via Joystiq


Sticking to a solid release schedule, Rampage World Tour busts down buildings and feeds on the innocent today on PSN. The game is $4.99 and supports Rampage's three monster mayhem both online and off. We're starting to run out of announced titles for PSN, so we expect a new list sometime soon.

On a general Rampage note, if there is any series that could use a revamp it's Rampage. It's freakin' monsters busting down buildings and although the game sells itself, it'd be nice to see a new Rampage that doesn't feel identical to the original from the Reagan administration. The Rampage series deserves more than what it's getting. ...

via Nintendo Wii Fanboy


Old school gamers rejoice; vertical shoot-em-up Karous is headed for the Wii. Karous was released a couple of months ago on the Dreamcast and currently stands as the last game released on the system.

We've already talked about how many classic shooters are available on the Virtual Console, so it's nice to see a new release joining the party.
The cel-shaded shooter is hardly a genre classic, but does add something a little different to the Wii's library. Who knows, if sales figures are good, a few other shmups might find their way over. Radiant Silvergun on Wii, anybody? Now we're dreaming ...

There's no release date yet, nor any confirmation of a U.S. release. Keep your itchy trigger fingers crossed. ...

via Nintendo DS Fanboy


The cat is slowly emerging from the bag, it would seem. We knew that Picross DS was in Gamestop's computers as a July release, and now the ESRB has pretty much confirmed it by rating the game.

Just think, this summer we could be filling in squares and making pictures just like they do in Europe. Well, you could be. Availability isn't the issue for us; being able to buy the game isn't going to magically make us less awful at Picross. ...

via Engadget




So it looks like those endless rumors of a newly-spec'ed PlayStation Portable are finally about to come true, with an analyst from Lazard Capital Markets reporting that Sony has in fact copped to just such a device (most definitively NOT pictured above) at its Gamer's Day gathering in San Diego. According to Lazard's Colin Sebastian in a briefing prepared for NPD, "the company also indicated that [in addition to new software titles best left to another fine publication], a video download service and [PSP] hardware refresh are expected later this year." While both tidbits sound like potentially big news, Sony was reluctant to give up any more info on either of these asides -- meaning that you can still let your imagination run wild with magical features before the inevitable letdown. Still, if you've got your credit card in hand and sonystyle.com open in another tab as we speak, it might pay to hold off for a bit and see how this plays out. ...

via Eurogamer


Nintendo is releasing Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest (SNES) and Mario & Yoshi (NES) on Virtual Console this week, and gamers in some European territories can already download them.

Normally we have to wait until Friday to do that, but the games have been sighted in the wild in some places, although they're currently not on the UK Virtual Console pages. "There are various public holidays across Europe today and tomorrow and that's why some have gone up early," Nintendo told us.

Diddy's Kong Quest is the 1995 follow-up to one of Nintendo's biggest Western success stories: Donkey Kong Country. The Rare-developed series was lauded for its impressively-rendered graphics, and wasn't a bad platformer to boot. The second game shifted the focus from Donkey Kong to his little pal Diddy and Diddy's girlfriend Dixie, whose ponytail was good for smacking enemies and grabbing onto things. On the VC it costs 800 Wii points.

Expect a more thorough explanation in tomorrow's Virtual Console Roundup, when we'll also be looking at puzzle game Mario & Yoshi, which will set you back 500 points. ...

via Eurogamer


A financial analysis of EA's bank vaults has let slip that Godfather 2 is in development.

The paper was put together by Nollenberger Capital Partners to help investors make tricky decisions, and was based on going behind the scenes at the publishing giant.

"Interestingly, we learned that EA is leveraging the significant amount of development time and costs that went into The Godfather game," it read. "The open-world engine was built from the ground up for Godfather, and is now being used by five different franchises, including The Simpsons."

"Godfather 2 is also in development currently, though timing is unknown."

Although EA wasn't able to comment on any of this, it shouldn't really come as too much of a surprise, given that executive producer David DeMartini told the BBC last year that it planned to do second and third instalments.

Nothing has been said about platforms or content, but we expect next/current/whatever-you-want-to-call-it generation consoles will be the focus and that the sandbox third-person gameplay will return.

What would you like to see this time around? ...

via Eurogamer


The next game in the Splinter Cell series will be called Conviction, and it will be heading to Xbox 360 and PC at the end of the year.

Details of the fifth Sam Fisher outing were rumoured earlier this month, and it seems Ubisoft has decided not to wait until its Ubidays event to reveal the title.

This time around everything will be different, according to IGN, despite Double Agent's critical success. So the original Ubisoft Montreal team has been called back on board to turn it all on its head.

"[Double Agent] was good, but repetitive over time," Mathieu Ferland, senior producer for the game, told IGN. "After three games we decided to make a big turnaround in the franchise."

Sam Fisher is now a fugitive, pursued by the very government he once served. And to survive he'll need to create an underground network of allies to help him out. But he'll be without all the flashy gizmos he's used to, and will have to rely on using his surroundings and quick thinking over night-vision goggles and remote cameras.

Stealth will still be a key feature, but it's more than simply lurking in darkness. Losing yourself in a crowd and creating distractions will be important, as will using your surroundings as makeshift weapons.

Which all sounds rather similar to Assassin's Creed - the other title in development at Ubisoft Montreal. It seems Sam Fisher will now more closely resemble Jason Bourne than James Bond.

"Improvisation is a concept we wanted to bring to the gamers, as we felt it was one of the strongest shared elements of all spy agents. They have to be able to deal with anything, anytime, anywhere - [but] faster, smarter," Ferland added.

All of which has our appetite truly whetted. Expect more information to crop up soon, as we get ever closer to the looming Ubidays bonanza. ...

via Kotaku


I was surprised to find Manhunt 2, due out July 10, on hand at the week's SCEA events. Pleasantly surprised. While we couldn't actually play the game ourselves, we could watch it be played. It has a neat, scratchy look to it and some interesting effects that I initially thought were graphic glitches. In particular, items you can interact with tend to glow and skitter about nervously, instead of sitting still. That's because, I was told, the main character has some "issues" and that's played out, in part, with these visual tics.

Of course, the main way the character's issues are played out is in the way, the extraordinarily brutal way, he kills people. He can, of course, do standard kills with weapons, but he also has the ability to sneak up behind someone and do a cinematic kill. The brutality of the kill depends on how patiently you can stay behind your victim holding a kill button. The longer you hold the button the more brutal the kill will be when you perform it.

Most of the weapons you can use for these kills have several different kill animations that you can trigger, depending on how long you hold the button. Once you pull off one of these executions the game slips to a cut-scene that shows the kill and then jumps you back into play. It was a little jarring, but the version were were looking at was pretty dated.

The developer on hand said the Wii version looks a bit crisper and that the jump to execution cinematic isn't as clunky. From the brief time I watched the game I'd say that Manhunt 2 will be a worthy purchase, but perhaps not as fun as the original.


Video clip here. leave feedback via comments. ...

via Computer and Video Games


According to the chaps at US Game Informer mag, a remake of Starbreeze studios' excellent Xbox shooter Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay is headed to PS3 and Xbox 360.

Apparently the remake will receive an obligatory graphical boost, along with one additional chapter over the Xbox original.

Considering the cult status of the original this will no-doubt come as fantastic news to anyone who had the pleasure of playing Riddick. It perhaps also explains why it's yet to appear on the Xbox 360's backward compatibility list. ...