Monthly Archives: September 2011

How Atari Can Really Take Advantage Of The Digital Age

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While the company has seen its share of ups and downs (and a few sideways moves) over the past few decades, there's something about Atari that makes me hope they'll be around in some form for as long as people are around to play video games. Primarily a publisher for a good deal of the past decade, since 2004 they've been tapping into their history to produce a few different plug & play console variants in the Atari Flashback line. These units feature not only many classic games, but unreleased as well as homebrew tittles have managed to make it into the mainstream thanks to the small but dedicated team contracted to put the Flashback project together. As good as these systems are, I think Atari can bring things to the next level in a really cool way.Read more »

Super Monkey Ball Coming To PS Vita

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Get it through your skulls, people: unless they can turn back time, Sega has NO plans to make a Dreamcast 2, period. Too much money down the drain in R&D plus the sad fact that the industry isn’t going to support standalone home consoles in this rush to enforce digital evolution, which is a bad idea at the end of the day. Trust me, when there’s a service outage along the lines of this year’s PSN debacle spread across whatever set top “cloud” box is in your house, you’ll be wishing you had a few consoles and physical games to fall back on while you’re waiting for service to be restored. THAT said, those cute as hell monkeys are back, this time on the Vita. Sega may not be cranking out consoles these days, but they sure as heck know how to produce and publish some great games. SO, focus your attention and gaming dollars on cool titles like this and help Sega thrive where it’s doing its best. That is all…

Review: God of War Origins Collection

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Platform: PlayStation 3

Developer: Ready At Dawn/Sony Santa Monica Studios

# of Players: 1

ESRB Rating: M (Mature)

Official Site

Score: A

Even if you already own both games on the PSP, God of War Origins Collection is a stellar must-purchase PS3 title that’s also one of the most polished ports of a portable game to a home console ever. Ready At Dawn along with Sony Santa Monica Studios have gone above and beyond here beefing up the two games with high resolution visuals (in great optional stereoscopic 3D), refined controls, Trophy support and even a bit of additional content. Both games are brutal, brilliant chapters that flesh out lead character Kratos’ story and make for a great pair of games that should please any fan of the franchise as well as anyone new to his violent world. As a longtime GOW fan, I’ll absolutely say that the man certainly knows how to make an entrance, no matter what platform he’s on. Continue reading →

Gallery: Max Payne 3 (Remedy Gets Even More Real)

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After a long wait (and still ongoing development cycle), Rockstar is finally bringing Remedy’s modern noir detective back, and this time he’s looking both better and worse for the wear. Better as in the game is taking the stellar visuals and phenomenal attention to detail the developer is known for to new heights of realism. Worse in terms of the presentation of a down and out Max Payne as an alcoholic, pill-popping gun for hire living in Sao Paolo. Of course, the game is not just about his decline well off the grid and whatever rotgut and cheap drugs he can score to feed his bad habits. There’s plenty of gunplay, bullet-time sequences and what’s looking like the most spectacular use of the Euphoria Engine to date. Rockstar is set to reveal the game’s first trailer next Wednesday, so expect that to get posted (most likely on the other blog, as I’m expecting it to be nice and violent).

Some in-progress screens are below and more are on the way (most likely next week with the trailer I’ll bet)..

Street Fighter X Tekken TGS Teaser Videos

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Two more character reveals from the upcoming PS3 and Xbox 360 fighter set to launch sometime next year. In case you still haven’t figured out who they are, look for the answers at TGS next week. Of course, if you’re a REAL fan, you already know who’s who, correct?

Happy Birthday, Star Trek!

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Hard to believe it’s been 45 years since the series first premiered on TV, but yes, it’s true. I actually have vague memories of watching parts of some episodes as a little kid, but I really didn’t have a clue as to what was going on. It took watching reruns of the original series in my teens and finding a few friends who were also into the show to make me appreciate it a lot more, but we still had fun pointing out the cornball effects and occasionally bad dialog, sets and visual effects. Here’s a clip of the Science Channel’s upcoming documentary, TREK NATION, a film project done in collaboration with the late gene Roddenberry’s son, Rod about the impact the show has had among a wide range of people. Now, I need to check my cable guide to see if I actually get the Science Channel. The documentary airs on November 30th, so you’ve got enough time to check your own cable listings.

Seven MORE KOF XIII Trailers (Atlus Keeps On Rolling…)

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Yes, these are going up a bit later than planned, but I was busy playing a few games and got sidetracked. Such is the life of the one-man operation. Here you go – seven more characters from the upcoming fighter. These are pretty short, so like the first nine, you won't need that beer and chips or have to worry about falling asleep halfway through. Hell, one of these guys or gals will slap you silly if you did anyway…

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Guardian Heroes Is Back! Now, How About A Sega Saturn Collection?

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Well alright! Treasure’s innovative fighter/RPG hybrid is finally coming to Xbox Live Arcade (and hopefully, PSN) soon. While this is indeed a great thing to see, I’d really love it if Sega just took the time to bring a bunch of their first-party Saturn games to us on a disc like they’ve done with the numerous Sega Genesis collections over the years for consoles and PC. Of course, given that Sonic The Hedgehog’s presence on the Saturn was somewhat weak, I’m wondering if that’s a main reason we haven’t seen a PS3 Blu-Ray or Xbox 360 disc collection yet. On the other hand, with games such as this one, Astal, Shining The Holy Ark, Shining Force III, The Panzer Dragoon games, Burning Rangers and more classics, it’s a no-brainer that seeing all these great games (and getting them all in one shot at a great price point) would be a win-win situation for Sega and gamers alike.

Studio Profile: From Software (Or: It’s About Time These Guys Got More Love!)

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Here’s a brief look at one of my very favorite game developers since 1994 when I first saw Japanese screenshots of King’s Field and later, Armored Core. The company has done a wide assortment of games since then, but it wasn’t really until Demon’s Souls and now, Dark Souls that they’re a household name among more gamers. Of course, the terrifyingly difficult Dark Souls will probably garner them more than a few curses from those that hop in unprepared or expecting the game to have a super-easy mode… but I think From wants those players to learn something about they way games used to be made.

Asura’s Wrath: CyberConnect2 Interview

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Capcom sits down with the developer’s CEO and producer for a few minutes of chat time about the upcoming action game set to hit the PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2012. So far, the game seems to be quite like an anime in terms of the storytelling and over the top action sequences. I happen to like the visual style quite a lot and I’m also curious to see how it all fits together once the game is completed and ready to ship. By the way, if you don’t see subtitles, just click on the “CC” button on the video bar for English text.