Monthly Archives: September 2009

A three-song AFI Track Pack has been released for Guitar Hero 5 on PS3, Wii and Xbox 360.

Joining the already on-disc “Medicate,” gamers can now download “Beautiful Thieves” before it’s released on the band’s latest album Crash Love, along with “Girl’s Not Grey,” and “The Missing Frame” from previous releases.

The full thing will run you 440 MS Points ($5.50/£3.74/€5.12) or individually for 160 MS Points ($2.00/£1.36/€1.86).

Turbine’s Craig Alexander confirmed during his keynote at GDC Austin that the firm is currently at work on a console MMO.

The VP of project development revealed that it has been in-house for a year and a half and the staff is working to release it on PS3 and Xbox 360.

There are also plans to develop one for Wii in the future.

So far, over 20 million dollars has been spent on the title, and while still mum on what exactly it entails, the targeted release date is early 2011.

During his speech, Alexander stated his opinion on console MMOs, and went so far as to claim PC versions of the genre will be surpassed by the console versions.

Thanks, Massively.

Piranha Bytes has announced that its RPG Risen has gone gold for PC and will be released on October 2, as expected.

However, its publisher Deep Silver has revealed that the Xbox 360 version has been moved to an early 2010 release.

No reason was given for the delay.

Via Shack.

The PC Gamer podcast has confirmed that the next add-on pack for Dawn of War II will be titled Chaos Rising.

Fitting considering it will feature the chaos faction.

Not surprising, really, but satisfying.

More information regarding the add-on is expected in the next issue of PC Gamer.

Thanks, Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

Part 3 of Sony’s motion controller Blog series is up, and we have it posted for you after the break.

In it, Richard Marks and Anton Mikhailov break down their E3 on-stage demo into more detail discussing plasma whips and drawing, abstract domino snakes and real time strategy games.

Stuff that was left out of the E3 presentation is included as well, so you might as well give it a watch.

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During a Q&A session on its official site, Rockstar responded to a question regarding the PS3 exclusive Agent, and if more information will be released on it this year.

Apparently not, according to the reply.

“It’s not likely we will have any more news this year,” stated a Rockstar rep, “but the game is shaping up to be something truly spectacular.”

The Q&A session was a chance for fans to submit questions regarding upcoming games from the firm.

More through the link.

David Braben has said that expectations are huge for Elite IV, but at the same time it won’t be released until he is pleased with how it looks and its ability to differentiate itself from the others.

When asked if work was being done on the title by GI.biz at the A Life in Videogames event, Braben admitted “it would be mad for us not to work on it”, but that he would have to be satisfied that it was “going to be a different type of experience”.

During his session, Braben commented on the importance of taking chances new types of games, citing Rollercoaster Tycoon and The Sims as examples.

More through the link.

LucasArts has released a video showing the public how Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron looks on DS.

Changes compared to the PSP version include a top-down view, which is to help provide the player with a more arcade-like experience, but another change is that it will also limited to four players.

See for yourself after the break courtesy of Joystiq.

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Episode Zero has been announced for Final Fantasy XIII, and its a set of stories that lead up to the events of the game.

To be released online separately, hidden away in the Special section of the game’s website, Episode Zero: Promise is to be penned by FF alumni Jun Eishima with the the first episode of the story titled “Encounter”.

Available to read online soon, this should get everyone a bit more familiar with what’s going on with the story once the game is released.

Via Unofficial FF Site.

Pearl Jam’s entire Backspacer album’s set to be released on the Rock Band Music Store after the album debuts in stores September 20.

Tracks:

• Gonna See My Friend
• Got Some
• The Fixer
• Johnny Guitar
• Just Breathe
• Amongst the Waves
• Unthought Known
• Supersonic
• Speed of Sound
• Force of Nature
• The End

All tracks are original master recordings and will be released via the following schedule: Xbox 360 (Sept. 20), Wii (Sept. 22) and PS3 (Sept. 24).

Tracks can be purchased individually for 160 MS Points ($1.99/£.99/€1.49 (160 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360)  or in its entirety for 1440 Ms Points ($17.99/ £9.19/11.25 ).

The PC demo of Need for Speed: SHIFT has landed on the net.

You can get it at FileFront, the official website, and many other places as well.

The demo is around 1.1 GB in size and features the Spa and London River routes, the Dodge Viper, Lotus Elise, BMW M3, Nissan GTR and the unlockabel Pagani Zonda.

Neato.

Game’s out today.

Valve’s Doug Lombardi has expressed that he was surpirsed to learn Left 4 Dead 2 was banned in Australia.

“We were surprised to hear of this news yesterday,” he told Shack. “Obviously, everyone at Valve is pretty bummed.

“It would be a shame if folks in Australia, or anywhere else, are unable to purchase Left 4 Dead 2 because of a ratings issue.”

It was revealed yesterday that the OFLC in Australia banned the game due to “realistic, frenetic and unrelenting violence”.

Game’s out for the rest of the globe on PC and Xbox 360 November 17 – except for down under unfortunately.

HMV’s GameOn! London event has been canceled.

According to the official website:

“It is with great sadness that we announce that GameOn! London has been cancelled. For those who have purchased tickets, Seatem ticketing agency will directly process your refunds.”

Originally scheduled for June 20-21, it was moved to November, now it’s a no go.

Thanks, CVG.

Activision has released a DJ Hero video featuring DJs Cut Chemist and J. Period.

Each appear in the game and provide exclusive mixes, including J. Period’s “Q-Tip ‘Good Thang’ vs. Billy Squier ‘Big Beat’” and “Gang Starr ‘Just to Get a Rep’ vs. Mobb Deep ‘Shook Ones, Part 2′”.

Other DJs confirmed for the Hero title include: DJ AM, DJ Grandmaster Flash, DJ Jazzy Jeff, DJ Shadow, DJ Z-Trip, The Scratch Perverts and DJ Yoda.

It’s out on October 30 for PS3, Wii and Xbox 360.

Head on over to CVG for a watch.

Square has released a video for Nier Replicant, which is expected sometime during 2010 for PS3.

It shows a rather strange world, where the hero of the game Nier, is on a quest to save his sister.

Nier Gestalt has our hero on a quest to save his daughter, and that version is out for Xbox 360.

Anyway, the video for Replicant is posted after the break. It’s a very interesting watch.

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The appearance this morning of a Witcher 2 video on YouTube is the “uncontrolled side effect” of trying to find a publisher for the game, CD Projekt boss Adam Kicinski has just said in a statement.

“Of course, we can’t and won’t try to deny the facts. The movie that appeared on the various sites yesterday presents our newest project, The Witcher 2, which we’ve been working on for some time. We made something about half year ago, to present the first playable version of the game,” he said.

“Currently we are looking for a potential publisher (or publishers) for this title, and this leak is an uncontrolled side effect of that process. For today, we are not commenting on anything that concerns the game itself.”

The game looks in fantastic form in the video. Fingers crossed we won’t have to wait too long for more.

Thanks, The_Villa.

The US PS movie store update this week had eight HD movies added to it, nine if you count the extended version of Walk the Line.

Over on the regular format end, X-Men Origins: Wolverine was added, and the US PS Blog has a video clip of Hugh Jackman from his ‘In Character With’ featurette.

HD TV shows include the usual suspects with The Office: Season Six being added to the mix.

Here’s the list of HD movie offerings in its entirety. The rest can be found through the link.

• Dance Flick Unrated Version
• Enchanted
• Fragments
• Miss Potter
• Next Day Air
• The Haunting of Molly Hartley
• Unbreakable
• Walk the Line
• Walk the Line (Extended

Tatsuya Minami, president and CEO of Platinum Games, has revealed through the company blog that after work was finished on the Xbox 360 version of Bayonetta, Plantinum handed the data over to SEGA so it could port it to PS3.

“With Bayonetta, we created the Xbox 360 version of the game first, and then handed off all the data and other assets to SEGA so they could begin the process of porting Bayonetta to the PS3,” Minami wrote, “giving them advice regarding the porting process along the way and overseeing the progress to ensure that the PS3 version would be the best it could be.

“As the developers of Bayonetta, we have overseen both versions, and I would like to make one thing clear. The Xbox 360 and PS3, as hardware platforms, both have their own distinct differences and peculiarities, and these characteristics will naturally give birth to differences in the final product. However, all involved endeavored to exploit the specific traits of each console to create an enjoyable experience.

“We feel the best way to evaluate this is by actually playing the game for yourself and coming to your own conclusions.”

More through the link.

Thanks, FeaturePreacher.

Loads of WET screens landed on the net today, and when we say loads, we are talking 43 of ‘em.

Some may be familiar to you, some may not.

Either way, it’s always nice to take a gander so you don’t miss out and have your friends tease you over it later.

Conformity is a good thing sometimes.

Via CVG.

Dead Space Extraction has more than 500 percent more dialogue in it than the original game, senior designer John Calhoun confirmed in the video you can see after the break.

“One of the things that fans may not know about this game is that we actually have over five times more dialogue than the original Dead Space,” said the developer.

“This is a story-driven game, and the reason why it succeeds as a story-driven game is because of the calibre of the actors. This triple-A cast really delivers.”

Please, please watch the movie below. The Wii shooter releases on October 2, and in terms of presentation and voice acting at least, it looks most definitely “not shit”.

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