Gaming News Tidbits for June 28, 2007
- At the Hollywood ang Games Summit (which has excellent coverage over at Gamasutra), Lucasarts has confirmed that a Star Wars game that invovles lightsaber usage is under development for the Wii. I think the inner fanboy in us all just giggled at the possiblity of swinging that remote around our collective living rooms.
- Codemasters has released a trailer for the new action/RPG game called Rise of the Argonauts. This game was profiled a couple months back in Game Informer and looks pretty interesting (well interesting to me).
- Sony Online Entertainment continues to expand its MMOG empire by signing a publishing deal for Pirates of the Burning Sea. The Joystiq post links to an update on the Pirates webite that documents the whole situation between the two companies. The great news is this adds to the benefits that Sony's Station Access Pass offers. For a single monthy price, a gamer has a plethora of games at their disposal. The downside for some gamers is that this is another title squarely in Sony's hands but it is a bit more complicated than that (as documented in the developer update).
- Feel that the PSP and Nintendo DS are too shiny for your gaming needs? Well, for all those old school gamers who really want to experience retro gaming but still have mobility we have the first images of the new Atari Flashback Portable. The folks over at Engadget have the shots and while there are still questions that need to be answered about actual availability and game distribution, it appears that the product is not vapor ware.
- Another option for mobile gaming is a Windows Mobile powered PDA, and there have been several titles that have come out on that device in recent years. Today, Machines at War was released as a beta for this platform. It is a real time strategy title with a laundry list of features. This news comes from Pocket Gamer which represents probably the number one spot for Pocket PC game news.
- Andre Lemothe has announced a new DIY game console. The $200 homebrew machine uses a new multi-core processor and a bunch of other items that would be better described on the XGS website. While the price point may prevent some from looking at this, I think it is definitely a possiblity for some folks who wish to learn about game consoles and hardware design elements which is not possible with the any of the other consoles out there.
- Shacknews reports that Supreme Commander is getting an expansion. The Forged Alliance expansion is a standalone affair that will add a new faction, 100+ new units and a new single player campaign. The game is targetted for a November 2007 launch.
- Major Nelson has setup a dedicated server for some LIVE enabled Games for Windows (which is a long way of saying, PC games). He claims that it won't be available 24x7, but a simple check of his servers profile page will allow those Vista gamers with Shadowrun or Halo 2 to engage in some fragging of some Microsoft guys. Just remember to give them the love they deserve...
- JP posted his impressions of Overlord (which is another Codemasters' title) a couple weeks ago, and they were positive if not a bit creepy. That whole cackling thing was a bit disturbing, but I digress. The game was released this last week for the PC and Xbox 360 and Trusted Reviews has reviewed the Xbox 360 version of the game. They gave it an 8 out of 10 and I would be remiss if I didn't include this quote:
A joyous mix of childish bad-boy attitude and ‘borrowed’ ideas, fashioned into one of the most stupidly entertaining games this year. Overlord may be slight, but it’s wickedly enjoyable all the same.
Which pretty much says that it is on my list of games to be purchased...
