayer with your partner, family and/or friends?

Phill Jupitus: Bit of everything, my wife has motion sickness issues with video games, but I wish she didn't. The kids and I love cartoony racing games.


SPOnG: If you were given carte blanche to design the game of your dreams, what would it be?

Phill Jupitus: Some sort of very English teenage platform game set in the 70s. You have to absorb a certain amount of pop culture as suits one of six character settings... Disco, Punk, Hippie, Geek, Sporty or God-botherer.


SPOnG: You’re a big Star Wars fan, so we hear. What do you think of the many games based on the Star Wars universe? Do any of them do the movies justice?

Phill Jupitus: When Rogue Squadron 1 came out based on the first movie, I was very happy. Nothing I like more than bitch slapping the death star. I thought the last three movies were bloody video games.


SPOnG is looking forward to The Godfather game, which is out in early 2006. With this in mind, which other movie license(s) would you like to see video game versions of?

Phill Jupitus: Carry On Sims (seriously) and something based on the film Midnight Run where you play a bounty hunter who has to get a bail jumper from NY to LA.


Well, there we go once more celeb-gamer fans, we love the idea of Carry on Sims. Come on Electronic Arts - get it made!

Thanks to Phill Jupitus for his time and to Sarah at BBC 6Music. You can check out Phil’s Breakfast show on 6Music every weekday. The man knows his music and he doesn’t have to stick to a tedious playlist, unlike pretty much every other breakfast show on air. SPOnG highly recommends it to anyone who's ears like music.

Next week: SPOnG goes in search of any celebs who aren’t still either sunning themselves in five star high-security hotel compounds in the Caribbean or checking themselves into The Priory for some quality post New Year celeb-rehab time.

If you have any ideas of who you would like to see us grill about their gaming habits and what you would like us to be asking our celebs, just let us know in the forum below, as we think GameStarz is a feature with legs… We’d really like to get Jonathan Ross and Mike Skinner from The Streets, so if anyone knows them, ask them to drop us a line.

Happy New Year, cya in 2006

SPOnG