Harley Quinn's Revenge Is Batman: Arkham City's Bad New Ending 
High Scores And Egos: There's Always A Bigger Doodle 
The Last Moments Of GAME 
How Bad User Interfaces Are Ruining Video Games And Other Wonderful Things 
She Tried To Make Good Video Games For Girls, Whatever That Meant 
The Story Of Doodle Jump: Brotherly Love And Digital Snacks DS hinge cracks? That’s so 2006. Or is it? In the last day or so, we’ve gotten emails from readers stating that it is still apparently a problem. Kotaku reader John/RickD39 sent us the above pic, while another reader named Kai had his DS Lite crack for the third time. According to Kai, Nintendo told him it will replace Lite cracks once and have corrected its manufacturing process. We’re not sure if these are isolated incidents. Perhaps they are, perhaps they aren’t. So! Time for a quick show of hands. Anyone else recently get hinge cracks on newly purchased or fixed DS Lites?
Spencer over at Siliconera brings word that Echocrome, Sony’s beautiful spacial puzzler, will be released on the Japanese PSN the same day it’s released on Japanese PSPs. Which is March 19. Still no word on when anyone else can expect the game, but feel free to import the Japanese PSP version in March. It’s not exactly text-heavy. Indeed it’s almost text-free. Echochrome arrives on the PlayStation Store in March [Siliconera]
Religious fronting aside, this game is amazingly bad. It’s so bad that we’re not sure if it’s actually real or a very funny joke. The game is called The Zoo Race. Based on Noah’s Ark (we think), the above clips opens with characters in a library. These characters are then turned or “re-shaped” into animals. Those animals then race around a track, run up ladders and are shot out of canons. Then they race around the depths of hell. Then a horse jumps on a rocket. There is more, but watching this clip made my brain hurt. The game’s website has The Zoo Race available for purchase, noting:
Buy the FUN game that the big game companies would not ever make.
Oh, the irony is delicious.
The Zoo Race [Official Site via Dtoid]
EA’s Dead Space – ie Resident Evil, or maybe BioShock, in space – was originally coming on 360 and PS3. Now it’s been announced the game will also be appearing on PC. And then appear on all three again, and again, and again. EA’s Glen Schofield: I would definitely like to make future Dead Space games. I’d love for this to become a well established franchise; we’ve created a huge and rich back story and universe, so other games could easily be made.
Wait, so they’re already thinking about a sequel to an unreleased game nobody cares about and may completely suck? Since when can people get away with that? Oh yeah. Right! Dead Space for PC, sequels possible [Eurogamer]
No More Heroes creator Goichi Suda says third party Wii games aren’t selling. He should know! Even though it faired well critically, nobody in Japan bought his game. (Well, not nobody.) What does Suda think of developing for the Wii? This:
Whilst the sales weren’t as high as I hoped, other titles for Wii aren’t selling so well either. Only Nintendo titles are doing well. This isn’t just because of the current situation in Japan, as this is happening outside Japan… Actually I was very surprised about the reality about Wii, because before I was making this game, I wasn’t expecting that Wii would be a console targeted only for non-gamers. I expected more games for hardcore gamers. The reality is different to what I expected.
Does that means the No More Heroes sequel will be on a “hardcore” consoles — say, the Xbox 360 or PS3?
It’s election season in the US, which means across the country, promises are already being made, power-brokers assured and re-assured, palms applied with healthy doses of grease. And the ESA – your ESA – aren’t missing out on the action. They’ve formed a political action committee, which should be up and running by March, with the aim of donating between $US 50,000 and $US 100,000 towards anyone running for a national office. The ESA’s Michael D. Gallagher, who also plans to mobilise the Video Game Voters Network, is excited: If I can walk into the office of a member of Congress and tell them we have 20,000 voters in their state who are already signed up to write letters and act based on game-related issues that concern them, that’s powerful.
That kind of money won’t buy much, especially when other entertainment industries donate millions, but it’s the thought that counts! Video Game Industry Seeks Political Clout [NY Times]
Maybe! This is Finger Fracture. Which is an advergame, but it still shows some promise, as it looks like it’s taking the iPhones unique features (widescreen, multi-touch) and is actually going to put them to good use. How? On a finger-boarding game. Which controls exactly as you’d imagine. Being an advergame and not a game game, we’ve no word on release dates (or to be honest if the project’s even real), but if time-wasting and cube-gleaming are high on your lists of things to do with your iPhone, some screens and an explanation of the controls are in the gallery below.
Vans Finger Fracture on iPhone [NOTCOT, thanks Mikey!]
Friendly reminder time! We’re giving away Culdcept Saga stuff that includes the Xbox 360 game, a poster signed by the game’s producer Kohei Takeshige and the soundtrack signed by Takeshige and composer Kenji Ito (who worked on some big Square games in the 90′s and is now part of the Super Smash Bros. Brawl composer superteam). Reader Alex sent us along this doozy of an entry, writing:
I had no idea what to do, so I took a stroll through my games last night and saw ICO, and figured it’d go along nicely with the crossing sign. After about an hour or two on Photoshop and 45 minutes with Office Depot’s worthless printing staff, I got this gem.
Protip: The language beneath the picture is the one spoken by its characters; it says “crossing”.So cool. Here’s the contest: Make a game related sign, put it outside and take a pic. Send your entries to kotakucontest@gmail.com with the subject line “Sign”. Contest ends January 23rd. Our memories live forever.
Poker has never really been our game. It’s good for a laugh, but I’m not the gambling type. However, a Japanese cell phone game in which one finds themselves in sexy strip poker situations with anime girls of various professions? Where do I put the 315 yen, exactly? The Gameloft published title, which Ashcraft says is loosely translated as Sexed Up Big Sister Flip Over—though he may be screwing with me—follows the simple formula of taking busty women and presenting them in various states of undress.
You’ll play multiple card games against a nurse, secretary, actress, racing queen, police woman and volleyball player, all of the sexy variety, then watch with delight as they are beholden to their disrobing bets, exposing their fine washables. It’s a fun sexy time. Technology is really wonderful isn’t it? We’ve come so far.
Sexed Up Big Sister Flip Over [Famitsu]
Microsoft’s David Edery, who’s Worldwide Games Portfolio Planner for XBL, has posted a few helpful tips on how to get a better demo. Presumably because most demos suck. Like the recent Burnout demo, for example, which I refuse to play again thanks to unskippable tutorials and promo vids. The whole post boils down to a single basic point: give players a taste of the game’s strengths, not simply the first 15 minutes of the game. Take Crackdown, for example. Prior to that demo’s release, the game wasn’t generating much buzz. After the demo, though, in which your abilities had been “fast-tracked”, people knew what the game would actually be like, and were going bananas. Same goes for Dead Rising. So devs, note for future reference: remember, a demo’s a chance to show us why we should buy your game! How to Increase Trial, Improve Conversion Rate, and Sell More Games [Game Tycoon, via Game|Life]
