The Wii has made home versions of light-gun games possible. Some of the first games in this style to be released for the Wii were ports of arcade games. Several of the House of the Dead titles were packaged together and released previously, but there was also a completely new title in development.
It’s called House of The Dead: Overkill and it combines all the best features of a light-gun game with all the best/worst features of campy horror movies. It’s directly aimed at the semi-casual market, with the content definitely not for kids and the gameplay on the relatively easy side.
The controls are incredibly simple, but for this style of gaming it’s exactly as they should be. Point, pull the trigger on your zapper or other lightgun accessory (or simply push the B button) and shoot. Shake to reload, shoot again. If you’re just going through the game you can simply blast away; enough hits will take down any of the walking dead. Hits to the limbs will sever that body part and of course headshots will take them down immediately.
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Video game companies are now discovering the buzz-building benefits of social tools like twitter; instead of generating a full-blown press release or waiting for a magazine to publish a new issue they can give a little hint that something is going to be happening soon. Then hordes of gamers and journalists alike will hover on their websites, clicking the refresh button every few moments in the hopes of glimpsing the update.
Midway’s community manager said “A sweet new demo of an early-stage game just arrived in my office. Color me excited.” Another Midway representative confirmed that it’s for an unannounced title which they are describing as “awesome”, though I doubt anyone can recall when a game company described one of their upcoming titles with any less bombastic phrasing.
With heavy debts looming Midway is likely hoping to generate significant interest in this new title as soon as possible to keep themselves afloat.
Bungie’s scifi series is a big cash cow for Microsoft; the three FPS titles have all sold well and now the newest offering in the universe is proving just as popular. Microsoft has announced that Halo Wars has sold more than a million copies worldwide, making it the best selling RTS game on any current console. That’s not exactly a significant accomplishment though since RTS games are developed mostly for the PC.
The game was released less than a month ago but the amount of time gamers have put into it is quite impressive. Over one hundred and eighteen years of gameplay have occurred over 2.6 million multiplayer matches. An average of about 200,000 gamers have taken part in online skirmishes every day.
The success of Halo Wars proves that RTS games are a viable option for consoles and probably means we’ll be seeing more of them in the future, especially since the ending of the Legendary difficulty mode hints at the possibility of a sequel, which seems all but inevitable now.
Game publisher Atlus is continuing their streak of bringing games to the USA; their newest title is Crimson Gem Saga, which they’ve secured the publishing rights to release on the PSP. The title is a JRPG which promises a thrilling story and turn based combat that is simple enough for newcomers to master and complex enough to keep the attention of more experienced gamers including combo chains, ambush attacks and multi-character attacks.
For once North American gamers are getting something over the Japanese version: in addition to an excellent soundtrack Atlus has added over a thousand extra lines of voice acting to the original. The game revolves around Killian von Rohcoff, a hero who hits a run of bad luck. After being robbed of the top spot in his graduating class he follows a lead on a job which gets his wallet stolen and propels him into the main storyline which revolves around an ancient artifact known as the ‘Wicked Stone’ (which my keen intuition tells me might be some shade of red).
It seems that not one, not two, but three new game studios have emerged from the ashes of the late Ensemble Studios.
This time, former Ensemble dev Dusty Monk takes the ropes and announces the launch of his new game studio, Windstorm Studios.
Theres no concrete details of what their first project will be, but they describe it as:
A better online game – a game with the promise of of a hopeful future — cities of glass and steel, and most importantly, flying cars!
Flying cars? Cool! More information on Windstorm Studios at their official website, here.
Read (Joystiq)
It seems that Microsoft isn’t happy with just including the New Xbox Experience on upcoming game discs and decided to add another approach.
The NXE dashboard update will be on a CD included with the next issue of Official Xbox Magazine.
So, for those of you unconnected old-dashboard-lovin’ Xbox owners, don’t insert that shiny lookin’ disc included with OXM, no matter how pretty it looks.
Read (Destructoid)
Empire: Total War, the newest entry in the very successful Total War strategy games, is topping the PC sales charts in the US.
The sales chart for March 1-7, according to NPD:
1. Empire: Total War
2. World Of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King
3. Warhammer Online: Age Of Reckoning
4. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe
5. Warhammer 40,000: Dawn Of War II
6. The Sims Carnival: Bumper Blast
7. Empire: Total War Collector’s Ed
8. Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 Premier Ed
9. World Of Warcraft: Battle Chest
10. World Of Warcraft
The chart is still dominated by World of Warcraft and The Sims — a trend that has been going on for a long time and will continue for a while as well.
Jason Anderson, one of the game designer’s who worked on the original Fallout game at Interplay, has joined developer inXile Entertainment and is working on a new game “that will push the boundaries of RPGs”, as said in a statement.
After working at Interplay on Fallout and Fallout 2, Anderson left for Troika Games, where he made Arcane: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura and Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines.
At inXile, he joins former Interplay co-founder Brian Fargo, who founded inXile in 2002 and currently serves as the CEO of the company.
If you are familiar with Rock Band and Guitar Hero, chances are you will love this new game from Pretzel Time. Pretzelmaker / Pretzel Time announced today that the company has launched a new online video game and sweepstakes in support of “Combo*Nation”, the brand’s current combo-meal promotion.
The “Pretzelmaker Rocks” video game offers all individuals who register a chance to win instantly and also enters registrants for the grand prize drawing. The game and sweepstakes can be found at www.pretzelmaker.com and will run through April 28, 2009. Pretzelmaker / Pretzel Time is managed by NexCen Franchise Management, Inc., a subsidiary of NexCen Brands, Inc.
Pretzelmaker Rocks is a game of musical rhythm and timing that challenges gamers to navigate through two levels of play. At the start, players are given the option to customize their rock star by selecting a male or female character and a rock star hairdo. Gamers then use the arrow-keys on their computer keyboards to sync to a patterned delivery of digital pretzels from an oven in the game’s background–points are earned each time the player hits the correct pretzel.
All registered players will have an opportunity to scratch-and-win a $10 gift certificate booklet redeemable at any Pretzelmaker or Pretzel Time store. Registrants will also be automatically entered to win a 42″ flat screen television, a Nintendo Wii(R) and Rock Band(R) 2 video game. Gamers can play up to five times a day through April 28, 2009. After the sweepstakes, the game will be open to ongoing play.
(Source) Press
