Video Game Ads Were Better In The 1930s

One of the best things about early 20th-century transportaton was the advertising. Cruise ships, airlines and car companies all used bold, iconic ads to sell their vision of the future. It’s a vision that transfers easily to classic video games. IGNs art team whipped up this line of ads showing how video game vehicles would…

Five Games That Were, And Should Be Again

Wolfire, the charitable types developing kooky PC action game Overgrowth, don’t just make games. They imagine what it would be like if people went and remade someone else’s old games, making them as awesome in 2010 as they were originally. Wolfire’s team has posted examples of five classic games that “could still be milked, along…

In Two Years, Gears Of War Might Chainsaw A Phone

Donald Mustard, creative director of Chair Entertainment (Shadow Complex), sees a bright future for gaming on a mobile phone. One so bright that in 2-5 years we’ll be playing Gears of Wars on something that fits in our pockets. Chair, who are currently working on Infinity Blade for the iPhone, say that at first doing…

9 Days With Kinect, My Video Diary

One man lives with a Kinect for nine days. What happens? How does his mind change? What are the surprises? And where in the world does the guy go on Day 7? This is my Kinect Diary, in video.

Club Mario Makes Us Want To Forget The 1990s

It’s easy to forget these days with Nintendo trying so hard to look all adult and stylish, but in the early 1990s, the company was anything but. Allow this montage of footage from Club Mario (a short “comedy” section of the The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!) serve as a reminder that not only did…

Beat The Foreign-Looking Dude With A Japanese Name

Soccer franchise Winning Eleven (AKA Pro Evolution Soccer) is facing increased competition from foreign-based developers. The game’s latest television spots also show heavy competition from a sauve non-Japanese-looking fella with a Japanese last name. And they’re some of the most popular ads on Japanese television. The first ad opens with actor Fuku Kondo talking to…

The Sights, Sounds And Dancing Armies Of Kinect’s NYC Launch

While Kinect launches all across the US tonight, the peripheral’s official bash was in New York City, where Marky Mark, Microsoft and an enormous army of purple-shirted dancers overran Times Square.

Configuring A Room For Kinect: A Tale of Two Homes

Kinect needs a lot of room, more room than any video game control device before it. But where there’s a will to move furniture or rotate TVs, there is a way. This is how we made room in two homes. From Stephen Totilo, deputy editor, based in Brooklyn: Space is tight in my Brooklyn condo.…

Virtual Idol Shoplifter Gets Really Punchy

Hatsune Miku, the popular star of Yamaha’s Vocaloid, doesn’t only appear in video games. Japanese politicians also use her to improve election chances. Miku is virtual, but has very real fans. One of them pocketed a Hatsune Miku plastic figurine, which ended in fists flying. MSN Japan reports that earlier this month outside Tokyo in…

The Cursed Crusade Screen Shots & Artwork

Review: Kinect Joy Ride

Combine racing video games with air guitar and you’ve got Kinect Joy Ride, a game that just might be the closest we get to a Wii Sports of the Kinect launch. Kinect Joy Ride is a simplified racing game, the first in the genre for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 Kinect sensor. You have little control of…

Review: Your Shape: Fitness Evolved

At last, I have a way to exercise in front of my TV without any contraptions (or other people) near my body but still with a way to get yelled at if my form is bad. No joke: Your Shape: Fitness Evolved has the potential to be a huge breakthrough in home fitness. This workout…

The World May End Before We Get Darksiders 2

Apocalypse simulator Darksiders was released in January 2010. The action/RPG game will be getting a sequel, but we hope you’re willing to wait, because it might not be here until 2013 Brian Farrell, CEO of the game’s publisher THQ, said this morning during an earnings call that the sequel to one of 2010’s sleeper hits…

Examining Kinect’s Minority Report Effect

Kinect may be touted as the Xbox 360’s answer to motion gaming, but it’s not just about making you the controller. Kinect can also let you interact with television, movies, music and the Xbox 360 like Tom Cruise in Minority Report, just without the fancy gloves. This video is a quite long, but in it…

Review: Kinect Sports

The Xbox 360 finally has its motion-based sports game. Packed with six sports, ten if you include all of the events of track and field, Kinect Sports drops you controller-free into an eclectic mix of athleticism. Aesthetically, Kinect Sports falls somewhere between Wii Sports and the Playstation Move’s Sports Champions. Kinect Sports uses your recently…

Review: Kinectimals

Don’t mistake Kinectimals for a Nintendogs clone. This is the closest the Kinect launch has to a traditional video game, one that eight year old girls are going to coo at. Kinectimals is both a virtual pet game featuring cute, fuzzy young wild cats and a quest to unlock the mysteries of an island. It’s…

StarCraft II Gives You One Free Name Do-Over

If you were in a rush when you picked your StarCraft II callsign and, in hindsight, think it sucks, help’s on the way. PC Gamer is reporting that Blizzard will allow one free rename. Others will cost. PC Gamer says Blizzard’s accommodating the user base’s recent demands for the name change option, but to a…

Review: Dance Central

Dance Central is a dancing rhythm game from the folks who created Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Packed with an eclectic mix of music and dance moves from the artists, it hopes to redefine the way we play dance games. Dance Central is among the most visually polished of the Kinect launch titles. Gamers stand…

A Visual Guide To Your Shape

Your Shape’s calibration measures things like shoulder span, arm length and leg length. When players are able to match movements with their trainer, they are “in rhythm”. Players can also exercise with training like bicep curls. Your Shape allows players to create fitness challenges among friends. You know it, you love it, the hula hoop.

There Might Be Life Left In Game Magazines Yet

The traditional “news-previews-reviews” games magazine is a dying beast, but the idea of a magazine based on video games is still one worth saving. It just has to be done right. Like Amusement. Or in this case, Kill Screen. Onto its second issue now, Kill Screen is the latest magazine to make the smart decision…