To: Crecente
From: Ashcraft

This past weekend, the family and I went to Universal Studios Japan. The park was "celebrating" Halloween, which was actually kinda nice cause the kid got to dress up. When I first came to Japan, people didn't really do anything for Halloween — not that they do tons of stuff now. Recently, however, people seem more aware of the holiday. Trick or treating doesn't really happen, and that's a shame. At USJ, they had places where you could say "trick or treat" to park employees and get candy. Yeah, I know, it's not the same, but still.

Mini-Bash dressed up as Jack Sparrow. He was unable to say "trick or treat," claiming that the phrase was "a little difficult." He did ride the Spider-man attraction and enjoyed the Waterworld show. I've actually never seen Waterworld. I know it was a huge flop, but is it really that bad?

He seems to think that "Halloween" is a Jack-o'-Lantern and not an actual day. I get the feeling lots of people here think that...

In big cities like Osaka and Tokyo, I don't see trick or treating catching on as so many people live in apartment buildings. These apartment buildings have automatic locks, meaning that not just anyone can enter. Though, I guess if each building organized a kind of trick or treat event, then it could work... But that seems kinda forced. Not as much fun as random kids and parents knocking on your door. Though, I have heard that in neighborhoods near international schools, there is door-to-door trick or treating.

What you missed last night
Xbox 360 gets cheaper in Japan
2008 GOTY
PGR4 Impressions
SCEE employee leaked Manhunt 2

We still can't quite believe how great this series is. Poignant Balrog jokes, a reversal in economic fortunes for Blanka, Guile on the decline... brilliant. On the subject, we're also looking into just how Chun-Li gets a little more irresistible with each passing episode.

Woah! Not only is there toilet paper, but there's also a machete, fake blood and a whole lotta scary. That's reader Daniel's entry in our Dementium: The Ward contest. Since Halloween is fast approaching, we're doing a cosplay contest. Not just any cosplay contest! That's boring. We're doing a bandage cosplay contest. Meaning? If you have toilet paper, you can enter. If you have band-aids, you can enter. Just cover yourself in bandage, and you are good to go. YES, IT'S THAT SIMPLE. The deadline for the contest is October 24th. Send your entries to kotakucontestATgmailDOTcom. And remember, you aren't just playing for a DS game. Oh, no. You are playing for INTERNET FAME.
Dementium [Official Site]

Back in September, an early PS2 Manhunt 2 build was leaked online. The question was "who?" Details were scant, but GamePolitics reports that the leak came from a Sony Computer Entertainment Europe employee. According to Manhunt 2 publisher Take-Two:

Take-Two Interactive has confirmed that a former employee of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) has acknowledged his responsibility for the unauthorized online distribution of an unrated play-test version of Manhunt 2 submitted for the European PAL PlayStation 2 computer entertainment system.

Leaking the clip led to that employee's termination. Swing by GamePolitics and get the lowdown.
Manhunt 2 Leak [GamePolitics]

I like driving games. Love 'em! Can't get enough of them. But as I've played more and more over the years, I've grown to develop a keen sense of what it is, exactly, I like about them. I like fun. I dig the sensation that I'm driving really really fast in a really really expensive car, and having to drive like a maniac to beat a bunch of other maniacs driving fast, expensive cars.

Lucky for me, you, Bizarre and Microsoft, then, that's exactly what PGR4 delivers. It's fun. Buckets full of bucketloads of fun. The core driving mechanics seem to be the same as PGR3, but just about everything else has been tweaked, improved or added to improve on the predecessor. Tracks are better, opponents more interesting, progression has been overhauled, the graphics are slicker, bikes add a whole new dimension to the game... see? Everything's been changed, and it's been changed for the better.

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Even when you've got a sore throat, Pokémon is there for you. Yes, this is Pocket Monsters nodo ame (throat lozenges), which comes in two fruity flavors: Orange and grape. They even have Vitamin C in them. How about that? And if this wasn't enough (it really isn't), there's Diamond & Pearl SPACE JUICE. Well, it's not really space juice. Pokémon space juice would be absurd. Rather, it's mixed fruit juice in an astronaut-style squeezy pouch that's often used for energy jelly drinks in Japan. Here, have a look:

Above, both "His" and "Hers" variants of TN Game's "3rd Space Vest". What's it do? Plug it into your PC and every time you get punched/kicked/shot/smacked/blown up in a game, the vest will replicate the blow to your real, human torso. In other words, while playing a game for fun, you'll incur real, physical pain. Having paid $US 170 for the "pleasure". Thanks, TN, but we'll pass on this one.
TN Games Shop [via Giz]

With all those erotic PC games released in Japan, how's a company supposed to stand out? Hint: Make the game tangible. On the fifth floor of Akihabara Sofmap, married women title Married Women Harem ~This is the Married Women Paradise Inn~ does just that! Instead of just leaving a stack of fliers and info about pre-ordering, there is a display to entice costumers to pick up the game's literature. We've seen this before: Here, for example. That doesn't mean one still can't marvel at this game promotion wizardy! Embarrassing jubblies safely placed after the jump.

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Anyone who needs to know how to make our day: this is how you make our day. Kotakuite Dave writes:

I noticed that you guys were lacking a Legend Of Zelda pumpkin so I had to contribute. I give you Link from The Wind Waker. Enjoy!

Dave. We so are. Thank you.

You know when you see game ads, and all the people look really excited? Like even the people who are not playing are giddy? Usually it's totally b.s., but this ad is not lying. At TGS, we checked out upcoming Capcom puzzle title Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure and, yes, even those who were not playing totally got into the puzzle solving — it's that fun. Truth in advertising? You better believe it.

Just got the press release for Tim Schafer's Brütal Legend, as well as a bunch of concept art. You really should just read it for yourselves, but if you're in a rush, I'll capture the spirit of the times with this excerpt:

Work has been going around the clock and insiders close to Schafer have described Brütal Legend as the chronicle of Eddie Riggs, a roadie of a virtuous metal band, pulled back in time to learn his true purpose. Offered the wealth and knowledge of an ancient kingdom in exchange for assembling a legion of his own design, the roadie commands a barbaric mob of demons, dragsters, amp stacks, leather and chrome. Together they thunder across the land in the ultimate Tour of Destruction, driving the ancient world headlong into the Age of Metal.

Bless you, Mr. Schafer. Concept art's in the gallery below, press release is after the jump.

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Now aren't those just darling? Reader Kyle made this Pika-Plane from heavy construction and even wrote an exciting dialogue to go with it.

"Kotaku One to Pika-Plane. Pika-Plane, please respond."

"Copy, Kotaku One. This is Pika-Plane. Over."

"Pika-Plane, please adjust your flightpath six degrees to the south. When it comes to Pokemon-themed aircraft, Kotaku Tower is a No-Fly Zone. Over."

See? EXCITING. What's going on? We're doing a paper airplane contest for Ace Combat 6. We've got a bundle of goodies that includes:
• Ace Combat 6
• Glossy, photo-quality screenshots autographed by the game's producer and director
• Ace Combat 6 Xbox 360 faceplates
&null; The AC6 Flightstick set
So what's the contest? Paper airplanes! That's right, to win this bundle you've gotta fold, cut, glue bits of paper together in hopes of creating a truly gnarly paper jet plane. They don't have to actually fly, but hey, if they do, that's a major plus. Be sure to snap a pic of your creation with something that says "Kotaku" and send it to kotakucontestATgmailDOTcom. Add "Ace Combat 6 Contest" to your subject line. Deadline is October 25th.

Dusted off my Japanese PSN account on Saturday morning to get hold of the GT5 Prologue demo. Since it's demo code, one track and a handful of cars, there's not much to say! Fans will still dig the ultra-authentic approach the series takes, critics will still hate on the sterility, ass-kicking adherence to realism and lack of damage modelling (no, despite earlier comments, smashed-up bits don't seem to have made the demo). One thing everyone will agree on, though, is that the car models look amazing. And the in-car view? Worth all those polygons, it's creepy-realistic. Anyone thinking of picking it up, all the necessary menu buttons are in English, you'll be fine.

Microsoft Japan just shot us an press release announcing that the Xbox 360 would be getting a price cut. Starting November 1st, the 20GB bundle, which originally listed at ¥39,795 (US $346), will retail for ¥34,800 ($US 302). Likewise, the ¥29,800 ($US 259) Core System will sell for ¥27,800 ($US 241). A new, limited-edition 20GB "Value Pack" with Forza Motorsport 2 and Viva Piñata will also go on sale. It will retail for ¥34,800 and not include an HDMI cable. Not a bad deal if you don't own an Xbox 360. Hey Japan, you listening?

...Of Spawn Baddies, as McFarlane's bread-winner stands valiantly atop a rooftop while thousands of innocent thugs, henchmen and ne'er-do-wells plunge to their deaths.
Embarrassing Moments in Game Design: Spawn Respawn [VC&G]

When you think of characters at Universal Studios, you think of characters connected to, well, Universal Studios. Characters like Woody Woodpecker or Beetlejuice. In recent years, Universal Studios Hollywood has licensed non-Universal character — for example, Sponge Bob, Marvel Comics superheroes and The Simpsons. Osaka's Universal Studios Japan has licensed Hello Kitty and Crash Bandicoot. He's even on the vending machines (pic after the jump). Not sure what a video game character has to do with USJ, but whatever! Someone, explain. Please.

Heads up, today is our favourite Kotakuday, Ban Monday. We LOVE Ban Mondays! While our hot line is open to ban recommendations at all times, we turn up the ban sensitivity on the Ban Hammer for this special monday. Here's how it works: Send us the commenter page for anyone that should get the boot. If we agree (even slightly), we'll swing. And swing hard. Though! No ban gloating. Gloating leads to Ban Hammer backfire, which could cause you to get the boot. Tuesday we'll be back better, lighter, strong and faster. Know that today is a Surprise Ban Monday, so shhhhhhh. Don't tell the other commenters — especially, those you want gone.

Finally, some uplifting news on the Australian game developer rebate front. Out of a recent meeting this morning between GDAA CEO Greg Bondar and deputy senate leader for the opposition Stephen Conroy, has come the promise that if Labor is elected, Conroy will "establish a high level committee to review the GDAA’s call for a 40% tax rebate for the games industry in Australia".

Okay, it's so-so news. There's no guarantee that anything will happen under a Labor Government - a committee is something you form before a war, not during. However, we know conclusively that nothing will happen if the Coalition is re-elected, and for those hunting desperately for even a foal's chance of a rebate, this is as good as it's going to get.

You can read the full release after the jump.

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Close watchers of the rumour mill will have noticed that the industry has recently acquired its own Deep throat. This oesophagus of privileged information has taken the form of a very innocent, plain-looking blog titled "Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars".

In the last few weeks, Surfer Girl has enlightened us on the progress of Team Bondi's LA Noire, a Resistance: Fall of Man sequel and shared a few tidbits on Turn 10's Forza Motorsport 3.

Are these rumours tasty? Yes. Varied? Certainly. Accurate? Only one person knows, and that's Surfer Girl herself. As such, we kindly asked the knowledgeable lass for a moment of her time:

Logan: Would you say you're directly involved in the games industry?
Surfer Girl: I'm an insider. Insider.

Hit the jump for the full interview.

PS. If you're wondering where exactly the name for Surfer Girl's blog came from, she's already done an excellent job of explaining it:

3) "Where the hell do you get a blog title like "Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars" from?"
The blog name comes from a Latvian tour guide who was on some sort of hallucinogenic and spoke random phrases.

4) "You never reviewed Star Wars, what did you think of Star Wars?"
Boring. A step down from a classic like American Graffiti. George did science fiction much better with THX 1138.

Surfer Girl also took the time to interview me during our Q&A. You can read it over at the Reviews Star Wars blog. It's mostly about Australian culture, which was awesome for me because I'm actually a Kiwi.

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During the Assassin's Creed demo down at the Australian Maritime Museum today, creative director Patrice Desilets (second from the right) commented on remarks he made two weeks ago on cramming all the game's data onto the Xbox 360's puny DVD format, and into the PS3's questionable memory density.

According to Desilets, his boss (Raymond perhaps? Far right, above) called him the day after the comments were made and they exchanged a few words. All Desilets was willing to say today on the Xbox 360 issue was:

There's no problem anymore. It's gone.

And:

I learned my lesson.

Patrice is a nice bloke, so I hope whoever spoke to him wasn't too hard on his tongue slippage.

Here starts the Atomic Live 2007 coverage!

Live 07 was held on the rather sunny Saturday of October 20, inside the Badgery Pavilion at Sydney Olympic Park. It was labelled a tech and gaming expo, and on both fronts it delivered. Rough attendance numbers on the day were about 1200 - I'm not sure if they hit that high, but the venue was always busy.

To kick off the first in a batch of posts are three snaps of cars that were present at the event. No, they didn't move much while they were there; they were more inclined to sit looking pretty, or challenge onlookers to figure out how they actually got inside the pavilion. Pictures after the jump!

Oh, and bonus virtual cookie if you can perfectly ID these vehicles, because my knowledge of cars is about as extensive as my experience with offshore oil rigging. Which is to say infinitesimal.

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Fair warning now - there's going to be a deluge of Assassin's Creed coverage over the next few days, as the game's creative director, Patrice Desilets, has ventured out from Ubisoft's Montreal studio to visit Australia. We saw a presentation of Creed today, and there's a one-on-one Q&A tomorrow, so expect me to make the most of it.

For now, here's a shot of the official Assassin's Creed faceplate for Xbox 360. Ubisoft handed them out today along with a quill and some pink ink, just in case I suddenly feel the need to scribe how hetero I am on the walls of my house. There's also a close-up shot after the jump.

If you have any questions you'd like me to take to Patrice, be sure to leave a comment!

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To: Ash & Luke
From: Flynn
Subject: La La Land

Greetings and salutations! I have been reporting all weekend from Los Angeles where I attended E for All briefly and I do mean briefly. I arrived for the press hours on Thursday, did a few interviews, played what games that were there and by three I was done. Since it didn't seem like there was much reason to attend the conference for all four days we decided to take a jaunt to Disneyland which was a complete blast. It was nice to get away for a day and have some fun away from games. As much as I love them, sometimes you just need a break, you know?

Some things you might have missed this weekend:

Cheapy D is a Dad!

Can you please get me one of these? You can keep the game!

That MGS4 demo we played in Japan, well it's in English now.

Well, I'm off to spend a last few relaxing hours in a fancy-ish hotel room. I'm looking forward to heading back home and the end of conference season. It will be nice to sleep in my own bed again. Hope you have a great week, goodnight!

Back in September, Fahey mentioned Lighthouse Interactive's PC adventure game Darkness Within: In Pursuit of Loath Nolder (pretty pictures included!), and now the nice people at Rock, Paper, Shotgun have taken the demo for a spin. You can get your own copy over at the official website. It doesn't sound like the demo gives a very good impression of the game, though I guess demos frequently don't:

We have no idea what we're meant to be doing or what we're meant to be achieving, so we resort to blind pointing and clicking and spinning in circles (At which point we note there's no bloody door into this room where we start, which spooks us pretty bad.). Through this we ascertain several things - that many objects are "interesting", without really giving any other reason why (And entirely unpick-up-able) and many labels are smudged. Papers? Can't tell the date. Bottles? Unreadable label and can't make out what it is (Clue: Looks like booze to me). Windows? Too dirty to see through.

There's not much to do. The full game apparently features some kind of Thinking Screen, which allows you to combine and mess around with objects, except that's not functional in the demo. Which strikes me a bit of a bad idea to not allow you to play around with one of the game's selling-points in the demo, much like giving a level of GTA where you weren't allowed to run over people or something.

Like so many blog posts, the comments are nearly as entertaining as the post itself. On the problems of staircases: "You know, it kind of dawned on me now - staircases are one of gaming's best, unsung archnemesis. As far back as I can recall, staircases have nearly always contributed to gamer frustration and prevented him from achieving success." In any case, if you're interested in an HP Lovecraft-inspired, point and click, adventure-horror PC game, you may want to take a look.

Things Man Was Not Meant To Click At [Rock, Paper, Shotgun]

So many good games coming out this week I'm afraid my bank account is going to take quite a beating. Eye of Judgement, Ratchet & Clank, Jericho and Castlevania are all on my short list of games to get this week although one or two of them may have to wait until the cash magically replenishes itself.

The Eye of Judgment (PS3)
Battle to the death with cards and a camera.

Painkiller: Overdose (PC)
Once a mod, now a for real game.

Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (PS3)
Ratchet and Clank return with another outrageous weapons arsenal.

Clive Barker's Jericho (PC, X360, PS3)
Control a team of psychic soldiers against legions of the undead.

Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation (X360)
Fighting planes are fun!

Mega Man ZX Advent (DS)
Mega Man returns!

Conan (X360, PS3)
The legendary barbarian graces the 360 with his twitching muscles.

Battlestar Galactica (X360, PC)
Downloadable game based on the uber popular TV series.

Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties (PC)
Age of Empires III spreads it's reach to the Asian Dynasties.

Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles (PSP)
All new revamped Castlevania action!

Kotakuite 'Kiriphii' gave us the heads up that the US premiere of the Distant Worlds: music from Final Fantasy will be next March in Chicago. Ticket prices will range from $35 to $150 (!), with the high end tickets including some extra stuff like a post-show meet and greet with Nobuo Uematsu. So all of you who are FF devotees and live in Chicago, mark your calendars for 1 March, 2008. Press release (including concert program) after the jump.

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Every Extend Extra Extreme: An Overview
Extended interest in Every Extend? Then check out this extra extreme info!

Res 4 Figures, Now With Cute Little Real Clothes
Finally, toys I can play with without looking like a completely tool. I bags Leon.

Solo Rock Band Instruments Are Coming, They're Coming
Don't worry, you'll be able to pick and choose your Rock Band peripherals.

Sega Hasn't Axed PS3 Golden Axe
Golden Axe coming to a PlayStation 3 near you. Soon. Well, sometime.

I came across this thoughtful overview of Every Extend Extra Extreme, Q? Entertainment's XBLA version of the PSP's Every Extend Extra (which is itself a version of Every Extend) that came out this past week. I haven't checked it out yet, since I've been up to my neck in work and my 360 has been left to fend for itself in the wilds of my living room, but I'm looking forward to taking it for a spin. Even more so after reading through this review of sorts:

In this way it almost compensates for the visually noisy playfield in a way that Space Giraffe fails to do. In Space Giraffe you have to quickly parse any useful information out of the busy playfield, the busy user interface and the busy audio, here you only need to really concentrate on the game. The tight design and colour selection further brings it all together into a very nice little package.

Above all, Every Extend Extra Extreme feels to be the closest realisation of that Kandinsky-inspired experience that Mizuguchi[1] has been trying to create since Project-K(andinsky), aka. Rez.

I'd be surprised if it manages to bump Lumines from my 'most loved' XBLA list, but anything's possible.

Every Extend Extra Extreme [the-inbetween via GameSetWatch]

Ever since the release of The Orange Box, gamers have gone Companion Cube crazy. There have been wallpapers, a papercraft, myriad fan-art and even a home made plushie dedicated to the little heart adorned box. I suppose it was just a matter of time before someone made a Companion Cube cake and it looks like that time is now. Half-Life 2.net forum poster f1r3b4ll and his significant other baked this tasty treat after completing Portal n honour of the game that has spawned numerous internet memes within it's first couple weeks of existence. Bon appetit!

[Thanks, animstar]

If you're of the crafty persuasion and lament the lack of variety in mass-produced cases, you're in luck: someone's kindly posted directions on how to make your own. I love the fact it's made out of corduroy trousers; if I were the DIY crafting type, I'd probably give it a whirl. [via Wonderland]