Friday, July 18, 2008
Britain, Your PS3s Will Stream TV As Of September 10 (Everyone Else, Little Later)
11:00PM Luke Plunkett | Europe’s PlayTV service for the PS3 is looking very nice. We already knew SCEE were looking at a release window of around September, but yesterday Sony’s David Reeves started handing out actual dates and actual info. The UK will be the first country to get PlayTV, with it due to start up on September 10, with a staggered roll-out across Europe in the weeks after. As a bonus treat, he also confirmed that you’ll be able to record TV onto your HDD at the same time you’re playing a game, with the necessary code having been quietly slipped into the 2.41 update. Oh, and before anyone not up to speed on PlayTV asks, no, there are no plans to bring it to the US. PlayTV dated, will record TV while gaming [Eurogamer] More »
Two Castlevania Games, Two Castlevania Trailers
10:00PM Luke Plunkett | Above, the clip for Castlevania Judgement, on the Wii. Iga can say whatever the hell he wants, but that right there, that’s a fighting game. And not a very good-looking one at that. Series purists may find more solace after the jump, with a trailer for Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia on the DS.
News
Job Cuts Coming After ActiBlizzard Merger
9:00PM Luke Plunkett | You can’t smoosh multiple companies together (don’t forget Sierra!) and expect everyone to keep their jobs. Not going to happen. There’s always areas – whether it be the mailroom, the tea room or the boardroom – where you’ll only need one person where previously there were two or three. And it’s no different with the Activision/Blizzard merger, with ActiBlizz CFO Thomas Tippl telling MCV “with every merger, there is overlap and redundancy, and so the same will be true here. Of course we’re going to go to our customers with one face. We don’t need two sales forces”. Those facing the axe shouldn’t get too down on themselves. Tippl promises they’ll be treated “respectfully”, then reminds them that at the rate this industry is growing, they may well find themselves needed, and back on the payroll, in no time. Activision Blizzard to suffer job cuts [MCV] More »
Would You Play A Halo MMO?
8:00PM Luke Plunkett | RPS’ Jim Rossignol, having picked up the scent of one of the internet’s more far-fetched rumours, has done a little digging and come up with a few possible (stress: POSSIBLE) clues, all pointing towards the possible possiblity that Microsoft are working on a Halo MMO. And not a loot-dropping MMO, an FPS MMO. Before you go getting your speculative knickers in a twist, whether such a project ever comes to light or not is irrelevant, nor is it the point. It’s simply interesting taking a look at Microsoft’s first, fumbling steps in examining the genre again, one left poisoned and barren since the failure of Planetside. Halo MMO: The Clues [Rock, Paper, Shotgun] More »
Conduit Devs: Wii Worth Better Games Than It’s Getting
7:00PM Luke Plunkett | High Voltage’s Conduit is already looking like it’ll be one of, if not the, best-looking Wii game around. And it’s a standard FPS to boot! No party games, no plastic add-ons, nothing but shooting in the first-person. Seems an awfully “core” game to be releasing exclusively on the Wii, so why’d they bother? Creative director Matt Corso has the answer: The Wii is a really cool game system. It’s worth better games than it’s getting right now. There are some great games out there for the system, but it just seems like there’s such an opportunity to do so much more with it. Considering it’s such a popular system right now, it just doesn’t make sense to not focus on making really quality games. Matt, be a dear and fwd that onto Ubisoft and THQ, would you? A Conduit dev walkthrough’s after the jump if you’re at all interested. More »
Yup, The US Is Getting Eternal Sonata On The PS3
6:00PM Luke Plunkett | In June, Namco Bandai said of the PS3 version of JRPG Eternal Sonata – currently due for release in Japan – “We have no plans to release the game on the PS3 in the US at this moment”. No plans in June, maybe, but this is July, buddy, and Namco Bandai have plans. They’ve announced that the game will indeed be getting a US release, in spring, and just like the Japanese version, will feature extra characters, extra cutscenes and (*squeal*) extra outfits. Presser’s only a click away. More »
Did Ubisoft ‘Fix’ Direct2Drive Rainbow Six Vegas 2 Using A Crack?
6:00PM Logan Booker | Imagine you’re a publisher, and there’s a problem with the copy protection on the Direct2Drive version of your game. You don’t have time to/can’t be bothered chasing up the unprotected executable for the title (which you should have in easy reach), so you just browse to your favourite crack search engine, whack in the game’s title, and download the appropriate hack.
According to a thread over at Ubisoft’s forums, this is exactly what the publisher did with Rainbow Six: Vegas 2. A savvy user opened the latest game executable (v1.03) in a hex editor, and found the tag for a crack group known as “Reloaded“. The patch responsible was once available from Ubisoft’s support site, but has since been removed… which doesn’t look good for the company.
The only official comment so far has come from a community manager: More » 
PSP Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop Sellin’ In Japan
5:30PM Michael McWhertor | There is no cure for PSP fever in Japan, what with all those massive marquee releases happening overseas. Like… um God of War: Chains of Olympus maybe? Is this just Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G after shocks or are folks just falling in love all over again with the Sony handheld? Regardless of the reason, the PSP comes out on top on this week’s Media Create sales chart. Nintendo DS and Wii hold strong, but certainly aren’t selling as well as they are in the States. Even the 360 is holding on to a larger slice of the pie than normal. It’s all so confusing! PSP – 56,998 Nintendo DS – 48,540 Wii – 41,768 PlayStation 3 – 12,458 PlayStation 2 – 10,405 Xbox 360 – 3,807 More »inFamous Trailer Will Shock You
5:00PM Luke Plunkett | inFamous (no, spell checker, it’s not my fault), for the PS3, looks to be Crackdown tied together with better graphics and a healthy dose of Deus Ex Machina. And while the game’s tone and colour palette could probably do with a little lightening up, the nuts and bolts – you know, the parts where you electrify a car before throwing it off a train track at somebody – seem to be doing a good job of getting folks excited. More »
