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High Scores And Egos: There's Always A Bigger Doodle Don’t go expecting that Wolfenstein movie adaptation any time soon. A combination of the writer’s strike and his own workload (plus, uh, some other stuff) means Roger Avary is still working on the movie’s script. And with nobody else having seen it, it’s to be presumed he’s only just started it. Bummer. While id’s Todd Hollenshead revealed to Eurogamer that the movie deal includes some “contract provisions”, stating Avary can’t just sit on the property forever, he also admits that it’s not every day you get a chance to have an Academy Award winner write your movie. Not every day an Academy Award winner gets to write a movie about nazis, zombies and a mechanised Adolf Hitler, either. Avary writing Wolf movie “right now” [Eurogamer]
The Platinum Games developed SEGA published Madworld looks great. It’s a black and white (and red) Wii title takes place in a “dystopian future” where a TV show called Death Watch has contestants kill each other. Like we said, seems great, but we’re ready to find out the nitty gritty details about it. Game site Siliconera took at stab at finding out more, but got the run around from SEGA associate producer Christopher Kaminski:
Is Man Darts [smacking guys into a large dart board with a bat]is a party game or could be played like a party game?
I’m going to go with no comment with that one.
…So is MadWorld just a single player game?
No comment. [laughs]
…It’s probably early to ask this question, but No More Heroes came out with a highly censored version to avoid a CERO Z rating. I don’t think Sega has ever published a CERO Z game in Japan. Do you think MadWorld can be toned down where it can be a CERO D release? Or is it not even being considered for a release in Japan at this point?
I can’t really comment on that one, but it’s an excellent question.
To be fair, SEGA America probably really can’t comment on what SEGA Japan does. Though, the other two questions are just examples of them not sharing. Boy, we totally hate it when people don’t share.
Inside the development of Sega’s MadWorld [Siliconera]
Hey, remember that Transformers mobile game from last week? Didn’t it look (surprisingly) fantastic? Why not see if it plays fantastic. The developers have a java-based demo up on their site, which lets you get to grips with the key-based controls. Knock yourselves out, then get busy wondering aloud why a DS version hasn’t already been announced.
30-year-old Raymundo Castaneda is suspected of having killed a man in December 2007 following a dispute over a soccer game. Wanted by the fuzz in Charlotte over the murder, Castaneda was apprehended by police in Jacksonville on Friday, who tracked him down after he was spotted at a local Wal-Mart. Spotted playing Guitar Hero in the games section. And playing it so damn hard he didn’t even notice police first approaching, then surrounding him. Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office spokesman Ken Jefferson: A team of U.S. Marshals and JSO officers went in to get Castaneda, but he wasn’t paying all that much attention to them. His focus was on this … He was calm, cool and collected. Playing a video game. He didn’t have a care in the world.
Reports claiming Castaneda only agreed to “come quietly” if the cops helped him beat the devil are unconfirmed. Suspected Killer Caught Playing Air Guitar [News 4 Jax, thanks Brett!]
As announced at E3 (and leaked way before that), Microsoft is introducing Avatars to Xbox LIVE. Here are supposedly the first images of the Avatar creator. These screens are not from the actual Fall dashboard update, but rather, are a “image collage” put together by game site Xbox 360 Fanboy of thumbnails and artwork that will apparently be used in the creator. They should give you an idea of what Xbox LIVE Avatar making will be like — there are icons for clothing, skin colour, height, weight, hair style and accessories.
Source: First images from 360 Avatar creator [Xbox 360 Fanboy]
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus guy Fumito Ueda is hard at work on a PS3 title. Oh yes, but what’s going on with that? Sony’s Shuhei Yoshida explains:
They are working on a title. I started the ICO project. Ueda-san joined my team in Japan as a cinematic animator, but he created a short movie and presented it to me and said, ‘I want to make this game.’ I said, ‘Yes, let’s do it, but you have never made a game. We have to have experienced people do it,’ so it took a while, recruiting one person at a time. And because Fumito Ueda doesn’t compromise, we had to move the development from PSone to PlayStation 2. Then I couldn’t complete the game because I moved to the United States. It took four years and the second game took four years too. So I started calling them the ‘Olympic Team.’ They haven’t released a PS3 title yet — of course not — they’ll take four years! But they have something really, really good on the way.
Then patient we will be!
They have something really, really good on the way [NeoGAF via VG247]
Metal Gear Solid 4 may been released earlier this summer, but that doesn’t mean the merchandizing is gonna stop! This December, Konami is releasing a set of 7cm “Fugimate” MGS4 figurines. Priced at ¥2,940 (US$US 27), the set includes Snake, Raiden, Ocelot and Otacon — all as shoeless little girls with giant heads.
MGS4 Figures [Konami Style Thanks, Randy!]
Bungie Promises Uber-Banhammer for Porn Filesharers Guess it’s back to BitTorrent for you!
Xbox Developer Dead in Murder-Suicide Tragic and unfortunate. Makes you wonder how situations escalate to this.
Kotaku Originals: Early Builds R Us All the best stories from last week, right here.
Oh man, Hannah Montana or the Cheetah Girls. Hannah Montana or the Cheetah Girls. Let’s not miss the bigger picture here: Hannah’s on the PS2 only. Nintendo, you been served notice that Sony’s in your henhouse, gonna break your hold on tweentertainment bubblegumware. This totally makes up for Final Fantasy XIII.
Monday (Aug 4) King of Clubs (Wii) Tuesday (Aug. 5) Beijing 2008 – The Official Video Game of the Olympic Games (PC) Ford Racing: Off Road (PC) B-Boy (PS2) Hannah Montana: Spotlight World Tour (PS2) Monster Madness: Grave Danger (PS3) Little League World Series 2008 (Wii, DS) Crash Time (360) GRID (DS) Puzzler Collection (DS) The Cheetah Girls: Passport to Stardom (DS) Quick Yoga Training (DS)
Wednesday (Aug. 6) Braid (360)
Friday (Aug. 8) Fate: Undiscovered Realms (PC)
Trade-ins and the resale market are a great benefit to cost-conscious gamers (not to mention retailers gigging the trade-in values and resale markups). They’re also a pain in the arse for developers, especially the smaller ones, who face creating popular but poor-selling titles because everyone swaps it around. In an interview with Develop magazine, Frontier founder David Braben says developers should stop complaining to retailers and figure out ways to make owning first-buy copies of their games essential.
“We need to help retailers”, Braben said. “In fairness, they’re probably doing it because they’re struggling. But there are ways of tracking and deterring pre-owned sales”.
His ideas: Unique codes on boxes, similar to those used for PC online games, to ensure the games can’t be sold. Or, special content that can only be unlocked with a scratch-off card containing a one-use code.
But most likely, small developers will look to the downloadable channel as the way to go, Braben says. This will certainly become more viable in future generations of consoles, meaning devs still must cope with retail markets for the forseeable future.
Braben Questions Game Prices [Develop, via Destructoid]
