To: Crecente From: Luke
I did two things on the weekend: saw Helmet play, and saw Iron Man. Both are looking awful spritely for their age. For a 45 year-old superhero, Iron Man’s never looked better. That movie is awesome, and these days, I don’t walk out of theatres saying that too often. As for Helmet, same story. Page Hamilton’s 48 years old, and rocked his arse off harder than most men half his age can manage. Good, good times.
You missed all this while I was working and you weren’t: Portal After Dark Ken Levine And Co. At Work On New X-Com Game? GTA Soundtrack A Little Obscure For Amazon Microsoft Release Free Game Creator The Sims & IKEA Are An Exercise In Tasteful Product Placement Metroid Prime, Now In The Third Dimension
Nope. Look, the lock-box, the artbook, they were all nice, but if I’d known that pre-ordering the game via Rockstar’s own online store would get me this sweet Burger Shot T-shirt instead, I wouldn’t have bothered with that whole midnight launch business. Reader Sulk sends these pics of his shirt, which while being far too large for his thin, Canadian frame is still an ideal size for framing and eternal admiration.
When Rockstar sat down with Amazon to work out their shiny new soundtrack deal – whereby in-game tracks from GTA IV can be saved to a playlist and then downloaded – they didn’t just sort out the money-making end of the deal. Rockstar had to tell them which artists would be appearing on the soundtrack. Then draw some pictures. Then write it down so Amazon could remember, because around 40% of the GTA IV’s real in-game music wasn’t yet available on Amazon’s store (it is now). So one single videogames developer (remember, Rockstar themselves licence the tracks for GTA, not Take-Two) had been able to licence tracks a multinational music distribution giant had not? Says a lot for Amazon’s depth. Or Rockstar’s insanely niche tastes. Actually, probably both. “Grand Theft Auto” simplifies song purchasing [Reuters]
Last week, Microsoft announced the release of PopFly, a simple program that allows users to create games without the need to know any code. Taking a number of genres as a foundation, PopFly offers a range of templates based on classic arcade games, upon which you can import your own characters, backgrounds, etc. Once done, the games can then be hosted, on stuff like websites, blogs, Facebook pages or even your Vista sidebar. It’ Silverlight-only, which is a slight hassle, and is fairly basic, but hey, who said everything on this world had to be perfect? [Microsoft PopFly]
Ever raved to strangers about a game they’ve never heard of? I have! About Kingpin. Yeah, I don’t know what it was about it…it was a good shooter, but there were better shooters, it was violent, but there were more violent games…something (probably the Cypress Hill – who did the soundtrack and some of the thug’s voice-acting – connection) just clicked with me, and as a bored 19 year-old uni student I played the shit out of it. So you can see why I blew a good 10 minutes on the weekend reading this excellent retrospective on the game. Why’s it excellent? Because long-winded look-backs on obscure, yet heart-warming old games are always excellent. Retro: Kingpin: Life Of Crime [Rock, Paper, Shotgun]
Activision have announced that, as of May 8, anyone who owns the 360 version of Guitar Hero III will be able to download a Muse song-pack. It’ll contain three songs: Exo-Politics, Supermassive Black Hole and Stockholm Syndrome. No word on the PS3 version, and since GHIII updates on the PlayStation Store seem to be all over the shop I don’t want go hazarding guesses, but if I had to hazard a guess, since May 8 is a Thursday it’ll probably be available same day as the 360 stuff. New Muse for Guitar Hero [CVG][Pic]
For all their squiddly-squaddly talk and propensity for dying in fires, nobody plays The Sims because of The Sims. They play it to design a house, then fill said house with loads of designer furniture. So this latest Sims expansion – Sims 2 IKEA Home Stuff – is a logical step. For both parties! Now, before fans worry over whether the Swedish furniture giant’s range will be incorporated tastefully into the game, this bullet-point from the game’s EA Store page should answer your question: Indulge your Sims with an office that is sure to promote order and productivity with its elegant Vika Hyttan desk, inspiring Kila desk lamp, bold Helmer drawer unit, and Lack zigzag wallshelf.
That’s a no, then. SIMS 2™ IKEA Home Stuff [EA Store, via Infinite Sims]
The latest Official Xbox Mag is running a rumour that’s been quietly – oh so quietly – doing the rounds for a few months now. That rumour concerns just what, exactly, 2K Boston (and I presume 2K Australia as well) are up to these days. With 2K Marin confirmed as the team behind BioShock 2, what could Ken Levine and the rest of the guys behind BioShock 1 be working on? Maybe a new X-Com game. Yes, X-Com. 2K quietly bought the rights to the series in 2007, so the rumour’s at least got a solid footing, though we’re still going to recommend you increase your daily intake of salt. If only because the thought of a new, official X-Com game is too awesome to mess around with. [Official Xbox Magazine, June 2008]
When Chell wakes up in Portal and needs to get herself out of a pickle, she wakes up wearing an orange jumpsuit and some snappy robotic chicken legs. They’re both comfortable and practical. But what if she’d woken up with… less gear? A surprisingly tasteful artist’s impression of this possible scenario awaits you. Unless you’re at work, that is, because like many other works of art, this one’s not safe for the office.
