Monthly Archives: July 2009

Activision’s sent out a brand new trailer of Guitar Hero V, showing off some of the game’s play features.

Looks natty. Catch it on Gamersyde

Game’s out this autumn for PS3, 360, Wii and PS2.

Treyarch has confirmed that it’ll be bringing Map Pack 2 for the PC version of Call of Duty: World at War in Patch 1.5. The update is currently in QA.

More info will be incoming next week.

Map Pack 2, which contains three multiplayer maps and one new zombie level has already been released for the PS3 and 360.

Thanks, Big Download.

BioShock creator Ken Levine has spoken out on the four games that made him what he is today, blaming Adventure, Castle Wolfenstein, Ultima Underworld and The Legend of Zelda, which he cites as the cause of the break-up with his first “super-serious” girlfriend.

“After I graduated from college, I moved to an apartment in San Francisco with the first super-serious girlfriend. She was a couple of years younger than me, so at the end of the summer, she was set to go back to school,” said Levine.

“On our last day together in San Fran, I for some reason picked up The Legend of Zelda. As she stood by waiting for some romantic gesture to happen on our last day living together, she was instead treated to watching me obsessively plow through Hyrule for around 15 hours. By the time the cab showed up to take her to the airport, I realized if I had any hope of keeping her as my girlfriend, it was time to shut off the NES.”

More at Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

The Major has announced that a cut-price Ikaruga is the latest Xbox Live Deal of the Week.

Normally at 800MS Points, the game is now at 400 for the next week. Remember, it’s for Gold members only.

Get it here.

Wedbush Morgan super-analyst Michael Pachter has predicted that Sony will cut PS3′s price before October 1 if US hardware sales continue to slide.

Speaking in a note today, Pachter estimated that US Wii, 360 and PS3 sales will show a year-on-year decline of 43 percent for June.

“We think that the console manufacturers will therefore be forced to consider a price cut before year-end, with Sony cutting the PS3’s price by October 1,” he said.

“Further, we do not think that Nintendo’s hardware forecast figures are achievable without a price cut, and we expect one around the same time as the PS3 price cut.

“It is likely both manufacturers will cut by $50, with Sony making up any lack of increased demand with a software bundle.

“We expect Microsoft to follow suit, giving us confidence that US software sales will grow later in the year, notwithstanding negative sales in the early part of the year.”

Pachter predicted sales of 350,000 Wii, 225,000 Xbox 360 and 165,000 PS3 consoles in June today. The June NPD releases this Thursday.

We dread to think what it’ll be like now for Final Fantasy XIII after seeing this.

After the jump is a video of the Dragon Quest IX launch in Shibuya, Tokyo. Honestly, its balls-to-the-walls mental.

The game sold over 2.3 million units in it’s first weekend at retail, although user opinion for the game hasn’t gone too well.

Via Tiny Cartridge and GoNintendo.

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Tiger 10 and Fight Night Round 4 have traded places at the top of the UK charts this week, with Woods now leading the pack to the boxing sequel’s number two.

Nice if you’re Peter Moore.

Transformers is steady at third. As predicted, Potter’s moved up, although only to fourth. We’ll leave it a few more weeks before we roll out the “HOGWARTS HOGWASH” headlines.

Last week’s chart here. Data below for the week ending July 11.

Good news for PS3 owners dying to get their hands on Tales of Vesperia: a demo for the PS3 version has just gone live on the Japanese PS Store.

It weighs in at 253Mb and lets you go to the Keiv Moc part of the game with a five-character party.

The game’s out this summer for PlayStation 3 in Japan, with no release date for Europe and the US as yet. The Xbox 360 version only launched in the West at the end of June.

Thanks, SCRAWL.

TheSixthAxis has noticed that the time trial DLC levels for Mirror’s Edge has now actually gone down in price on the UK PlayStation Store, from £7 to £0.

Translation: it’s now free.

We just checked and it is indeed true. However, for any 360 owners hoping for the same, its not. The content’s still at 800 MS Points on Xbox Live Marketplace.

The DLC was launched back in February for PS3, 360 and PC.

Well, what are you waiting for? Go, go!

Famitsu is reporting that Dragon Quest IX has sold over 2.3 million units in its first two days on sale in Japan.

The game released over the weekend. Pre-orders for the hugely anticipated DS RPG had topped 2 million.

The title appears to have beaten the launch of its predecessor: Dragon Quest VIII sold 2,237,000 units in its opening 48 hours in 2004.

Thanks, Andriasang.

A rumour of U2 and Michael Jackson editions of SingStar releasing this autumn has been drop-kicked into submission by SCEE.

“We currently have no plans to release dedicated disks for either artist,” said a rep.

The talk emerged on French site PS3Gen this morning in a piece that also dated a string of high profile SCEE products.

The company gave us a “no comment” on the other parts of the rumoured schedule.

Louisiana’s decided to award games companies in the state a tax break of 25 percent.

ESA’s welcomed the move.

“We commend Governor Jindal for his strong leadership as well as that of Senator Duplessis for expanding the state’s computer and videogame development and production base, and helping lead the way in creating the next generation of entertainment innovation in Louisiana,” said ESA boss Michael Gallagher.

“Developers and publishers live and work for years in states where games are created, providing a higher return on investment than any form of entertainment.”

More at GI.

French site PS3Gen is quoting “sources” that claim Uncharted 2 will release on September 30.

The talk follows a little tooing an froing on the issue last week, with some apparent confusion over a proposed October release for he sequel.

That’s not all. The report reckons “SingStar: Michael Jackson,” with and without microphones, will launch on November 13.

True? We don’t know. We’ve asked Sony for comment.

Thanks, Panipal2005.

Eat, Sleep, Play boss David Jaffe has tweeted that his new game is to be announced ”soon”.

That’s despite the developer previously saying he’d “love” to announce it at E3 2010.

But is it Twisted Metal? Probably. We should know before too long, from the sound of it.

Naughty Dog co-president Evan Wells has tweeted that Uncharted 2 is going under a “difficulty tuning” as the game prepares for an autumn release.

“We’re doing a playtest of the entire game of Uncharted 2 this weekend to begin our difficulty tuning,” said Wells. “It’s a very delicate process.”

It’s exclusive to the PlayStation 3. No exact date yet.

Ubisoft’s announcement of a brand new studio in Toronto last week could be bad news for other businesses in the area, according to Marcus Gee of The Globe and Mail.

In a post for the website, the reporter set his sights on Toronto premier, Dalton McGuinty, stating that the opening of the new studio would be a ”tax burden” for other developers in the area.

McGuinty pledged a $263 million grant to help Ubi set up the facility, which, it’s claimed, will provide 800 new jobs for the area over the next decade.

“That quarter-billion has to come from somewhere, much of it from good Toronto businesses that don’t have the buzz factor to attract an open-collared premier,” said Gee.

“Their tax burden will rise, and their business will suffer, while the cool kids in the video-game industry collect government cheques.”

More through the link.

Team 17′s just released Worms for iPhone and iPod Touch.

For $4.99 you get 50 challenges, four-way multiplayer and more.

Go get it here.

Heavy Rain will release in 2010 to give it “space to live” away from the hectic Christmas retail period, Quantic Dream co-CEO Guillaume de Fondaumiere has told GI.

“Purely from my perspective, most publishers today realise that it’s not ideal to release a new IP or a new genre just before Christmas,” he said.

“It’s a very crowded place to be, and certain games need more space to live their life. Everybody at working on the project, both at Quantic and Sony, believe this is the right time.”

The thriller’s alpha was delivered on April 15, the developer added, “on time, on budget”.

Expect a better look from Gamescom in Cologne next month.

Dragon Quest IX shipped in Japan over the weekend. The kids aren’t happy, if this set of Amazon review scores is anything to go by.

• 5 stars (67 stars)
• 4 stars (57)
• 3 stars (70)
• 2 stars (86)
• 1 star (223)

There’s no pleasing some folk. More on Kotaku.

Naughty Dog’s released another new Uncharted 2 video, this one showing camera control in multiplayer. Watch it after the break.

You can speed things up, slow things down, follow people and, um, do other stuff.

It’s out later this year, exclusively for PS3.

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