Randy's rambling ... er, writing about games dates back more than a decade. You may remember him best as executive editor of the late, great PSM: 100% Independent PlayStation Magazine. Or, if you're really old, the official Sega Dreamcast mag. Now he's blogging and bent on putting the "OH!" in "Web 2.0"
Hoping to somehow diminish our aversion to the sight of Miis playing musical instruments, Vicarious Visions is working the user-created, er ... "avatars" into the Wii version of Guitar Hero World Tour in a so-called unique way. In an interview with IGN, the developer explained how the recently revealed Mii mode, known as "Mii Freestyle," will work.
Using the guitar or drumkit peripherals (or, if you're crazy so inclined, the Wiimote and Nunchuck for "air drumming") the mode lets you and a friend jam in a variety of music genres, laying down single notes, chords, and beats as you wish. According to Vicarious Visions, it'll all sound good because, well, it's programmed to clean up what you do. Take that, years of practice!
Did you find yourself driven just a wee bit mad by some of the design decisions in Alone in the Dark for Xbox 360? Well, you're not alone, and developer Eden Games isn't in the dark about what it did wrong.
During a Leipzig Games Convention presentation, the studio owned up to the title's shortcomings, promising that a number of them are being addressed in the upcoming PS3 version. Specifically, the camerawork is different (it's pulled back more, and players will have free control using the right analog stick); the player character, Edward Carnby, runs by default; and the atrociously twitchy car handling has been mellowed out.
While this is good news for PS3 owners still eager to experience the game, they won't be the only ones to reap the benefits of Eden's hindsight and extra development time. It's been announced that an upcoming patch will bring these fixes – and potentially more – to the 360 version, although no firm date has been given for its release (it'll presumably hit when the PS3 game does in November).
Capcom is showing Airtight Games' Gears of War/Crimson Skies/Rocketeer mash-up, Dark Void, at Games Convention – in fact, it's the very same section of the game that was on display at last month's E3. What's changed, though, is quite important: the frame rate. When we played the game less than 30 days ago, we liked it ... but we didn't like the sheer chugginess of it all.
You can see that things have improved markedly in these three new videos (two more can be found after the break). In them, Dark Void designer, Jose Perez III, details the game's story and concept, vertical gameplay, and flight gameplay, respectively. Airtight still has about a year of development time to make sure the game is, well ... airtight when it ships in '09.
Sega has a mighty lineup on public display (and behind closed doors) at Leipzig Games Convention 2008, comprised of titles from the East and West. MadWorld and Bayonetta, its collaborations with former Clover Studios staff, are there, as are Sonic games, strategy titles, DS wares, and more. But there's nary a sign of PSP support to be found. And it was doing so well with games like Crush. Ah well. You can check out screenshot galleries of everything Sega has on show after the break.
Sony, Guerilla – our hats voice headsets are off to you. After all, you tried to deliver the total online play experience with your official Killzone 2 multiplayer trailer at Leipzig. The only problem is ... well, it sounds too much like real mutiplayer. Or maybe someone's polite approximation thereof.
Oh, we like what we see (and say, are those auto-turrets from Aliens?) but the "radio chatter" not only sounds forced – it's totally free of racial slurs and/or comments regarding the sexuality of those playing. Now, how can we expect to take that seriously?
Now here's an interesting twist on your average game video – Ubisoft has created a "guided tour" of the first area from its jaw-dropping, new-genPrince of Persia. In fact, it's the entire first zone of the game, and the same area we played at this year's E3.
In it, you'll see the tweaks made to the series' platforming style, the ways in which the Prince's partner, Elika, aids him, and the strategic combat system used during battles with zone bosses. Oh, and did we mention it's drop-dead gorgeous? It doesn't hurt that it's already playing great, either.
Somehow, we always imagined the impending zombie apocalypse would involve more ... zombies. This latest footage of Dead Rising: Chop 'Til You Drop for Wii sees protagonist Frank West running sauntering through swarms groups of hundredsdozens 10 crazed bored zombies on what appears to be Super Bowl Sunday (or during the American Idol finale). It's nice to see the improved aiming mechanic in action, even if it is lifted directly from Resident Evil 4 Wii Edition. There's a longer gameplay trailer after the break, although we don't recommend viewing it while driving or operating heavy machinery.
In development for PSP and mobile phones, Square Enix's third Parasite Eve game has largely been – like many of the company's titles are wont to be – a mystery. A new Famitsu interview with director Hajime Tabata (who's also heading up Fantasy Agito XIII for PSP) reveals that the game is a third-person shooter. Square Enix ... third-person shooter ... Dirge of Cerberus ... yikes!
Thankfully, Tabata says that while the game may share a genre with the reviled FFVII spin-off, it's different in that it's a "true" third-person shooter. Dirge was ... not-so-true, evidently. The game may also boast Wi-Fi play, something that Tabata says his team is "investigating." Hey, the game's lead, Aya Brea, is an investigator of sorts ... maybe she can help with that? (Fun fact: If the above image were to be used as the game's US box art, it would receive an automatic "M" rating from the ESRB ... because Aya is pointing her gun directly at the "viewer." Fun!)
Capcom is showing the first multiplayer map from its next-gen current-gen Bionic Commando at Leipzig Games Convention, but isn't making with any screens of the mode. What you see above (and in the gallery below) are the latest screens from the solo campaign, which, oddly, isn't on display. Oh well.
From our experience with it thus far, the multiplayer mode is sheer mayhem -- four players swinging every which way in a confined area featuring buildings of various heights, trees, and overhead pipes to grapple. There are set spawn points for several weapons, including a shotgun, sniper rifle, sub-machine gun, and (our favorite) a grenade launcher. Mostly it's a mad dash for the latter in every match, but there are some interesting touches, such as getting extra points for killing other players while they're airborne, and the fact that you can grapple onto an opponent, slowing them down as they drag you along.
It's certainly one of the more unique multiplayer experiences we've tried, if just for the grapple and swing mechanic. As it stands, though, we're not convinced it will have (bionic) legs as a lasting experience on Xbox Live and PSN.
Call us old fashioned, but we're just a little more interested in how EA's next Need For Speed will stack up as a gameplay experience than a Hollywood movie starring Maggie Q. (No offense, miss, er, Q.) So celebutaunts and FMV (okay, HD FMV) aside, the demo of the game we got behind the wheel of is surprisingly ... a racing game with cop chases.
Mind you, it's very pretty, with HDR lighting and a nice healthy framerate to, dare we say, satiate one's need for speed. To that end, one of the three challenge types we played – Highway Battle – was an all-out drag race through heavy freeway traffic, the goal of which being to get far enough to your opponent that they "fail out." It was a rush, and showcased the ease of control EA is aiming for with Undercover's cars (read: we didn't crash nearly as much as we'd expected to), but it was over all too quickly.
Speaking at the outset of this year's Leipzig Games Convention, Crytek boss Cevat Yerli revealed that the developer's graphical tour de force, Crysis, cost an estimated $22 million to create. Yerli has previously lamented the effect piracy has had on the title, but reiterated that it's still recouped the development costs, saying, "If it wasn't profitable I wouldn't be able to stand here."
Best known for their stunning visuals, Crytek's game engines are also guilty of bringing even the mightiest of gaming PCs to their knees. While the upcoming, heavily-optimized Crysis: Warhead promises a significant performance increase even on mid-range systems, Crytek is already cooking up its next GPU melter, which Yerli says should be ready by 2012. That's when he anticipates GPU tech making the next major leap in its evolution; until then, he expects fellow developers to focus more on what they already have to work with, by means of stylized graphics and hardware accelerated physics.
Source – Crysis cost 22 million to make, IGN Source – Crytek: New engine in 2012, IGN
From making rival gangsters offers they can't refuse, to using your voice to command soldiers not to refuse orders, these fresh-off-the-editing-computer videos from EA's The Godfather II and Ubisoft's Tom Clancy's EndWar are presented for your viewing pleasure (and "Should I pre-order either of them?" evidence pool). The EndWar trailer is the same one being trotted out at the Leipzig Games Convention 2008; the first look at EA's gangster sequel was shown to the press last week at the publisher's annual Studio Showcase. But you don't have to travel to Germany (or even the Bay Area) to watch 'em – just click through after the break.
Source – Godfather II at GameTrailers Source – Tom Clancy's EndWar at GameTrailers
We hope you're ready for a face full of freshly, um, zombified zombies on film, because that's exactly what Capcom has delivered at the Leipzig Games Convention. This new, entirely in-game trailer for Resident Evil 5doesn't show too much that's especially new, but it's worth taking note of the vehicle chase sequence and hey ... is that another mine cart level?
Click on the video above and you'll get a peek at playing as Chris Redfield's female sidekick, Sheva Alomar, along with some oh-so-brief snippets of various (we presume) über-important cutscenes. Sure, it may be more RE4, but is that really so awful – especially when it looks this scary-good?
IGN reports that the latest issue of Famitsu PS3 is chock-a-block with details on the forthcoming Final Fantasy XIII demo, due to be packaged with the Blu-ray Disc release of Final Fantasy: Advent Children Complete. The info comes straight from the game's director, Motomu Toriyama, who divulges more than its expected length – which, as we previously reported, could break the two-hour mark. (Presumably just to prove that more than an hour of the game is actually finished.)
According to Toriyama, the demo will be "Like the FFVII demo that was included with PlayStation's Tobal Nol.1," allowing players to experience the game's opening sequence and prologue.
He also says that the primary goal of the demo is to get players acquainted with the new party system, which will allow them to experience the game's story from multiple characters' perspectives. Players will control more than one character in the demo – Toriyama points out to Famitsu that, in fact, there's no one "central" character in FFXIII – and, in "classic" FF form, will be controlling them directly, one after another, in purely turn-based combat.
For better or worse, Silicon Knights has finally kicked Too Human out of the nest, seemingly not too concerned about whether it will actually fly with most gamers. In fact, while the developer still intends to finish off the planned trilogy, it's not going to be doing so anytime soon.
Speaking with CVG, SK boss Denis Dyack confirmed that his studio's next game is going to be "Like nothing else we've ever made before." The dev has been working on a new title for Sega, which not too long ago was allegedly leaked in video form under the title The Crucible. Sega was quick to deny any connection between SK and a game with that name – which would be good for Dyack, since it was clearly a third-person action/horror game. You know, totally unlike Eternal Darkness.
"We've been lucky enough to make Legacy of Kain, Eternal Darkness, Too Human ... and if you look at all of those they're all really different," Dyack said of SK's plans for its new IP. "We want to continue to do that, to keep fresh. That's really what's important, and making sure that we continue to make new IPs but also continue to innovate in the genres that we try to... create content in." We think it's safe to assume that, whatever this totally fresh new project is, it won't be using the Unreal Engine.
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