I saw people playing Brink at E3, and thought it looked pretty promising. Bit hard for you to really understand without moving pictures of gameplay, though, so here’s some moving pictures of gameplay.
It’s the first part of the demo we saw at E3, showing off the game’s free-running “autopilot”. Hopefully the Mirrors Edge 2 team are watching this and taking notes. Oh, and if you missed it earlier today, the game’s been delayed slightly.
I saw people playing Brink at E3, and thought it looked pretty promising. Bit hard for you to really understand without moving pictures of gameplay, though, so here's some moving pictures of gameplay.
It's the first part of the demo we saw at E3, showing off the game's free-running "autopilot". Hopefully the Mirrors Edge 2 team are watching this and taking notes. Oh, and if you missed it earlier today, the game's been delayed slightly.
Sony saw swift PlayStation 3 sales over Black Friday and the holiday weekend. The home console racked up big numbers, reaching an all time high for the the system, selling 440,000 units.
“The 2009 holiday season got off to an amazing start for PlayStation, with all key retailers showing a significant increase for PS3, PSP and key holiday titles over Black Friday and the holiday weekend,” Sony told Kotaku in a written statement. “In today’s economy, consumers are drawn to items that offer the most value for their money, making the PS3 an ideal choice for those who want a comprehensive gaming and entertainment system all in one package.”
Sony saw swift PlayStation 3 sales over Black Friday and the holiday weekend. The home console racked up big numbers, reaching an all time high for the the system, selling 440,000 units.
"The 2009 holiday season got off to an amazing start for PlayStation, with all key retailers showing a significant increase for PS3, PSP and key holiday titles over Black Friday and the holiday weekend," Sony told Kotaku in a written statement. "In today's economy, consumers are drawn to items that offer the most value for their money, making the PS3 an ideal choice for those who want a comprehensive gaming and entertainment system all in one package."
Why do gamers seem to like the sometimes un-heroic Nathan Drake of Uncharted fame? One of Drake’s creators explained in a comment on Gamasutra.
The short take is that Nathan Drake has attitude without being a jerk, and he cheerfully but woefully gets in over his head. This helps make him charming rather than annoying.
Former Naughty Dog creative director E. Daniel Arey explains it better than that in a comment below a Gamasutra essay about another character voiced by Drake actor Nolan North, the revised prince of last year’s Prince of Persia. Some gamers disliked the new prince, finding him to be too abrasive, too unlikable and — in a comment not as directly addressed by Arey — too sexually frank.
Here’s Arey explaining how and why the Uncharted team thought they could make Drake both unusual (for a game) and unusually likable:
I can tell you from our experience that there is a fine line between jerk and lovable rogue. We developed Nathan Drake determined to make him more human and accessible than most videogame heroes.
Heroes can be cocky, (in fact, if they’re not, you run the equal risk of making them inactive and only reactive – the kiss of death), but if a hero constantly shows their human side, we relate and forgive any seeming overconfidence because we’ve all been there.
The whole team, as well as myself, Amy, and Evan thought the reason characters like Han Solo (and his emotional twin, Indiana Jones) are likable is the fact that these characters constantly butt up against their frailty and often get in way over their head, barely finding a way out of predicaments. We can all relate to that! Couple this lovable trait with humor and a quirkiness about life, and you get a character you want to watch and play. (The kind of person you’d like to go have a few beers with.)
Arey’s full comment — and the Prince of Persia article above it — is well worth the read. Then again, that revised Prince of Persia is well worth trying out. So go catch up, please.
Why do gamers seem to like the sometimes un-heroic Nathan Drake of Uncharted fame? One of Drake's creators explained in a comment on Gamasutra.
The short take is that Nathan Drake has attitude without being a jerk, and he cheerfully but woefully gets in over his head. This helps make him charming rather than annoying.
Former Naughty Dog creative director E. Daniel Arey explains it better than that in a comment below a Gamasutra essay about another character voiced by Drake actor Nolan North, the revised prince of last year's Prince of Persia. Some gamers disliked the new prince, finding him to be too abrasive, too unlikable and — in a comment not as directly addressed by Arey — too sexually frank.
Here's Arey explaining how and why the Uncharted team thought they could make Drake both unusual (for a game) and unusually likable:
I can tell you from our experience that there is a fine line between jerk and lovable rogue. We developed Nathan Drake determined to make him more human and accessible than most videogame heroes.
Heroes can be cocky, (in fact, if they're not, you run the equal risk of making them inactive and only reactive – the kiss of death), but if a hero constantly shows their human side, we relate and forgive any seeming overconfidence because we've all been there.
The whole team, as well as myself, Amy, and Evan thought the reason characters like Han Solo (and his emotional twin, Indiana Jones) are likable is the fact that these characters constantly butt up against their frailty and often get in way over their head, barely finding a way out of predicaments. We can all relate to that! Couple this lovable trait with humor and a quirkiness about life, and you get a character you want to watch and play. (The kind of person you'd like to go have a few beers with.)
Arey's full comment — and the Prince of Persia article above it — is well worth the read. Then again, that revised Prince of Persia is well worth trying out. So go catch up, please.
Now I don’t know how indicative these trailers are of what Bizarre Creations’ Blur actually looks like with a controller in your hand, but they remind me of the now-we’re-going-really-fast-bro moments in The Fast and the Furious combined with the paranormal fun of Ghostbusters.
You may think those cars are engulfed in electricity or even flames, but you’d be wrong. I’m telling you, it’s the ghosts. Plus, Ghostbusters NES had realistic driving simulation in it. This basically is the sequel, guys.
The little beginning segment alludes to Blur’s social networking/community stuff, but honestly, it’s all about those power-ups. Again, if these videos are representative of the full game, anyone who isn’t in last place will be getting shot at constantly, meaning lots of potential crashes.
Kids, if a stranger offers you a blue shell, just say “no.”
Now I don't know how indicative these trailers are of what Bizarre Creations' Blur actually looks like with a controller in your hand, but they remind me of the now-we're-going-really-fast-bro moments in The Fast and the Furious combined with the paranormal fun of Ghostbusters.
You may think those cars are engulfed in electricity or even flames, but you'd be wrong. I'm telling you, it's the ghosts. Plus, Ghostbusters NES had realistic driving simulation in it. This basically is the sequel, guys.
The little beginning segment alludes to Blur's social networking/community stuff, but honestly, it's all about those power-ups. Again, if these videos are representative of the full game, anyone who isn't in last place will be getting shot at constantly, meaning lots of potential crashes.
Kids, if a stranger offers you a blue shell, just say "no."
I got some new children’s games to try out. Couple of them were instant hits (Zoowaboo doesn’t look like it’s really hot with two, so it’s still waiting) with Nooa.
Mouse Carousel has six tubes and seven mice with different colours. There’s some cheese cubes on the middle of the tubes and to get to that cheese, you need to push the seventh mouse to one of the tubes, making another mouse appear. If the colour of the mouse matches the cubes, the mouse eats the cubes and you get another go. If you fail, it’s next player.
A simple memory game, then, but remembering which mouse is where is bit of a problem, especially if the game is played fast enough. The constant switching of places can be a bit taxing and takes some proper concentration. However, the idea is simple enough that a three-year old can figure it out and actually play competitively. Just minimize all distractions – one games was totally ruined by a TV that was on at the background, Nooa was so distracted his playing was completely random.
The game looks gorgeous, but has some usability issues. Red and orange cheese is nearly impossible to tell apart in weak light and at least my copy has blue cheese cubes matching to a mostly purple mouse. The mice are marked with small stickers, which may or may not last, but at least the game comes with a set of spares.
Kids of Carcassonne simplifies Carcassonne for four-year-olds. It’s simple enough that Nooa, three years and five months now, can play it correctly. He doesn’t really have a clue of strategy, but with some practise I’m sure it’ll come to him.
This one also looks gorgeous (and is, like Mouse Carousel, illustrated by Rolf Vogt). The tiles are extra large, as are the meeples. Every tile fits everywhere, as all have roads leading to every direction. Players try to complete roads (which is easy, as there are terminals on most tiles). Whenever a road is done, players get to place their meeples on the road, each non-terminal road piece has a picture of one of the kids. Just fill up with correct meeples, very simple. Winner is the player who first gets rid of all eight meeples. No counting involved!
Kids of Carcassonne is a winner, because it works so well with kids and adults can enjoy it, too. Actually, once we got the kids in bed yesterday, we played three quick games with Johanna. She likes the game, more than regular Carcassonne. I think it’s charming, too, but I don’t think I’d take the game to a game club, even though it’s a nice five-minute filler with adults. Regular Carcassonne can be played almost as fast and is more rarely decided by the tile draws. Still, this is a top-notch children’s game.
Yup. This again. Dare to dream. A listing for Yakuza 3 has appeared on Amazon Germany’s site, and while we normally wouldn’t bother with mysterious retail listings, Amazon Germany have quite the track record.
It says it’ll be out in March 2010, will cost €63 (USD$94) and…says nothing else.
So far, so good! Remember, though, this is still a retail listing, Amazon Germany or not, and retail listings can often be things of pure fantasy. EB Games in Australia, for example once had Halo on PS2 available for pre-order. For years.
Another couple of things counting against it: Sega are listed as publishers, when we’d heard someone else would be distributing the game in Europe, and the game apparently earned an 18 rating from the USK, even though the USK’s records say nothing of the sort.
Yup. This again. Dare to dream. A listing for Yakuza 3 has appeared on Amazon Germany's site, and while we normally wouldn't bother with mysterious retail listings, Amazon Germany have quite the track record.
It says it'll be out in March 2010, will cost €63 (USD$94) and...says nothing else.
So far, so good! Remember, though, this is still a retail listing, Amazon Germany or not, and retail listings can often be things of pure fantasy. EB Games in Australia, for example once had Halo on PS2 available for pre-order. For years.
Another couple of things counting against it: Sega are listed as publishers, when we'd heard someone else would be distributing the game in Europe, and the game apparently earned an 18 rating from the USK, even though the USK's records say nothing of the sort.
As expected, people bought things during Black Friday. While we’d love to give you a comprehensive report on the number of GE blenders sold during the American free-for-all, it just wouldn’t fit with the rest of the content on our Web page. What does, though, is Aaron Greenberg’s broad announcement of Xbox 360 sales during the week of Black Friday (which, by the way, seems like something the platform publisher should be celebrating soon).
According to a recent tweet by the Xbox 360 and Xbox LIVE director of product management, the Xbox 360 experienced the “biggest sales week of the year” during Black Friday week, successfully doing more than “[two times the] previous week sales.”
The exact figure hasn’t been revealed as of yet, but we’re guessing more than two or three Xbox 360s flew off the shelves during last week. Regardless, we’ll know soon enough and will definitely share the information with you when it comes in.
As expected, people bought things during Black Friday. While we’d love to give you a comprehensive report on the number of GE blenders sold during the American free-for-all, it just wouldn’t fit with the rest of the content on our Web page. What does, though, is Aaron Greenberg’s broad announcement of Xbox 360 sales during the week of Black Friday (which, by the way, seems like something the platform publisher should be celebrating soon).
According to a recent tweet by the Xbox 360 and Xbox LIVE director of product management, the Xbox 360 experienced the “biggest sales week of the year” during Black Friday week, successfully doing more than “[two times the] previous week sales.”
The exact figure hasn’t been revealed as of yet, but we’re guessing more than two or three Xbox 360s flew off the shelves during last week. Regardless, we’ll know soon enough and will definitely share the information with you when it comes in.
A few weeks ago, Stardock published their annual customer report where they identified its own Impulse PC game download service as the number two most popular service with 10 percent of the market share, although it did admit being well behind Valve’s Steam service which it said has as much as 70 percent of the market share. Now Gamasutra reports that IGN’s Direct2Drive is calling Stardock’s claims out.
Direct2Drive used a NPD Group study on PC download services which it says does shows Steam as the number one such service, followed by Blizzard.com, EA.com and finally Direct2Drive. Impulse was not listed in the NPD Group study. Direct2Drive Vice-President Sutton Trout called Stardock’s claims, ” . . . misinformation at best.”
Brad Wardell, the CEO of Stardock, fired back, saying, “The data we used came from the publishers.” He also stated Stardock’s own exclusive games like Sins of A Solar Empire, Demigod and others that are not available on other download sites and services “allows Impulse to edge third parties:” There’s been a ton of debate on exactly how many PC game sales are conducted via digital downloads with most companies keeping that data close to the chest. Direct2Drive’s Trout says the company is ” . . . actively engaged with reputable data-collection services to determine how to most effectively implement standardized reporting in the digital distribution business.”
A few weeks ago, Stardock published their annual customer report where they identified its own Impulse PC game download service as the number two most popular service with 10 percent of the market share, although it did admit being well behind Valve's Steam service which it said has as much as 70 percent of the market share. Now Gamasutra reports that IGN's Direct2Drive is calling Stardock's claims out.
Direct2Drive used a NPD Group study on PC download services which it says does shows Steam as the number one such service, followed by Blizzard.com, EA.com and finally Direct2Drive. Impulse was not listed in the NPD Group study. Direct2Drive Vice-President Sutton Trout called Stardock's claims, " . . . misinformation at best."
Brad Wardell, the CEO of Stardock, fired back, saying, "The data we used came from the publishers." He also stated Stardock's own exclusive games like Sins of A Solar Empire, Demigod and others that are not available on other download sites and services "allows Impulse to edge third parties:" There's been a ton of debate on exactly how many PC game sales are conducted via digital downloads with most companies keeping that data close to the chest. Direct2Drive's Trout says the company is " . . . actively engaged with reputable data-collection services to determine how to most effectively implement standardized reporting in the digital distribution business."
Over the weekend we had a lively discussion of file and disc formats and why exactly the mp3 soundtrack for Dragon Age: Origins was inaccessible on the PS3. BioWare’s asking anyone with the problem to email, they can fix it.
A BioWare spokesman dropped the official help URL – help.dragonage.com – and asked that people contact customer service through the “email us,” URL there. “Our customer service department is ready to help and will ensure that this is resolved,” saith BioWare.
A search of the site’s knowledgebase doesn’t turn up any additional info, but reader Nerdslashpimp says that if you contact someone, they give you the downloadable version of the collectors edition bonus content over the EA Downloader, and it includes the soundtrack.
Anyway, now all you PS3 Dragon Age owners have your lovemaking music when you and your significant other roleplay Morrigan and Allistair by the glow of a passionate fire.
Over the weekend we had a lively discussion of file and disc formats and why exactly the mp3 soundtrack for Dragon Age: Origins was inaccessible on the PS3. BioWare's asking anyone with the problem to email, they can fix it.
A BioWare spokesman dropped the official help URL - help.dragonage.com - and asked that people contact customer service through the "email us," URL there. "Our customer service department is ready to help and will ensure that this is resolved," saith BioWare.
A search of the site's knowledgebase doesn't turn up any additional info, but reader Nerdslashpimp says that if you contact someone, they give you the downloadable version of the collectors edition bonus content over the EA Downloader, and it includes the soundtrack.
Anyway, now all you PS3 Dragon Age owners have your lovemaking music when you and your significant other roleplay Morrigan and Allistair by the glow of a passionate fire.
Get ready to for some corporate gloating, Microsoft-style, in the coming days. According to the company’s Director of Product Management for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, the Xbox 360 just had its “biggest sales week of the year.”
We’ll see if Microsoft can top 2008, when the Xbox 360 maker claimed it outsold its PlayStation 3 competition three-to-one.
Get ready to for some corporate gloating, Microsoft-style, in the coming days. According to the company's Director of Product Management for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, the Xbox 360 just had its "biggest sales week of the year."
I saw people playing Brink at E3, and thought it looked pretty promising. Bit hard for you to really understand without moving pictures of gameplay, though, so here’s some moving pictures of gameplay.
Sony saw swift PlayStation 3 sales over Black Friday and the holiday weekend. The home console racked up big numbers, reaching an all time high for the the system, selling 440,000 units.
Why do gamers seem to like the sometimes un-heroic 
Get ready to for some corporate gloating, Microsoft-style, in the coming days. According to the company’s Director of Product Management for 
