Gaming Signal: April 2006 Archives

Thursday April 27, 2006

Nintendo Wii - ack!

Nintendo announced today that the actual brand name for their next generation gaming console, previously known by its codename Revolution, would in fact be Wii (pronounced 'we'.)

Uh, WTF!

OK, I get that they wanted to create a unique name and I get that they wanted to evoke the idea of people playing together, but seriously, do we think this name will fly? I thought it was the Japanese name when I first heard it, but apparently it is the worldwide name. Wow. Did they test this with focus groups? In the US? Will moms really say 'OK honey, you can have a Wii for your birthday - let me call Target and see if they have any Wii's in stock'???

Gaming Tidbits For 04/27/06

Some interesting, if targeted, stuff for you today:

First up, TooHuman.net is a website dedicated to the upcoming Silicon Knights game, Too Human. Some interesting articles here, especially the series covering the influence of the Norse mythos on the story of Too Human.
ByteSector has a preview of Too Human posted. They have several kick butt screenies for you to drool over. I'd say this game is jumping up my personal hype ladder.
Speaking of Silicon Knights, they have started a blog on everyone's favorite gaming site, IGN.COM. They will be covering all aspects of the game's development, and the first post even has a really cool wallpaper for you to download. Sweet.
Moving on to Tim's favorite gaming site, 1UP, we find that Electronic Gaming Monthly Magazine now has a podcast. No word as to whether the podcast lives up to the 'quality' of the print magazine. I will listen to see though.
We all like free right? Well, if you have an Xbox (360), the week of May 8 - 14 will be a free Xbox Live Gold Week! If you have an Xbox Live account, it will be upgraded to Gold for free, for the week of E3. Us 360 owners get a gratis Silver account, so I'll be there! Apparently, Verizon will be giving out 1 Million Xbox Points over that week too. Not sure how that will work. I wonder how much they paid MS to sponsor this week? Good move on MS' part though, another revenue stream.
For Pete, we have the Dead Or Alive movie trailer. I'mpretty sure words are unnecessary at this point.
Fight the powa and give your Xbox 360 a voice! Sign up and your 360 will start its own blog. Mine is rather lonely right now. Buck up little box, I'll be hooking you up right quick!
Check out these new Battlefield 2142 screenshots. If you think I'm a tank whore now in BF2, wait till I get to drive a mech... Don't forget to watch the trailer.
Siliconera is reporting that there will be a Too Human demo available in advance of E3 on XBL Marketplace. Sweet! And this for a game not due out until October.
Tomb Raider Chronicles has a site detailing the Evolution Of Lara Croft. Specifically, they cover all the models that have played Lara Croft in the Tomb Raider ad campaigns. You're welcome Pete.
Bethesda Softworks has a nifty news site for their upcoming Star Trek games, Legacy (PC/360) and Tactical Assault (PSP/DS). Both of these look like auto buys for me. Check out the 360 screenies for Legacy. Holy Horta Cpt. Kirk!

Updated with more Tids, or Bits, or whatever you want to call them.

Wednesday April 26, 2006

Computer Gaming World grows up

I'm not sure everybody has access to it, but if not you really owe it to yourself to pick up a recent copy of Computer Gaming World. The last couple of months have featured fantastic articles - actual intelligent, well-written journalism - on topics such as virtual escorts in Second Life, the issue of why sex in video games is taboo while not so in movies, discussions with gold farmers and gold buyers, and an interview with the writers of Penny Arcade.

Overall, the magazine is maturing and moving beyond a hype machine of nothing but endless fanboy raving about upcoming games (that rarely deliver) like some lame multi-authored gaming blog. They've recently dropped rating games all together - there are still reviews, but they no longer put a rating number on games - you actually have to (shock) read the review!. They have real interviews, and some interesting in-depth articles. And the best part - its no longer written to a 3rd grade reading level (discussions of how the upcoming game Bioshock being influenced by the writing of Ayn Rand, for example.)

Frankly, it's about time. With a million blogs, review sites, and all-hype magazines giving you reviews and previews, it's refreshing to see a magazine delivering on something more.

Monday April 24, 2006

Gaming Tidbits - 04/24/06

Some random gaming news, to cover for that slacker Tim...:

EA is working on an 'Oblivion killer', called Project Gray Company. It's supposedly a next-gen, open-ended RPG game that lets the player decide how things unfold, much like Oblivion. No word really on what 'next-gen' means, whether that is 360/PS3 or PC. May be cool. Does EA make decent RPGs?
On the WoW Forums, there is a thread covering Epics For Casuals. Not sure how casual they mean, but I know its not me casual.
Keeping with the WoW theme, we have WoW Panoramic Wallpapers. All are stitched together from in-game screenshots. Nice work here.

Saturday April 22, 2006

New PSP Games

I recently got to experience several hours on a plane and as a result spent some quality time with my dusty old Sony PSP. I picked up both some new games and some old games, and I have snapshot reviews below.

Overall, I'm still not convinced there are any games that really deliver the best gaming experience on the PSP. There are plenty of good games ported over, but they each suffer from some challenges as a result.

Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories: A new PSP game based on the world of GTA3, Liberty contains everything the fans of that series have come to expect. It has an mature theme, all the radio stations, achievements, and open-ended gameplay that have made this series a classic. The PSP version delivers and if you're a fan you shouldn't miss it. I haven't finished the main plot yet, but I can tell already it's a good one. It does suffer from the overall poor controls of the PSP - fighting seems harder than it should be, but the driving is relatively easy.

Metal Gear Acid 2: The much-awaited sequel to a very interesting game, MGA2 takes the unique card-game style play of the first game to the next level. Although I haven't finished it, the gameplay is solid and feels a little stronger than the first game. Both games seem to really deliver on great handheld gaming with the PSP - so far this is my favorite PSP game. The controls work, the graphics are decent (if not spectacular), and the game is fun. The overall nature of a random collectible card game it here, but it isn't a hindrance. I like the ability to customize your deck fo the type of mission (stealth, outright assault, or a balanced approach.) Unfortunately, it isn't always clear what kind of mission it is until you play it once.

Splinter Cell Essentials: Another new PSP game and another based on a classic, this time we get a handheld version of the classic Splinter Cell games. I'm a huge fan of this series, so I was really looking forward to enjoying this one. Unfortunately, the controls are pretty odd - making it a chore to play rather than the fun it should be. The camera especially is made difficult to control often ending up a hindrance rather than a natural part of the game. All the best aspects of Splinter Cell are here - the combat, the stealth action, and the gadgets. I didn't get very far at all unfortunately because I was forced to play some sections over and over again while fighting the controls to effectively maneuver Sam through the interesting aspects of his past.

Thursday April 13, 2006

World of Warcraft floats all boats?

As for April 10th, Bethesda Softworks announced that The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion has shipped over 1.7 million copies. In fact, it was responsible for 13% of all PC game sales during its first week on the shelves. All I can say to that is - WoW! As in, see the influence of World of Warcraft?

Wait - you don't? Well...let me explain. Few games sell a million copies in a year. So who exactly is buying all those copies? Well, certainly 360 owners who are starved for decent content. But also - lots and lots of World of Warcraft players have run out and bought it as well. WoW has brought all kinds of gamers to the RPG genre who didn't play PC games and those folks are now open to buying other RPGs. In other worlds, WoW has single-handedly grown the market for PC games, and PC RPG's in particular. Thus, a great title like Oblivion benefits tremendously.

I'm glad to see it, and hopefully this trend holds. It would be nice if the overall market growth allows for niche players (like Stardock) to get in and get their games supported by buyers. I suppose this has to be proved though - it's not that big a jump from WoW to Oblivion, but it is a much bigger leap to move from WoW to a real-time strategy game.

Tuesday April 11, 2006

News Tidbits for April 11, 2006

We begin today's festivities with an interview with the Bioware courtesy the folks over at the Firing Squad.

The Escapist has an article up about the power of Walmart and the gaming industry. The Escapist is probably one of the slickest online gaming magazine, and have had several great topics.

The folks over at Kotaku have an article about the failure of Xbox360 in Japan. I don't think this is very much of a surprise really in that the current game offerings are just not appealing to that audience. Maybe once a couple of the Japanese designed games come out, there will be some increase in sales, but who knows.

Monday April 10, 2006

Gaming News Tidbits for April 10, 2006

Goodness, its been ten days since our last little news tidbits post and I am sure glad I am taking the time today to give you all a few things to mentally gnaw on today. So without further ado...

The April edition of Carnival of Gamers is up over at n3rfed. The great thing about the carnival is that every blog that hosts it does it in thier own style. I am not saying that the style used here is best, but it is unique.

The folks over at Gamasutra have a great article about the post mortem of Galactic Civilizations 2. This article covers some interesting details about the precursor in that it was developed for a relatively small budget with a very small team of developers. Definitely a great read..

Are you a console fanboy? I can probably say that Scott is not, but he could find out for sure by taking this web quiz I don't think its perfect and there are some definite gaps in the quiz, but hey its for fun right...

Hmm, that is a short list for today, but who knows I may find more interesting little news nuggets later today...

Wednesday April 05, 2006

Oblivion micro-content

Bethesda opened their site that allows downloading of micro-content for The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion today. Over at obliviondownloads.com you can buy horse armor for $1.99. Future content will include the ability to rebuild the orrery and a mage tower you can claim as you in-game home - each with the same $1.99 price.

Uh, WTF? $2 for horse armor or an in-game house? I can see paying $2 for a new themed dungeon to go through, but for these little things it just feels wrong.