Joel over at BoingBoing Gadgets got his hands on some screens for the upcoming D&D Insider app, which is not a new D&D-based video game. Instead, it's a program that lets you create and run real D&D 4.0 games on a PC. Which, OK, technically makes it a PC game, but whatever. Those worried D&D would lose its nerdy charms need not worry - just look at those character designs! Truly awful.

Two weeks ago, Capcom tried some pre-emptive measures aimed at heading off an impending lawsuit from The MKR Group, who hold the rights to George Romero's Dawn of the Dead film. Didn't work. MKR have since sued Capcom, claiming that Dead Rising is essentially an unlicensed adaptation of Romero's masterpiece:

Both works are dark comedies. In both, the recreational activities of the zombies and absurdly grotesque 'kill scenes' provide unexpected comedic relief.

Both works provided thoughtful social commentary on the 'mall culture' zeitgeist, in addition to serving up a sizable portion of sensationalistic violence.

Gears of War 2 is coming. And so soon! Not surprising since it's been in development before Gears of War 1 shipped. Does that mean it's going to be Gears rehash? You know, more of the same? Epic honcho Mark Rein says:

Yes, we're doing Gears of War 2! Did you ever doubt that? It's been in development since before Gears of War 1 shipped... We had an executive review the other day and I can tell you it is definitely more badarse. It's really good. One thing I can say is that compared to where we were in the February before we shipped the last Gears, the game is in phenomenal shape. There are some good surprises for people.

360 and PS3 developers, look upon these charts, and despair! Actually, British gamers, you, too, should look upon this list and despair, for were it not for Devil May Cry 4's and UTIII's appearance, this would be a top ten of woefully epic proportions. Unless you're Nintendo. Or making rubbish games for a Nintendo console. If so, you'll be tickled pink.

1) Mario & Sonic At The Olympics (Wii)
2) Mario & Sonic At The Olympics (DS)
3) Brain Training
4) Wii Play
5) Game Party (Wii)
6) Unreal Tournament III (PS3)
7) Cooking Mama 2 (DS)
8) Devil May Cry 4 (360)
9) More Brain Training
10) Sight Training (DS)

[charts courtesy of ChartTrack]

Yeah, we know Will Wright has talked about the Care Bears before, saying he'd like to see interstellar wars between Care Bears and Klingons. Totally understandable! But we had not idea he's so into the Care Bears. Like really into the Care Bears. When asked what would surprise people the most about him, Will Wright answered:

Probably my utter fascination with Care Bears. I could tell you more than you want to know about Care Bears. Oh, you want to know about Care Bears? ...Yeah, 'cause they live in Care-a-Lot, which is above the Forest of Feelings where the Care Bear Cousins live, which is above Earth... But the Care Bear Cousins aren't even Bears. They're like lions and monkeys and things, but they call them Care Bear Cousins. Yeah... They have these particle beam weapons in their stomachs, and when they get really upset, they fire this Star Wars thing. Yeah, they're cool.

Electronic Arts doesn't just want to buy Take Two. It also wants to make smaller, more original games. The publisher is best know for huge, ubiquitous franchises like The Sims and Madden, but is looking to get creative with its new development arm, Blueprint. The Blueprint games will be made with smaller teams. So far, Blueprint is involved with Steven Spielberg's BOOM BLOX and Will Wright's Spore — both of which are massively hyped games. Former EA Los Angeles studio head Neal Young is helming EA Blueprint and says:

We want to find a new way to make games with smaller teams.

This is Love. Love is different. It's a little bit FPS, it's a little bit MMO, it's a little bit adventure game. The basic deal is as follows: it's an online game, which you play in small groups, and it's hoped those small groups will band together as they work through and explore the game world. Sounds OK so far, so here's the kick: the game world is procedurally-generated. It's highly ambitious, and also incredibly beautiful (that shot above is a screen), doubly so when you find out it's all the work of one guy: Eskil Steenberg. You can check out Love's progress at the site below.
Love [Official Site, via Rock, Paper, Shotgun]

There are bad people on the internet. Really bad. Good thing the government is gonna get them! According to the US Director of National Intelligence, the country's top snoopers are developing software that will help trackdown violent extremists congregating in online worlds. The proposed project falls under the post 9/11 "Data Mining Reporting Act." ("Data mining" is defined as "a program involving pattern-based queries, searches or other analyses of 1 or more electronic databases" in order to "discover or locate a predictive pattern or anomaly indicative of terrorist or criminal activity...") Called "The Reynard Project," this new software will first study the way gamers behave online, and then apply this data while searching for violent extremists. Still in its preliminary stages, the ultimate goal is to "automatically detecting suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world." Thus, the program could detect "normal" MMO gaming behavior and pinpoint those who are deviating from that norm. Hello Big Brother!
Sleepers Looking For Terrorists In WoW [Threat Level via GameSpot] Pic]

OK, so billions of dollars haven't convinced anyone from Take-Two to sell. Time to get with the flattery, which EA must believe will get them somewhere. During the conference call from earlier today, EA boss John Riccitiello was positively gushing over T2's star stable, and how they served as a big inspiration when it came to restructuring the publishing giant:

I would note that we have enormous respect for Rockstar, and the leadership at Rockstar - this is an organisation and leadership team that has survived at least six CEO transitions in the last five years.

So under any circumstances they've got staying power and they are resilient. I would also point out that our label structure in many ways is inspired by some of the work that has taken place within Rockstar, and Sam Houser's particular beliefs on how these things ought to work...so I think we'd represent a good home for them.

It's numbers time! That's right, we've got a post full of data that provides insight into people who answered survey questions. Hooray. In this case, it's over a thousand old Japanese ladies between the ages of 50 and 69. Findings include: 41.3 percent have a game console. What's more, 12.4 percent play their game console "often," while 33.6 percent play it "sometimes" and 23.4 percent play it "occasionally". The most common consoles?

While Microsoft struck down its Xbox 360 HD DVD Player last week, Xbox Japan was still milling things over last we heard. But today, no more! As of today, Xbox Japan has decided to wash its hands of the HD DVD Player. Surprised? No one is! This just, you know, makes it all official and shit.
Xbox 360 HD DVD プレーヤーの生産を終了いたします [Xbox Japan] [Pic]

Metal Gear Solid 4, Killzone 2, whatever. They're sideshows. Distractions. No, for Sony, the year's biggest game on the PS3 might just be LittleBigPlanet, with an SCEE rep saying it's "potentially our biggest Blu-ray release of 2008". That announcement was partly to let us know Sony are just psyched about the game, but also to say they're a lot more psyched about it than they were about Warhawk. "This isn't a Warhawk or a Tekken: Dark Resurrection. This is a triple-A Blu-ray title". There there, Warhawk. I'm sure he didn't mean to be so...mean.
LittleBigPlanet: Sony's "Biggest" 08 Game [Eurogamer]

The idea of a Wii Bionic Commando port sounds nice and all. You could use the Wii-mote to swing around. Great! No wonder there's an internet petition trying to make it happen. The cold, brutal reality is something else altogether — if not impossible. About that pie-in-the-sky petition, the game's producer and money-hater Ben Judd says:

I understand where they're coming from. If we did a Wii version it would not be with one-to-one swinging... you couldn't do [that] for more than 10 minutes.

Just when you thought Nintendo scarves had been played out, along comes this. Knitted by the delightful Etsy merchant and Nintendo fangirl Tanya (Beatboxtaun), it's got Mike Tyson on one side looking like he's had his fill of babies for the day, while on the other, Little Mac is looking a little worse for wear. Beautiful! Such beauty comes at a price, however: at 72-inches long and one-of-a-kind, you'll be throwing down $US 175 for the privilege of wearing it around your scrawny neck, so impulse-shoppers might want to avoid hitting the link below if they haven't paid their month's rent yet.
Mike Tysons Punch-Out Scarf - DIY [BeatboxTaun @ Etsy]

Devil May Cry's always been a rather sexy series. Effeminate heroes, long red coats, exposed man-chests, you know how it goes. But a slutty series? No. Not until today, anyway. High-brow British men's lifestyle magazine Front has subbed Dante and Nero from the game's screens and replaced them with the demure, classily-named Vikki Blows. What will those marketing types think of next?
Devil May Cry 4 [TVG]

Nintendo have gotten around to giving us all some new details on Pokemon Ranch (formerly Pokemon Farm), one of the first WiiWare games ever announced. Turns out anyone who wants to import their Pokemon from Diamond and Pearl onto their Wii can store up to 1000 of them in the "ranch", and once there, "interact" with them via activities. Like...sitting around a campfire with them. Seriously. I don't know about you, but prior to this update, I was a little concerned by this game. Now? That screenshot has me terrified.
Pokemon Ranch [via Go Nintendo]

Tecmo's Tomonobu Itagaki is so not fucking around. He's a man of extremes, chugging black coffee and eating burnt steaks. He scoffs at quote-un-quote video game violence. That's nothing. From the BBC piece:

"Violence is not about cutting an enemy into pieces or seeing a lot of blood," he [Itagaki] says. "That's not what real violence is." To emphasise his point, Itagaki reaches for a sheathed samurai sword mounted in his office, and holds it out in front of me.

"In the Japanese warrior tradition you would shame an opponent. A real sword expert would aim his slice at the first four fingers of his opponent's sword hand. This would cost a warrior his livelihood and someone suffering this wound would normally commit suicide rather than live without their sword hand.

"That's what I consider to be real violence," he says...

When PC owners want their games digitally delivered, they head to Valve's Steam service. But Valve don't just want your money for games. No, they want your money for music and movies as well, and will be stepping up their efforts during the year to start offering other forms of entertainment on the platform. Valve's Doug Lombardi:

...we're also looking at other types of content like video and music. We're definitely having those conversations and meetings, and we're reaching out to folks with other types of digital entertainment. I think before the end of the year, you'll probably see some pilot programs with other digital entertainment on Steam.

German site PC Games Hardware got in touch with Charles Beauchemin, the technical lead on the upcoming PC version of Assassin's Creed. In the interview, the developer confirms that the game's Direct3D 10 rendering pipeline will have better performance than its D3D 9 counterpart, while running under Vista. The thing is, in theory, Direct3D 10 should almost always be faster than Direct3D 9, but reality has shown this not to be the case.

Beauchemin goes on to say that AMD and NVIDIA's D3D 10 drivers still need work, and even once the engine code is finalised, driver updates could provide noticeable performance gains.He also mentions that the PC port of Assassin's Creed will focus on performance rather than visuals. When asked if there will be any new content thanks to D3D 10:

No. Most of the porting to DX10 involves optimisations of the existing calls, without any new content.

So, will Assassin's Creed on PC be the first game to warrant the installation of Vista? At the very least, it might take the edge off its hefty system requirements.

News: Assassin's Creed: DX10 confirmed, faster than DX9 [PCGH, via Blue's News]

To: Ash
From: Crecente
Re: "Heroes" Is All Kinds of Dumb

So on Sunday I was struck with the burning desire to go out and buy myself some Nerf weaponry. I blame the folks at Massive Black who talked up their Nerf armory last week. So we headed off to the local Toys R Us where I picked up a Recon Rifle and a AirZone Tommy Gun. Fun stuff. After tinkering for a bit I went outside to play a little Nerf Capture the Flag. The rules were simple, you had to grab the flag from the other person's base and then run it back to your for a point. If you were shot you had to sit out for 30 seconds.

Ten seconds into my first flag run I was tearing across the neighbor's yard when I realised I had better stop to check the road for traffic. But when I tried to stop I realised that the yard was coated with a sheet of ice. My feet shot out from under me until they were almost above my head and then I slammed back down on my arse. I lay there for a second half trying not to vomit and half trying not to laugh.

It was pretty funny until I woke up this morning. Wow, I'll never take a body slam for granted again, my entire body, from head to toes is aching.

Ps. Tristan and his friend beat me three-to-two and that was even after I overheard him telling his pal to "let me win". So sad.

Oh EA, you make Monday's so tough
One of my favorite developers.
Another.
Seriously, Still Alive and Alcohol don't mix
He's no Peter Moore, good thing or bad one?
Puzzzzlllllleeeee Queeeeeest in Spaaaaaaaaaaaace!

Fanboy crossover RPG Namco x Capcom was destined never to be released outside of Japan. Filled with fanservice on both sides, featuring characters culled from Darkstalkers, The Legend of Valkyrie, Street Fighter, Tekken, Strider and many more Namco and Capcom franchises, the tactical action RPG would have been too great an undertaking for too little benefit for both publishers. What looked like a franchise wet dream would only be experienced by Japanese speakers.

Fans to the rescue!

The homegrown translation team at Transgen has localised the PlayStation 2 game's Japanese dialogue from KOS-MOS, Morrigan and dozens of others and is now in the beta-testing stages. While we don't expect it will be easy (or legal) to get your hands on the English language version of Namco x Capcom, interested parties will surely find a way.

Beta-Test in Progress! [Transgen]

EA's attempt at snatching up Take-Two Interactive for $US 2 billion in cash may not have been as warmly welcomed as CEO John Riccitiello had hoped, but it may have a back up plan. It's clear that EA is serious about trying to absorb Take-Two, even going as far as registering eatake2.com—yeah, they're into this for tens of dollars already—and it may be also be set on welcoming someone else into the fold soon.

GameCyte points out that not only did EA register the EATake2 domain name through a proxy on February 22, two days before the buy out proposal went public, it also snapped up eaubisoft.com. While EA already has a 19.9% stake in Ubisoft, the French publisher is becoming a more expensive acquisition prospect, based on some of its recent successes.

Yes, the evidence is circumstantial and EA may simply be parking the domain in case any squatters get quick buck ideas, but interesting nonetheless.

EA and Ubisoft? [GameCyte]

During the course of the handing out of awards at last week's Independent Games Festival, audiences were treated to exclusive Mega64 produced videos between acceptance speeches. They weren't the typical game parodies played out in real life, but clips that spoke to the audience on hand. The production above, shown after the intro after the jump, was my personal favourite.

For a somewhat startling, volume lowering surprise from artist Dan Paladin of Alien Hominid fame, make the jump. Just make sure the kids are out of the room.

Add one more game to the list of PlayStation 3 latecomers, Codemasters and Triumph Studios' Overlord. The demonic spin on Pikmin gameplay features heavy real-time strategy and role-playing elements and will finally come to PS3s this Summer. The latecomer version of Overlord will arrive with the downloadable goodies previously released on Xbox Live Marketplace as well, giving Sony fans the complete experience... and just a year late!

Overlord PS3 confirmed - exclusive screens [CVG]

Lost: The Video Game for the 360 arrived today. Being a fan of the show, I got excited. Not heaps excited, but moderately excited. The sort of excited a platypus would feel if it had any concept of just how uniquely freakish it is.

You want to know about the game, don't you? Sure, I can do that.

It opens like an episode of the show. We're introduced to a new character, Elliott, a photojournalist who turns out to be the player. The plane breaks up, people get sucked out of windows, etc., and the lights go out. Then we wake up on our backs in the middle of the jungle, Jack-style.

Except we can't remember anything.

We get up and walk around, examining some plane seats using the Y button. Then, we see a figure in the distance. Is it Jack's dead father? No, it's not. It's some chick we don't know. As we run up to her, we're distracted by a body caught in a tree. When we look back, she's vanished.

Cue Twilight Zone music. I'm thinking it's not so bad, a little linear, but it's an adventure game so that's how things normally roll. And then we had a flashback.

Remember that rumour from EGM that pointed to a Dead Rising sequel coming from a Western developer? We heard a similar but slightly different rumour from a source that also says development duties are being shifted stateside, specifically at Vancouver-area third-party Blue Castle Games. If you're not familiar with the name, you may remember Blue Castle from its work on The Bigs for 2K Sports. While the relatively young, 100-person strong development studio is known for its multi-platform sports work, it is currently listing an unnamed "action game" for the Xbox 360 as one of three secret projects on its plate.

While the majority of the Japanese Wii line-up looks to be targeted at families who wear nothing but sterile white cotton, the marketing for Metroid Prime 3 Corruption skews a bit differently overseas. That image of a lonesome gamer transfixed by the blue glow of a monitor in a darkened room, the very thing Nintendo was rejecting? Apparently, it's kosher again and precisely the kind of thing that appeals to women looking for something to play between bouts of Wii Play. We'll see if attractive, whispy Japanese women and fashionable Japanese men take the FPS plunge when the Wii Metroid ships in Japan next week. I'm expecting a debut somewhere in the teens.