In the days of catridge gaming playing games from a previous system meant you had to hook that system back up to your TV and slot the game in to achieve the appropriate tinglings of reminiscence. When storage formats were universalized via the adoption of CDs as the medium of choice the question of backwards compability began, even before it became an industry/gamer buzzword.

The PS2 was the first to feature it, allowing gamers to still play their old favorites. The Xbox 360 followed suit somewhat, with a few hundred original Xbox games playable. The Wii can handle any Gamecube title, though there likely aren’t too many people go back to. The PS3 offered backwards compatibility as well, but only on certain SKUs and only for a limited period of time.

If you didn’t buy one of the 60 gigabyte models you were out of luck as your system didn’t have the necessary hardware to play PS2 games. It seems that all might change though as Sony filed an application for a patent that would allow backwards compatability to be integrated into existing systems via a software update. According to the patent Sony has figured out a way to get the PS3′s cell processor to emulate the PS2′s emotion engine.

I admit that after trying to read through the garbled nonsense of patent filing I have no clue whether or not IGN has interpreted this correctly, so this could be for something else entirely, but it seems logical. Now whether this would be available for everyone is the question. They could hold it back for release with the PS3 Slim, offering it at a later date as a paid download to anyone with a non-slim PS3, or they could simply show they’re nice guys and release it for free.

In the video game industry there’s usually a reverse correlation between the uniqueness of the premise and how combat focused it is. Don’t get me wrong, games like the God of War series and Mass Effect definitely have a lot going for them in terms of style and plot, but the basic barebones ideas behind each aren’t terribly unique: fighting monsters from ancient mythologies and shooting various alien creatures in space.

Every once in a while though we get an interesting game that brings an interesting take on one of the standard action formulae. First person shooters are notoriously uninventive, but Aspyr Media and Mindware Studios are teaming up to create an FPS that’ll blow your mind. Or at least blow it up. Some writers have toyed with the idea of psychic therapy, somehow going directly into someone’s mind to fix their issues, but in Dreamkiller you’ll be taking a much more cathartic approach. As psychologist Alice Drake you possess the unusual ability to enter into the minds of your patients and fight their demons with an array of weapons and powers.

The game will be spread over twelve different levels with an overarching plot that hurtles you towards a showdown with an ultimate evil force. It might not be the most unique premise in the world, feeling like the love child of the film The Cell and an HP Lovecraft story but the underlying potential is great. Games that take place in a setting which can completely ignore any laws of physics or realistic dimensions can be incredibly unique and unusual. Do I think this game will live up to its incredible potential? Probably not, but I can certainly hope. The title is set to ship this fall for PC and Xbox 360.

Pachter: Xbox 360 ending in third place in 2015
Halo: Reach May Use Natal
Animal Crossing City Folk Game Review–Absolute Absurdity
WoW held up StarCraft 2 progress
Blizzard: no LAN support in StarCraft 2
LittleBigPlanet gets “sacktue of liberty”, celebrates liberty
THQ exec lands at MTV, gears up for world domination
Frozenbyte responds to Trine pricing controversy
Dynasty Warriors 6 Empires Review- The Same, But Different
Battlefield 1943 coming on June 9?

Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter and his team have compiled a 210 page report on the future of video game industry. In it, Pachter predicts that the Wii will win this console generation, and that Nintendo will release a WiiHD, most likely in 2010. He also said that the fact that Sony’s Blu-ray won the HD disc war, it will fuel PS3 sales for years to come, eventually surpassing the Xbox 360, which will, according to Pachter, end up third by the end of this console generation. Which is in 2015, in case you’re wondering. Or at least, according to Pachter.

While discussing the gameplay differences between the upcoming Halo3: ODST and the original trilogy Bungie Studio president Harold Ryan says the studio got an early look at Microsoft’s Project Natal and that he says it could be used for the next Halo title: ”I absolutely think ‘Reach‘ could be enabled with it.” Of course this is far from any confirmation that the camera-based motion sensing device is going to be part of the Halo prequel, but it’s certainly an interesting possibility.

The device could be used in cooperation with a controller or on its own for certain portions, though to play the game entirely through gestures isn’t likely. To bank the potential success of an upcoming Halo game on the install base of an as-yet unreleased peripheral would be a huge risk, though the potential for interesting control scheme combinations does make this possibility quite interesting. Imagine controlling a vehicle by leaning side to side while controlling the turrets and assorted weaponry using the controller.

Animal Crossing: City Folk, now available on the Nintendo Wii (were you expecting Xbox 360?)  may well be the most absurd game I’ve ever played.  And considering not so long ago I was writing about a game called You Have To Defecate Upon King Bhumibol, that’s saying a LOT.

As for the plot, you play a random traveler on his way to a certain city that’s populated entirely by cheerful anthropomorphic animals despite the fact that your character is clearly human.  Those of you wondering if your avatar is, in fact, some kind of closet furry join me in wondering the exact same thing.  Your new town is admittedly rather small and quaint, but boasts a clothing shop, a museum, a bus station, and a general store run by everybody’s favorite loan shark / raccoon, Tom Nook.  A word about Tom Nook–he operates the general store Nook’s Cranny (ba DUM bum!) and will give you your first home loan to purchase a place in the small town.  He will then offer you a job in Nook’s Cranny to get you started paying down your debt, but he’ll promptly fire you after one day with a huge amount in mortgage left.  At least I think that’s the currency of choice there; I’m a little spacey on that detail.  Anyway, the good news is that Nook’s Cranny deals in pretty much EVERY ITEM KNOWN TO MAN OR ANTHROPOMORPHIC ANIMAL, and thus, you’ll be able to sell Nook any random piece of garbage you find anywhere to pay down your house debt, despite the fact that he could literally stay within sight of his shop and get the exact same thing himself for free.

Seriously–it’s actually quite possible to pay off a home loan in Animal Crossing City Folk with cherries you find on public trees.  No wonder Tom Nook’s a loan shark–people can pay him off with shiny rocks and sticks they found on the ground and he’s required by some kind of law to take them.  He’s got to charge ridiculous fees just to keep ahead of the deflationary curve!  If I went down to MY bank and asked if they take cherries on a mortgage payment they’d probably have me arrested.  Or shot.  Possibly both!

This game is just the epoch of absurdity.  For instance–after getting fired from Nook’s, I went to the town’s bulletin board on my first day and left a rambling, profanity-laden diatribe about how I wished every resident of the town would die in a series of horrible tragedies just to see what would happen.  Sure enough…they greeted me with cheerful smiles and sunny waves and offers to join them for dinner or bridge or knocking over garbage cans or whatever giant anthropomorphic animals do for fun.  You can’t get a rise out of these people, thus you’re left to play the game as intended.

Which is, sadly, boring.  You go fishing.  You find fossils which you take to the museum where they make appropriate oohing and aahing noises over before putting them on display.  Occasionally you can go into the city (hence the name, City Folk) and see a movie or go shopping.  It’s like life, if your banker were a raccoon that accepted tree bark on a mortgage payment and your neighbor were a five foot tall pig that walked on its hind legs and sent you a vase on your birthday.

And frankly, if I wanted my games to be more like real life, I think I’d just stop, you know, playing games.

It’s just not Blizzard’s day today, is it? Word comes from Eurogamer that the studio held up the release of its highly anticipated sequel to StarCraft for World of Warcraft.

Rob Pardo told the site that development on the sequel had begun in 2003 and that there had been a playable build since 2005. However, it was held up due to the appearance of World of Warcraft which saw a fair amount of the design team moving to MMO project to help finish the game.

Apparently, these people had lots of great experience and had knowledge and know-how to fix map editor problems, as well as dealing with balancing.

Now you know who to hate for holding up StarCraft 2. The original was released back in 1998. It’s been eleven years since then.

Sure to strike legions of stinky nerds who like to huddle in a single, hot room to play videogames competitively, it appears that Blizzard does not have any plans to add LAN multiplayer support to StarCraft 2.

This comes from different previews of the game on Kotaku and IncGamers, both of whom checked out the new Battle.net, the solo campaign and more. When they asked about multiplayer LAN play, this is what they received as an answer: “We will not support it.”

The studio additionally pointed out that there is “zero percent” chance of seeing the game on consoles.

If the news got you down, Joystiq adds salt to the wound by showing seven minutes of multiplayer play from the game. Go cry in the corner, you.

To celebrate the coming of Independence day, developer Media Molecule has revealed a free LittleBigPlanet costume that it will release.

To be available for a limited time, the “Sacktue of Liberty” costume will introduce the iconic cardboard crown and torch to your littlebig sackboy, or more appropriately, in this case, your sackgirl.

So, if you’re a PS3 owner longing for something free and you love independence, then be sure to liven up LBP’s world with liberty this Thursday, July 2.

Jumping ship from THQ, Scott Guthrie, former executive vice president at the popular publisher, has landed at MTV Games, having been labeled its new executive vice president and general manager.

MTV Games also announced former SCEA sales and merchandise director David Cox as its senior VP of sales.

The company has recently stepped up its efforts to break into the gaming biz, having acquired Harmonix and working closely with Jerry Bruckheimer’s games company. It’s now one of the top five game publishers and is host to the popular Rock Band franchise.

So, what exactly is the company up to these days? Another band-themed Rock Band, some action game, or a totally new game?