I’ve been trying to work out Metroid Other M for a bit now. Is it a re-hash of the older “Metroid-vania” type 2D games, or is it still holding on to the stuff Retro Studios did with the Prime Trilogy? Or, because Team Ninja are involved, did it turn into Ninja Gaiden? Well, by the looks of things on this gameplay trailer, a mix of all three?
Sure enough, the camera often makes it look like you running through environments on a 2D plane, occasionally shooting things, but then it opens out and you get a bit of space to run around, and shoot some more stuff. It also features a first person aiming mode by the looks of things for the missiles and maybe scanning abilities, not sure yet. It’s helpful that the control scheme was demonstrated on the video, but I’m going to find using the D-Pad to run about in all three of the useful dimensions, a bit strange, oh my analog conditioned thumbs.
There is also a bit more of a dramatic edge to the game and that trademark solitary exploration appears to been dulled down a bit, which could be no bad thing so long as it doesn’t impact on the actual way the game plays. Having said that, looks like the trademark stuff is there, but no doubt there will be an “abilitease” of “Hey look at all these cool pow… oh, start from scratch, that’s cool…”. It does look nice though, and I’ll refrain from harking back to the Wii’s graphical record, but it looks like a Metroid game. I’ve been playing through the original Metroid Prime recently, don’t ask why other than it’s a good game, and the environments in Other M are comparable, just perhaps with a little less detail thanks to the third person perspective.
I’m not convinced yet over the “anime” direction some of the stuff seems to of gone in terms of story context, but if the game plays as good as it appears to on the video, it could be a interesting entry to the franchise, hopefully a good one.
A.P.B means All Points Bulletin. Which doesn’t really mean a whole lot, so let me tell you a little bit about the game. You will play in a living breathing city, but it’s all going to be online, with two sides, criminals and enforcers, attempting missions to get to the top of the ladder.
According to their website, each server will hold 100,000 players, with there being 100 players per district. We don’t really know much about how the game will actually play yet, but take a look at the trailer, recently shown at the Penny Arcade Expo 2010 to take a look. It’s from the folks that made Crackdown, so expect a similar type of vibe to that, except that co-op concept times fifty…or something like that.
Expect to see more A.P.B information later this year, as it’s due for a 2010 release.
SING ALONG WITH ME "We all love, the pikachu bus, the pikachu bus we love!"
Not many people really like school. I often used to cringe when I heard, mostly girls, say “I love going to school to learn and see my friends”. I mean COME ON. Spending all day at home or doing something you want to do or most of the day feeling embarrassed during PE lessons and wanting to gouge your eyes out with pencil sharpeners as we take another look at “quadratic equations”. And my school buses are terrible, I’ve seen cleaner pub toilets than we get shuttled to school in.
Needless to say, I ain’t too positive on this who ‘school lark’, but if I went to school in Japan, and also happened to be in Kindergarden, there would be a very big incentive for me to want to go…I GET TO RIDE THE PIKACHU BUS.
By playing a cruel trick on young Japanese children, Osaka schools realised that if they convince kids to ride the Pikachu bus, and what isn’t exciting about stepping into a long Pikachu, with wheels? You also have a variety of pokeballs on the side, all identical to what you would expect and other Pokemon, the only one I recognise is Mew, with some other “new generation” monster next to them. And rather than scouring Bulbapedia, I’ll let everyone else work it out.
[Source]
At a Swedish demoscene event DATASTORM 2010 (can’t believe it slipped off my calender) Digital Illusions, who are now know essentially, as the “Battlefield Guys”, came along to show off a game they had been working on towards the end of the Megadrive life cycle around 1994.
Hardcore, featured in the video above, is a run and gun based shooter, which perhaps demonstrates DICE’s affinity for erm, games with guns in them? Graphically, it looks like what Megadrive games look like, with that awesome sound chip pumping out some actually pretty nice tunes.
Their publisher at the time, Psygnosis, who have since transformed into Sony Liverpool, cancelled the game, along with 12 others, when they released there wasn’t really much life in the Megadrive, despite, according to the co-founders of DICE, Andreas Axelsson and Olof Gustafsson, them only having
“One bug to squish”
Whilst I really like Megadrive stuff, I can’t say as was a big fan of games such as Hardcore, however, this may be countered by my love of all things “Beta” and unreleased. I find it really interesting to see how far a game is along in it’s development cycle once it gets canned, or how a game has changed over time. Plus, I’d like to see what quality Megadrive games were at once the platform was begining to be phased out.
With regards to actually being able to play Hardcore in the public domain, Axelsson and Gustafsson say that they are “working on it”, with Sony technically now owning the license, but hopefully we’ll be able to see it free and released to the public in emulation form (something legal at last) soon.
Ah, this takes me back, and makes me remember why I don't use it anymore, TOO MUCH EFFORT!
Posted today on the PlayStation EU blog, the next PS3 firmware update, due for release on this Thursday, will remove the “Other OS” option that allowed users to install alternative operating systems such as Linux Distributions onto the machine.
This functionality had already been removed from the slimmer PS3′s, released last September, but many users are “outraged” (in an internet sense) at this feature being removed from what is essentially a mandatory update.
Basically, the Other OS option on the “phat” PS3′s had allowed you to install another operating system to a partition on the drive. Of course, the system was very limited, you had to run a system that supported a Power PC architecture and was a low enough spec to run on the locked down system.
I myself used to run Yellow Dog Linux, and whilst you were a bit limited in what you could do thanks to not having access to the graphics processor, I managed to spend a lot of time and even play some games on it, thanks a solid community of supporters, who are now probably a bit annoyed right about now.
There reasoning behind this is “security concerns” after hacker “George Hotz” managed to gain access to the RSX graphics chip, so Sony is killing the easiest gateway in. In a way, that is understandable, they don’t want piracy to go out of control as it has with the PSP.
Of course, you don’t have to update on April 1st (apparently it’s not an April Fools Joke), but then you will lose online access as well as being able to play games that require the firmware 3.21. And let’s be honest here, unless you are super serious about running Linux as well, bearing in mind I know that it’s a far better games console than a linux box.
On this weeks episode of Ignition we celebrate Matt’s birthday and read out a letter sent to us by Paradigm Entertainment regarding Stuntman: Ignition and why Matt’s failure to buy it spelt the end for the studio.
In our news section Josh discusses the announcement of the Nintendo 3DS; the Modern Warfare 2 stimulus pack and the possibility of a new Michael Jackson game.Stevie talks about Apple overtaking PSP in the mobile gaming world; how the FBI will be adding you on Facebook and Ubuntu’s attempts to rival iTunes. Finally Matt talks about Tim Burtons next project; discusses the Scott Pilgram Vs The World trailer and has news about MI:4; Scream 4 and Austin Powers 4.
Duration: 66 minutes
I liked what I played of Modnation Racers, think it’s got promise to be a pretty well received title in a similar way to LittleBigPlanet was. This trailer, released by Sony, focuses on the “Race!” part of the game, as opposed to the “Create” and “Share”.
Incoming to online stores near you, the Modern Warfare 2 Stimulus package is adding four multiplayer maps, Bailout, Storm and two from Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Crash and Overgrown. Prepare to get all stimulated over some maps…
It's been wanted for a while, but the government has finally woken up to the need to support the UK games industry. Shame an election is round the corner...
The UK’s Budget, as announced by Chancellor Alistair Darling today, is finally offering tax relief to UK based developers, aiming to provide incentives and means for British developers to compete with those in other territories.
Despite many calls over the past few years for the government to offer some sort of relief to British game developers who have, up to this point, received little financial incentive and benefit from being based in the UK. With companies from Rockstar North, Lionhead and Media Molecule, Britain has often been seen as the home of quality and character over the years, even harking back to Rare’s games on Nintendo’s older systems.
The plans which were announced today will mean that successful games, how this is going to be measure is yet to be seen, will be able to pay less tax on their profits, whilst the games that do less well, or simply bomb, will be able to reduce their losses with tax credits, which sounds like a pretty useful plan.
You know they are proper serious about stuff in the Witcher 2 when they mention “King’s Salvation”, check out this nice looking trailer of the second Witcher game and also yes. Nakedness.
