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Looks like Microsoft is turning game show Hole in the Wall, the Western take on Japan's Nōkabe (aka Brain Wall or colloquially "Human Tetris"), into an Xbox 360 game. And, yes, that does seem like a very natural fit for Kinect... More »
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This story involves Germany and a video game packed with violent content, so yeah, you can already imagine where things are headed from here. More »
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While Activision's plans for a Guitar Hero game highlighting the music and career of Van Halen is a poorly kept secret, the publisher hasn't yet officially announced it. But the German game ratings board has. More »
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[UPDATE - EA contacted us to let us know the German version has two covers; a paper sleeve and the actual DVD case. Only the paper sleeve features this edited box art]The Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle, or USK, are Germany's classification board. And as you may already be aware, they're a conservative bunch, banning games that even Australia let slide. But this, this is new. Witness Germany's box art for Valve's upcoming zombie co-op shooter, Left 4 Dead. Notice anything, uh, different? That's right. We don't know whether the USK had a say in this, or whether Valve/EA just felt like playing it safe, either way, that's a different box. While every other region's cover art shows a left hand with the thumb bitten off - zombies feast on the flesh of the living, you see, it's a joke - on the German version, the thumb's simply tucked in behind the hand there. No gore. How humourless. More »
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And that's all we know! Because all we know is that a rating for the game has turned up on the website of the Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle (ie the USK, ie Germany's classification board), it's got a 12 rating, it's only for the PS3, and it is, apparently, a military strategy game. Seeing as we've never heard of this before, odds are good that it's a PSN title. Odds are equally good that we'll be seeing it at some stage during Sony's lone ranger press conference at Leipzig next week. More »
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Last time I ever give the USK (Germany's classification board) any credit. German gaming site areagames is reporting that the Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle have refused EA's Army of Two classification, effectively banning the title from retail sale in the country. A quick search of the USK's website seems to confirm this, as the title doesn't turn up in classification searches (nor do other "banned" titles like Dead Rising). Anyone able to point out what makes this so different from the 1,943 "men with guns" games they've seen fit to OK over the past twelve months? More »
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Germany, it's OK. Despite the USK banning games like they were going out of style throughout 2007, they've managed to see fit to OK Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto IV for release. Sure, it's got itself a retail-unfriendly 18+ rating, but a release is a release. With Australia and now Germany - the West's two toughest nations when it comes to classification - having signed off on the game, Rockstar must be breathing one deep, raspy sigh of relief. More »
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Looks like German Xbox 360 owners are going to have a harder time getting their Crackdown fix, as the German software ratings board, Unterhaltungssoftware Selbskontrolle, has refused to rate the sci-fi, cel-shady, third-person action game. More »
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First, Dead Rising gets "nixed" by Germany's rating board, the Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle, and next up on its chopping block: Gears of War. The USK has decided not to rate the chainsaw-gun-shooting game. Instead of making the necessary changes to get approval for sale, Microsoft has decided not to publish the game in Deutschland. So, we call all safely say this USK pretty much sucks, huh? Brian Ashcraft More »
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