Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/videos/dragon-quest-collection-footage
Thursday, 15 September 2011
Review: Ico & Shadow of the Colossus Collection HD
Shadows and fog.
If Ico and Shadow and the Colossus were novels, they'd be getting the Penguin Modern Classics treatment around about now. They'd be done up in paperback with a jarringly appropriate bit of art stuck on the front, while inside you'd get an introductory essay with a name like, "Shadow of the Beast: Manichean belief structures and Agro the horse", written by Tony Tanner - if he wasn't already dead. You'd plod through that intro because you wanted to get your money's worth, and after all that, you might end up with the strange feeling that there weren't too many reasons left to re-read the actual stories anymore.
Luckily, Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are video games, and video games have their own impulses when it comes to curatorship. In Sony's new HD collection, both of Fumito Ueda's classics are reborn in high resolution and 7.1 surround sound with improved frame rates and it's left to the player, rather than Tony Tanner, to unravel what they think of the games themselves. Instead of scholarly essays, there are downloadable themes - one for each game - and making-of videos (none of which we've been sent in our review copy, alas). Instead of the unusual cover image, there are trophies and stereoscopic 3D for both titles.
Best of all, there are still plenty of reasons left to play these games again. Let's check them out.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-08-ico-and-shadow-of-the-colossus-collection-hd-review
News: Takashi Miike to direct Ace Attorney film?
Notorious gorehound teases new project.
Notoriously gore-obsessed Japanese movie director Takashi Miike has hinted that his next project is a film adaptation of Capcom's light-hearted Ace Attorney franchise.
While promoting his latest movie, blood-soaked samurai epic 13 Assassins, at the Cannes Film Festival this week, Miike briefly outlined his next project to The Huffington Post.
"It is a very light comedy that I am filming now, a court drama, based on a video game, the Nintendo game DS."
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-05-23-takashi-miike-to-direct-ace-attorney-film
News: Cut The Rope: Experiments announced
Mystery iOS sequel out tomorrow.
Cut The Rope: Experiments, a follow-up to the smash hit iOS physics puzzler, drops into the gaping mouths of hungry App Store patrons tomorrow.
Developer Zepto Labs is keeping quiet on gameplay details though did offer the following statement about what fans can expect from the title:
"What on earth is Om Nom?! That's what millions of fans of the widely acclaimed game, Cut the Rope, have been asking about the cute little monster who eats candy like its his job! That same question has a mad (but not bad) scientist studying the little creature that mysteriously arrived outside his house."
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-03-cut-the-rope-experiments-announced
News: Dead Island PC patch may wipe saves
But publisher planning a "make up" offer.
Dead Island's day one title update may wipe some of users' save data, thanks to incompatibility issues thrown up by the game's embarrassing PC launch balls-up, the game's publisher has admitted.
A statement from Deep Silver handed to horror site Daily Dead explained that it had done its best to avoid save files being compromised but in some instances players will lose their progress.
"We tried every avenue possible in order to avoid fans having to wipe their saved games? this update may cause incompatibilities between the incorrect version of Dead Island that was released and the fixed version and cause a wipe on saved games. "
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-07-dead-island-pc-patch-may-wipe-saves
Preview: Dragon's Dogma
Breathe fire, eat sheep.
You've got to feel sorry for new IP: we bleat for it all the time, then Capcom whips the covers off its first-ever open world game, a titan-slaying adventure of breathtaking scope. And then people say "Monster Hunter meets Demon's Souls, innit."
The comparisons aren't without basis: many games - Monster Hunter, Oblivion, Demon's Souls, and Shadow of the Colossus - are influences here. But Dragon's Dogma is no patchwork, and casting it as a simple blend of what's gone before doesn't illuminate a game that plays differently from any of them.
On offer in this latest hands-on is a dungeon section from near the game's beginning, and a Griffin boss fight, each played with a different class - the warrior for the former (sword and shield) and the strider for the latter (bow and daggers). You play a character called Arisen � urgh � trying to hunt down the dragon who's bound to his heart: this eponymous sod gives Arisen instructions throughout the game, hence the title, but at this point you're just chasing it down.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-03-dragons-dogma-preview
News: Sony unveils cheap PSP model specs
?99 machine ditches wi-fi, stereo sound.
Sony has released a list of technical specs for its upcoming budget PSP - the PSP-E1000. The new cheaper model comes without wi-fi capabilities or stereo sound.
The E1000 is slightly larger than the PSP-3000 (172.4 � 73.4 � 21.6 mm compared to 169.4 x 71.4 x 18.6 mm) and weighs a tad more, too (223g including its battery pack, compared with just 189g).
Its external glossy sheen has gone - replaced with a matte charcoal finish.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-23-sony-unveils-cheap-psp-model-specs
Preview: F1 2011
Spin DRS.
Blanchimont is a small, unassuming and often unsung stretch of tarmac tucked away in Belgium's Ardennes forest. As part of the make-up of the Spa-Francorchamps circuit, it's Eau Rouge, the famed uphill kink that dares drivers to take it flat, and Pouhoun, a violently fast double-apex left hander, that take the plaudits. Blanchimont, on the other hand, is a mere footnote, a simple bend on the back straight that barely registers in most other driving games.
But in F1 2011 it's got bite; the kind of bite that'll leave big teeth marks in the rear of the car as it spits you out into the concrete wall that's there to catch anyone dumb enough to underestimate the turn.
Coming so soon off the back of F1 2010, Codemasters' inaugural HD take on the licence it snapped up from Sony in 2008, it's something of a revelation. Last year's game was competent and assured - and it did enough to ensure it was the best take on the sport since Geoff Crammond's heyday - but it was also a little lightweight in its handling.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-02-f1-2011-preview
Raving Rabbids: Travel in Time 3D - Royal Wedding Trailer
We have just learned that the rabbids have invaded the royal wedding as they were spotted trying to sneak in using various disguises. See for yourself.
Read and Post Comments | Get the full article at GameSpot
"Raving Rabbids: Travel in Time 3D - Royal Wedding Trailer" was posted by MikeTao on Wed, 27 Apr 2011 11:20:18 -0700
Preview: PixelJunk Lifelike
Drawn from life.
Music games are as nebulous and diverse as music itself, as we've very recently explored. Still, it's no surprise that when Q-Games turned its hand to the genre the results would be stranger yet - for if there's one thing that's defined the studio's PixelJunk series, it's a willingness to be different.
"I personally always feel uncomfortable if the game feels too familiar," says Dylan Cuthbert, Q-Games' founder and president whose long and illustrious career has taken him from Edgware to his current base in Kyoto, "but at the same time I like to have a small amount of familiarity in there."�
And so the PixelJunk games have always used the most simple of concepts as a springboard, be that the tower defence template at the core of Monsters or the 2D shmup mechanics that the forthcoming Sidescroller is built around. From there, though, ideas are spun out and explored, accompanied by often breathtaking visuals provided by an impressive roster of collaborators.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-10-pixeljunk-lifelike-preview
Start/Select - UK Chart, Gears of War 3 leaked, Black Rock to close
Guy takes you through this week's UK chart toppers, Gears of War 3 springs a leak, and Disney closes Black Rock.
Read and Post Comments | Get the full article at GameSpot
"Start/Select - UK Chart, Gears of War 3 leaked, Black Rock to close" was posted by johnnyC on Mon, 04 Jul 2011 08:56:39 -0700
Preview: Silent Hill: Downpour
Puddle quest.
What separates the good horror films from the really good ones? What holds the genuine shockers apart from the moderate spine-tinglers? I've been thinking about this - for at least two minutes - and I'm pretty sure the answer isn't sharks. In fact, I'm pretty sure the answer is something like ambiguity: a creepy sense of uncertainty, a little bit of leeway for your imagination to work its dark magic.
And sharks, of course. But Silent Hill: Downpour doesn't have sharks in it so let's stick with the ambiguity for now.
Silent Hill's always thrived on ambiguity. It offers you passage into a half-seen world, obscured by mist and rust: a place where abandoned buildings poke out of the fog as you creep closer, and where two conflicting dimensions grind against each other in the shadows, one a landscape of faded fifties Americana, another an ugly and corroding force of entropy.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-07-13-silent-hill-downpour-preview
Wednesday, 14 September 2011
News: Steam Dead Island an Xbox 360 dev build?
Update: Patch will rectify matter.
Update 2: A post by Deep Silver on the Dead-Island.com forums suggests a patch will remove the develop options from the Steam version of the game.
"As far as I know, the planned patch for today remove the developer options," wrote "Gadwyn", who is tagged as Deep Silver staff.
"I cannot say yet, to what extent this affects the game."
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-06-steam-dead-island-an-xbox-360-dev-build
Hands-on with Cooking Mama meets George Romero freemium title Zombie Cookin?
Zombies aren?t exactly known for their culinary skills. Given that most appear to eat human brains for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, it?s a little surprising to see that Capcom's mobile brand Beeline has decided to choose the living dead for its upcoming freemium title�Zombie Cookin?. That is until you see some of the pun-tastic recipes on offer. ?Scrambled Legs? anyone? But there?s...
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/PocketGamerLatestPreviews/~3/C_2MlbA6rBw/news.asp
A Game With Balls Space Balls Gameplay Movie
Balls in space.
Read and Post Comments | Get the full article at GameSpot
"A Game With Balls Space Balls Gameplay Movie" was posted by edmondt on Thu, 01 Sep 2011 22:58:10 -0700
Review: Mobile Games Roundup
D.A.R.K! Reckless! Rainbow! Pinball! CurveBot!
As some of my favourite musicians have proved, if you haven't got any ideas of your own, just go ahead and plunder the past for inspiration. It's an approach that's served Noel Gallagher pretty well over the past couple of decades, and something that game developers in the mobile space are particularly fond of.
Take this week's crop. One game goes right back to 1981 for its mechanics, while two others decide that remaking nineties classics is the way to go - sadly, one of them rips the guts out of the experience by assuming that we're all pathetic at games these days. To be fair, they're probably right.
The remainder also cast backwards glances to try to get us excited, with varying degrees of success. Frankly, if you can't make the original idea better, then don't waste our time. You'll only get bitter and twisted. If you can, though, you'll be our friend forever.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-01-mobile-games-roundup-review
Saturday, 10 September 2011
Rampart Trivia Pack Screens
1 new shots posted.
Get the full article at GameSpot
"Rampart Trivia Pack Screens" was posted on Wed, 01 Jun 2011 17:07:45 -0700
Source: http://www.gamespot.com/windows-mobile/puzzle/ramparttriviapack/images.html?sid=6316637
News: PC Driver: San Fran "wasn't held back"
Console code-base meant "natural delay".
That the PC version of Driver: San Francisco must wait for a 30th September release represents a "natural delay" - "it wasn't held back", developer Ubisoft Reflections told Eurogamer.
"The PC version trails the console versions because the code-base comes from the consoles," explained studio boss Martin Edmonson.
"It wasn't held back."
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-06-pc-driver-san-fran-wasnt-held-back
Bastion landing on PC August 16
Supergiant Games' downloadable role-playing title arriving on Steam in under two weeks.
Bastion made a strong critical splash on Xbox Live Arcade when it arrived on July 20 as the year's first Summer of Arcade game. Soon, PC gamers will have a chance to check out the title, as Supergiant Games has dated Bastion for August 16 on that platform.
Initially, Bastion for the PC will be available only on Valve's digital distribution warehouse Steam. Its availability will expand later in the month when the game is released on other PC download hubs.
Like its Xbox Live Arcade counterpart, Bastion for the PC will cost $15. On Steam, the DRM-free game will leverage the service's Steamworks functionality, support cloud saves, and let gamers track their progress via leaderboards and achievement records.
As for the game, Bastion relies heavily on storytelling, offering dozens of levels that gamers explore to uncover the origins of Calamity, a civilization-destroying event. For more on the title, check out GameSpot's review of the XBLA iteration of Bastion.
Read and Post Comments | Get the full article at GameSpot
"Bastion landing on PC August 16" was posted by Eddie Makuch on Fri, 05 Aug 2011 09:26:52 -0700
Source: http://www.gamespot.com/iphone/action/bastion/news/6327406/bastion-landing-on-pc-august-16
iOS gamers downloaded 5 million titles a day in March - Study
Newzoo, Distimo research indicates 63 million people in US, UK, other Euro nations bought games from Apple's App Store last month.
The iOS platform has become the most popular for established publishers and indie game makers alike, and a new combined analytics study by Newzoo and Distimo illustrates why. Today, the two firms announced research results that indicate there were 63 million people in March 2011 who used Apple's iOS as a gaming platform in the US, UK, Germany, France, Spain, The Netherlands, and Belgium.
Those 63 million gamers are reportedly making significant expenditures on games. Calling games "the largest single App-category on Apple App Stores," the study said that gamers download an average of 2.5 games per month.
Newzoo and Distimo's research further indicated that more than 5 million games were downloaded from the App Store a day in the aforementioned seven countries in March. The vast majority of these games--90 percent, or 4.6 million--were purchased for use on the iPhone and iPod Touch. The iPad took 9 percent of that figure with 430,000 games reportedly purchased, while Mac gamers accounted for just 1 percent at 41,000 units.
Of the top 300 most-downloaded iOS games, the study found that 88 percent are free. However, the study also found that 40 percent of total sales on the iPhone/iPod Touch and 32 percent on the iPad came from in-game transactions, irrespective of whether the game was free or paid. The study also found that in-game transactions will surpass upfront purchases by the second half of 2011.
Read and Post Comments | Get the full article at GameSpot
"iOS gamers downloaded 5 million titles a day in March - Study" was posted by Tom Magrino on Wed, 18 May 2011 14:57:28 -0700
Meteor Screens
1 new shots posted.
Get the full article at GameSpot
"Meteor Screens" was posted on Mon, 01 Aug 2011 17:09:25 -0700
Source: http://www.gamespot.com/windows-mobile/action/meteor/images.html?sid=6326563
News: Rage system requirements detailed
Free up 25GB of hard disk space.
The PC version of forthcoming id Software shooter Rage demands a hefty 25GB of your machine's hard disk space, publisher Bethesda has revealed.
Other than that, the game's system requirements, as revealed on the Bethesda Blog today, seem fairly manageable.
Here's what you'll need:
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-07-rage-system-requirements-detailed
Preview: WRC 2
Rallying on.
Last year, Milestone's World Rally Championship ended a long hiatus from video games for one of motorsport's top-tier series. It wasn't the only one, of course - but while Codemasters' F1 2010 came with all the swagger and polish that's befitting of the world's noisiest circus, then WRC was perhaps a reflection of rallying's more diminutive following.
The worlds of S�bastien Loeb and Sebastian Vettel, though revolving around four wheels, couldn't be more different. Glamour and mud don't necessarily go hand in hand, and while champagne is the tipple of choice in the Grand Prix paddock club, when the WRC came to the UK last year and wanted to put on a show, it did so in a damp Cardiff car park where a thermos of tea was the only sensible choice of refreshment.
It's fitting, then, that last year's WRC game wasn't the glitziest. A bare-bones driving experience, it nailed the essentials of flinging a car through thick forests well enough, though it was lacking elsewhere. It's not unfair to say that, at times, WRC was as pretty as mud.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-15-wrc-2-preview
Preview: Behind the Wheel of Driver: San Francisco
How Reflections is steering the series back on course.
Driver: San Francisco is a game that has its chief character in a coma for much of its duration, his consciousness flitting across The City by the Bay as he shifts from car to car. If it's a little disingenuous to draw a parallel and suggest that Driver has been a series on life support these past few years, it's definitely been drifting out in the ether for some time; by the time Driver: San Francisco is released, it'll be nearly five years since the brand was last seen on a home console.
That's a long time for a series that was once at the cutting edge of driving games, a place that its developer Reflections sees as its rightful home. The Newcastle studio's PlayStation launch title Destruction Derby was a brilliant Ballardian funfair ride, and with Driver's release in 1998 it introduced a then-novel cinematic sensibility to its cars and open world.
A couple of years later Reflections could proudly boast that it beat Rockstar to the punch in delivering an open-world 3D game in which you could leave your car and walk around the city, being the first to offer the kind of digital tourism that became so prevalent in the decade that followed. But famously, the empire would soon all come tumbling down.
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-12-behind-the-wheel-of-driver-san-francisco-preview
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