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Don’t Buy The New Crackdown 2 Add-on (Yet)
Crackdown 2 players who downloaded the newly released Toy Box add-on for the Xbox 360 game are finding their games on lockdown. Reports from readers and the official Xbox support forums indicate today’s DLC is a bit broken. Crackdown 2 players are reporting that the Xbox 360 game will freeze up when attempting to load.…
By Michael McWhertor Published September 2, 2010 -
A Fairy, An Astronaut And A Spartan Walk Into A Bar…
Taken at a Halo: Reach press event in Sydney yesterday.
By Luke Plunkett Published September 2, 2010 -
Report: Kinect Will Only Understand Americans, Brits, Japanese & Mexicans
Oh dear. It’s not just Spaniards who won’t be able to control Kinect with their voices when the peripheral launches. It’s everyone who doesn’t live in the US, Mexico or United Kingdom. Eurogamer has confirmed with Microsoft that when Kinect is released in November, no languages from mainland Europe will be supported. So if you’re…
By Luke Plunkett Published September 1, 2010 -
Report: Kinect Doesn’t Speak Spanish (It Speaks Mexican) [Update]
According to the Spanish press, Microsoft’s motion-sensing camera Kinect will not speak Spanish. It will only speak “Mexican”. At a press event in Bilbao, Spain last week, reports say Microsoft revealed that when the peripheral ships worldwide in November, it will only ship with the capability to understand three spoken languages: English, Japanese and “Mexican”.…
By Luke Plunkett Published September 1, 2010 -
Welp, Someone Done Tried To Sell Their Kinect Beta Already
Microsoft had to figure this was going to happen: Someone put their Kinect beta hardware and their console for sale on eBay, hoping to get $1,200 for it. It was rather quickly de-listed, however. I haven’t seen the entire EULA for this hardware beta but something tells me Microsoft probably forbids selling the unit and…
By Owen Good Published August 31, 2010 -
Microsoft Reveals New 360 Controller With Transforming D-Pad
The Xbox 360 controller gets a little more fighter friendly later this year, with a new version featuring a transforming d-pad and monochrome buttons hitting stores on November 9. So what’s a transforming d-pad? As Major Nelson demonstrates in the video below, users can change the new Xbox 360 controller’s directional pad from a flat…
By Mike Fahey Published August 31, 2010 -
A Fistful of Zombies: Gunplay in Dead Rising 2: Case 0
A lot of people loved killing zombies in the original Dead Rising. But almost just as many hated using guns to do so. Why? The controls. That was one of the big things that Canadian developers Blue Castle worked on with Capcom while developing Dead Rising 2: Creating solid shooter controls for the sequel. How…
By Brian Crecente Published August 31, 2010 -
Microsoft Promises More, Bigger Games For PC Owners
Microsoft’s two most recent PC game reveals were welcome, sure, but they were also catered towards a certain end of the market: the end that is cool with playing browser games. But what about the PC gamers that hardware companies would call “enthusiasts”? Is there a game coming for them, something for them to double-check…
By Luke Plunkett Published August 31, 2010 -
First Look At That HUGE Beta Kinect Camera in the Wild
Beta users for the Xbox 360’s Kinect seem to have mixed feelings about the still-in-development motion gaming device. The beta Kinect kits started showing up in mailboxes and on doorsteps today and came with a small collection of games including Kinect Sports and Kinect Joyride. It also came with the motorized camera and a smiley-face…
By Brian Crecente Published August 30, 2010 -
Drunk Zombie Fighting and Vomit Pratfalls
Dead Rising 2: Case 0 hits the Xbox 360 tomorrow with a robust taste of what the full Dead Rising 2 has in store for gamers. Just don’t blame me if that taste is tainted with a bit of bile. As seen in the prequel, protagonist Chuck Greene isn’t just a zombie-killing machine, he’s also…
By Brian Crecente Published August 30, 2010 -
Xbox Live Price Increase Coming November 1
Xbox Live Gold subscribers might want to renew before November 1, when the price of a yearly subscription to the service jumps $10 in North America. According to a post on Major Nelson’s blog, after eight years’ of Xbox Live at the $50 a year price point, the service is finally seeing a price hike.…
By Mike Fahey Published August 30, 2010 -
Kinect Clone Maker Understands Chinese Gamers “Better”
Microsoft is releasing a controller-free system called Kinect. So is Beijing eedoo Technology Ltd., a spin-off company created by Chinese computer giant Lenovo. It’s called the eBox. Watch out, Microsoft! “We are the world’s second company to produce a controller-free game console, behind only Microsoft,” Beijing eedoo Technology president Jack Luo tells China Daily. Lenovo…
By Brian Ashcraft Published August 30, 2010 -
It’s Not 2001, It’s Halo: Reach
Reader Sean was strolling down the street in his native Toronto when he spotted this monolithic hulk, which is one of the more unique game advertisements we’ve ever seen. It’s a 2001-esque cylinder that seems to exist solely to pulse a red light and point people towards Halo: Reach’s web portals. It might succeed at…
By Luke Plunkett Published August 27, 2010 -
A Closer Look At The Kinect Beta’s Avatars and Dashboards
With the official Kinect Beta flooding out to those select few whom Microsoft invited to test out their upcoming motion gaming add-on, the images are already starting to stream in. Here for your perusal is a closer look at both Kinect’s new dashboard and menu systems and the revamped avatars hitting the Xbox 360 when…
By Brian Crecente Published August 27, 2010 -
Reminder: Beta Test Kinect, You Will Be Silenced [Update]
If you’re one of the lucky ones receiving an invitation to Kinect’s beta testing program tonight, a word of caution before you accept: you’ll be losing some of your means of communicating over Xbox Live. Because of the 360’s improved voice chat tech – or, if you’re the tin-hat-wearing type, because Microsoft is crazy-paranoid about…
By Luke Plunkett Published August 27, 2010 -
Xbox 360 Voice Chat Being Upgraded
Xbox Live Studios boss Jerry Johnson has revealed that the Xbox 360’s voice chat feature is in for an upgrade, aimed at improving the quality of player-to-player communication over Xbox Live. “The codec we used when we first launched was a low bit rate codec and we stuck with that”, he said at the Edinburgh…
By Luke Plunkett Published August 27, 2010 -
Halo: Reach’s Live-Action “Deliver Hope” Brings the Combat To Life
Forget the civilian bickering, the standing around in the dark, Halo: Reach’s game-setting live-action videos have suddenly gotten very real, very explodey. This is the sort of video that delivers chills and the burning desire to play through a game. Starting on Aug. 29, the Deliver Hope campaign kicks off for real, with the live-action…
By Brian Crecente Published August 26, 2010 -
The Day Before Halo: Reach’s Invasion
The Halo universe is famous for explosions and the colour purple. But pregnant British women? Never seen one of them in a Halo game before. This is yet another live-action trailer for Halo: Reach, showing the lives of some of the citizens of Reach the day before the Covenant invasion. They’re OK, but Microsoft, the…
By Luke Plunkett Published August 25, 2010 -
Microsoft: Eerily Familiar “Space Marine” Ad Not Connected to Halo
Samsung’s television commercial for its new Galaxy S phone has a lot of people thinking Halo when they watch it. The armor seems very similar and the look of the action also has a taste of Halo about it. Of course the flying crayfish starship is about as far off as you can get. So…
By Brian Crecente Published August 24, 2010 -
Microsoft Is Ready To Ban Halo: Reach Pirates
As leaked copies of Halo: Reach hit the torrent sites, Microsoft tells Kotaku that they are aggressively investigating the leak and are fully prepared to hand out bans to anyone caught playing the game pre-release. It happens every time a big game comes out, but when it’s a game as big as Bungie’s final Halo…
By Mike Fahey Published August 24, 2010