Fans of Bethesda’s Fallout 3 will be happy to hear that GameStop has begun selling the game’s newest DLC pack, Point Lookout, pior to its scheduled June 23rd release date.

Now, we’re not sure how long they will be selling Point Lookout for but Kotaku has confirmed that they are in fact shipping the content. Better yet, they have also confirmed that the codes shipped by GameStop are working and will give players the chance to play Point Lookout early.

So Fallout 3-ers, what are you waiting for?

Read (GameStop)

Leading game retailer GameStop has revealed that they’re expecting a significant price drop for the PS3 this year, joining a number of analysts and industry folks who are all basically saying the same thing: A much needed PS3 price cut is coming.

GameStop expects a price drop of $100 this holiday season, just in time for the launch of Madden 10, which hits the stores on August 18. GameStop also notes that this will likely force Nintendo to cut the price of the Wii by $50, making it a $199 machine.

Gordon van Dyke, one of the producers of Battlefield 1943 (and other Battlefield games), recently spoke to Eurogamer where he revealed that the downloadable-only game would not have a beta, but it would have a trial version for players to check out the game. In other words, a demo.

No beta, but we have a trial version that lets you confirm what you already thought – that this game is the best USD 15 I will ever spend!

Battlefield 1943 will be released this July on Xbox 360 and PS3 as a downloadable game only, for $15, while the PC version will be released later this September.

An interview linked to from a Facebook Fallout 3 page gave more details regarding the upcoming Fallout 3 content packs, Point Lookout and Mothership Zeta. Most of the information contained therein is about the first of the two, likely because it’s the more mundane of the two, featuring more commonplace quests in a new location. They’re keeping a little more of a lid on Mothership Zeta because it’s definitely more unusual.

As you may know, Point Lookout is set in the actual area of the same name, though residents of the area will notice that they have taken a generous amount of artistic license with the geography, they also drew inspiration directly from certain features and landmarks. It’s set in a location that’s not accessible by foot from the rest of the Capital Wasteland and though it wasn’t hit by any bombs it’ll still have evidence of the war, likely in the form of mutated residents.

Things there will be pretty low-tech, with new weapons being more like lever action rifles and double barrelled shotguns. The main thrust of the story will revolve around a ghoul named Desmond and a band of tribals, though there will be other quests to undertake and non-quest related areas to discover.

Mothership Zeta sound very nearly the opposite with a more linear quest and of course more advanced technology. They were pretty tight-lipped regarding anything beyond the most basic details, but what they did give is pretty interesting. The aliens are standard Roswell greys, as were the bodies at the crashed ship, though there’ll be various robots to battle against on their ship. You’ll begin simply trying to escape, though after finding out their aliens ultimate goals you’ll have more to do. There’ll also be other abductees you can interact with, and a new rifle called the disintegrator. Both DLC packs will offer some quest-related perks, but no new level-up perks.

Sometimes there’s a real downside to writing about Wii games.  Like I said in the headline, they defy any real or simple description.  It’s hard to tell what exactly is going on sometimes.  They can even be downright confusing.  That’s definitely the case with Wario Ware: Smooth Moves.

Long, long ago, civilization was infested with these things called “form batons”, mystical objects that contained vast power and ostensibly controlled a race of tiny humanoids if the hieroglyphs are to be believed.  Anyway, one day, Nintendo‘s biggest anti-hero and treasure hunter extraordinaire Wario was sitting in his chair at home, sucking down cake and donuts and suchlike when one of those tiny humanoids from the hieroglyphs abducts Wario’s snacks.  Naturally, Wario can’t stand for such nonsense, and thus he chases after the tiny humanoid to recover his snacks.  What he finds instead is one of the legendary form batons.  Thus, Wario will join a whole cast of motley characters, including a dog and cat taxi driving team, two inveterate gamers, a cheerleader, an inventor and a witch with her pet demon familiar in a series of slice of life-style vignettes as they go about their lives.

You, meanwhile, will have to accomplish a series of tasks in rapid succession, accomplished by doing various things with your Wiimote.  You’ll hold it like a waiter holding a tray, like a remote control, up in front of your nose like an elephant with its trunk, and on top of your head like a mohawk to do any of a number of things, including driving a car, picking up trash with a remote controlled robot, picking your nose, and scrubbing a cow’s ass.  No, seriously.  You’re going to do all that and even less savory tasks.  Frankly, I was amazed enough to find myself working my Wiimote into a position where I could ram a finger up a polygonal nose on a polygonal face, but when I started running a scrub brush over a cow’s rump roast, well, that just did it for me.  I had nothing to say.

The graphics are, of course, last generation weak, but the biggest problem with Wario Ware: Smooth Moves is also the biggest joy–the controls.  Several times I found myself about to start a game and I was left totally unaware of what to actually DO.  Oh, sure, I knew how to HOLD the Wiimote–they make that perfectly clear from the second you start a game–but I didn’t always know what to do from there.  Did I swing to the left?  The right?  When do I pick up?  And most unaccountably of all, why won’t the Wiimote acknowledge ANYTHING I do, no matter what direction I move?  This didn’t happen often, but when it did, it really spoiled the game.

I have to admit that I enjoyed this game.  I liked the rapid switching of games, and how at higher speeds it could be tough to keep up.  There was some challenge involved here–it was no walkover.  It took me two, even three times to get through some stages.

All things considered, this is definitely a game to get your hands on and wrap some smooth moves around.

Ubisoft’s forums are abuzz with talk about the upcoming Splinter Cell: Conviction. People are discussing features, plotlines, whether they enjoy the idea of a character actually aging as games go by (Sam Fisher is in his fifties in this title), the usual sorts of pre-release forum chatter. Ubisoft has started a thread allowing fans to pose questions to the developers, with some of them being answered in the weeks to come.

Of course, one of the first questions posed had to do with whether or not we’d be seeing the game released for PS3 as well as the Xbox 360. Though the Splinter Cell games so far have been exclusive to Microsoft consoles, most third party developers and publishers are putting out their games for any capable system. Most have cited this as a better business practice, so it would seem that Ubisoft could be going down the same path.

Ubisoft has put paid to any rumors about a multiplatform release, citing that Splinter Cell is a ‘true Microsoft exclusive title’. They begin with pointing out that there’s a historical link between the console and the games, saying that the original Splinter Cell was the first game to truly utilize the Xbox’s potential. In response Microsoft was excited about the game and supported it heavily, leading to what they referred to as a “link of heart” between the two. Finally they point out that by focusing on a single console they can devote more time to completely optimizing the game for its single system.

I’m going to start this post of with a disclaimer: neither myself nor anyone associated with this website have any stake in Sony’s success/failure. I own every current gen console and handheld and play them all regularly. That being said, let’s get on to the news. While advances in technology often lower the price of operating in certain media, the video games industry is often on a upward slope.

Some are estimating that the next generation games will cost up to $60 million to develop and one publisher is already expresing concerns over current generation costs. Activision boss Bobby Kotick is suggesting that unless there’s a price cut for the PS3 the company might have to reconsider supporting the console: “I’m getting concerned about Sony; the PlayStation 3 is losing a bit of momentum and they don’t make it easy for me to support the platform.”

He suggests that if the price for the console doesn’t drop the attach rates will diminish, following that line of thought with: “if we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony. When we look at 2010 and 2011, we might want to consider if we support the console – and the PSP [portable] too.”

Considering the as-yet untapped potential of the console and Sony’s insistence that their strategy is long term, things could still be turned around, but if enough publishers and developers shift their efforts elsewhere the console could founder before it has the chance to take off, though I doubt this is actually going to happen. This could very well be nothing more than posturing to achieve some greater concessions from Sony in their business arrangements.

Video games are in some ways are starting to resemble the auto industry. We’re hearing more and more details about future titles in a series that hasn’t even released a sequel yet. Eventually developers will leak details of sequels to games that have yet to hit the shelves. Regardless of how early this news is, it’s still interesting to hear. In the first trailers for Mass Effect 2 we saw little more than a robotic geth wearing the protagonists armor, leading many to assume that he’d died in the ambiguous ending of the original.

Later though it was revealed that he had survived and would be present for at least some of the sequel. Now BioWare’s Casey Hudson, the executive producer on the title has revealed that not only has Shepard survived to the sequel, he may even make it to the final chapter of the trilogy. I say ‘may’ however not out of any ambiguity on the part of the developer- the choice rests on the player. Mass Effect 2 will have certain events or differences based on choices you made in the original (assuming you played it and still have your save file). As you’ve probably heard, depending on your actions characters can die in this game. Hopefully it won’t simply be due to the rigors of everyday combat, because in the original I generally found myself the only one standing at the end of nearly every encounter. Not only can your teammates die, but Shepard himself can be offed.

Of course if you fail to keep him alive, he’ll be replaced by a stand-in character in Mass Effect 3 so as to not force the developers to create two different plotlines, but if you play your cards right the hero can survive the supposed suicide mission he embarks on in #2 and head out for another attempt at defeating overwhelming odds.

Playstation Store gets updated, includes Metal Gear Solid
Halo 3: ODST pre-orders get Sergeant Johnson as playable character
Microsoft responds to Steve Ballmer’s Project Natal statement
DiRT 2 acknowledges the late-and-great Colin McRae
DJ Hero bundle dated and priced thanks to Amazon, Gamestop?
America’s Army developer shutting down
Aion Collector’s Edition revealed
Delta Force coming to Steam
Forza 3 getting Limited Edition
Gamestop No Longer Pushing Used Games
Microsoft confirms “new Xbox console in 2010″
Huge Dawn of War 2 update coming
Newest COD Map Pack Sells One Million In First Week
Hell’s Kitchen Game Review–Another Game That Shouldn’t Be Fun
Infinity Ward Says No To MW2 Subscriptions
Sony: “We’re Not Copying The Wii”
Indie Studio Unveiling Xbox 360 FPS

Just as the ESRB suggested late last month, Metal Gear Solid has found its way onto the Playstation Store in the form of a Playstation 1 Classic.

That’s not all thats been added as Tom Clancy’s GRAW 2 for the PSP and an NCAA Football 10 demo have also made the cut. Of course, a bunch of Guitar Hero and Rock Band songs, wallpapers along with a bunch of other stuff you probably don’t care about were also added.

Hit the read link for the full list.
READ ON »