Video Game News Highlights for 05.19.08 – 05.23.08 May 24, 2008
Posted by Weasel Terrahawk in News.Tags: Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, Doom 4, Guitar Hero, Haze, Madden NFL 09, Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of, Resident Evil 5, Rock Band, SingStar, Wii Fit
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• Major games released this week were: Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures for the PC, Haze for the PS3, SingStar for the PS3, Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness for the 360 and PC, and Wii Fit for the Wii.
• The ongoing battle for ownership of Take-Two continues, as this week EA extends the deadline for shareholders to June 16. This is the third extension EA has made in the offer to buy out Take-Two from under them. Take-Two released a statement soon after saying that they had begun formal discussions with EA, although EA was not the only interested buyer in Take-Two’s dramatic roller coaster.
• The newest MMORPG to hit the shelves became a huge hit, overselling what they had originally expected that they would. Age of Conan, one of the first “M” rated MMORPGs, completely sold out of their Collector’s Edition, even after running a second print of them, totaling out to 110,000 copies. 700,000 copies of the standard edition were also shipped out on day one to retailers everywhere.
• Even though Nintendo boasted through their advertisements that Wii Fit was to come out on May 19, retailers were unable to sell their copies until Wednesday May 21. The May 19th release date was found to be the release at the Nintendo World Store in New York City, and that was to be all. Following this was still a shortage of units at retailers throughout the nation. Replenishment has been lacking still after the initial sell-out on day one.
• Sony released information that they would be releasing a special limited-edition Madden NFL 09 Bundle for the PlayStation Portable, which includes the blue PSP, a copy of Madden NFL 09, a 1GB Memory Stick Pro Duo, and a UMD disc, “NFL: In Just One Play”. This bundle will be available on Madden 09’s release day of August 12, and will cost $200.
• Activision, creators of the widely popular Guitar Hero series, confirmed this week that they would be adding functionality for a microphone, and a unique drum kit, which features three drum pads, two raised cymbals, and a bass kick pedal. All of these items will be wireless, unlike Harmonix’s Rock Band peripherals. Also coming in this will be Music Studio, a music-creation software where songwriters can make their own music which can be uploaded and shared via GHTunes.
• Capcom has been silent about information, and even a release date, for it’s popular horror action adventure game Resident Evil 5, until now. Capcom announced that they are planning on releasing RE5 by March of 2009, and they projected that sales would be around 2.3 million copies. March 2009 is the end of the fiscal 2008 year for Capcom, and many other game publishers.
• As with previous weeks, another game publisher has added their name to the list of companies not attending this years E3 convention. id Software, creators of sci-fi FPS Doom, which recently announced Doom 4, said that they would not be attending this years E3. Three other companies: Activision, Vivendi, and LucasArts; also pulled out of attending this year, though LucasArts says that they may still attend to show off some of their new works.
WiiFit, Not Just a Wii-Bit Popular May 21, 2008
Posted by Weasel Terrahawk in Nintendo Wii.Tags: Dance Dance Revolution Hottest Party, Guitar Hero III, WiiFit
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While many people have asked what is so great about a Balance Board, more people around the ages of 25 and older don’t care to ask that question, as they are all heading out to purchase the newest phenomonom for the Nintendo Wii: WiiFit.
While many retailers were not expecting a mass rush, many were sold out of this new exercise game for the Wii before the noon hour had even arrived. Many Target stores became a popular spot, as by 11 AM, 8 out of 11 stores in the metro area of Minnesota had sold out of the game. Lines had even formed before the store had opened, while for games like Halo 3 and Grand Theft Auto IV, no lines were made at store opening for the Target store.
While this game looks to be a lot of fun, it seems that the age range has been targeted towards older folks, rather than the younger generation, which usually takes on to games such as Dance Dance Revolution Hottest Party and Guitar Hero III. The majority of people buying WiiFit were around the ages of 25-85, including many grandparents.
It will be intersting to see if Nintendo can properly stock this game on retailer shelves, unlike the Wii console itself, or some of it’s more popular games. Until then, rumor has it that many Best Buys and GameStops also sold out of this new hit sensation to take the family game world by storm. We’ll be watching to see how well this continues to fly off of the shelves in the coming future.
Video Game News Highlights for 05.05.08 – 05.09.08 May 11, 2008
Posted by Weasel Terrahawk in News.Tags: Boom Blox, Crosswords DS, Doom 4, Gran Turismo, Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, Grand Theft Auto IV, Iron Man, Killzone 2, Motorstorm Pacific Rift, Neverwinter Nights 2 Gold, Resistance 2, Rock Band, Speed Racer, Wits & Wagers
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• Major games released this week were: Crosswords DS for the DS, Boom Blox for the Wii, Speed Racer for the Wii and DS, Neverwinter Nights 2 Gold for the PC, Iron Man for the PC, and Wits & Wagers for the XBLA.
• While Rock Band has always had downloadable content for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions, the PlayStation 2 and Wii versions have never had that option. Harmonix has decided to change that by releasing a new disc which they are calling the Rock Band Track Pack Volume 1, which includes 20 tracks and will be for sale for $30 on July 15th.
• EU PlayStation Day took place this week in Europe. Sony showed off a way to download videos using the PSP, a Motorstorm Pacific Rift demo, a Resistance 2 sneak peak; and announced that Killzone 2 may be delayed a bit, possibly until 2009.
• id Software announced that they are looking for employees who could work on the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and the PC for their newest horror shooter in line: Doom 4. No release date was announced at the time, nor was it confirmed that it would be released on all of the aforementioned systems, but id’s jobs page noted looking for hires on all platforms, so one can only assume.
• Nintendo opened up a new channel for American users this week: the Nintendo Channel, which has been available in Japan since late last year. The Nintendo Channel will allows Wii owners to download videos, trailers, interviews, game demos, and more. If you are a DS owner as well, you will be able to turn your Wii into a Wi-Fi download station to transfer demos to your Nintendo DS.
• 10-year-old racing guru series, made by Polyphony, hit a major milestone, selling their 50 millionth unit this week. Gran Turismo 5 Prologue was the setting stone in this record that aided them in finally overturning the 50 million mark. Gran Turismo started with it’s first edition in 1997 on the PlayStation console, and has been renowned as the most realistic driving and racing game made yet.
• Take-Two once again made it into the news, this time suing the Chicago Transit Authority, who pulled their ads for Grand Theft Auto IV for showing “unlawful content”. The CTA has backed up their decision stating that they “[have] the right to regulate and establish guidelines for advertising on its properties”. Take-Two is suing them over freedom of speech rights and also breakage of contract. Take-Two is asking for $300,000 in damages.
• Rockstar released a patch for PlayStation 3 users, saying that it will help peoples’ games from freezing and locking up their system. This issue was caused by the online servers that they are using becoming overloaded. No word on a patch for the Xbox 360 version as of this time.
• Grand Theft Auto IV, toted to be one of the best games in history, had what was said to be the “largest launch in the history of interactive entertainment”. GTAIV sold 3.6 million units on day one, and a total of over 6 million units at the end of the first week, making their revenue approximately $500 million. This beat out Bungie’s popular shooter, Halo 3, by at least $200 million in week one sales.
Echochrome: The B&W Review May 1, 2008
Posted by Weasel Terrahawk in PlayStation 3, PlayStation Portable, Reviews.Tags: echochrome
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echochrome is a very unique puzzle game that was revealed back in July of 2007 by SCEI, SCE, and JapanStudio at E3, and was released on May 1st for the PlayStation 3 on the PlayStation Network as a downloadable, and the PlayStation Portable, also able to be downloaded from PSN.
echochrome is a very unique puzzle game, taking on the simplistic look of the monochromatic tones. The basic premise of the game is to take your mannequin character that you play as, and capture your echoes that are scattered in the maze of paths, holes and jumps that litter the playing field. Controlling your character is as simple as tilting the analog stick. By moving the analog stick, you move the maze in whichever direction that you push it. This is definately mandatory, because you’ll need to move the maze so that you are able to connect paths together to make the maze one unit, to cover holes so that you don’t fall through, to cover empty spaces so that you are able to traverse an impossible opening, or to jump to a platform that is positioned above you.
While this game may not look like anything special, with the colors being very monotone and simple, it offers a lot of space when it comes to creation of maps. There are a couple of different modes you can enter on how you want to play the game. In freeform, it randomly chooses mazes for you to have to solve. In atelier, you can choose from stages ranging from a to g, and 1 to 8 within that. Or you can enter the canvas mode, in which you can create your own maze for you to play, or for you to send to your friends to play.
The music is very easy listening, and very calming. The simple piano music invites you to settle down with the game and relax, while giving you enough of a challenge to keep you interested. With the free addition of new downloadable maps that other users can create at any time, you can continuously be playing a new maze every time that you play if enough people make them.
All-in-all, this game doesn’t offer a huge variety in what you are supposed to do, and you are limited to the laws of the world, and the laws of direction and rotation. But for $9.99 on the PlayStation Network, this game seems like it’s worth the small investment in the long run.
Score: 9 out of 10
Metal Gear Online: First Impressions April 28, 2008
Posted by Weasel Terrahawk in PlayStation 3, Previews.Tags: Metal Gear Online
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After downloading and installing the two updates required to be able to now play the Metal Gear Online Premiere Beta, I was finally able to get my hands on some of the greatest multiplayer online shooting that I have ever played. Please note that this story is the opinion of the editor, and may not express the same feelings as the other editors of the site.
After I had made my Konami ID and was able to log in, I was greeted with an elaborate “Create a Character” dialog, in which I was able to create the person who I was to kill my fellow soldiers as. The options were limited, as I would expect since it is just the Beta, but to be honest, there was enough there to distinguish my character out from the others.
When I was able to finally be able to get into some gameplay, the first thing I noticed was a Training Mode, in which I could learn to use my weapons, move my camera, and shoot some fake targets to get myself accustomed to the game’s control scheme. MGO actually has a quite easy to learn control scheme that works well, so I was able to get the hang of it quickly.
After finishing my training, I was ready to play. The first thing I noticed was the ability to do either Automatchmaking, or to create or join my own or someone else’s created match. That is something that PlayStation 3 owners have been waiting for for quite some time, and finally got to use. After entering a match and hitting that I was ready to play, the match began.
So far, MGO has five different game modes, ranging from Deathmatch, to Team Deathmatch, to a very unique mode called Sneaking Mission, which I did get the chance to participate in. In Sneaking Mission, one player gets to play as Solid Snake and use the Octocamo to be able to neutralize other players and steal their dogtags. I actually did better in that than I had done all night I must admit, when I got the chance to play as Snake.
In-game voice chat was working successfully when I was using it, and there were nothing but very minor bugs in the system it seemed. Load times were minimal, and everyone was having a great time. One more feature that I would like to point out is the easy in-game friends list. If you are in a match and want to add a friend, all you have to do is click the “AddFriend” button and scroll to their name. It will instantly put them on an in-game list, which you can use to find them later on and join whatever match they may be in, as well as send in-game “e-mails” through a Private Message client also built in to the game.
All in all, I would say that Konami and Kojima Productions did an excellent job on Metal Gear Online so far. Even for just a Beta, the gameplay was very smooth, and for someone who is not a major shooter game fan, it has me hooked. If they add more, we’ll be sure to update you all on how it all works, and what it looks like. And for those of you who don’t own a PlayStation 3, this game may be JUST the reason you were looking for to get one.
Metal Gear Online: Still Offline April 26, 2008
Posted by Weasel Terrahawk in PlayStation 3, Previews.Tags: Metal Gear Online
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I’ve not seen something so painfully broken in quite some time, and while I can understand why, it’s still painful to watch.
This weekend is really the first weekend of the Metal Gear Online Beta. While it theoretically was supposed to be opened at the beginning of this week, it was delayed due to the massive traffic that they received as everyone began to log on, crashing their servers. Since the Beta only reopened on Thursday night, this is the first real test of it’s ability to run.
For the past hour now, I’ve been attempting to get on to play MGO. Due to their updates, there are two patches that need to be downloaded to be able to play, and they need to be downloaded and patched seperately. MGO offers two ways of downloading though, one by P2P and one by HTTP.
I attempted both of them with quite terrible results actually. When trying to connect to the P2P, which is recommends, it basically doesn’t do anything, even after making sure to open up the port on my router. And the HTTP basically times out and says, “There has been a network error” after barely even 2% every time. It seems like the issues that they were having with their servers still hasn’t been resolved.
I’m glad that they extended the end of the Beta period, but I am still unable to get anywhere close to being able to play yet. Hopefully Konami can get their servers repaired. I must admit, I am still quite excited to try out the Beta and provide you all with details on how it is.
