So, how's it going EA? Find any new developers to buy up? You broke my heart when you bought Maxis. It further disintegrated when you guys dissolved Maxis into EA Games. You bastard. I hate you. Luckily for you, I am still a die hard Will Wright Fan, and for that reason I'll have a reason periodically to buy a game developed and published by you.
Recently, you released Harmonix's Rock Band to the masses in "North America". It was shortly around launch that you clarified "North America" to mean United States. Now, I am American, but when I think North America, I think three countries:
Canada
Mexico
United States
In addition, Latin America is part of North America, even if we tend to ignore those countries. I feel honored to bring you that geography lesson for today, brought to you by NAFTA. Someone should have given Harmonix / EA this lesson when they decided to announce a release date for Rock Band. If I was Canadian, I'd feel pretty slighted by the fact that EA does not find you part of North America. I'd be even more ticked that Rock Band was delayed all the way to yesterday. But, perhaps EA would make amends by giving you guys a decent launch. Eh? Eh?! Nah, that's not EA's style. Turns out most retailers in Canada did not get a shipment yesterday, much to the disappointment of fans camping out for the game. Furthermore, those retailers that did get a shipment got a horribly reduced release. This slighting would infuriate me if I was Canadian, and I've come up with some conclusions about EA:
EA, you have an identity crisis. I believe that you think that you are Nintendo. Furthermore, I think you have confused Canada with the continent of Europe. What's the deal? Did you guys get hit on your head? Snap out of hit! Stop shafting our friends to the North, where some people call themselves Tan and some people like to say 'Eh?'. It's a lovely country. Stop screwing the pooch. Give them the game. Don't be jerks. It only hurts your sales. Ask Activision, I bet they could give you some pointers on alienating fans.
Sorry Canada, I couldn't snap EA out of their trance. Before you know it, you'll start seeing EA published minigames out the wahzoo and more casually focused games! My God, help us all.
[img align=right width=200]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/repository/13487935904766ca8debe7fBig_Brother.jpg[/img] Let's get this straight - Manhunt 2 is not a good game. Don't believe me? Well, why not believe the composite score as told by Gamerankings.com. Gamerankings is respectable right? It is a cNET property after all, and cNet is nothing but at the pinnacle of journalistic integrity. So yeah, now that we've got that out of the way, let's talk.
James, AndyC, Belgarath, Alabama Shrimp, any other British Member we have that I am not aware of - I feel sorry for you guys at times. I hear that in London the police can actually yell at you via the security cameras. Here in the US, we we use cameras just for observation. We are harassed via the telescreen, that two way bastion of mind control that we Oceanians have come to know and love. Lest we also not forget about . HAIL BIG BUSH... err... BROTHER!
Britain, we Oceanians are impressed. You have the beginnings of the Thought Police that we Oceanians have had for so very long. It appears as though your government feels as though you are not competent to make your own rational decisions on certain matters regarding these... video games. I know not of such things, for fun here in Oceania we relish in the two minutes hate. Hail Big Brother. But yes, I hear that video games are... fun. Truly it is a shame that we are not blessed with such devices.
Manhunt 2. Ah yes, we Oceanians have that game. Officially though, it is not a game, but rather a training exercise required of all Oceanians by Minipeace. I am more prepared now to fight in the unending war now that I have experienced that training exercise. We Oceanians find it strange then that your Thought Police would try to ban such an effective training exercise. As such, Rockstar, the creator of the exercise, successfully filed an appeal with the appeals committee in your country. Luckily for you guys, Rockstar was successful in the appeal, but for some strange reason your Thought Police wish to stop its release. Need we Oceanians remind Britons of the hallowed statement:
WAR IS PEACE FREEDOM IS SLAVERY IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
We Oceanians hope to guide your Thought Police in making the right decision here. Forfeit the judicial review. Approve this training exercise. It is an essential tool in fighting the unending war. Join Us in Our Quest. That is All. Hail Big Brother.
The Author of this Post assumes no responsibility for any thoughtcrime that may have occurred while reading this article. Hail Big Brother. That is all.
2007 was the year of hype in gaming. Between Halo 3, Mass Effect, Super Mario Galaxy, Crysis, and Assassin's Creed, this year has seen the release of some of the most talked up games of all-time. While some of them fell far short of the hype, there were plenty of other far superior games that came out, but received little to no attention from mainstream gamers. So, continuing now and on every Wednesday (or Thursday) (or sometime) until the end of the year, I will be giving you a look at two games released this year that deserve your hard-earned cash and attention. At the end of this five-part series (ending the day after Christmas), I will list them in order of the most overlooked/underrated.
If you followed the video game world at all this year, you'll likely know that Lair for the Playstation 3 was a massively hyped game that was often touted as one of saviors of Sony's big black monolith of a gaming console known as the Playstation 3, but that did not happen as Lair was a critical bomb. All the hype that was generated by the game blew up in Sony's face as the game got largely horrible reviews and become the butt of all video game related jokes. Did it deserve all the negative reviews? Is it really that bad of a game? The answer to that question is quite simply, no. Lair is perhaps one of the most underrated games of the year (not overlooked, mind you, underrated).
The game's story revolves around two kingdoms, Asilya and Mokai, former allies now torn apart due to their land being ravaged by volcanoes. Now the Mokai's land is depleted of resources, and the Mokai live on a resource rich land. As time goes on, the two become enemies due to religion coming in and teaching them that they are enemies and should not tolerate each other. So, the Mokai decide to launch a surprise attack against the Asylians, this is where you come in as Rohn, a member of the Asylian Sky Guard who fights off the invading Mokai using dragons. It's a good plot, especially for an action game involving dragons and burning things up and is definitely better than stuff like Eragon.
But on to the game itself. As stated, most of the game revolves around you flying around on a dragon burning things and defending your people from attack. The game's graphics are quite good and really capture a world in ruin quite well. The game does support 1080p high definition, however, I have only seen at 1080i and 720p. Both modes look incredible. The only problem is that there are some slowdowns at time, but nothing too distracting. Even more amazing than the graphics is the sound, which is among the best I've ever heard in a video game. Presented in UNCOMPRESSED 7.1 SOUND (!!!) with THX Certification, the game completely envelopes you in sound. Now, I've only played it in compressed Dolby Digital 5.1, but even in that situation, dragons swooping overhead, flames flying in all directions, and exploding ships all sounded awesome. However, what really shines in the game is the soundtrack composed John Debney, who also did the music for The Passion of the Christ and Sin City. The soundtrack is definitely the best of 2007 and rivals most film soundtracks. The music is so good that Sony is selling the whole soundtrack for the game on iTunes.
But enough about the technical side of the game, let's move onto what gets trashed the most, the gameplay. The team at Factor 5 decided to take advantage of what the PS3 offers them in graphical capability, sound, and capacity with the Blu-ray Disc, however, they also decided to take advantage of the PS3's new Sixaxis controller with motion sensing capability. This is what caused the most criticism over the game. The tilt controls were viewed as hard to use and unresponsive. To those people I say, "Pfft, spend some more time with it." Yes, it is kind of tough to get the hang of, but you must remember that you are controlling a gigantic dragon, and not an airplane which can turn on a dime. If you think of it in the sense that you are at the reins of a gigantic beast, then the controls might be a little easier to work, since it basically is like you're at the reins. Slap the reins down and you'll get a speed boost, pull them up quickly and the dragon will do a 180 and face the other way. Once you get used to the controls, you'll be burning those Mokai bastards quickly. Or, take a look at the instructional video included in the bonus material, it's a like a video version of the Lair Review Guide.
However, despite all this, I would only give the game a 7.5 at the maximum because it's slow at times, it's rather short, and the controls don't always work right. It is definitely worth checking out when it gets down to $15 or so.
This might be an odd inclusion since it never had a retail release, but this is something that I'm sure none of you have heard of by a developer you've definitely heard of. Did you know that Harmonix, the same company behind Guitar Hero and Rock Band released an iPod game this year? No, really, AN iPOD GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The game is called Phase, and it's basically just like Amplitude or Guitar Hero, but on your iPod.
Basically, the game is played by clicking the left button, the center button, or the right button in time to your music. Sometimes there will also be a wave of dots that comes up, known as a flowing sweep. When one of these flowing sweeps come up, you have to scroll the click wheel left and right, following the pattern of the dots. The game has it's own small soundtrack of seven songs (Bang Camaro - Nightlife Commando, Dealership - Dots And Dashes, Freezepop - Pop Music Is Not A Crime (YES!!! FREEZEPOP!!!), Inter:sect - Midnight Gamma, Kodomo - Spira Mirabilis, Speck - The Theme Of The Awesome, Universal Hall Pass - Dragonfly Remix), but the big feature here is that you can import ANY song you have on your iPod into the game and it will make it into a level for you to play, with different difficulties. Want to play on insane (Video is on the default difficulty, by the way)? You can do that! Want to play along to Run DMC? Sure, you can do that too. Want to play along to the I Have A Dream Speech? Uh...yeah, you can do that too. Want to play along to static? No you don't. Of course you don't. But you technically could do that in Phase!
It's a $5 download from the iTunes store, and has been described by many as the only iPod game worth having. The game requires a third-generation iPod nano or better, iPod classic, or fifth-generation iPod or better.
Check back on Wednesday or Thursday when I actually deliver this feature on-time...(at least I hope).
Since I was busy having a social life last night, I was unable to do my regularly scheduled underrated/overlooked feature on time, however I found a somewhat (Sony biased to a certain degree) related feature on GamesRadar looking at the biggest games of the year that we all seemed to forget about. Kind of an intersting take on some of the top games of the year, but an important one nonetheless. Anyways, here's what they came up with (in the order they were presented):
Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (PSP): Whoa wait what?! There was an MGS on PSP this year? I had no idea. Dang, add that to the reasons for me to get a PSP...
Heavenly Sword (PS3): YES! That is a great game, but very short though, which is why people probably forgot about it. What's more shocking about this is that the article said it's been outsold by freaking Lair, and isn't even in the top 20 selling PS3 games list this week. Amazing.
God of War 2 (PS2): I was tempted to include this on my overlooked games of the year list, because really, have you heard much about the game since it came out last February. I sure haven't. Probably because it was released on a last-gen system early on in the year and got overshadowed by all the other next-gen games that came out later in the year. Make sure you do not forget this game as it is one of the 10 best PS2 games ever made.
Motorstorm (PS3): This was actually a very very good game that for some reason isn't mentioned very much any more...outside of the monthly downloadable content additions to the game on the Playstation Store.
SSX Blur (Wii): I admit, I've never played SSX Blur, but I've heard nothing but good comments about it. It seems odd that an SSX game is forgotten about so quickly though.
Stranglehold (360, PS3): I've only played the demo, but I don't know that Stranglehold exactly qualifies as one of the best of the year. It's certainly a very fun game with many imaginative features that really make you feel like your in a big hollywood action movie, but the thing is that the game is not extraordinary. I would pay $20 for it, but not the next-gen price of $60.
Crysis (PC): I think the only reason this game is on the list is because 90% of gamers don't have a PC good enough to run it, thus forgot about the game. However, when I get a computer that can actually run the game decently (in 8 years or so knowing me), I'll definitely give it a shot. But the game was published by EA, so chances are there will be a port for 360 and PS3 (that is if EA can get their head out of their asses when it comes to programming for that system)
Project Gotham Racing 4 (360): Now, I recall this one coming out and doing fairly well, but I haven't heard much about it after the amazing fall season the 360 had. It's a shame because PGR has been a great series.
Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (PS3): Yes. Yes. FREAKING YES! Now, it's well known to PS3 owners but who else cares about it? No one really, especially Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto, who's never heard of it.
So, RFGen, what are some of your favorite huge games of the year that you just don't hear mentioned any more?
So, you're a PS3 owner and you happen to own both Guitar Hero III and Rock Band. Harmonix said that the Guitar Hero III Controller would work with Rock Band. Almost a month after release though, it still does not work. Blame Harmonix? Don't be so quick to blame, as this release by Harmonix explains:
Quote from: Harmonix
Hi Everyone,
As we have said in the past, Harmonix and MTV Games believe in an open standard philosophy of hardware and game compatibility. We think that there should be interoperability between music instrument controllers across all music games. This is clearly in the best interest of consumers, game developers and console manufacturers and will only help to grow the music game genre as well as inspire innovation and creativity.
Two weeks ago, Harmonix created a software patch for the Sony PLAYSTATION 3 version of Rock Band that allowed for guitar compatibility and support for third party peripherals, including enabling use of Activision's Guitar Hero III controller with Rock Band. The compatibility patch was submitted, approved and had been scheduled for release by Sony on Tuesday, December 4. Unfortunately, Activision objected to the compatibility patch's release. The patch remains with Sony, but we have been told that it will unfortunately not be released due to Activision's continued objection.
As is the case with the Microsoft Xbox360, we believe that Sony PLAYSTATION 3 users should be able to use the peripheral of their choice with Rock Band. We sincerely hope that Activision will reverse its decision and allow release of the compatibility patch and further, that Activision will allow Guitar Hero III to support Rock Band guitar controllers as well. We welcome all third party developers who wish to support our controllers and will provide any required support in order for them to do so.
We believe that when consumers have choice, everyone wins. Harmonix and MTV Games hope that Activision and others will also adopt this philosophy.
Sincerely, The Harmonix Team
Well, ain't that a crock of shit. If I was impacted by this situation, I'd be pretty ticked off right now. Seriously, how can a PS3 Rock Band have a bassist right now? Certainly, they can not. This is a pretty douchy move on Activision's part, and I hope they realize that they are angering a lot of people who have previously been buyers of Guitar Hero. I guess they don't care about future sales of GHIV. With the Wii Mono situation, the exorbitant price of DLC and this dilemma, GHIII owners have some things to be ticked about.
Third party accessory developer Nyko has announced a Wii accessory that is actually very useful, unlike the multitudes of attachments, wireless sensor bars and controller gloves. This accessory being a wireless nunchuk. Finally, Nyko has freed us from the chains of wires on the Wii, and protected us from strangling each other with that one foot long nunchuk cord.
The wireless nunchuk works by attaching a little receiver to the bottom of the Wii remote which takes the signals from the nunchuk and delivers it to the Wii remote. Pretty clever, but it would have been nicer if it linked to the console directly, but I don't know if that is possible given that the Wii is set up only to work with Wii remotes for Bluetooth input (at least to my knowledge).
However, all may not be well in Wiiland. This wireless nunchuk could end up using yet another set of batteries. Or they could end up going the route of drawing power from the Wiimote itself. No details have been announced about how exactly it will be powered, but no matter what they do, it will end up costing you more batteries. Unless Nyko has the smarts to make it rechargable. Too bad Nintendo wasn't smart enough to actually make the Wiimote itself rechargable using USB or something of that sort. Oh well, it's in the past, nothing we can do about it now...other than bitch and moan to Nintendo to do it.
And of course, what wireless Wii accessory wouldn't be complete without its very own tacky wrist strap? Well, the nunchuk is definitely not one of those, as it does have its own wrist strap in order to protect you from yourself. No word on when the wireless nunchuk condom will be coming out.
However, the major downside of this is that the nunchuck is technically not a nunchuk, as it is not connected to something else. Sorry all you wannabe ninjas out there, you'll have to go find some other nunchuk to fool around with instead of being cheap and using your Wiimote/nunchuk between games of Naruto: Clash of Ninja Revolution.
2007 was the year of hype in gaming. Between Halo 3, Mass Effect, Super Mario Galaxy, Crysis, and Assassin's Creed, this year has seen the release of some of the most talked up games of all-time. While some of them fell far short of the hype, there were plenty of other far superior games that came out, but received little to no attention from mainstream gamers. So, continuing now and on every Wednesday (or Thursday) until the end of the year, I will be giving you a look at two games released this year that deserve your hard-earned cash and attention. At the end of this five-part series (ending the day after Christmas), I will list them in order of the most overlooked/underrated.
First up this week is the Halo 3 BetaCrackdown by RealTime Worlds and published by Microsoft for the Xbox 360 (I know, Ctrl-Alt-Del sucks, B^U, etc etc, but this one isn't half bad.). Before I talk about it, I want to confess that I have never actually played the game, but I'm just going based off of what Tynstar has said about the game on our forums and what I have heard from elsewhere on the web. Crackdown is an example of when something with not much anticipation rides the coattails of another more popular thing (like The Decemberists riding Stephen Colbert's coattails). Some previous examples of this in gaming include Zone of the Enders (Came with the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo) and Dragon Quest 8 (came with the Final Fantasy 12 demo). In Crackdown's case, RealTime Worlds' corporate overlords (in the publishing sense) at Microsoft thought, "Hey, why don't we give people who buy Crackdown access to a time-limited beta version of Halo 3! It will increase sales for us because Halo fans will buy anything related to the game..." Okay, maybe they didn't say that exactly, but that seems to be the logic. Include a demo for the most anticipated game of all-time with a game that wouldn't sell very well on its own in order to boost sales. Makes sense. Well, the plan worked, as Crackdown went on to sell 1.35 million copies. Now why, would I include such a successful game on this list? Simple. It only sold that many for the Halo 3 beta. Just go to any used game store and you'll see a boatload of copies of Crackdown available for sale. It's a damned shame too because it's actually a great game and got very good reviews and response from those who actually played it. In the game, you play as a genetically enhanced cop with superhuman, comic book esque abilities. The game revolves around you taking down three gangs that control the city. The game has been described by many people (including our very own Tynstar) as very addictive, and definitely worth picking up. So, those of you with a 360, definitely look into getting this game.
Next game I'd like to feature is one of my favorite games of the year, Picross DS by Jupiter and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS. Now, as many of you on this site have discovered, Picross DS is a very addictive DS puzzler which is controlled entirely by the stylus (or the dpad if you please) and is a followup of sorts to Mario's Picross released here in the US 10 years ago on the original Game Boy. Now, many Picross games came out in Japan after Mario's Picross, but they never were released here because Mario's Picross was a commercial failure here, but 12 years later, Nintendo has tried out Picross in the US and Europe again. However, the DS iteration did not do extraordinarily well over here as well. But, for $20 it's a damn good value that will have you hooked for months. Picross DS is kind of like Sudoku, but with pictures. The numbers across the top of the puzzle tell you how many squares to fill in going down (and how many in a row there are), and the numbers going down the side of the puzzle do the same thing, but for going across. It's kind of hard to explain, but if you try out a few puzzles online, you'll understand it. Check out Wikipedia article about Nonograms in order to learn how to play them. You can also try your hand at a few nonogram puzzles by going here. Back to Picross DS, the game includes over 135 puzzles, a Daily Picross feature with five different unlockable minigames to test your puzzle solving skills, a puzzle creator, and online play. The coolest feature about this game are the free downloadable puzzle packs Nintendo has been releasing biweekly. Right now, you can download over 120 additional puzzles to your Picross DS cart (which can hold up to 100 puzzles). The puzzles are mostly from Mario's Picross on the Game Boy, but Nintendo has been having contests to make puzzles and some of those will be posted in a pack. Another online feature the game has is that you can send puzzles you created to your friends and have them solve them. All that for only $20. You really can't go wrong with Picross DS.
Check back next week when we look at something I haven't decided yet. Oddly enough I have no clue what I want to feature the next two times, but I know what the final part of the series will be. Oh well, check back and we'll see what I do.
2007 was the year of hype in gaming. Between Halo 3, Mass Effect, Super Mario Galaxy, Crysis, and Assassin's Creed, this year has seen the release of some of the most talked up games of all-time. While some of them fell far short of the hype, there were plenty of other far superior games that came out, but received little to no attention from mainstream gamers. So, starting today and on every Wednesday (or Thursday) until the end of the year, I will be giving you a look at two games released this year that deserve your hard-earned cash and attention. At the end of this five-part series (ending the day after Christmas), I will list them in order of the most overlooked/underrated.
First up Dewy's Adventure for the Nintendo Wii. Developed by the same team at Konami that created last year's sleeper hit Elebits, Dewy's Adventure is a platformer with a very distinct twist. In the game, you play as a cute little drop of water named Dewy, and what you do is tilt the level and change the temperature. Very simple yes, but it provides many challenges. By changing the temperature, you change the form Dewy takes on. If you raise it, he will become mist and a cloud, and will be able to hit enemies with lightning. If you lower the temperature, he will become ice and slide across large pools of water. The game is also like its cousin, Elebits, in that it grades you based on your performance in each stage, so that adds some replay value. Also featured in that game is a multiplayer mode, and the ability to create levels and send them to your friends using Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. If you own a Wii and don't mind a cute, somewhat childish looking game with a pro-environment message and odd loading screen advertisement messages for Nestle bottled water, by all means, give this one a look. I have a feeling that you will be seeing this profiled in some magazine in three years for a "best games you've never played" feature. But don't take my word for it, here's a cool little video explaining one guy's opinion on why the game is so awesome.
Or if a cute platformer isn't mature enough for you, then check out The Darkness (for both Xbox 360 and Playstation 3), developed by Starbreeze, the same studio behind the underrated Xbox/PC game, Chronicles Of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay (look for the remake on PS3 and Xbox 360 in the near future!). The Darkness is a game based on the comic book of the same name in which you play as Jackie Estacado, a mafia hitman blamed for double crossing Uncle Paulie, the New York mob boss. Oddly enough, on the same day this happens, Jackie is posessed by an alien creature named The Darkness, which gives him superpowers, but takes over his will. The main game plays as a standard modern day console FPS, complete with regenerating health and dual weilding, but when you summon The Darkness, the game changes completely. When summoned, The Darkness will appear as two tentacles which come out of Jackie's shoulder, giving him strength and four special powers. The first power will make The Darkness extend one of its tentacles, allowing you to look ahead, pick up guns, and kill enemies using it. The second power will give you two super powered guns. The third power will give you a sharp tentacle, which can pierce through enemies and obstacles. And the fourth power will create a black hole which sucks in EVERYTHING in its vicinity. Also, when you have The Darkness summoned, you are able to call Darklings, which are little critters that comes in different varities (Kamakazie, Gunner, Light Killer) to aid you in destroying your enemies and creating darkness for The Darkness to feed off off, since light is its only weakness. No overview of The Darkness would be complete without praising its superb voice acting. Mike Patton's (vocalist for the bands Faith No More, Mr. Bungle, Tomahawk, Fantomas, and some others) vocal performance, which was unedited and has no studio effects applied to it, is one of the best ever heard in a video game. However, the coolest part about the game is the sheer amount of content one can watch on the in-game television sets. Instead of having generic stock footage like in most games, The Darkness opted for public domain films, cartoons, and one full-length licensed movie, To Kill A Mockingbird. Yes, that's right. You can watch the entire, unedited version of the 1962 classic right in the game. Or if Popeye, The Three Stooges, or Flash Gordon is more you style, you can always watch some of those. However, it should be mentioned that the PS3 version has much much more in-game television content due to the increased disc size that Blu-ray offers (most notable: five additional Popeye cartoons), however, both versions have plenty to watch. A complete listing of the movies and animated shorts that can be found in the game is located here (I think this list covers the PS3 version).
Check back next week where we take a look at a game that's as addictive as crack (and a great stocking stuffer to boot), and a game that many cared about only for the bonus it had.
This is by far the most important Free Game of the Week feature I've ever done. Read on...
Alright guys, the on-demand gaming service Gametap (which just added its 1000th game, by the way), has added the Tim Schafer classic, Psychonauts, to its free service until December 31st. If you know me, you'll know that Psychonauts is easily one of my five favorite games of the 2000s.
In Psychonauts, you play as Raz, a ten year old boy with psychic powers who was raised in the circus. The game revolves around Raz and the other children at the Whispering Rock Psychic Summer Camp in which Raz has run off to. Along the way you'll meet a large cast of characters, each with their own very unique and hilarious personalities, and uncover a deviant plot to steal the minds of these young children and use them for evil purposes.
All you need to do in order to get free access to Gametap is download the client (click here: 35mb download), install it, and create an account. Once you've done that, launch the client and start downloading Psychonauts (about 4GB, so sorry those of you with dialup). And while you're at it, check out some of the other great games up on Gametap for free. Right now some of the games up for free are Hitman: Codename 47, Hitman 2: Silent Assassin, Hitman: Contracts, Bloodrayne, Second Sight, Myst Online: Uru Live, Bubble Bobble, Legacy of Kain: Blood Omen 2, realMYST, Metal Slug, last week's free game of the week: Sam and Max: Episode 4: Abe Lincoln Must Die, and many many others, all for free. A listing of all the games available for free can be viewed here.
So, you have a long Thanksgiving weekend coming up. Why not spend some of it at the Whispering Rock Psychic Summer Camp and get to know Raz, Dogen, Lili Zanotto, Agent Cruller, Sasha Nein, Bobby Zilch, and all the other people at the camp? Oh and don't forget about the milkman, who's milk is delicious.
[img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/repository/1342659547474245a680030Animal.jpg[/img] There is this comic hitting the internet today. It tells a tale, and it is done in a rather moving manner. To say that it affected me would be a gross understatement. I really encourage you all to check this comic out. Cherish your loved ones, for they certainly love you.
There are two ways to check out this comic. There is the ytmnd that you can check out, or you can view the comic in its entirety here.
This is the most moving thing I've seen in a really long time, I hope you find it's story moving too.
As most of us in the US know, this upcoming Friday is considered Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. The day which stores open very early and offer insane deals on the hottest items for the holiday season. Now, these deals are not just limited to Tickle Me Elmo and power tool sets, video games are included as well, and there are some great deals that will save you money if you're looking at buying for a loved one or getting a little treat for yourself.
Well, I have taken the liberty of compiling some great game-related deals that you will find this Friday so you you can plan your full-scale retail assault in advance.
Hit the jump to see the full list of deals. For your convenience, I have bolded what I think are the best deals.
Sweet mother of double jeopardy backstroking in butterscotch! In celebration of Season Two of their critically acclaimed Sam & Max episodic game series, Telltale Games has released Episode 4 from last season, Abe Lincoln Must Die!, for free! That's right, FREE!
The game continues the adventures of the Freelance Police: Sam, a detective dog, and Max, a "hyperkinetic rabbity thing". This time, they must travel to Washington DC and take care of the President who is enacting federally mandated group hugs before sporting events, putting an embargo on pudding, and requiring mandatory gun registration! Along the way, you will encounter many hilarious situations, such as Max becoming president of the United States, an incredible musical number, and the Soda Poppers becoming the Governors of North Dakota, South Dakota, and West Dakota (newly formed).
This game is a must play for it's sharp writing and intelligent humor, both of which are very rare to find in gaming (or any other media) these days. You can download the game direct from Telltale Games for free. If you like this episode, be sure to buy Sam & Max Season One from Telltale ($30 for a download of all six episodes, plus a free bonus DVD with the episodes and a ton of bonus features) or the boxed retail version from The Adventure Company/Dreamcatcher Interactive ($30 as well, but you don't get as many extras). Also, remember to check out Season Two, which just started on both Gametap and Telltale's website.
Seriously guys. This is by far one of the best games out there right now. I urge each and every one of you to try it out and see what you think.
Starting on Decmember 4th with the fall update, you will be able to purchase and download games from the original Xbox from the Xbox Live Marketplace. Among the first games offered for download are Fable, Indigo Prophecy (the best of the initial offerings, in my honest opinion), Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge, Crash Bandicoot: Wrath of Cortex, Burnout 3, and some other TOTALLY OBVIOUS game which need not be mentioned here. These six games will run you 1200 MS Points (that's $15 in real money), and obviously will not work on the Core/Arcade model unless you have a hard drive added in.
I think that while it's nice that they are adding downloadable games from the original Xbox, I think that $15 is too much to pay for them, especially when you can go to Gamestop or the local pawn shop and get those games for a much lower price than $15. Seems kind of a waste if you can get the game cheaper and can get the physical media and manual as an added bonus. In addition, these games will probably be up to 7GB in size, which means you won't be able to store very many on a 20GB system. So that means you'll have to take the Nintendo-recommended approach and delete games from your hard drive that you aren't using.
It should also be noted that all of the games up for download are currently backwards compatible with the 360. Why sell them for $15 then? Probably so MS can try and capture some money from the sale of secondhand games is my guess. However, I am happy they are doing this because it will be nice to have a catalog of the original Xbox games up for download when they become harder to find.
[img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/repository/4790319754737ba3ac4734old_TV.jpg[/img] So, in between my Pavement Problems I've been playing Guitar Hero, but today I noticed something as I was up close to the game. Sound was only coming out of the center speaker of my sound system. Nothing in the subwoofer, rear, or front speakers, just the center speaker. I didn't think much of it, as my receiver does DSP, which I promptly turned on. How humorous then is it when Tondog sends me a link mentioning that the Wii version of Guitar Hero III was in fact shipped with only Mono Sound. For a game that touts the music, certainly this is a low blow, and this screw up should have been caught in the really stringent QA that I guess Activision really does not have. Here's to you, Activision. Charging $90 for a gimped product, I certainly hope that the money you saved on skipped QA time will cover the costs of this screw up.
If you followed the video game world at all this year, you'll likely know that 
This might be an odd inclusion since it never had a retail release, but this is something that I'm sure none of you have heard of by a developer you've definitely heard of. Did you know that Harmonix, the same company behind Guitar Hero and Rock Band released an iPod game this year? No, really, AN iPOD GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The game is called 
Since I was busy having a social life last night, I was unable to do my regularly scheduled underrated/overlooked feature on time, however I found a somewhat (Sony biased to a certain degree) related feature on 
Third party accessory developer Nyko has announced a 
First up this week is the 
Next game I'd like to feature is one of my favorite games of the year, Picross DS by Jupiter and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS. Now, as many of you on this site have discovered, Picross DS is a very addictive DS puzzler which is controlled entirely by the stylus (or the dpad if you please) and is a followup of sorts to Mario's Picross released here in the US 10 years ago on the original Game Boy. Now, many Picross games came out in Japan after Mario's Picross, but they never were released here because Mario's Picross was a commercial failure here, but 12 years later, Nintendo has tried out Picross in the US and Europe again. However, the DS iteration did not do extraordinarily well over here as well. But, for $20 it's a damn good value that will have you hooked for months. Picross DS is kind of like Sudoku, but with pictures. The numbers across the top of the puzzle tell you how many squares to fill in going down (and how many in a row there are), and the numbers going down the side of the puzzle do the same thing, but for going across. It's kind of hard to explain, but if you try out a few puzzles online, you'll understand it. Check out 
First up 
Or if a cute platformer isn't mature enough for you, then check out 
This is by far the most important Free Game of the Week feature I've ever done. Read on...
Sweet mother of double jeopardy backstroking in butterscotch! In celebration of Season Two of their critically acclaimed Sam & Max episodic game series, Telltale Games has released Episode 4 from last season, 
Starting on Decmember 4th with the fall update, you will be able to purchase and download games from the original Xbox from the Xbox Live Marketplace. Among the first games offered for download are 
