Portable Gaming Revolution

I’m going to start by admitting that I’m not normally a huge fan of role-playing games myself, I can watch someone else play them for hours, but have just never been able to get invested personally. That all changed with the release, eight years ago, of Parasite Eve for the PSX. I spent hours guiding Aya Brea through NYC, battling past all sorts of mitochondrial beasties. I always meant to go back and replay the game using the walk-through but never managed to find the time.

Then came the announcement that Square Enix is developing a third installment in the series for the PSP, which they are calling The 3rd Birthday. This game was originally announced as a mobile phone exclusive title, I’m glad that SE changed their mind! I know that Dustin Barton made mention of this in his post about Square Enix’s DKS3713, but I feel strongly enough about this game to comment separately about it!

At the DKS3713 Private Party, all that was shown of the game was a fairly short trailer which didn’t show off any game play details or much of the upcoming plot.  This is what IGN had to say about the trailer:

While [it] was rather short, it started out by focusing on events that occurred from the previous two games. This included many of the visually striking cutscenes in a montage that highlighted many of the monsters that Aya destroyed. This quickly moved into a scene where Aya walked down the aisle of an empty church in a wedding dress. However, it didn’t appear that the wedding would fully take place, as a figure appeared in the doorway of the church. Suddenly, the glass and pews of the church crumbled and fell to the floor, as did the decorative flower arrangements inside. As Aya turned and raised a pistol, a wedding ring fell to the floor. With the floor slowly being covered in blood, the trailer ended and the logo flashed up on screen.

That’s about all the information that has been released so far, other than it’s expected release date for sometime in 2009 in Japan.  I’m hoping very badly that this game makes it to the North American market, since it’s one that I will definitely be getting my hands on!  I will keep you posted as more information becomes available.

Re-blogged from our sister site: Nukoda.com

Cherry Tree Lane is a new brand being marketed by Koch Media UK, with their focus being entirely on making gaming a family affair, promoting family values and teaching children to use their imaginations with both the DS and Wii.  Their target audience lies mainly in the 6-12 age group, specifically girls.

There are four titles that have been announced that will be ready when the brand launches sometime in Q4 2008, all for the DS with the exception of Ellen Whitaker’s Horse Life, which will come out for both the DS and Wii:

• Groovy Chick Nursery and Groovy Chick Fashion Shop: two titles aimed at fashion-conscious, pre-teenage girls who just love to shop!

• Ellen Whitaker’s Horse Life: Is the perfect solution of living your dream to own and care for your very own champion pony.

• Baby Life: Allows you to love and care your very own virtual baby .

• Let’s Play: a range of six unique titles, Shops, Firemen, Schools, Pet Hospitals, Fashion Designer, Mums, that allow children to let their imagination run wild in the safety of the game’s controlled environment.

We’re immensely excited to be launching the Cherry Tree Lane range,” said Craig McNicol, Managing Director at Koch Media. “There is a huge market for family-focused games, particularly for girls in the 6-12 age range, and we expect our hand picked titles to stand out in retail due to unique positioning and strong licensed endorsements. We will work diligently so that the Cherry Tree Lane brand name becomes synonymous with strong, positive family values and high-quality gaming.

I really appreciate the fact that companies are starting to think about their younger audiences, especially considering that I have two kids of my own, and live in a house with a huge video gaming presence.  My son is only 2-years-old and is already constantly trying to get his hands on my DS and needs to have his own Wii-Mote in his hands whenever anyone plays.    

I would be quite interested in getting my hands on Let’s Play to see what my son thinks of actually being able to play a game on the DS!

Re-blogged from our sister site: Nukoda.com

Homebrew developer PSProgramer has released version 0.02 of his role-playing game, Uncharted Lands, for the PSP.  This second release of the game fixes some of the issues that arose with the first version that was released on July 18 and adds quite a bit of functionality to the game as well.  This is definitely to be expected as v0.01 was initially released merely as a proof of PSProgramer’s overall concept and only included a simple demo along with a couple of maps. 

Here are the details on what you can expect with this newest version:

• 5 outside Maps and 4 indoor Maps
• fixed pause menu
• main menu - (fully functional)
• items shop interface
• weapons shop interface
• NPC characters - (moving characters, functions have been made, and will be fully implemented next release)
• beginning night time function (it’s function is made and is in the file, just hasn’t been activated in the game because it lags too much)
• early sign reading/talking function
• state system created, and functional

The developer has indicated that we can expect a considerable amount of time to pass before the next version of the game is released as he is working on some BIG things, including a battle system and additional maps, among numerous other things.

Download: Uncharted Lands v0.02

Re-blogged from our sister site: Nukoda.com

It looks like the murder mysteries will be abounding aplenty on the DS in the coming months. Unsolved Crimes put a bit of a unique twist on the genre though, placing you in 1970’s New York City as a rookie homicide detective. Coming out from publisher Empire Interactive, they are advertising a whopping eight independent cases to be included in the game, with the main event focusing on the disappearance of an aspiring model.

I think one of the main selling features of this game will be that the environments are 3D and very realistic looking, when you compare them to the other mystery games that are currently out on the market (Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, for instance).  This title isn’t going to be all about the whodunit either, there are going to be adventure side-games, shoot-outs and supposedly even some driving elements thrown in. This isn’t going to be a game where you can just breeze your way through, either. You’re going to have to pay attention! In addition to the crime investigation, you’ll be quizzed quite frequently on all aspects of crime scenes, witnesses, etc. Sounds to me like a move in the right direction for this particular genre!

Look for this title to be hitting store shelves this October.

Check out the full press release after the jump.

Re-blogged from our sister site, Nukoda.com

Continue reading ‘Unsolved Crimes coming to DS this Fall’

I have many happy memories of coming home from school to plop down in front of the tv to watch some Transformers before dinner. Unfortunately, this is one of those iconic shows that doesn’t hold up well to the test of time. I recently tried to watch the old cartoon but ended up shutting it off in disgust, it might have been better for me to remain ignorant of the truly bad quality and just remember it in the hazy golden glow from childhood.

From the looks of things, this game will not be following very closely in the footsteps of the old ’80’s cartoon series, instead being based on the news series currently being shown on Cartoon Network. The graphics look pretty amazing, and from what I’ve read, the game play sounds like it’ll definitely be worth checking out.  It’s a side-scrolling platform game with some racing scenes thrown in for good measure. You get control of one of four different Autobots: Optimus Prime, Prowl, Bulkhead or Bumblebee and are able to switch between them instantaneously as the puzzles in the game demand their different skills.

Check out the press release after the jump.

Re-blogged from our sister site, Nukoda.com

Continue reading ‘Transformers: Animated for the DS’

Having just recently jumped onto the microblogging bandwagon myself, I know just how addictive it can be to want to comment on every single thing and thought that you do/have throughout any given day. There are several popular social networking websites out there, including both Plurk and Tumblr; the biggest, by far, is Twitter.

There is some pretty exciting news on the homebrew front for my fellow addicts, BadBoy has written an application for the PSP which will allow you to post text updates of up to 140 characters and send it directly to Twitter, provided you have a working WLAN connection for your PSP.

The app, called p-twit! is still in beta, currently sitting at version 0.02. With this newest version, anything sent from your PSP will indicate that it was sent “from p-twit!” once it appears on Twitter, instead of the generic “via web” that would normally appear. The only thing to keep in mind if you choose to go ahead and install this application is that it doesn’t currently support IR keyboards, although this may be coming in the future.

I’m more of a Plurker than anything else, but this is a good step in the right direction if only to make sure that everybody can keep up-to-date with my daily goings-on, even when I’m on the go. Maybe somebody could come up with a p-plurk! app?

Download: p-twit! v0.0.2

Re-blogged from our sister site, Nukoda.com

Popcap Games has finally put rumors to bed about their bringing the insanely addictive game, Peggle, to the DS. They’ve gone and paired up with Q Entertainment, who brought us such puzzle games as Lumines and Meteos. Q Entertainment is a good partner, as they are adding several brand new features that don’t appear on the Mac or PC versions of the game. We still don’t have any word as to what these additional features may be, but we don’t have that long to wait, with an anticipated launch date this winter.

For those of you who haven’t been bitten by the Peggle bug as of yet, you can think of it as an extremely pumped-up version of pachinko, with a few elements of pinball and pool thrown in for good measure. You shoot a grey ball from the top of the screen, trying to ricochet it off of the different colored pegs to eliminate the orange ones, all without running out of balls.

Check out the full press release after the jump.

Re-blogged from our sister site, Nukoda.com

Continue reading ‘Peggle Coming to the DS’

So it looks like the GPS unit will finally be coming to a PSP near you… sometime.  Unfortunately, we don’t have an actual date to pass on.  There is some good news though: after all waiting patiently since the gadget was first announced by Sony back in 2006, the folks over at IGN have actually SEEN it!  The GPS made it’s appearance at this years Comic-Con in San Deigo.  Here is what they have to say, after playing around with it a little bit:

From the main menu, there are four options for you to dive into — Find and Go, Explore Map, My Data, and Settings. I’m assuming you’ve been in a car in the last few years and are somewhat familiar with a GPS system. Find and Go acts as the PSP ap’s most basic GPS function — you choose a city and state before entering a location and getting step-by-step directions. Once you get the data in, you can just explore the map if you like and see what all is around. The default view is a top-down Mapquest POV, while the secondary look anchors the lower part of the map at the bottom of the screen and tilts the view at an angle. Explore Map lets you jump around at will, and My Data has you set up to 32 favorite places; search by hotels, airports, and more; view saved routes; and track logs.

Well that sounds like a little bit of all right!  Apparently the unit will even give different directions, depending on whether you tell it you’re traveling by car, bike or on foot.  All that Sony has indicated is that it should be released sometime in the next nine months.  

I’ve never been a fan of GPS units, having never seen the need for one.  But having one that is portable and that will go anywhere with me and my PSP might just be too good to pass up!  I’ll keep you all posted as more information is released! 

Kratos is stunned: there isn’t a flock of identical zombies…

After the short and sweet opening cinema detailing the you-whomp-‘em-Persian-guards objective, you’ll become immediately aware that the tried and true hack-‘n-slash formula is in full, familiar force in Ready At Dawn’s God of War: Chains of Olympus. Fortunately, that means loads of enemies on screen to catch the business end of Kratos’ blades in the neck, eyeballs or frequently bisected torso. In true God of War fashion, Chains of Olympus flows at a smooth pace as players progress through mythological Greece as a tormented and violently angered, hopping from one legendary location to another.

Unfortunately, the amount of backtracking required to progress to a new setting limits the amount of scenic routes to about a half dozen. Puzzle solving on COO, while equally satisfying and tedious, requires hiking it through entire temples or caves, which are shockingly huge and completely devoid of load times. Navigating Kratos from one end of a city to another, through buildings, over bridges and vertically towards rooftops, is seamless and without framerate drops.

The scope of this game is as impressive as its art style and visual design. Epic views of a crumbling town, complete with a look-out of your future path, compliment the great character models and beautiful textures. Facial and combat animations are spot on, and the dialogue – while irritatingly pretentious – is well delivered throughout the entirety of Kratos’ six hour, vengeful adventure, which will requre you to do nothing but rapidly beat the hell out of your square button to succeed.

Continue reading ‘God of War: Chains of Olympus Review’

So you really want to play God of War on your PSP, huh? Maybe you don’t have the money to buy it, the parents cheaped out, or perhaps you’re just incredibly cheap. Lucky for you Nukoda and PGRevolution are here to hook you up like two topless and randy Greek vixens.

We’re giving away a free copy of God of War: Chains of Olympus because we liked it so much and want to spread the love. Our review copy was so good to us that we want it to share its gruesome, gritty Greek-God action with the readers and listeners of the Bmashers network. How do you get in?

Check it after the jump.

Continue reading ‘Win God of War: Chains of Olympus!’

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with a preview build of FlatOut: Head On for the PSP. I have to say that I was genuinely impressed with how this racer is shaping up for it’s March 11th release date.

Racing games can basically be distilled down into two key types; the Arcade Racer and the Simulation. FlatOut thankfully has always accepted that it was the former and pushes that envelope. Any game with a driver high jump event as a challenge can’t be taking itself too seriously after all.

Head On is the latest in the series of games that started out on the previous console generation and most recently made an appearance on the Xbox 360 as FlatOut: Carnage. FlatOut: Head On was based on that 360 version and places heavy focus on its predecessor’s Carnage mode. Carnage is a perfect fit for the quick pick up and play gaming habits that us portable gamers tend to develop. Instead of trying to finish first in a race your goal is to cause as much damage as possible while running the race. Think of it as a cross between Burnout’s crash mode and a smash up derby and you’ll have a good idea what I’m talking about.

Continue reading ‘FlatOut: Head On Preview’

With weapons-based combat titles such as Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden largely coming out of Japan, it was great to see a western touch on the genre when SCEA dropped God of War for the PS2 in 2005. The differences in these games were quite noticeable, most poignantly that God of War required less skill and encouraged heavy amounts of button mashing as opposed to learning combos, parries and evasion, as Japanese action games did.

Despite this, the game was a roaring success, and with the third iteration of the God of War franchise hitting PSP’s in early March, the series looks to be embracing its success.

God of War: Chains of Olympus, the third edition of the gruesome Greek gore-fest, is one of the most impressive handheld titles ever created.

Even critics of the game’s simplicity and ease will be converted at the immense technical capabilities that the game offers. While it still retains its square-square-square method of fighting, Chains of Olympus manages to be an impressive and fun button masher, and an absolutely incredible tribute to the console series.

Continue reading ‘God of War: Chains of Olympus Preview’