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  Japanese Hardware War Now Officially Boring

  Minor fluctuations in the currently tepid Japanese console race don’t make this week’s Media Create chart all that exciting, to be honest. A slightly slinking PlayStation presence and marginally expanded Nintendo one isn’t exactly thrilling. But neither was the software contest, which saw a pair of Nintendo DS titles beating out the Japanese release of…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Microsoft Shooting For A 300,000 Player Online Game?

  Yeah, you read that right. 300,000 players. A job listing issued by Microsoft’s says exactly that, indicating that the game will be for the 360 and that it will be in “real-time”. The job is specifically looking for somebody who is “an experienced server developer to help develop our server architecture. We are building an…

  By Luke Plunkett Published May 28, 2009
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  Here’s (Some Of) What Namco Bandai’s Bringing To E3

  Publisher Namco Bandai doesn’t seem quite ready to reveal its entire E3 lineup for 2009, but it has let us know which of its games are definitely going to be there. Any surprises? No, silly. Why would there be surprises in a partially-revealed lineup of games that Namco Bandai is showing off at E3? It’s…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Wii RPG Fragile Coming Stateside Via XSEED

  Namco Bandai and tri-Crescendo’s role-playing game Fragile is coming to North American Wiis later this year, thanks to publisher XSEED. If you were a fan of Baten Kaitos or Eternal Sonata, this one’s for you. According to IGN, XSEED has picked up Namco Bandai of America’s publishing slack, with Fragile: Farewell Ruins of the Moon…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Rock Band To Feel The Pain Of Iron Maiden In June

  MTV Games and Harmonix’s Rock Band is getting a little heavier the week after E3, as the game’s community ‘zine has revealed that a dozen new Iron Maiden tracks will be released as downloadable content. The Iron Maiden track pack brings 12 classic tracks and new live concert performances to Rock Band and Rock Band…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  T-Minus Three Days

  To: Ash From: Crecente Re: Mini-Bash’s Favorite TV Show Is… I can’t believe we’re only three days away from what is shaping up to be quite a spectacular E3. There’s so much news that it’s popping loose before the show even before it gets underway. I think all of the big three are going to…

  By Brian Crecente Published May 28, 2009
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  Go Frame By Frame With The King Of Fighters XII Crew

  The transition to new, higher-definition 2D sprites in The King of Fighters XII didn’t just happen overnight. SNK Playmore illustrates why that process has taken so long with its animation showcase, “2D Dot Gallery.” Five of The King of Fighters XII‘s characters get the showcase treatment, letting fans peruse each frame of three animation sequences,…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Red Dead Redemption Eyes-On Impressions

  Rockstar San Diego’s sequel to Red Dead Revolver has been a long time coming, with the original released in 2004 and a current-gen follow-up teased via video at Sony’s E3 2005 press conference. That four-year-old teaser for what is now called Red Dead Redemption is hardly indicative of what the final product plans to offer.…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Valve: Team Fortress 2 Random-Item Issues Improved Last Night

  Some tweaks on Valve’s side of things may already have improved the controversial but still-evolving new system the company has been using to randomly grant players access to new items in Team Fortress 2. It may have been invisible to players but Team Fortress 2 director Robin Walker told Kotaku today that some of the…

  By Stephen Totilo Published May 28, 2009
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  All Things Midway Going To The Highest Bidder

  Bankrupt game publisher Midway has today “established the timeline” for selling of its assets, studios and intellectual property to the highest bidder, meaning that Smash TV and Joust could be yours… for the right price. Midway already has a $33 million offer from Warner Bros. to acquire a good deal of the company’s goods, including…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Win Stan Bush Swag If You’ve Got The Touch

  Activision passed us some Stan Bush swag in celebration of “The Touch” being available as free downloadable content for Guitar Hero World Tour. If you know your Transformers the Movie trivia, it could be yours. Here’s how this is going to work. We have two XL Stan Bush t-shirts and five signed copies of Stan’s…

  By Mike Fahey Published May 28, 2009
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  The Chiptunes Band That Just Might Break Through

  by Leigh Alexander The notoriously insular and fickle Brooklyn music scene has had its doors blown off, and the culprit is – NES sound chip music? What’s That, Now? Chiptune music – tunes made using hacked sound chips from video game hardware – is as well-known to many gamers who snap to the nostalgic bleeps…

  By Stephen Totilo Published May 28, 2009
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  Japanese Gamers Snap Up More Mass Effect Than You Might Expect

  While BioWare’s Mass Effect didn’t score top placement in this week’s Japanese software sales chart—Sloane to MacHale: Nazo no Monogatari did—it had a pretty damn good showing, considering the platform’s last place position. Mass Effect‘s first week sales were a solid, if not spectacular 18,000, making it the third bestselling game in Japan, according to…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Kotaku Robot Wars Round Three: Salvation

  The Kotaku Robot Wars continue on the other side of the world, as Osaka Japan and Canberra Australia are reduced to steaming piles of rubble and broken robot parts…but whose broken robot parts? Once more we pit the power of human intuition against the mechanical will of Crecente’s R2-D2 robot to try and predict the…

  By Mike Fahey Published May 28, 2009
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  The Three (Or More, Or Less) Laws Of Gaming AI

  It’s pure fantasy. Robots won’t ever actually rise up and go to war with humanity. You know why? Because the robots of the future will be governed by Asimov’s three laws of robotics. For those who don’t know what those are, know that sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov established three basic laws governing the programming of…

  By Luke Plunkett Published May 28, 2009
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  Sony’s New Phone Lets You Stream Media From Your PS3

  Sony may not yet be ready to dive in feet first with a PlayStation branded phone, but the new Sony Ericsson Aino brings some of that “gadget to gadget” magic Sony bossman Howard Stringer teased. The Aino will let users control their PlayStation 3s using “Remote Play,” allowing for across-the-internet streaming of media from your…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Dead Space Extraction Extracts Itself In September

  EA has given the Wii installment of their survival horror franchise a release date, with Dead Space Extraction scheduled to hit a little under a year after the original game. September 29th marks the date that Wii owners get shot of EA-flavored survival horror. Dead Space Extraction is an on-rails shooter that tells the story…

  By Mike Fahey Published May 28, 2009
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  2009 Life. Love. Game Design Challenge Winners Unveiled

  Is it possible to educate about teen dating violence through a violence-free video game? That’s the idea behind the annual Life. Love Game Design Challenge, now in it’s second year. Jennifer Ann’s Group today announced the winners of their second annual flash game design contest, handing out $1,500 to Jared Sain for first place. Runners…

  By Brian Crecente Published May 28, 2009
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  The E3 2009 Kotaku Fantasy Betting Pool

  Next week, all eyes will be on E3, as the video game industry blows the doors off the Los Angeles Convention Center with megaton-caliber announcements. There will be short shorts, there will be news. And we already know what some of that news might be, as prophesied by our sometimes precise E3 2009 predictions. Some…

  By Michael McWhertor Published May 28, 2009
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  Robots We Love: Pin*Bot

  While video game robots are all well and good, it takes a special sort of robot to carry a pinball game. Sure, he may bear a striking resemblance to Cobra Commander, but we love Pin*Bot. Pin*Bot originates from the 1986 Williams pinball table of the same name. As you attempt to advance your silver ball…

  By Mike Fahey Published May 28, 2009