Blue Dragon on XBox 360 delivered for 18 quid

if thats what floats your boat
"It's a Blue Dragon story..."
get in quick tho, today only!

or indeed Forza Motorsport 2 for the same:
4 Za Tu

Deus Ex 3 announced

In an interview with Eidos Montreal's general manager Gamasutra learned that they have just passed the proof of concept for Deus Ex 3.

I hope this is back in the vein of the first, rather than the slightly lacklustre second game. To be honest I'd be happy playing an updated version of the first on my 360.

Lightweight teaser on GameVideos.com:

Mummy I dun a bagsie...

FRIDAY FRIDAY FRIDAY
MONSTERTRUCK MONSTERTRUCK MONSTERTRUCK

Wait, did they even have those ads on TV over here? Ach, ferget it, I'll go with the potty theme.

I have two screens here, so if we're going to XBL it, we may need more hardware. Alternatively, we can break out the DSs and see what's new in hook up world.

500 Free MS points!

To claim your 500 Microsoft Points, all you have to do is register on this web site using your Windows Live ID associated to your gamertag. You can register until midnight (Pacific Time) on November 29, 2007, and after you do so, you will receive an e-mail with a 25-digit code that lets you to activate your Microsoft Points through your Xbox 360 console. Don't expect that email to arrive instantly as the deadline for that email is December 21, 2007. Claim dem pwan!

Who You Gonna Call?

Sierra Games have released a press statement regarding Ghostbusters The Video Game. A pan-platform game, it debuts on the 360 in Autumn 08 and will call on the talents of Ackroyd and Ramis to write the event-driven story line and all of the original crew will be back for the voice acting.

Check the official site for a very lean teaser video and a few screenies.

I really really really hope this game works out.

Fall Update announced

Apparently the Fall Update is going to include the XBox original downloads code, so that means that December 4th will be the big day.

Still hoping for divx / xvid support. With PS3 getting it, surely that forces MS's hand?

Happy Birthday Dear XBL!

Xbox Live is 5 years old today! Happy Birthday XBL!

To celebrate MS are letting every single XBL user download a free arcade game tomorrow (16th November) so don't forget to sign on and do so. Not sure at this point if it's one particular arcade game, or a free for all. I suspect the former.

Also, as of December 4th we'll be able to download full original XBOX games through the marketplace at a cost of 1200 MicroBucks a pop (that's about £8 in real money.) Launch titles include Halo, Psychonauts, Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge and Fable.

I might pick up Halo, although I suspect I could get the disk cheaper if I shopped around. Also Psychonauts is well worth a look if you've not played it.

Super Mario Galaxy - A Dialogue

Ruut and I have both had a chance to play Super Mario Galaxy for a couple of hours. Here's our conversation regarding our first impressions of Nintendo's latest Mario game:

s u d 0: so SMG.. you're further ahead than I am
Ruut: I want to play some more!
R: I *did* play for 3 and a half hours
R: that was fun
S: I played for a couple of hours I think
S: I can't put my finger on why it has that wonder of SM64
S: but Sunshine didn't
R: it's so polished
R: so beautiful
R: and the physics are bang on, you know everything in the world, all the objects exist for a reason
S: did you play Sunshine?
R: no
S: It didn't flow very well and although it had its moments it was ultimately quite a frustrating experience
R: but I know the feeling -- when they released SMB2
S: it didn't feel like a Mario game.
R: which was a rehash of a Japanese game called Doki Doki panic
R: it also didn't feel like a Mario game, and it lacked cohesion
R: and there were parts to it that you thought "What's this got to do with Mario?"
S: Once I understood how SMG was going to work I could see the logical succession from SM64 that just wasn't there in Sunshine
R: yeah
S: It sounds like SMB2 and Sunshine suffered from the same problem
R: there was a point to things in SM64
S: SM64 was so damn clever, and Galaxy is the same. I keep coming back to the word 'wonder'
R: in SMG, the progression works, the story works, the look and feel is bang on, I'm excited just remembering it
S: It's redefined platforming again, in the way that SM64 did
R: I was in Tesco on Saturday and I saw SMG on the cover of a mag and it felt like it feels when you've seen a really good action escapist film the night before
S: It's taken it to the next level, in a way I struggled to visualise from the videos
S: I wasn't sure, or couldn't see, how it was going to work... like the running upside down thing
R: it's so much more than the previews showed. Like, in the vids I thought it all looked disjointed, jumping from world to world, but in the game with the story line behind it it makes sense
R: Where you press A to get beamed to the blue stars and you follow a path that way, puzzles like that give me such a sense of achievement
R: it's like a Mario Zelda game
S: Especially with the fixed camera, all the things that are usually so frustrating in a game - moving in an unatural orientation, with a fixed viewpoint
R: the nunchuk has a button to make the view flip
R: and the first person view is glorious
R: I stop and look at the view a lot
S: but I guess, like SM64 you can't move like that?
R: no, no movement in FPP
R: but it's great for collecting star bits
R: stop, look about and point at the bits to pick them up
S: When I first died and got put back at the start of that Galaxy, I thought "Oh no."
S: but it wasn't a chore
S: and in fact the coin collecting encourages replay, just like SM64 did
R: the galaxies have rooms, too, and you have to do the room a different way each time
R: but they change the objects in the rooms to make it work differently
R: not room as in four walls, but you know, a connecting level
S: Ah yes.
S: I loved the first boss... the Dino Egg
S: I was going to say I was grinning, but then I was grinning all the way through
R: oh yeah, figuring him out was great, and the animation was lovely, the RAGE
R: I was grinning too and LOLing
S: I was wondering about the planets, or comets or whatever they're called
S: once you start running over them, they seem suddenly to become larger
S: they take a lot longer to circumnavigate
S: then the appearance seems to warrant
S: do you think that's clever scaling or a real illusion?
R: they're all different sizes
R: I didn't notice that...
R: I thought they seemed right to scale
S: I felt it straight away on the first puzzle planet... where you have to change the yellow switches to blue
R: that was fun
S: maybe it's just me
S: there hasn't been a rock I haven't completely scoured yet
R: no, I did that, too
R: it seemed a waste not to
S: exploration doesn't become a chore
R: and from the beginning I started to collect bits, even before they said
R: oh the village leading up to the caste from SM64
R: it was glorious
S: yes - in fact, when I accidentally catapulted off or climbed the vine to the next rock, before I'd completed my recce it bothered me
S: so - any downsides that you could find, or foresee?
R: not really
R: there were times when I plummeted off a ledge and thought "that's not fair..."
R: but that's just me
S: yeah.. the ledge thing. It didn't happen a lot to me, but the black-hole planets seem to be worse for it
S: there's no clear indication as to when you're going to fall and when you're going to flip
S: Hence I approach many of the precipices quite timidly
R: Yeah, I know what you mean
S: so he gets to do the fingertip catch if it's a drop
S: do you think you could get bored with the format?
S: it just seems so open to invention
S: i can imagine the developers coming up with this idea, say, one day before lunch
S: and by 3pm, when they'd realised what they'd come up with...
R: it's prolly one of the finest gaming moments I can remember
S: can you imagine the brainstorming sessions?
R: just pure fun
R: oh yeah, it must be great to do
R: it's a killer app
R: that, zelda and metroid justify the console's existence
R: if they do nothing else worth while, they at least gave it it's history making games
S: is it too hardcore for the new gamer bunch?
R: no
R: it's very gentle at the start
S: i wonder.. like metroid it takes advantage of conventions that we know about
S: from 20 years of gaming
R: it leads you to each new move in a very Shigeru way
S: I think it is a lot more friendly than Metroid, overall though
R: some of it may confuse, like hitting and re-hitting ? blocks
R: like, why would you do that?
R: plus crouch jumping and wall jumping
R: but you would discover them
R: and we dont have a book
S: The slide-flip was quite a hard move to pull off in SM64 at first
S: but I think it's much easier on the Wii controls
S: they've tuned that in nicely
R: yeah
R: I liked the waggle to pull me off toward the next planetoid
S: heh... I remember one bit that I loved.. on a giant five-point star
S: with a blue pull star on each point
R: yeah, floating towards the middle -- timing and selection
S: and you had to switch direction mid-flow in order to get to the center
S: also - there are stars in space that seem to be there purely to extend your journey
S: no other reason but to make Mario go Whheeeeee and do an extra loop
S: there's a lot there for someone with previous knowledge of the genre.
R: there are the stars that you waggle to activate in deep space, you can fly past, or if you time the waggle right when he's flying, you can divert to a new path
S: Shig's just gone "Here you are guys, I know you'll like this."
S: and a new player wouldn't even see it, let alone get it
R: the music in the underground pipe... rooms
R: "banna banna banna"
S: yeah... following that path
R: I love how he grabs the stars when he's won them too
R: he slaps them in a different way sometimes
S: I hadn't even noticed that
S: To be honest this is the game that Zelda and Metroid didn't quite manage to be.
S: And by that I mean - the game that makes the Wii.
S: to be fair Twilight Princess is a Gamecube game
S: But despite the fact that Corruption is technically spot on, it felt lacking in some ways
S: Corruption is strange... it's a pixel perfect Metroid game. You really can't fault it (as long as you're right handed.)
S: But there's a spark missing. There's nothing new there, even given the brilliant control scheme.
S: Is it better than SM64?
R: Galaxies?
S: yeah
R: yeah, so much better
R: this is better than Super Mario World
S: it's not such a technical leap forward, but it seems like a quantum leap in how to think about building a platform game
R: it's not about the technical side, never has been with Mario, it's the fact that it's so well finished off
R: so complete
R: and it's the little touches
S: We have so much praise and we've only played for a total of 4 hours between us.
R: I reckon three hours is enough time to know a game
S: so - when are you getting your Wii?
R: LOL
S: you looking forward to babysitting again? ;)
R: fo def
S: I can't wait to get home tonight.
R: I'll bet
S: I was so annoyed at falling asleep.
R: LOL
S: I was tempted to grab a coffee at midnight so I could carry on
R: did he wake you up? "Hey! What-a-da-fuck?"
R: lets-a-go
S: Mario is dangling by his fingertips while I doze!

Fingertip Wii Control

I really like what this guy's done using an IR LED array, a Wiimote and some reflective tape.



His hardware is a tad cludgey, but it works surprisingly well and could be bundled officially and cheaply using just the guts of the wiimote, leaving out the motion sensing, buzzer and speaker etc (so you don't tie up your existing hardware) and a set of nice thimble-like fingertip covers. I'm sure it would make a great enhancement to the Wii control methods.

"For Those About To Rock......."

....We give you a Price.

Well, almost.

Amazon.com have Rock Band listed as $169.99, released on 20/11/07.

Linkage! Clikkit bitches!

Amazon.co.uk and Play do not have a price or date as yet.

This should mean about £99.99 in the UK but will probably end up being £119.99 to £139.99.

Still, should be better than we were speculating the other week.

The set only contains one guitar though, along with microphone, drums and game.

Should be supported with down-loadable content in the future.

Metallica have, apparently, signed up to allow quite a few of their tracks to be used, as well as Enter Sandman which is on the game disc.

Looking at the included tracks, there's lots there worth playing, in my humble rock-addled view.

And with Guitar Hero III out soon as well, my pants are near saturation!

( "Nurse....Nurse....I'm wet again. Please change me!" )

I'll still be beaten by Mrs. Cookie, though.

Who would have thought that she'd turn out to be such a wizard on the (plastic imitation) guitar?

PlayStation 2 Modchip on a Memory Card

Make: is saying that 34 quid gets you a modchip that fits into a PS2 or PSTwo memport.

Memor32

TITWTWB - 11 November

Ok... Here we go for another TITWTWB (pron. tit-wut-wub). The games vying for our 10-second-spanned attention this week are here.

First up is the mighty midget; Nintendo's tiny trojan - the DS. Only one title jumps out at me this week for the DS, and it's not Animal Paradise ("Animal Paradise allows you to make friends with and earn the love of 18 different types of animal on your uncle's farm." - I think I saw the film at a party once.) This week's eye-grabbing title for the DS is Mario and Sonic at the Olympics, the two world famous characters together at last ready to battle it out at the Olympic Games. There's no real word on whether this is a straight-faced Track And Field game or if you're going to be firing off spin attacks in the 100 metres and munching performance enhancing fungi in the middle of the high jump event. As with last week's Beowulf and Simpsons, I'm wary of event specific tie-ins, ever since the KP Skips-inspired Clumsy Colin Action Biker game on the Spectrum.

The obvious choice for the PC next week is Crysis from Crytek, the makers of Far Cry, on an all-new CryEngine 2. There aren't any online reviews for this yet, just a couple of mag reviews, both in the 90s. What we can see is that the graphics are gorgeous. The gameplay is mooted to quite open-ended, allowing you to approach levels in a variety of ways, employing various tactics, enhanced by nano-suit and weapon mods. Some superb enemy AI rounds off what sounds like a very very nice FPS. Online multiplayer supports up to 32 players too. This is almost enough to make me think about getting my PC back up to scratch.

PS2 barely warrants a mention with Jackass The Game, International Cricket Captain III and Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey.

Just two releases on the PS3 this time round: Medal of Honor: Airborne and Assassin's Creed (more of which below.) MoH:A follows the fortunes of the 82nd Airborne division as they parachute into a massive area with each new mission. Maybe this will be different enough from other WWII shooters to feel fresh and interesting. The 360 version was met with middling approval, reviews picking up on stale mission objectives and difficult and unforgiving gameplay.

Sony's sexy shiny lozenge (which is getting sexier and shinier by the month), the PSP, is graced with two new releases next week. Firstly is the instantly dismissable International Cricket Captain III, and secondly is the could-be-interesting Warriors of the Lost Empire. An action/RPG slasher featuring two player co-op and short load times.

The 360 bag contains the F.E.A.R Files, a bundle of the Perseus Mandate and Extraction Point add-ons for F.E.A.R. I suppose if you've played F.E.A.R then you've already heard about these expansions, and considered purchasing them. I'm not really able to get worked up about them. Additionally we have a poorly reviewed World Championship Poker, and a (presumably) slipped Beowulf makes another appearance. Cream of the crop for Microsoft's chunky white hoover impressionist is Assassin's Creed. AC goes straight onto my must-play list (hovering corpses or not) with it's open-ended gameplay, impressive graphics and large city-based play areas.

And so on to the awards... I think I made a compositional error by putting the Turd of the Week at the end of last week's synposis, so this time I'm doing that first. Sorry DS, I'm picking on you again this week for the woefully daft and bizarre My Pet Dolphin. Pet sims have proven to be big money for Nintendo, with Nintendogs helping to launch the portable to its dizzying instant success. Other publishers quickly jumped on board with Dogz and Catz and the like. The Sims franchise followed with Sims 2: Pets. But have we really run out of standard domestic animals so quickly? What more unlikely pet could you wish for than a dolphin? Large, heavy, smelly, wet, dangerous and distinctly uncuddly, I can't think of an animal I'd like to share my home with less. Perhaps that's the point - you'll never have a pet dolphin, so it makes it worth simulating. What's the point of simulating a rodent you could pick up from Pets At Home for less than the price of the game cart? Hmm.... no, I won't change my mind. My Pet Dolphin you are Turd of the Week.

Poor old Assassin's Creed. Any other week it would've earned my highly prized Thumbs Up Game of the Week award. Unfortunately for Ubisoft there's a little unassuming console called the Wii. And on that console this week is a game I've been waiting nearly a decade to play - the spiritual successor to Super Mario 64... Ladies and Gentlemen I give you s u d 0's Game of the Week: Super Mario Galaxy. Already at the top of the metacritic Wii charts, two points above Zelda at 97/100, it has garnered four 100-point score reviews proving that Mario is as relevant today as ever. The disk is ready and waiting next to my Wii, but I've promised myself that I will finish Metroid Prime 3 before starting on this. Temptation is growing though, and my will is weak. It's only a matter of time...

Sorry guys - you knew I was going to do that didn't you?

Gamercards With Status

You may have noticed the slightly updated Gamercards down the right hand margin, courtesy of MyGamerCard.net. I think the information that MGC provide is slightly improved over the xbox.com link and the cards look a bit nicer too.

You'll see that mine contains my XBL status as well. You can get this on yours by following a sign-up procedure that approaches that of joining the Masons.

First off, go to MyGamerCard.net and sign up. They'll do the obligatory send-you-an-email-with-a-validation-link thing in it, so use a real email address. Also - use your proper XBL ID.

Then they send you a Private Message at the Xbox.com Forums (NOT an Xbox Live Message!) to which you reply, or you can log-in to MGC.net to initiate the message yourself. Once your XBL validity has been confirmed in this way you should check your profile at MGC and tick the four boxes at the bottom to enable this data in your gamercard.

This isn't really as arduous as it sounds and easier than I made it, as I didn't realise the PM came on the xbox forum rather than XBL.

MGC.net also have an ace gamerpic scout to help you find out where the cool gamerpics come from, how common they are and also to get a preview of a pack before you buy it on Marketplace.

GTA IV in April.

Wii60.com report that GTA IV is appearing on shop release sheets and promo boxes are arriving in store.

The date on the sheet is April 15 '08. It's a long time to wait, but then there's a lot of other stuff about at the moment.

Ready for the big one.

Having done Levels II and III of Halo 3 twice on Heroic and not gotten the achievements for either, nor the 250GP completion award, I'm about done with single player - I've seen the end, Finished The Fight - where're my fecking gamerpoints? Anyone want to join up for Legendary Co-op? Let's fix a couple of evenings and times. We're going to need three or four of us, and I don't mind not being Mister Chief.

If not, I'll be playing Metroid Prime 3 again, readying my Wii for Mario Galaxy.

"I Changed it's Path of Destruction...."

Another great Halo splatter, again beautifully edited. I'm seeing more and more of these and they just don't get old.