If you've been with me for a while, you know how much I'm looking forward to Brink. It's almost here; just a little more than a month until I can start talking friends out of wasting their time with CoD: BlOps and start playing something a little more fun, to say the least. Maybe it's unfair to compare the two, but I'm stoked that Brink encourages and rewards the mobile player, whereas most other modern shooters encourage camping. Boring!
The latest trailer details some of the customization you'll be able to play with on the abilities front. Things like turrets, hacks, extra life, sticky bombs and molotovs; you know, tools of the trade. Of course, your ability loadout all depends on the class you choose, allowing you to finetune your wall-running machine-gunning experience. Sure they're just perks, but when you combine them with all the other customization options, it seems like each individual player will be able to craft their own personal experience. That's going to go a hell of a long way.
Life after Tomonobu Itagaki (reknowned pimp, gangster, and former Team Ninja lead) has been business as usual for Team Ninja, as they continue to develop the titles the team has already become known for, such as Ninja Gaiden. We last heard of the ultra-violent series in the form of a teaser trailer, showing head-ninja-in-charge Ryu Hayabusa condemning the viewer to a slow, painful death, before teasing his own unmasking. It didn't make much sense because we've all seen Hayabusa sans mask, so what's the big deal this time?
Games Thirst is reporting some new info, out of the most recent PlayStation: The Official Magazine, straight from project lead Yosuke Hayashi. Apparently unmasking is a metaphor for learning more about Ryu Hayabusa the man, as opposed to Ryu Hayabusa the emotionless killer. Uh oh, they better not give Ninja Gaiden the Metroid: Other M treatment!
“We are focusing Ryu as a dark Japanese hero,” says Hayashi. “There won’t be new playable characters, but we’ll focus more deeply on Ryu Hyabusa’s life and lifestyle and feelings and thoughts.” Dead or Alive always stated Hayabusa as the owner of a Curio shop. Will we be able to control him as he attempts to sell strange and exotic items to drunken tourists?
“We are trying to take the violent concepts even deeper and make people realize how it feels to actually kill someone and what it is to actually gut someone,” he continued. “It’s very important to us that people realize that violence is not only about blood and gore.” True that, but at the same time, a ninja is supposed to be an emotionless killer. Hayabusa has been cold as ice through most of his adventures as he's cut through legions of humans, beasts, and big breasted women. Why show his emotion now?
At least the incredible level of difficulty will feel familiar to series vets right? Maybe not. “We know that many fans feel good about the difficulty level, but we are taking a slightly different approach. It’s not that the game’s going to be easier – nothing like that." Hayashi stated. "It’s just that we are trying to make a whole game, a more exciting game that can be enjoyed by anyone. But at the same time, hardcore gamers will be able to feel and appreciate what the series is about.”
Hayashi also mentions a "complex multiplayer mode" and gets all defensive about PS3 Move support.
So there you have it gals and gangstas. With Itagaki's departure comes a huge departure from what the Ninja Gaiden series has been in it's past few installments. Hayabusa's feelings, newb accessibility, and multiplayer. I'm not sure how I feel about this, but it definitely sounds like Ninja Gaiden 3 is going to get Other M'd.
Death, Taxes, and Spider-Man games are the three constants in the world today. 2011 is not exempt from this rule, as we are reminded with the announcement of the latest Spider-Man title, Spider-Man: Edge of Time.
Developed by Beenox (the team behind last year's ho-hum Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions) and published by our overlords at Activision, Spider-Man: Edge of Time lets you assume control of both the old classic Amazing Spider-Man, and the looks-awesome-but-never-quite-caught-on Spider-Man 2099. The action gameplay will feature a "cause-and-effect" mechanic, where the actions of one Spider-Man will directly influence and change the timeline of the other. Not sure if this can work more ways than one, because I don't think events of the future can alter the past. Or can they?! Mind = blown.
While you're busy trying to wrap your mind around riddles of time and space, I'll be drafting up the script for Activision's 2012 Spider-Man title, Italian Spiderman. Spider-Man: Edge of Time is due out this fall for Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, DS, and 3DS.
Hey y'all, don't miss out on a chance to win a bunch of awesome stuff from PAX East. The swag bag overfloweth with awesomeness. With multiple chances to win, your slots are straight turnips, son. Act fast; the music is speeding up, which means you don't have much time left to get in!
I tend to take screenshots with a grain of salt. It's easier to make a game look amazing than it is to create an immersive world with a memorable cast and addicting action. Luckily, the Elder Scrolls series has a pedigree of quality releases.
The latest entry in the series, Skyrim, is looking pretty damn sweet. The screens we've seen so far display a huge leap in the eye candy department. This is good. If Skyrim can retain its ridiculous amount of immersion and depth of content, we're going to have a real winner on our hands. But let me not jump ahead of myself here, we still need to learn more and see more of this thing in motion. In the mean time, have some lovely screenshots!
Been a while since we visited Raccoon City, hasn't it? As the Resident Evil series has transitioned more from survival horror to the action genre, so has the scene shifted from Ground Zero to more exotic locations such as Europe and Africa. These locales have provided an interesting and perhaps equally creepy backdrop for a tale of zombies and virii, though honestly, there's no place like home.
Though the action returns to the familiar, apocalypse-torn home of the Umbrella Corporation, Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City is veering off the beaten path to take the Resident Evil franchise in a new direction. For this, Capcom has teamed up with Slant Six Games -- veteran developers of some of the more recent SOCOM series off-shoots -- infusing the current Resident Evil formula with a tactical twist and touch of multiplayer.
Operation Raccoon City has you -- and possibly three of your friends -- take control of an elite Umbrella Corporation squad tasked to infiltrate the city circa 1998, destroy any evidence of the T-Virus, and eliminate all survivors. As if slaughtering zombies and unwilling survivors wasn't enough, your crew will also have to deal with the unfriendly advances of United States Government special agents and their public funded weaponry.
The third-person, team based shooting action of Operation Raccoon City looks like a mix of SOCOM and Left 4 Dead. No complaints from me! Aside from the cooperative multiplayer campaign, Operation Raccoon City will also feature a number of competitive online multiplayer modes. With so many different sides involved in the battle within Raccoon City, online play could be really fun if done right. Hunk versus Licker versus psychotic armed citizen versus Leon Kennedy's wafting bangs. Let's dance!
Goodbye Mega Man Universe, we hardly knew ye! Always a fan of classic Mega Man action, I was looking forward to this one. Not to say I was salivating and fighting back bouts of the shakes though. When I playedMega Man Universe at New York Comic Con 2010, it seemed like a flawed product, but it had promise. The create your own Mega Man angle seemed like a pretty neat idea, especially taking into account the broad range of characters across Capcom's library that could have been added in.
The official Mega Man Universe site states "various reasons" for cancellation. I wonder if this has anything to do with Capcom's serious lack of Keiji Inafune these days? Mega Man Universe was scheduled for release in Spring 2011 for PlayStation Network and Xbox LIVE Arcade. I guess Mega Fans will just have to keep their fingers crossed that the demise of Universe opens the door for Mega Man 11.
When Valve Software announced J.K. Simmons as Cave Johnson, the CEO and voice of Aperture Science in Portal 2, I thought "Oh, cool." That's it, just cool. But the more I hear Cave speak, the more I'm absolutely enamored by the voice and the choice. Simmons' unique sound and excellent delivery not only lends some B-star credibility to Portal 2, but he also plays the the role perfectly.
In this, the second of Aperture Science's hilarious "investment opportunity" video series, Cave Johnson details the ways robots are more trusting than humans. Well, he's definitely convinced me. Now, not only am I going to layer my house in lovely panels, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to ditch all my friends and replace them with robots. Thank you Aperture Science!
The world needs more four-player cooperative futuristic ninja games, dammit. Thankfully Square Enix has answered the call with Moon Diver, the multiplayer ninja platformer created by the man who may have pioneered the genre, Kouichi Yotsui, designer of the arcade classic, Strider.
Ninjas are an easy sell for me, as is four-player co-op. Pairing the two means I'd buy four copies of the game, which I may consider for my tight-pocketed friends. I understand some may not be sold on what to me seems like a complete no-brainer. For those of you on the fence, there are three items to sway you into a purchase: a demo which is currently available on PSN, a launch trailer which is considerately attached to at the end of this post, and a katana to the neck!
Moon Diver is out today on PSN for $14.99, with an unspecified XBLA release sometime in April.
A few years ago, QWOP set the internet ablaze with Chariots of Fire, and an atrophied Olympian who faceplanted his way to what was perhaps one of the funniest free Flash games I have ever played. Everyone is a winner! Now the makers of the original keyboard-controlled hilarity has returned with more of that good stuff.
GIRP is the spiritual successor to QWOP, where instead of controlling an Olympian with involuntary leg muscle spasms, you control a ragdolling ginger whose carpet matches the drapes. Yes, orange pants and orange hair. Where QWOP strugged to run even half a meter down an Olympic track, GIRP is a real man. He toplessly climbs the mountain side with the elegance of Sylvester Stallone in Cliffhanger, while fending off a territorial bird and the rising tide. Go GIRP, go!
GIRP is not NEARLY as difficult as QWOP (thankfully), but its accessibility, if you can call it that, makes it more addicting. I wanted to write this article hours ago, but I was stymied by the desire to see how far I could get GIRP. The screenshot above is my high score after an hour or so of practice. Of course, I promptly fell 64.3 meters to my untimely death immediately afterward. Come get some!
Tuesday, April 5, 2011 at 11:40AM 
;)
;)
