Kotaku: tie-in

Ubisoft - No More 'Heroes'

Stuart Houghton — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 15:20:00 MST

Ubisoft has cancelled its plans for a game based on NBC's Heroes.

"The rights to the ‘Heroes’ video game have reverted back to NBC Universal," said a decisive Jaime Cottnic, Ubisoft's PR director, "Ubisoft will no longer produce a video game based on the TV series.”

It's a bit of a shame - especially as Ubisoft can seemingly bang out games about all kinds of random subjects on a seemingly daily basis - but perhaps understandable now that Season 3 seems to be dropping Nielsen points like they burn it's very flesh.

While the overcooked time travel plotlines and surfeit of characters with daddy issues could do with a trim on TV, I can't help but think that it would work really well as a multi-character RPG or thoughtful action adventure. Any developers out there want to pick this one up for cheap?

Ubisoft Drops Plans For ‘Heroes’ Game [MTV Multiplayer]

Warner's Not Playing Safe WIth Watchmen

Stuart Houghton — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:20:00 MDT

Warner Bros are quite convinced that releasing an episodic downloadable Watchmen tie-in game is not only innovative, but actually rather brave.

"We know it’s risky for us, and the safe move would have been to cram out a retail game alongside the film release," Senior VP Samantha Ryan told MCV, "but we didn’t feel that was the right decision.”

Surely the risk with Watchmen isn't the length of the game, the media it arrives in or how closely it aligns with the film's release.. it is the fact that Watchmen is such a beloved comic that fans are convinced it is going to stink up the place before seeing even a few pixels and will hunt you down, vigilante style if it is worse than they fear?

Warner: 'Watchmen release is industry first' [MCV]

Fox Gets Terminators In Our iPhones

Stuart Houghton — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 17:20:00 MDT

Noooo! Anyone who has seen Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles will tell you two things - 1) lady terminators are pretty and 2) if the bloody things can get on the internet they can hack anything and cause all kinds of hassle.

Fox has only gone and introduced the glow-eyed menaces to the iPhone. Great. Now death will be both swift AND stylish.

Terminator: Ambush is a mini MMO that can be played via the iPhone or a web browser. the idea is that players using the web interface hunt down and terminate those using the iPhone version. There is a GPS component to the game, so don't play if you actually are being hunted by a killer robot - this will lead them right to you.

FOX Launches ‘Terminator’-themed, location-based MMORPG [Touch Arcade]

New CSI: NY Game Lets You Play TV Characters

Stuart Houghton — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:20:00 MDT

CSI Fans always a seem a little ghoulish to me. Admit it - part of the fun is in the increasingly intricate forms of death and the kind forensic detail that could give George Romero the willies.

It's not clear yet how much corpse-rummaging will be involved in the new CSI: NY game from Ubisoft, but what you will get — for the first time in a CSI game — is the chance to play some of the actual characters from the show.

Five new cases have been created by writers from the show and then illustrated in a new 'graphic novel' style of cartoony animation. It looks quite nice, although I would be hard pressed to identify that guy as Gary Sinese without the caption. Maybe there is some kind of likeness licensing issue.

A new interrogation feature lets you keep pushing suspects in different directions to wear them down and ferret out the info you need.

Other than that it looks like minigame business as usual trying to triangulate bullet trajectories, reconstruct evidence and crack codes.

Crack the case with new 'CSI: NY' game [Monsters and Critics]

Topps Launches Candy Coated Speed Racer Web Game

fdemarco — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 12:00:00 MDT

Topps, the purveyors of candy treats have just launched a little racing web based game to help promote the upcoming Speed Racer Movie, Speed Racer Candy Tracks The game is exactly what you'd expect from the title, a racing game with a Topps candy tie in. The tie in coming from a massive onslaught of in game advertising for all of their products from Bazooka gum to Ring Pops. The tracks may be pink and candy coated but this Flash game already seems ten times more interesting than the bore fest that is Speed Racer the Video Game. I'm sorry, but having to tack on "the Video Game" at the end automatically puts it on my "don't buy list."

Topps' Speed Racer Candy Tracks Game [Topps]

Transformers: The Movie: The Game Hits "Day And Date" Of Film

Michael McWhertor — Sun, 02 Jul 2006 21:57:08 MDT

Amid the feel good news that Hollywood and the video game industry benefit from eachother comes this little nugget of news: The Transformers video game—the one based on the upcoming Michael Bay movie, not a re-issue of the previous capable Transformers game—will hit stores the same day the movie hits theatres. For those of you keeping score, thats July 4th of 2007.

The game will be coming courtesy of Digital Domain, a production house recently purchased by Mr. Bay's Wyndcrest Holdings, LLC. They'll apparently be "sharing assets" with the film crew, so expect the game to stay true to the film from a visuals standpoint.

I'm nervously excited about the prospect of a live action Transformers flick, but this is Michael Bay we're talking about here. Michael McWhertor

Hollywood & Games: helping hype each other [Gamespot]