General MINOR gaming related news, rumours and things of not-thread-worthy nature
 

We have a couple of threads floating about for general Xbox or PlayStation news and discussion, but we have nothing for a general catch-all of gaming related and multiplatform news and stuff: until now that is. I figure we can use this thread to post random news and cross-platform game tidbits that don't quite justify a full thread yet.

And to kick things off, some random news:

Mass Effect 2 announced - now multiplatform
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Now enter Skills to bitch and moan about Mass Effect. :p

Crytek have bought Free Radical Design
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This is hopefully good news for any potential future TimeSplitters, or so I hope. I certainly remember TimeSplitter 2 being a bucket load of fun.

Amazon get in on the 'casual gaming' thing
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Multiplatform Mass Effect 2? One suspects they mean PC and 360, I'm not sure how much of a market there'd be on the PS3, given the inevitability that the next game will be a direct sequel. I would say that of more interest to me would be whether they can actually deliver on half the promises they made about the first game this time out and whether the game will feature Commander Sheppard again and let you carry over your character from the first one.

Yeah, it could well mean just the 360 and PC, but there's always the outside chance it could be making its way to the PS3. As for being a direct sequel, that was always going to be the case, since it's a planned trilogy is it not? Either way, I guess they could either take a chance on people playing it (provided there was some sort of story recap video or something), or they could sneak out a port of the first game for the PS3 (unlikely, but you never know).

I'd also very much imagine, unless they change the character focus of the game, you'd be able to carry your character across (in looks if nothing else).

I expect they'll keep a couple of characters around, and ditch a couple characters. Bye bye Ashley and Kaiden. They will probably keep Wrex and Liara, if not all four aliens, and add a Salarian to the mix. That said, it wouldn't bother me if they mostly ditched the existing characters and let you embark with a new cast. I mostly liked the characters from the first game, but change isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I don't see why they would avoid a PS3 release simply because the first game didn't get one. EA isn't going to let something as small as that stop them from releasing on PS3, especially when you look around and see that Mass Effect is one of the handful of titles that people with only a PS3 consistently list as something they want to play.

I guess it's a matter of the cost of converting it against the expected revenue from a PS3 version. EA don't have a huge amount of cash to throw at risky projects at the moment, although I suspect that Mass Effect would be a pretty sure seller.

It was originally touted as a trilogy but there's no reason why Bioware would make the next game a sequel the same way KOTOR 2 is a sequel, set it much later and with a new cast of characters, especially if they're porting to a format where everyone won't already have saved games. There's also the difficulty of balancing as there's no fixed maximum point for characters and you can finish the first game anywhere between level 40 and 70 theoretically. They don't want to release a new game with no challenge for players who've got all the achievement bonuses and best equipment on a level 70 Sheppard. Confirmation of continuing characters would encourage me to go for another playthrough though, just to set-up a character for the sequel (Probably one who looks like a neo-nazi and hates aliens, killing off all the aliens in your party whenever possible). Actually, that brings up another issue with continuing straight on, you have a choice of which party members make it to the end and as such they either need to decide for you (Like in KOTOR 2 where they arbitrarily decide that that you didn't leave Carth to his death on the last planet and kill Jolee) or write multiple story arcs right from the start.

Since all the characters in Mass Effect have interchangeable personalities, it'd be fucking ACE if they actually bothered to do something cool like take a look at your last game's save file and kill off all the characters except the ones you used the most during that playthrough. That way you get a new cast of morality waffling nobodies that no one gives a shit about AND everyone gets their favourite characters in the sequel.

Hey, I can dream right?

Well quite, a bit less vanilla amongst the support staff and your actions to make a blind bit of difference to the world around you would be more than welcome. Essentially I want KOTOR 3, even dressed up as Mass Effect.

The characters were vanilla and interchangeable during post-introduction story scenes for the most part, and had actual personalities when you talked to them in the Normandy. This is pretty consistent with Bioware's previous games. I'm not sure why you would expect anything different, at least until they actually deliver something different. I still think that at its core, it was a very good game, and if Bioware can improve on the rest, to the point where all the non-plot planetary bases aren't identical, to where it matters which supporting characters you have in your party during story scenes, to where 75% of the game is actual game, rather than 75% of the game being sidequests, to where the Mako doesn't exist, to where textures load sometime before the end credits roll, to where I can have a lightsabre to where your actions matter slightly more than just "oops killed or was mean to that guy, so this sidequest doesn't open", it could be an outstanding game. Sure, some of those points are easier said that done, but just because something is difficult doesn't mean they shouldn't make an effort.

Just hoping that Enemies Everywhere 2 will have more depth in planetary expeditions, instead of a billion planets and only a handful of them have quests.

My biggest gripe was how all of the bases you visted on planets had two floorplans and the only difference was the furniture layout.

Saw a link to this on JoyStiq this morning and it's too awesome not to share:


Also, interesting news about Hellbent Games doing a Lego Battles game for the DS:
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GTA:Wild West Red Dead Redemption announced by Rockstar:



More info on the official website

I never did play Red Dead Revolver. Was it any good?

A friend of mine was very into it but then he also spent 200 odd hours of his life driving a truck around the highways in San Andreas listening to the country music radio station so he might not be the best benchmark for good taste. They're using the RAGE engine so this will probably be a decent enough open world effort if nothing else. One wonders how much of the game world will be pointless open desert though and what sort of combat system they're going to put in it. Rockstar don't often make bad games though and although nothing they release ever quite matches up to the GTA games, there's no denying that Canis Canum Edit was a smashing little game so they have a proven record of putting their engine to good use.

Little-known fact: Much of Red Dead Revolver's development was actually Capcom's work. Rockstar picked it up for the final two years before release.

Oh, yeah, and Free Radical aren't Free Radical anymore - one of the conditions of the acquisition was that they rebrand themselves as Crytek UK. Whatever. As long as I get my delicious Timesplitters 4 sometime between now and my funeral.

I did like Red Dead Revolver. Great title with AWESOME music. That said, I hope Red Dead Redemption is more over the top than Gun was. Honestly, once you've done battle with a undertaker with a frikkin' gattling gun in a coffin, you don't go back.

I actually really liked Gun. Never played Red Dead Revolver and I'm not sure why, considering Rockstar is pretty reliable for at least a decent time. How similar were it and Gun?

File this under 'unexpected' in the news category, but apparently this summer the XBLA, PSN and PC will be seeing a version of Battlefield, called Battlefield 1943:

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I've got to agree with you. The best thing about Mass Effect isn't so much the game as it stands, it is the massive potential for further developments. It's well past time someone did a decent sci-fi RPG with FPS elements, the world has been screaming for decent game that recreates the appeal of Star Trek, Babylon 5 and the like since the SNES for God's sake. Remember those Star Trek RPG/Top-Down Shooter efforts? They were very limited, but quite popular as I recall. That's seriously the closest we got until Mass Effect, unless I've missed an important title.

Of course I've yet to break the seal on my copy of Fallout 3 so if that's going to be all my hopes and dreams wrapped up in a delicious package, then so much the better. I doubt it though. The whole 'post-apocalyptic' sci-fi RPG doesn't really appeal to me nearly as much as something of the 'space opera the shooting RPG' that Mass Effect has to offer.

I seriously have to quote this to say nothing of greater significance than FUCK YEAH! Best game Rockstar ever made other than the very, very best of the GTA series. Which is to say GTAIII and Vice City. Honestly I put the other GTA titles just a hint below Canis Canem Edit. Just on the basis of 'fun factor'. The story in San Andreas was good for a giggle, but some aspects of the gameplay really just rubbed me the wrong way.

Additional Spam:
Gotta love more LEGO gaming. I wish it was on the 360 though, I've had far too much fun playing co-op in the other LEGO titles since I got mah 360.

JoyStiq have a hands on with Battlefield 1943, the upcoming XBLA/PSN/PC download title, and it actually sounds like it's shaping up quite nicely. Mark me down as very interested in seeing how this turns out (I only got into Battlefield with BF2 but ended up playing it for ages, and if we get a good few of us together for squad based fun then count me in):

Move to the new thread I've created for the game - http://www.gamingforce.org/forums/vi...ld-1943-a.html

Sounds excellent. Not chuffed about ANOTHER WW2 game, but it ought to be fun times with GFFers.

I still haven't got around to playing anything with you fuckers yet. What gives?

Being that I still actually like WWII shooters, and BF:BC was one of my favorite games of last year, I can see this being a day one purchase for me. I'm still more excited for BF:BC2, but this seems like it will definitely be good enough to hold me over until it comes out.

Interesting that Dice seem to be "borrowing" features from Frontlines on their second game since Kaos's superior effort. I guess they thought that BF:BC would be better than Frontlines without those features or were too far into development to implement them before launch. Still, I do like a bit of sqaud fps action and even though Bad Company was a real dissapointment, Battlefield 2 was a great game in it's time and if this is as cheap as they promise I might pick this up.

For anyone still waiting on Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix in Europe on the old PS3, tomorrow is the day (a little miss-timed now, perhaps):

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And for PC gamers who had a (jealous) eye on Jonathan Blow's Braid, the game will be heading to PC at the end of March:

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New Worms game heading to XBLA and PSN, could be woo-some, might not be:

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Awesome. Worms Armaggedon is the best of the series by far. It's basically a case of seeing who can go the longest without breaking the gentlemen's agreement not to use the Concrete Donkey or Nuclear Test...

Or am I thinking of Worms World Party? I can never remember which is which...

That update is pretty disappointing. I don't care about the 1080p, especially not with a game as basic as Worms, but it's stupid to give the PSN release additional weapons and levels when they seem to be in development at the same time. I'm eager to see what new content the XBLA version is getting, but it would still be nice if they didn't describe it as a nerfed PSN release.

Can't you just be happy to get Worms without having to have a gay-baby hissyfit about WHY DOES THE PLAYSTATION GET MORE CAKE THAN ME

But yeah 1080p on Worms is basically a recipe for eyestrain unless they massively overhaul the sprites

which they won't do

because Team17 are incredibly lazy

"Pretty disappointing" has to be the lowest rank of gay-baby hissyfit possible. I apologize for not overreacting more.

There have been too many bad Worms games since Armageddon to get excited solely by the series name now. I'm hopeful; that's all.

Um, I think your righteous, fanboy anger is more than a little misplaced anyway dude. Read again what Maggie posted, taking into account they mention specifics of the PSN version first and then tell me the PSN isn't getting the old XBLA game with 1080p graphics and XBLA isn't getting a whole new game with all the weapons from Armageddon in it, i.e. something much better than the PS3 version.

I mean shit, it pays to read these things properly before you draft a letter to your local congressman.

How are you people getting rage out of that? All I said is that it's irritating if they're really developing one version of the new game to have extra weapons and levels when there's no real reason not to make them the same.

The way I read it, and still read it, is that the PSN version is an enhanced version of the XBLA game the rest of the article was already talking about. Below that it specifies "original" XBLA Worms. It could be read either way, and I hope you're right.

Yeah, it doesn't state specifically if the PSN release is an enhanced version of the original XBLA game or the new one that that's coming out for XBLA.

EDIT: Oh forget it you guys can fight all you want.

Can't we all just agree that Worms was awesome?

a strong emphasis on the word "was"

The latest W:A patch is only about 8 months old so I'm going to go ahead and replace that "was" with an "is" okay good times yeah

Worms Open Warfare 2 on the DS is pretty great too. Awesome Worms games do still exist.

Surely, these must be outrageous lies. Next you'll be telling me there is a better Oregon Trail.

As it happens, I quite like Worms 3D. It's a completely different game to the 2D ones but can still be fun, especially with unlimited jetpacks.

Armaggedon really was the pinacle though. Me and a mate generally play in an enclosed level (So no strikes or anything) with a tiny bit of land on each end and a load of bridges between them. There's an unwritten rule that the first person to move has to use a kamakazi across one of the bridges (Especially if there is only one bridge) and if anyone manages to fling themselves into the air off a ninja rope, open the parachute in midair and then launch a supersheep and fly it into a really narrow gap between two bridges and kill someone and yet still land safely, they automatically win the round. Jetpack herd of cows drops are pretty suave too. It's amazing how good you can get at a game when you play it a lot, stoned...

Just to clear up some of the Worms nonsense that was discussed in here, Team 17 have seemingly put up images from the upcoming games on Facebook, and it very much appears that the PSN is getting a version of the Worms that has been on XBLA for ages, and XBLA is getting Worms 2: Armageddon.

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W00t! I'll probably get this round about the day it comes out then.

One has to wonder why Team 17 doesn't just develop the same game for XBLA and PSN.

$$$$$

thats why

Wouldn't it be more profitable to work on one game and release it for both XBLA and PSN than developing two seperate games?

But the PS3 is getting the old XBLA game so it's already made, they just need to tweak it for PSN, it probably cost them fuck all and they've used it as an exercise in writing for the PS3. This way they can release the new XBLA game on PSN in a year's time and make a load more money.

I would assume the reasoning might have something to do with Worms being a PC game, the 360 being (by all accounts) fairly easy to port PC source to, and the PS3 not being so easy to code for. I imagine they may well be using the opportunity to port a simpler game (the original Worms) to the PS3 to get a feel for it.

I could be wrong, but that'd be my guess.

I'm not sure how much "simpler" one game is than the other, considering 2 is a couple of physics parameter changes and a bunch of new weapons. And the occasional inconsequential transparency effect.

I'm pretty sure if you can do one, the other would require a negligible amount of additional effort.

I'm feeling the idea of the double dip being more profitable being the main reason behind this.

Do you have any idea of the maths involved in dropping a Concrete Donkey on a tightly packed group of 12 worms in a low gravity environment?

Details are scarce and I didn't see it mentioned here, so behold a new Mega Drive/Genesis.

Well, kind of. These guys already released a handheld and some controllers with built in Mega Drive games. This new thing however is console shaped, comes with two 6 button pads and has a cartridge slot. The site doesn't give a whole lot of info, but its listing on Play.com says "you can use original Mega Drive and Genesis cartridges from all regions". It also gives the built in games as:

Alex Kid
Alien Storm
Altered Beast
Arrow Flash
Bonanza Bros.
Columns
Crack Down
Decap Attack
E Swat
Fatal Labyrinth
Flicky
Gain Ground
Golden Axe
Shadow Dancer
Sonic And Knuckles

It being branded as "Plug and Play on your TV" suggests that it'll be battery instead of mains powered, which would be a pain. I'm not going to get my hopes up about being able to unplug those pads and use them on a proper Mega Drive either. It'll be released in Europe on the 24th of April and probably nowhere else ever.

I was thinking more of MS giving them money to make it exclusive but yeah your idea could be true

Luke, excellent news my boy, there's another trilogy of Layton games in the work.

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This is excellent news, though a tad annoying, because I'm desperately waiting for them to get number 2 out in English (come on guys, how long must we wait?).

I saw a commercial for Layton on TV recently. Looked like they were pushing this game hard for the ladies. I may be a piratefag but I did my part and bought myself a copy of Layton. I think it's still in its shrinkwrap because I've been playing it off an on via my Cyclo. Hopefully by the time I actually get around to finishing it they announce bringing the rest of the games over.

Play Animal Crossing? Well according to the Mid Missouri internet task force that makes you a pedo... ugh.

Online task force: Adults shouldn't play Animal Crossing - Ars Technica

Why can't people who don't know what they're talking about keep their mouths shut? I don't like Animal Crossing myself, but that's just retarded. I mean, what about all the people who played the original before it even had internet capability?

Yeah, Missouri is onto me. Why can't a grown man collect fruit-based furniture in peace?

Ah crap. I usually don't look in the sewers. Didn't realize it was already mentioned.

Somehow I don't think anyone can blame you for not checking the Sewers before posting gaming news.

http://j.photos.cx/animalcrossing_sad-1f0.gif

Missouri needs to screen its employees better for the crazy.

Something to perhaps pique Q's interest, it seems Max Payne 3 is on the way for winter time:

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Any fans of Tim Schafer might want to check out this little web-based adventure game he's made: Double Fine Minigames! - Host Master and the Conquest of Humor?

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Son of a bitch I'm stuck. I just found half a joke in the mirror.

GDC Game Awards time, and it's Fallout 3 that claims the big prize:

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It pleases me greatly to see some other folks noticed this. There's some truely great work done here from both an atmospheric and technical standpoint. I'm glad that the game has gotten at least some of the accolades it deserves.

Maybe now Rockstar will go back to making games that are fun, as well as technically impressive.

Oddly, Square Enix has purchased Eidos.

Takeover: Square Enix Eidos Takeover Is Go

I guess the big question is... how long before Lara Croft appears in Kingdom Hearts.

Considering only Square characters ie Final Fantasy characters have appeared thus far the chances are pretty damn low. Not that I care.

Yeah, they've not branched away from Final Fantasy so far so it looks unlikely. That said, Lara Croft is probably a more recognisable character than anyone from an Enix game (At least to the western market who I believe the Kingdom Hearts games are primarily aimed at) so never say never.

If we're really lucky, this aquisition will mean they'll release a sequel to Deathtrap Dungeon which is an awesome game, as well as being one of the most unfairly difficult games of all time. Again, it's unlikely but we can dream, right?

Rumour time: it looks like there's rumours floating about the Internets suggesting that Marvel vs Capcom 2 could be heading to the XBLA (and one would assume the PSN too). Could turn out to be nothing, but fingers crossed, because that was an awesome game on the Dreamcast and I'd be down for picking it up again with some online multiplayer action.

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Looool is that a Wolverine quote in that there achievement. I agree it needs more FUCK THE KNICKS and such though.

Max Payne 3 you say? That could be interesting. Gonna have to go with Shin (god help me) in saying that I hope it's more fun than the stuff they've released lately.

Me and a mate used to session MvC2 in the arcade and the Dreamcast release was awesome too. Let's hope if this does come out it means they're gonna release Powerstone too.

That along with Project Justice would be the best gaming news I've heard in a long time.

My PS1 Rival Schools Disk has finally given up the ghost now so that'd be a great addition to the service.

Since Bethesda have apparently just announced this at an event in London (source) then I think this moves from being a rumour to actual news.

Actually, I'd say that this caters more to the Fallout 1 and 2 fans.

Thank god. I was hoping they were working on ESV, which is highly likely their next game.

If you don't want to do multiplayer for it Bethesda, at least put coop in ESV thanks.

Speaking of Fallout, has the Pitt DLC ever been fully fixed? Last I heard it was still kind of glitchy even though they put it back up on the marketplace for download. I'd really like to give it a go, but it had some pretty nasty issues before.

Joke's on them, Vegas is already a nuclear wasteland.

I always did want a New Reno-ish city in Fallout 3. I was pretty disappointed that there wasn't. Hopefully this will be similar.

If you think anybody is going to bother catering anything to the mongoloids at NMA you have another think coming.

Obsidian is a real studio that exists in reality and, like Bethesda, they will produce an actual game that actual people will actually buy. If anybody's expecting a FO2 expansion pack just because Avellone's involved I feel deeply, deeply sorry.

Will it have a different feel than the Bethesda game? Of course. Will it be "a return to the old school"? Ahahahaha, ahahahahaha, hahahahaha, hahahahahahaha, no.

I'm pretty excited about this myself but that's because I love Fallout and I trust Obsidian, not because of some hallucinatory idea of it being a throwback.

(If nothing else, Obsidian will probably hire more than three VAs)

It would be interesting to see what the profit margins have been like for Obsidian on projects like this, as they've basically been their bread and butter since the Black Isle days, so you'd think something has to be working. They tend to have a reputation for getting good content creators, but I would think that might almost bite them more with the escalation of next gen graphics. Maybe they make it up with not having to dive into the nuts and bolts of game creation as often. Then again, quite a few companies have moved over to wholly purchased engine development, so really it would be more the tradeoff off of existing franchises / user bases with licensing fees.

Also, if were to be some Avellone driven project, I would much rather see Fallout:Torment. Need another million word count novel hidden in a game.

Seems someone heard you Garr, and you now have your answer to that question: May 5th.

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Now this is only unofficially(?) speculation right now, but I've just come across a couple of telling signs that the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 will soon be graced with the presence of a certain fighting game that takes you for rides:

http://www.xblarcade.com/files/mvc2_listing_3.png

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If this is considered old news, then forgive me because I wasn't aware until now; The articles I linked to were posted only a few days ago so they should still be relevant, even if only containing 'updated' info.

:gonk:

Well damm, my bad.

No worries, though interesting that the rumour is still floating about. Guess we'll see how it plays out, but no official news has hit yet.

It's been confirmed, Marvel Vs Capcom 2 is heading to the XBLA and PSN this summer:

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Follow the link for more information on the feature they're bringing.

Trailers and some gameplay. Where are my delicious pixel edges though :(

But finally, no one pussying out choosing Easy Mode.

Seriously, Easy Mode has to be the worst addition in any of these tag games.

I've not seen the trailers (at work), but I'm guessing they're showing off the 'smooth' mode for the sprites. You'll be interested in this bit from the Capcom page I linked above Q:

So, are you guys gonna make an attempt at playing this game seriously or are you all going to just play it for about a week or two and never touch it again? (Street Fighter 4 anyone?)

Ouch. Is that entirely necessary Manny? I mean, I personally plan to pick up SFIV again soon, but have been somewhat distracted with life, illness, work and other games (heaven forbid). At the moment I'm not 100% sure I'll be picking this up as it largely depends on what price they pitch it at.

Q: This entry at Capcom Unity has comparison snaps of Classic and Smoothed filters if you're interested: http://www.capcom-unity.com/jimmyrey...ts_mahvel_baby

MvC2 is far more appealing than SFIV to me as it attracts far fewer of the people like Manny who take fighting games far too seriously in my experience. At least that's how it always used to be in the arcades round here. You'd get a load of spotty nerds hanging around the SF3 and KoF cabinets discussing counter ranges and pokes and what ever the fuck it is you weirdos talk about and the MvC and similar games would just have people having a laugh and playing the game on them.

It's a sillier game but there's still room to have serious fights which is why I like it. Hopefully this release will have decent online connectivity and I won't be too handicapped using the shitty 360 d-pad (Because you can fuck right off if you think I'm spending £100 on an arcade stick to play a game that costs a tenner and I already have several iterations of on a console I do have a decent arcade stick for). I suppose I could get a PS3 and the PSN version and use my old Namco arcade stick to play it.

Anyway, I'll probably be buying this and studiously avoiding anyone who talks about frame cancelling and tiering of characters.

That's excellent news OP. Looking sweet indeed.

Wow, awesome! Even though I'm one of five people on the planet who liked the Jazzy music, I'm still glad to hear about support of custom soundtracks. I wonder if there will be any new extras, such as color themes, or perhaps saved team configurations (Load up your 'profile' and automatically select with Cable, Spider-Man and Ryu, for example)? I guess with them saying no unlockables (or very few) extra surprises will be kept to a minimum. Online battle is gonna be the real draw for me I think.

Anyway, great news to hear Omagnus, can't wait for this =D

My apologies for being snobbish in that post. Just, I can't help but wonder why people buy these games sometimes when they only play it for X amount of time, never care enough to get better, then just throw it off to the side. It has me thinking "Why are they so excited about it in the first place then?".

That's the thing. I never said "You guys should be spending at least 5 hour a day on this game to get better otherwise, you should not be playing this game!". I AM however questioning why people would want to purchase this game unless they fit one of these 2 things:

-They got a group of buddies that they wanna stick with and don't care about getting much better at the game overall and won't bother playing with randoms.

-They want to seriously learn the game.

I would like to just remind everyone that if you fall under the first one, don't start complaining about the game when you start to run into this (which will be a lot more often than other games since this game is insanely popular in America):

YouTube - ECC9 MVC2 Santhrax VS JWong Grand Finals Set 2 Part 1

Also, the people that fall under the second one will far outnumber the people who fall under the first after a few weeks. THIS is the reason why fighting games are such a niche market. It's also (IMO) the biggest problem with fighting games. Some people like tackle football, and other people like tag football.

Not being funny Manny but you can pretty much get the fuck out with that attitude. I quite frankly feel I've put plenty of time in Street Fighter IV (as I have with most every game I've played) and don't need anyone telling me what I am and aren't allowed to have been excited about.

I get excited about games that look like they'll bring me enjoyable experiences, or those that are remakes/re-release of games I know I have enjoyed before (as is the case with MvC2), and if I buy it I can spend 5 minutes or 5 years playing it for all it matters. Perhaps I should give companies who produce games I don't plough endless hours into the finger and just pirate their games or something, is that your alternative plan? Or because I don't spend the Manny-approved amount of hours with a game do I not deserve to play it at all? Fuck you.

Shin: If I buy this, which I probably will provided they don't charge silly money for it, then I'm down for some muck about fighting with you.

I agree wholeheartedly with Omagnus, why is it so wrong to just buy a game to have a laugh with it? Let's face it, a full price computer game costs about the same as a night out these day, often less so if I've got at least five hours enjoyment out of it then that represents good value for money in my book. I don't feel the need to invest hundreds of hours getting good at something in order to justify buying the thing in the first place.

I own plenty of games I'm not that good at and I've had hours of fun playing them online, even against randoms who are much better at them than I am. Sure sometimes you get taken apart in quick order but that doesn't neccessarily make it less fun. Personally I can enjoy something without winning all the time.

The idea that someone wouldn't play a game online if they weren't serious about becoming the greatest player ever is a stupid one, simple as that. Manny, are you one of those people who quits out of games they can no longer mathematically win? People like that are the reason I don't play online at all as much as I used to, what's wrong with just playing games for the fun of playing them?

And yes Omagnus, I'm bang up for that assuming this is under £15 or so.

Yeah, should be grabbing that. I'm interested to see how the controls handle, and most importantly how well the swinging mechanic has been implemented, since those are the bits that make me question whether or not this will get a purchase. I'm pretty sure Skills is planning to get it too, so with a few more we should be able to set up some private matches (provided the demo supports that).

Absolutely. I've been aching for a multiplayer game with some vertical action forever.

Okay, I apologize for getting you guys all riled up. Thank you Shin for at least answering the question.

Just read about this:

http://psp.ign.com/articles/977/977050p1.html

Tekken 6 for the PSP? Finally something entertaining to play while on the shitter!

Nah man, I can't play it for 30 hours this week so it won't be worth the asking price. :(

I take it you don't own a DS, then.

I do. Just finished all the games that I currently own.

Then you obviously need a flash cart.

Yes because naturally the solution to "I've completed all the games I own" is "Well then you need to pirate some games" not "Buy some more". -__-

But Omagnus, if he wasn't going to buy them anyway then they've not lost out on any revenue have they? Everyone's a winner!

/me minimises the window on his pirated copy of Civ IV and acts nonchalant

Sticking it to da man, hell yeah.

Bionic Commando demo is live. See you guys on there.

EDIT: Holy shit, the grappling mechanics aren't that bad!

EDIT 2: Online competitive play sucks, though. Is there going to be online co-op in the full game? That might have potential.

Since there's probably a bunch of us who will be chatting about this game more over the next few days I've put up a new thread for BC discussion:

http://www.gamingforce.org/forums/vi...-commando.html

I would have posted this in the Call of Duty 4 thread, but really that thing is long dead and so I'll stick it here.

Now I like Infinity Ward as a dev, and I love me some Call of Duty 4 since it is a fantastic game and the online MP was some of the best going until the number of cheaters and glitches became too many for it to be any fun anymore. In the world of "Where was this a fucking year ago?!" news, IW are finally attempting to patch the game to stop cheaters.

[ source ]

I mean really, seriously, where the fuck was this a year ago?! This is very much a case of too little, waaaaaay too late. Right now I'd rather they spend their time make sure people can't glitch and cheat the fuck out of Modern Warfare 2.

I know the submission process is bullshit, but the PC version had these fixes a year back. While I'm appreciative, too little, waaaay too late is the understatement of the year.

Maybe they'll add a delay in fire rate for some weapons so assholes with shit like this end up losing out.

I think they lost out the day they spent $130 just to improve their reload rate in a computer game.

Oh nice, maybe once this patch is out, my idiot friends will go back to CoD4 so I won't have to play CoD:WaWateredDown anymore.

This doesn't warrant it's own thread but this weekend Microsoft are throwing the Xtival, the best part of which is all silver memberships count as gold for the weekend so Qwarky can play people online for a couple of days. I imagine there'll also be some new dlc, probably for the music games and maybe a new t-shirt or some shit for your avatar.

Most of us are cheap asses these days. Such as myself.

Not all of us have money to blow on games. :(

First of all, don't say 'most' when you're speaking on your own behalf alone. There may be other 'cheap asses' here who think like you, but unless you're the head of some union you're representing own opinion, nothing more.

Also I wasn't mocking the fact that you choose to pirate games, more the fact that your default move to running out of games was 'well you need to pirate some'. You may not be able to afford to buy brand new games, and that sucks for you, but that doesn't make that attitude OK.

Regardless, all this is discussion for another thread, it certainly doesn't belong in the news thread, so if you want to continue this please feel free to start a thread on it or PM me.

I couldn't find any women to sleep with me last weekend so I did the obvious thing and raped some bitch. I mean, it's not like her pussy healed up after or anything, she can still use it so it's a victimless crime right?

Some people would say that if you can't afford luxury items like games then you should go without until you can afford them. Hell, it's not like games are even that expensive these days. I remember paying £60 for Killer Instinct when it came out in the 90's. You can get three new games for that now, not even taking into consideration inflation.

Anyway, in more exciting news Ubisoft have announced their lineup for the coming year and there's a new Ghost Recon game in it. Also Splinter Cell, Red Steel and Assasin's Creed (Which we all knew about anyway). No mention of a new Rainbow game but they tend to stagger Rainbow and GR games from one year to the next as they're pretty interchangeable. The new one is tagged GR4 (GRAW being 3) which suggests a fundemental departure of some sort from GRAW although there wasn't a huge step up from GR and Island Thunder to GR2 and Summit Strike. Anyway, I'll be keeping an eye on this because I fucking love Tom Clancy games, even if they are all the same.

Which reminds me, I really ought to play GRAW 2 at some point.

I saw some news today that had Ubisoft saying that they're starting to prepare for the next generation of games consoles. Fuck that. Perhaps it's just me, but I don't even feel like we're even at the mid-point of this generation's life yet, let alone near ready to be thinking about another one.

I'm amused by Splinter Cell being mentioned again, since I'd assumed that had slipped off the face of the planet. Will be interesting to see what sort of shape it appears in once they start showing something.

Two years ago they showed their Jack Bauer Sam Fisher hiding in plain sight stealth Splinter Cell that looked hilariously bad, then like you said, it fell off the face of the earth. Hopefully they've spent the last couple of years ditching that idea and making something that isn't retarded.

Wasn't that supposed to be called Splinter Cell:Conviction or something? I remember seeing some screenshots of the guy in it running around an office building and jumping through a window or something dressed in jeans. If memory serves it looked like Stranglehold with less action in it.

Yeah, that's the one. Nothing says stealth like a guy walking through a crowded park in the middle of the day.

I tend to think of this as a good thing, most internal Ubi games are lucky to be development for half an hour before they're shit out onto a conveyor belt, so something with some degree of work effort thought put in instead of diarrhea in a jar like usual might be a good thing.

For anyone here who still doesn't have the game at all, or only has the 360 version, this Friday (i.e., tomorow), Steam is offering Left 4 Dead for the low low price of $0. That's a Zero, not an o.

The catch? Its more like a glorified demo: The promotion, called "Freaky Free Friday" will allow Steam users to download the entire game for free and play it for 24 hours before it becomes locked, at which point gamers will have to cough up the cash to continue playing.

If some among you are curious what the noise about this game is all about, this provides a good opportunity to try out the game, for a very reasonable price.

The official announcement from Steam's website:

Source:
The Escapist : News : Left 4 Dead 4 Free 4 24 Hours
Kotaku - Left 4 Dead Will Be Free! (For 24 Hours) - Left 4 Dead
Left 4 Dead on Steam

Now no one has an excuse not to try this. They could download and try just to see how it runs on their computer.

I saw the same announcement in Edge. It was pretty thin on details though so it could just be corporate hot air (Given that it came from their annual report) or it could mean they're upping the number of polys in the Rabbid models in anticipation of Nintendo managing a resolution better than VGA with their next console. I doubt that the announcement is in any way tied to any actual game development, there's a lot more than two years left in the current generation. Hell, there was another article on the Edge website with Sony claiming the PS3 will be number one console in five years, hardly the announcement of a company planning on superceding it in a couple of years.

Well, obviously it's literally just them pondering over unfinalized tech specs, but even if all they do is even contemplate a fucking tech demo, that's still far more effort put in than the average Ubi brick of condensed dog shit in a box that lines our store shelves.

I am merely joking about how garbage they are, not making any serious comment regarding anything else

I don't know, it takes a bit of foresight to come up with a plan like clipping the ending off your game and selling it separately. Some of their games are so bad it had to have been planned.

I saw leaked internal documents that stated Prince of Persia's name while in development was "Project Namco-Bandai"

They've produced some decent games over the years, I wouldn't write them off just yet. Armoured Core 2 was pretty decent, Grandia 2 is fairly popular and who can honestly say they didn't love Iron Lord?

I never did get to the end of that. :(

That's From Software, Game Arts, and a game made by two people in 1989, none of which were touched by the internal dev houses that make up Ubisoft's shitfactory these days.

The correct answer would have been Vegas, the latter Silent Hunters, and Chaos Theory.

In Shin's defense, Ubisoft was the publisher for those NA/EU-wise.

Um, yeah. Duh.

But this entire time I was referencing them as a developer, see.

Thank you for pointing out the flaw of my comment, in that people can't tell the difference. I know Shin knows. I'm just throwing this out there.

A++ will never assume anyone knows anything again.

Likewise, I was trying to make a joke about how the only good things with UbiSoft's name on are things they've published not developed themselves.

The joke was rather let down by the fact that I think most people know I'm pretty gay for Vegas and Blazing Angels.

Well, that was one big clusterfuck then. Let's pretend our unfunny asses haven't said anything for the last four posts and let's continue on with our day, then.

Hey, I kinda liked Pandora Tomorrow.

And why no Sands of Time, that's like one of the greatest games to start with the logo :mad:

Screw the Tom Clancy crap, it's all about Rayman 2 & 3. As amusing as the Rabbids are, I'd love to see them put out another actual Rayman platformer. That seems more and more doubtful with each Rabbid entry, though.

Well considering with Pandora Tomorrow came one of the greatest multiplayer game modes of all time, and had a decent single player. What was not to like? Too bad they decided to not include such multiplayer in Double Agent. They should just have both modes in the next one.

For those among us who enjoy Deus Ex, it has come to my attention that The Nameless Mod has recently been completed, which in a nutshell, is an enormous single-player total conversion mod for Deus Ex.

Source:
Gamasutra - News - Interview: Offtopic Productions Talks Making Mods And Taking Names
Narcissus Speaks: Nameless Mod Released | Rock, Paper, Shotgun
TNM - The Nameless Mod

I believe this is also required:
http://www.pleaselink.me/_/myconfine...ex-mention.jpg

Sorry for the double-post, but Marvel Vs. Capcom has been given a release date by Marvel: June 29th, and will be available on the PSN for US $15 and on Xbox LIVE Arcade for 1,200 Microsoft Points. It should be noted that Marvel added a small disclaimer: "scheduled release dates are subject to change". So until someone officially says otherwise, that's the Monday you can get taken for a ride.

Source: Newsarama.com : Marvel Releases Q1 2009 Numbers

SORNY Walkman Entertainment pushes Atari over in the mud up runs off with publishing rights to Ghostbusters. It's now a timed PS3/PSP/PS2 (there was a PS2 version?) exclusive. 360/Wii/DS versions to be released towards the end of the year from Atari. I think.

That's if Atari is still around by then. :cmb:

I... I... What?!

Bit of a bummer, but I figure this'll give them time to fix whatever bugs the tripple version with ship with, and throw in some new content for the 360 version. Every cloud has a silver lining.

(If not, well, the PS3 version will be cheaper by the time it hits the other platforms, so I'll just wait to spring for it.)

ITT: Atari slaps money out of my hand, watches it fall into the gutter, laughs at me

This announcement only affects PAL territories, according to Kotaku. Atari is still publishing the title in North America, so no worries for us.

Yeah, looking at the article again the Atari rep does call out Europe specifically. I guess I deserve to be deceived if I trust a news website with a .biz extension.

How is the site deceiving you if there is mention to the fact that it's Europe specifically? Also, perhaps worth noting is that it's a UK-based site (which would explain the point of view from which it is written).

And, with that, millions of people around the world who intelligently voted in their DNF deadpools that the answer was "never" are now 100% correct.

Nonsense. Always bet on Duke.

Apparently, the Duke Nukem Trilogy for DS and PSP are still scheduled for release. Duke isn't going down that easily.

3D Realms reportedly closed, Duke Nukem Trilogy 'unaffected' - News at GameSpot


Wow...Take-Two retains Duke Nukem Forever publishing rights.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6209271.html

In that it takes several paragraphs to get to this (implied) point. It's like a newspaper article with the headline FRENCH FRIES ARE CYANIDE RISK and then when you read all the way to the bottom it was just one guy's french fries and it turned out the cyanide was because the kid working the deep fryer dropped an Almond Joy in there.

I had no idea the site was UK-focussed, and Infernal certainly didn't point it out; ergo, I was deceived.

I am still betting on Duke. This is just a hoax publicity stunt, and E3 will have a gigantic Duke-a-mania.

So, a remake of Lunar: The Silver Star was announced for the PSP in the latest Famitsu (it's titled Lunar: Harmony of the Silver Star). Graphically, it looks similar to Lunar Legend, except towns and dungeons are now viewed from an isometric angle.

oh nice! I love Lunar:SSSC on ps1 but sadly I lost my cds and the only way I could play it now was on emulator, but having this on psp will be great!

edit: just found the scan if anyone is interested.

http://thumbnails6.imagebam.com/3561/d232e035607845.gif

As much as I love the Lunar series, I question how many times they're gonna keep re-releasing this game. I mean, isn't this like the fifth time they've done so? Even though I heard it wasn't that great, I'd rather they make original titles in the franchise like Lunar: Dragon Song instead of releasing the first game over and over again.

But I heard Dragon Song was awful. Also if they bring that PSP port/remake of SSSC out here I wonder how its translation will compare to Working Designs' masterpiece.

Yeah, I'd love to have SSSC portable, but I've heard none of the versions can really stack up to the Working Designs' translation. It just wouldn't be quite the same without all that quirky stuff they put in there.

Dragon Song was a tragedy. I was so excited about the prospect of a new Lunar game, and then it turned out to be horrible with practically no redeeming features.

As much as I love Wolfenstein (and I fucking love Wolfenstein), I really would like to see ports of Doom RPG and Wolfenstein RPG show up on the Arcade. They'd just, you know, need to make 'em 200-400 points a pop.

When I played through Return to Castle Wolfenstein on the OldBox (Which was a great game btw) I got really excited that you could unlock the original Wolf3D when you finished it.

Then I finished it, replayed Wolf3D and was really disappointed how badly it had aged. Doom is still pretty playable now, Wolfenstein is just a bit dull sadly.

They should have reduced it to a minigame where you attempt to teabag robohitler. Now that's an unlockable!

Oh wow.

Kotaku - Nintendo Power: Tatsunoko vs Capcom Coming To US - Tatsunoko

Tatsunoko vs Capcom is allegedly coming to the US. All that licensing tape but it's happening.

It seems we may not have seen the last of Duke Nukem Forever.

Take-Two is suing 3D Realms, basically for taking too god damn long to make the game and ultimately shitcanning it. Also, they want the DNF source code to be preserved for the entirety of the trial.

The writer brings up a good point. If Take-Two wins, and they get the source code, they may actually finish the job and we just might get to see that awesome gameplay that Garr posted put to good use.

Hideo Kojima is screwing with us again...the son of a bitch. A teaser site on konami's website has been updated. It's a vast field and thunder and lightning going on. When the lightning flashes, what looks to be the number "5" or an "S" appears briefly then disappears.

KOJIMA PRODUCTION "NEXT"

Now could this be Metal Gear Solid 5? Well it's likely that it is a Metal Gear game. If you view the source of the page, here's a look at the metatags:

<meta name="author" content="KONAMI" />
<meta name="description" content="KOJIMA PRODUCTION &quot;NEXT&quot;">
<meta name="copyright" content="©2009 Konami Digital Entertainment" />
<meta name="keywords" content="Hideo Kojima, MGS,METAL GEAR, NEXT, game, konami, kojima game, KJP, Kojima Production ">

Like I said Hideo could be screwing with us again. It's something to watch out for, though.

or they could just be putting those things in the code because people will search for them. either way, my bet it if it is mgs it will be like metal gear acid or some other non-canonical game.

how awesome would it be if it were mgs4 subterfuge (or suburb) for xbox 360...

but how much you want to bet it's like zone of the enders or something.

Zone of the Enders is arguably a lot more exciting than MGS4 for the 360. Sorry bub.

General internet consensus seems to be that it's a new MGS game with Raiden in it, a.k.a Metal Gear Unpopular I imagine.

It's actually MGS4 Cheekless Suit Edition.

maybe for some, but depending on the console it was released for, zoe3 would probably sell like 20% of mgs4 for xbox360.

also, substance and subsistence were so much better than mgs2 and 3 that a revamped version of mgs4 would probably grab the attention of a lot more people than a zoe game. it may be a better gamer, I am not questioning that, it's just that mgs is much, MUCH more popular and therefore almost anything you do with it will be exciting for a lot more people than zoe.

if it is a new mgs game with raiden, what do you guys make of the countdown? it is too early for a game to be released... but it's pointless to put a countdown in for a simple press-release.

It's "pointless", but it's done for a lot of big releases, like Grand Theft Auto IV. There's nothing to make of it, it's just for publicity.

Regardless, if it's another Metal Gear, Kojima should just kill himself. Personally, I'd like to see a neo-noir detective adventure in the world of Snatcher, or preferrably something entirely new. There's also a rumour that the game is called "Tornado Outbreak", though the source is very dubious (a GameFly database entry).

Or Kojima could make an entirely new IP. That might be neato.

I read that Kojima wanted to initially stop on Metal Gear after the Playstation game, but the combination of Fans, Executives and Money kept him coming back to it. I wouldn't be suprised if there was another Metal Gear game, but I would be if Kojima was behind it. He WANTS do to new things.

New IPs would be awesome, but can I at least get ZoE3?

I'm a little surprise that the battle for DNF continues. Hopefully this may give them reason to hurry up and finish up DNF.

Even if it does ever get finished, there's no way it could even come close to living up to the hype. It's been so long coming that should it get released, the expectation would be that it'd be the best game ever made but the continued hold ups in development plus the fact that the original design team are all gone would suggest that it wouldn't be anything like that good. Even if it was a decent game people would still rag on it for not being worth the twenty five years they've spent making the thing.

Just look at Too Human. I like it and so do a lot of other people but the general reaction when it was released after being in development since 1972 was "Is that it?". It had lukewarm sales and now it looks like Silicon Knights have abandoned the project, having gone from promising DLC and sequels in the near future to having made no comment at all since August last and concentrating instead on issuing lawsuits to try and scrape back some money.

Just go and play Quake with Army of Darkness on in the background, it'll be essentially the same experience.

People still expected it to be a good game? I figured they were more looking forward to a Duke "experience" more than a top-notch FPS.

You mean a load of Carry On-esque innuendos delivered in a deep voice? I didn't find Duke 3D that amusing when I was 15, I wouldn't have thought the experience has aged all that well. I assumed people kept banging on about this because it was supposed to be a good game, not for the knob gags.

I guess I can continue holding out on buying it until the Game of the Year Edition hits, since the regular version is still full price.

Really? It's been about £20 here in most shops for months now.

Well I'm definitely glad I waited on getting the game, despite being pretty interested in it. Still don't know if I'm willing to pay full price for the GotY edition (because I'm cheap like that), but at least there's a way better chance of the physical game going on sale than there is of the DLC doing so.

I still see it for full price everywhere too.

Sadly, I already got the game, so if I want the new DLC I will end up spending something like $110 on the game. Fuck.

I guess it must not be as popular over here or something. Us Europeans do only play football games after all.

I've seen it on sale a couple of times (for around $40 or so), but never low enough to prompt me to buy it (which is usually about $20 or so for most games I'm interested in).

One thing I'm wondering though is if they're going to release another Collector's Edition along with the GotY version. I kinda doubt it, though I'd certainly buy it since I usually try to get them when they're available. But if it comes down to getting the CE or getting the GotY, there's no question I'm gonna choose the better value on in-game content over some knick knacks I don't actually need.

New Dreamcast Homebrew
 

Well, it is called "Duke Nukem' Forever..."

Also, just wanted to mention a possible new Dreamcast homebrew game (that's not some junk puzzler or scrolling shooter). It's called Hypertension and it's a port/remake/homage of "Blood" by Monolith Software: New Dreamcast FPS “Hypertension” on its way - Sega Nerds Supposedly there are a lot of other FPS homebrew out there; I'm going to have to do some hunting...

As if the newly announced Gears 2 content wasn't enough:

I can only pray that should this become a reality, it could work in Private sessions and not just in Public sessions. I'd rather turn my eye in a clear moment and see intelligent teammates shooting down Grinders and Boomers than having to turn my head and see 3 guys get taken down in 2-second spans.

So it looks like Kojima's new game is another Big Boss prequel.

http://i40.tinypic.com/15pgvnn.jpg

[!]

The bovine standing in the field looks nervous.

That's some imposing art of Big Boss right there. I'm excited~ Wonder if it's going to be MGS5.

Also of note is that "P" and "R" now flash up on the screen along with "E", "3" and "5". E3, MGS5, PR...? Or maybe the 5 is an S, and it means PS3?

There's a lowercase e in there as well, but people have rumored that to be an @ symbol. In which case the message could read:

5 E3 @ PR

Along with the picture of Big Boss flashing from time to time. It's all speculation for now on whether it's MGS5 or a different Metal Gear, but something is definitely happening at E3.

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/image...famitsu_kp.jpg
http://cache.gawker.com/assets/image..._interview.jpg

This needs to be translated like right now!

5 PR(EQUEL) @ E3?

Maybe two parallel prequels in one game, one for Raiden (a lot of things happened to him after the events of MGS2 but before MGS4 that were mentioned only in passing) and one for Big Boss leading up to the events of the first Metal Gear (not Solid) game. That would finally cover the whole storyline... until they decide to make another game with The Boss during World War 2.

Why don't they just cut the bullshit and just make this a movie, with 7 minute load times in between scenes of course.

Kojima I am getting sick and tired of playing this game with you. You have IPs other than Metal Gear. Where is my next-gen Zone of the Enders?

In other, less Kojima-fellatio news, Raiden 4 has been announced for North American release. This is great news if you're one of the five people in NA that care about shmups on consoles. I hope you'll buy it twenty times so we'll get more of these stateside.

Source: 1up

Nova's not wrong. Considering how much gameplay they remove with each progressive iteration here, I'm actually quite confused as to what they could remove from MGS4 while going forward. It's like performing organ removal surgery on a skeleton at this point. In the end, they'll just pull the spine out and it won't even resemble a game anymore. Just a mass of broken garbage on the floor.

It'll just turn into Xenosaga.

That makes me one of five apparently. Thanks for the heads up... although I'll probably only get one copy.

It'll be an on-rails, Virtua Cop style shooter, only to get the best stealth rating you have to not shoot anyone.

For those among us who enjoy fast-paced First Person Shooters, Steam is having a "Free To Play" weekend once again (Much like what they did with Left 4 Dead and Team Fortress 2 recently) and this time it is for Unreal Tournament 3 Black.

The game can be 'pre-loaded' right now, and will be officially available to try out today at 10AM (Your time zone may vary). The game is Single and Multiplayer, features Co-op, and has Steam Achievements. In addition, it also includes the 'Titan Pack', which has lots more vehicles, weapons, characters and deployable items.

Source:
UT3 Black free on Steam this weekend News // PC /// Eurogamer - Games Reviews, News and More
Shack PSA: Unreal Tournament 3 Free Weekend Begins Anew This Thursday - Shacknews - PC Games, PlayStation, Xbox 360 and Wii video game news, previews and downloads

YouTube Video

Sega takes a bold step in their quest to make the worst Sonic game ever.

WHY IS SONIC IN A CAR?!? HE'S THE FASTEST THING ON THE PLANET, A CAR WILL ONLY SLOW HIM DOWN.

Sonic Team Kart Racing Wii™

Sonic Team Presents Kart Racing PS3 Wii 360 With Monkey Balls

Oh jeez...well, it's worth a shot as long as it controls better than Sonic Riders.

Strictly speaking, he's only the fastest thing alive.

YouTube Video

Mechanical improvements are a possibility.

This isn't the first sonic racing, of course. There's Sonic Drift 1 and 2 for Game gear and Sonic R for Saturn (I think). So I'm not too surprised by this, but I think I'm gonna get this anyway, when it comes out.

The important thing is that it isn't just a Sonic game, though. You can see Amigo several times in the trailer, so it's obviously a continuation of the Sega Superstars Tennis franchise. Sure it's incredibly stupid for Sonic to be in a car, but the game has potential especially if we get a House of the Dead course where you mow down zombies.

Alright, I am officially confused...damn you Hideo! While the countdown on Kojima Production "Next" is not supposed to end until Sunday, there seem to already be new additions. The picture of Raiden as shown above from the magazine, but now there are also a "6" , a "C" and a "O" or "0" appearing.

I'm quite pleased that I don't give a shit about Metal Gear, otherwise this absolutely bullshit countdown they're running would drive me insane.

Let's not forget the mask at KOJIMA PRODUCTION"MASK"

Remember how he said he wanted to try and make a humorous game? So he's either making two different games or the humorous part of the game will be the MGS cast in a horror survival game.

http://www.shacknews.com/images/gene...nkeyisland.jpg

It's the Internet

Holy fucking cunt burgers, Tales of Monkey Island episodic series announced for PC and WiiWare. Developed by Telltale Games. Complete remake of Secret of Monkey Island also headed to PC and XBLA.

The music on the mask page makes me happy in the pants.

But not as much as that Monkey Island news~

MONKEY ISLAND MONKEY ISLAND MONKEY ISLAND MONKEY ISLAND MONKEY ISLAND
OMG SO HAPPY

So Gamestop has an "E3 special" where select titles are Free Overnight Shipping if you order them. While browsing the titles there was one that stuck out in my head when I saw it.

The next Lego-style game: Lego Harry Potter Years 1-4.

IGN: Lego Harry Potter and Crystal Skull in Development

With the rumor of another Lego series... The Hobbit (possibly LotR?)

Lego Harry Potter should be interesting, though Crystal Skull seems kind of odd. One of the best things about the Lego games is the obscene number of playable characters, and I'm wondering how much they can get out of a single movie. So far it's always been trilogies or even the entire series in Batman's case.

Still, I'll look forward to both of them. Lego Batman in particular is one of my favorite recent platformers.

That story is a bit old. Since then, it's been officially announced as just Lego Indiana Jones 2, and while they said it would have elements of Crystal Skull in there, it won't exclusively focus on it.

EDIT: Here's a recent developer interview where they mention that it will feature elements from both the original trilogy and The Crystal Skull.

Ultimately this is probably somebody trolling, but this is a thread for rumors, anyway.

Why hello there.

I know, what happened to Capcom's mystery game? It's day two, and they still haven't had their press conference?

According to the E3 website, this is the fourth and final day. It would be nice to see at least Legends 1 and 2 released on XBLA/PSN...

It's the second day of the actual showcasing. Days one and two were conferences, which is why I'm confused.

Actually, there is an answer out there on Capcom's twitter feed: "Capcom Mystery Game #2: Resident Evil PSP. All new, designed specifically for PSPGo. A ways out, but an awesome design planned." I'm not sure where that was announced, but hooray?

Actually, E3 did start in the official sense (with the show floor, booths and all that jazz) on Tuesday. Yes, they had press conferences on that day, but companies were showcasing games then as well. So today is the official last day of the expo. Most people just refer to it as E3 week since there are pre-E3 events (i.e. Microsoft's press conference on Monday), and I wouldn't be surprised if there was still some E3 wrap-up stuff happening tomorrow.

How is Resident Evil mysterious? We get plenty of that. Come on Capcom, be creative for once. Or at least milk something we want you to milk.

As an extension of their respective conferences, sure-- after they speak they welcome people to stay and try things. It's semantics, as my point was that conferences were well over and the convention itself had been underway for some time. I really don't care numerically what day it is.

Well, that was certainly underwhelming. I thought they were teasing sequel that, you know, didn't come from a series that has annual entries.

All in all? Crummy E3, but certainly better than the smaller format. Smart move to bring back the glitz and glamor.

What's the difference between Guybrush Threepwood and 99% of Monkey Island players?



99% of Monkey Island players are already pirates.

:tpg:

I'm not gonna lie. I got a copy of The Secret of Monkey Island back in the day on floppy from my childhood friend's father and he also gave me xerox'd scans of every single combination of the spinning silly pirate head wheel. Of course later I bought my own copy but man was flipping through pages upon pages just so I could play the game ever so awesome. :)

Not sure if its been mentioned somewhere, but you have just under a week to register the rest of your Nintendo PINs before progress towards Platinum status is erased. Your coins will remain, but you'll have to start over as of July for the points.

https://club.nintendo.com/elite-award-reminder.do

Just register your 600 points so you can get the "special reward" or whatever it is. Either way, free stuff is free....but I assume nobody buys DS games here since you all have M3s, and nobody buys Wii games because "omg casual," so meh.

Correction.

No one buys Wii games because they don't exist.

Thanks for the tip, forgot about this.

Nothing really great to buy with the points though. Maybe I'll send for the Animal Crossing cards.

An invisible space wizard, a PS3 game, and a Wii game walk into a bar...

Wow, I pretty much never register my games, just systems. I went and got everything Wii/DS in my house and thanks to my mom buying her own DS and Wii games, I've got 690 points. I'm so tired of taking surveys -_-

According to a Rockstar email today, GTA:Chinatown Wars is coming out on PSP later this year with tweaked graphics and some new missions. Better get your torrent managers warmed up PSP fans.

I really don't get how they think if it didn't sell that well on the DS, that it'll sell any on the PSP.

But Qwarky, it's the highest rated DS game of all time, how would it not sell?

I imagine the graphical tweaks were done by a work experience kid and they'd already done the extra missions but couldn't fit them on a DS cart, there's no way they've spent any money on a PSP game. I think Liberty City Stories sold pretty well though so we could be underestimating them. After all, the overwhelming majority of DS's are owned by small children and girls whereas PSP's are owned by, well, the Playstation generation (That's us, folks) so are far more the target audience for a GTA game. Ignoring the fact that nobody ever buys PSP games, this could be a pretty popular title.

Didn't the Playstation generation buy those consoles because they had a huge game library? ;)

Sooo....

Mario Hat or Punch-Out Minigame?

I chose the hat just because, as much fun as it would be to fight Doc, it's a single-match Punch-Out!! that's going to be pirated to shit as soon as it falls into the wrong hands.

Why would anyone want to punch out Doc Louis anyway? Sure, the guy stole your bike, but that was back in 1987. Let it go. The man's changed, he's massive and eats nothing but chocolate. Plus he had that role in The Wire.

He's a war hero. You don't punch them in the fucking face.

It could be just me, but I don't like either of the two prizes. Both are pretty lame, and I can't decide which is the better of the two to get. I'm never going to wear the hat and the game doesn't interest me at all. : /

Seems MadCatz might be doing some more TE sticks, though not tied into SFIV this time:

[ source ]

Some good news and some bad news floating about today, though the good news also includes a bit of a WTF? moment.

Good news (if your name is Skills):

[ source ]

R-Type Tactics II: Operation Bitter Chocolate?! Erm, sure.

Bad news (especially if your name is Qwarky):

[ source ]

Boo.

You know, if they wanted more copies to be sold I'd slam all three games together. They have to have a shit ton of copies rotting in warehouses. And if not just all three games on one or two discs. For 60 buck I'd totally buy that.

You and no one else.

Also yeah, I read about that today. It's such shitty news, but not at all surprising. Meanwhile, Sonic Riderz will probably get a second sequel eventually because Miles probably bought that but not Yakuza 2. Most likely because it has black and white manual or something :mad:

MIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES >8U~

I wonder if Atlus will pick up the second one. Pretty awesome, regardless. I know enough about the mechanics of the first one to probably bullshit my way through the second, provided it's not a total overhaul. Importing if I have to.

No Yakuza 3 stateside? FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFffffff.

That news made me :(

The second Yakuza? It's been out in English, for quite some time.

20bux for a pretty awesome game.

Are you serious Taco. He's talking about R-Type... OP even said "Good News if you're name is Skills".

On topic though, I know SD is sorely disappointed in such low reception of Yakuza. He's a fan of the series too. I laughed when I saw him punch and kick a TIGER in Yakuza 2.

Aww, dammit. I guess there's no chance in hell that Yakuza: Kenzan! will make it either then, let alone the possibility of it ever getting an EU release.

I would have played the hell out of that game =(
Well, it's off my list, so I won't frequently be reminded of how much SEGA suck.


:sega: = :emo:

Well, Sega came out and publicly backtracked a bit, saying they still haven't decided.

Doesn't really mean anything, but I suppose you don't have to give up hope about Yakuza 3 yet.

An interesting bit of news from Konami regarding the PS2:

[ source ]

That's pretty awesome if it reaches EU too. I've never played MGS2 because I all I ever find is Sons of Liberty while browsing pre-owned games. Granted, I haven't put a whole much of effort into getting it, could just ebay - but this would make it easy to just pick up a scratch-free disc when I feel like having a go at it.

I wouldn't need to work that hard to find SH3 if that comes to yurop.

Even though I already have this, more copies of it available are never a bad thing :)

Also a question to Konami: why not Suikoden 3-5, why Tactics? :\

I wouldn't mind grabbing a copy of ZOE2 on the cheap if I ran across it. I've already beaten it as a rental many years ago, but it was quite a bit of fun. Even moreso once you get the teleportation ability at the end.

Wow, Microsoft just kicked Australia in the balls big time:

[ source ]

Whoever's idea it was to allow each territory to price individually in such a haphazard way needs a good slapping, along with the arsehole who decided 6000 MSP was reasonable for a download only version of a game. Fuck that sideways.

What blows my mind is they didn't learn from the Xbox Originals failure.

Sometimes "Try, try again" just doesn't work, boys.

Buying both games on disc, in the one package = $50

http://i28.tinypic.com/200p53s.jpg

Buying both games as digital downloads = $100.
Downloading both games = almost hits the monthly download limit for a lot of people (lolworstinternetintheworld).
Digital distribution future = frown.gif

Yeah, I checked the CAD price for COD2.

40 dollars.

Gamestop's used version of the GOTY edition with the 15 extra dollars worth of map packs?

7 dollars.

YEAHHHHHHHHh BOI

https://wiki.brown.edu/confluence/do...39610/flav.jpg

Well they must think people will buy the things at this price or they wouldn't have set it like that. Microsoft spends a fucking fortune on market research, they haven't just put a load of random prices into a hat and pulled one out. I'd imagine that they're relying on the fact that most people in Australia live a ten minute drive from their next door neighbour, let alone a Gamestop and as such, downloading games is much easier than trying to get to a shop. I'm not sure how many bush ranches have broadband mind you.

It's like charging for avatar stuff. Most of us here think it's retarded but then we're all well informed as a rule so we know better. For every one of you facepalming at the idea of paying for avatar clothes, don't forget there's me over here facepalming at you lot spending an extra $5 to get your game in a metal tin rather than a plastic case. We all have different ideas of what constitues stuff worth spending money on and Microsoft obviously think there's enough people who think avatar clothes or full price games from five years ago are a good deal, otherwise they wouldn't have bothered launching the stuff.

They can spend all they want, it doesn't make sense.

Xbox Originals was a commercial flop because of it's high prices. If you're going to set a downloadable game above it's retail price and give less features (no GOTY edition DLC), you just haven't done your homework.

They have an opportunity to make it a success after learning from the mistakes of the Originals line, but they are making the EXACT SAME ONES, and if it isn't a miserable disaster again I'll eat my hat.

Edit: To their credit, they did pick a better lineup to launch the service with this time. Mostly games people have heard of and those of which reviews are favourable, not the "pick one or the other" that was the Originals line.

I still don't think the average consumer is dumb enough to make this a success again though. It failed before and it will fail again unless they price accordingly. (See PSN for mostly proper pricing strategies for their DLC PS1 games. 6 bucks for the most part for something like Wild Arms 2, which is reasonable. Most of what's up there resells for more than it's price up there. Versus here where it's the opposite scenario.)

I won't buy any, just because of the fact that I might want to sell the game down the line. Did that with a lot of PC and PS games a few years back.

Technically the RRP of Halo 3 is still £45. That nobody would ever pay that much for it is beside the point, in Microsoft's stock list it costs £45.

Of course this is a rather blinkered view point and one would hope that they are usnig more than their stock sheet to set prices but like I said, they've set a price they think they can make money from. After all, it's costing MS fuck all to make these things available online so any sales they do get are pretty much pure profit and I'm often reading people here say they've not bought certain games because their local store doesn't have it and they've apparently never heard of Amazon.

They have missed a trick though. If they priced the stuff much lower, they could pretty much wipe out the second hand game market which I know is something a lot of developers would welcome. I guess MS and co need the games stores to get their message out or something so they don't want to extinct them just yet but I'd suggest that they'll be a lot fewer mainstream game shops about in ten years time once digital distribution really kicks off.

I could very well be wrong about this, but they I think MS, Sony, and Gamestop have a pretty good thing going at the moment. While their focus on preowned sales is pissing off some developers, they also seem to fund the majority of TV ads for games. Nintendo games are the only commercials that don't focus on, or at least end with a message to pre-order whatever game it is being advertised at Gamestop. Microsoft probably isn't quite ready to piss them off.

I've got no interest in these games on demand unless they get marked down considerably cheaper than their store price. If I'm going to pay full market price for a game then I want a case and manual to go with it. I suppose not having to put in the disc to play a game would be nice, but considering how long the NXE game library takes to load it's probably faster to get the disc off the shelf.

Not like I have any room on my 20GB HDD for a full 360 game anyway.

I bet at least one of the big companies will probably attempt a download-only version of a console. It would cut down on so many costs, and with terabyte hard-drives at like $70 space is becoming less and less of an issue.

Isn't there a PSP coming out without a umd drive? I can see some people would be interested in a (arcade like) xbox 360 step-down which can only download games. Think about it, virtually no load times.

Yeah, the new version of the PSP has no UMD drive. Then again, nobody ever buys PSP games anyway so there's not much of a market to destroy in the first place. I'd be surprised if in the next few years while they develop a new generation of consoles the big players don't consider a move to facilitate a lot more digitally downloadable content. Sony are already doing pretty well with this distribution method and a few developers have suggested they'll be the first out with a new console, to avoid the kicking they got from the 360 coming out a year earlier than the PS3. A new generation is still a long way off though. I think digital distribution would catch on a lot faster if MS let you use any HDD with your 360 rather than an offiical one, given you can pick up a terrabyte of storage for the price of an official 360 100 gig one.

Yeah, installed games have no load times whatsoev...wait what

Remember how Bionic Commando was kinda set up for a sequel? Guess we'll never see it.

Source: Joystiq

Took them long enough to talk about it. They've been dropping jobs left right and center for weeks. It's a crying shame, too.

I wouldn't be counting on a Bionic sequel based on it's sales, rather than on this unfortunate newsbit though, to be quite honest.

As some of you might be aware, the Metroid Prime trilogy is coming to the Wii. For those of you who like Pre-ordering and bonuses, Amazon.com has a poster available for those who pre-order the game from them. Gamestop does the game, and also throws in an "exclusive" T-Shirt. The game is cheaper from Amazon.com (46.99 + Free Shipping), so it really comes down to this for those pre-ordering: Do you like T-Shirts? Considering the bland design of the shirt, I'm probably gonna skip it and go to Amazon, but up to the individual of course.

Amazon.com: Metroid Prime Trilogy Collector's Edition: Nintendo Wii: Video Games
Gamestop.com - Buy Metroid Prime Trilogy - Nintendo Wii

Metroid Prime Trilogy ships the 24th of August.

Microsoft manage to demonstrate their 'excellent' understanding of how to price stuff once again:

[ source ]

So they're removing stuff and upping the price. Yep, that's going to stimulate sales for sure.

Does anyone actually buy the arcade model though? Surely putting up the price of something nobody buys won't harm their sales figures of none?

I bought this, but pretty sure I payed $40 for it at Best Buy.

(I still have some catching up to do on my gaming. Just came into some money and vacation time, so I got it.)

Kinda makes sense if you think about it. If MS runs its books based on the US dollar. If the pound is weak, it means selling an item for more UK pounds is gonna bring in the same revenue in US$. That said though, the product still sucks and would need a reduction even with the weakness of the UK pound to sell anything. :P

EARTHWORM JIM

Interplay has announced a new EWJ game for XBLA, WiiWare and PSN, launching in like, two months or something. It'll be a timed exclusive for XBLA (one month). Gameloft is developing it. The talented mobile studio behind Sexy Poker and American Pop Star: Road to Celebrity. :mad:

"The game, with its humorous and edgy style, is a great fit for today's gamer who craves a fully immersive experience that is fun and easily accessible. We look forward to delivering a fantastic game."

Earthworm Jim Coming to WiiWare, PSN and XBLA

Also good fucking work using a badly emulated ZSNES screenshot, 1UP.

But Shiny Entertainment is dead, man. DEAD.

Gameloft took Assassin's Creed and made this :gonk:

Well if there were any doubts left about a new PS3 console, they have been dissolved. Today at GamesCom 2009, Kaz Hirai introduced the PS3 Slim which will contain 120GB of space, released on the first week of September internationally, and will retail for $299.

The current 80GB phat model will have the price cut to $299 starting tomorrow.

"[10:36] The PS3 Slim is 32 percent smaller and 36 percent lighter and has 34 percent less power consumption than the current model. It will have all the same features and functionality as the current PS3."

Source

http://image.com.com/gamespot/images..._screen017.jpg

Apparently they slimmed it down by making it ugly.

Good for them.

Not like they ever looked great to begin with. Hopefully with its 34% reduction in power consumption it won't have that deafening fan anymore.

God dammit, Sony, put the backwards compatibility back in. $300 isn't a bad price, especially since my PS2 died.

Also, how about that aboutface from Sony? They were pretty steadfast on price for a while, and unless I missed something, the price drop came completely out of nowhere.

Granted, the Slim has been rumored for months, but I never saw anything about a new price being attached to it.

The price and the lack of proper BC were the two main things holding me back from considering one. The slim reduction is a nice bonus, but yeah, BC is found in the other two consoles (with varying degrees of success) so I should think it wouldn't be that hard to include it in the PS3.

Of course the reason I've heard that it DOESN'T feature proper BC is because they don't want people to not buy a PS2, which (while making sense from a business perspective since the PS2 is the main money-maker in Sony's Game Division) is stupid all the same.

This is great. There was never any hope for any further backwards compatibility in new models, so I'm not concerned about that. What I do like is that there is extra hard drive space for the $299 price and the unit is no longer the size of a mothership. If you like the price and don't mind the old phat units, BB has a bundle deal with the regular 80GB model bundled with Wall-E and Little Big Planet all for $299. Not a bad deal...

*The actual unit reminds me vaguely of a Neo-Geo without the cartridge slot, probably because of the round buttons below the drive slot...

Fix'd.

http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/8383/slimlol.jpg

This is by far the worst job of "slimming" I've ever seen. And they did it so well with the PS2.

If this is slim then I think the ps2 slim should be rename paper thin. I really didn't mind the size of the original one anyway, even if yes it's pretty big. I don't really like the new matte surface either, it make it look cheap, but I guess people were tired of wiping finger print of their ps3...

I guess the only great thing about the ps3 slim is the price drop, which if I'm not mistaken, is now cheaper than the Elite 360 no?

Fingerprints on you triple? What the fuck? How do you insert discs, by rubbing yourself over it and using your elbows? I get dust on my machine, but fingerprints? No. No I do not feel the need to fondle my electronics to let them feel loved.

I play Uncharted for that.

I didn't say I was wiping fingerprint but some don't like that glossy finish because of that, like the psp but that's another thing since it's a portable system...

Backwards compatability is completely pointless. Everyone on the planet already owns a PS2 and if your breaks you can pick up a decent second hand one for the price of a PS3 game. On top of that, once you have your shiny new HD PS3, you'll probably never be that arsed about playing any old PS2 games ever again. I haven't played an original Xbox game since I bought my 360 and I've not really had any desire to play any of them.

The very slight price drop is pretty cool I guess but I'm still going to wait for there to be more decent games before I buy a PS3. God of War 3 is about the only thing I'm bothered about on it currently.

Alright, nov completely pointless but I would have thought anyone desperate to play PS2 games would just buy a PS2 for forty quid, rather than dropping three hundred on the PS3. Only one console ever released has been properly backwards compatible and I'd question how many people bought a PS2 just because of that feature.

Surely by "Only one console ever released has been properly backwards compatible", you mean the handheld console GBA/SP?

I'm pretty content though (and I'm aware that I'm a minority), with my PS3's backwards compatibility. If it wasn't for that I'd never have played GoW 1+2, and I'm about to get started with MGS 2+3 when I get around to it.
Sadly, the bilnd hype of the internet also made me play SotC, oh God I want those 6 hours of boredom back.

Plus there's a few PS1 games that don't work on PS2 anyway. Fuck Integral though.

And of course the Wii plays all GC games but who's counting right. It's just numbers, you know. Pfft.

Backwards compatibility also gives you access to a whole library you may not have had before. Someone may have never owned a GBA but now has access to games like Metroid Fusion and Golden Sun after buying a DS, similar examples for PS2 -> PS1, Wii -> Gamecube.

Granted this is going to be a small portion of people as I'd assume a lot of game consumers are a) going to get what they're interested in the first place, or if they pass it up, will probably not come back to it later and b) going to be somewhat brand loyal and will probably already have a PS2 if they end up buying a PS3. So the issue of whether it's worth it to include both in practicality and demand is a valid one. But it's still a perk and selling point to a certain audience for sure.

No Puzzle Maniacs for PS3. :(

http://image.com.com/gamespot/images...2508_front.jpg

I was talking about games consoles, not kid's toys.

Actually I forgot about the DS and SP being backwards compatible and given that even fewer GameCube games got sold than Wii games other than WiiSports are selling now, I'd argue that people ain't buying a Wii for the old school gaming angle.

Doesn't help that Nintendo only releases a good game on Virtual Console every quarter century.

looking forward to this post being quoted and fixed

This post is correct in every way.

I reckon. :(

is it really that huge a deal?

i bought my n64 for like 8 bucks at a salvation army and got pilot wings for like 3 on ebay.

Isn't that what it'd cost on the virtual console?

Plus, I got like 10 n64 games for like $20 off another ebay purchase. probably much cheaper than it'd cost on the virtual console, but I wouldn't know since I don't want to pay $300 for wii sports.

I'd complain about the Virtual Console too but all I want is Arcana for SNES and a couple Commodore 64 games that'll probably never get added no matter how active they are so...

Marco, it's not really so much whether or not any of these rom & instruction manual containers are worth their asking price because we've known they aren't. It's the logic behind the releases that's bothersome and slightly infuriating. This far in the game they should have moved beyond the Virtual Console because its releases should have been exhausted a year ago. The current trickling that we are experience shouldn't be because of Nintendo being lazy but because of Nintendo not having any actual games that can be released. They have moved beyond Virtual Console by focusing on Wiiware but they completely forgot the whole classic library they had been filing away. There's still a shit ton of empty shelves they've yet to fill.

So yeah, I roll my eyes every week when I see Wiiware getting Let's Trivia Party, Wacky Fun Game 5, I Made A Bowling Game Too: The Revenge, and Lovable Indie Game and then see that Virtual Console gets either an NES sports title or an obscure nigh unplayable Commodore 64 title and nothing else.

One thing I'm not sure: Can the Hard drive be change on the slim version? I didn't see any "door" for the hard drive, maybe its under the ps3 slim.

There is a small hinge of sorts underneath the PS3 slim that reveals a blue screw. Unscrew it and a front piece (where all the fun logos are I believe) will loosen and allow you to slide the HDD in and out.

I might have missed it earlier in this thread, but MS decided to drop the 360 Pro and it'll soon be replaced by the Elite.

Now the question is do I try to score a Pro for relatively cheap when stores are clearing them out or try to get through my backlog of 10 pretty solid PS2 titles I really want to play.

Wasn't that supposed to kick in as soon as the end of the month?

In before the cost of the Wii goes up, instead.

Anyway, I hope they reduce the costs on the HD upgrades to go along with this, but I'm sure that won't happen at all.

So it seems that I can get a PS3 and/or a 360 for 300 bux? And I heard the PS3 slim is better than the fat one, and the newer 360's don't break as easy as the earlier ones.

The big thing for me is not having a shitload of consoles lying around hogging up space, taking up inputs on my TV, and taking up plugs on my power strip. It's a pain in the balls to reach behind my TV and unplug one console just to plug in another one that, as you said, won't get played on that much. Sure, I didn't play PS1 or Cube games often on my PS2/Wii, but the fact that I had the option is excellent and I would be amiss if I didn't have it on either of those consoles.

Does it not seem silly that the PSP Go is going to be only 50 dollars cheaper than the PS3 now?

Yeah, I do see your point there but I tend to onlhy play one console at a time. My 360 and my PS2 are plugged in permanently, it takes about 20 seconds to plug in a Wii on the insanely rare occasions I'd want to play on one and the only time I've played a PS1 game in the last 7 years or so has been on an emulator or my PSP. I've not touched an Xbox game since I got a 360 and I can't remember the last time I played a GameCube game, I'd be amazed if mine even still works.

I mean, I'm not saying backwards compatability is a bad thing, just that it's not something I've overly bothered about when choosing a console.

Still gonna be a pure PC gamer for FPS, though. :cool:

(I like my free updates in TF2 and L4D.)

Yeah, the new price point is pretty sweet for late adapters.
But I don't know if the PS3 Slim is better than the PS3 SlightlyFatter in other ways than power consumption (unless you actually count size/weight/looks).

Comparing it to my old 60GB, the Slim is missing the flash card readers, ethernet cable, backwards compatibility, 2 usb slots, and the possibility of installing another OS.
If you don't intent of using any of the above, fair enough, but calling the Slim "better" is still a bit of a stretch.

But it comes with a Dual Shock 3 which the 60GB didn't :cow:

(so an ethernet cable costs less than a Dual Shock 3, if we're going into this)

True that. I actually thought the port was missing, but it isn't.

It came to my ears somewhere on the internets, that the previously photo was not in "favor" of the Slim, because of the angle.
I feel like I owe this board an apology and will now post an entirely legit comparison picture.

http://img43.imageshack.us/img43/567/ps3slihmmmm.jpg

LOOK AT THAT BULLSHIT

Fucking Sony conspiracy

ps3slim more like ps3xbox1

Having seen and held the new model personally, I had to admit it looked a lot better than in the photos I'd seen, strangely enough. It's not a looker for me, the style is all over the place, like different designers designed different sides of the case. But it's not as bad as the old one.

It was interesting too since I hadn't noticed the slim uses a thin power cord for clock radios and such (like the PS2) and not the thick one.

Yeah, I read somewhere that it looks a whole lot nicer irl than on pictures, for some reason. I think it was over at Joystiq.

Once again you're first to the insider Sony goods =)
Still got that sweet job?

Darius Burst announced. =] For PSP.

http://i27.tinypic.com/33wm5g5.jpg

DARIUS.

"DARIUS" :D


..."PSP" :|

I think it's nice that Sony continue to support the freeware community.

Just on case anyone hasn't heard by now, God of War and God of War II are coming to PS3.

Almost makes me kind of glad I lost my save data for the first game. I had planned on starting over on it again so I could finally finish it, but now I might as well just wait for this version to come out (because I'm a whore for pretty graphics and trophies). I'm usually not a fan of double dipping, but since I still haven't beaten either game and it's not that big of a monetary loss (I got both of the original games for $10 each) I don't mind so much.

I just wish they would tell us if the games will also be included with a "Collector's Edition" of God of War III.

If I had to take a guess I'd say no, since including it would put the package at $100 even without whatever additional knick knacks and doodads that would come with the package. Granted, there are quite a few $100+ CEs out there (sadly), but that would just seem unnecessary (most people interested in GoW III probably already own I & II, and I don't know how willing new fans would be to plunk down that much all at once for something they've never played).

I guess anything is possible though, especially since this is one of Sony's few AAA franchises that's both critically and commercially successful. Personally though, I'd rather pick it up separately if it means I can get it earlier and finish both games before the third ones comes out.

This is very much just a rumour, but good god I hope it ends up being true:

[ source ]

Holy crap yes please.

Dat analogue stick tho :x

Controller-wise I'd have put Dreamcast games on the 360.

I really don't think Sony cares whether their controller is a good fit for Dreamcast games or not.

No, no they don't. How astute of you, russ.

My comment was more on the thinking that if Sega were to put their Dreamcast library on either the 360 or the PS3 that the 360's controller would feel closer to the Dreamcast's. Ultimately this is Sega's decision in who they do this deal with (currently Sony being the only known contender) but if I were them "controller-wise I'd have put Dreamcast games on the 360."

Sega: "Hey Microsoft, we will let you put our Dreamcast games up for download on Live for a million dollars, you interested?"

Microsoft: "lol dreamcast. I think you should leave before I call security."

later that day

Sega: "Hey Sony, we'll let you put our Dreamcast games up for download on PSN for a million dollars. You better decide soon though, we actually just came from Microsoft's offices earlier this morning. They seemed pretty interested, but you know how slowly things work their way through management there."

Sony: "WE'LL DO IT RIGHT NOW BUT YOU HAVE TO TAKE OFFER OFF TABLE FOR MICROSOFT!!!"

Sega: "My boss isn't going to like this, but for you, I think we have a deal."

It seem it's not exactly fully exclusive for PSN but more some title will be.

and link to the document: Leaked Sega Doc

I really hope this isn't Sony's solution to backwards compatibility for PS2 games on the PS3 slim...making people buy them over again when they've already paid $20-$50 on it. I can play my PS1 and PS2 games just fine on my fat 80gig.

I noticed that Best of Sonic disc for $99 that Sega is considering. It better be every damn game that's been released up to Project Needlemouse, but it probably won't be. There's no way they could bring the GBA and DS games over to PS3, not to mention the Wii exclusives. I'd say it'd be from Sonic 1 to maybe Sonic Heroes.

No clue what Sony is thinking except this: Whoever leaked this is a dead man.

Well I'm sure most of us here have a PS2 so its not like we're obligated to purchase anything, it seems more akin to Microsoft's strategy of offering their Xbox and select Xbox 360 titles available for download.

If the above document Inhert leaked is true to any degree, then I can't wait to play some DC games on my 360 :3:

God, you understand nothing about the gaming industry. Of COURSE Sony wants your money twice. That means twice as much money. You see how that might be a perk for a corporation? Besides, if you have a backwards compatible PS3 then stop whining. I imagine most people who want the backwards compatibility probably already own some mechanism for doing it. As a retarded chimp could figure out, this mechanism would appeal to people who don't give a shit about backwards compatibility, but might want to pay two or three games. Not people looking to replace an entire library.

Second, if it was a best of Sonic disc, it would include Sonic and Sonic II and nothing else. Stop being such an idiot fanboy and realise you've deified an underwhelming series and need to move on with your life. Seriously. Move. The. Fuck. On. We're all disgustingly sick of your constant sounding off about Sonic.

I say again, you understand nothing about how the gaming industry works if you can't comprehend why this is easy money for Sony. Please, please stop talking. It hurts those of us who can think.

What he said.

It's a sound strategy, but it still doesn't make it right. A lot of people were pissed when Sony stopped putting backwards compatibility in their PS3s. If a system has that capability, there are going to be people who will sell their older Sony systems in order to buy a PS3. In my view, there aren't that many good exclusive titles for PS3 right now that I'd want to play.

Alright, that I can agree on.

Doesn't make it right? I'm sorry, I wasn't aware we were now using some random dude on the internet's scale of morality to practice business.

I had no idea you were an aspie.

The only relevant games that the Sonic franchise had were up to Sonic Advance. 2 is debatable.

The rest is a shoddy mess.

I don't know about you guys but I'm totally looking forward to Sonic and Chinese Dragon. Or how about Sonic and the Voodoo Dagger? It's gonna be great.

But he's a Sonic fan. :confused:

I could see people wanting a backwards compatible PS3 if they had a PS2 that stopped reading the blue-bottom discs or something. I imagine if my PS2 suddenly stopped working I'd go out and buy a triple if I could play the PS2 games I still have yet to go through instead of getting some cheetodust-encrusted used PS2 from Gamestop. Without the backwards compatibility I'd rather just get another PS2.

(Enter comments on how I'm cheap blah blah blah.)

You are aware that pretty much everyone on the planet owns a PS2 already right? You'd be lucky to get twenty quid selling one second hand these days, why not just get a proper job and work an hour's overtime to make the money you would have made selling your old system. Backwards compatability is a complete non-issue for Sony. The only people who'd be put off buying a PS3 because of it are cheapskates like Reaver and Sony undoubtedly made a business decision not to market their console at those people.

Hey Guys it's the World of Goo Happy Birthday Sale Time!

2D Boy: Games

Until the 19th, you can buy World of Goo for whatever price you chose!

In a move that will surprise precisely no one with more than two brain cells to rub together, EA are revamping the Medal of Honor (sic) series and setting it in modern warfare.

[ source ]

Gee, I wonder what could have prompted that move.

In a display of stealing money from idiots so cynical it can only have been the product of the marketing team at Apple, there's a new iPhone App that lets you sign into Xbox Live and manage your account "On the move".

The fact that you could use the iPhone's web browser to visit xboxlive.com and do exactly the same things for free, and could have done the same on any phone with a web browser for years, has either escaped the App's creators, or they're relying on the average iPhone user being that dumb and App-obsessed that they'll actually fork out a couple of dollars to do something they could already do for free.

If anybody is stupid enough to actually pay for this then they deserve to get ripped off I guess, but then to be in a position to buy the App you've already shown yourself to be stupid enough to buy an iPhone in the first place.

That sums it up really. Though one thing to note about that is, as a few places have pointed out, Microsoft set out guidelines that said people aren't allowed to charge for anything that uses their API for that stuff. Surprised no action has been taken over it yet actually.

In light of that, I imagine that the app will either become free or be pulled altogether soonish. Knowing Apple, though, they'll reject the re-submitted free version on totally arbitrary grounds a few times before eventually accepting it.

Now that woman has to explain why Don’t Be Nervous Talking 2 Girls is on her resume every time she applies for a job.

I just like the image in my head of the game guys approaching that actress.

"We need you to act in a video game that teaches sad nerds how to talk to women."
"...I hate my life."

(Man offscreen): "That is one tall rollercoaster..."
Woman: "...That's it?"
(Man offscreen): "Yes, we've done...you know, research and shit. This is what women respond to. Now, let's try again. That is one tall rollercoaster."

Sorry, I'm done, but I kind of want to play that game now for the laughs. And hey, for only the low low price of $1!

For this to be a true simulator of Skills' life it needs a third, somewhat nonsensical option which results in physical harm. Something like:

(X) Yeah, I'll ride your ass through a loop.

"Baby you can pilot my Jump Jet any day" -- Skills

The game over screen is a sad man shaking his head, with the caption, "Sorry, I've got work tomorrow."

For it to truly be an accurate simulator of Skills's life it actually needs a scenario where the girl is flirting outrageously and there's a third option: (x) Completely fail to realise what's going on and drive away.

You're right, there definitely needs to be an option for being totally oblivious. We can just make that (Y).

If there's an asian woman in the game they will make serious bank.

I WON'T BE RONERY TONIGHT ^_____________^

"Lemme make dat ass clap" would be pretty flavor, too.

Alright kids, we've got some release dates for some Nintendo games that you may or may not care for:

Super Mario Galaxy 2 - May 23
Sin and Punishment: Star Successor - June 7 (w/ online leaderboards)
Metroid: Other M - June 27

You can find information about other release dates for Nintendo games in the first half of 2010 here: Source

You forgot to mention that CAVE STORY finally has an official release date: March 22.

YouTube Video

Black folk? In a Nintendo game?

There's been black folk in Nintendo games all the time. You just don't remember them. As you can see, he is doing his part to help refresh your memory.

Here we go again...

Duke Nukem Forever: Leaked Images and Video GamingBolt.com: Video Game News, Reviews, Previews and Blog

YouTube Video

Earthworm Jim HD: A remake of the first game coming soon for XBLA (nothing about PSN).

Earthworm Jim HD Video Game, Debut Trailer | Game Trailers & Videos | GameTrailers.com

New Deus Ex 3 E3 Cinematic Story trailer:

Deus Ex: Human Revolution Video Game, E3 2010: Trailer HD | Game Trailers & Videos | GameTrailers.com

Look freaking good!!!

[10:59] <Qworkie> GECH YAKUZA 4 CONFIRMED FOR WEST NEXT YEAR WHERE YOU AT
[11:00] <Qworkie> hostess bars returning
[11:03] <CHz> :victolydanceu:

SEGA Europe Blog | Yakuza 4 Comes West Spring 2011… & Ask Nagoshi-san A Question!

Infuckingsane. Best trailer ever maybe.

CG Director' Cut

This I guess is the longer version of the above. FUCKING epic. Music/Sound got me more then anything =D

newer gameplay stuff:

Deus Ex: Human Revolution Video Game, Penetrate The Penthouse Gameplay Trailer HD | Video Clip | Game Trailers & Videos | GameTrailers.com

I work at Eidos Montreal and I'm currently testing that game.

I really can't say anything except that most of the cg trailer are part of the game either in cinematic or part of the gameplay. ^^

River City Ransom 2 is Finally Happening

OH HELL YES

what's up homo muffins. y'all ready for that new map pack bout to hit. haven't played in forever but i'm getting back on just to bring some rape.

castlevania DLC bout to hit first though.

ps--gimme a gold banner around my name to match my visor. i ain't even paying though.

Aren't the new maps already out? I assumed from all the promo stuff on Live that they were, I don't have room on my hard drive for them at the moment.

Last week, game developer and virtual hatter Valve put three new hats up for sale in Team Fortress 2, with the proceeds going to Japan disaster relief:

Team Fortress 2

In just a week, charitable TF2 Players have collectively raised over three hundred thousand ($300,000) dollars in hat sales that will go towards relief for victims of the 2011 Japan Quake + Tsunami disaster!

Team Fortress 2

(I just bought the 7.99 hat myself if anyone cares)

I actually totally forgot about Deus Ex until a week ago. I had put it out of my mind when I heard it was delayed from early this year. Been watching all the new trailers and a little bit of the gameplay footage (tried to avoid it mostly) and I have to say I am hyped again.

Its coming out next Tuesday!

I am just wishing it brings back some great memories of one of the best game experiences I had way back in the day. In addition to standing on its own two feet. I like that by all accounts it has kept some of the RPG elements.

I also was glad to hear that much of the music fits the Deus Ex style as can be heard on Youtube. Apparently there was some sort of beta release that got out as usual.

It looks like PC gamer gave it 94% and xbox magazine a 10, but who knows with reviewers. All signs point to it being one hell of a game. I wonder how much the non-original Deus Ex-ers will go for it though.

Elevator Action Deluxe

I guess a lot of these older classic arcade titles are being revamped for PSN/Xbox Live. Elevator Action was always one of my favorite games, glad to see it back like this. :)

But what about Chuckie Egg eh? WHAT ABOUT CHUCKIE EGG?