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Alabama is No. 1 in the First Top 25 Poll of the Season
News and notes from around the world of sports video gaming: • The Associated Press and the USA Today Coaches’ Poll won’t send in their preseason ballots for another few weeks, but that hasn’t stopped EA Sports from releasing its first poll—the preseason Top 25 of the 2012-2013 season in NCAA Football 13. This is…
By Owen Good -
SmartGlass Could Make Wii U a Better Sports Console, Too
There was so little mention of the Wii U by Electronic Arts, or any sports publisher at E3, I felt compelled to double-check with Madden‘s boss that they still were building a version for it. “Well, Peter [Moore] announced it on stage last year,” said Cam Weber, the label’s general manager of American football, breaking…
By Owen Good -
Dependable Pest Control With Centipede: Origins
Centipede‘s premise didn’t make much sense to me when I was nine years old. What the hell is this spaceship doing shooting mushrooms? I thought. Then I saw the box art for the Atari 5200 adaptation—in the days when box art made everything look much more compelling—and got it. Centipede: Origins, for iOS and Android…
By Owen Good -
Minecraft Ban Leads to SWAT Team Assault
Last year, the Washington state legislature was said to be considering stronger laws and punishments against “SWATting,” which is trolls’ cute way to take revenge when something displeases them in an online game. They phone a fake call to your local cops and next thing you know, armed deputies are crawling around the backyard. I’d…
By Owen Good -
Report: NBA 2K13‘s Cover will Feature NBA Elite‘s Star
NBA 2K13 is running a Twitter campaign enticing folks to fill in tiny squares on a jigsaw puzzle to reveal the next star or stars gracing the basketball title’s cover. Pastapadre has obtained an image that, while not the cover art itself, contains three extremely unsubtle hints about who the honorees will be. In the…
By Owen Good -
College Football’s New Postseason Presents a Few Options for NCAA Football to Run
College football is all but certainly headed for a four-team playoff in 2014, a move that would dramatically alter not only the game on the field but the one on the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3. The plan is not yet finalized, and even if it was, it is way too late to get…
By Owen Good -
NHL 13 Crowns Its Cover Star at the League’s Awards Night
Claude Giroux, a pivotal figure in the Philadelphia Flyers’ run to the Stanley Cup Final in 2010, was named the star of the cover of NHL 13 at the league’s annual awards banquet on Wednesday night, prevailing over Pekka Rinne, the Nashville goalie, in a fan-voted contest. Giroux won out after an extremely long—March 29…
By Owen Good -
NBA 2K13 Starts to Tease its Next Cover Star
News and notes from around the world of sports video gaming: • The second week after E3 is typically when 2K Sports cranks up the hypeotron for NBA 2K, and we’re hearing the engine hum right on schedule. The game’s social media operation is asking people to tweet what they hope or want to see…
By Owen Good -
How Long Can NCAA Remain Above the Anger Against Madden?
Both are made by EA Sports. Both are American football titles. Both are made under exclusive license, and both come out every year. Speak the name of NCAA Football, and no one brings up NCAA College Football 2K3. But say anything about Madden, and every gamer with a commenting account starts chanting for the ultimate…
By Owen Good -
Culture
Gods and Heroes
Two heavy-hitters step up on Tuesday—Civilization V and LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes. Others of note include the Avengers Chronicles suite of four Marvel-themed tables in Pinball FX2 and Marvel Pinball, and Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor Monday • Pokemon Conquest (DS) Tuesday • Marvel Pinball: Avengers Chronicles (PSN) • Sid Meier’s Civilization V: Gods…
By Owen Good -
Call of Duty‘s Next Two Maps Could be Modern Warfare 2 Throwbacks
According to this video, the map names “Shipbreaker” and “Terminal” briefly appeared in the map selection list of Modern Warfare 3‘s private match menu, apparently tipping off the names of two maps to come in the game’s next DLC drop this month. The enthusiast site CallofDutyMapPacks.com speculates that “Shipbreaker” could be a new Face Off…
By Owen Good -
Grand Theft Auto‘s Boss is Skeptical of Wii U’s Appeal to Core Titles
Whatever you think of Take-Two or its boss, the company’s principles are clear and they don’t deviate from them. Titles like Max Payne and BioShock and Spec Ops: The Line get delayed because the publisher won’t put out anything before it’s truly ready. And it’ll walk from high profile licenses like Major League Baseball because…
By Owen Good -
Playing a Video Game to Remember an Historic Day in Sport—or to Forget It
We’re all familiar with the conventional wisdom that at halftime of a championship sporting event, the local water system is strained by fans’ long-postponed evacuations of a beer or three. Well, after full time of a major fixture, FIFA‘s Internet pipe is likewise overflowing with teeth-gritting angst and cathartic release, too. Probably the best example…
By Owen Good -
Ubisoft Movie Plans May Include Splinter Cell and Watch Dogs
Fresh off a rumor saying Paramount is considering a Splinter Cell film comes word that several domains have been registered for a movie version of Watch Dogs, the surprise sensation of E3 after a strongly positive debut. Fusible, the domain watch dog watching Watch Dogs, says that just this week Ubisoft registered Watch-Dogsmovie.com and Watch-Dogsthemovie.com,…
By Owen Good -
I Want to See The Amazing Spider-Man—and Spider-Man on a Budget, Too
From the same demented minds that gave us The Avengers—on a Budget now comes the summer’s next thriftily made blockbuster—The Amazing Spider-Man—on a Budget It’s another (mostly) shot-for-shot recreation of the upcoming film’s trailer, featuring loads of super string and, once again, a shirtless guy in green body paint. Gwen Stacy’s totally not hot but…
By Owen Good -
Pika-Chewed
I’m not the world’s biggest Pokémon expert, but I do know that half a dozen schoolchildren fisting a Pikachu is an image too rich to pass up for this week’s Shop Contest. Really, you need me to explain what’s going on here? OK well, actually, I can’t. Bash, our Japanese speaker, can’t, either. In his…
By Owen Good
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