Monthly Archives: April 2009

Game designer Tim Schafer has posted on his blog that creative games will be made no matter how poorly they sell.

Basically, stop fretting.

Here’s the long and short of it:

“Unless it’s your money on the line, game sales don’t need to keep you up at night. The market and game executives do not dictate what games get made – they just dictate what gets made easily. They affect what can be made without a fight. As long as there are creative people out there willing to fight for ideas they care about, then there is nothing that the market or anyone else can do to stop them.”

Hit the link to read the full thing.

Via MTV.

Spore creator Will Wright has quit EA, it’s just been confirmed, to start his new venture, an “entertainment think tank” called Stupid Fun Club.

EA co-owns the new firm, who’s purpose is to develop “new intellectual properties to be deployed across multiple fronts including video games, movies, television, the internet, and toys.”

“The entertainment industry is moving rapidly into an era of revolutionary change,” said Wright.

“Stupid Fun Club will explore new possibilities that are emerging from this sublime chaos and create new forms of entertainment on a variety of platforms.

“In my 12 years at EA, I’ve had the pleasure to work alongside some of the brightest and most talented game developers in the industry and I look forward to working with them again in the near future.”

Press release after the break.

More »

DK Publishing is to release an officially-licensed Halo encyclopedia.

It will be “the comprehensive guide to the characters, weapons, vehicles, equipment, and locations” for Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3, Halo Wars, and Halo 3: ODST.

You can expect the 352-page, full-color book to hit store shelves in November. It includes a foreword penned by Halo director, Frank O’Connor.

“Microsoft approached DK to discuss a Halo book project after San Diego Comic-Con last year, where they saw our impressive array of Star Wars, DC Comics, Marvel and other licensed reference titles,” said DK’s Alex Allan

“Halo has always fascinated the creative team at DK, many of whom are avid gamers and we had the full support of Halo’s very experienced team to create this spectacular book.”

Press release below.

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Just a heads up. We’re being moved onto new hardware tomorrow night, so there’s going to be a bit of downtime. VG247′s being prioritized in the shift, so all being well we should be back up and running in less than two hours.

Just so you know when the lights go off.

According to a new Nielsen report, the largest demographic in PC gaming is women aged 25 and upwards.

The group accounted for 46.2 percent of all players and 54.6 percent of all gameplay minutes in December 2008.

The most played games on PC are card games from Microsoft, with Solitaire averaging over 17 million players during the month.

Apparently, hardcore games are not a favorite amongst the majority of females, then.

Shame that.

[UPDATE] Looks like Nielsen polled World of Warcraft players for the same report and found that over 428,621 are female. Now we feel bad for making a bit of fun at their expense earlier. Thanks, Shack.

Washington DC police are upset over a GTA modder’s authentic depictions of cop cars.

They even went so far as to cry to NBC about it, which, in true fashion, jumped on the news like a rabid foxhound.

Pulled from the report:

“Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery. But don’t tell that to some local police jurisdictions that are upset over YouTube videos depicting their cruisers in a video game…

“One video even shows a digital officer getting out of a Fairfax County Police cruiser to gun down citizens on the street.

“The Fairfax County Police Department finds the videos in very poor taste,” said spokesperson Don Gotthardt. “One of the reasons we find it in poor taste is because of the way the officers are depicted.”

Sorry folks. It’s slow this morning.

Thanks, GamePolitics.

According to a report from IncGamers, there are no plans close any other EU Warhammer Online servers.

“GOA, European publisher of WAR, has no plans to scale back the WAR servers,” said a spokesperson. “There is an ongoing optimization process that deals with efficient distribution of players between the servers, which is designed to ensure all players get the best possible experience.”

Merging two low population servers into one works, because many quests in WAR require a high level of players to accomplish a task – like sacking a city.

On the flip side, the fate of low populated US server Ostermark is still up in the air at this time.

Update – We just had SCEE on the phone. The EU Blog launch is still TBC. The April 17 date is for Three Speech’s closure.

“Semi-official” PlayStation site Three Speech is to close, it’s confirmed.

In its place, an EU PS Blog is to launch on April 17.

“Both Three Speech and SCE UK are very grateful to everyone who has made this site so busy and lively over the past two and half years,” said a post on the site.

A good thing? Yes. Hit the link for more.

Cowen’s Doug Creutz has told Gamasutra that Wii is just “fool’s gold” to investors, and that backing PS3 and Xbox 360 offerings should be taken more seriously.

“I think the Wii installed base represents, to a certain extent, fool’s gold for someone looking to invest in video game development,” he said.

“You’re rolling the dice on succeeding in a market which has proved very resistant to generating meaningful hits away from Nintendo titles and the music genre.”

Creutz also cautioned that just because Wii is currently dominating the market does not make it the best investment, and feels you have more control over your fate when choosing to invest in one of the other two consoles.

“The choice here is really between investing for the Xbox 360 and PS3, since their capabilities are fairly similar, or the Wii,” said Creutz. “I would caution investors and developers that the larger installed base of the Wii is really a bit of a red herring.”

More through the link.

Sega’s to release its European Valkyria Chronicles DLC on April 16, the firm said today.

There’s three parts to it – as previously announced – and it’s going to cost £3.19 or €3.99 “each”.

The press release doesn’t make it particularly clear if it’s all coming in one lump or it’s going to cost you £10 for the lot.

Decipher it yourself after the break.

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Director Gore Verbinski has passed on the fourth installment in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise in order to focus on the upcoming BioShock movie.

That’s fine, because, if we’re being honest, the last PotC film was shit anyway.

Take-Two head Strauss Zelnick said last year that the BioShock movie will release alongside a third game.

More over on SciFi Wire.

Activision confirmed today that Radical’s open-world, shape-shifting action game, Prototype, will ship on June 5 and 9 in Europe and North America respectively.

The title has passed inspection without any cuts from the BBFC for an 18 rating (thanks, deftangel), while the ESRB has handed it an M for Mature. Did we expect anything less?

The official website has also been updated with new information and content, including a partial video of the game’s introduction.

It’s out for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360.

Press release is below.

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Amazon’s launched a 360 store in the US, offering games for download for cash instead of Microsoft Points.

You buy the games, download them to your 360 and play them. All very convenient.

The service also allows people to purchase subscription cards for Xbox Live and Microsoft Points.

Kotaku’s rumouring the same may be on the way for PS3, Wii and possibly PSP.

All sounds good to us. Thanks, Blerk.

Fucking hell. You can’t keep a really, really, really old shooting franchise down, apparently. Konami confirmed a version of Silent Scope for iPhone today, claiming the on-rails actioner will have “touch-screen capabilities, multiple gameplay modes and difficulty levels”.

A bit like Metal Gear Solid Touch. The new game’s based on the 1999 arcade release.

“With the release of Silent Scope on the iPhone and iPod touch, we’re substantiating our commitment to developing quality content that takes our top franchise titles and turns them into an on-the-go gaming experience,” said Konami Mobile’s Anthony Borquez.

“Silent Scope allows players to conceal their firearms and perfect their sharpshooting skills wherever they go.”

Sounds amazing. No date. Press release after the break.

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TimeGate has filed a lawsuit for trademark infringement against Paramount over the name “Section 8″.

Section 8 is a TimeGate FPS, and the company claims it had set-up meetings regarding “potential business ventures” with Paramount which were canceled without explanation or follow-up from Paramount.

The firm goes on to claim that three days after canceling the meeting, Paramount Digital Entertainment plans to release an interactive web series called Section 8 with a foreign company.

More through the link.

Speaking in the next issue of Famitsu, Final Fantasy XIII director Motomu Toriyama has said that the RPG is “currently” running at 720p and 30 frames a second, according to Kotaku.

Toriyama said the team was currently making sure all text in the game was readable on SD TVs.

Sounds as though development’s rolling along nicely now.

“We’ve almost finished all the parts of the game,” said Toriyama. “From now on, it’s a matter of putting them together.”

The demo’s out later this month.

Harmonix just released a trailer for Rock Band Unplugged the franchise’s PSP version. Get it after the break.

An “Limited Edition Rock Band Unplugged PSP Entertainment Pack” is on the way, to include the black PSP-3000, a 4GB Memory Stick PRO Duo, and a PSN downloadable movie voucher for School of Rock.

Exclusive tracks for the game:

• 3 Doors Down – “Kryptonite”
• AFI – “Miss Murder”
• Alice in Chains – “Would?”
• Audioslave – “Gasoline”
• Black Tide – “Show Me the Way”
• Blink 182 – “What’s My Age Again”
• Freezepop – “Less Talk More Rokk”
• Jackson 5 – “ABC”
• Tenacious D – “Rock Your Socks”

It’s out on June 9. Loads more on the PS Blog.

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Remember how Capcom announced Lost Planet 2 on Xbox Live and only confirmed it for 360? And remember how there was tons of speculation about whether or not it was coming to PS3?

Yeah, well it isn’t. Yet.

“We’re still thinking about it and haven’t announced a PS3 version, so we can’t say more about it just yet,” producer Jun Takeuchi told Gamesradar.

Takeuchi explained the reasoning about revealing the game on Live.

“We wanted to show the game first and foremost to fans of the original Lost Planet,” he added.

“We talked to Microsoft about doing it this way and they were interested in it as well. Also, I think it was a unique and memorable way to announce the game.”

There’s a full interview through there.

SCEA hardware marketing boss John Koller has said that Blu-ray, and the public’s perception of the value it brings to PS3, will be a driving factor in increased sales for the machine this year.

“We are looking at a general move by the consumer to understanding the complete value of the PS3, inclusive of Blu-ray will is really gaining a lot of traction for us,” the exec told VG247.

Koller said that PS3 sales are expected to rise up to 15 percent this year compared to fiscal 2008.

PSP is to enjoy a similar rate of growth this year, he said, and that the handheld’s Remote Play feature would factor into the rise, just as Blu-ray will for PS3.

Despite appreciation of hardware features helping things along, though, software will play a vital role for the PlayStation family this year, Koller said.

“That’s being driven by, in a lot of ways, by our first-party software line-up, which is outstanding, but there’s some third-party titles coming,” he added.

“The line-up’s very strong.”

Both Flock! and Puzzle Quest: Galactrix have been released on Xbox Live, costing 1,200 and 1,600 MS Points respectively.

Flock! looks awesome. So probably buy that. More here and here.