Source - Gamesradar

Take 2 is bringing Tokobot to UK gamers, the first PSP game to come from Dead or Alive developer Tecmo.

Tokobot is a puzzle adventure game which revolves around the existence of Tokobots, small robot helpers that have extraordinary power.

The tiny bots have attracted attention from various treasure hunters who want to use them to take over the world; something which our hero, Bolt, wants to prevent from happening.

While small and feeble on their own, Tokobots become much more useful when they fuse together to execute joint actions such as creating ladders, swings and gliders. They can also merge together to create a larger, more powerful robot that can wield a sword or act like a crane.

Gamers will start the adventure with six Tokobots but will have to find more as the puzzles and challenges become more difficult.

Tokobot will be released for PSP in March

Tokobot is already for sale at Lik Sang (and its region free like all PSP Games) for $39 or £22 with free worldwide shipping, more info here --> http://www.yesasia.com/?/info.php?pro...5&lsaid=219793 ...

Nintendo UK has today announced that 1 million units of its Nintendo DS handheld console are in the hands of gamers across the country. The announcement is just another highlight in a long line of successes throughout 2005 where the Nintendo DS has led the handheld market not only in the UK but across the globe. Many stores across the UK are continuing to report they are sold out of Nintendo DS until new stock arrives in the coming week.

Following Nintendo DS's launch in Europe in March 2005, almost three and a half million Nintendo DS units have been sold. Worldwide sales have shown a similar pattern with millions of people turning to Nintendo for their portable gaming. Approximately 13 million* Nintendo DS were in the hands of people all around the world by the end of December 2005, leaving any competition standing.

UK sales of the Nintendo DS have been significantly bolstered by the launch of ground breaking games such as Nintendogs, which has sold over 1.6 million copies in Europe since launch in October and Mario Kart DS which stormed the Christmas charts selling 800,000 copies in Europe since its late November launch.

UK gamers have a lot to look forward to in 2006, including Animal Crossing: Wild World which has been a huge success in Japan having already sold over one million copies and is launching soon in the UK.

The Nintendo DS is available for around £89. Mario Kart DS and Nintendogs are now available for around £30 and both games are also available in bundle packs (including a copy of the game and a Nintendo DS), available for around £99.

Click onto www.nintendo-europe-media.com for all of the most up to date official information on Nintendo.

*Combined sell-thru numbers in Japan, North America, Latin America, Australia and other territories. ...

Nintendo's DS continues to hold the lion's share of the top ten in Japan's software charts this week, with seven titles for the hugely popular handheld in the ranking - but hardware supply shortages are still stunting sales of the console itself.

With the incredibly busy New Years sales period drawing to a close - this week's sales were less than half as strong as last week's - the latest Brain Training title, More DS Training for Adults: Work Your Brain, is still at number one.

It is followed in the ranking by last year's best-selling game in Japan, Animal Crossing: Wild World, whild the original DS Training for Adults: Work Your Brain is at number three in the chart, and Mario Kart DS is at number four.

Three more DS titles - namely Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time, Gentle Brain Exercises, and Bandai's Tamagotchi Connection - occupy positions eight, nine and ten respectively in this week's chart.

There's only one new release in the ranking, Sony Computer Entertainment's anime-based mech-strategy-cum-dating PS2 game, Gunparade Orchestra: White Chapter, which sold around 36,000 units to come in at number five this week.

Rounding out the top ten are one more PS2 title - Square Enix' hugely successful Kingdom Hearts II, enjoying yet another week in the charts with a number seven placing - and a single PSP title, Capcom's Monster Hunster Portable, at number six.

However, in hardware terms, the PSP was the best-selling console of the week in Japan for a second consecutive week, selling almost 58,000 to the DS' 54,000 unit sales, a reflection of Nintendo's ongoing stock problems with the DS.

In the first two weeks of this year the PSP has sold over 190,000 units, compared to just shy of 146,000 for the DS - a massive decline for the persistently out-of-stock DS, which sold around 1.3 million units in the last three weeks of December alone.

Nintendo has made no comment on the stock situation since apologising to retailers and consumers almost two weeks ago, but told GamesIndustry.biz last week that claims that the low levels of stock are partially due to plans to introduce a redesigned DS console in the coming weeks were "pure speculation." ...

Next Generation is running down the reasons why the Nintendo DS is so popular in Japan, by analyzing an article on the subject from Famitsu. From the article: "In any department store in Japan, there are DS demo stations. Usually the screens are scratched to high hell (I can't imagine what people are DOING with the stylus), and lately, there are a lot of games to choose from. On the launch day of Xbox 360, I recall seeing a line eight persons deep to play Super Mario Kart DS, and not one person even looking at the 360. This was in Shibuya Tsutaya, statistically the most foot-trafficked game retailer in all of Japan." ...

Via GameSetWatch, an editorial on the site Firing Squad suggesting that Nintendo is poised for a gaming industry coup. Their unique controller and appeal to casual gamers, the author posits, will turn the status quo on its head. From the article: "The cheapness of the console will help it sell and it's unlikely that Nintendo will face production shortages since it won't use exotic and difficult-to-make components. With a large installed owner base, more developers will be inclined to take a shot at it, publishers will feel pressured to release key titles (like Madden) for the Revolution regardless of their past GameCube experience. The controller is standard enough to work for most titles - so Xbox and PlayStation games will most likely work on the Revolution without major trouble, yet that same controller offers unique features that will be difficult to replicate for Microsoft's and Sony's consoles. ...

Game Collector has posted a review of the newly released game Ys The Arc of Napishtim, heres more info on the game:



In the latest game in the series that originated in 1987, players assume the role of Adol Christian and embark on a rich adventure set on a deserted island. This time Nihon Falcom changed for a 3D action-RPG featuring stunning magical skills and a rebuilt gameplay.

Buy at Lik Sang

Heres an excerpt from the review:

I got this game nice and early this morning and I played through up to the first boss. First of all I have to say that what I read about there being no voice was correct Come on Konami, how hard would it have been to keep the voices intact!?! Pretty sad when games like Tales of Eternia, GTA and Comic Party Portable exist with their full voice. Anyway, I guess it doesn't bother me TOO much as I have not played the PS2 version and I have only played this on the PC up till now. Another silly thing Konami did was keep the save points, a very bad thing to have in a portable game.

The graphics are great, they look just like the PC version and there has been no slowdown or anything so far and the music is identical. There is no cheat mode in the menu and the only difficulty available at the begining is Normal.

Check out the rest of the review here --> http://www.dcemu.co.uk/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=17409 ...

TyRaNiD posted this news:

I've just commited a working PSP ELF packer to subversion (under svn://svn.pspdev.org/psp/psppacker), it is based in part on the version John _K did a while back but improved somewhat, plus it has a nice simple PC tool to pack you executables. It also works with both normal ELFs (even pre-built applications) and PRX files.

For all the lazy windows 'tards out there I have cross compiled a version for windows using mingw, it is available in the www.pspdev.org psp tools section.

Enjoy and post any feedback/bugs etc. here.

Oh and you need to update your pspsdk, again, to build it ;P

This release is for Developers only. ...

Percival has released the first homebrew game thats only for v2.01/v2.5/v2.6 PSP Consoles, heres the details:

The goal of Penguin Scramble is to survive as long as possible. Don't touch the ice at the roof or the bottom!

BETA NOTES:
===========
Penguin Scramble is still beta. The following are known problems:
-highscore
-sometimes the cave is impossible to go through
TODO:
-highscore :-)
-good looking menus
-hazards
-more features

Installation:
=============
To install, Place the proper savegame folder (ULUS10041S5 for US or ULES00151S5 for UK) on your Memory Stick. Boot up GTA and load this savegame file.

Controls:
=========

At title screen:
Press any button to start the game

During the game:
L - speed down
R - speed up
Start - pause
Select - quit

Screenshot and download via comments. ...

DJing and Bemani fans listen up!

From the Korean game maker Pentavision comes a special PSP™ version of the web-based and mobile music mixing game DJ Max. The game resembles Konami's popular beatmania series: You take the position as DJ and are challenged to hit the correct button(s) on your PSP™ handheld at the right time to complete the song.

As expected from a music game, most parts are completely in English and make DJ Max easy to understand and to pick up for persons without any Korean knowledge. With more than 50 tracks to choose from (including K-Pop, Techno, Breakbeat, Hip Hop, Rock and other popular genres), every music game fan will find a tune of his taste. Lyrics of all songs are included in the game's manual as bonus.

Prior song selection, you will have several options available, such as speed & fader adjustment, mirror mode selection and more. After completion of a song, you will receive a summary of your performance, including a combo & break counter, rating and score.

Your achievements are saved into a Ranking Chart. Additionally, you can unlock new tracks and items in the Gallery Mode.

Depending on the difficulty level, DJ Max can be played in either 4 button (left, up, triangle, circle) or 6 button mode (left, up, right, square, triangle, circle). You can further manually increase the speed with the L/R buttons.

DJ Max contains a number of game modes and extras as listed up below. Be warned that rookies might have their difficulties in the beginning; DJ Max's difficulty level is adjusted to experienced gamers.

Portable Game Mode


Rookie DJing: Easy difficulty 4 button mode. 10 tracks are selectable from the start.
Pro DJing: Normal difficulty 6 button mode. 11 tracks are selectable from the start.
Club DJing: Expert difficulty 4/6 button mode. Select a music theme and unlock new genres.
Unlimited Mixing Stage: Choose from 40 tracks from the start in either 4 or 6 button mode.
Gallery: Shows your disc collection and a number of images and videos once you have completed parts of the game.
Ranking Chart: Your high scores are saved here.
Options: Adjust settings such as Gear Display (left/center/right), Sound (speaker/earphone), Control Settings & Save Settings
OST

All 58 tracks that are included on the Collector's Edition double disc soundtrack album are also stored on the UMD. The player includes useful functions, such as random and repeat play. Ideal to chill out and listen to DJ Max Portable's sound on the go.

M/V Clips

Select from 39 music videos to play back from the start. Here you can sit back and relax and watch DJ Max's music videos without being challenged as DJ at the same time.

DJ Max Portable is now available as regular edition and Limited Collector's package, suitable to play on any PSP™ console from any region. ...