“The ESA Foundation is committed to helping improve the lives of young people,” said Jenny Lai, Vice President of the ESA Foundation. “The proceeds of this event will allow us to give back even more and enable students from across the country to pursue studies in computer and video game development and design.”

The competition will pit gamers in a collection of single-elimination events featuring Rock Band 2, Madden 08, I-Play Bowling and Super Smash Bros. The event's $20 entry fee will go toward the ESA Foundation Scholarship Program.

The program assists women and minority students continuing their education in video game development, including those studying graphic design, computer science, animation, programming, digital entertainment or software engineering. The Foundation’s scholarships are awarded annually to full-time students at accredited four-year colleges and universities.

The competition will run from 6 to 10 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 17 in the ballroom of the Four Seasons Hotel Austin.

Prizes for the event include cash, video games, t-shirts, caps, gaming accessories, video game collectibles and 3D art which will be awarded to the first and second place winners for each game title, plus two grand prize winners for overall score, excellence and sportsmanship.

LEVEL UP CHARITY GAMES COMPETITION TO BENEFIT THE ESA Foundation

Austin Event Will Support Foundation’s Scholarship Program for Future Video Game Developers

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The ESA Foundation will be the beneficiary of the upcoming Level Up Charity Games competition in Austin, Texas, the charitable organization announced today. Proceeds from the September 17 event will support the ESA Foundation’s Scholarship Program, which provides tuition assistance to women and minority students studying video game subjects.

“The ESA Foundation is committed to helping improve the lives of young people,” said Jenny Lai, Vice President of the ESA Foundation. “The proceeds of this event will allow us to give back even more and enable students from across the country to pursue studies in computer and video game development and design.”

Hosted by game industry partner GameRecruiter, the Level Up Charity Games competition will take place during the Austin Game Developers Conference at the Four Seasons Hotel Austin. The event is open to gamers of all ages and types and the competition will feature four popular game titles: Rock Band 2, Madden 08, I-Play Bowling and Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

The event’s $20 per competitor entry fee will benefit the ESA Foundation Scholarship Program. The program assists women and minority students continuing their education in video game development, including those studying graphic design, computer science, animation, programming, digital entertainment or software engineering. The Foundation’s scholarships are awarded annually to full-time students at accredited four-year colleges and universities.

"We have a long-standing commitment to supporting the educational needs of minority and female students who are interested in being part of the video game industry,” said Marc Mencher, CEO of GameRecruiter. “By providing this support to the ESA Foundation’s Scholarship Program, we hope to allow deserving individuals to further their education and expand workplace diversity within our industry.”

The Level Up Charity Games are scheduled from 6 to 10 p.m. on Wednesday, September 17, with early registration beginning at 5 p.m. The event will be staged in the ballroom of the Four Seasons Hotel Austin, which is located at 98 San Jacinto Boulevard, directly across the street from the Austin Convention Center, the site of the Austin Game Developers Conference.

Competitors are invited to come and play for prizes, including cash, video games, T-shirts, caps, gaming accessories, video game collectibles, 3D art software and more. Each player has opportunity to play in single elimination competitive play. Prizes will be awarded to the first and second place winners for each game title, plus two grand prize winners for overall score, excellence and sportsmanship.

The event’s co-sponsors include MTV Games, IGN.com, Obsidian Entertainment, McDonald's, Southwest Airlines, Powered by Game Spy, Havok, TransGaming, I-play, 1-up Network, Belkin International, DAZ 3D, Bethesda Softworks and Petroglyph Games, with game competition elements sponsored by Midnight Gaming Championships.

The ESA Foundation was created by the American interactive entertainment software industry to support and provide opportunities that can make a difference in the lives of America’s youth. One of the foundation’s key efforts is scholarship program that assists women and minority students studying for careers in the video game industry. For more information about the ESA Foundation and its programs, please visit www.theESA.com/foundation.

With a 2-decades-long history of recruitment specializing in unique and unadvertised opportunities focused exclusively in games, GameRecruiter has earned an international reputation for recruiting the technical, production, and executive staff who build game industry companies and make game history. For more information about GameRecruiter and the Level Up Charity Games Competition, please visit www.gamerecruiter.com or www.levelupcharitygames.org.

An OLPC Jam is a sort of intense workathon where developers, artists, and other 'creatives' throw themselves at a problem over a short space of time. Previous Jams have created educational and medical resources for use with the OLPC in developing countries and the organizers are confident that the talented geeks putting themselves forward for the Physics Game Jam will come up with something special.

All the code will be open source, so it is not impossible that the games created in the Jam will see the light of day in web-based games or other platforms down the line.

If you have any coding, game design or artistic chops and fancy helping out, get in touch here. There are prizes — including XO laptops and other goodies — for the best creations, plus a lovely warm feeling from helping a good cause.

OLPC Physics Game Jam For an XO [Slashdot]

Ian Baverstock, CEO for Kuju Entertainment, said, “Headstrong is the final ‘piece in the puzzle’ for Kuju’s offering in the UK. As action specialists they complement the other studios that have already rebranded and together offer publishers a full service solution to their development needs. ”

The development studio is expected to stay busy-busy through the rebranding, working on several projects, including an unannounced game for Sega. Teases.

Kuju London renamed Headstrong.

Headstrong launched today as the rebranded London studio of the Kuju Entertainment network. The central London developer has already enjoyed huge success with Nintendo's Battalion Wars™ and Battalion Wars™ 2 and continues to focus on what it does best; great Character Action titles. Headstrong offers publishers a specialist service on the Wii™ and occupies an exclusive position in the market due to a wealth of experience gained by working on Nintendo titles.

Studio Head, Bradley Crooks, commented, “We have the ideal opportunity to build on a solid foundation at Headstrong and we have some great projects in development. The studio has a real advantage on the Wii due to our experience with both single-player and multi-player development and we can get projects up and running quickly with our mature technology and tools”.

The studio is expecting a busy schedule over the coming months with discussions on a number of projects. Headstrong has a flexible approach to new opportunities and is happy to work with publishers on licensed products, existing IP or to develop new ideas.

Ian Baverstock, CEO for Kuju Entertainment, said, “Headstrong is the final ‘piece in the puzzle’ for Kuju’s offering in the UK. As action specialists they complement the other studios that have already rebranded and together offer publishers a full service solution to their development needs. ”

Headstrong is located in the Bankside area of London, near the Tate Modern, and is working on a soon to be announced title with SEGA® and a number of other projects.

“Since we re-branded last year we have had an enormous interest in the studio from both publishers and new recruits” says Ed Daly, Studio Head. “Following on from our huge growth in Brighton where we are now approaching 150 staff, we felt the time was right to open a second studio. This will enable us to take on more projects and staff without losing the intimate company culture that is so central to our approach”.

The new studio will hit the ground running, with two projects lined up for the new team, overseen by current Zoë Mode Brighton executive producer Nick Rodriguez.

Zoë Mode® Announces New London Studio

Following their hugely successful first year since Kuju Brighton rebranded, music and party game specialist Zoë Mode is pleased to announce the formation of Zoë Mode London. Launching on 1st September 2008, the studio will be based near the south bank of the Thames in central London and will be led by Nick Rodriguez, currently Executive Producer at Zoë Mode Brighton.

“Since we re-branded last year we have had an enormous interest in the studio from both publishers and new recruits” says Ed Daly, Studio Head. “Following on from our huge growth in Brighton where we are now approaching 150 staff, we felt the time was right to open a second studio. This will enable us to take on more projects and staff without losing the intimate company culture that is so central to our approach”.

With two projects already lined up and a core team established from the Brighton studio, Zoë Mode London is set to grow quickly.

Nick Rodriguez, Studio Head London;
“London has been a development hub for the games industry for many years now, which means that there’s a fantastic pool of talent here to join our new studio. We’re looking for staff in all disciplines and we’re really excited about the opportunities that being in London present to us”.

For more information about Zoë Mode London and details of positions available please visit: www.zoemode.com

"What Zootfly did for us, inadvertently, is help sell the concept. When their footage came out, we were close to our green-light meeting, and when the executives saw the reaction from the fans, they immediately knew, 'Hey, Ghostbusters is going to be a big hit - we need to put this game into production.'"

Small consolation for the folks at ZootFly, but Ghostbusters fans around the world sure appreciate the help. Next time just make sure you're allowed to make the game before you make it!

Zootfly Ghostbusters footage helped sell concept [CVG]

Kojima explains his brand of antiwar sentiment, which is more or less circumspect about the reasons and results of war rather than outright pacifism. He also pines for a future where smaller, art-house productions are comparatively viable, among a world of titles that are increasingly developed for blockbuster effect, like Grand Theft Auto IV and MGS4.

Kojima said that action, sex and gambling are the genres "immediately understood all over the world," and expands on that in a thought-provoking way.

"We use action and that is why our games become bigger and bigger - Hollywood big. It is however possible to make smaller, more personal games if you, for example, limit the target region, the gender or the age of the audience. MGS is a Hollywood blockbuster, like GTA. But maybe it is time for something like independent movies, with a smaller target audience, like movies for an arthouse movie theater.

And he gives a great one-liner when asked to explain MGS4 to a non-gamer. "It's a game of hide-and-seek."

Spiegel Online Interview: Hideo Kojima talks about pacifism, movies and GTA [Gaming in Germany, thanks for the translation maxax]

Totilo talks to some pretty big names about the practice, including GameSpot's former employee Jeff Gerstmann, who explains why the practice is so disturbing.

I’ve gotten e-mails from developers over the years who have said, ‘I don’t think you realize what you’re doing to me with this review’ because my review knocked them out of the range of some bonus that they were up for...

It's really a ridiculous practice that almost always works in the publisher's favor. Luckily it isn't as widespread as it once was, but it does give you interesting insight into why some developers will defend their games as if their lives depended on it. Sometimes they might.

Low Metacritic Scores Cause Game Publishers To Withhold Developer Royalties [MTV Multiplayer]

...Wait, wait, don't glaze - in plain language, this means making it possible for the levels you built in Echochrome or your Spore creature creations, for example, to be swapped around to any platform where the game resides. Ever wonder why you can't transfer user-created Echochrome levels between the PlayStation 3 and PSP versions of the game, when it seems so theoretically possible?

Echochrome associate producer Kumi Yuasa explained at Croal's Level Up:

There is a large size difference between PS3 levels and PSP levels, PS3 levels being 8 times larger than PSP levels. So if a user decides to create a small PSP-size level on PS3, technically it may be possible to have the levels downloaded to PSP.

However, Yuasa told Croal that the goal for different platforms was decidedly different experiences - meaning more than technical compatibility is at issue here:

The team didn't want to implement the markup solution to make PS3 and PSP levels compatible because of the basic rule of this game: optical illusions. This game is based on optical illusions when you see a level as a whole, not when you zoom in certain parts of levels. So if you were to convert a level into something 8 times smaller and transfer to PSP, it would make it very difficult to see levels unless you can zoom in.

Basically the team wants users to experience the difference between PS3 levels and PSP levels solely. PS3 levels are larger and more dynamic, whereas PSP levels are smaller and more condensed/concentrated. Smaller the level does not mean easier it is to clear.

Ohhhh. See, this is why I just write about the games. I'll just duck back into my media cave now.

The XML-ization of Videogames, Part I: A Chat With Echochrome Associate Producer Kumi Yuasa [Level Up]

“MvG has been created with the goal of bringing fun and easily accessible music games to an audience that has largely remained unnoticed to this point,” said Vincent Bitetti, CEO of MvG. “The music video game market and the online casual games market both continue to grow exponentially. MvG will provide games that will appeal to both demographics.”

Five years ago this would have been perfect. Now I'm not so sure we need more music games, casual or otherwise. Still, maybe MvG will find their niche. They've certainly got a dynamic name going for them, and a kick-ass logo. Go get 'em, plucky little upstart!

Veteran Video Game Talents Announce Launch of New Company, Music Video Games (MvG)
Seasoned Executives From the Music and Entertainment Space Join Forces to Launch Video Game Portal Focused on Casual Gamers and Music Fans

EL SEGUNDO, Calif.—(BUSINESS WIRE)—Today the formation of Music Video Games™ (MvG) was announced, a music-based game company focused on delivering interactive entertainment experiences for both casual gamers and music fans. MvG was founded by David Warhol, president of video game studio Realtime Associates, Inc., and Vincent Bitetti, a video game publishing executive and former CEO of TDK Mediactive, which was sold to Take Two Interactive (NASDAQ:TTWO) in 2004.

“MvG has been created with the goal of bringing fun and easily accessible music games to an audience that has largely remained unnoticed to this point,” said Vincent Bitetti, CEO of MvG. “The music video game market and the online casual games market both continue to grow exponentially. MvG will provide games that will appeal to both demographics.”

Mr. Bitetti will act as the company’s CEO while Mr. Warhol will be the Chief Creative Officer. Acting as strategic advisors to the new company are music industry veteran Mark Goldstein, former Senior Vice President of Business and Legal Affairs at Warner Bros Records Inc. (NYSE:WMG), and interactive entertainment guru Tim Walsh, formerly the Senior Vice President of International Publishing, President of THQ Wireless, and a Corporate Officer at THQ (NASDAQ:THQI).

According to Pacific Crest Securities the U.S. online casual games business will grow to $725 million in 2008 from $375 million in 2006, with casual games becoming a primary industry growth driver for 2008 and beyond.

To find out more about MvG, please visit www.musicvideogames.net.

But the Web site B3TA tracked down Mr. Cherry and, by all appearances, got a legit Q&A with him. A bunch of their commenters sent in questions and according to the article, Cherry got back to them about a year later. The big question, would he play ball with this kind of an interview? Oh yes, he did.

Q: Exactly how much time and money has been wasted globally as a result of office workers playing Solitaire? A: There was a global recession in 1991/1992, just after Solitaire was released. Thank you very much. Oh, and you can't have your time back.

Q: Is there a way to change the speed of the card trail thing at the end? I've found it at different speeds on different OS'.
A: Yes, upgrade to a IBM 286 running at 16mHz. That should slow it down right good. Or install Norton Antivirus. I'll leave it to Mr. Moore and his law to make things faster.

Q: Why didn't you call it Patience in the English version?
A: Because I speak English, and I call it Solitaire.

Interviews: Wes Cherry [B3TA]

It's a huge talk. I can't digest it all into bullet points for you. But he delves into the origin of the 3D GTA titles, more or less saying that Take Two's 1999 acquisition of DMA (which became Rockstar, and now Rockstar North) was to answer an internal dispute of whether Grand Theft Auto could be done in 3D. We know the answer to that.

Fritz asks Houser if, at any point, the creators doubted that the level of detail put into GTA III would even matter, much less become the baseline expectation of the sandbox genre as we know it. Houser answers with a visionary's conviction:

I remember when we were talking about 60 or 80 different speaking parts, I remember it was such a big production issue, but the thing we never spoke about was, "Are people going to care about it?" Our attitude always was, "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing. If they don't' like it..."

I agree wholeheartedly. Some first person games, I feel like I'm looking into a shoebox diorama of the world where I'm playing. Admittedly, a well rendered, often fun diorama. But it makes me wonder again why they ever did the first-person free-look in GTA III and Vice City (I will never stop complaining about that.)

There's tons more in the full interview.

Dan Houser's very extended interview about everything "Grand Theft Auto IV" and Rockstar [Variety]

That said, it's a common condition and as Ars Technica points out, one that developers either don't know what to do with, or do too little to accommodate.

Battlefield 2142, for example (I don't play it) has real problems helping color-blind gamers differentiate team flags. Puzzle games are a hard-hit genre too. And in others there are other minor issues, such as a Mario and Luigi looking almost identical to some red-green color-sight challenged. So just to get started on a thought provoking note, and because "this is what stuff looks like to color-blind people" is always cool, here's the article.

As for me, I don't want your pity. Seriously, I have no frame of reference to make me know I'm missing something, and I haven't yet screwed the pooch in team play (Unless you count the time in church league hoops, when we had green jerseys and Maple Springs Methodist had red, and I had to sit the bench the whole game) And who's to say you're not seeing the world all screwed up, and I'm right?

Color-blind gamers: common. Developer awareness? Minimal [Ars Technica]

The new deadline for the Flash game design contest, which challenges designers to create a game about teen dating violence prevention without violent content or a violent theme, is May 15.

First prize is $1,000 and judges, besides myself, include Simon Carless, director of the Independent Games Festival; Stephen Totilo, of MTV and huge brain fame, Dr. Ian Bogost, Ph.D., co-founder, Persuasive Games, and Dr. Elizabeth Richeson, a psychologist, Texas Psychological Association Board member, and my mom.

2008 Game Contest [Life. Love.]

Eidos and parent company SCi pulled the plug on several projects, among them an unnamed title Pseudo was working on. Without the account, Pseudo Interactive couldn't push through crippling layoffs and will instead shut its doors.

Pseudo Interactive was based in Toronto and had more than 50 employees two years ago. In addition to Full Auto, it was responsible for Cel Damage, featuring a zany cartoon physics model, on Xbox and PS2.

Full Auto Developer Shuts Down [1UP]

Thats right, the directional arrow which points to where you should go next is actually patented by Sega.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080309-patents-on-video-game-mechanics-may-strangle-innovation.html

Valve Publications [Valve via GameSetWatch]

Hit the jump for the top 20 devs on the list.

1. Nintendo Kyoto (Brain Age, Wii Play)
2. Infinity Ward (Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare)
3. Blizzard Entertainment (World Of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade)
4. Electronic Arts Canada (FIFA Soccer 08, NBA Street: Homecourt)
5. Valve (Portal, Team Fortress 2)
6. Konami Japan Studio (Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer, Dance Dance Revolution Universe)
7. Insomniac Games (Ratchet & Clank Future)
8. Capcom Osaka Studio (Lost Planet: Extreme Condition, Monster Hunter Freedom)
9. Electronic Arts Tiburon (Madden NFL 08, NASCAR 08)
10. BioWare Edmonton (Mass Effect, Jade Empire: Special Edition)
11. Bungie Studios (Halo 3)
12. Ubisoft Montreal (Assassin's Creed, Naruto: Rise Of A Ninja)
13. 2K Boston [& Australia] (BioShock)
14. Harmonix (Rock Band)
15. Bandai Namco Tokyo (Ace Combat 6: Fires Of Liberation, Beautiful Katamari)
16. Square Enix Tokyo (Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core, Front Mission DS)
17. Game Freak (Pokemon Diamond/Pearl)
18. Epic Games (Unreal Tournament 3, Gears Of War PC)
19. Hudson Soft (Mario Party 8, Mario Party DS)
20. Neversoft (Guitar Hero III, Tony Hawk's Proving Ground)

Nintendo, Infinity Ward, Blizzard Top First-Ever 'Top 50 Developers' Countdown [Gamasutra]

Hell, you don't even need an iPhone (though it's recommended). All you need is an OSX based Mac and, you know, a bit of genius and a lot of work ethic. (Apparently you can actually develop right on the iPhone as well...but who knows how well that'll work.)

So you're thinking, "But I want to sell my product on their Apple Store. That'll cost me a ton and be impossible." Nope, it won't be either of those things.

$99 per year is all it costs for a developer to post an unlimited number of titles to iTunes on their own schedule. (Internal business programming runs up to $299 per year). If developers feel like setting a price for their content, Apple takes 30% of the sales. (Boy, that number sounds vaguely reminiscent of Microsoft's deal for XBLA developers before they were rumored to hike their cut).

While we're talking money, Apple has a $100,000,000 iFund. Think of it as grants that will go to seed software development products. Surely, at least a small chunk of that will entice up and coming game designers.

As for Apple's screening process, so far it only seems that extreme content (like porn) will be banned from the applications store. Obviously there are implications here—how violent/graphic can game developers make their content?

To that, we still have no answer.

But so far, we really like what we're hearing. Because today, Apple has made ever developer into a publisher for the most buzzed about products in the consumer electronics industry.

iPhone SDK Available Today for Free, $99 to Publish Your Apps [Gizmodo]

"You can roll this around a map and it's like this clean blank canvas for combat," he said. "When it's driving around it works as a mobile forward spawn point and when you spawn into it you get additional equipment."

Jobe said the APC will also be able to deploy a piece of equipment that is "like the mother of all bubble shields" and is a couple of hundred feet wide.

Enemies won't be able to shoot into it but allies will be able to shoot out and when a Warhawk gets too close to it it came become unstable and explode.

While the APC won't have a weapon of its own it does have a turbo boost, Jobe said, which can turn the entire vehicle into a giant missile of sorts.

"I've had kills before where I've launched through a Warhawk in an APC," he said.

The booster pack will come with a new battlefield which has ten layouts and it will also include new layouts for existing maps.

While Jobe was hesitant to peg a specific date, because the pack is still being play tested, he did say that he hopes to get it out by the end of next month of the first half of April.

While Operation Broken Mirror won't come with new gameplay modes, Jobe said they are talking about creating some and if they do come they will likely be released as free patches.

"I'd hope we would add new game modes, game modes are things I don't think gamers should have to pay for," he said.

I also asked Jobe about the possibility of a single-player campaign being released for Warhawk, which was once meant to include single-player play, either as an expansion pack or episodic content.

"We made a conscious strategic decision to go multiplayer only, If we were to go single player we would probably address it in another product," he said. "As a player I don't know if I would want to play single player through episodic content. I'd be hesitant."

Jobe added that Incognito isn't just 100 percent Warhawk nowadays either.

"Right now we are working on some exciting things," he said. "But we can't make any announcements."

My experience with Street Fighter 2 CE was born entirely in my time first hanging out at arcades and then running one in the 90s in Maryland. I loved the game so much that my time spent playing it is what likely lead to me being fired from the job. I slathered more attention on our big-screen SF2 box than I did every other machine in the place, combined. I regularly replaced the cherry switches and springs on a weekly basis.

But I couldn't have told you who the game's producer was, what sort of lore was buried in the creating of such an indelible franchise or how they came about with the idea of the characters in the game.

That being said, read on.

The first thing I noticed when I saw the game, was the 2.5D effect of the graphics. Described on paper, it sounds immensely off-putting, but in action it manages to pull Street Fighter into the modern age without sullying the gameplay at all. This is done by essentially making both the background and characters 3D but forcing the characters to move on a 2D plane. What you're left with is the best of both worlds.

More importantly, the game's look seems to have returned to its origins. Sure the graphics pop, really pop, but they're very reminiscent of II and not as SNKey as I felt Street Fighter III had become. I know, blaspheme.

While the controls haven't entirely returned to the grandeur of Street Fighter II, they have mostly returned. The same can be said of the attacks. Sure you have to still use two buttons to throw (so annoying) and taunt (so unnecessary) and there are revenge, super and ultra moves, but at it's heart this is a game that strips away the unessentials and returns to what made the Street Fighter franchise so addictive: Timing.

This isn't just my opinion. When I spoke with producer Yoshinori Ono he said that there was a concerted effort to refocus the franchise with this title. Street Fighter had become too filled with moves and had lost its way, he essentially said. What the game was always about was timing, much like real martial arts, not flashy moves.

Playing the game, after years spent ignoring the increasingly annoying character-driven Street Fighter III spin-offs, was like returning to a childhood home to find that it was, in fact, larger, not smaller than you had remembered it.

The game's timing, which plays at about the speed of Street Fighter II Turbo, has been tweaked, deliberately, and I believe the hit boxes (which invisible surround the characters) shrunk, but that just gives me an excuse to relearn the game. There also seems to be a slightly longer delay after pulling off a move, or whiffing one.

In fact, I can honestly say that the only thing about this early build of Street Fighter IV that disappoints me, so far, is that it probably won't be showing up in arcades across America and that's because there aren't arcades across America anymore.

Disclaimer: these impressions are eyes-on only. No one at the GDC EA event from which this write-up stems had the chance to play.

You launch the game through the website. a big button on the front and center of the page. You go through a series of screens to select your character and join a game, and you're in. Why is this moment so exciting? The start of the game is also the end of all advertising. That's right, in Battlefield Heroes, despite EA drawing their profits from advertisements, players will not be subjected to dynamic in-game billboards destroying the mis en scene.

As for the combat, it's sort of like Battlefield Light. Players choose between 3 classes (soldier, heavier gunman and spy) and let it rip from there. The third-person gameplay is a cross between capture the flag and team deathmatch. Each team races for 50 kills, but capturing a flag gives the successful team a score modifier that will affect the fragcount (meaning a 2x modifier will give your team two kills for the price of one).

The level we saw tested featured both tanks and planes. The tank was designed to be easy to drive, with each mortar round exploding light a classic Adam West punch. The plane looked just as easy to operate, with the fun option of dive bombing a teammate to give them a seat on your wing. (Note: the pilot can also leave his seat to sit on the opposite wing, in which case the plane will land softly on the pillow-like ground). Yeah, this ain't realism.

Then there's the power-up system. On top of your base skill set, you'll occasionally have access to more powerful techniques. Do things like see through walls or replenish health. It's a balancing system for casual players, and it's one part of the game that actually reminds us more of Shadowrun (R.I.P) than Team Fortress 2.

So are we pumped? Not really. Don't get us wrong, for a free web game Heroes looks great. But for those used to online multiplayer fragfests, Heroes' simple (read: rudimentary) mechanics will grow dull quickly. It's hard to see in the promo clip above, but there's something about the physics and general interface that just feels a generation younger than the current consoles...let alone PCs.

But honestly, we're not so sure that Battlefield Heroes is intended for anyone reading this article anyway. We're betting it's EA's gateway drug for casual gamers to try out shooters. And with that hat on, the game could be quite successful.

Ugh, I wasn't really a huge fan of the original and didn't really have a whole lot of interest in checking it out... but after Tarzaning across a level and using my bionic claw to toss barrels at people and people at barrels, I quickly changed my mind.

The first thing you notice when you pick up the XBLA/PSN title (I played on the 360) is how pretty it is. Just because a game is 2D and harkens back to the bitastic days of old, doesn't mean that it has to be ugly. Capcom managed to give the game a high polish and still include echoes of the classic.

The thing I found most frustrating about the original was that moving diagonally with your claw was never very easy for me, it didn't feel fluid and it was easy to get it wrong. Not so with the remake, I was able to cruise up and down levels in record time with just the claw. And they didn't make it too easy, just smoothed out the process and precision of the controls.

The game really makes use of the HD real estate, but still has levels that feel like they belong in the original. You still can't jump down, you have to drop, you still can't jump up, you have to use your claw. But this time, for me at least, it seems to work better.

I know it's blasphemy to even hint at the fact that a remake of an arcade classic could in anyway be improved upon for a console, but from what I saw in the very early build of the game, Bionic Commando Rearmed might very well do that.

Aoyama explained that a "debate raged for several weeks" until the team came up with what they felt to be a better direction, the play history list.

Aoyama explained, ""instead of instituting some play limit...this allowed parents to monitor and discuss how much their children were playing...this is why you can't erase the play history on the console."

It's interesting to see how two companies making similar products tackled a problem (limiting play time to please parents) in such a different manner. Nintendo hoped that the list would provide constant check-up on children, initiating a parent to child dialogue. Microsoft, on the other hand, went with the more straightforward, less child-trusting approach (the even Iwata initially supported).

Which is better? I love the philosophy behind Nintendo's parental controls, but I'm betting that for most American families, Microsoft's are flat-out more effective. Thoughts?

How was it? Fun, but not revolutionary.

Let's take a step back. Battlefield: Bad Company multiplayer is all about gold. One team has it, the other team wants it. And despite the multitude of technologically advanced armaments that you and your squad have access to throughout the game, this gold is kept in simple locked chests that can be blown up with, say, 4 or 5 grenades.

While it's your pretty standard Battlefield class-based gameplay (you choose your type of character with for which you have corresponding weapons/skills), this battle for gold adds some arcadey fun moments. You see, the gold is divided into several chests—with each chest the offense destroys, the more advantages they get. Respawn points become closer and advanced weapons and vehicles are unlocked.

The result is a game the will consistently start slow are grow more ludicrous as men on foot are replaced by men in tanks and plenty of the always fulfilling air support (nothing like airstriking a defenseless building).

And it works, aided by a pretty unique and complimentary respawn system. One can either choose to respawn at their current base, or, for the gamblers out there, respawn with your squad. In other words, you enter by the action, but you'll have to dodge bullets in a possibly outnumbered/outgunned situation.

But as for these promises of destructible environments—I'm not certain that it's a concept that designers have quite grasped yet.

As a DICE employee explained to me, destruction in games is complicated because gamers really don't want everything to be destructible. While leveling a building sounds fun, the map I played on was nothing but buildings. Imagine leveling the whole playing field and being left with a few withering blades of grass on an open plain. Maybe the first time the idea sounds fun. The second or third? Not so much.

So the way destructible environments work in Battlefield: Bad Company is pretty much this: trees can be knocked over and walls can be blown through. But a building's frame will always stay intact, even if a million bajillion nuclear bombs were to drop in close proximity.

I know, the compromise doesn't sound so bad. A guy is shooting you from a window. You shoot your grenade launcher, blowing away his cover. Then you shoot him in the ass until he dies.

This part is fun, no doubt. And it opens up a slew of new strategies.

But where the game becomes less fulfilling is during those McGuyeresque moments of improvisation. For instance, you are on the bottom floor of a two-story building and decide, what the hell, I'll blow the floor out from under the sniper who's upstairs. This doesn't work. And the same seemed to apply for the moments when you could get above a building and wanted to make a surprise entrance through the roof. Certain things don't blow up that really should.

The thing is, I don't even fault the game. It seems more likely to be a situation similar to the first 3D platformers; things weren't quite right and nobody knew why. That's how Bad Company felt...just a hair off of really grasping the exciting concept of truly destructible environments.

All of that said, I'm sure many will have loads of fun with the game. And I'll definitely give it another shot at launch. No pun intended.

I wondered how they would change the jewel matching style gameplay to make this game different from its predecessor and they certainly didn't disappoint. Besides the obvious visual differences in the interface, the style of puzzling has changed as well. The round pieces have changed to hexagonal ones and extra challenge has been added by the movement of the hexagons once you have matched up your three or more. Instead of dropping straight down, your columns slide diagonally, and depending on which piece you move, the columns will fill in either from the left or the right. Gravity will have a bearing on the various movements of the pieces as well making you have to think in several directions at once.

One of the things I asked about was whether the AI was going to be improved over the seemingly punishingly difficult AI of the original Puzzle Quest. I was told that the developers had heard players issues and it was something they were working on. So hopefully this time around, our enemies from space won't have the same kind of luck that will allow them 5 minutes worth of amazing moves while we just sit and watch our health go down.

Like the original Puzzle Quest, Galactrix has an overarching storyline that ties all the puzzle battling together. In the far future, the entire galaxy is run by four mega corporations. It's not long before one of these corporations starts deadly experiments that go awry and threaten the existence of the universe. The player must puzzle battle these enemies of the universe and save us all.

There wasn't much more information given in the short demo that I saw but I could tell from what I did see that D3 definitely has another addicting hit on their hands. The changes from the original game are enough that new players will find it exciting and seasoned players will take to it immediately without feeling like they are just playing the same game over again. Puzzle Quest: Galactrix will be coming to the DS, PC and XBLA later this year, ready to fly its way into your heart and not let go.

As I'm sure you're all aware Valve threw a little party during last week's big show (We weren't invited. I blame our butchering of their song.) and during the tail end of it they brought up Jonathan Coulton to play a set. At the end of his last song he invited the Rock Band folks up on the stage to play Still Alive on their game, a really neat way to announce that the song was coming to the game.

After they finished the crowd went crazy, a Harmonix developer told me the next day. The crowd was so excited, in fact, that one of them burst from the masses and jumped onto the stage. Walking up to the 360 that was home to the song, he plucked out a memory card, plugged it in and started fiddling. At which point one of their larger of the Harmonix guys walked over and asked him if he needed help with something.

"I'm just grabbing Still Alive, everyone needs to be able to play this," he said, if my source's memory serves.

The developer plucked the controller from the rotund man's hands and deftly deleted the song, which he had already managed to grab, from the card. Better luck next time.

The Harmonix guys thought it was even stranger that he later bragged to Harmonix co-founder Alex Rigopulos about it. Personally, I think it's super weird that he happened to have a Memory Card on him.

This year, we heard a really funny joke involving a possible 2008 game release. So funny it made out sides hurt! That fantasyland release day joke was?

In this 15 minute chat we talk about the death of the PC gaming market, how GDC has evolved and what type of character he plays in WoW... among other things.

powered by ODEO

The real treat however was a little surprise waiting on a DS in the corner, Metal Slug 7! I hot footed it over to the corner of the room and practically wrestled the girl playing it to the ground in my attempt to check out the game. It looked great, played better and had everything you could possibly want from a Metal Slug game. So if you are ready for a new Metal Slug experience, look no further than Metal Slug 7, coming soon to a DS near you.

While the above pic may not be of the best quality, we got a few individuals snaps that are much better looking. They're behind the jump, front page visitors, because I'm pretty sure that pic of a pants-less Miyamoto is not safe for work.

Seriously, man. Put some khakis on!

Since Portal is essentially a first person puzzle game, the team initially thought it would simply end on what they thought was appropriate, a puzzle more complex than anything the player had seen before. That solution, they said, was a pain.

Their first proper boss fight attempt, when GLaDOS was just a translucent shimmery cube, was the "Giant Laser" battle. Players had to direct lasers back at GLaDOS to destroy it. It wasn't fun and the lasers were just too difficult to aim.

Boss battle attempt number two, their "Mortal Kombat" stab, was full of intensity. Missing flying, turrets spawning, an out of place firefight than belied Portal's slower paced, cerebral gameplay. It also sucked, according to Wolpaw.

Attempt number three was a chase sequence. But the pacing was horrible and there was no opportunity to communicate to the player.

Around this time, Wolpaw said the Half-Life 2 Episode Two guys excitedly said to the Portal team "Our final battle is gonna have 100 Striders, you're going to get to drive a car and fight dozens of mini-Striders. It's gonna be awesome! What are you guys gonna do?"

With a tiny team on Portal, they simply couldn't match a boss battle that epic, and they ultimately created the time limited incinerator set piece as the final fight.

The Portal team's limited resources also forced them to "trim the narrative fat" elsewhere. Swift talked about a proposed scene involving "The Rat Man" the fellow escaped test subject whose writing and sketches appear in the game's later levels.

As far as Portal's other co-star, the Weighted Companion Cube, its origins lie in addressing player frustration with finishing the "box marathon" level that features the lovable crate. Wolpaw said that he was inspired to give the Cube a little personality by what he'd been reading in de-classified government interrogation manuals. "They're great," he said, pointing to findings that people in isolation become emotionally attached to inanimate objects.

Wolpaw had advice for those trying to write a "funny" game—"God help you." He related his previous experience with Psychonauts, on which he was one of the game's writers. Upon name dropping the cult favorite, Wolpaw was met with a huge round of applause. "More people just clapped than bought the game," he joked.

"Hearing macho tough guy dialogue is annoying enough, but hearing the same joke fifty times, a couple of which may actually be funny can be much worse," Wolpaw said. He called the playtesting of Psychonauts "psychological torture", his comedic script met with silence when being pumped out of 40 monitors in the QA section at Double Fine Productions.

When the two had wrapped up their session, taking questions from the audience, the discussion quickly moved to plans for Portal 2. Swift and Wolpaw mostly dodged the question, with the latter saying "I'm just trying to bask in the moment... without people bugging me about it."

It was as always, a treat to watch. It was also, as always, something that leaves you perhaps with less of an idea of what he's on about than before he started talking.

Check out the clip which shows the talk in all of it's more than 30-minutes glory and stay, at least, until you get to his now infamous Russian Space Minute.

While the bass is a little bit on the easy side, the lead guitar, drums, and of course, singing are all the perfect level of challenging to make it fun. I'm already a HUGE fan of the song so playing it on Rock Band was a real treat. I can't imagine a single person with the game not wanting to pick this up when it hits the consoles.

I was a little bummed to discover that while the original singing is there and can be cranked up enough to cover your truly awful singing voice, there is no modulation for your voice while you are singing. So you can harmonize with a computer, but you can't sound like one... and we all know how awful that is.

While the internal, companywide development platform was originally understood to be built for PlayStation 3 development (specifically, Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy versus XIII), it is being designed with multiple platforms, including the Xbox 360 and PC, in mind. Murata also confirmed that a version is being readied for the Wii, which is still very early, but we don't expect it to kick out visuals on par with the PS3.

APB does have persistence and progression, if done a bit non-traditionally. But customization is one feature that APB has in spades.

Jones kicked off the early look at APB with a preview of character customization. One of the design goals for APB was to "let the player make their own action figure", putting character generation in the hands of the user and giving them the ability to make their avatars look totally unique. While deep character customization has become a staple of the MMO, APB's version may feature the broadest set of tools yet.

Jones walked us through a sped up version of the creation process, outfitting his avatar with unique identifiers—facials scars, veins, freckles, tattoos, realistic looking hair, a massive wardrobe. Using a system that might look familiar to serious Forza Motorsport 2 players, APB looks to one-up what Turn 10 Studios has done, with a decal system that has some stunning customization chops. Not only can users manipulate primitive vector shapes, they can apply shaders, textures and pre-made hi-res images to their designs, making for extremely realistic decals. These decals can be applied to anything the player wears, even to his skin, with a realistic tattoo look applied to the player generated content.

Clothing is also fully customizable, with attention paid to fit, layering and even things like tucking or untucking one's shirt.

That unique identity extends not just to your own character, but to your clan and your car as well. Car customization works just like avatar customization, so the decals a player has emblazoned on his jacket can also be applied to your ride.

Jones showed footage from the game, featuring characters fresh to the world—one thug was on an early mission, stealing a TV set in the default noob outfit of white t-shirt and jeans—and characters who were longtime APB vets. The MMO features "dynamic matchmaking" as Jones called it, essentially setting up player versus player missions on the fly. A three-player group of Gangsters were tasked with scoring some loot, then driving it to a safe point to complete their mission, a standard Grand Theft Auto-style mission set up. The moment the Gangsters crossed the line and broke the law, an APB was sent out to the game's Enforcers, the cops to their robbers.

What followed was essentially the MMO version of a Counter-Strike round, with players either driving their respective vehicles or engaging in a third-person firefight. The pair of Enforcers, two player pairs, responding to the all points bulletin eventually tracked down the bad guys, blocking them into an alleyway.

Jones said that these dynamic matchmaking battles in APB wouldn't necessarily pit players of the same level against each other. He showed a clip of a group of new players, with just a single pistol between the four of them, being matched with a very high level Enforcer. He quickly took them down, but not before destroying their low level car with a rocket launcher. Who doesn't like rocket launchers?

What we saw of APB was really exciting stuff. The team looks like they may have something special that appeals to gamers who would traditionally scoff and MMOs, but something that isn't just Crackdown Online or EverQuest In The Bad Part Of Town.

The final feature that Jones showed, was APB's ability to generate great machinima. With a group of wildly customized characters that looked like Cloud and Barret from Final Fantasy VII taking on a Cactuar and something impish, but not immediately recognizable to this FF noob. A turn based battle ensued, which quickly ended when "Cloud" summoned a decked out flaming car, done, of course, to hilarious effect.

We have dozens of screens of the game in motion at GDC, including the mock Final Fantasy VII cinema, in the gallery below. Be sure to check them out.

A number of specialty arcades and stores, we were told, have already ordered the arcade machine from importers directly. Unfortunately, Capcom is still trying to find a distributor with the reach to get it into arcade. The big hang-up, it seems, is that nowadays most U.S. arcade distributors deal almost only with redemption ticket games.

Microsoft just responded to our request for comment with this statement:

Xbox LIVE Arcade has long been known as the premier destination for digitally distributed original and classic games - making it a very appealing platform for game developers. We don't disclose details on our business contracts, but what we can tell you is that we work closely with all of our partners to provide the Xbox 360 community with the best entertainment possible while making publishing a title on XBLA an attractive prospect.

While not really a confirmation nor a denial, it does sound as if they are reacting to what our multiple indie developer sources told us was fact. We will be meeting with some of the XBLA indie development folks with Microsoft later today and will make sure to follow up with them about this issue.

Stay tuned.

Microsoft Cuts Indie Royalties in Half [Kotaku]

It's on! Masahiro Sakurai takes the stage.

After rolling the operatic trailer for Brawl, and a round of applause, Sakurai belts out his own version of the tune. He's got quite a voice!

Sakurai moves to the make up of the development staff, which required a new office set up in Tokyo. Folks from Game Arts, Nintendo and HAL Laboratories were brought on staff, including a few other unnamed temps. The staff level was about 100, but not all were full time.

He moves on to the Brawl character roster and how fighters were chosen.

Characters were chosen based on their individuality, saying they must stand out in the game. They had to consider developments costs and the time needed to include someone in the roster.

The decision to include Sonic the Hedgehog as a playable character wasn't made until 2007. Sounds like a pretty tight schedule!

Sakurai talks about four of the game's newcomers, Ike, Meta Knight, Zero Suit Samus and Snake. He points out that the suit-free Samus falls in the "supple martial arts" category. Mmmm... supple.

He says, fundamentally we had to use Nintendo's official character models. Putting all these characters in a game, side by side, requires a unified look. You can't for instance, put in someone like Bugs Bunny alongside photorealistic styles like what was applied for Link.

"We tried to reduce the sensation of things not fitting together by unifying the materials," Sakurai says.

But you couldn't modify the look of the Pokemon Trainer and Lucas too much toward some middle ground, or they'd look inappropriate.

Sakurai shows the "official" Mario design, a clean, soft, cartoony look. The Brawl version, he says, has scuffs and wear, details that were important to defining the look of the roster.

They weren't just trying to take advantage of the Wii's visual upgrade, the team simply wanted to add an appropriate level of detail. He shows the same process with Pikmin's Captain Olimar, the original version of which doesn't feature the same details like stitching that Brawl does.

One character that underwent "serious" changes was Pit. "This (a 2D cartoon version of Pit) became this (Brawl's totally new 3D model)" The team did twenty years of updating on Pit's look all at once.

Link's progression was much more natural, occurring over many games. A similar design evolution was applied to Pit.

Pit's makeover features golden head and arm bands, with a bit of anime and earnestness applied. They decided to make his scarf a different material than his toga for added character.

"I'm proud of the representation we gave Pit as a winged being."

When Pit's arrow of light is fired, it's controllable. "We made it so that his bow can be made into two parts, and use them as a sword. It's sort of like Darth Maul in Star Wars." His tights were added to give him a "youthful" image, but other costume pieces were targeting "nobility." Clearly, someone put some thought into this.

Sakurai says they gave Pit furry boots for a bit of a leg-warmer look. "We think they look pretty cute."

He moves on from "Graphics" to "Motion." In the beginning, Sakurai says that he based the move sets on what he'd like to see in Brawl. "Just thinking up moves is easy" but balance is required.

Standby, wind-up, strike and follow through are the typical motion components of a particular move. Link's "standard attack" is used as an example. Standby, he says, is the starting point of every standing action. Wind-up is the animation where the character draws back to attack. This gives the player (and his opponent) visual cues that actions are about to happen. It's simple, two-frame animation, but conveys a lot of information. Strike, that's the "meat" of attacking. Follow-through, which occupies the most screen time, and needs to look the least like Standby poses. Now you know how Sakurai breaks down a move.

The animation for Fox's up smash takes less than 3/4 of a second to play out. Realistic moves, Sakurai says, aren't always the best fit, even if you're animating a humanoid character.

How do you convey poses to animators? Sakurai used a Microman poseable action figure. Using these, he snapped photos of many of the poses that would ultimately become final animations. It's clear, even from these photos, whose animations these are, with Pit and Zero Suit Samus standing out.

He compares his Microman photos against the final version of Wario's moves. They look nearly identical. The same is true for Sonic's moves.

Now, Sakurai shows off the final animations that had to change drastically from their Microman originals, mostly to better convey motion.

He moves on to Pit's and Samus' poses. For the latter, he used a female version of Microman, which Sakurai says comes with multiple breast sizes. He unfortunately glosses over this quickly.

"For Snake, I really wanted the character to express weight." For Snake's weapons, Sakurai culled accessories and weapons from official Microman toys. He changed Snake's crawling animation from the Metal Gear Solid original, to give him a more imposing look, with shoulders raised.

Sakurai shows off many of the other characters, ones that don't have the build of a Microman toy, like King Dedede, Olimar, Diddy Kong and Meta Knight. Sakurai busts out one of the Micromen, he says in his "Ken" pose.

"One thing I'd like to point out though, is that there are no Street Fighter characters in Super Smash Bros." Consider us crestfallen!

Sakurai moves on to Parameters, the numbers of Super Smash Bros. Brawl. "Being in the brawl is more than just making the roster" his slide reads, adding that characters need to blend their own original series, Smash Bros and solid gameplay to be good adds.

Character essence, he says, is a key factor. Keeping these rules in mind is some of the most "unglamorous" work of game development.

He then compares the jumps of Mario and Samus, from their appearances in Super Mario Bros. and the original Metroid. Mario's is more realistic on its downward arc, while Samus' jump has more "float" to it. And you can't just explain that by saying that Metroid takes place in space, it has to be carried over to the game.

Similarly, simply believing that Sonic is merely a "really fast character" is an easy mistake to make. Sakurai boots up the Wii, playing Sonic, Pit and Snake on screen. He shows of Sonic's movement, saying that the weight of the character, combined with blazing fast speed, conveys his speed. He calls Sonic's double jump "gimmicky." So humble!

Taking the remote controlling Snake, Sakurai demos the Metal Gear Solid fighter and his move set.

"The more you play Snake, the more cunning your use of his weapons will become and that's how we designed it." He shows Snake applying bombs to Pit and Sonic, using the pan and scan photo feature to get a laugh out of the crowd. Everyone likes to see Pit with a face full of explosives!

Pit is now being shown. "Pit didn't appear in any other game before, but I think we've done a good job putting him in the universe and making him a good fighting game character," Sakurai says.

Sakurai takes a photo of Snake close quarter combat attacking Pit. "Look! It's Snake with wings!" he jokes.

He has Snake whip out his special cardboard box, then has Sonic snatch it away. GDC attendees think that's just hilarious.

Back to the talk. Sakurai tells the crowd that game designers must think before they act. "If you think before you act, you can reduce the workloads of your programmers and artists," the slide reads. Similarly, he warns not to fall back on the excuse "We'll never no before we try."

Sakurai skips to "Getting The Word Out." By this, he means, the Smash Bros. Dojo.

We developed homepages for the Nintendo 64 and Gamecube Smash Bros. games before, but only in Japan.

He says that the Dojo is "possibly the grandest scale ever among official single game sites." It started in May of 2007 and has seen 230 updates. At its peak, it had 1 million hits in a single day, 5 million in one week. Sakurai writes the site himself, with visuals taken by other Brawl staffers. Nintendo decides when the updates go out.

To get the word out, production staff has to take part in selling the game. He says that the game wouldn't have the buzz it does if it weren't for the Smash Bros. Dojo.

Sakuari wraps it up with that sage advice, thanking his interpreter and exiting the stage. Unfortunately, there is no QA session, but if anyone has any questions about what was shown, please make requests in the comments. I'll do my best to better explain when not trying to frantically liveblog.

Thanks for checking in!