Geek vs Life

With the (semi) recent releases of such games as Halo3, Guitar Hero III, Rock Band, Mass Effect and Final Fantasy XII for the DS, it’s a miracle I can even make it out the door to buy food. That and I think my girlfriend and I are still on speaking terms. I think. Well at least it’s not World of Warcraft, that shit has torn apart more families than crack, alcohol and naked pictures of Bea Arthur on your hard drive.

This weeks bundles of joy are delivered from all places:

Warriors of the Lost Empire looks like a solid game for the PSP if you have one of those.

If you took the time last week to buy the Wii Zapper that came with Link’s Crossbow Training, why not try something closer to the original NES zapper game, Ultimate Duck Hunting. Make sure the dog doesn’t leave tooth marks on your fallen fowl.

Growing up, I’ve had a few heroes. Be it Batman, later Richard Feynman (yes, I’m one of those), Shigero Miyamoto, or Will Wright, I get excited when stuff dealing with them comes up.

The British Academy of Film and Television announced that Will Wright will become one of the BAFTA Fellowship this year at their British Academy Video Game Awards, making him the first member of video game industry to be one of the fellowship. BAFTA is starting to recognize the “massive impact” that video games have made on pop culture, and how they’ve changed motion pictures.

“Will’s immense, creative body of work and his continued contribution to the industry make him a most worthy recipient of the Fellowship,” said Hilary Bevan Jones, chairman of the Academy, “and being such a pioneer, we are thrilled that he will be the first person to receive this honor.”

This is just coming up today. Bungie Development Studios is no longer owned by Microsoft, and is now its own independent company. I’ll be hunting around tomorrow while I’m at the World Cyber Games here in Seattle for more information. I just wanted to get the word out, since this is right on the coat tails of Halo 3’s release.

“Beautiful weather for a game launch is it not?” said Alex Dunn of Everett Washington. It’s as if the heavens had blessed the rainy city with a night of reprieve as the biggest game on the planet was about to launch. Although technically Halo 3 wasn’t officially released until September 25, the party did get its start early.

Even if stores across the country were creating their own events, from Texas to Toronto, only 4 sites were chosen as official launch sites for Halo 3: Los Angeles, New York, Miami and Seattle (although technically it was in Bellevue).

Hundreds of fans gathered around the Bellevue Best Buy, counting down the hours, then minutes then seconds until the door would finally open and let them in to get their copies of the game. There were gifts to be distributed to the eager fans: t-shirts, baseball caps, posters, giant scarabs, and pizza. All the swag given out was mostly due to the sponsorship provided by the folks at Bungie, Microsoft, Mountain Dew, Hero Clix and Best Buy amongst others.

A lot of things come to mind when perusing this list. First off, I hate basketball, I really tried, but it just doesn’t click with me. Maybe if they added a goalie? Anyway, NBA Live 08 and NBA 2K8 are out. Second? Project Gotham Racing 4 looks both beautiful and awesome, can’t wait to get my hands on it.Third, finally Zelda: Phantom Hourglass is released! Woot! Now I get something to play on the bus as the agonizing hours away from Halo 3 hollow out my soul…

(09.30.07)
Hot Wheels: Beat That (Wii) Driving

It’s four a.m. so I’ll keep this short.

Eternal Sonata. Here is a direct quote from wikipedia: “The story takes place in a dream world which centers around famed piano composer Frédéric Chopin.” If that doesn’t get you intrigued as hell, I don’t know what else will. here is a list of playable characters: Chopin, Allegretto, Polka, Beat, Viola, Salsa, March, Jazz, Falsetto and Claves. The battle system is based on musical elements. Really just go out and buy it already.

MySims looks to be a combination of Animal Crossing and The Sims. The game is available for both the DS and the Wii. The DS version will actually make use of the microphone feature, something that not many games on the DS have used in the past. The game might seem a bit odd, but you like The Sims without the whole idea of human verisimilitude, then this game is for you.

I got a chance to try out Heavenly Sword at PAX. I can see why it get so many comparisons with God of War. Same type of battles where you get swarmed on all sides and combs help even out the playing field as the enemies blood flies everywhere. I totally agree, both games had A LOT in common. Although I don’t really get why that would be a bad thing. GOW was awesome and so is Heavenly Sword.

My hearts swells when the new hockey starts. It then cries a little because Seattle has no real hockey team (Sorry Thunderbirds, I like my NHL action). Thankfully, every year brings a new hockey game as is the case this week with not one but TWO hockey games, EA Sport’s NHL 08 and NHL 2K8 from Take-Two Interactive. Using the “create a dynasty” mode, I can then build a team from the ground up. Choose the players, choose the team colors, choose a new logo and better yet, choose a city for them to play in. Congratulations Seattle Chuppa-Thingies for winning your 12th Stanley Cup in a row. You’re welcome.

Wait a sec, Stranglehold is a video game collaboration between action film master John Woo and Chow Yun-Fat? Did you see “Hard Boiled“? They both collaborated on that and it kicked so much ass, my couch fell apart. The game is a sort o sequel to the movie, Chow even reprises his role as Tequila. The hardest level of the game is even called Hard Boiled. I want this game. A lot. Anybody need a spare kidney?

A puzzle games called “I Love Kittens“… but who doesn’t love kittens? I’ll tell you who, Nazis that’s who. Dirty kitten hating Nazis. Who incidentally hate puppies as well. Stay tuned for more developments on the “I Love Kittens 2: Takin’ down some Nazis” a 3rd person shooter.

Hudson’s Adventure Island is one of the first games I ever played all the way through. I wonder if I can actually do it again? Only one way to find out…

Labor Day is considered by many to be the last real weekend of summer. For some it’s the return to school and others it’s just another Monday, just like every other week. When to game, when to game. Especially with a treasure trove of gaming goodness that is being released this week.

Let’s start off with Blue Dragon for Xbox360, another promising RPG from the folks at Mistwalker and Artoon released by Microsoft Game Studios. The game melds an older style of RPG’ing with cool anime style graphics.

Next up we have Guild Wars: Eye of the North. There’s just something that entices me about being able to play a MMORPG without having to pay an extra fee every damn month. Besides, the game is awesome.

Metroid Prime 3 will make use of the Wii-mote to it’s fullest capabilities. I had a chance to get some hands on time at PAX and folks, I like what I saw, chances are, so will you.

The big game coming out this week is definitely Bioshock for Xbox 360 and PC. The visuals look awesome if we take the demo that was released on Xbox Live. Whether the game has a decent replay value has yet to be seen. We’ll let you know.

Two Worlds looks like a brilliant RPG. Early speculation and critiques of the game compares it to Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, not a bad thing in my mind. Apparently fully customizable characters and free play to forge your path through the world. Sounds like fun.

Despite the fact that it seems to be an 360 kinda week, DS releases the much anticipated sequel to one of their biggest sellers: Brain Age 2. New challenges include such games as: Days and Dates, Word Scramble, Masterpiece Recital and even rock paper scissor. How this will train your brain rather than just amuse you has yet to be seen.

I don’t think that I have salivated this much at a weeks release in far too long. Not not because of Madden 08, I can’t stand the series which refuses to acknowledge the CFL. As always, I crave myself some new RPG’s. Forget the fact that I have 16 of them siting on my shelf unfinished. I want them all. Yes I even succumbed and bought Pokemon because of JoshuaBryan. I have brought more shame to my family than Paris Hilton did for doing that sex tape+being a drunken whore+being a poor actress+being a poor singer+++ (you get the point…)

On my must buy list you will find: Heroes OF Mana, Luminous Arc, Rune Factory: A Fantasy Harvest Moon, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 and yes, even the old Sega Genesis classic, Shining in the Darkness. Screw Madden 08, have a nice week.

This is probably the third time we announce that Chameleon:To Dye For!” is being released. Hopefully this is the right time.

(08.06.07)
Chameleon: To Dye For! (DS) Puzzle
Glory Days 2 (DS) Strategy
UFO Interactive Attack on Pearl Harbor (PC) Simulation

(08.07.07)
Boogie (Wii) Puzzle
Crazy Taxi: Fare Wars (PSP) Action
High School Musical: Makin’ the Cut (DS) Puzzle
Mega Man Star Force: Pegasus (DS) RPG
Mega Man Star Force: Leo (DS) RPG
Mega Man Star Force: Dragon (DS) RPG

(08.08.07)
Track & Field (X360) Action
Tomb Raider: Anniversary (PSP) Adventure

(08.10.07)
Lego Fun Pack V2 (PC) Puzzle

Wii Virtual Console (08.06.07)
Wave Race 64 (N64) Driving
Galaga ‘90 (TGx 16) Action
Adventures of Lolo (NES) Puzzle

A few weeks ago at E3, Sony announced that it was going to drop the price of its PS3 by $100. In response to the news, Microsoft said that it thought that the price of the Xbox 360 was “competitive.” That was then.

Today at Comic-Con, Microsoft decided that a price drop would be a good idea, just not on the system. The $20 price drop will be on the 360 HD-DVD drive, bringing the price down to $179. Along with the price cut, customers will be allowed to chose 5 free movies from a pre-selected list of 15, which they can then receive by the mail. Here is the list of the selected movies: Apollo 13, Blazing Saddles, Casablanca, Chronicles of Riddick, Constantine, Dukes of Hazzard, Four Brothers, Tomb Raider, Perfect Storm, Rundown, Seabiscuit, Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow, U2: Rattle & Hum, U-571 and We Were Soldiers.

Again from the Video Game Voters Network, here is their list of top ten gamer facts. Pretty impressive figures.

1. US computer and video game software sales grew six percent in 2006 to $7.4 billion – almost tripling industry software sales since 1996.

2. Sixty-seven percent of American heads of households play computer and video games.

3. The average game player is 33 years old and has been playing games for 12 years.

4. The average age of the most frequent game buyer is 38 years old. In 2007, 92 percent of computer game buyers and 80 percent of console game buyers were over the age of 18.

5. Eighty-five percent of all games sold in 2006 were rated “E” for Everyone, “T” for Teen, or “E10+” for Everyone 10+. For more information on ratings, please see www.esrb.org.