Goshdangit! My NASCAR 09 Gamesave Done Blowed Up!

WTF is going on at EA Sports? First came the manifold glitches and problems in NCAA 09, now we're seeing accounts of corrupt profiles forcing Xbox 360 racers to ditch their gamesaves and start all over.

After reaching a certain level of progress — the theory is cumulative laps driven, as it's struck gamers at differing points in their careers — the profile becomes corrupted and freezes the game right at the load screen. There is no other way to play the game except to delete the file and start all over. You can see a video of it here — but it takes 7 minutes to explain what was just said above. There is, however, a swell parakeet whistling in the background.

Of course, using a memory stick and disabling auto-save is one workaround. That doesn't help anyone who had no idea he'd bought a defective game and finds out about this after putting 20 or 30 hours worth of effort into it.

Reader S.H. (who tipped us here) says EA Sports is not responding to forum posts, emails or any calls for help (which the video helpfully points out). No wonder they're putting Peter Moore's face into a boxing game. That'll probably crash, too.

Seriously, EA Sports, why is it amateur hour all of a sudden? What the fuck is the matter with you people?

Soulcalibur IV Breaks Street Part II: Gameplay Video

Yesterday we posted pictures of guys who got their hands on Soulcalibur IV, 10 days before its release date of July 29. Today, we have video. I guess you can just walk into any store and ask them to break the street date and get your game. Here's Yoda vs. Ivy, Yoda taking it 4-1 with a lot of button mashing and bad camera work. If the game looks repetitive, I think these guys' admittedly bad technique (" I hadn't played a Soul Calibur title since Soul Calibur 2 a couple years ago, so our match is pretty bad.") might be to blame, not the game. If any of you manage to snag this, we'd appreciate a more informed breakdown of gameplay in the comments.

Soul Calibur [sic] IV Gameplay [Youtube]

This Wii Hard Drive Is So Damn Phony (And Funny)

See that picture of a supposed Wii hard drive? It's from a tipster, and a note on the Flickr page where it appears reads:

After several days, today I could shoot a prototype hard drive for the Wii. According to what we've been seeing these days, work is well underway and I think it could be submitted on July 15 at the Kodak Theatre.
I would like to have one to experiment ^_^

But this "prototype" is fake. Like, really, really, really fake. Hilariously so. Okay, let's say that Nintendo actually did put stickers on prototypes that read "Confidential Property of Nintendo". Hey, maybe they do! See that picture of the label? It's kind of hard to make out the Japanese, but there is Japanese. And Nintendo is a Japanese company. As a Japanese company, Nintendo does know how to use the Japanese language correctly. The person who made that sticker does not. At all. So let's look at where this "prototype hard drive" exposes itself as a big, fat faker. That, after the jump.

American McGee Gives Gamers Free Grimm

Once Upon A Time, American McGee decided to create an episodic game based on fairy tales like Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk and Beauty and the Beast with a dark twist.

Better still, McGee decided that those episodes, their are eight in the first volume, will be free to play for the first 24 hours of release. The best is that the very first episode, A Boy Learns What Fear Is, will be permanently free when it hits on July 31.

Those who want to play the rest of the games episodes at their leisure will have to sign up for the GameTap Gold service. Not a bad idea. It certainly shows just how much faith GameTap has in the game.

Hit the jump for the break down of episodes and scans from the press release story book that GameTap sent along today. Be warned, it ends with everyone dying!

Drugs Are Bad, May Lead To Urine-Soaked Consoles

There's nothing that will make one feel more confident about one's life choices than combing through the police blotter. As a gamer and roommate myself, the Seattle Post Intelligencer's "Seattle 911" blog — which does the police report harvesting for you — makes me feel like one of the world's finest human beings. In a recent story about a scuffle between a pot head and his live-in gamer buddy, we learn not resolve our differences as these two do.

According to Seattle 911, after one too many disagreeable bong-hitting sessions, the roommate who gets high only on life shattered said bong on the sidewalk. Bong-smasher was met the next day with a wet Xbox that "smelled like urine" and controllers that were partially glued to... something. No arrests were made.

Clearly not news, just one of those daily affirmation type stories that reminds you that you're not a total loser.

Dumb criminal tricks [Seattle 911 - thanks, Ted?]

Postal Wins Award... Really

Uwe Boll must be on cloud nine, maybe even ten or eleven.

Running with Scissors just announced that his Postal film won not one, but two awards at the Hoboken International Film Festival. Boll took home $500 cash money for the best director award, beating out the directors of films like Crazy, Strange Girls, The Sensei and Flyboys. Oh, snap! Boll beat out D. Lee Inosanto!!!

Postal also was named the best of the festival despite showings of The Noogies, In The Eyes of a Killer, Predator’s Return and The Pack.

"When the fans speak, WE WIN,” said Vince Desi, the movies executive producer and founder of Running With Scissors. “We know this from our experience in the game industry and now the film business just confirms it. The continued success of the POSTAL franchise in all its forms is proof that democracy works; you cannot stop what’s in the hearts of the people. Freedom will always triumph over tyranny."

The New Jersey awards fly in the face of the movies mysterious box office opening when it hit 13 screens nationwide, and put a little salve on Boll's ego, bruised when hundreds walked from a free screening of the movie earlier this month... oh wait, that was at the same festival.

Ladies And Gentlemen, Master Chief As Balloons

We'll admit to not following advancements in balloon animal technology, so we were understandably blown away to see this nearly life-sized Master Chief inflatable construction—clearly not an animal. This is the stuff of dreams and nightmares, the work of a balloonsmith known as Balloon Guy, a master of the latex folding arts. Based out of Provo, Utah, Balloon Guy says he'll make almost anything "as long as it's family friendly." He's also in possession of a rather dapper vest!

Balloon Guy has an equally impressive/horrific Mario on display, but some of these things are not for the queasy. Regardless of what potential nightmares await, we've yet to see such an impressive display of video game characters constructed from balloons, like, ever.

Balloon Guy Entertainment [The Official Site - thanks, Ty!]

London Boy Has Copy Of Donkey Konga Signed By Amy Winehouse For Some Reason

Look, I don't get what's going on here either—and, yes, this is clearly not news—but apparently singer and controlled substance enthusiast Amy Winehouse will autograph whatever is handed to her when someone visits her London residence. A perfect example is that someone, a boy named Laurence we're told, knocked on Ms. Winehouse's door, offered up a copy of Donkey Konga for the Gamecube and a set of bongo controllers, upon which she scrawled something. I assume she then went off to pick fresh scabs while googly-eyed.

It's notable for being one of the few good uses for Donkey Konga bongo controllers and perfect as a response to confusing internet situations. You're welcome to make a copy with text that reads "I have no idea what you're talking about, so here's a picture of Amy Winehouse with bongo controllers."

Image via Bauer-Griffin.

Grand Theft Auto: DUI

If you listen to the brayings of uninformed crisis-mongers like CNN's Glenn Beck, you'd get the idea that Grand Theft Auto IV not only requires drunk driving in the game, but also is training people to do it in real life, and convincing them they can get away with it. Seems plausible. After all, Guitar Hero has also convinced millions they too can play a guitar and get away with it in real life.

This NSFW long-awaited (and teased) Kotaku original video, conceived with a lot of suffering (and you'll see it in the end) explores how easy, and hard, it is to do things drunk in GTA IV. And yes, we're carrying it to a logical — and inappropriate — extreme. There's more discussion (and spoilers? I feel stupid typing that) after the jump. So watch it on the front page — probably not around polite company either — and then go looking for more.

Ubisoft's Haze is a futuristic first person shooter from developers Free Radical Design. Set in 2048 and a war torn world in which private military company Mantel Global Industries acts as private peacekeeper, with organizations like the UN and NATO a thing of the past, players control Sergeant Shane Carpenter who has been deployed to the Boa region of South America to help neutralize the Promise Hand rebellion. With the help of a performance enhancing drug known as Nectar, Shane and his fellow Mantel troopers are on the hunt for a man known as "Skin Coat."

For better or worse, Haze carries the distinction of being a PlayStation 3 exclusive and has the development pedigree of being created by the team responsible for seminal console shooters like GoldenEye 007 and the Timesplitters series. Unfortunately for Free Radical—and gamers—Haze won't be as fondly remembered as those two first person classics.

Your Game Consoles Have Hazardous Chemicals!

Nintendo used to be bad for the environment. Now? Just sorta bad! Last year, Greenpeace singled the Kyoto-based game maker by giving it the lowest score in its "Guide to Greener Electronics" had ever awarded to a company — a 0/10. Part of the reason for this dubious honor was that Nintendo failed to provide any data about its environmental standards. Nintendo issued a response, and Greenpeace still wasn't satisfied. (In comparison, Microsoft got a 2.7/10 and Sony got a 7.3/10). Zeina Al-Hajj, Greenpeace's International Toxic Campaign co-ordinator points out:

Sony has a very good record in our ranking guide. They have committed to eliminating these chemicals from mobile devices. But why are we finding them in such high percentages in a console? This is a tool used by children in our homes. None of these chemicals exist in Sony's Vaio laptop. So if they can do it for a laptop, why can't they push this for the console also?

Greenpeace has taken things into its own hands. Literally. The environmental organization has dissected each of the three major game consoles and examined how environmentally sound the consoles' innards are.

Results, after the jump. Onward!

Interview: Playboy Cyber Girl of the Year Is A True Player

Do Playboy models love video games? On a first meeting with Jo Garcia, it'd be easy to levy skepticism. She's Playboy's "Cyber Girl Of The Year," beating out 52 weeks of rival models in an online-only competition. It just happens, Garcia said, that she's "really big into games."

We've seen many beautiful faces representing themselves as gamers, of course; booth babes, models and even amateur cam girls using photos of themselves posed suggestively with game paraphernalia to sell products or drive web hits. Because of this phenomenon, every time you see a so-called "hot gamer chick," the temptation is to assume she can't possibly be an actual gamer.

So is Jo Garcia the real deal? Full interview - and slightly NSFW pics - follow the jump.

It's MiWi v Vii In Battle For Chinese Wii Rip-Off Supremacy

Looks like the Vii's got some competition! This is the MiWi, by China's Eittek Electronics, and it's got the Vii beat in several key areas. Firstly, it's got a "W" in the name, just like the real Wii! Secondly, it comes not just with two controllers that look like Wii Remotes, but a bonus third controller that's equally familiar-looking. Finally - and perhaps most importantly - it also comes with a range of crummy "peripheral" add-ons like clip-on tennis racquets and golf clubs, to really round out that Wii-owning experience.

miwi game console is nothing like a wii, really [technabob]

Game With a Brain put up this render of Scorpion yesterday, didn't say where they got it from but it might be an in-game pose. Pretty nice uniform update, with the bone mask and all; but his tunic looks sorta like one of those beaded massagers cab drivers sit on. I kid, Mr. Scorpion, I kid.

So someone already did Dress Like Niko, can anyone tell me how much this business-caz ensemble goes for? I think I could pull off that look.

And remember children, bone masks are OK. Skull bongs are not.

Image of the Day: Scorpion Gets a Spiffy New Look [Game With a Brain]

Mario Kart Wii, the other half of our nonstop new release blitz for the past month, releases today, too. So all is not GTA IV. If any of you backsliding heathens skipped church to snag your copy, assuming ya don't have blue laws forbidding the sale of video games 'afore 1 pee em in your county, let us know what you think in the comments.

For those who've been consumed by all things Niko and Liberty City, you can see what the fuss is at the following links.

Justify Your Mario Kart Wii
Mario Kart Wii Driving School Impressions
The Kartokumentary
Mario Kart Wii Across America
A 6-Year-Old's Take on the Wii Wheel
Going Online With Mario Kart Wii (And Hands On With That Wheel Thing)

How Are You Preparing for GTA IV's Arrival?

Grand Theft Auto IV has been on pre-order in my Amazon account ever since I got laid off last May and bought a lot of crap with my severance. The original release date was, what, October? At that time I thought I'd still be looking for work, and GTA is one of the great unemployed game franchises of all time. But fortunately (or not, if you have really distorted priorities) I have a job now.

So, I'm seriously considering taking a day off of work April 29, or whenever it gets here. I made an ultra-quick decision on a new apartment just so I could be fully moved in by the time it arrives. Ordinarily, I never leave a forwarding address, just to give bill collectors the slip. I will this time just in case it gets sent to my old address after I leave. And there are other little subtle things going on that, at root, are preparations for the arrival of this mammoth game.

My consoles absolutely hate Ben Heck. Every time he releases a new mod, such as this gorgeous PlayStation 3 laptop, similar to his Xbox 360 Elite laptop from awhile back, I tend to spend many hours sitting in my living room, eyes moving curious from consoles to the cabinet where I keep my (barely used) tools. With my degree of electronics knowledge, this is the game console equivalent of having someone quietly staring first at you, and then at a loaded gun in front of them, over and over again. Luckily for them I've yet to work up the nerve, though I do have an extra PSone sitting around gathering dust. I think I just heard it whimper.

Ben Heck's Latest Wonder Project: PS3 Laptop [Gizmodo]