RPGs: Stop Making Bad First Impressions 
Is Hitman's Next Target Assassin's Creed? 
Why Kotaku Australia Should Never Work With Children... Or Robots 
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 Has it really been 10 years since DanceDanceRevolution two-stepped into the gaming scene? Even more incredulously, has Konami really one 10 years without building a community portal for the series? No matter, as rectification comes now with the announcement of DDROnlineCommunity.com, a community portal where fans of Konami’s footloose franchise can gather together in peace and harmony, sharing videos, writing blogs, and sprucing up their personal profiles so they look much better than mine up there.
The site also supports stat tracking, though currently the only game that supports the feature is DDR Universe 2 for the Xbox 360, which I own and have played exactly three times in the past three months, displaying my powerful commitment to personal fitness. Hit the link to set up your own online DDR presence, or jump right over it for a press release guaranteed to make your body move, probably.
DDR Online Community Site [Konami]
LucasArts and Day 1 Studios is getting ready to release their terraforming shooter Fracture this fall, and they’re rolled out the newly updated website for the game to help get the hype train started right! Along with the standard videos, screenshots, and developer blogs, the site is launching a brand new community-oriented Wiki site that will allow fans to interact and access exclusive content meant just for those who care enough to hang about and their friends in the gaming press.
You can visit the newly updated site at http://www.fracturegame.com, and be sure to tune into GameTrailers TV tonight on Spike for the premiere of the new Fracture trailer. Hype machine away!
About a day from now, EBGames.com.au will relaunch with not only a new look, but much needed upgrades. The updated site will include an improved catalogue browser, trade-in viewer and best of all – drop down menus.
Okay, it’s really hard to make this exciting, especially as drop down menus are, by nature, pretty damn boring. I’m sure everyone who uses the site on a regular basis will get a lot out of it, or at least, convince themselves they’re getting a lot out of it.
[Thanks Benjamin]
Well this is certainly a new look for Ubisoft’s official Prince of Persia website. Clicking on the link below takes you to a flash animation of glowing blue glyphs (words?) that slowly get engulf by a mass of oozing black goo. Could this have something to do with the recently trademarked Prince of Persia Prodigy, or is this something completely different? Will we finally see what happens when the Prince comes up again Spider-Man’s archenemy, Venom? Probably not. Trying to believably mix established gaming icons with comic book heroes and villains is a silly idea. I suppose we’ll just have to wait until either the big reveal, or they morph the slime into some sort of damned countdown clock.
Official Prince of Persia Website [Ubisoft - Thanks ES!]
Clusterfuck and all, Konami cares. Konami wants you to have a good Metal Gear Online experience. But before you can have a good MGO, it would be nice if getting a Konami ID wasn’t such a pain in the arse. Well! Konami has streamlined its website and made getting an ID somewhat less of a pain in the arse. Bravo. Now, if they can get their servers up and running for the *planned* Friday Beta, things would be just grand. Quick Registration [Konami via PS3 Fanboy]
The official website for Namco Bandai’s Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm for the PlayStation 3 is now live! Inside you’ll find a spot to sign up for a newsletter, the trailer we posted yesterday, and the screenshots we posted the day before, along with a few choice new additions. Ah, but wait! You cannot simply enter the website…that is not the way of the ninja. You must first discover the correct combination on the puzzle wheel before you can get to the goodies inside. If only there were some sort of giant hint, staring you right in the face. Until that appears, you’ll just have to blindly fumble for the solution.
Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm Website [Namco Bandai - Thanks LDjosh!]
We all know and love (or hate) the expansive list of video game tropes; the TV Tropes wiki has put together a shockingly extensive list (also home of a wiki version ofthe grand list of RPG clichés), spanning all sorts of genres and with plenty of examples. My favourite is “Malevolent Architecture”:
Prototype Website Relaunched Today: There’s no time for co-op multiplayer, but enough for a site redesign! At least the AUS/NZ version is being handled locally. There’s a Flash mini-game involving DNA and base pairs, where you can unlock exclusive media. I spent five minutes with it and parted ways confused. Official site
Activision is launching a new community site for Guitar Hero that will let you earn groupies, find friends and enter tournaments.
After the game launches on Oct. 28, player will be able to create or join a group on the site to compare scores along with tracking and finding friends. The press release isn’t exactly crystal clear, but it sounds like the site might be a bit like Bungie’s Halo 3 site, meaning that it could track scores, which is a fantastic idea for Guitar Hero III.
People seem to really love Ben 10. The Cartoon Network show crosses the lines between kids and adults and when I saw the game demoed at Comic-Con, both sets of ages were there, enjoying the game with equal abandon. I tried it out myself and even though I wasn’t terribly familiar with the show, the game was pretty fun. With the game’s launch not far off, D3 Publishers has premiered the game’s website which is now open and ready for your rather stringent approval. I’m sure you’ll have plenty to say about it.
