Monthly Archives: November 2009

The Nintendo DSi LL launched in Japan over the weekend.

Famitsu has live some shots of the launch in Japan, including a picture of a granny holding her recently bought unit. Shows you how far this industry has come.

Find them through the link. DSi LL doesn’t launch in the West until 2010.

Zipper’s extended the open beta for MAG, for anyone looking to get onboard or to get playing again if you haven’t already.

Originally meant to end on Friday, the beta has been extended until sometime this week.

Zipper’s also promised details on how to get into the next beta trial for the game this week.

The game is out in January.

All you kids today, with your high-res graphics and 3D gaming. You have it lucky.

Shigeru Miyamoto is against you whipper snappers, somewhat. He thinks everything shouldn’t necessarily be 3D.

“I don’t think everything needs to be 3D, or that just because we’re seeing more 2D games now, that everything’s going to shift back to 2D,” he said in an interview with Nintendo Power.

“Instead, I think that what’s going on is that people are realizing the benefits of a 3D game, and at the same time, remembering what the benefits of 2D games were,” he said. “When going 2D, you need the courage to not be so attached to visual appearance of the games and to really pursue the gameplay experience.”

Thanks, D’Toid.

If a CV found by superannuation seems to indicate, BioWare are working on something that isn’t Mass Effect 2, The Old Republic or Dragon Age: Origins DLC.

In fact, the CV of Daniel Roy shows that they are working on a “unreleased original IP.” He was a senior producer on the project.

What is Roy up to these days?  He is actually traveling the world “one meal at a time.”

His words, not ours.

Make of this as you will.

Game Informer celebrated passing 200 issues recently, so to celebrate, they compiled a list of 200 games, which they think are the best games of all time.

The Legend of Zelda for the NES was the winner, followed then by Super Mario Bros, Tetris, Grand Theft Auto III and Half Life 2.

We’re absolutely sickened though that Metal Gear Solid 3 is near all the way the bottom though at 191. Sickened.

Find the top ten below, with the full 200 at Nintendo Everything.

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GTTV host Geoff Keighley has tweeted that there is still ten more games to be announced for the VGAs next month on December 12.

Speaking in a update, he said: “I think we have around 10 games still unannounced.”

He tweeted a while ago that there will be more announcements coming this week.

So far, only Halo: Reach and the secret 2k Games shooter has been pegged for the show, although a longer and extended version of the trailer for the latter emerged on Saturday.

Thanks, SCRAWL.

A countdown has begun on the Japanese website for Final Fantasy XIII, which says it’ll be the “Final Trailer” for the game.

It’s unknown if this will be the final trailer before the game’s Japanese release next month, or the final trailer full stop.

It’ll go live on the Japanese Final Fantasy website at 4am GMT on Wednesday.

We’ll drop a mail with Square, and see if an English version will also drop the same day. Obviously at a sensible time

Thanks, RPG Site.

Like the mythical Dracula on which Bloodrayne is (kinda) based, nothing can keep Uwe Boll down. Even the would-be wooden stake in the heart that is heading up countless cinematic clunkers has done little to halt the 476 train pile-up that is his career. So now he’s back yet again, this time with Bloodrayne 3.

Somehow, though, we doubt “third time’s a charm” applies to this film franchise.

The movie’s slated to begin filming in January, and will apparently take place during World War II.

Granted, a certain other movie franchise has recently proven that “vampires” and “utter shit” can make for box office magic, so maybe Bloodrayne 3 will be Boll’s breakout hit.

Thanks, The Movie Blog and Dread Central.

Hey Noby Noby Boy… players (?), there’s now a new in-game area for you to play (?) in! Over the weekend, dedicated Noby Noby fans managed to pool their scores and stretch GIRL all the way to Jupiter – thanks in part to a tremendous length multiplier.

Huh? What’d we just say? Holy cow, we spoke in tongues! Neato!

Check out a video of colorful wriggly things partying it up on Jupiter after the break. Hm. Now we’re hungry for gummy worms.

Thanks, PSN Stores.

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They say it’s your birthday! We’re gonna have a good time! And now it’s your birthday! Happy birthday to you!

In case you haven’t noticed, its the Xbox 360′s fourth birthday in the US! It was released on Tuesday November 22 2005.

Some of it’s notable launch games include Project Gotham Racing 3, Perfect Dark Zero and Call of Duty 2.

Happy birthday to you, US 360!

Thanks to Joystiq for reminding us. We’ll get the party hats out, and play musicial chairs.

EA may have pink-slipped 200 Pandemic staffers last week, but true to its word, The Saboteur escaped from the carnage relatively unscathed. And now, according to a post on Pandemic’s community site, the game has gone gold – just in time for its launch next month.

“I am very proud to communicate today that The Saboteur has officially gone ‘GOLD’ on all 3 planned platforms (PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 & PC). This has been a very difficult week for Pandemic Studios, but does not change the fact that a team of amazing people worked very hard to make The Saboteur a great game that fans will be able to enjoy this holiday season,” said former Pandemician “sledgehammer70.”

On the bright side, this sadly orphaned game is looking great. Sure, it may not be the greatest thing ever to result from the loss of one’s parentage (that’d be Batman), but as far as videogames go, we think The Saboteur’s a pretty sure bet.

Valve’s released an update for Left 4 Dead 2.

Start up Steam and it’ll take.

Here’s the patch notes:

• Fixed performance problem when rendering lots of decals, notably when fighting tanks with shotguns
• Fixed rcon response not working on Linux dedicated servers
• Fixed matchmaking problem matching into Advanced and Expert games
• Fix bug that would cause other specials to try to pummel a player a Charger disconnects or reconnects
• Fixed versus mode results panel being cut off in transition stats screen in non-english
• Found games: fixed non-player entries drawing the wrong type of icon in the selected item name label
• Game mode selector on main menu now takes keyboard input

More through the link.

Just in case you were unaware, Microsoft’s updated Games for Windows Live with some cosmetic changes.

Along with a change to the download system, it has a redesigned marketplace and game pages are more detailed – making it feel more like XBL Marketplace.

There is also a new top sellers box on the homepage so you can see what is popular at the moment, along with DirectX 11 support for future titles and a few bug fixes.

You can get the download by logging into GFW, or though the official website.

Blizzard has reiterated that Diablo III does not currently have a release date, and that the RPG will not be out any time soon.

“[ Diablo III] is not going to be out next year,” said bossman Rob Pardo told Techland. “We always announce all of our games too early. We realize that and go, ‘You know what? Next time we’re not going to do that.’ And then we always fail at that.

“We’ve been wrong (on release dates) for as long as I can remember. So that’s why don’t do release dates anymore.”

Expect it sometime after the Rapture, then.

Via BigDownload.

Not  much going on this week with Indie and other games of interest. Must be the looming holiday coming up next week.

However, there are still a few bits worth noting through the break, like the releases of The Marionette, Divinity II, and The Mystery of the Mary Celeste.

Click onward.

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THQ has piled D’toid with loads of stuff on Darksiders: Wrath of War, along with some really hot new screens and a video.

Apparently, War will be able to acquire weapons and upgrades through the exchange of souls instead of currency.

See, souls are good for something other than controlling through the use of Jasmine infused candles and plucked hen feathers.

Oops. We said too much.

More through the link.

Ubisoft has confirmed that it will not be the publisher of No More Heroes or Heroes’ Paradise on Xbox 360 and PS3 when released in the US.

“Ubisoft will not be publishing either of these versions,” a company spokesperson told G4, although it still plans to publish the sequel on Wii – No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle.

Rising Star, which is the European publisher, has not announced one for the US, but we’ll send ‘em a mail to see if a decision has been made yet.

More through the link.

A retail listing for the Xbox 360 version of No More Heroes: Heroes’ Paradise in Japan suggests that it will more than likely carry a CERO Z rating (mature) when released in February.

This is because it’s the North American version, which still has “bloodshed” intact. With such a strong rating, it is not likely to be carried on normal retail shelves.

PS3 versions probably won’t get the same rating, as it’s the censored version originally released in Japan.

If this sort of thing interests you, Joystiq has more on it here.

BioWare has tweeted that a “surpirse” is in store for Mass Effect 2 fans next week.

Here’s the tweet:

“Man, so much time tied up today in meetings and ‘secret stuff’ I didn’t get any time with ME2 at all. =( Still with the coming surprise for next week on the ME2 website, I’m sure fans will forgive me for no update.”

Which was followed by a second tweet that read:

“Did I, Evil Chris Priestly, just drop a hint? Yes. Yes I did.”

Last time BioWare teased us, it ended up being DLC for Dragon Age, so who knows what this could be about.

More through CinemaBlend.

Comics will not made available through the digital PSP store until next month, but those who downloaded firmware 6.20 can still get a preview of what’s to come.

Over on the PlayStation Comics website, there are codes to download two different comics: Americans get the first issue of Transformers: All Hail Megatron; Europeans get the first issue of Aleister Arcane.

Each one eats up about 40Mb of space, in case that’s the sort of thing you take into consideration.

More through the link, via Joystiq.