Brian Crecente

Bayonetta, MadWorld, The Conduit Lookin’ Fine

In case you missed it, today turned out to be SEGA DAY! Happy Sega Day, go hug a hedgehog!* To celebrate we posted impressions, mostly hands-on, with The Conduit, Bayonetta and Madworld. Also a very red video for one of those. Check it out: MadWorld Paints the Wii Red: Hands-On Impressions The Conduit Channels Hardcore…

Meet This Generation’s PS3 or Xbox 360-Toting Neo-Geo

The Game Gate VU, unveiled this week at the Amusement Trade Exhibition International in London, is a device that will let arcade operators charge people to play console video games. That’s right, it’s essentially a Neo-Geo-esque demo station with a coin slot acceptor. Though it does look like this machine will also sport online support…

Suspected U.S. Spy Paid By Russians in Cash-Stuffed Playstation Games

The son of convicted CIA spy, Harold Nicholson, is accused of selling national secrets to the Russians in return for cash that he snuck into the country stuffed in Playstation game cases. That’s really the only tie to gaming this bizarre espionage case, which now goes back more than ten years, has. But it’s intriguing…

Bayonetta Brings Devil May Cry Aesthetic To a New Level

From Croft to Cammy, I’ll take a female protagonist over some cheesy line-spewing pretty boy any day of the week. So Bayonetta, the upcoming third-person actioner from Platinum Games (compiled of key members from Okami’s Clover Studio), is high on my list of games to play. While I’m inclined to focus on the the eponymous,…

Blagojevich Corruption Strategy Game Coming to iPhone

One of the visual effects team members for the Watchman movie just finished their first iPhone game, a title that has gamers selling off bits of Illinois government, Blagojevich-style, in Dope Wars-esque gameplay. Pa2Play was just submitted to Apple for final approval, in preparation for getting the App Store game out to the public. Described…

The Conduit Channels Hardcore Gaming To the Wii: Hands-On

It’s clear that High Voltage Software are excited about the ability of The Conduit, their upcoming first-person shooter geared for hardcore gamers, to ratchet the Wii’s technology several notches past what it’s previously pulled off. At a recent hands-on demo, the game’s art director, Matt Corso, was dropping all kinds of techie jargon into my…

MadWorld Paints the Wii Red: Hands-On Impressions

My moments spent playing MadWorld earlier this week had me recalling cult faves like Killer 7 and No More Heroes. This Platinum Games title brings way-over-the top violence and stylized visuals to the Mii-making masses and backs them with intuitive controls and tight camera work. Despite the red-heavy screens we’ve all been looking at since…

Reviewing Flawed Code

To: Ash From: Crecente Re: Golly, Pie With Cheese Is Good I know I’ve ranted about this before, but I just don’t get how so many people can write reviews of games using early builds and just ignore the issues. Sure they’re issues that will most likely be fixed for retail release. But what if…

Prince of Persia’s DLC to Bring Three More Hours of Gaming

That new Prince of Persia downloadable content planned for a Feb. 26 release will add three new hours of gameplay to the title, Ubisoft said today. The still-unpriced-content will continue the story of the Price and Elika through the Underground Palace. Other pack goodies include: New Power: Energize – Reconstruct destroyed areas of the environment…

LittleDeskCalendar

No, it never does get old. Seen here is a pretty spiffy LittleBigPlanet-themed desk calendar that reader Renor, from Poland, received as a promotional item from SCEP. The book is about 400 pages thick.

CNN Gets Giddy Over Obama Simulator

Embedded video from CNN Video We’ve mentioned Obama simulator Commander in Chief before, but it’s nice to see that the Geo Political computer game is getting a little face time on CNN. I think this could be a pretty interesting game. I actually enjoyed playing The Political Machine when it first came out… for a…

Leipzig GamesCon Goes MMO, Mobile Only, Cologne Gamescom Ready to Pump You Up

What’s a European gamer to do? With the once enormous Leipzig Games Convention fractured, two new gaming conventions are popping up around the same time to take its place. Technically, the Leipzig Games Convention still exists, but the folks putting it on just announced that they’ve decided to refocus the gaming event on just online…

Boom Blox Bash Party in Pictures

Two of them to be exact. Early this morning Electronic Arts announced that they are working on a sequel to Wii ball-tosser Boom Blox. Boom Blox Bash Party comes with 400 new levels and some interesting settings, including under water and in zero gravity. “In BOOM BLOX Bash Party we are taking the game elements…

Nobel Prize Museum Goes Postal

Infamously infamous first-person shooter Postal 2 will be making an appearance at the Nobel Museum in Stockholm, the game’s developer’s said today. The footage of the game will be shown as part of the museum’s exhibit on freedom of speech: Freedom of Speech: How Free is Free? Game developer Running with Scissors says they were…

Competitive StarCraft Gets UC Berkeley Class

A new course being offered at UC Berkeley aims to teach students how to enjoy the “art of competitive StarCraft”. Suggested prerequisites includes a working knowledge of StarCraft strategy and suggested reading includes The Art of War by Sun Tzu and Crazy as Me by Lim Yo Hwan. While the course isn’t listed on the…

Persona 4: Reflecting The Self

Recent Persona games have become cult hits thanks largely to their gameplay framework — traditional Japanese RPG leveling mechanics reframed around personal improvement, social relationships and the concept of the self. And though it’s about the lead character’s ultimately linear story arc, this framework subtly becomes about the player’s self, too. Persona 3 and Persona…

Edge Guesstimates The US and UK’s Top Selling Video Games of 08

The Edge put together an intriguing list of top video game sales that looks at the combined totals of the US and the UK. Since all retail sales number are really just estimates, including NPD and Chart-Track, Edge’s analysis seems pretty dead on to me. They used both NPD and Chart-Track and then combines platform…

The ESA Spent $4.2M Lobbying for $22B Industry Last Year

The Entertainment Software Association spent a record $4.2 million on federal lobbying in 2008, Gamasutra reports this morning. In the fourth quarter alone the industry trade group spent $1,1 million. The money was spent in lobbying efforts of both chambers of Congress on broadband development, online gaming and immigration issues. While that’s a 25.6 percent…

Hands Inside The SFIV Tournament Edition FightStick

Yesterday I wrote up my review of Mad Catz’ Street Fighter IV Tournament Edition FightStick. If you’re interested in seeing what this controller, and its Sanwa parts, look like on the inside check out this video. After shooting the video, I did a bit more research and discovered that I was right about the Sanwa…

Oh, The Games We Play

To: Ash From: Crecente Re: Hooray For Hermit Shopping You think your indoor clothes shopping spree is bad? My wife bought me shirts that are reversible for Christmas. That’s right, I’m allowed to wear them two days in a row! Man, I’ve picked the absolute worst time to get completely addicted to Fallout 3. I…