Monthly Archives: April 2009

Criterion just released a teaser video of the Cops and Robbers update for Burnout Paradise.

There are some very awesome police cars there. No date, though, apart from soon.

Look and see after the break.

More »

SCEE just confirmed that David Reeves has quit as its president, to be replaced by Andrew House.

Reeves will leave the company on April 30. He’s been with SCEE since 1995.

House is currently CMO. He’ll assume the role of “Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Co-Chief Operating Officer (Co-COO) of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE)” as of May 1.

“It has been a wonderful ride with PlayStation,” said Reeves.

“I never got to visit all 106 countries but managed 66. I have just two things to say on leaving: I want to thank all of those people who have supported SCEE and me personally in the past 14 years; you have been magnificent!

“Secondly, I am going to spend my time now trying to repay society for all I have taken from it. If your children are having physics lessons at the local school or wondering why their ski instructor is very elderly, your car mechanic has a bad back, or the social worker keeps bringing you PSP games, then it could just be me! Good luck to everybody at SCEE and everybody who continues to support us.”

Press releases after the break.

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Now. We received a postcard from Italy this morning, showing a Venice scene. The postmark, however, isn’t Venetian. There’s nothing written on it at all. Hit the link to see a hi-res shot.

There’s a few reasons why there’s almost certainly something fishy going on here:

1. The image shows Venice. Seen Venice in the news recently?
2. There’s a plaque on the right sporting the words “Da Vinci”. Seen Da Vinci in the news recently?
3. We don’t know anyone in Venice, from Venice, or related to Venice in any way.
4. It’s highly unlikely anyone we do know in Italy would send us a postcard of Venice.
5. We run a videogames website. This is probably about a videogame.

We’ve asked Ubi for comment. Take a look for yourself.

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THQ said last night that Saints Row 2′s upcoming DLC, Ultor Exposed, has slipped by a week and will now launch on April 23.

Tera Patrick’s in it, or at least a really terrible digital representation of her is, so that means you have to part with 800 MS Points to play it.

There’s other stuff in it, too, like cars, haircuts and clothes. For the win.

IGN’s gone apeshit mental over Rock Band: Unplugged, posting a preview, some new screens and a few movies of the rhythm action staple’s PSP version.

It’s out this June. Hit the links.

Microsoft’s posted OutRun Online Arcade up to Live. It’ll cost you 800 MS Points.

There’s a trial version of it there, too.

Buy it. It’s fun.

Co-op would have been great in Killzone 2. Bad luck, then, arrives in the form of Guerrilla MD Hermen Hulst telling Game Informer that it’s unlikely to be added via a download.

“We looked at all the different flavors of co-op early on, but decided our first priority would have to be the single-player experience and the multiplayer,” he said.

“Rather than just tack on co-op, it would have to be integrated and done to a similar standard as the single and multiplayer.

“Having looked at it again now, I do not think we would want to add it as DLC.”

And that’s that. Thanks, PSU.

World of Warcraft’s 3.1 patch is now out, whether you’re American, European, or Martian. Get is in any language from BigDownload.

The update includes a ton of stuff, but most notably the new Ulduar instance. Get the full patch notes here.

EA’s released another screen of Madden NFL 10, this time showing a blue man holding a ball.

It’s pretty. We know nothing about American football, and we’re not going to pretend we do. Read lots of stuff about adaptive AI, Franchise mode and a recent Madden community day here.

The Australian authorities have refused to grant Farm 51 FPS Necrovision a release thanks to excessive violence, Gamespot reports.

The title is the latest in a long string of games to fall foul of the fact Australia doesn’t allow adults to play adult videogames. The country has no 18 rating for games.

Full thing through there.

Acording to this Gamasutra report, WiiWare developers don’t get paid unless they hit a certain sales threshold.

From the piece:

Multiple sources have indicated to Gamasutra that there is a minimum amount of sales, on a per-territory basis, that WiiWare developers must reach in order to recoup any money at all for their games.

It is believed that this sales number is set in the mid-four figure range for North America, and lower four figures for individual European territories. Until a WiiWare title sells over that number, nothing will be paid out.

Full thing through there.

Genius Products and Numark Industries are suing Activision over Scratch: The Ultimate DJ, claiming the publisher conspired to prevent the companies bringing the game to market.

Activision tried to acquire the rights to Scratch; once owner Genius rejected the offer, Activision went on to acquire the game’s developer, 7 Studios, who was still under contract (complete with a non-disclosure and confidentiality agreement) to make the game for Genius.

Why? Ever heard of DJ Hero?

Get the full filing here.

PSU’s posted up 30 HD grabs from the FFXIII demo. Pretty, they are.

Where’s the giant movie? Where is it?

The hour-long demo ships tomorrow in Japan.

Wii@Everyday’s posted up a photo of a Ninety Nine Nights 2 DPS in the latest Famitsu issue.

Being as we can’t speak Japanese, we’ll have to guess at a translation: “You must kill everything. And then you will win.”

Don’t quote us on that. It’s 360-only, out this year.

Sick of looking at Fight Night Round 4′s boxers yet? We’re not. See 15 more screens on GameInfoWire.

The game’s out this June, and looks phenomenal, in the graphics department at least.

Take a look.

SOE’s released some new images of the now-delayed DC Universe Online.

Game them on GameInfoWire.

You can “be” the Incredible Hulk in it. A grey one. Like our dreams… made real.

PC and PS3 in 2010.

Round and round we go. Halo 3′s back on top of the Live play charts, beating World at War and CoD4 for the week of April 6.

Get all the Community and Arcade stuff here. Last week’s chart here.

1. Halo 3
2. Call of Duty: WaW
3. Call of Duty 4
4. Gears of War 2
5. RESIDENT EVIL 5
6. GTA IV
7. FIFA 09
8. Left 4 Dead
9. Halo Wars
10. Guitar Hero World Tour

There’s a live stream of FFXIII gameplay right here on Justin, which is nice. That didn’t take long, did it?

This is from the demo, obviously, which ships in Japan with FFVII Advent Children tomorrow.

You could wait for the direct-feed videos. Or you could import it. Or you could just wait until this winter and buy the Japanese version. Or you could wait until 2010 and buy the western version.

The choice is yours.

A Halo Wars title update’s on the way, according to the game’s official site.

A release window wasn’t provided, but the post said players can expect fixes to some matchmaking bugs, and a few other minor bits.

Two things of note though: the Prophet of Regret’s speed on land will be reduced to match the other leaders, which will help balance the Prophet Rush.

Also, the Flaming Warthog and the Honor Guard Wraith will now be available in multiplayer battles against other players.

Hit the link for more.

Lionhead boss Peter Molyneux has once again refused to confirm or deny the existence of a PC port for Fable II.

When asked by VG247 if we could expect a Windows-based version of the game, he replied with a quick, “No comment”.

Rumors of the SKU have been floating about since last year.

Lionhead flat-out denied talk of a PC version in January this year:

“We’re not working on a PC version of Fable II,” said a Lionhead employee. “If this changes we’ll make sure you know about it.”

“No comment” is always better than a flat-out “no” any day, we reckon.