Monthly Archives: May 2009

Atari’s officially backed out of Europe, with Namco Bandai now handling Atari titles in the region.

According to this MCV post, Distribution Partners (or Namco Bandai Partners) will be headed up by former Take Two, THQ and EA exec John Galloway in Europe.

“We believe that DP will become a wholly-owned Namco Bandai games company soon, but this process requires time and we will comment further when we have an anticipated closing date,” said Atari’s European marketing boss David Miller this week.

Atari will still operate as a brand in the US.

More through there. So long, Atari. Was fun.

Thanks, scratchy.

A brief new glimpse of Monster Hunter 3 (~tri) popped up this morning. Get it after the break.

Looks bloody mint for a Wii game. Watch E3 for US and European announcements.

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Team17 put out three videos of Worms 2 Armageddon in action this morning – see them here, here and here.

The footage shows a magnet repelling an airstrike, a worm panicking and the use of fire in the game.

It’s out this summer for XBLA. Team17′s Facebook page is here.

Sony expects PS3 sales to rise from 10 million in FY08 to 13 million this year, it said in its full-year figures today.

PSP sales are expected to grow to 16 million from 14 million.

The only predicted downturn is PlayStation 2, which will fall from 8 million to 6 million in the current financial year, Sony said.

Total software sales for all consoles are expected to hit 240 million units.

All Sony’s fiscal ’08 news can be found here.

Update – The original images have been pulled.

Some images of what looks remarkably like a slim PS3 have appeared on a Chinese message board, apparently taken from a factory.

Pay attention. The elbows in the ribs are strong on this one. E3 or bust.

Via 1UP.

Overall PlayStation sales were down 18 percent for the 12 months ending March 31, Sony said today, resting at 1.284 billion yen.

Foreign exchange rates and a decrease in PlayStation 2 hardware and software sales were blamed for the drop.

Losses for the year were trimmed from 124.5 billion yen in 2007 to 58.5 billion yen in FY08 thanks to the decreased cost of PS3 hardware production, the company said.

Sony Corporation reported a loss of 98.9 billion yen for the period overall.

All Sony’s fiscal ’08 news can be found here.

PS3 hardware sales rose 10 percent in the full-year ending March 31, up to 10.06 million units from 9.12 million in fiscal 2007.

PS2 hardware, however, collapsed in the past year, with sales down 42 percent to 7.91 million consoles compared to the year previous.

PSP sales were up 2 percent to 14.11 million sold.

All Sony’s fiscal ’08 news can be found here.

PS3 software sales went through the roof in the 12 months ending March 31, up 79 percent to 103.7 million units compared to the previous year, vastly outmatching hardware sales for growth.

The story wasn’t so solid for PSP and PS2, however, down 9 percent to 50.3 million units and down 46 percent to 83.5 million units year-on-year respectively.

All Sony’s fiscal ’08 news can be found here.

Sony’s updated PS3 to v2.76, as noted on the PS Blog.

According to that post, “This is a minor update that improves the playback quality of some PS3 format software.”

Knock yourselves out.

Sega Sammy’s posted a ¥22.88 billion loss for the fiscal year, down from the ¥52.47 billion loss in 2008.

Game sales slid 7.5 percent year-on-year, but the majority of the loss came from the company’s pachinko and arcade business.

There’s more on Kotaku.

Think we missed a week here. Anyhoo. Pokemon Mystery Dungeon’s on top in Japan this week, and Wii Fit’s back in the top ten.

It’s all go. Data for the week ending May 10. Thanks, ChartGet.

01. [NDS] Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of the Sky (Nintendo) 44,000 / 283,000
02. [NDS] Dragon Ball Kai: Saiyajin Raishuu (Namco Bandai) 41,000 / 115,000
03. [NDS] Made in Ore (Wario Ware) (Nintendo) 41,000 / 97,000
04. [NDS] Mario & Luigi RPG 3 (Nintendo) 26,000 / 606,000
05. [PSP] Monster Hunter Portable 2 G (PSP the Best) (Capcom) 23,000 / 663,000
06. [WII] Monster Hunter G (Capcom) 23,000 / 195,000
07. [WII] Wii Fit (Nintendo) 20,000 / 3,403,000
08. [PS2] Jikkyou Power Pro Major League 2009 (Konami) 15,000 / 58,000
09. [PSP] Persona (Atlus) 14,000 / 93,000
10. [WII] Taiko no Tatsujin Wii (Namco Bandai) 14,000 / 498,000

Treyarch community lead Josh Olin feels that the game market is not saturated with zombies.

In fact, he says he could “play zombies for the rest of time.”

While promoting the upcoming Call of Duty: World at War map pack in a Giant Bomb podcast, Olin talked about his insatiable love for the undead and why it goes so well with the WWII setting.

“Out of fear of showing my zombie nerd-ism I will contend that zombies aren’t saturated at all. I could play zombies for the rest of time,” he said.

“But people thought that about the World War II genre, right — that that was saturated? And I think that with World at War at least our hope was that we would come out with something that was new and different that people haven’t been used to playing before.

“Hopefully that’s been proven by the success of these map packs.”

Long live zombies.

Via Kotaku.

Martin Hollis has said that he would love to see GoldenEye land on Wii’s Virtual Console.

Speaking with Official Nintendo Magazine, the designer said that because of legal issues, the classic N64 shooter may never be released through the download service.

“There’s always someone with some exclusivity agreement, so there’s lots of lawyers,” he said. “I’m not going to hold my breath. I’d love it to happen, but I can’t see it.”

Shame that.

More through the link.

Awesome nine-minute developer walkthrough for BioShock 2 is posted after the break.

Jordan Thomas, creative director for the game, talks you through all the nuances and the absolute coolness of it.

You fight Big Sisters. What more can we say.

Just watch it already.

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Bayonetta director Hideki Kamiya has explained the latest Bayonetta trailer in a developer video, and breaks the trailer down for you bit by bit.

He talks about her weapons and how to switch between two sets of them, what the deal is with lollipops, and two things she’ll never strip herself of in the game.

Interested in hearing about all things Bayonetta? Got 23-minutes to spare? Then watch the video posted after the break.

Via Kotaku.

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New DLC is making its way to PSN for MotorStorm: Pacific Rift.

Best of all – it’s free.

For eight weeks, one pack per week will be released  featuring new paint jobs for three vehicles.

When all is said and done, every single vehicle class in the game will have a new look.

There’s a video of the new colors posted after the break.

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Intellisurvey has sent out a survey suggesting that Lord of the Rings Online is indeed coming to Xbox 360.

Originally rumored to be a free-to-play, microtransaction based MMO, one  question posed to survey takers asked if they’d be willing to pay $12.99 per month for a subscription (after laying down $59.99 for the game), or if they would prefer a free model where you pay for add-ons.

Downloadable items listed as possible microtransaction were: in-game currency, additional classess, races, clothing, weapons, armor, animals, transportation, expansion packs, additional quests, and map packs.

Both Turbine and Warner Bros. refuse to confirm or deny the MMO, but it’s been known for quite some time that Turbine was working on one for Xbox 360.

Proposed game description from the survey is after the break.

Thanks, GameDaily.

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The official website for Splinter Cell: Conviction is offering up a big tease of sorts.

According to Eurogamer Portugal it’s not the site, but the link it takes you to that’s the head scratcher.

The site reads: “Site currently under investigation” and “If you have any information on Sam Fisher, please report it here.”

Said link takes you to the game forums, and not much else is known. Possibly a reveal of sorts soon.

Whatever it is, it’s got the forums buzzing.

EU PlayStation Home community manager, TedTheDog, has admitted that the game space lacks the content offered elsewhere, but promises it will get more soon.

“Let’s be honest, SCEE Home is behind the other regions in the number of spaces we have to offer,” he said on the official forums. “That’s not to say we don’t have some really good clothing and furniture, we’ve actually got some excellent partners in the shopping centre.

“In isolation we don’t think this makes SCEE Home a bad place but we fully understand the regional comparisons and why they’re made.

“In the spirit of openness being requested of us, and that we’ve committed to, we’re going to say what we’re going to do about this and in short, we’re going to switch our priorities to the production of spaces for the foreseeable future. We will continue to support our partners in the shopping centre but our primary focus will be to improve our output and range of spaces.”

He explained that Europe’s version of Home fell behind due to lack of staff resources, but more content’s on the way thanks to a new hire.

“The timeline for this is probably about the next two to four months and there is likely to be a drop in output before it starts to really pick up and improve,” he said.

SCEE plans to introduce 17 new Home spaces along with the Uncharted, Warhawk and Resident Evil 5 themes already present in other regions.

More through the links.

Thanks, CVG.

DICE has said that it learned its lesson with Battlefield: Bad Company and plans to do a better job on the sequel.

Speaking with GI.biz, creative director Lars Gustavsson told the site that the studio was so used to developing shooters for the PC crowd, that it underestimated consoles users.

“To me, Battlefield: Bad Company was an eye-opener, and for a very long time I think the PC audience was seen as the hardcore, the most competitive and dedicated audience. Maybe at one time that was partially true, but now we definitely see a fanatic shooter audience on console.

“I think one of our biggest mistakes with Battlefield: Bad Company for example was that when we started making it, laying out the plans, the view on the gamer was that it’s a console audience, and we need to treat them a bit more gently, since they’re less experienced…

“Well, when we shipped it – it was quite a long project – the audience had grown, matured, played more online… so they knew what a shooter on a console should be like, what to expect.

“So I think in some areas, as lead designer on that project, I feel that we could have done a better job of meeting those expectations, even though I was extremely pleased with the project.”

You can read more of the interview with Gustavsson through the link.