Slashdot Mirror

If you aren't hooked by Odin Sphere's unique visual style, then you'll be grabbed by its classic sentimentality and tough-as-nails difficulty. -- Gamespot review

Probably? At the end of this gameplay demo, Sonic is shown obtaining a Smash Ball, which initiates his Super Sonic transformation. Although it explains it in the video, I'll just add that Super Sonic flies around smacking people during the final smash.

Sure.
Cracked versions of EA games (madden NFL 08, fifa 08), or use an emulator like daemon. Not that I like EA one bit, they've dived far off the deep end the last few years and I hope they rot in hell ever since buying exclusive deals to shut out competition and also decided to treat programmers like slave labor. Non MMO hmm how about Steam gaming? At least they finally have begun to get things right, essentially. /pirating EA for life if its even worth playing, to play with friends in front of a bigscreen //not going to support a jagoff company thats also known to abuse their employees. Bad ethics all around.

back in 2005 Jack Thompson almost made a good argument regarding Sims 2. He initially was demanding that EA show us "what's under the blur" over the rude bits on Sims, because he was of the belief that by using a cheat code you could see, *shock*, genitalia! So, EA responded and said no, Sims don't have genitalia.. they're more like Ken and Barbie dolls being perfectly smooth "down there".

So yeah, Jack is again revealed to be the overreacting retard that he is. 'cept, thing is, there *are* "expansion packs" out there that will provide your Sims with full nakedness, including genitalia. Both adults, and here's the creepy bit, kids. EA has taken a hands off approach to these expansion packs which are undoubtedly adored by pedophiles everywhere. They're not going to stop it, and why would they? Any third party add-on which expands their market share for the base game, especially in ways that they would never dare to do themselves, is good for business right?

It was remade as Space Horse. Even has online multi. It was originally going to only support local multiplayer, a la the original, but enough people begged for online that they threw it in. Ironically, pretty much nobody bought it, since it had fairly weak graphics/sound and some fundamental interface issues.

http://www.shrapnelgames.com/gilligames/Space_HoRSE/1.htm
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/spacehorse/review.html

Sony continues to sell PS-ONE systems (for pretty cheap too) so it's unlikely they're going to stop selling PS-2 systems any time soon.

The link in the article is incorrect, the list is actually located here: http://www.gamespot.com/news/6179170.html

I grew up with Mario Bros underwear, Mario Brothers fruit snacks, and little jumping goombas in my Happy Meals.

Maybe Microsoft had better leave it to the pros though, how many kids are going to have any clue what the Battlefront hint means?

(sorry, only decent article google could find, no homosexual references on that page if you're afraid)

Actually I looked up some benchmarks

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6177688/p-7.html

Essentially if you use a very fast video card and change processors, any single core processor no matter how fast gets 40 fps. And any dual core processor gets around 61-65. It looks like the game FPS saturates quite easily, but the speed up from dual core is pretty impressive.

The difference in the pictures for Zelda and Excite Truck sets on this site are similar to the difference I saw on my TV.

You fail to take into account that Sony and Microsoft take a loss on each console sold, whereas Nintendo actually makes a profit on them.

When Half-Life 2: The Orange Box ships later this year, it promises to deliver an impressively wide range of gameplay. First, there's Half-Life 2: Episode Two, the second part of the trilogy follow-up to 2004's blockbuster Half-Life 2. (The Orange Box will also include Half-Life 2 as well as Episode One to get newcomers up to speed.) Next is Team Fortress 2, the stylized, team-based multiplayer action game that's been in development off and on over the past decade. Finally, The Orange Box will also include Portal, the innovative first-person action puzzle game.

The Orange Box is a menagerie of Valve Software's most recent and forthcoming titles, including Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode One, Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Team Fortress 2 and Portal.

Yeah, except when your job is to rate this game.

Since we're supposed to be all concerned for Sony (of recent rootkit fame) and defending them against criticism and wouldbe censorship by the Church of England how about we take a stand for another company we dislike as well? They need to be defended from criticism and censorship by Islam. Any takers?

Remember this from back in August? Capcom Removes Islamic Phrase From Wii Game

If you read the linked article you might also notice that Kakuto Chojin back in 2003 got Microsoft in some hot water.

Here's a couple of links making reference to that:

http://www.gamespot.com/xbox/action/kakutochojin/news.html?sid=6105587
http://episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/39309975/m/8700918055

Sticking up for companies we don't generally like when people try to censor them is a good thing, but lets remember to stick up for them in cases besides those where it is Christians trying to censor them.

Now what about America's Army? While it isn't an explicit combat trainer, it is a game called "America's Army" put out by the U.S. Army itself. It's not just any video game, it's official advertising for the Army, their P.R. for what being in the Army is like and what kind of exciting things you'll be able to do. Look at how in the game no matter which team you are on, your side is always the U.S. Army and the other side is the evil terrorists.

And the only option you have is to start killing.... When the Swedish Department of Defense created a training sim on the other hand, it emphasized talking to people and avoiding conflict. Crazy, huh?

Also, your company want might to pay more attention to the "building up" of user bases. The rate at which the PS3 and Xbox 360 are selling combined is less than that of the Wii. Beyond the costs of multi-platforming your "real" games, you'll still be targeting a smaller user base when your games come out in a few years.

Combine that with the costs of Development. THQ's president that said a Wii game cost between 25% - 50% of a 360 title...

So you can sell to a larger install base AND develop 2-4 games for the same investment? To combat this MS, and Sony need to get their install base much higher, and much quicker (or at least more profitable VIA microtransactions and such) than Nintendo, or the Wii will soon become the PS2 of this generation.

That would be Sniper Elite, a terrific game in my opinion. I don't think i've seen another sniper sim ever since. It had a great balance of realistic shooting and action.

Hrmm, Silicon Knights aren't some newbie devs making their first big game. They made one of the most critically successul games for Gamecube, and indeed one of my favorite games of all time: Eternal Darkness 9.4/10 (gamespot). There may well be other reasons behind this situation but to say its because they aren't experienced devs is very silly and betrays the epic fanboys..

"That is your opinion."

As if this statement says ANYTHING about game quality. The Dev team even admitted the SP campaign was pure crap! That right there says quite a lot.

Yes thats right, since I actually own the piece of crap called NWN. It was totally mediocre to anyone who's played RPG's for the last 20 years, so I'd say my opinion has a bit more weight behind it then a D&D fanatic or some newbie gamer with no gaming history under their belt. How one experiences NWN is directly related to the amount of games they have played and what kind of gaming history they have.

I will respect bioware for their valiant attempt in NWN because they really made an attempt at making great tools for the mod community but it ended up making the game itself a mediocre pile of crap and no one with serious gaming acument can dispute this. I really WANTED to like NWN, lots of good things ended up in the game but the gmae really needed another 2 years in development, NWN was like a game who's potential was never truly realized, period.

"I for one sincerely enjoyed the original campaign, it wasn't the *best* I've ever played, but it was very enjoyable for me."

Then you are either:

1) Inexperienced gamer or
2) Have a very low thresh-hold for enjoyment

"I think too many people say the community is what saved NWN."

Give me a break, many people on the forums complained about the utter crappyness of the single player experience compared to their (biowares) previous games like Baldurs gate, BG2, and other infinity engine games not made by them like Torment and Icewind dale. The truth is NWN basically attracted all the really strange D&D fanatics & weirdos who didn't really care much for game quality. The truth is I compare the majority of the people who bought and liked NWN with the likes of people who bought and liked the matrix or 50 cent games, I have the same respect for them as I do say creationists. As hard as that may be to swallow, I know gaming in's and outs I have played nearly every game under the sun and I analyze games to find out what makes them percieved as "good" to different gaming demographics. The truth was the barrier to playing NWN was very low, since it took a page from MMO's with their automatically controlled gaming mechanics (i.e. the user just pushed menu buttons), WoW and NWN have the exact same mindless interface for the drooling hordes, which I can understand from but the content simply could not make up for the borefest of crappy single player content.

And yes the community did a lot to save NWN, most of my enjoyment from NWN came from playing other peoples mod's and the single player and sp campaign was truly horrible. The fact that you had one single character you could truly control in the party which was handled automatically (robot avatar) made for a tenuous and boring game with little for the player to do then sit and drool through the SP campaign.

If you enjoyed NWN over those prior games, I have to say you are among the reasons why gaming is taking a nosedive in quality to serve the mass audience of mediocrity.

"Bioware's internal surveys and statistics always indicated that the singleplayer portion of NWN was far more popular."

Of course but because something is popular doesn't make it good. I'm not the only one that feels that gaming is backsliding into mediocrity.

http://www.gamespot.com/users/Cube_of_MooN/show_bl og_entry.php?topic_id=m-100-25099957

Campaign http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176222/ Terran units http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176216/starc raft-ii-terran-faction-blizzcon-preview Short fight: http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176214/starc raft-ii-official-movie-3

Campaign http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176222/ Terran units http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176216/starc raft-ii-terran-faction-blizzcon-preview Short fight: http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176214/starc raft-ii-official-movie-3

Campaign http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176222/ Terran units http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176216/starc raft-ii-terran-faction-blizzcon-preview Short fight: http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176214/starc raft-ii-official-movie-3

http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176222/

http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176222/starc raft-ii-single-player-campaign-blizzcon-preview I wouldn't advise watching it to the end. I mean talk about cliff-hanger endings... how dare they mock us so bad? Bratwurst.

http://www.gamespot.com/video/939643/6176222/

The usable space is only 7Gb. This is wholly inadequate for many next gen games when 5.1 surround sound, HD FMV and even textures & polygons are going to take 4-10x the space of last gen yet the disk is only 2x larger than last gen. And localized content is totally out of the question too.

Honestly, I'm surprised any developer is doing Pre-rendered FMV's with the current gen systems. Why not do everything with the in game engine? The graphics look great to begin with, it saves space on the disk, less/ no load times between the switch, and it doesn't break the immersion.

With very few exceptions (something like Rogue Squadron II ) I'd be happier to see FMV's go away.

As you may know, EA has already confirmed that a DS version of Spore is already in the works, and they've hinted that they have plans to release the game on other consoles down the road, so technically Spore can already be considered a franchise. Furthermore, Will Wright's game have an excellent track record when it comes to longevity and replayability. SimCity came out in 1989 and remains a successful franchise property to this day. While the core concept of the gameplay has always been the same, I would hardly say it's stagnated over the years. With each iteration they've observed what works and what doesn't, redesigned and rewritten the engine, and expanded the scope of the gameplay possibilities while remaining true to the core idea.

Furthermore, I don't think there's much danger of Spore falling to The Sims-style Release-of-the-Month Syndrome. The whole concept behind the system is that there's no need for the developer to continue to add new content resources; the players will do that on their own. With any game that has a development cycle as long as Spore and that breaks so much new ground, to ensure a good return on the substantial upfront investment requires branching out into as many markets as possible. Furthermore, once the core development work has been finished, it only makes financial sense to continue to leverage that property to develop new markets and maintain profitability.

The fact that Will Wright has demonstrated that his games will have broad appeal and continue to sell for years is exactly what has given Maxis the kind of financial leverage necessary to be able to make this kind of undertaking a reality. Most developers can't even dream of pushing the envelope like this. For most companies the risk would be far too high. For the time being let's keep our fingers crossed and hope that Spore does indeed push the boundaries of the gaming experience and evolve (pun unintentional) into a successful franchise property that will continue to develop this fascinating gameplay concept for years to come. Even if it does stagnate, it'll still be better money spent than most of the other games out there that are still rehashing the same tired gameplay over and over.

Clarification: The Wii is region-locked.
The DS is not.

Thanks for the heads up on the hint codes.

No Goalies - At The Start Screen: Hold A and B on Both Controllers and then Start on the first controller

Non-Stop Puck and No goalies! - On he title screen hold down the A and B buttons on controllers 1 and 2, then press start on controller 1, now you'll have a puck that never stops moving, and no goalies at the nets.

Source: Gamespot

Wii households more likely to be upscale

So much for all of the PS3 fans saying that anyone who doesn't buy a PS3 must be poor.

A potentially relationship-ending addiction?

"Our code is the most elegant, best-structured base code in the world. When we started out with id Tech 5, we didn't hack onto an old engine and then sort of replace parts as we went along. It's an entirely new engine. The structure is super-fundamentally sound." - Steve Nix, to Gamespot

Volition is still around. Unfortunately Freespace II didn't sell well at all so Freespace III was never made. However if you want to replay some old space shooters Wing Commander IV, Freespace, Freespace II, Space Fury? (Whichever space shooter was made by the company that made space empires) are all on Gametap. In addition Gametap is getting some exclusive space shooter title in the near future.

Theres also a wing commander title thats going to be showing up on the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/sim/wingcommandera rena/screenindex.html

This might be the year space shooters start making a comeback... We were due!!!

Yup, this machine was probably built for XP. And from your statement I'm guessing that your parents aren't doing anything on a computer that needs to be done. I know if my mom can't get her email or watch a flash video one day she just decides to do something else for a while.

A student, otoh, has work that needs to be done. And in a timely manner. And often using whatever wierd software the school/prof says they will. Things like "CPU" and "RAM" aren't bells or whistles. They're the basic needs for getting work done. The fact that a better CPU or more RAM also makes it possible to play a game doesn't mean that games are all a better machine is good for.

If you're that worried about your kids playing a game on the PC you buy them then you'd better remove all the other bells and whistles too... like Flash... and the web browser... and Java and the OS... because they can be used for entertainment too.

I can't believe nobody has brought this one up. It made me laugh so hard I could barely breathe.

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/driving/bigrigsotrr/rev iew.html

WhereTF is Mortal Kombat?

e.g.,
http://www.gamespot.com/features/6090892/p-5.html

It looks like this "article" was written in about 5 minutes and would probably get a C in your average sixth-grade English class if judged for intellectual content.

Yeah, gamespot did a review of that one. (I guess it goes under a couple different names)

"Once that product is gone from the retailer shelves, then we're back to a $599 SKU only, so it's not like we have a two-price strategy in the US market. We found out very early on how consumers react to having just one SKU as opposed to two."

Sony seems to be getting stupider and stupider. I don't know what the holy hell is going over there but I am sure that all of the execs at Sony have lost their mids COMPLETELY. Here it is folks. This $499.99 price tag? Just a clearance of the 60 GB model which is now going out of production. At that point all the 60 GB models will be for sale until they are all gone. Then it is back to $599.99 for the 80 GB model. make of it what you will. I am mystified and rather pissed at these game they seem to be playing with us. Is this Stringers doing? WTF is going on? Here is the link from Gamespot and Game Daily: Gamespot: http://www.gamespot.com/news/6175011.html?om_act=c onvert&om_clk=newstop&tag=newstop;title;2 Game Daily: http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=1679 1 This bullshit pure and simple.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6175011.html?om_act=c onvert&om_clk=newstop&tag=newstop;title;1
From Kaz and Karraker. No more $500 PS3s once supplies are sold. Please correct the headline.

Gamespot had both games in their office for demo [Jade Raymond was demoing AC :)] They have a twenty minute video of each on their E3 site. (Check the Wednesday tab).

http://e3.gamespot.com/live.html

I had time to kill, so I decided to go through that list of 60 games:

(Originally I had a nice list, but I had to condense it to get past the lameness filter)

Non-Exclusive / Multi-Platform (34 total):

Oblivion, Need for Speed: Carbon, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, Tony Hawk's Project 8, Call of Duty 3, The Darkness, Sonic the Hedgehog, Virtua Fighter 5,Joust, The BIGS, Surf's Up, Def Jam: Icon, Armored Core 4, Enchanted Arms, Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII, F.E.A.R, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent, NHL 2K7, NBA 2K7, Madden NFL 07, Major League Baseball 2K7, NBA Street Homecourt, The Godfather, MLB 07: The Show, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Transformers: The Game, Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Spider-Man 3, Virtua Tennis 3, College Hoops 2K7, Fight Night Round 3, Tiger Woogs PGA Tour 07

PS3 Exclusives (13 total):

Ninja Gaiden Sigma, MotorStorm, Genji: Days of the Blade, Resistance: Fall of Man, Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire, Blast Factor Advanced Research, Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom, Ridge Racer 7, GripShift, Full Auto 2: Battlelines, Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection, Formula One Championship Edition, NBA 07

Downloadable PS3 Content / Old Ports (13 total):

Cash Guns Chaos, Q*bert, Go! Puzzle, Championship Sprint, Rampage World Tour, Super Stardust HD, Rampart, Super Rub a Dub, Gauntlet 2, Mortal Kombat 2, Calling All Cars, flOw, Lemmings

Your are attempting to spread FUD that the PS3 has no games. Too bad your FUD can easily be countered with facts. There are currently 60 PS3 games reviewed on Gamespot:

http://www.gamespot.com/reviews.html?type=reviews& platform=1028&mode=all&sort=post_date&dlx_type=all &sortdir=asc

For the record, Microsoft has not said it won't publish AO games, or Manhunt 2 in particular.

Really?

I'd be interested to know what games the Wii has that you really like to play. Most people would agree that the Wii has 2 good exclusives: Paper Mario and Zelda. Maybe RE4, but that's only exclusive if you count the controls; the content is exactly the same. In any case, the latter two are painful to play on an HDTV (or even an SDTV if you've played any 360 or PS3 titles). If a game is multiplatform, like Marvel Ultimate Alliance, there's no question that I'm going to avoid the Wii version. Wii Sports has all the entertainment value of Rock Paper Scissors. The Wii only has two games rated 9+. Compare that to the 360 with 6 games making the 9.0 cut (only 3 exclusive, though none available on the Wii), and the entire rest of the page consisting of 8.0+ titles. While that's proportional to the consoles' respective times on market (~2 9.0+ titles per 6 months time on market per console), it makes sense to consider both the present and future value of a system. If I get 3x as many (mutually) exclusive quality games on Console A today, and have no reason not to expect at least an equal quantity of exclusive titles in the future, AND have other value-added features, such as networked play, a large library of downloadable titles (both old and new), HD resolution (which is "future proofing," even if you don't have an HDTV today), and HD-DVD add-on (although the utility of that is debatable at best, especially if you don't own an HDTV, since better and cheaper stand-alone players will probably exist in the very near future), then it would make sense to choose it over Console B with fewer quality titles available today, an equal number of future titles, and fewer/inferior value added features.

The Wii is clearly the right choice for budget-limited and/or extremely casual gamers (as even semi-casual gamers can find plenty to like about the 360), and those who are turned off by the slightly more complex interface of the 360. If one enjoys either single-player or networked gaming in the least, then the 360 is the way to go. Personally, I would perfer the PS3, but I cannot justify its purchase to myself or anyone else, given its anemic selection of titles. Believe me, I would love to recommend anything other than Microsoft (and I personally avoided the original X-Box completely, and avoided the 360 until just recently), but they clearly have the most to offer this time around.