Posts

The general consensus seems to be thatGrand Theft Auto IVwon’t stop being fun or grow old anytime soon. There’s a seemingly endless amount of things you can do in not only the single-player portion of the game, but in the multiplayer modes too, which is why we’ll be playing it tonight for hours on end. Whether you’re trying to beat a co-op mission or getting a group of people together in free mode to fly helicopters high above Liberty City’s tallest skyscrapers, only to jump out and attempt to land on civilians, there’s a tremendous amount of fun to be had....

Last week’s debatewas the first of two rounds, where we argued over which of the threePaper Mariogames is the best and most deserving to duel against its predecessor in round two. Obviously by this post’s name and picture above,Paper Mario 64came out on top, but it was a come from behind victory and a close fight to the end. Here are the results: On paper (heyo!) this looks like quite the odd fight....

Not long after Ziff Davisannouncedthey were canning OPM, now Future Publishing (Edge, Next-Gen.biz, OXM, etc.) hassaidthey have suffered $95.6 million in losses. Ouch. Look out how the corporate head spins the news: “It is clear with hindsight that during the past two years, Future over-invested in acquisitions and under-invested in organic development. The consequences of this strategy are clearly evident in today’s disappointing results.” “We have taken a number of steps to strengthen the business....

Last year’s Tokyo Game Show, as always, was full of surprises. But I will never ever forget the highlight of Sony’s PlayStation Network offerings,Gomibako. The easiest way to describe it is “Tetriswith trash.” You smash and burn trash — toilets, barrels, stuffed animals — to score points. Because why the hell not? Today Sonyhas annoucnedthat the game will be coming to North America this Spring asTrash Panic. We don’t expect much about the game will change from its Japanese release, and quite frankly, we’d be mad if anything did....

Assassin’s Creed 2won’t be all sunshine, roses, and familiar Italian cities. At gamescom, Ubisoft Montreal revealed more locations — available for viewing in the gallery — as well as several engine improvements that should make Ezio’s wicked knife-plunging escapades more interesting than Altair’s. We hope, at least. New to Anvil engine is the inclusion of a dynamic day and night cycle. While we can’t say that the narrative won’t dictate the time of day during certain missions, it’ll be interesting to see what effects it has on the way assassination targets, free-roaming soldiers, and the way Ezio interacts with the environment....

While you may be lying in your hotel room this morning wondering if your hangover is actually normal or if you need to go to the ER for alcohol poisoning, somewhere CMP has been busily assembling the details of the next GDC. Either they never drink, or they had their guts replaced with robotic parts so they could still get up and do things the next morning after industry parties that actually require real thought....

While I think many of us had expected Harmonix to follow up theirGuitar Herosuccess with a full band game, most of us also thought the name “Band Hero” might have been the perfect fit. Apparently it wasn’t. “We didn’t want to makeBand Hero,” said Harmonix’s Dan Teasdale today during his GDC session, “we want to make game with a completely different feel. One that promoted band play over the solo experience....

It must be odd for two studios to be working on the same game license simultaneously, but that’s the situation Gearbox Software and Rebellion find themselves in. Both studios are creating their ownAliensFPS for Sega — Gearbox hasAliens: Colonial Marineswhile Rebellion hasAliens vs. Predator. According to Rebellion, this has led to a friendly rivalry between the two. “I think if we all want to produce the best possible game at the end of the day you’ve got to use your own imagination but keep pace with what other people are doing....

Oh yes, it’s time for another edition of Geek Chic where we look at gaming related fashion. There are some nice new videogame related shirts that have been released over the last couple of weeks. Up first is the Fossilized Friend T-shirtfrom SplitReason. The best part I think is that Luigi is stuck on guard duty. Like he has anything better to do, right? SplitReason also has this newish gaming shirtcalled Heartpad....

This is the latest trailer forFluffy: Operation Overkill, soon to arrive on Xbox Live Indie Games. A 2D run-and-gun, you play an unhinged squirrel in a hazard suit fighting legions of virulent beasts while searching for a cure to save the world. Slaughter with a variety of weapons and special abilities and score bonus points for stylish kills. So So Dev Games promises violence and gore, which this trailer delivers on, as well as crude humor....

We’re getting closer and closer to the release of two James Bond games in one month and I couldn’t be more excited. Right about now is when all my worries and concerns fly out the window and the Bond fanboy in me takes over and I can do nothing, but be excited. As for the trailer above, it features your standard motion capture suits, action and talk about how motion capture really helps create lifelike characters and such....

Any studio who can so brilliantly capture the essence of a retro game and bring it into the modern era — without going overboard — like Golgoth isdoing withTokiis fine by me. In an interviewwith GameSetWatch, the developer explains what it was like to tackle such a project, which is a good read in and of itself. More interesting to me, however, was the mention of Golgoth’s next game. On the quest to findToki‘s license holder, the studio was offered to take a look at some Data East IPs from a Japanese company called G-mode....

With onlymere hoursbefore theGrand Theft Auto IVtrailer is broadcast to the world, I thought it would be fun to hear any last minute predictions you all have about what you think will be revealed. This is a huge game (arguably the biggest one of the year) and announcements like this don’t come along very often. Let’s make the most of the anticipation, shall we? Any thoughts about gameplay? Location? Characters? Whoever hits the most nails on the head will win something really great....