What do you get when you cross Guitar Hero, Rock Band, and a company that wants to prove they originated music rhythm games? You get Rock Revolution, the latest musical brain child from Konami, that’s what. The game was showed off at Konami’s Gamer’s Night 2008 and promises to be “the most innovative and realistic rock game to hit the market, that will provide a quality drum peripheral and music that players will appreciate,” according to Anthony Crouts, Konami’s Vice President of Marketing. Continue reading this story..

Update: Trailer now officially released, embedded below.

Chainsaws cutting through people. Geysers of blood. Impalement. Sin City. So far, this seems to sum up the gist of MADWORLD and, believe it or not, it’s a Wii game. By now you’ve probably seen the leaked trailer for the game which has been ripped off the Internet by SEGA’s leagal team(although not entirely), but we just received a press release from SEGA that has the first details on the game. Plus IGN has even more details from an interview they did with four of the members of Platinum Studio, the studio behind the game, at a recent SEGA press event. You may not have heard of Platinum Studios, which is led by ex-Capcom and ex-Clover team members, yet if MADWORLD is any indication you will be hearing about them a lot more because it’s going to be impossible to ignore their games.

Enough about that though, what you want to know is why an entirely monochrome man is ripping a person in half with his chainsaw arm or hurling enemies into walls of spikes. Well we aren’t entirely sure about that as the game’s developers are keeping the storyline close to the chest. From what IGN can glean, the bulky protagonist’s name is Jack and he’s in a sort of situation where he’s going to be killing people under the watch of an entity called the Death Watch. What this seems to mean is that there are rules and rewards for the death of people, not to mention entertaining color commentary running over your mass murdering. The developers relate the killing spree to a game of baseball. In short, think Running Man.

Continue reading this story..

Since its release in September of 2007, MySims for the Wii, in typical Sims fashion, has sold more than 2.8 million copies worldwide. Now Sims is set to deliver two times the cuteness with MySims Kingdom, which EA is bringing exclusively to the Wii and the DS.

With MySims now being its own franchise in the Sims label, the creators have pushed the envelope further with a story of “adventure, discovery and exploration.” Not only do you get customize everything you build to put your own spin on the world, now you are charged with helping revitalizing an entire kingdom.

The Kingdom experience starts in the Castle of The Capital where you meet up with your first set of friends — King Roland, Princess Butter, and the Wizard Marlon. As the game progresses you will meet new friends and gain access to new challenges like raising pigs or finding treasure. New building options allow you to progress like fixing a broken bridge to move to a new area. Eventually players will set sail in their own ship to explore even more lands beyond The Capital. Continue reading this story..

SEGA ON, a German blog on all things SEGA has got the rumor mill gears turning on a possible sequel to the popular RPG and cult favorite Skies of Arcadia. The blog writes that according to “very reliable” and “close” sources over at SEGA, the sequel will drop sometime this year but that we shouldn’t be expecting any official announcements before Tokyo Game Show.

There’s apparently also a Wii version already in the works, and the game could also be getting released on PlayStation 3.

The Tokyo Game Show will take place October 9 - October 12, so I guess we’ll just have to sit still until then to see if there’s any weight to this rumor.

The game has only been out for one day but already we get confirmation of a sequel to LostWinds. You can now sign up for information on the sequel via Frontier Development’s official site, which is also how they decided to announce the game. I’d call this an amazingly knee jerk reaction if it wasn’t so obvious that the sequel was already in development before the first one was even available. Considering all the positive press reaction their game was getting, Frontier must have known they had a good thing coming.

I haven’t even had time to download and play the game yet but if the internet is to be trusted - and it always is - then LostWinds is one of the best Wii games to be released this year. According to reviews, the art design is amazing, the gameplay and controls are simple yet enthralling and even the music is top notch. I wasn’t even planning on getting any WiiWare games right off the bat but I don’t see how I can pass this up now. The only complaint I’ve read is that the game is to short because, like Portal, you just want more. But unlike Portal, we’ll be getting just that some time soon.

[See also: LostWinds gallery]

Some might argue that what separates videogames from other forms of electronic entertainment is the fact that games challenge and test us. While a healthy challange keeps us coming back and gives us a sense of accomplishment at the end of it all, there are some things that can just tip us over the edge and put us on the warpath; green skin and ripped purple pants included.

Seen as just about everything has been organized into lists of ten since Moses came wandering back down the mountain, here’s our Top 10 videogame annoyances.

10. Getting up to change discs

You know how convenient it is to load Arcade games in the Xbox 360 or PSN games in the PS3? Imagine if all games were like that… As somebody who actually owned the ill-fated HDLoader for the PS2, which allowed you to upload your games to the PS2’s HDD, going back to swapping discs for the current generation consoles has become quite a drag. With Microsoft edging all its bets on the death of the physical medium and the fact Sony offers gamers the chance to download some of PS3’s games, it’s only a matter of time before having to get up to change games is nothing but a painful memory. Continue reading this story..

Last year’s Skate from EA was a game that breathed new life into the genre by offering players some of the deepest immersion that had ever been applied to a skateboarding game. EA’s title dethroned Activision’s Tony Hawk franchise and became a runaway success, spawning a legion of fans in the process. But while a hit on the PS3 and 360, the Wii and DS, despite being the leading consoles on the market, didn’t get a piece of the action.

EA looks to change that now, as they’ve announced that Skate It, a spin-off of Skate, is coming to both the Wii and the DS. IGN recently sat down with EA’s Scott Blackwood to get the scoop on the game, here’s some of the finer points of what was discussed:

• Skate It isn’t a quick port to cash-in on the success the franchise has had, the game went into development right after the original version was released for the other systems
• Black Box, who designed the original title, are co-developing the title with EA Montreal
• Skate It will retain the core Skate game engine but utilizes “all-new technology specific to Wii”
• You’ll be able to use the Wii Balance board to play, or the standard Wii remote controls
• No online

There’s no definite release date yet, but look for Skate It to arrive sometime in 2008.

The press release announcing Skate It also officially confirmed the existence of Skate 2, which is being developed for the 360 and PS3.

[See also: Skate It gallery]

Last summer Epicenter Studios announced the development of Real Heroes: Firefighters, exclusively for the Wii. The game puts players into the role of a rookie firefighter who has just been assigned to a busy metro station. Here players have to use the Wii remote to douse fires with a hose, wield an axe to break down doors and walls as well as operate the Jaws of Life.

Epicenter has tried to make Firefighters as realistic as possible. Not only will the game force players to master realistic firefighting tools and methods to survive; but also deal with Epicenter’s proprietary “Living Fire.” Here the fire acts to consume, not just decorate an area to make it look like it’s burning till you wave the hose over it. Real Heroes’ blazes will seem alive as the fire moves to consume structures, victims and firefighters as well as cause unexpected changes to the environment. This promises that no two scenarios are the same, making players think quickly and adapt appropriately. Continue reading this story..

Activision has announced that they are jumping on board the whole retro revival trend with a brand new Pitfall title for the Wii. Or they’d like you to think that since the press release for Pitfall: The Big Adventre has nary a mention of any Pitfall game since the original. The game is in development by Edge of Reality and will be heading to game shelves this fall.

In case you’ve never played Pitfall, the game is an action puzzler in which you guide Pitfall Harry through levels replete with traps and dangers. Of course this time you’ll be swinging over those alligator infested pits with the help of your trusty Wii remote.

The game will feature over 60 levels of jungle survival and is being designed from the ground up to best utilize the Wii’s controls. We don’t have much information on the gameplay but as you can see from the screenshots, the look bears a strong resemblance to 2004’s Pitfall: The Lost Expedition which was also developed by Edge of Reality. Not sure why Dave Oxford at Activision Publishing calls Pitfall Harry “retro-cool” in the press release when the screens clearly show that he’s “child-friendly modern” but I suppose you gotta try to grab those hardcore gamers anyway you can.

[See also: Pitfall: The Big Adventure gallery]

You know what? This is crap, Nintendo. Just because you’re debuting a brand new gaming channel with original games to download doesn’t mean you get to slack off in other departments. Not releasing any VC games this week is a slap in the face to everything good and pure in the world. I don’ care if you claim that it’s in “celebration” of your fancy new channel with its fancy new games. Give me retro, or give me death!

Fine. I’ll be back next week covering the VC releases and it seems Nintendo’s Wii-kly updates are going to start having info on new WiiWare games too, so we’ll be keeping our eye on that also. For now, go enjoy your WiiWare, you’ll just have to wait until next week to get back to classic gaming.

Nintendo’s rebuttal to the PlayStation Network and XBL Arcade is going live today, May 12th, in the US with a total of six titles available on day 1. The service had already gone though a mass amount of criticism before it even saw the light of day so it would be easy to assume that the launch titles will see just as much scrutiny.

WiiWare has been slandered by gamers and developers for the restrictive file sizes, as well as the fact that the Wii simply has no internal or external hard drive available to store a large number of downloadable games. These problems still exist, but Nintendo is confident that consumers will see the value in the games and be satisfied with the high level of content that will be distributed.

The launch titles are as follows:

• Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King (Square Enix, 1,500 Wii Points)
• LostWinds (Frontier Development, 1,000 Wii Points)
• Defend your Castle (XGen Studios, 500 Wii Points)
• Pop (Nnooo, 1-4 players, 700 Wii Points)
• V.I.P. Casino: Blackjack (High Voltage Software, Inc., 700 Wii Points)
• TV Show King (Gameloft, 1,000 Wii Points)

Continue reading this story..

In all fairness when I first heard of Hudson’s Deca Sports I was less than pleased. It seemed like just another quick cash in on the Wii Sports craze except now with even more sports that you’ll just avoid in favor of playing bowling….sweet, sweet, Wii bowling. I mean, who really was demanding a chance to play badminton on their Wii or who hates Mario Kart so much that they’d rather play a kart game that was crammed in with a multitude of other “sports”?

Well it seems, from the demo disc that we received from the good people at Hudson, that my fears were entirely warranted and unwarranted at the same time. The disc came with four playable “sports” - figure skating, beach volleyball, badminton and supercross - and just like Wii Sports some are actually fun and others are, well, not. Worthy of mention before we get into each individual game is that you can choose what team you want before each sport. Each team has different members with different qualities, some are made up of all quick and little people, some big and strong people and others are more spread out. Characters look disturbingly like Miis but they aren’t which is a little sad. I only noticed a bit of a change when playing with different characters in each sport but you can tell a difference is there, especially in steering and running. I’m assuming that in the full game you’ll be able to take your team and lead them to Deca Sport glory by defeating all the other teams. Continue reading this story..

Do you hear that? That’s the sound of millions of Zelda fans worldwide gasping for air. It turns out that The Legend of Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto proposed using a first-person perspective in Ocarina of Time, the first 3D Zelda title released for the Nintendo 64. This tidbit of news was revealed in a recent promotion for the upcoming Japanese release of Link’s Crossbow Training.

While Miyamoto was describing the factors that led to the imaging of Link’s Crossbow Training, he said: “I’ve always been into first person shooter style games, 3D games in which you can walk around freely and see things from your own point of view.”

“At first when we were developing The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, I even proposed using a first-person perspective.”

“I thought that the FPS system would be the best way of enabling players to take in the vast terrain of the Hyrule Field. Besides, by not having the player’s character on the screen, we can spend more time and machine power on creating enemies and the environments,” Miyamoto added, also explaining that he feels the perspective in first-person shooters is “more comfortable, more natural”.

Very, very interesting. Who knows what could’ve happened? Would Ocarina of Time have ended up being Metroid Prime type awesome?

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare may have taken a backseat to GTA4 for a moment as far as online play is concerned, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t continue to bleed awesomeness. Since its release in November of 2007, CoD4 has sold well over seven million copies worldwide and the well told story, which resonated with most people in the world these days, was a welcome change from the oversaturated WWII shooter genre.

Even though a dedicated person could get through the single player campaign in a single day, it’s CoD4’s multiplayer that boosted the game to stardom. And with the success the franchise has had, it’s no surprise that a follow-up will be coming out in due time. There are very few details out there about CoD5 at the moment, but in a recent chat with analysts and investors, Activision’s CEO Mike Griffith gave a few more. Continue reading this story..