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Lucky for you then that you can use a keyboard and mouse on your PS2.

I thought they generally behaved. BTW the football "hooligans - storm over europe" RTS game is now only £5 on PC. Or can be downloaded (61Mbytes). Wasn't it coded by a Dutch team? I haven't played it but have seen it about.

Co-op is in the xbox version:

http://www.gamepro.com/microsoft/xbox/games/featur es/34068.shtml

One thing Atari does do well, which obviously does not include making great epic games, is teasing the press. Quite frankly, the press has no balls, and Atari's Enter the Matrix proved it once. EGM, for example, dedicated half of its magazine and cover to the game the month before it came out, with cautious but glowing language. Driver 3 proves the balllessness of the press once again. Driv3r isn't nearly the comedown that ETM was, but for a massively marketed game that's getting 5/10s and 60%s, it's as if these people had played an entirely different game before it came out.

EGM's, for example, doesn't say specifically, "this is a great game," but it comes as close as it can. Driver 3, EGM claims, is "high-revving hardly-a-GTA-clone that's peeling rubber to the PlayStation 2 and Xbox." The language used is as excited as it woul be in a 8 or 9/10 review. Yet, they're not even looking at the full game. I wouldn't doubt if a majority of the preview came from a designer just talking about great the game is, and the previewer transcribing it.

1up, the online media conglomerate for several print magazines, goes further. "Judging by the time we've spent so far with the near-final . . . it avoids the pitfalls that all the other GTA wannabes fell into. From a technical standpoint, DRIV3R is already something special."

CVG is as generous and used as many exclamation points as the editor probably allowed. "We haven't even had a chance to talk about how the top-notch storyline is shaping up, the amazing Hollywood voice cast, how cool the first-person viewpoint is and the way you can complete missions by going in with your guns blazin' or your wheels squealin'."

Gamepro, in a hands on preview, said the game "was looking very nice," "collision detection is already solid," and the "variety is sure to please anyone." Likewise, Gampro promises that "Driv3r is already shaping up into what looks like an incredibly fun title."

Of the quick survey I did of DRIV3R's previews, IGN's was sadly the most realistic. They list a few of its problems, but then reassure, "We know it'll be fixed." The rest of the preview sounds like a giddy school girl. Likewise, Gamespot admits that the graphics are rough, but "Driver 3 definitely looks promising." Then, like IGN, they seem to apologize for that nugget of truth with an entire paragraph on how great Driver 3 will be. It's as if they just insulted the game designers' mothers.

What's happening here is a symbiotic relationship between the press and the publishers. Like movies, music, or comic books, in most cases a game makes a majority of its sales during the first 2-4 weeks of its shelflife. There are exceptions, including GTA3, but the largest portion of games aren't GTA3s, but DRIV3Rs. With regards to print magazines, that renders the reviews almost useless. The people that buy after the first month probably don't read game magazines and sites nearly as much as those who do buy in the first month. Secondly, first day buyers often don't even have online reviews, let alone the print reviews which come out a full month or two after the game's release. That means that buyers are relying on previews almost exclusively.

And I think the publishers know it. What's going on here is simple, as demonstrated by the extremely apologetic and defensive Gamespot and IGN reviewers, is that if the previewers were honest, they'd lose their "exclusives" and

Those numbers are cummulative. PS2 had a head start on X-Box and on top of that X-Box had a slow start. The monthly sales numbers are much closer. In fact, in April more X-Box were sold than PS2 according to GamePro.

Sony WILL need to worry about Microsoft (and Nintendo for that matter) or the Playstation line will end up on the asheap of history along with all of the other consoles and computers that looked like they were going to keep their market forever (Atari, Commodore, Sega). They will therefore need to keep a low-priced alternative to the X-Box and Gamecube handy here in the states.

Why is it appropriate to exclude the GC? Aside from the fact that hardly anyone would buy a title for their PC and then buy the same title for their Xbox or PS2 (or maybe even favour buying the "next in series" for their console rather than their PC) the original article says, "If everybody turns to an Xbox or a PlayStation for entertainment, who's going to need new PC equipment?"

Well, I used to upgrade my PC all the time to keep up with games (I remember paying 150ukp for my Righteous 3D 3dfx card), and I'm as big a fan as any of Half-Life, Quake 3 etc. But I'm really fed up with the cost of upgrading and the pain of trying to get my older games to work with new hardware and new operating systems. So I decided to buy a console for my entertainment because it's a lot of hardware for the money, and guaranteed compatibility of old and new games. I chose the GameCube over the Xbox and PS2. Metroid Prime, Zelda: Wind Waker and Pikmin absolutely rock, to mention a few. Now I don't bother upgrading my PC and just buy GC games (of which there is a reasonable enough selection to keep me happy). This is entirely relevant to the original article and therefore not an "appropriate exclusion".

Why is it appropriate to exclude the GC? Aside from the fact that hardly anyone would buy a title for their PC and then buy the same title for their Xbox or PS2 (or maybe even favour buying the "next in series" for their console rather than their PC) the original article says, "If everybody turns to an Xbox or a PlayStation for entertainment, who's going to need new PC equipment?"

Well, I used to upgrade my PC all the time to keep up with games (I remember paying 150ukp for my Righteous 3D 3dfx card), and I'm as big a fan as any of Half-Life, Quake 3 etc. But I'm really fed up with the cost of upgrading and the pain of trying to get my older games to work with new hardware and new operating systems. So I decided to buy a console for my entertainment because it's a lot of hardware for the money, and guaranteed compatibility of old and new games. I chose the GameCube over the Xbox and PS2. Metroid Prime, Zelda: Wind Waker and Pikmin absolutely rock, to mention a few. Now I don't bother upgrading my PC and just buy GC games (of which there is a reasonable enough selection to keep me happy). This is entirely relevant to the original article and therefore not an "appropriate exclusion".

that

Well, video actually. In WMV format. Here.
Enjoy.

I hope that the Doom 3 coop mode is similar to Halo. It is nice that when you get 'stuck' in some area, you can have a friend help you to get you through it, then switch back to single player mode and keep on cruising.

If I had that mode for Medal of Honor: Spearhead, I might have finished the game.

It's also the only thing that got me through a few tough levels in Halo at higher difficulty levels.

Also- I'm thrilled at the way they are developing Doom 3 for two separate systems. One group working on the PC, and another working on the Xbox. Then we won't hear how it is 'watered down' from the PC people, or how the 'controls suck' from the Xbox people.

I'm not a huge Doom fan, but the fact that it is being developed this way, and the co-op mode, mean that I will be getting the Xbox version. The screenshot for the Xbox version looked pretty good. I've been putting off an HDTV for a while- but if Doom runs at 720p, I might get one sooner than planned.

Depending on what the release date is- I don't think they have one yet- this could be something for me to get excited about. Halo2 of course is at the top of my console FPS list, and Half-Life 2 is slipping fast, I lose a little more interest in that just about every day.

But then again- Splinter Cell:Pandora Tomorrow comes out this month, so that should suck up a large part of April for me. And I have this 'Real Life' shit I am supposed to be working on. Gotta find a cheat for that one...maybe something like 'God Mode' or 'Invincible'. At least some 3d glasses..or sumpin'.

Malice did look cool. And being supposedly voice by Gwen Stefani also seemed cool.

Unfortunately, it was delayed one too many times and then thrown into the scrap-heap.

Argonaut Games made I-ninja, so they're still around.

I thought what made Onimusha cool was the samurai aspect of it. Feudal Japan is just cooler than modern day France to me.

Also, Jean, Ivy wants her Whipsword back. Also, Yoshimitsu wants his style back.

I thought what made Onimusha cool was the samurai aspect of it. Feudal Japan is just cooler than modern day France to me.

Also, Jean, Ivy wants her Whipsword back. Also, Yoshimitsu wants his style back.

Goblin Commander certainly looks interesting to me. If it makes it's current speculated date, it'll be out by the end of the year or the beginning of the next.

From an interview with Kenichi Sugino, the guy behind the design of the GBA SP:

Q: One of the main complaints people have about the SP is its lack of built-in headphone jack. What was the reason behind removing it?
KS: Well, you can use headphones with the SP if you plug in an adapter, of course. In the beginning we planned to include the jack, but from a purely physical standpoint, we just couldn't get it in. (laughs) If we put the port in, then that's that much cubic volume we can't use for other parts of the GBA. We were worried, of course, how people would respond to that, but when we looked at our research, we found that the percentage of people that use headphones with their GBA is actually pretty low. It's low, but there are people that use them, so we decided to build the system with the majority of users in mind and, at the same time, also accommodate the rest of the people that play it with the adapter. It was a compromise, you could say.

That would help more if people would stop writing articles that read like:

"There's an article on CNN about a new sequel to the popular PC game Half-Life by Valve Software (and published by Sierra Entertainment. I'm sure all of Slashdot will be glad to hear this news. GamePro also has an article. The White House had no comment.

That would help more if people would stop writing articles that read like:

"There's an article on CNN about a new sequel to the popular PC game Half-Life by Valve Software (and published by Sierra Entertainment. I'm sure all of Slashdot will be glad to hear this news. GamePro also has an article. The White House had no comment.

It's not exactly that pachinko is derived from pinball or vice-versa, but that they're both thought to descend from a variety of gambling schemes that showed up in 1920s Chicago (where the pinball industry largely remained until its recent demise).

I'm not sure that Nintendo got into vids through pachinko - they actually set up light-gun shooting galleries in old decrepit bowling alleys in the 1970s. They got to "Donkey Kong" more or less by blind luck.

They were always pretty tight with organised crime, and arguably still are. But those graphics in Super Mario Sunshine shure are bright and perky. ;)

That would make some sense if the computer actually calculated individual fields (which is the term you're looking for).

Thank you -- what I said does make sense. I also meant "frames", not "fields". Fields is a term specific to the video format, which really doesn't come into the rendering side of things, which is what I'm talking about.

The CPU calculates each full frame internally as one progressive pass - this applies to any console BTW - and the video hardware translates this to NTSC.

Some games render at 30 fps and vertically blur the image, and others render at 60 fps (and while I cannot swear to it, I doubt that the GPU goes to the trouble of rendering odd lines of even lines are the only thing being displayed). There definitely is *not* a 30 fps hardware restriction on any consoles that I know of.

The television is responsible for drawing the frame, which it does as two interlaced fields. CPU cycles don't enter into it.

However, performing the general game computation (movement, AI, physics, etc) *do* require more CPU time. Which, surprise, is why two half resolution frames don't compare to one full resolution frame.

Thanks for proving my point though.

Or not.

Q: Is there any specific technological feat that you're most proud of?
Steve: Pretty much the engine overall, because we were able to get a lot of performance out of the GameCube, and it allowed us to have these really gorgeous environments that were very rich in detail. That's mainly thanks to the engineering support we received.
Michael: Also, to run at 60 frames per second and achieve all of that is pretty amazing.
Miyamoto: The ability to show off all those particle effects at once and still have it run at 60 frames per second. That was impressive.

From an interview with three Metroid developers

Pokemon [for GameCube] will not REQUIRE [a GBA, a GCN/GBA cable, and Pokemon for GBA] to be played.

Are you claiming that this page, this page (which directly quotes a Nintendo press release), and this page are all inaccurate?

There's another article about this in Gamepro. A sharp-eyed Miyazaki fan noticed that Future Boy Conan, an early Miyazaki TV series, appears on one of the cards in one of the lower pictures.

Funny...in the Niven et al book Fallen Angels (the book that makes notable references to RMS), one of the methods used to get around the totalitarian anti-literature government is to retrofit regular gameboys to serve as covert e-book devices. Looks like life's imitating art.

Speaking of the iPod, I've heard a rumor that the next one will have sixty gigs of storage and a touch-sensitive screen, and be Apple's entry into the fully-functional PDA market. No idea if it's true, but it sure would be neat if it were.

Anybody who thinks Nintendo is going somewhere apparently has no idea what is going on in the gaming industry.

Many have the "opinion" that nintendo could and should get out of the console business. Yes, the GB/GBA obviously rake it in. It has been rumored that Sega may be pulling their sports titles from the gamecube. However, they certainly are commited to the Cube, as there are a great number of exclusive titles going to this system. Still, if they were to stop all of the "NFL" and "NBA" titles across platforms, they'd be in trouble.

People buy Nintendo systems for Nintendo titles. I know I'm looking forward to playing Zelda and Metroid, but these titles alone aren't enough for me to "get one now". I'll borrow a friends system, or pick one up in a few years.

Let's imagine for a second if they did become software only. Could you imagine the $ they could rake in if they launched an re-port of the Mario classics on the PS2? Or if Zelda were a PS2 title? Sales would increase many-fold. How profitable can it be to be a hardware vendor? (Apple, this goes for you too!)

Oh, and the Gamecube is ahead of the XBox in sales worldwide, even if it is only closely "tied" or a bit behind in the US. Globally, Nintendo is kicking Microsoft square in the jimmy

Actually, this is pretty far off.

Here is a link quoting "Nintendo president Satoru Iwata reported that his company would likely not meet their GameCube userbase goal of 8 million before the end of 2002, a goal that was already reduced from 10 million last October. As of September, Nintendo had sold 6.7 million GameCubes worldwide".

Here is another with xbox info. "Of the total sold to date, 5.4 million units were sold in North America, 1.8 million were sold in Europe and about 850,000 were sold in the Asia-Pacific region, with just less than half of those in Japan". (this adds up to just over 8 million, for the lazy).

They appear to be neck and neck, hardly "kicking in the jimmy", as you put it.

I'm not knocking the XBox, because I like the platform just fine. But Microsoft fanboys that think the XBox is going to dominate need to give up waiting for the exodus to happen. It isn't going to.

No one expects this Xbox to "dominate" anything. The best they could hope for is a good foot in the door for the next generation of consoles. The 3rd party support of the consoles at that time should be the deciding factor of who "dominates" who. It's unlikely that many will fall for Sony's marketing techno-babble hype.

If Microsoft turns into another Shit-Game-Spewing company like Electronic Arts, then I just won't buy their shit.

Indeed, if a game is shitty, it shouldn't be purchased. It seems that MS has a decent track record of releasing decent PC games, as well as Xbox titles. Admit it, you're going home to play Age of Mythology tonight, aren't you! :)

--falz

Nintendo updates GBA
Much as sources including reputed UK gaming mag Edge have been speculating over
the last few months, the GBA SP boasts an updated clamshell design, improved ...

Nintendo announces Backlit GBA
Dubbed GBA SP, the new model comes in a redesigned clamshell case with
a screen that flips up (think cellphone) to reveal the control pad. ...

New Game Boy Advance revealed ... conditions. Partly to offset the demands of the internal light, Nintendo
has added rechargeable batteries to the GBA SP. And to ...
The Next Game Boy Is Here
Nintendo to sell premium model of Game Boy Advance

I'm thinking thats probably mostly from The Sims, and Grand Theft Auto 3.

Then I read the next line:

The current video game hit, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, sold more than 1.4 million copies at an average $48 apiece in its first three days. That $70 million windfall easily puts it in the ranks of a blockbuster movie.

Also, There was a 2 issue article in GamePro about "Take This Job and Love It!." Working in the video game industry. Heres a link to the lo-fi version, search for the pretty oneTake This Job and Love It.

Here's the story from Yahoo

"Under the accord, 0.81 Enix share will be exchanged for one Square share, with Enix emerging as the surviving entity. "

and

"The postmerger entity, to be called Square Enix, "

while you where correct in that Enix is going to absorb square assets,

"Square, in its current company structure, will be disbanded, and (on paper, anyway) Enix will absorb Square's assets and liabilities. However, Yoichi Wada, current president of Square, will head up the new company, suggesting that Square will have more power than Enix in the merger's final structure. "

all of this was also repeated here

• Yeah ... Because the subscription-model worked so well for
• Gamepro.