The horde descended on Tate Modern in London on Saturday, with more than 50 zombies aided by the Viking Hats Zombie Crawl Team making up the shambling, moaning, and decomposing army of Resident Evil fans.

If you ask me, there's not enough mass hysteria in mass marketing. Nicely done, Capcom UK PR team!

Sounds like a completely appropriate and amazingly creative way to promotion the new Red Faction game, in which smashing things with a sledgehammer accounts for a vast majority of the fun to be had. Over the course of the day, hundreds of passers-by took up arms against the innocent vehicle, many walking away with copies of the game for the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360, while many just felt like beating a car to death. THQ PR manager Simon Watts explains.

"Because Red Faction Guerrilla features the world's most realistic destruction engine, we thought that it would make for an interesting experiment to find out how many people, going about their everyday business, would stop in a busy city street to work out some stress by smashing their way into a car to earn a copy of the brand new game."

Brilliant. If there's one thing missing from my day-to-day life, it's opportunities to hit things with sledgehammers. I shall have to rectify that.

Interested players who'll be in the London, England, area on on February 12th can visit whatisfearlive.com and enter for a chance to be one of eight players selected for a F.E.A.R. 2 multiplayer battle in a top-secret location. Those who don't make the cut will still be able to watch what happens live on the website on the day of the event.

Not sure what they've got planned, but you can probably bet there's going to be some LARPeting (marketing via Live-Action Role-Playing) involved. It's just what they do.

A huge plastic BattleDome will be erected under the stony gaze of Lord Nelson in which gamers can try out the latest releases, including the UK premiere of Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, Mirror’s Edge, Battleforge, Spore and Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning.

London Mayor Boris Johnson has decided to ignore his previous comments about videogames "rotting the brain" to welcome the event, adding that he found last year's Be The One "an undoubted highlight of last year's festival, which reinforces London's position at the center of one the most fastest-growing creative industries in the world.”

EA to take over Trafalgar Square [MCV]

"Whilst a lucky few might have got some free petrol, hundreds of local residents have faced misery on their daily journeys this morning...They deserve an apology for being the victims of such an ill-thought out media stunt."

Oh come on Featherstone, it's not like they strapped cash to babies and set them loose in a busy intersection.

Free petrol stunt causes chaos [Telegraph via Game Politics]

[via Wonderland]

Hellgate London To Get First Content Update [Gamasutra]

MARVEL'S SPIDER-MAN TO HOST VIDEO GAME SIGNING AT LOCAL HMV World Famous Super Hero To Appear and Sign Copies of Spider-ManTM: Friend or Foe on Friday, 26 October, 2007 London, U.K. - October 25, 2007 - In support of his newest video game adventure, Marvel's legendary web-slinger will appear to meet fans and sign copies of Activision Inc.'s Spider-Man™: Friend or Foe on Friday, 26 October, 2007 at the HMV London store, located at Oxford Street.

An all-new adventure where a defeated arch-enemy can become an invaluable ally, Spider-Man: Friend or Foe challenges players to defeat and then join forces with notorious movie foes from the Marvel Universe including Doc Ock, Green Goblin, Venom and Sandman, as well as others from the classic Spider-Man family of characters. In the game, players will embark on a global quest to overcome an evil threat, by controlling Spider-Man and one of many Super Hero or Super Villain sidekicks, as they master unique fighting moves and styles while switching between characters to execute team combos and defeat foes.

For the first time ever in a Spider-Man game, Spider-Man: Friend or Foe features a unique co-op mode in which a friend can join the game at any time and take control of Spider-Man's sidekick as they battle through the game side-by-side and replay favorite levels. As the gaming experience unravels, Spider-Man and his sidekicks unlock a variety of arenas and secret areas containing special tokens which allow players to revisit previously explored levels at any time as well as fortify their cache of collectables, power upgrades and mini-games. Gamers can also replay levels as Spider-Man's darker, more mysterious persona, Black-Suited Spider-Man, and experience a robust Versus mode, with multiple arenas, where players match up any two characters and battle it out to see who wins.

Hilary Bevan Jones, Chairman of the Academy said "Will's immense, creative body of work and his continued contribution to the industry make him a most worthy recipient of the Fellowship and being such a pioneer, we are thrilled that he will be the first person to receive this honour".

Sims Creator Wright inducted into BAFTA Fellowship Creator of The Sims, Will Wright, joins legends such as Alfred Hitchcock, Charlie Chaplin and Steven Spielberg as he is inducted into BAFTA's Fellowship at this year's Awards ceremony

Monday 15th October/... Will Wright, the creator of The Sims, the world's best selling PC gaming franchise with more than 90 million units sold, will shortly join an exclusive number of household names from TV and Film as he becomes the first recipient of the Fellowship from the video games industry at the British Academy Video Games Awards 2007. The Fellowship is the highest accolade the Academy can bestow on an individual for their creative work.

Until now, the much lauded Fellowship has remained an exclusive part of BAFTA's more established pillars, TV and Film. But today's British Academy recognises the massive impact of video games on popular culture and their huge contribution to the whole art form of the moving image.

Hilary Bevan Jones, Chairman of the Academy said "Will's immense, creative body of work and his continued contribution to the industry make him a most worthy recipient of the Fellowship and being such a pioneer, we are thrilled that he will be the first person to receive this honour".

Wright, who is widely accepted as one of the world's leading visionaries in the field of video game design, has been passionately creating games for more than twenty years. Although he has worked on a number of hugely successful games, among them Raid On Bungling Bay (1984), SimCity (1989), SimCity 2000 (1993), SimCity 3000 (1989) and SimCity 4 (2003), he is best known for bringing to fruition one of the best-loved games franchises in history, The Sims - a game whose inspiration sprang from a combination of the aforementioned titles.

Other 'firsts' at this year's Awards include the BAFTA Ones To Watch Award in association with Dare To Be Digital which recognises up-and-coming talent, and the PC World Gamers' Award, the only publicly-voted award of the night (www.obsessedwithgames.co.uk). This year's Awards will be held at London's Battersea Evolution on 23 October. Music acts will include the indie rock band Athlete with another act being confirmed this week. The show will be broadcast on E4 on November 4 at 11pm and repeated the following weekend on Channel 4.

"The Handheld Learning Conference and Exhibition brings together so many thought-leaders it is natural that Nintendo gets involved with this important educational conference," said David Yarnton, Nintendo UK's general manager. "As the biggest supplier of handheld entertainment, Nintendo is already driving learning across all age groups with its products, in particular the Touch Generations series, including Dr Kawashima's Brain Training: How Old is Your Brain? and Big Brain Academy." Graham Brown-Martin, managing director of Handheld Learning added, "The majority of gaming devices - and particularly those by Nintendo - all feature local and wide area networking capabilities, which are exploited by its software titles to enable positive social interaction and networks. Whilst the world has been focusing on the $100 laptop Nintendo had already developed one in the form of the Nintendo DS."

More information on the conference and exhibition can be found at the Handheld Learning 2007 website. [via Next Generation]

US megastar Pharrell Williams launches Halo 3 in the UK

Music icon flies to London to host a video game launch party like never before

London, 18th September 2007: US music superstar Pharrell Williams will fly to the UK next week to host a very special party for the launch of Halo 3, Microsoft reveals today.

As anticipation for the game reaches fever pitch, the music icon and self-confessed gaming fanatic will head to London's BFI IMAX cinema on September 25 to host the 'Halo 3 Premiere' which will see him taking on members of the public at the game, and other major celebrities around Europe via Xbox LIVE.

The red carpet affair, which will be attended by VIPs, celebrities and lucky competition winners is just one of a number of similar events happening around Europe as the world's biggest ever video game is released to the masses. The premiere events, which are taking place in London, Paris, Madrid, Amsterdam and Milan, will be linked via Xbox LIVE as the stars in each country take on each other for this one-off night where gaming meets partying. For consumers and competition winners, it provides a chance to be amongst the very first to see the game, experience content never seen before and play the most hotly anticipated game ever against their celebrity idols.

Following the London Premiere, at midnight, more than 1,000 retail stores across the UK will throw open their doors giving eager fans the chance to be amongst the first to get their hands on the third installment of the legendary series.

The "Halo" franchise is among the biggest worldwide entertainment properties in history and continues to change the way we think about interactive entertainment.

"Halo" is more than just a video game - it's a truly unique entertainment phenomenon and an experience that has expanded beyond games, into bestselling novels, comics, merchandise and more, and captured the attention of millions of fans including gamers, musicians, celebrities, athletes, and even storytelling visionaries like Peter Jackson. First week revenue of the game is set to outstrip major Hollywood blockbusters like Spiderman 3 or the Harry Potter franchise.

Pre orders for "Halo 3" have soared past 1.25 million globally as the world holds its breath and awaits the launch of the title in Europe on September 26th 2007. Microsoft also revealed that production of the game disc itself has reached 81 per second as it gears up for what is expected to be the biggest entertainment launch in history.

In America, people lined up days, no weeks, before the PS3 launched. People with eBay stars in their eyes and money to burn. In England, we are hours away from the console's launch. Retailer GAME canned its midnight launch and will be selling the console early Friday morning. The Virgin Megastore has already opened its doors to "campers," turning the ground-floor into a makeshift "campsite." How many people are in line? Hint: You can count them on one hand. Kat from Shiny Media swung by the Virgin on Oxford Street and has this to report:

The three who were camping inside at 6pm today were keen, the first to arrive, Rititsu Thomas (pictured with me) had turned up on Virgin's doorstep at 5am that morning, but he had many more hours to wait out before someone else joined him, at 11.45am. The third, and last (when I arrived at 5pm) to rock up was Omar, who had got there only a few hours prior to me, was planning on buying six consoles to sell on eBay. Although goodness knows if he'll go through with it, as after hearing me discuss the low profits made by reselling the consoles on eBay with Retitsu, he took me aside and asked me nervously if I recommended he go through with it or not...

Wow, does Omar live under a rock or what? It's still early, but it's not yet what we would call widespread PS3 mania. It's not even a passing fancy. Fear not! There is still time. Brian Ashcraft

Virgin Megastore Line [Pspsps.tv]

Sony is sponsoring a production of Puccini's La Boheme at the London Coliseum and somehow managed to convince the hall to let them set up the console in the foyer for play testing. Classy!

"We don't want the PS3 to be pigeon-holed as a video game console," Carl Christopher from Sony PlayStation UK, told The Times. "We want people to look at PlayStation as a brand in a different way."

Someone, please, go to this opera a get a picture of women in evening gowns playing Resistance: Fall of Man. I must see this picture. Brian Crecente

Playstation 3 goes to the Opera [Hexus]

By: Lesley Smith

Standing outside Square Enix's UK offices is a surreal experience. Slap bang in the middle of London, a stone's throw from the river and a massive roundabout, only the plain sign betrays that inside a normal building is the offices of the publisher responsible for so many great franchises. And my reason for standing there? To mark the European release of Final Fantasy III on the DS and the German and French versions of Final Fantasy XI, Square Enix arranged a press event and interview opportunities with Tanaka Hiromichi-san.

Strolling onto their floor, the first thing which greets you in the lobby is a life-size statue of one of Final Fantasy XII's fearsome Archadian Judges in full armor. PR maestro Alex Huhtala had explained their UK headquarters was just your run-of-the-mill office but, to be fair, normal offices don't have giant armor-wearing Judges! The rest of the floor is just as colorful, walls are decorated with framed Japanese adverts, there are huge replica boxes and standees for Kingdom Hearts, Dragon Quest and, of course, various installments of Final Fantasy.

Moments later I was guided into a large meeting room, dominated by a projector looping footage of Final Fantasy XI and two PCs running the different versions of the game. I grabbed a quick drink and had a go, I have a little knowledge of French and a lot of German from high school and both come in handy. As I played, I started chatting to one of the localisation folk who explained a little about the process.

As lunch rolled in and Square Enix employees began appearing out of the woodwork. it was time to mingle. As well as representatives from various websites and magazines, there was the editorial team from Official Nintendo Magazine, half of Square Enix's own PR department, Tanaka-san himself and his translator Saori-san.

I did find time to play on Final Fantasy III. Like many gamers I've played the original via emulators but the DS version boasts souped up graphics, a truly stunning opening FMV and the use of the touch screen is intuitive and very easy to use. I'm not the world's biggest RPG fan (I prefer games with a beginning, middle and end, rather that ones which require dozens of hours levelling up) but I was impressed. The random battles was a little annoying the I can't wait to get my hands on the final code.

Although I didn't get as much time to play the game as I'd have liked. Final Fantasy III certainly looks to be an excellent port. The touch screen lets you direct characters with a finger or stylus. It did take me a few minutes to figure out exactly how to navigate Luneth through a dungeon but the learning curve is about two minutes. Double tapping will trigger attacks on enemies or open chests and while there is a menu screen, the controls now revolve around the DS Lite's revolutionary feature. The characters are rendered in 3-D with 2-D environments that are much more graphically intensive. Okay the game would never pass on a TV screen but that's not the point; it's ideally suited to the DS and has lots of interesting WiFi options, so I'm told. I got to play from a ROM cart so I don't think all the features, bar the English translation itself were present.

Finally it was time to meet The Man himself. Together with Adam Riley of the Nintendo website Cubed, we headed into an adjacent room to be introduced to Tanaka-san. I normally get nervous when I'm interviewing and this was the second time I'd gotten to grill a founding member of the Final Fantasy franchise. It's still quite a nerve-racking experience and my eyes kept wandering to the DS Lite on the table which was looping the gorgeous Final Fantasy III FMV.

Tanaka-san even had the first Limited Edition Final Fantasy III DS Lite with him. A great photo op was had and Alex made sure to hand me a black gift bag filled with goodies including seven limited edition Final Fantasy III figures (three of which aren't being released in Europe) and a Final Fantasy XI USB drive. Swag just makes press events that much sweeter. While the event was a lot more relaxed and low key than others I've been to (and, frankly, I prefer them like that), it was an excellent day and well worth the four hour train trip down to London Town.

January in Britain. Usually cold, dark and miserably wet (although getting quite scarily balmy these days because of global warming, but that won't stop the tradition of moaning about the weather). What better than a night in the pub with some gaming compadres, total strangers with a shared passion for sticky joysticks and Wii-ing everwhere?

You're in luck. Online alternamag Way Of The Rodent is hosting their own Videogame Awards Ceremony in a London pub on January 25th, 2007.

On THURSDAY the 25th of January 2007 - The Royal George in that-there-London will play host to the first ever Rodent Game Awards. In a tiny downstairs room we shall be awarding the inaugural 'WotR Stars'. All the nominees are invited and we wholly expect absolutely none of them to turn up - so we're going to sit in a corner and drink cherry-beer and reflect on how awful life is.

Check out the categories and nominees here. Book your free tickets and get further details here. Hurry though, at time of posting there were only 27 tickets left. Alice Taylor

Way Of The Rodent's Game Awards Night (thanks Richard!)

Limpit over at WiiDs found this outdoor Wii kiosk in his home town of London. Two young gentlemen in white puffy Wii coats and hats demoed Wii Sports outdoors to an adoring crowd of onlookers on a Samsung HD TV.

This could really add a whole new level of realism to Wii Sports. Imagine dragging your Wii and your big ole TV outside and playing a round of Wii baseball in the rain, just like the professionals do! Your neighbors could pull up lawn chairs and boxes of popcorn and coolers full of beer that they can throw at you when you make a particularly terrible play. It would be the ultimate in virtual reality. Flynn De Marco

Wii Outdoors ?! [WiiDs]

Even if they don't get the system, four of them got sweet limited edition Wii watches. Man, why can't I wait in line in the bitter cold for days and nights and get a Nintendo watch? It's just not fair! Michael McWhertor

Wii Mania Begins in London [IGN]

At the keynote for the 2006 London Games Summit, Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios [Europe] V.P. Michael Denny got down to brass tacks on the future of gaming. And it is? In the hands of you and me, the consumers. Game site Gamasutra was on hand, and reports that Denny said, "consumers have more choices, want better things and have louder voices." And we are making our voices being made over the internet—hence, the niche market growth.

For those worrying about Sony's online service, fear not. Sony is taking this very seriously. Well, at least Denny is. He points out that:

It is becoming unlikely that any new computers purchased will not be used standalone, without the internet. This is how we feel about the PlayStation 3.

Reassuring, indeed. Microsoft has already hot wired its console and is taking advantage of the intertubes. Denny adds that it is necessary to inspire new gamers, connect them in new ways and extend both gameplay and franchise value. It, he notes, will take careful planning on the industry's part. "This requires the most fundamental shift that our industry has ever seen," Denny believes. Well said. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Gamasutra]

All eyes are on Japan right now, but today is miserably the last day of the Tokyo Game Show, so what's up next? London steps in with a more compact and bijou offering: the London Games Festival, kicking off shortly on October 2. It looks like there'll be a ton of games to play at a special setup in Oxford Street's HMV; plus there are various other events, venues and showcases, neatly repeated across the week so scheduling visits shouldn't be too complicated.

That Trocadero is a grubby old place, though. You'll want to take some sanitary handwipes, it's as sticky as a Roppongi nightclub in there. Alice Taylor

London Games Festival.

Sometimes you really do wish a picture were better. Or at least taken with a camera the aperture of which was not jellied up with a thick layer of K-Y.

BitChain took this great picture of Inky, Blinky, Whasisface and Clyde prancing their way around Golden Square in Soho, London. They were promoting Pac-Man's incursion onto Xbox Live Arcade, apparently.

"Quite disruptive to my hamburger eating and girl watching," BitChain writes. I'm not sure about that. Look close enough at Pac-Man's shoes and it becomes clear he's either a girl, or crapping out the lower half of one. Florian Eckhardt