TGS is over. *Sniff*. But with the Makahari Messe now devoid of bright lights, scantily-clad ladies and the sweaty musk of tens of thousands of Japanese gamers, attention now turns towards the important stuff. Like what won “best in show”. Or, as CESA (Japan’s ESRB) call it, the “Future Awards”, held as part of their Japan Game Awards 2008 festivities. Twelve games were recognised – most of them having been playable on the showroom floor – and every major Japanese gaming platform (ie everything bar the PC) is represented.
When Kaz Hirai took over Sony Computer Entertainment, the company’s outlook changed. The previous head, PlayStation father Ken Kutaragi, kept talking up the PS3′s other selling points. It was a Blu-ray player! It was a super computer! It had 4D!! Somewhere along the line, the focus that Sony Computer Entertainment made game machines was lost. Hirai has done a sold job of roping that back in. In an interview with Nikkei, Hirai said:
Of all the days I had to play games at TGS, and of all games I had the chance to play, why the hell did I leave it until Sunday afternoon to play Castlevania Judgement? I mean, my last memory of TGS could have been of something good, like Macross Ace Frontier or, in Konami’s case, another kick at Pro Evo 2009. Instead, I walked away from the show feeling bad. Bad for Castlevania fans, at least.
Over at MTV’s Multiplayer blog, they’ve gone a little Nintendo number crunching crazy. Based on data pulled from the Wii’s Nintendo Channel, there’s Wii software usages (as of October 5, 2008) for Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, Wii Sports, Mario Kart Wii, Rock Band and many more! Interesting factoids:
The big Street Fighter-related surprise from TGS last week was the inclusion of Sakura. Surprising in that they announced her, and not Cammy, who they must be holding for the Christmas news cycle. Anyway, Crecente tried out the new, improved, slightly-older Sakura last week and had a blast. You, though, can’t use her just yet, so why not pass the time with these new screens.
For a while there, the whole SecuROM thing overshadowed the actual release of Spore. Which when you consider how high-profile a release Spore was is kind of a big deal. As a result, your thoughts on DRM are clear. But what about EA’s thoughts? Well, according to EA boss John Riccitiello, the number of people who even noticed it, let alone cared about it, was minuscule. We implemented a form of DRM and it’s something that 99.8 percent of users wouldn’t notice. But for the other .2 percent, it became an issue and a number of them launched a cabal online to protest against it.
We know, he’s not your usual source for hot gaming news, but Dan Ackroyd’s got a trusting face. That and he’s, you know, closely involved in this whole Ghostbusters thing. Speaking with Dallas radio station 105.3 KLLI this morning, the Ghostbusters star said that the currently in-limbo game has been picked up by Atari, and is about “a year away” from being released. Now, he could just be reading Kotaku, since we said the same thing last month, but we’d like to think he doesn’t, and instead heard this somewhere else. Ackroyd’s too classy to hang around here commenting about Shenmue and shitty Wii games.
Yes, this again. All throughout Metal Gear Solid 4‘s development, rumours swirled that the PS3 exclusive would go multi-platform. Even after Konami announced that the game would feature an in-game PS3 controller, the rumours persisted. And now thanks to Japanese stock investor bulletin Morningstar, those rumours continue. The site points out that the number of cross platform titles has increased in an effort to appeal to a more international market. While at TGS, Konami pr mouthpiece Yoshitaka Arai told Morningstar:
Conventional wisdom says games are recession proof. Sony Computer Entertainment is not a conventional company and SCE head Kaz Hirai is not a conventional exec. So screw that wisdom. Well, sorta. Hirai doesn’t think games are the market equivalent of Teflon, but does think gaming won’t get hit as hard as other industries. Said Hirai:
Sources deep within the EA borders tells us that professional wrestler Ric Flair and a guy in a bear suit were spotted at the EA Los Angeles gym earlier today. According to the report, “Ric Flair and a guy in a bear suit are currently filming something in the EA Los Angeles gym.” See? Exactly what we said.
