Well, maybe it’s not the first but heck, it’s rare that a respectable gaming site would give perfect 10 to a game. So Grand Theft Auto IV started off with wobbly last years’ graphics and had loads of potty mouth running around shooting and ramming things over in town. It’s a story about a gangster and it’s gangs, whaddaya expect? The game let you have up to 16 players at a time, what is not to love?
This paragraph alone makes me want to go out and get the game:
One of the many things that set GTAIV apart from its predecessors is Liberty City, which is more convincing as a living, breathing urban environment than anything that you’ve seen in a game before, and bears little resemblance to its namesake in 2001’s GTAIII. Liberty’s diverse population believably attempts to go about its daily business, seemingly unaware that several criminal factions are at war in the city. Niko has no such luck. He’s compelled to start working for one of the factions shortly after arriving, when he learns that his cousin Roman has some potentially fatal gambling debts. Niko’s military experience makes him a useful freelancer for employers in the business of killing each other, and though his reluctance to carry out their orders is often apparent, he does whatever is asked of him in the hope that completing missions for other people will ultimately give him the means to complete his own
Nintendo is setting its eyes in the Europe market when it receives more than a lukewarm welcome in UK and Europe.
All looks rosy for Nintendo and its fans in the UK and the rest of Europe. Wii Fit is currently balanced on top of the UK charts (although GTAIV’s sales figures indicate that may not be for long), Mario Kart Wii snaked to the front of the pack at launch, and Super Smash Bros. has finally got a release date. To make things even sweeter, the Mario Factory has just been tipped by an analyst to oust Sony from the top of the heap in the region.
Despite a lukewarm response to Nintendo’s global outlook when it announced its most recent annual results and unveiled its projections for the coming year, David Cole of DFC Intelligence is projecting big things for the Japanese publisher in Europe. He points to the success of Sony’s casual-gaming products such as SingStar and the EyeToy range as the prime indicator for Nintendo’s upcoming dominance in the region in a report published this week.
He believes that “the Wii product line and control system are an evolution of what made the PlayStation 2 so successful in Europe,” and indicated that the move to Atari by Phil Harrison, who was president of SCE Worldwide Studios and seen by many as the standard bearer for Sony’s charge into non-traditional markets, was a turning point. “In many ways this departure is symbolic of how the torch in Europe seems to be passing to Nintendo,” Cole said.
Haze is a first person shooter game by PS3 developed by Free Radical Design. Although I dissed PS3 by saying XBOX360 rules hands down, i have to give it to PS3 for games that really piqued my interest. For example, Haze is one perfect game that I would like to get my paws on.
In the game, Mantel soldiers make use of Nectar, a performance-enhancing pharmaceutical drug that grants the user enhanced speed, accuracy and strength. Mantel uses this drug to control the minds of its soldiers. When administered, “Nectar” can control–among other things– what a soldier sees, similar to the effects of a hallucinogenic drug. It makes enemies the only real thing soldiers see, and drowns out the surrounding images of death and destruction. An overdose of Nectar is dangerous, with loss of mental control and death being its possible side-effects.
As revealed in a E³ 2007 trailer, Rebel soldiers may go in to a Play Dead state just before they are killed, allowing them to regenerate health. In addition, they have been given the capability to exploit Mantel’s dependence on nectar by attacking the nectar injector, extracting nectar to use on throwing knives from dead mantel troopers and using the injector to create nectar grenades. They can also steal a Mantel trooper’s gun, and bury grenades in the ground as mines.
The XBox is doing extremely well with 68% increase in sales this quarter.
After having the next-gen console race to itself for a year, the Xbox 360 has been in a three-way battle since the PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii launched in November 2006. After being roundly outsold by the Wii for most of last year–save for September, when Halo 3 debuted–the console found its sales bested by the PlayStation 3 in January and February. In March, the 360 triumphed over Sony’s console by a mere 5,000 units.
However, despite the competition, the Xbox 360 is helping Microsoft turn a profit the size of many country’s entire economies. According to an earnings report filed today, the software giant’s Entertainment and Devices Division–which includes income from the Xbox 360, Games for Windows, and Zune multimedia handheld–saw its quarterly revenue surge 68 percent.
For the three months ended March 31, the division saw $1.57 billion in revenue, up from $936 million the prior year. However, operating income for the period was just $89 million–an improvement over the $324 million loss the company took the year before, as outcry over widespread 360 hardware failures was reaching a fever pitch.
The cartoon that inspired many to fight for their own cause. The cartoon that says, “screw you, superheroes” because the green hulk is angry and his anger is the only reason why he beats bad men and trash things around him. What’s not to love about this green guy, he is angsty and amok, which is why we love him.
Anyway, The Incredible Hulk is set to deliver and based on it’s previous game, it already has a loyal fan base waiting to pursue the green monster’s course. The movie is set to come out too. The array of actors playing the Hulk and the support cast seems rather promising. I’ve always love Edward Norton since I saw him on American History X. :P
Check out the review for the Incredible Hulk game:
With rumors swirling about creative differences on the set of the upcoming Incredible Hulk film, it’s understandable that there are some questions as to how the video game based on the movie is going to turn out. The last Hulk game turned out to be pretty good in spite of the movie being less than stellar, and judging by our first look at the current-gen version of The Incredible Hulk, this game is poised to deliver what Hulk fans want regardless of how the movie turns out.
The Incredible Hulk begins with a brief cutscene showing Bruce Banner standing in the snow with a loaded pistol in his mouth. Just as a shot rings out the screen goes black, and when the picture comes back the Hulk, standing where Banner once stood, spits out the bullet. From there the game jumps ahead five years and shows a cutscene with Bruce being chased by some sort of special-ops unit through the streets of Brazil. Suddenly a helicopter appears, and Banner ducks into a building to get away. But it’s too late; the helicopter fires a missile into the building, turning it into rubble.
From here the game is in your hands. You start by mashing the Y button, which performs one of the Hulk’s “feats of strength,” which in this case involves him digging out from a demolished concrete building. Once he has dusted himself off the Hulk sets off into a factory to exact revenge on the people chasing him. This area acts as a training level, and it’s where you’ll get acquainted with the Hulk’s many moves–conveyor belts will be leveled, puny humans will be thrown, soldiers wearing mechanized suits will be cast aside, and doors will crumble under the weight of his mighty fists. The level ends after an encounter with the game’s first boss, Emil Blonsky, who after suffering defeat at the hands of the Hulk discusses what happened with General Ross.
Gone are the days when sales are boosted only during holiday seasons. Analyst found that the gaming industry has now matured with March being a month where sales are steadily hiking even without any holiday season in tow in what is called, the “perfect sales storm”.
The NPD Group’s freshly released gaming industry sales figures for the month of March handily trumped analysts’ expectations, as US retailers sold nearly $1 billion in game software, and another $551 million in hardware.
Though the numbers have barely had time to sink in, one analyst has already pulled a few lessons from the data dump. Electronic Entertainment Design and Research analyst Jesse Divnich (formerly with the simExchange prediction market) called the month a “perfect storm” for new game releases, with something for everyone.
“Super Smash Bros. Brawl fulfilled the needs of the casual, social, and sub-13 year old markets,” Divnich said in a note to reporters. “The hardcore gamers seeking heavy action and strong multiplayer support had Rainbow Six Vegas 2. Even Army of Two played its role by attracting in consumers with its flashy marketing campaign and catchy theme song!”
The success of these games further shows that the gaming business has reached a certain level of maturity, according to Divnich.
“The industry is finally large enough to support numerous AAA titles during an off-season month,” Divnich said, “and going forward, publishers need not fear a PS3/Xbox 360 title hindering their Wii title (or vice versa). March has proven that the PS3/Xbox360 and the Wii can co-exist perfectly together.”
Metal Gear Online is going to be out on the new and improved PS Store.
Yesterday, Sony Japan issued a release saying that the new and improved PlayStation Store would be coming April 15. It was assumed by many–but not officially confirmed at the time–that this was going to be a global launch, due to the nature and history of the store.
To remove any doubt, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe has now confirmed that the “enhanced” PlayStation Store will indeed be coming on April 15.
It also had more good news for Europeans–on April 17, the first content update for two weeks will include the launch of Metal Gear Online Premiere Beta. The beta had already been confirmed for Japan, but those outside of the country had been left hanging.
The online beta will be running from April 21 to May 6, as an online multiplayer companion to Konami’s highly anticipated Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, which is due for release on June 12.
Two maps will be available for testers to explore: Blood Bath, and Groznyi Grad, each of which “requires unique strategies” for success. Up to 16 gamers are able to play together in each.
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