Tag Archives: eurogamer

Rich Leadbetter’s Eurogamer’s new technology editor, the company’s announced.

The Digital Foundry founder is a games editorial veteran, having worked on CVG, Mean Machines and many other UK games brands.

“Digital Foundry’s embedded presence on Eurogamer is a brilliant opportunity to exploit everything I’ve learned from 19 years working in the games business,” said Leadbetter.

Gratz, etc. PR after the break.

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Fable III drew the most traffic for Eurogamer over GamesCom for a single game, according to this GI piece.

Which is all very nice, but the real story here is the graphs. Just look at that shit. Pastel shades, italics, extended radial spokes on the pie; a new level.

Hit the link to see for yourself.

Eurogamer Expo 2009 just announced its full publisher line-up, and it’s pretty much “complete,” from the look of it.

Sony, Microsoft, EA, Ubisoft, Eidos, Sega, Capcom, Konami, 2K, Bethesda, Namco and Deep Silver will all have playable games on hand.

This year’s show is split over two UK locations. The Leeds event is being held at The Royal Armouries on October 27-28, followed by a London leg at Old Billingsgate October 30-31.

Games confirmed so far include Assassin’s Creed II, Halo 3: ODST, Borderlands, Tekken 6, Left 4 Dead 2, Dante’s Inferno and Aliens vs. Predator. Expect an awful lot more to be announced as we get closer to the show.

Buy tickets here. PR after the break.

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Eurogamer’s posted its re-review of EA’s Grand Slam Tennis, bumping the score from 5/10 to 8/10.

The site said last week it was to reassess the game after it found the Wii MotionPlus-enabled sports title to be sluggish on its Wii debug unit.

Reviews, eh? Millions of words through the link.

GamesAid, a UK games industry charity for children and young people, announced its first company partners, including Codemasters, Eurogamer and Nintendo amongst others.

“GamesAid is all about inclusiveness and raising awareness, whilst at the same time keeping our running costs as low as possible,” said GamesAid chairman, Andy Payne.

“This partnership scheme recognises those companies who have committed to help GamesAid by raising awareness and funds and also contributing services on a pro bono basis.”

Want to get involved? There’s a charity poker tournament at the Grosvenor Casino, Brighton during the Develop Conference & Expo in Brighton in July. So get saving. Players can register here.

Full thing after the break.

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EG’s just said it’s to re-review EA’s Grand Slam Tennis, and has pulled its original 5/10 score.

The site’s editor, Tom Bramwell, said on his blog today that the game’s retail version is significantly more responsive than the dev kit set-up used for the review.

“As a result, I’m immediately withdrawing Eurogamer’s Grand Slam Tennis review until we will publish a new review based purely on retail console play,” said Bramwell.

“The existing text will remain online with big whopping signposts on it that highlight the above, and once the replacement review is published, it will redirect to that.”

The new score will go live on Monday.

The “new” Digital Foundry blog has just launched on Eurogamer, adding HD video to the UK-based site.

The tech site, run by long-standing games industry media chap Richard Leadbetter, focuses on console technology and video-related coverage.

“It’s been a long time coming, but finally the Digital Foundry tech blog has been humanely re-homed and is ready to resume full service,” said Leadbetter.

“For those new to the site, our aims are remarkably straightforward – to go beyond the gameplay, telling you how games work, what makes them tick, and of course, crucially, what levels of performance you can expect from them.”

Take a look.

Eurogamer’s giving away 2,000 copies of Lord of the Rings Online as part of a two-year birthday promo for the game.

Just hit the link for details. Looks as though it’s going to be a first come, first served thing.

The giveaway’s happening on April 24.

Update: IGN’s given it 9.4.

Update 2: More scores:

• Jeuxvideo – 17/20
• IGN AU – 9
• Gamereactor Denmark – 9
• Eurogamer Portugal – 10
• Eurogamer Italy – 9
• Eurogamer Spain – 10

Eurogamer’s gone live with its Killzone 2 review, giving the game 9/10.

Snip:

This is a methodical shooter that makes few concessions to those not already interested in its single-minded approach to cover-based military action. I’ve compared it to Rainbow Six in the past, but it also calls to mind F.E.A.R, another tough tactical effort that was often misunderstood by those expecting a frag-happy spook hunt. Killzone 2 is a taut and muscular game, a shooter that gives back more than you put in, provided you have the intestinal fortitude. It may take its time revealing its true depths and pleasures, but the journey is well worth taking. Between Killzone 2′s unforgiving grit and Resistance 2′s alien-bursting excess, the PS3 finally has both ends of the shooter spectrum covered in grand style.

We’ll bring you more scores as they come up. Game’s out later this month.

Eurogamer has announced that the latest ABC Electronic audit confirms that the site had over 3.7 million unique users in November last year. That’s more than double 2007’s figure for the same month.

“The results are particularly pleasing as both the UK site increased significantly to 2.3 million unique users during the month, and our more established European editions showed impressive numbers too,” Eurogamer MD Rupert Loman said.

“With over 750,000 unique users in Germany, over 250,000 in Portugal and almost 200,000 in France the European network is really doing well.”

He added, “If you were to take into account GamesIndustry.biz as well the business is now reaching well over 4 million unique users per month.”

Full release after the break.

By Mike Bowden

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EA Sports president Peter Moore’s Christmas could’ve been better. After tearing through five days’ worth of wrapping paper, the one gift he most desired failed to materialize. And sadly, no amount of Hallmark-disguised holiday cash will ever net FIFA 09 a spot on Eurogamer’s prestigious Top 50.

“Huh? WTF?? As in WHERE THE HELL IS FIFA 09???” Moore blogged after his breadwinner failed to nab even a participation ribbon.

“Now I get that the sports genre is the Rodney Dangerfield of games when the awards are handed out. But c’mon, one of the best sports games of recent times not even in the Top 50? This title will sell in excess of 10 million units when all is done and dusted, but doesn’t even rank a mention?”

In response, Eurogamer reiterated its award policy, giving a disappointed shake of the head to readers world over.

“Most damaging of all though, people still believe we are presenting these as the definitive games of the year when, as the above illustrates, we are not,” Eurogamer editor Tom Bramwell emphasized. “The Readers’ Top 50, to which over a thousand people contributed, reflects much broader tastes.”

“The formula is designed to highlight games that our staff and core contributors have played – whether through choice or obligation – and then enjoyed over the year. We take top ten lists from our core staff and contributors, and combine them to produce the list of 50 games, which we then comment on as a group. Unfortunately for Peter, we sports fans form a minority of Eurogamer’s editorial staff.”

So there you go. No Electoral College here, folks. Just awful, awful bias.

By Nathan Grayson

Eurogamer’s claimed the PC version of Far Cry is the best of the three SKUs in another of Richard Leadbetter face-off features.

“Far Cry 2 is an excellent release on PC, and the fact that it can run in high definition with all features set to high levels while still providing a reasonably smooth, graphically superb experience is a first-rate achievement,” said Leadbetter.

“Both console versions are intelligently ported and decent games to play, but with clear compromises.”

Not only that, but Ubi Montreal’s work is on a par with CryEngine 2, apparently, and even tops it in the fact that it’s already working on consoles.

“We’d still give the nod to CryEngine 2 in terms of overall performance, but [Far Cry 2 engine] Dunia is working in the here and now on both PC and console, while Crytek’s 360 and PS3 work remains under wraps in Frankfurt,” he added.

More through there.

Eurogamer’s about to run a live interview with Valve’s Chet Faliszek on the subject of Left 4 Dead.

As ever, this means you get to ask the questions, and, if you’re lucky, they may be answered.

Get over there and get asking, varmint.

Eurogamer’s published one of its trademark comparison features, this time focussing solely on the differences between the three versions of Fallout 3.

We won’t spoil the outcome for you. Take a look.

EuroClash, the customer publishing partnership between MediaClash and Eurogamer, has won a contract to publish a quarterly games mag for UK retailer Currys.

The venture will have an initial launch run of 300,000 copies.

“We are offering a superb, extended range of hardware and games for peak trading. The introduction of a games guide will help customers choose the right products for themselves and their friends and family,” said Currys games chap, David Poulter.

Press release after the link.

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Eurogamer’s put a 7/10 on Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. Worth noting IGN’s score of 8.3 if you missed it this morning.

Snip from the EG review:

Whereas a traditional platform game could survive a sequence of poor levels, or even succeed in spite of a majority with a world as lovely as this, with characters so delightful and secrets so pleasing to uncover, Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts is not a platform game. The game it has become instead demands thoughtful, exciting challenges that inspire the player to pitch in and help get the most out of each level, but it fails to provide them, and even though it’s worth persevering with for the occasional hurdles race, egg-and-spoon and a game-world in aptly Rare form, ultimately it’s a brilliant shell with a mostly hollow centre.

So there we are. Full thing through the link.

Eurogamer’s just put its Resistance 2 review live, giving the shooter 9/10.

Snip:

Overall, multiplayer is the satisfying other half to a formidable package, and Resistance 2 is precisely the sort of exclusive game that the PS3 needs. Improving tenfold on its predecessor in almost every area, it not only belongs on the shopping list of existing Resistance fans, but those who were underwhelmed with the original as well will also want to check it out, and then fight for it on the internet. It’s the way of the warrior.

Full thing through there. It’s out in Europe on November 28.

The 2008 Games Media Awards in London last night saw Edge take the gong for best UK mag and Eurogamer win for best British site last night, with Eurogamer’s Ellie Gibson and PC Gamer’s Tom Francis winning best online and print writers respectively.

Full list of winners below. We live-blogged it as well, as you can see here.

• Games Media Legend; Sponsored by Atari: Steve Jarratt
• Games Magazine: Edge
• Games Website: Eurogamer
• Games Broadcast: Games Night on X-League.TV
• Specialist Games Writer, Print: Tom Francis, PC Gamer
• Specialist Games Writer, Online: Ellie Gibson, Eurogamer
• Rising Star; Sponsored by Rising Star Games: Simon Millar, X360
• Mainstream Magazine Games Writer; Sponsored by Ubisoft: Simon Munk, FHM
• National Newspaper, Best Games Coverage: The Guardian
• Regional Games Columnist – Dave Cook

Hit this quick. Eurogamer’s giving away 5,800 LittleBigPlanet beta keys right now. The European beta starts tomorrow and runs until October 12.

Go!

Update: The file’s 906Mb and you can play as soon as you download it, apparently.

Update 2: Eurogamer’s getting absolutely twatted. Good luck with that.

Update 3: Keep trying. It’s 8.27pm now and we’ve just been told there are about 1,000 keys left.

Update 4: EG tech man says all keys are now gone. Just filmed the first 15 minutes of play. Will sort now.

Update 5: Posted the video. You can watch the full intro, the tutorial and the first level here. There’s 14 minutes of footage in total.

Both Eurogamer and Gamespot have launched UK-only competitions for LittleBigPlanet.

It’s a design-a-level affair, with the winners getting their work in the game and a free PS3, among other stuff. Bargain.

There’s a level creation kit for you to download, so don’t panic about being the computer illiterate monkey you clearly are.

Follow the links fro more details.