All Topics Gaming older than one year ago

#activision The next chapter in Bungie's development history is well underway, according to its new publisher Activision. With Halo: Reach having "gone gold," the team responsible for Halo (until now) is shifting its focus. More »

#gameface The Mail Online calls it a "pink cat-like medallion," and X17 Online calls it a "flashy, piggy-bank necklace," but when know R&B singer Chris Brown is just spreading the Kirby love. More »

Use your powers to stop them.

Activision's recently released Q2 2011 investor's report contains a bit of bad news for United Front Games' upcoming reboot of the True Crime franchise -- or good news, depending on how you look at it. According to the report, True Crime: Hong Kong's super ambiguous 2010 release window has been pushed to an equally ambiguous 2011 release window, which Activision hopes will "give the development team more time to deliver the high-quality entertainment experience they envision for the game."

We normally can't help but scoff when publishers give this excuse when pushing back the release of one of their titles, but in this case, we'll let it slide. We're not sure if you've heard, but Hong Kong is ... um, kind of big.

Activision's recently released Q2 2011 investor's report contains a bit of bad news for United Front Games' upcoming reboot of the True Crime franchise -- or good news, depending on how you look at it. According to the report, the game's super ambiguous 2010 release window has been pushed to an equally ambiguous 2011 release window, which Activision hopes will "give the development team more time to deliver the high-quality entertainment experience they envision for the game."

We normally can't help but scoff when publishers give this excuse when pushing back the release of one of their titles, but in this case, we'll let it slide. We're not sure if you've heard, but Hong Kong is ... um, kind of big.

Activision's recently released Q2 2011 investor's report contains a bit of bad news for United Front Games' upcoming reboot of the True Crime franchise -- or good news, depending on how you look at it. According to the report, the game's super ambiguous 2010 release window has been pushed to an equally ambiguous 2011 release window, which Activision hopes will "give the development team more time to deliver the high-quality entertainment experience they envision for the game."

We normally can't help but scoff when publishers give this excuse when pushing back the release of one of their titles, but in this case, we'll let it slide. We're not sure if you've heard, but Hong Kong is ... um, kind of big.

#event GameStop, Microsoft and pro-gamer Tom "Tsquared" Taylor will be showing off some new Halo Reach footage and sharing some tips and tricks for the game at an event this Friday. More »

#clips In normal Spider-Man continuity, a burglar Peter Parker lets escape kills his Uncle Ben. In Spider-Man Noir continuity, former circus freak Adrian Toomes, a.k.a. the Vulture, eats Uncle Ben. You can avenge the Vulture's dinner in Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions. More »

#delayofgame Activision did its part to thin the typically obese late year release schedule today, delaying True Crime: Hong Kong to next year. Originally planned for release this fall, the PS3, PC and Xbox 360 game will hit in 2011. Why? More »

#doom It's a week until QuakeCon, one week until John Carmack's keynote (which turned into a three-hour liveblog on an iPhone by me last year), one week until... Doom IV? More »

Activision delays open-world game.

Konami's Zack & Ombra: The Phantom Amusement Park reminds us of a certain other DS series starring a smartly-dressed protagonist and his young apprentice in creepy, mysterious villages. We're just puzzled as to which one we're thinking of.

Zack & Ombra, though similar in style, bears one major difference from ... that top-hat guy's games. Instead of strictly puzzles, magician Zack and his pal Polly take part in around 180 minigames to clear away the "pranks" left on Delphino Island by the eggplant-looking Ombra creatures, who threaten to ruin the island's festival.

This game is being directed by Junko Kawano, best known for her work on the Suikoden games, but also as the designer of Time Hollow and Shadow of Destiny. It also features animation by Studio 4°C (which reminds us of some other DS game with anime-style cutscenes ... ) It'll be released in Japan on October 28.
Konami walks in a top-hatted shadow with 'Zack & Ombra'

* Speed upgrades increase the rate of the charge beam. * gameplay can run on for an hour or more without any cutscenes * real-time cutscenes as well * cannot skip cutscenes on the first time * ability to skip cutscenes on repeated attempts unknown * You can dodge while in first person * Deactivating holographic generators reveals new areas to [...]

We know the year is far from over. We just can't help ourselves.

We know the year is far from over. We just can't help ourselves.

We know the year is far from over. We just can't help ourselves.

We know the year is far from over. We just can't help ourselves.

#salesget What does Japan like this week? Feudal Japanese fantasy battles in the form of Sengoku Basara 3 and rhythm games starring vocaloid Hatsune Miku. Yep, shirtless samurai warriors and sexy singing robots are just what Japan needed more of. More »

#art CGHUB's CharacterFORGE challenged artists to redesign Mega Man heroes and villains in the vein of dark age fantasy characters, and the results so far are truly epic. See if you can tell which character is represented in these pics. More »

To quote world-renowned poet and philosopher Nelly: "Good gracious, these tracks are bodacious." Only, well, he doesn't say tracks. He says something else entirely, as you'll likely see upon your first playthrough of Def Jam Rapstar -- a recently announced batch of songs for the rhythm title include Nelly's seminal summer hit "Hot in Herre," alongside similarly beloved jams from Nas, Method Man, Public Enemy and more.

Check out the full list of new tracks for the title posted after the jump. Also, and we're not trying to start a fuss, but -- we're still waiting on "Parents Just Don't Understand." Don't let us down, Def Jam.

Global pre-order sales surpass Fallout 3.

#science Two years ago students and instructors from the University of Washington applied human intuition to the problem of protein folding with the game FoldIt. Since then the game has proven that even under-educated players can out-fold the most powerful computers. More »

Writing on LA Times' Hero Complex blog, Ben Fritz reports that film director Guillermo del Toro is looking to forge a partnership with Red Faction publisher THQ. Though del Toro, who directed Pan's Labyrinth and almost directed The Hobbit, has refrained from naming the custodian of his video game vision, he recently admitted that he was in talks with a "big company" to collaborate on "technically and narratively very interesting" projects.

THQ is no stranger to films and has adopted an enthusiastic stance on their intersection with games. The publisher is currently preparing an original sci-fi (and Syfy) movie based on the Red Faction franchise, set to debut alongside the latest game in March 2011.

THQ's Core Games VP, Danny Bilson, has expressed belief in the "Hollywood model" of IP ownership, "which is that, the bigger the artist, the more important, the more successful they are, the bigger share they get." Bilson has been aggressive in acquiring high-profile talent and products for THQ (such as Devil's Third, led by Tomonobu Itagaki), and predicted that the company's lineup of partnerships would impress us over the next few months.

"Wait till you see our announcements! You're going to go, 'oh my God'."