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UncategorizedKinect Hype Vs. Kinect Reality
In June 2009, Microsoft premiered a terrific hype trailer – “product vision,” they called it – for the device that would become this season’s Xbox 360 Kinect sensor. Vision trailers tend not to match reality. How close did Microsoft get? Here is that Kinect trailer, shown at E3 2009, back when the Kinect was still…
By Stephen Totilo Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Guess I Shouldn’t Drink This…
To: Totilo From: Bashcraft RE: It’s Beginning To Smell A Lot Like Christmas No real Christmas trees here in Osaka. Just small fake ones. But look, booze from North Korea! A friend brought it to me from Korea a while back, and I did try it. Haven’t worked up the courage to finish it yet……
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
What’s The First Wii Game To Reach 4 Million Sold In Japan?
Here’s a hint: It’s one of these 408 titles. (Oh, that top pic is a hint, too!) According to Japanese publisher Enterbrain, New Super Mario Bros. Wii has crossed the 4 million sold mark in Japan, making it the first Wii title to do so in The Land of the Rising Sun. New Super Mario…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Make A Monster Profit With This PSP Game
Tomorrow in Japan, arguably this year’s most eagerly awaited game, Monster Hunter Portable 3rd, goes on sale. It’s retail price is ¥5,800 (US$69). Buy it and make a profit. At least one store is offering ¥8,000 ($95) for unused copies of the game. Other used game shops are expected to pay retail or close to…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
A Ratings System Just For Islam
An industry body in the Middle East has gone and done something fascinating: they’ve launched a ratings system for games based not on a nation’s classification laws, but on the tenets of the Islamic faith. This makes it a world first, a system aimed at transcending national borders and laws and appealing directly to the…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 -
UncategorizedFallout: New Vegas Lightens Up, Gets Its Boogie On
The world of Fallout: New Vegas is a bleak and empty one. Nuclear holocausts will do that to a people. What everyone in the game needs, then, is a little dancing This mod brings a little dancing. Actually, it brings a lot of dancing, importing a ton of motion-captured dance routines into the game, then…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
NSFW: Kinect Can Recognize Solo Play
People are hacking Kinect, doing all sorts of amazing things with it like mapping their rooms and turning into a bloated mutant. But when does the screwing start? Sex tech website Slashdong wonders just that. Well, with it possible to teach Kinect to track boobs, then surely laying pipe must be around the corner, no?…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 -
UncategorizedGentlemen, Start Your Coffee Tables
Racing wheels open up a new level of play for driving games. They also take up space and many require tables to clamp onto. Shame there isn’t a coffee table that can transform into a racing set-up. Oh, but there is. After several prototypes, the RACE-STAR ConverTTable is finally going into production and priced at…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
EA Sports, It’s In A Real Game
Major League Soccer will be getting a little more backing from a video game company next season, as EA Sports has revealed it’s become a major sponsor of expansion team the Vancouver Whitecaps. With the Xbox 360 and Xbox Live logos appearing on the playing strips of the Seattle Sounders, EA’s deal with the Whitecaps…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Yakuza Developers Blasting Off For Space Game
Toshihiro Nagoshi, the producer behind the Yakuza franchise, is moving from the gritty urban streets of Japan to somewhere more celestial: space. In the latest issue of Famitsu, Nagoshi talks about his upcoming project, Binary Domain. The game differs from his previous titles in that not only it is multi-platform and sci-fi themed, but it…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Dead Or Alive, Kasumi’s A Pricey Figure
A figure of Dead or Alive star Kasumi is never going to be the classiest thing in the world, but then, Kasumi isn’t the classiest girl in the world, either, so I guess in this case things are working out just fine! She’s priced at around USD$80. That’s a lot of money for a piece…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Is This The Biggest Wii Bundle Ever?
One Wii console, one Wii Balance Board and apparently all 408 games released in Japan. Yours for a cool one million yen. That’s over US$11,000. Japanese used game shop Enterking is offering this limited one-off bundle for the Japanese New Year sales period. The complete bundle is largely used, sure, but Japanese gamers tend to…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 -
UncategorizedTrue Love Is Found In Nintendo Classics
Get ready for some feel-good times, as a man and his lady agree to be wed after a night spent dining, drinking wine then playing classic Nintendo RPG series Earthbound. This kind of stuff is sweet at the best of times, but hacking a copy of Mother 2 (or, as it’s known in the West,…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
A Week In Comments
Same-Sex Marriage Thrives In Frontierville Comment by: NixNada Nominated by: Taggart451 Yeah, but this is the internet. You might THINK you’re cyber-marrying some guy, when in fact “he” is actually a hot 19 year old girl. You gotta be careful. Are The PlayStation 3-Exclusive Assassin’s Creed Missions Worth It? Comment by: DrDankstone Nominated by: D-K…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Dressing Up As A Video Game…Console…Mascot?
When people engage in the art of cosplay, we normally expect to see them dress up as characters from a video game, not a video game console itself. And when they do dress up as a console, we’d expect to see them dress up as a, well, console. Not what this lass is wearing, which…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Bloody Bar Punch Up Isn’t Kabuki Theater
One does not become a kabuki actor, it’s a male-only birthright. There are kabuki dynasties, and only the oldest son can star in kabuki theater. One of Japan’s most popular kabuki actors just got his face smashed in. And it might cost him his career. Ebizo Ichikawa XI, 32 years old, was born Horikoshi Takatoshi…
By Brian Ashcraft Published November 30, 2010 -
UncategorizedTwo Kinects Can Make A Model Of The World Around You
With one Kinect motion-sensing camera, we can see part of our surroundings in 3D. With two, however, we can actually generate 3D models of our surroundings. Oliver Kreylos, the man behind the first of these kind of videos, has got hold of a second camera and with it built an adorable little 3D model of…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 - Uncategorized
Halo: Reach Could Have Had A Lot More Spaceships Blowin’ Each Other Up
One of the best parts about Halo: Reach was that, for the game’s all-important change of pace, the developers swapped out the awful Flood and replaced them with an enjoyable space battle sequence. So it’s a shame to hear that there was an original – if half-baked – plan to have a lot more space…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010 -
UncategorizedCan A Man Jump Over A Rocket?
Find out, as the same methodology used on TV to sort myth from busted fiction is applied to the multiplayer portion of Call of Duty: Black Ops. Whether it’s shooting down unmanned helicopters, protecting yourself from death by remote control car or surviving being crushed by radiation blast doors, this video breaks down (or upholds!)…
By Luke Plunkett Published November 30, 2010