Those "additional boss characters" added to the Western PS3 release of No More Heroes: Heroes' Paradise? "All of the additional bosses in the game are from No More Heroes 2," Konami's Tak Fuji told GameSugar, "making this much more than just the original Wii game." That's welcome news for people experiencing the series for the first time through this PS3 game, as it now encompasses at least a bit of a sequel.

He didn't mention which bosses or how many -- but we can guarantee that whichever bosses are included, whether it's the revenge-obsessed young man who pulls his own head off, the flamethrower-wielding ghost of a murdered child, or the robot filled with cheerleaders, they're going to be weird.

Fuji also indicated that Konami is at least considering a Kinect-enabled release on Xbox 360. "We have, and are still tossing around ideas for linking NMH with the Kinect for Xbox 360 gamers," he said, "but since the Kinect is such a unique device, it's a bit more difficult. This isn't to say that the Kinect is a poor interface by any means, but more that in its uniqueness it requires a bit more care and planning to bring Travis to the Xbox 360. So if we were to do so, we'd need more time." It's worth noting that Heroes' Paradise was released on both Xbox and PS3 in Japan, so there is a 360 version to work with.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/11/11/no...osses-from-no/ ...

Unsatisfied by their stellar performance in Mario Hoops 3-on-3, a number of characters from the Final Fantasy universe will once again show their athletic prowess in Square Enix's Mario Sports Mix. Gaming news site The Bit Block recently compiled a bunch of gameplay clips from the title's official website, featuring the special moves of the White Mage, Black Mage, Cactuar, Moogle and Ninja. The Mario Sports Mix website also references some Dragon Quest cameos -- though none of those appear in the aforementioned reel, which is posted after the jump.

Once again, the Final Fantasy characters appear to be really sportsmanlike about the whole thing. For instance, that Black Mage would have a much easier time of making a three pointer if he took out all his defenders with a well-timed Ultima, yet he takes his knocks like everyone else. Good form, Mr. Black Mage.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/11/11/fi...io-sports-mix/ ...

Speaking at the BMO Capital Markets Annual Digital Entertainment Conference in New York today, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime highlighted the importance of this year's holiday season, and contrasted his company's greater reliance on the end-of-year sales boom over that of competitors.

"The holidays are more important to Nintendo than to other manufacturers," Fils-Aime said. "We have a distinct edge when it comes to gift-giving, and it's no doubt because of the familiarity and recognition of both our brand and key franchises." Nintendo's upcoming software lineup for November and December boasts some famous -- though not distinctly edgy -- brands, including Donkey Kong Country Returns and Disney Epic Mickey, but hardware has historically been the company's best performer during the holiday season. Nintendo sold over five million DS units and five million Wiis in the US through November and December last year, a two-month tally which Fils-Aime said comprised over 40% of Nintendo's annual sales.

Fils-Aime also cited NPD data, which showed that Nintendo had shifted 43.1 million DS systems and 30.4 million Wiis in the US thus far. The holidays are just as crucial for software sales, with Fils-Aime noting that 44 percent of all annual game sales were incurred during the last two months of the year (compared to 33 percent for other manufacturers). Nintendo had the top three best-selling games in December 2009 -- New Super Mario Bros., Wii Fit Plus and Wii Sports Resort -- though it conceded November to Call of Duty. It's likely to do so again this year.

With the introduction of new Mario-themed console bundles and a solid lineup of seemingly evergreen first-party sellers, Nintendo seems adequately prepared before it wades bravely into that throbbing, Black Friday consumer crowd. Perhaps Microsoft is the smart one for courting those same customers from a distance -- of eight feet or so.

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/11/11/ho...itors-says-fi/ ...

We'll get this out of the way right up front: VGChartz won't say where it gets its sales figures and, because of that, they're not to be taken as gospel or treated with much validity on their own. But, comparing one set of the site's numbers to another can be useful in showing trends, and with that caveat firmly in mind let's take a look at Microsoft's Kinect vs. Sony's PlayStation Move. According to the site, Kinect Adventures (bundled in with the camera itself) sold just under 480,000 units in one week after launching on November 4th, while the PlayStation Move sold 200,000 "units" in its first week, which according to VGChartz is not individual pieces of hardware but bundles of hardware tied to a single console. (This contrasts to Sony's figure, which counts each piece of hardware -- nunchuck, wand, and camera -- separately.) So, by these rather early and decidedly unofficial numbers it looks like Microsoft's Kinect investment might just be paying off, though of course it's the long-run that counts in these things.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/11/s...o-have-handil/ ...

Yes indeed, the expected wide availability of Hulu Plus on the PlayStation 3 has just been enacted, allowing any US PlayStation Network member to get streaming with Hulu's premium offering. Until now, you needed to be a paying member of Sony's PlayStation Plus club to qualify, but that requirement has now finally been dropped. Check out our experience with Hulu Plus on the PS3 if you still need help deciding whether the $9.99 TV streaming service is worth your hard-earned greenbacks. Those of us unlucky enough to be living on another continent will just go drown our sorrows with another round of Black Ops mayhem.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/11/h...s-europe-lets/ ...

A Lego Mindstorms robotics kit controlled by an HTC Nexus One smartphone successfully untangled a Rubik's Cube puzzle in 12.5 seconds at this weeks ARM technical conference in Silicon Valley. The current 3x3x3 cube-solvers's 15-second average represents a substantial improvement over the 25-second solutions of an earlier version, which was powered by a circa-2006 Nokia N95 smartphone, thanks to a faster (1GHz) CPU, more RAM, and revamped cube-solving algorithms. ARM Engineer David Gilder, who created the robotic cube-solver, claims the current version's algorithms can handle cube complexities up to 100x100x100, assuming he build the mechanics. In terms of racing humans, Gilder says the Lego robotics kits can only manage around 1.5 moves per second, whereas human players can make between 5 and 6 moves per second, amazingly enough.

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/10/11...In-125-Seconds ...

Microsoft's reboot of its smartphone division seems to have suffered a major setback in its first real test, apparently selling only 40,000 Windows Phone 7 devices on the day of its release in the US - despite an estimated $100 million marketing budget.

That figure is spread across nine different models of smartphone supporting the new OS and architecture, between the two US carriers currently stocking the phone - At&T and T-Mobile.

The figure was reported by business site The Street, which cites its source as a 'market research firm' but does not give details. No international figures are available.

To put that figure into context, Apple claims that 270,000 iPhones are being sold each day, internationally, while Google puts the daily sales for its Android phones at around 200,000.

"It's early in the game," Nielsen telecom analyst Roger Entner told The Street. "Not every product surges right out of the starting blocks. The first Android phone was not a big seller at T-Mobile."

"We'll see what happens with Black Friday sales. They'll probably cut prices like everyone else does. It's the nature of the beast. The only one that doesn't do promotions is Apple."

However, many retailers and twitter users posting with the #WP7 hashtag were reporting sell-outs across the US and in other territories. Microsoft and the US carriers have declined to publish any official sales figures for the phones.

Windows Phone 7 offers customers integrated Xbox Live and Games for Windows Live support - a feature countered by Apple's Game Center feature.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...ndows-7-phones ...

Blitz Games claims to be getting nearly twice as much out of Kinect as everyone else. Those games you see on the shelves today - they're using barely a third of what the new device can do.

"A lot of the games you're seeing are using 20 to 30 per cent of what Kinect's capable of," Blitz Games' Steve Stopps remarked to Eurogamer. "What we're doing is using probably 50 to 60 per cent.

"What most developers are starting to do now is they're realising that under the hood of what Kinect can do there's a whole world of potential we're only really just scratching."

The Kinect Sports and the Kinect Adventures and the Dance Centrals of the world are using Kinect in a very "obvious" way, Stopps declared. Yoostar 2, Blitz' game, adopts an "innovative" approach.

Yoostar 2 takes clips from famous films and puts you in them. For instance, Arnold Schwarzenegger telling the Police clerk "I'll be back": you'll watch the scene once and then Arnie will be cut out you will fill his shoes - Kinect removes you from your living room and places you in the scene in real-time.

This process was only possible on PC because Yoostar 1 shipped with a green screen. The PS3 Move version almost had to ship a green-screen, too - until Stopps and team worked out a clever get-around for the PlayStation Eye.

"You'll see a lot of the games coming out in the first generation aren't using much of the voice recognition technology," Stopps continued. "That will add a whole new layer to what people can do within a game and what people can engage with.

"You'll also find that every single game at the moment is a Kinect only game. There's a whole world of opportunities for games to use both controller and Kinect together to deliver a different experience.

"And the third thing," he added, "is the most important: it's the different design approach required to design a Kinect game. It's not necessarily a functionality that exists, it's designing a game with a Kinect mentality - approaching a game from an utterly different direction. You're trying to think of engaging ways to use the body and voice recognition to create immersive and fun gameplay."

When that potential is unlocked, Stopps is "100 per cent yes" convinced that Kinect can support core game experiences.

"Imagine playing something like Halo or like Call of Duty where you're holding a controller in your hand but if you want to look round a corner you actually move your head and the camera position changes," he dreamed. "Those kind of experiences you can create to blend the best of Kinect and the best of a controller."

Yoostar 2 will be released for Kinect and Move in Q1 2011 - "around 21st February," Stopps said. Johnny Minkley talked to Spock about it.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...cent-of-kinect ...

A Kinect Sports Facebook app that sorts times set in the main Xbox 360 game into online leagues has been released.

Developed by Rare and Nzime, the Kinect Sports Facebook app uses your Xbox Live gamertag to compare your results with those of friends and randoms in Kinect Sports leagues.

You can join a weekly international league, create your own league and watch videos of your performances uploaded from Kinect Sports.

Leagues are automatically updated. Coming soon is the ability to see your complete personal stats and records (event-specific or all-in).

Kinect Sports released on Wednesday alongside Kinect itself. Johnny Minkley awarded it 7/10 for Eurogamer.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...k-app-launched ...