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Mike's already there. Crecente's there. And Ashcraft, well, he's always there. Me, I'm about to board my flight to Japan, rounding out Team Kotaku (or Kotaku F.C. for our European readers) for our balls-to-the-wall Tokyo Game Show coverage. The show kicks off on Thursday (that's THIS Thursday, October 9), but we'll be doing stuff all week that you will find interesting. Stay tuned.
That's right boys and girls, next week is the official kick off of the Tokyo Game Show. Technically the show starts on Thursday, but four of us will be safely ensconced in Tokyo come Monday to start digging stories and interviewing... well hopefully developer types.
This year's Tokyo Game Show will be brought to you by myself, Brian Ashcraft, Luke Plunkett and Michael McWhertor, with back-breaking post counts and Tower support coming from Fahey and crew.
As with past coverage we'll keep this single post updated throughout the show by category so you can bookmark it now if you want a single stop shop for all Tokyo Game Show news. See you on Monday, can't wait.
A bunch of games! No time to waste, let's dive in. Here is Koei's TGS booth line-up:
DYNASTY WARRIORS: Multi-Raid (PSP) (Action)
WARRIORS OROCHI 2 (PSP) (Tactical Action)
Monster Racers (NDS) (RPG)
Saihai no Yukue (NDS) (Adventure)
DYNASTY WARRIORS 6 (PS2) (Tactical Action)
G1 Jockey Wii 2008 (Wii) (Horse Racing)
Neo Angelique Special (PSP) (Adventure)
Nobunaga's Ambition Online (PC/PS2) (MMORPG)
Uncharted Water Online (PC) (MMORPG)
Romance of the Three Kingdoms Online (PC) (MMORPG)
DYNASTY WARRIORS Online (PC) (MMO Action)
Nintendo had a big day today and just in case you weren't up in the Wii (pun intended) hours of the morning anxiously awaiting Iwata's golden words, we've got Iwata's speech in full as well as his slides. Some highlights from the transcript include Iwata discussing some of the different approaches Nintendo took regarding the camera on the DSi. While mobile phones keep improving camera resolution, the Dsi specifically doesn't focus on that at all. He also goes to explain some of the features the new handheld will harbor and why Nintendo made those specific choices. Of course, while the DSi was the star of the show, there was still plenty to talk about regarding the Wii and its future.
Read the transcript of Iwata's full speech and check out the slides after the jump. Ooooh, slides.
At 1:30pm Tokyo time (convert this to your own time here), Nintendo will be holding a big, fancy press event. Where something should be unveiled. But what, exactly? We should get a new DS. We might get a revival of an old franchise. We may (OK, probably won't) even hear something about a new Wii. We may get all of those things! Or none of them. Who knows! Why don't you stick around and find out. We'll be hanging on every word from the conference, and posting the news throughout the night. So grab a cup of tea and some chocolate biccies. Make yourself comfortable.
With Nintendo's press conference kicking off later tonight the rumours have been at full speed about what the profitable console maker may announce.
We've heard about a new media-friendly DS with MP3 playback and a camera, we've heard about possible new peripherals, we've heard about some big much-anticipated game remake, we've even heard about a new Wii iteration, this one in high-def.
But unlike with Microsoft, not all Nintendo rumours are true. So what do you think will be happening tonight when Nintendo kicks off their presser in Japan?
Konami has announced its TGS game plans, and we are posting them. Oh yes. Let's dive in:
World Soccer Winning Eleven 2009 (PS3, Xbox 360) Playable, Trailer
Metal Gear Solid 4 (PS3) Trailer, Stage Event
Metal Gear Online (PS3) Playable, Trailer, Stage Event
Genso Suikoden Tierkreis (DS) Playable, Trailer, Stage Event
Tongari Boushi to Mahou no 365 nichi (DS) Playable, Trailer
Castlevania Judgement (Wii) Playable, Trailer, Stage Event
Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia (DS) Playable, Trailer, Stage Event
Silent Hill Homecoming (PS3, Xbox 360) Playable, Trailer
ChaoticEden (PC) Playable, Trailer
That's right, MGS4 is making yet another TGS appearance. How many times is that now? Lots, that's how many.
Here we go, the list of PS3 and PSP that will be playable at TGS. Let's look at the PSP titles first, including third party titles:
Sengoku BASARA: Battle Heroes
Shin Sangoku Musou: MULTI RAID
Musou OROCHI: Maou Sairin
KINGDOM HEARTS Birth by Sleep
DISSIDIA FINAL FANTASY
Clank & Ratchet: Maru Hi Mission Ignition!
Sarugetchu Pipo-Saru Senki
Patapon 2 Donchaka
BLEACH ~Soul Carnival~
Mainichi Issho Portable
Yuusha no Kuse ni Namaikida or2
LocoRoco 2
THE iDOLM@STER SP
Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Gundam
Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2
IndieCade cordially invites folks who'll be in or around Bellevue, Washington in October to come celebrate independent gaming as they launch their first stand-alone international independent gaming event. Running October 10th through the 17th, IndieCade kicks off with a two-day preview event leading into a week-long exhibition open to the public. The launch event features talks from speakers such as Jenova Chen of flOw fame and Jeep Barnett from the Portal team, who'll be discussing the path from indie to mainstream, along with master classes, preview screenings of upcoming titles, and an awards ceremony where five top games will be selected from a field of 26 finalists. Once the show opens to the public it'll be hands-on all week long. Yum.
The festival takes place at Open Satellite in Bellevue, Washington. Hit the jump for more details on this much-deserved showcase for independent game developers.
By their powers combined, they are Captain Sitting Around In A Chair! Five of the country's "legendary" names in gaming are converging on the E for All Expo in the name of ending hunger, once and for a little while! Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, Billy Mitchell, Justin Wong, Todd Rogers and TriForce will be taking on all comers at E for All next weekend, with the price of admission being one perishable food item to be donated to the Los Angeles Food Bank for the upcoming holiday season. Each gamer is playing a specific game - FatalONEty has Doom 4, Billy "Hot Sauce" Mitchell on Donkey Kong, Justin Wong is rocking Marvel VS. Capcom 2, Todd Rogers will be on Gorf (hell yeah), and finally TriForce takes it tiny with Tetris DS.
It's actually a pretty sweet thing they're doing here, so if you're planning on attending E For All, bring along some canned food, and not the generic crap. It's for the holidays, dammit. Hit the jump for more info.
Earlier this week Warner Brothers Interactive took over a portion of the Museum of Nature and Science to host a LEGO Batman The Videogame launch party. While I wasn't able to swing by the place (must have missed the Crecente Signal), some folks in PR were kind enough to pass along this buffet of pictures from the event. Looks like people had a blast. My review of the game, incidentally, should be up in the next few days.
Posted by Seamus Byrne at 10:05 AM on September 26, 2008
It's great news for fans they can get their Blizzcon on thanks to Main Event Pay-Per-View here in Australia, but the disappearance of the Polar Bear Mount gave a slight tinge of disappointment. We've now received the official press release on the PPV and turns out they were just finalising local details, because the Polar Bear Mount (with flag-waving Murloc) is now heading to homes of viewers who buy in on both days of the package.
We checked in with Foxtel PR, and were told that yes, you do have to be a subscriber to pay for a Main Event PPV. So you can't just buy the mount for $29.90. But if you have family or friends who have Foxtel and aren't into WoW, throw them the dough and then get yourself a code! Where there's a will...
Official press release after the jump.
The results of the inauguaral PAX 10 indie games showcase are in and the audience has spoken. 10 games won spots on display at the 2008 Penny Arcade Expo, where convention goers were asked to cast secret ballots selecting their favourite of the lot, and Twisted Pixel's XBLA action platformer The Maw came out on top.
"The intense sense of purpose and camaraderie amongst The PAX 10 was astonishing," commented Michael Wilford of Twisted Pixel. "We feel extremely lucky to have been chosen from such an august group and grateful to have been a part of the PAX experience."
Posted by Seamus Byrne at 2:05 PM on September 19, 2008
Blizzcon 2008 is set to have 16 hours of coverage over two days on Main Event Pay-Per-View, available via Foxtel, Austar, or Optus. 'Blizzcon 2008 Live' will run 4am to 1pm on October 11-12, with repeat screening from 3pm to 12am both days. (That's 9 hours each day, not 8. Must have a break somewhere.) Interviews, presentations, tournaments, and panels galore. Price will be $14.95 per day, which puts the total at about the same as any typical PPV for the whole two days.
At first look, it seemed like we'd also be getting access to a special treat in the form of the BlizzCon 2008 World of Warcraft in-game polar bear mount (with mounted, flag-waving murloc), but that has since disappeared from the Main Event description, so it seems that was an overzealous cut and paste from the DirecTV version of the broadcast.
More details after the jump. [Thanks to Aaron for the hot tip!]
With attendance almost as light as the wispy foam creations that were being wafted skywards, the Kirby Superstar Ultra events were a bit of a damp squib.
Nevertheless, we cannot fail to be impressed that there exists a company who managed to get venture capital funding for a machine that makes foam logos (sure, they probably have the Marshmallow Fluff contract in the bag but still..) and so for that reason - and to satisfy the curiosity of the legions of Kirby fans who don't live near any place called 'Kirby' - we present this video of the main event at Kirby Middle School, Birmingham, Alabama.
While Nintendo's super secret Kirby event didn't occur anywhere your Kotaku staff had easy access to, Kotakuites are legion, and one of said legion has the skinny. Dextr and his girlfriend, whom we hear is gloriously attractive, stopped in at the Kirby Park event in Pennsylvania and send word of pink bubbles and book covers.
Hello, I just left the Kirby event in Kirby Park in PA. They had a small crew sending small kirbies into the sky made of pink soap bubbles and helium. There weren't many people there yet. They were only promoting Kirby Superstar Ultra, but we (my girlfriend and i) got bookcovers/posters out of it.
So no Kirby Wii announcement. Sadness. Along with the words come pictures of the event poster, along with the promise of more once he can interface his camera with a computer. He also notes that a rep told him the main event was in Alabama, which makes it the most interesting thing to happen in Alabama in over 50 years (*holds up Georgia resident make fun of Alabama permit*). UPDATE - Hit the jump for more galleries and reports, including one from the main event in Alabama!
...to the Arcade Mania Tokyo launch event, book signing and drinking fun fun. The event takes place Saturday, September 27 (19:00-23:00) at Cafe Pause in Ikebukuro. Drinks are ¥500 a pop, and there will be free munchies to munch on. Fez composer Jason DeGroot (6955) selected the music, and the event will also kick off an exhibition of photos taken by Yuki Nakano for the book. The show will run until October 5th. The party won't.
Also, today the book's official website has gone live, complete with HIGHLY INTERACTIVE CRANE GAME. It was designed by Andrew Lee, who also designed the book's layout. He's a wizard, you know.
Hope to see you in Tokyo on the 27th!
Arcade Mania! [Official Site]
Nintendo sends us word of a mysterious special event that will take place on the morning of September 18th, promising "A luminous spectacle that onlookers from coast to coast will be talking about." The only clue we have as to what the special event is about it the locations it's taking place at. Kirby Middle School, Kirby Historical Mill, Kirby Park, and Kirby Gate Shopping Centre. I feel the names mean something, but what? Damn you Nintendo for being so mysterious!
Authorities at Nintendo are forecasting an extraordinary celestial event this season. Expected to be visible on Sept. 18, this eye-popping occurrence will be best viewed from a handful of specific U.S. locations (see below). Experts are still deliberating over the scientific significance of this rare phenomenon, but evidence points clearly to the reemergence of a luminous entity that citizens from all walks of life will appreciate.
Could it be the long-awaited official announcement of the Kirby Wii title that Hal Laboratories has been working on? Seeing as Kirby Super Star Ultra for the DS is scheduled for release four days later, I very much doubt it. Hit the jump to see if you live close enough to any of these places to find out for yourself!
I had the distinct honour and pleasure of interviewing Mark-Paul Gosselaar at Nintendo's party Friday night. Of course we talked a lot about video games, from his personal favs to what he's looking forward to the most. He's quite the gamer, if you didn't know. Unsurprisingly, he's a big fan of music games, but he dropped this shocking announcement. The former front man of the legendary band Zack Attack is looking for a singer to complete his Rock Band group. He'd prefer a female, but describes that possibility turning into a stressful situation.
Nintendo invited press, games industry members, and some "A-List" celebrities to an exclusive party last night at their famous Nintendo World Store at Rockefeller Plaza in Midtown Manhattan. It was all for a good cause, however, as invitees could partake in the silent charity auction and witness the presentation of mobile Wii gaming centres to be used to by patients in New York City hospitals. Oh yeah, there were also some playable games and an open bar there, too.
The Virtual Worlds Expo took place last week in Los Angeles, and there's been bits and pieces of news from the event floating around — the wrap ups of roundtables and panels are the most interesting. Over at Free To Play, they have put together five big trends in virtual worlds, ranging from 'the war on geekiness' (oh, ouch) to one I'm most interested in, the movement from virtual world to real world instead of the other way around:
September is turning out to be a hell of a month. A hurricane is heading for my homestead, my dental appointment got pushed to the morning after the Atari event and Atari fell the day after the Guitar Hero event I'm not allowed to talk about until next week. Which happens to be right when I start Stanford.
Yes, he may be a golf-obsessed, card-carrying Republican, but Alice Cooper is still an officially-sanctioned Rock Legend and thus the perfect choice to tear the roof off Hollywood's Viper Room with his undoubted Rock Band 2 skills, this Monday.
Tonight publishers and celebrities will descend on the Mandalay Bay Convention Centre in Las Vegas to talk games with the country's GameStop employees.
The annual GameStop eXpo has quickly become a great way for folks to leak tons of video game details to us each year.
This year around the retailer-only show will give folks their hands on time with Guitar Hero: World Tour, Rock Band 2, Wii Music, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, Spore, Call of Duty: World at War, Animal Crossing and, I'm told, a first ever chance to check out Halo Wars.
All of the big publishers will be on hand as well as a gaggle of GameStop execs and an impressive line-up of celebrities including Todd McFarlane, Ozzy Osbourne, Mark McGrath, Travis Barker, Shaun White and "other surprise guests".
If you're attending you know our email address, that's all I'm saying.
