Newly released today



features
Afro Samurai, starring the voice talents of Samuel L. Jackson, follows the exploits of the original series and includes new material and background for fans of the series and newcomers alike
A striking art style, shading and texturing that give Afro Samurai a truly unique look and feel
A balanced experience between stylistic combat and acrobatic platforming with the ability to dynamically slice and dismember enemies with ease
Afro interacts with anything and everything in the environment in beautifully animated open world environments
Innovative gameplay system where the music affects the enemy AI and the tone of the gameplay with a hip-hop soundtrack developed in collaboration with RZA of Wu-Tang Clan fame

description
The Battle To Be #1 Begins!

Based on the hit animation series, Afro Samurai is a cutting-edge interactive adventure that delivers a new kind of cinematic game experience that’s literally dripping in style.
Join “Afro” on an epic hunt for his father killer, as he scends into the timeless mysticism of the Samurai Code.

Afro Samurai blends traditional Japanese folklore, funky technology and hip-hop culture, to create a brutally fresh interactive experience. The hit animated TV series comes alive with style so cutting-edge it hurts!

http://www.play-asia.com/SOap-23-83-...j-70-2mfs.html ...

In the annals of console history, the Dreamcast is often portrayed as a small, square, white plastic JFK. A progressive force in some ways, perhaps misguided in others, but nevertheless a promising life cut tragically short by dark shadowy forces, spawning complex conspiracy theories that endure to this day. So to celebrate the tenth anniversary of its launch, which passed recently, Eurogamer is going all CSI to consider who - or what - killed the Dreamcast.

Was it grinchy old EA, withholding the precious lifeblood of its licensed sports games? Or did the fiendish pirates help to sink the SEGA ship, cracking the GD-ROM format and allowing anyone with a CD burner to brazenly copy Dreamcast games? Or was it that big mean bully Sony, tucked away on the grassy knoll, blowing the head off the competition with a bullet of ruthless PR chicanery?

By November 1998, when the Dreamcast first arrived in Japanese shops, it had been ten long years since the popular Megadrive, a decade punctuated by a triple whammy of high-profile hardware mistakes. The SEGA CD add-on was the first, an over-priced and poorly supported multimedia attachment for the Megadrive that relied on the thankfully short-lived craze for FMV-based "interactive movies". Customers soon wised up to the fact that beneath the grainy video footage, they really weren't getting any more gameplay for their money. Following up this clunky bit of kit with the even more pointless 32X add-on merely deepened SEGA's malaise in 1994.

Another expensive add-on, the 32X flopped hard, selling less than a quarter of a million units. Software support was virtually non-existent, and the whole sorry affair was brushed under the rug in less than a year. SEGA fans who had faithfully bought each new product were left with pricey lumps of plastic and a severe case of buyer's remorse. It didn't help that the 32X was developed by SEGA's American arm, allegedly unaware that at the same time their Japanese colleagues were working on the SEGA Saturn.

By E3 1997, SEGA had given up on the Saturn.
Released a few months ahead of Sony's dark horse PlayStation, the Saturn seemed poised to restore SEGA's console fortunes. But SEGA hadn't banked on Sony successfully appealing to a wider audience, with PlayStation's clubland aesthetic and slicker image, and with the Saturn's internal architecture proving something of a tangle, many developers switched their attention to Sony's more accessible and successful platform. Despite fairly strong sales in Japan, the system struggled in America and Europe and soon found itself trailing in third place behind the PlayStation and Nintendo 64. With dwindling third-party support, SEGA's American head honcho Bernie Stolar announced at E3 in 1997 that "the Saturn is not our future".

Coming off a run of three high-profile failures, SEGA took the unusual step of getting two competing R&D teams to come up with a console capable of putting the company back on top. One team was based in Japan, the other in the US. Both had different ideas as to which combination of chips and parts would fit the bill, and the American team signed a deal with 3dfx to use a custom version of the company's Voodoo 2 graphics chip. Unfortunately, during the development period, 3dfx was looking to sell shares and as part of the documentation it revealed lots of juicy details regarding the top-secret SEGA console. The US plan was ditched and SEGA opted to go with the Japanese design, prompting the newly floated 3dfx stock to drop by 43 per cent. 3dfx filed a lawsuit, claiming breach of contract. The case was quickly settled out of court, but it was the sort of speedbump that SEGA could ill afford.

After a tepid Japanese debut launched the console with a resounding thud in November 1998, we poor saps in America and Europe would have to wait almost a year to get our hands on it. Finally going global in the autumn of 1999, the Dreamcast swiftly made up for its poor Japanese performance, breaking US sales records by clocking up 300,000 pre-orders and shifting over 500,000 units in the first two weeks.

We still would.
It was a deserved success, carried on the shoulders of solid technical specifications and innovative new features. The Dreamcast wasn't the first console to offer online functions - even the SNES had tentatively dipped a toe in those waters - but it was the first to come with a modem built in and its own ISP for online gaming, thus enabling online play for all, rather than those who purchased a chunky peripheral. It was also the first to offer a memory card that doubled as a gaming device in its own right, with the Visual Memory Unit able to download mini-games, swap data with friends and act as a rudimentary battery-guzzling personal organiser.

It's true that Electronic Arts opted not to support the system, denying the Dreamcast the guaranteed sales that brands like Madden provided, but contrary to what the conspiracy theorists will tell you the Dreamcast software line-up managed just fine thanks to the SEGA Sports label. SEGA's own NFL 2K1, marketed as the first football game with online play, ...

It's Monday morning, and the Nintendo Wii downloadables delivery van is making its weekly rounds with a mix of alpine sports adventure, space-filling puzzles, and yet another installment of brazen blue hedgehog.

Mixing things up today, we'll kick things off with the solo Virtual Console title dropping this week, Sonic Chaos for the Sega Master System (500 Wii Points). Dr. Eggman's motivations have never been so clear; he's using a Red Chaos Emerald to make weapons of mass destruction, I assume in order to destroy...masses? Somehow this results in Sonic's home of South Island sinking into the sea with nay a missile fired, and it's up to the titular hedgehog and his mutant fox pal Tails to save the day. We're really scraping the bottom of the Sonic barrel now kids.

http://kotaku.com/5144254/weekly-wii...-space-puzzles ...

I've been playing around with Payback on my iPhone for the past week or so. The game is a top down action game very reminiscent of the original Grand Theft Auto.

Did I say reminiscent? It's really closer to a copycat. I haven't really played it enough yet to write up a formal review, but the game does seem to have some interesting things going for it.

http://kotaku.com/5141603/iphone-gets-its-gta-knock-off ...

iPhone appears to be one of the main drivers behind mobile gaming growth, according to the comScore report released on Friday.

iPhone owners accounted for 14 percent of mobile game downloaders in November, with 32.4 percent of all iPhone users reporting they downloaded a game in the month, compared with a market average of 3.8 percent.

That's nearly 10 times the average. No wonder so many companies are hopping onto the iPhone bandwagon.

http://kotaku.com/5144678/iphone-acc...game-downloads ...

This Wednesday on Xbox Live Arcade, shoot-em up fans get a healthy dose of redone retro goodness with R-Type Dimensions, repackaging and repolishing the first two games in the R-Type series.

R-Type and R-Type II return this Wednesday in R-Type Dimensions, which takes the classic gameplay of the original shooters and updates them with all the bells and whistles you'd expect from today's advanced downloadable titles. While you can simply amuse yourself playing the classics in their original form, the updated 3D versions look simply amazing, and you can switch between them on the fly at any point during gameplay. Along with the graphical upgrades, Dimensions also adds co-op play both online and off, a stage unlock feature that lets you choose where you want to start shooting once you've completed a stage, and Infinite mode, which loosely translates into Easy mode.

Now how much would you pay? How about 1200 Microsoft points? It's a bit of a higher price than I am used to for a remake of an older title, but the extra features could just be worth it.

http://kotaku.com/5144687/this-week-...ype-dimensions ...

This Wednesday on Xbox Live Arcade, shoot-em up fans get a healthy dose of redone retro goodness with R-Type Dimensions, repackaging and repolishing the first two games in the R-Type series.

R-Type and R-Type II return this Wednesday in R-Type Dimensions, which takes the classic gameplay of the original shooters and updates them with all the bells and whistles you'd expect from today's advanced downloadable titles. While you can simply amuse yourself playing the classics in their original form, the updated 3D versions look simply amazing, and you can switch between them on the fly at any point during gameplay. Along with the graphical upgrades, Dimensions also adds co-op play both online and off, a stage unlock feature that lets you choose where you want to start shooting once you've completed a stage, and Infinite mode, which loosely translates into Easy mode.

Now how much would you pay? How about 1200 Microsoft points? It's a bit of a higher price than I am used to for a remake of an older title, but the extra features could just be worth it.

http://kotaku.com/5144687/this-week-...ype-dimensions ...

Nintendo's customer service has a reputation for going above and beyond to satisfy the needs of once-distraught fans. This may be because only the stories of NIntendo awesomeness proliferate online (Not a headline: "Nintendo says it can't do anything for broken DS"), but this stuff makes us so happy that we'd rather not go all cynical. For now.

GoNintendo reader PsyduckWarrior's house caught fire, destroying (among other things, of course) his entire video game collection, including almost every Nintendo system and "more than 250 Nintendo games spanning all their consoles". Later, he sent Nintendo a fairly simple inquiry about transferring his account to a new Wii, including pictures demonstrating the circumstances through which he came to require a new Wii.

Nintendo responded by offering to send him a new Wii, along with a replacement for his Game Boy Advance SP. It may not be a replacement for his whole game collection, but it is a super-classy move from a company that could have just classified PsyduckWarrior's plight as, "Not our problem."

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/02/02/ni...in-house-fire/ ...

f Apple's sat back and let the iPhone hacking community do its thing in peace (well, relative peace) so far, this little gem just might be what the doctor ordered to stir up the crap. Crackulous -- available now in beta form through Cydia -- claims to be able to strip the protection off most apps downloaded from the App Store, meaning that just a single user needs to take the plunge and buy a target app once to get it busted and into free circulation. You need a jailbroken iPhone to get Crackulous loaded, naturally -- you'll see Apple make a Windows Mobile-powered device before you'll see Crackulous in the App Store -- but seeing how PwnageTool is dead simple to use, this puts most users just a couple graphical tools away from foolproof piracy and the golden opportunity to take a few hard-earned bucks out of a programmer's pocket.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/02/c...otection-sche/ ...