Three Words I Said To The Man I Defeated In Gears Of War That I'll Never Say Again 
New Doom 3 For Xbox 360 And PlayStation 3 Supports Head-Mounted Displays 
Far Cry 3 And The Stranger In A Strange Land 
Why Robin Makes Batman Better 
Resistance: Burning Skies: The Kotaku Review 
Harley Quinn's Revenge Is Batman: Arkham City's Bad New Ending NetDevil – the guys behind the upcoming Lego MMO Lego Universe – are taking the game seriously. Very seriously. So seriously that they’ve made some changes to the normal development process by making use of a team of die-hard, adult, “purist” Lego fans. Lead producer Ryan Seabury explains: We’ve been working with about 50 of them — and now up to 68, and it’s only going to keep expanding. We’ve brought them out to Denver twice… the first time, it was more about getting them up to speed on the concept and what was going on and hearing a lot of feedback and opening a dialogue, and the next time we brought them back out, they actually got hands-on with the tools and the technology.
Conceptually, we think of them as developers helping us build the game…You never hear about a community being involved in an MMO besides coming in at the beta test at the end. Those people that can be the most influential… [are]heavily involved and tell us what their expectations are.
I can tell you our expectations: if we can’t recreate the original Lego castle, all bets are off.
NetDevil Talks Merits, Precautions Of Early Focus Testing [Gamasutra]
Japanese game developer Level 5 (Professor Layton, White Knight Chronicles) has teamed up with venerated animation house Studio Ghibli (My Neighbour Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service) to make DS title Ninokuni: THE ANOTHER WORLD, the developer’s first “10th Anniversary” product. Ghibli is handling the animation for the game, which will be bundled with a “Magic Master” book which is akin to the book carried by the game’s protagonist. The book has a crest to ward off evil spirits and contains secret elixir recipes and spells. Players even use information in the book in-game, apparently. Level 5, you had us at animation by Studio Ghibli. Ghibli / Level 5 Gallery [2ch]
Mark Jacobs, co-founder of Mythic Entertainment, does not like gold farmers. He will not tolerate them in his game, Warhammer Online. Posting on his blog, Jacobs writes: I hate gold sellers/spammers. No, that’s not strong enough, let me try again. I HATE GOLD SELLERS WITH EVERY FIBRE OF MY BEING. Ah, that’s better. Now, why do I hate them you may ask? I hate them for a number of reasons, most of which have been detailed in various interviews I’ve done over the years. And now that they have taken their obnoxiousness to new levels with gold service spamming, I HATE GOLD SPAMMERS EVEN MORE NOW THAN EVER BEFORE.
Remember: Mark Jacobs does not like gold farmers. So what are he and his crew doing about them?
Last week, a SEGA ad featuring a dragon-type shadow announced: “We’re making RPG now!” Apparently, SEGA is. This week’s Famitsu reveals that the mystery RPG is a DS title called Seventh Dragon. It’s the new game from Etrian Odyssey director Kazuya Niinou. The game allows up to four players to play in a single party at once with job classes that include skill trees. The job classes are: Rogue, Mage, Princess, Knight, Fighter, Samurai and Healer. The game uses a “command-style” battle system, and the aim is rather straightforward: Kill the dragon. The game is slated for release next spring in Japan.
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Valve make PC games. They port em over to consoles, sure, but at heart, they’re a PC developer. But what if they were more than that? What if they decided to start making Wii games, or MMO games? Team Fortress Summer Party? World Of Black Mesa? It’d be hilarious. And it’s something Valve would love to do. Except, uh, they won’t. Not unless you or anyone you know knows magic.
GN: The thing is I’m a big fan of the Wii in terms of a lot of the interesting things that it does, and we have absolutely zero Wii games in development. There’s always so much more that we’d like to do that we could do. We have a bunch of MMO fans inside of the company that would kill to be working on an MMO….
1UP: …including you?
GN: Myself included. [Laughs]A Wii MMO! Woo-hoo! We have nobody working on such a beast. Magically, if we could increase ourselves in size, then we can do a lot more of this stuff.
Don’t know about magic, Gabe, but we hear cash money works just as well with that sorta stuff.
Two birds, one stone! Peter Molyneux chats up how he was impressed by Final Fantasy VII and how he’s not so impressed (so far) with the PLAYSTATION 3. According the Microsoft employee:
I always remember back to Final Fantasy VII, when I first played FFVII, that to me defined the genre… Those were the ‘oh my god’ moments, I don’t believe they exist. I haven’t seen many of those on the PS3.
But have you seen many of those on the Xbox 360, Peter? He adds: “This is very much me as a gamer talking, not as an industry spokesman. I’ve got a PS3, a Wii and a 360, I’ve got just about everything.” Just like when Molyneux said that the PS3 was waiting for its “defining title”.
Molyneux: ‘FFVII, that to me defined the genre’ [VideoGamer]
Take that! The all-female Takarazuka Revue troupe is best known its musical stage shows where women actresses play both male and female roles. The Revue’s shows range from the traditional (Guys and Dolls, Oklahoma!) to anything but (stage versions of Oliver Stone’s JFK, Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby). Next February, the Takarazuka Revue’s Cosmos troupe will bring its crossing-dressing musical sense to a stage version of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, complete with romance and intrigue. It’s interesting to note that Takarazuka has decided to go with the game’s English language character name, Phoenix Wright, instead of the character’s original Japanese name, Ryuichi Naruhodo. The ace attorney will be played by actress Ranju Tomu, pictured in costume. Hit the jump for a shot of her without the man makeup.
Spore, anyone? More like Spore, everyone, as Maxis’ galactic creature game sold like a house on fire that was full of combustible hotcakes. Spore’s #1, the Galactic Edition is #2, and even the Creature Creator hangs on to #4, despite the real thing being out. The rest is your standard Warcraft/Sims breakdown, with the exception of Crysis, which hung around thanks the pre-Warhead interest spike.
1. Spore 2. Spore Galactic Edition 3. The Sims 2 Apartment Life 4. Spore Creature Creator 5. WoW: Battle Chest 6. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe 7. World of Warcraft 8. WoW: The Burning Crusade 9. Warcraft III Battle Chest 10. Crysis
[via Big Download][Image]
We didn’t get into the LittleBigPlanet beta. Bummer. Tell you someone who did, though: VG247. And they’ve dutifully gone ahead and posted a 14-minute clip of the experience, intro sequence and everything. If you’re a fan of both LBP and the soothing, make-a-walrus-purr voice of Stephen Fry, click below! If you don’t like to have the gaming equivalent of the “new car smell” ruined by sitting through a game’s opening stages, don’t click below.
LBP beta movie – The intro, tutorial and first level [VG247]
Announced during E3, Sony today released what’s surely the last meaningful PS2 bundle, cobbled together to lead the console’s charge into what’s surely it’s last meaningful holiday season. For $149, you’re getting a PS2, Lego Batman and a copy of Justice League: New Frontier, the animated adaptation of Darwyn Cooke’s amazing comic series. Sony promise that stocks are in “limited supply”, and at that price, we’re liable to believe them.
