Monthly Archives: February 2009

A chainsaw to the gut, decapitations, puddles of blood, bashing folks against tress, and loads of running around to hip-hop music grace the latest MadWorld video. Watch it after the jump.

The Platinum Wii exclusive is out March 10.

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A supposedly 1080p version of yesterday’s God of War III trailer released by Sony today is simply upscaled from 720p, according to the ever-vigilant Digital Foundry.

“There are two videos available now for download on the PlayStation Store – 1080p and 720p – but it’s clear that the full HD video is nothing more than an upscaled version of the superb 720p trailer, and plays back with a tangible quality hit,” said the site.

“1080p has more than double the pixel count of 720p, but the filesize of the former is only about 1.5 times larger than the latter. There’s actually no point whatsoever in downloading the 1080p version as it contains more compression artifacts than the 720p version on which it is based, and takes longer to download! Indeed, it seems that the 720p trailer actually resolves more detail than the 1080p version.”

You have to get up earlier than that to catch these guys out, Sony. More detail and pics through the link.

Namco’s released yet more Tekken 6 shots, this time showing next gen Kuma doing the do. See them on Shacknews.

This is actually Kuma Jr, as any self-respecting Tekken fan knows. Kuma died of old age after the second Iron Fist tournament. Looks beary, doesn’t he?

Out this year for PS3 and 360.

LucasArts put out the first Hutt screens from MMO The Old Republic overnight, as seen on Gamespot.

There’s no hint of Carrie Fisher dressed in a furry bikini, unfortunately, but them’s the breaks.

No date as yet.

Ethan Nicholas, a bedroom coder who created an iPhone game called iShoot, has raked in more than $600,000 in one month from Apples App Store.

Shoot’s a tank artillery game, and was launched in January. The title earned Nicholas $37,000 in its first day.

“I’m not going to be a millionaire in the next month, but I’d be shocked if it didn’t happen at the end of the year,” he said in a phone interview with Wired.

“If it weren’t for taxes I would be a millionaire right now.”

Nicholas is an engineer at Sun Microsystems, and after pulling an eight hour-shift he would come home and work on iShoot another eight hours. The self-taught coder held his one year-old son in one hand and coded with the other until the game was finished.

iShoot has been the number one iPhone app for 26 days straight.

Sony’s put up the official God of War III site, following the lifting of the game’s first major press embargo yesterday.

All the screens and both the new movie and E3 trailer are up there, so if you want to see the action in 1080p you’re in luck.

You can sign up for updates and even pre-order, if you like.

According to this list, digital audio recording firm PCB Productions is working on facial motion capture for Syphon Filter 5 for PS3.

The title is apparently in development by Sony Bend Studios (Resistance PSP), and is featured within a long list of credits, including many other games, films and TV programs.

A new Syphon Filter game seems highly likely and the source seems genuine enough, but to be on the safe side we’ll label this as rumour for now.

Sony can expect an inquisitive email in its inbox on Monday.

Thanks, PSLS.

1UP’s put up the first screens and details of Dead to Rights: Retribution, the Namco action reboot for 360 and PS3.

According to a press release, “Dead to Rights: Retribution will form an origin story portraying key events that shape and define Jack Slate’s character including how he and Shadow first come together as partners against those who would bring the once great city to its knees.”

Shadow’s the dog, if you can’t remember the original games.

The gameplay hook this time around, according to Namco, is a “hybrid combat system” that mixes hand-to-hand combat with shooting.

More through there. There’s no date on it yet.

Rare’s confirmed it’s to release Grabbed by the Ghoulies as an Xbox original.

The ghostly adventure’s being added on February 16. Which is Monday.

“For all those discerning games connoisseurs who somehow managed to miss out on playing Ghoulies the first time (and I’m sure there must be a few million of you somewhere), I highly recommend you spend a few lazy evenings (or a lot if you’re rubbish at games) inside the Baron’s delightful Ghoulhaven Hall,” said Rare boss Gregg Mayles.

“Imagine a game you really like and then visualise Ghoulies as a stylish haunted house version of that. So, if you like Halo, pretend that the main character is Master Chief and the hilarious DJ Mummy is a terrifying Covenant alien. It works for me.”

You really may as well try it. It’s not half bad.

Sad day for those who frequent the Sony Metreon store, or who dreamed of one day visiting over 350,000 square feet of PlayStation-specific goodness. The center is to close.

The Metreon PlayStation was the first place Sony launched PlayStation in the US, but as it’s looking for better ways to push gaming merchandise at retail, Sony has decided not to renew the lease when it expires on March 31.

“Our lease with the Metreon for the PlayStation Store will expire this summer and we have chosen not to renew it,” a Sony representative confirmed to GameSpot.

“While we are always looking at new avenues for additional retail exposure and space, we felt it best not to continue with a dedicated PlayStation Store at the Metreon at this time.”

Sony still operates many other Sony Style stores throughout the US, but nothing the size of this one.

More through the link.

A free version of Puzzle Quest will be hitting iPhone and iPod Touch’s App Store next week.

Also, Chapter 2 of the iPhone Puzzle Quest trilogy will be free to owners of Chapter 1, and will include 20 more hours of gameplay when it goes live in the next week or two.

If you like puzzle games on the go, it may be worth looking into.

Future Publishing is wondering why its rival, Imagine Publishing, has not released circulation figures since launching Total PC Gaming in 2007. As you do.

Speaking in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, James Binns was curious as to why the publisher had yet to reveal an ABC for the title.

“What’s interesting in the PC market is we had a competitor launch that hasn’t revealed ABCs yet,” said Binns.

“Total PC Gaming has talked up quite a big talk and they’re 16 issues in now and haven’t owned up to their copy sales. If it was still 16 issues in and I was still hiding – it’s weird for them to boast so much and then show so little,” he added.

Imagine’s Managing Director Damian Butt rebutted, saying the reason why an official figure hasn’t been released was that the magazine simply wasn’t established enough yet.

“We would always be at a massive competitive disadvantage against those rival magazines that have had years to build up subs and export sales”, he said.

“Which as you can see from the ABCs for PC Gamer and PC Zone are quite considerable.”

Circulation numbers are down with Future’s offerings, though, and news of lay-offs in the US was confirmed today.

Peripheral manufacturer Mad Catz has reported a net loss of $26.9 million for its latest financial quarter, despite a 19 percent increase in sales to $41 million.

Losses from Q3, ending December 31, stemmed from higher royalty and shipping costs, as well as new product development hires, the company said.

Mad Catz recently revealed the new Limited Edition Street Fighter IV arcade and fightsticks for PS3 and Xbox 360, which are something akin to gold dust at the moment.

Press release after the jump.

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King’s Bounty: The Legend arrives in stores today.

The RPG/RTS hybrid allows you to lead an army of dwarves, humans, vampires, pirates, snakes and devilfish across a huge continent, completing missions such as leading revolutions, overthrowing tyrants, slaying dragons and taking part in strategic battles. Eclectic.

You can even start your own family should the desire strike you. Mates can be anything from zombies to supernatural creatures — you’ll also gain points for spawning strange offspring.

Nice.

Press release after the jump.

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NCsoft’s reported Q4 financials, showing a 22 percent loss despite an 11 percent sales rise.

The news comes nipping at the heels of lay-offs and restructuring reports on Wednesday.

Fans wanting Guild Wars 2 will suffer because of this, with the game has been pushed into 2010/2011 to focus more on the release of MMO Aion this year.

Having proved so successful in Korea, the company plans on releasing Aion in Japan in the third quarter. The US and Europe will get the game in Q4.

More over on Massively.

Edge doesn’t take shit lying down. No sir. Despite losing the delights of Matt Mathews’ famed NPD analysis features back to Gamasutra in November, Edge’s own Kris Graft has stepped up to the plate with his own graphs, his own words, his own coloured pie charts based on the monthly NPD release. See here.

It’s good. Strong colours for the graphs and four whole pages. And it’s fast. The figures were only released last night, and Mathews’ piece is yet to appear. Has Matt been flanked? How will Gama respond? Features an hour after the NPD release, 20 pages long with 4D graphs?

This sort of stuff keeps us awake at night. Check Kris’s pies out.

GameTap uncorked the final volume of American McGee’s Grimm yesterday with Episode 17: The Frog King, as well as adding Take-Two’s bullet-ridden Serious Sam II.

This Grimm episode sees a naïve young princess discover just how messy love can get when she hooks up with an unusually charming – albeit slimy – frog. All new episodes of Grimm are free for the first 24 hours.

Serious Sam II is also free for its first week on the service, but there are close to 142 free games over there to play should you sign up, so you’re pretty much spoiled for choice on the “free” front.

More Grimm is expected next week, and gold members will soon get Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War: Dark Crusade, and Titan Quest with the Immortal Throne expansion pack.

2K Marin has posted a job listing over at GamaSutra looking for a UI programmer to work on BioShock 2 — that’s familiar with Wii.

All the listing says is that they need someone with “experience developing for next-generation game consoles (PS3, XBOX 360, Wii)”.

Full job listing here.

The Asian version of From Software’s Ninja Blade’s been released, says Siliconera, and it’s region-free. And in English.

You should, therefore, buy it. Don’t think. Thinking won’t get you anywhere. Buying Ninja Blade will.

Thanks, Kotaku.

Extensive patch notes are through the link, but it mainly boils down to new multiplayer maps and bug fixes.

The Dawn Of War 2 community site says the update is currently in testing at Microsoft and should be released within a few days of launch.

Bad things? Leaderboards and player stats will be reset when it goes live due to formatting changes.

The game’s out on February 20.