Even the Cemeteries Are Gorgeous in Akaneiro: Demon Hunters

American McGee and his Shanghai-based studio Spicy Horse continue to polish one of the most beautiful browser-based / Android games I’ve seen. With open beta looming, let’s take a look at the dark and lovely Bloodroot Cemetery, the latest area revealed for Akaneiro: Demon Hunters Akaneiro is a action role-playing game that combines Japanese mythology…

Hacker Says He’s Cracked Open The Wii U, CPU Is ‘Nothing To Write Home About’

Hector Martin, he who put together the first open-source driver for Microsoft’s Kinect two years ago, now says he’s cracked open the Wii U. He won’t say what he did to get the details out of Nintendo’s latest console, but he did tweet some juicy (and very, very technical) tidbits about the system: So what…

Writer Rumble Lets You Beat Fools Up in a Spelling Bee Deathmatch

A while back, Gamefly announced that they’d be getting into the game publishing business. Writer Rumble is the first game out of the gate and it turns out to be a surprisingly fun affair. You get to pick from six influential scribes—Edgar Allen Poe, Agatha Christie, the Brothers Grimm, Jane Austen, Homer or H.P. Lovecraft—who…

Entertainment Weekly Picked The 10 Best Games Of the Past 10 Years. Be Happy. Be Angry. Vote?

Why wait for a year ending in nine or zero or one to pick the best games of the past decade? Entertainment Weekly is picking the best games of the decade this year, 2012. It’s not that they wager the world is ending and that we’re wrapping up the final decade ever. It’s that Spike…

These 14 Games Are Going in The Same Museum as Van Gogh’s Starry Night

New York City’s Museum of Modern Art ranks as one of the most prestigious museums in the world. You can go there to see iconic creations like Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans and Pablo Picasso’s The Bullfight, as well as taking in exhibition on thrilling and important art movements throughout history. And now you can…

The Next Big Social Word Game is Also a Horse Racing Game

Only in the mobile gaming sector could a developer not only come up with an idea as convoluted as combining betting on and racing horses with Scrabble, but turn that idea into what could be the next smash-hit social word game. Mention Mobile’s Word Derby turns tile-based word-assembly into a horse race. Up to four…

Check out this week’s Side Mission podcast to hear Jason Schreier talk about JRPGs, Wii U, and high school drama.

The Original Deus Ex‘s Visual Overhaul Is Ready For Activation

I generally have a save game going in the original Deus Ex at all times, picking it up a couple of times a month to peck away at the story and relive old times. I hadn’t yet downloaded the “New Vision” mod that was partially released last August, mostly because I figured if I was…

YouTuber: I Was Banned From Making Money Because Of An Over-Zealous Fan [UPDATE]

Like a lot of people on YouTube, Nick Reineke makes videos about games. And like a lot of people on YouTube, he wants to make money off those videos. But he can’t. Last month, YouTube banned him from AdSense, the advertising service that most YouTubers use to make money. It’s not clear exactly why he…

Sony Sold 525,000 PS3s Last Week

The week of Thanksgiving marks one of the most important retail milestones for sellers of things. We’ve got a ballpark figure for how many people brought the new Wii U. (Around 400,000.) And Microsoft bragged about all the Xbox 360 units they shifted into people homes, too. (750,000 for those guys.) So, what about Sony?…

Halo 4’s Crimson Map Pack Drops on Dec. 10th, Bringing New ‘Extraction Mode’ With It

Looks like the info from that German dashboard image was right, as Microsoft has announced that the first of three planned Halo 4 map packs will be hitting on December 10th. Along with the new multiplayer environments, online players will be getting a new match type in Halo 4, too. Descriptions follow: • Wreckage: Wreckage…

Guy Puts More Than 1,000 Video Game Timelines In Chronological Order

We’ve seen plenty of timelines that put video game release dates in order. And recently, we’ve begun making timelines that put video game news in chronological order. But what about the timelines inside the games? The years over which the game’s story takes place? Has anyone ever chronicled those? Now, someone has. Alex Jaffe, specifically,…

ChefVille Catering FAQs: Get Prepared for Catering with These Tips

If you ask many former Cafe World players, they’ll likely tell you that the constant stream of new catering orders was one of the reasons they stopped playing Zynga‘s first cooking game. If that’s the case, those same players are likely to be very disappointed with the new launch of a catering system in ChefVille,…

Company of Heroes 2‘s first gameplay trailer lets it snow, lets it snow, lets it snow… and rain death, too.

EA Mobile is giving away one million free download codes for Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12 for the iPhone. Get yours here

THQ Is So Broke, They’ve Made A Humble Bundle

Ahh, Humble Bundle, the best site in the world for great packages of indie games and- wait, what’s this? Saints Row? Darksiders? I see you, THQ! Just peeking in the bushes there, waiting to ensnare us with your new humble bundle. You’re not an indie developer at all, THQ! What are you even doing. At…

Meet a Man Who Made It Through ZombiU Without Dying. He Has Some Tips For You.

ZombiU is the Wii U’s extremely difficult survival horror first-person shooter. You’re not supposed to be able to make it through it in one life, though the game’s Survival mode challenges you to do that. A few brave souls have cleared Survival mode. About 13 of them so far, it seems. Most of them have…

There’s a New Mobile Final Fantasy Game on the Horizon, and We Hold the Key to Sephiroth

The airships are coming! Following a highly successful launch in Japan, DeNA Co. and Square Enix are preparing to bring Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade to North American Apple and Android devices. Airborne Brigade, the first free-to-play Final Fantasy social game to be released in English, casts players as airship pilots exploring an FF-inspired land, banding…

Vice City‘s Mobile Makeover Will Take Your Self Control

The neon-soaked streets of Vice City have never looked as good as they do in next week’s 10th Anniversary Edition for iOS and Android. The fingers are still fused together, but the bodies attached to them are better than ever. When I first watched this trailer I was a little shocked. This is not how…

The New Lego Lord of the Rings Game Apes Peter Jackson’s Movies Brilliantly

The new Lego Lord of the Rings game for consoles and PC is terrific in many ways. One amazing aspect: how closely it matches up with Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movies. The game uses the voices of the actors from the films. You’re hearing Cate Blanchett as Galadriel, Hugo Weaving as Elrond, Andy…