Old school laserdisc and arcade game Mad Dog McCree appears to be heading to Wii, if an ESRB rating for a Gunslinger Pack is to be believed.

"This is a first-person shooter featuring live-action scenes instead of traditional animation. Set in the Wild West, the game allows players to engage in gunfights with bandits, rescue innocents, and shoot objects for points. Players use crosshair targeting to fire their gun at various outlaws who yell, flail, and crash through the scenery," says the ESRB.

Word backs chatter from late last month, when GameFly online rental service also listed Mad Dog McCree for the Nintendo Console.

Majesco is rumoured to be the publisher and we're currently trying to find out more.

Mad Dog McCree swaggered into arcades in 1990, and used live-action sequences performed by real stuntmen and actors to captivate light gun, on-rails shooter fans.

The game has sprung up on various formats since, but suffers due to loading times between user input and game reaction. Blu-ray, we hope, can rectify this.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/ma...likely-for-wii ...

Blu-ray release of FF Advent Children, with included FFXIII demo, sees Sony trump opposition
Never doubt the appetite for all things Final Fantasy in Japan – sales of PS3 rocketed last week after the arrival of a playable demo of Square Enix’s Final Fantasy XIII on the Blu-ray release of CGI movie Final Fantasy: Advent Children Complete.
Sales of Sony’s machine hit 62,527, up a massive 274 per cent on the week before. All other consoles, in contrast, saw week-on-week sales decline.
Sony’s PSP was the second best selling machine, with unit sales reaching 40,065 (-2 per cent). Closely behind was the DSi with 38,287 sales – if the 6,438 sales of DS Lite were added then Nintendo’s machine would win the weekly portable hardware battle.
Wii shifted 13,221 units (-1 per cent), the Xbox 360 8,652 units (-14.62 per cent) and the PS2 4,320 units (-7 per cent).

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/34086/JAPA...ales-surge-274 ...

Activision has dished out the Spider-Man and Transformer franchises to two developers it acquired (and kept) from the merger with Vivendi.

According to a report by Variety's usually reliable Cut-Scene blog, the next Transformers game will now be handled by Bourne Identity developer High Moon, while Spider-Man goes to Prototype developer Radical.

The latter's inheritance of Spidey is a no-brainer considering its history of developing open-world games (and they can basically get away with re-skinning Prototype). But Bourne is a bit more of an interesting choice.

According to Cut-Scene the High Moon game is a non-movie tie-in to be released next year. We quite liked Bourne (I did, anyway) and it had some interesting ideas, so we'll be keen to see if High Moon can put out a better Transformers game than the rubbish one we got last time round.

We've left a message with Activision. We'll let you know what it has to say.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com....php?id=213780 ...

Until now the rules surrounding what developers can and can't do with Xbox 360 Achievements has been a bit hazy, especially considering so much has changed since Microsoft's last official guidelines were released in 2007.

Thankfully for those of you losing sleep over it (and we know some of you are), a "credible source" has spilled the beans on Microsoft's Achievement rules to Euro outlet Xbox360Achievements.org. Here they are...


Maximum Additions: 1750 Gamerscore, 80 Achievements
"This explains Halo's mad jump to 1750 late last year, as well as Gears 2, Fable 2 and Fallout 3 passing 1250, and announced jumps for GTA and Saints Row 2. Obviously the old max of 1250 is smashed to bits, though the number is a bit odd. Why not 1500 or 2000? Regardless, we still have one rule-breaker with The Orange Box sitting at 99 achievements.

That will perhaps be the exception to the rule since it was apparently before these 'new' rules were set and since it is such a unique game overall. Valve swears they are going to add new achievements when (or at this point if) they release their Team Fortress 2 update. According to this, they are just talking through their teeth, because it won't be allowed. We'll see how that one plays out."

Maximum Additions Per Quarter: 250 Gamerscore, 10 Achievements

"This is an interesting stipulation, but it does explain some things. My source used Fallout 3 as an example, Bethesda only adding 100 points for each of the first two content packs, then going over 250 with the third pack, since it was a new quarter at that point. It also explains how Fable recently added 13 achievements from one single DLC, having only used up 3 achievements in its first quarter. Finally, Halo jumping straight to 1750 is also explained, since it had been over a year (four quarters) since the game's release when that happened."

Additionally, game developers are not allowed to provide new Achievements for DLC that's free, the site claims. This would explain why Left 4 Dead's just-released add-on pack is completely Gamerscore-free.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com....php?id=213806 ...

Universal Pictures has paused pre-production on the movie adaptation of Take-Two's BioShock, over concerns of an inflated budget.

The Gore Verbinski-directed film was set to begin shooting in Los Angeles when it was stalled as the budget grew to USD 160 million, according to Variety. The studio and director are said to be looking to film at other locations, such as London, in order to cut costs.

"We were asked by Universal to move the film outside the US to take advantage of a tax credit," commented Verbinski. "We are evaluating whether this is something we want to do. In the meantime, the film is in a holding pattern."

Verbinski, of Pirates of the Caribbean fame, was named as BioShock's director last year, while a videogame sequel to the original is in development by 2K Games now.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...ie-put-on-hold ...

Wii Fit has held onto the top of the UK software sales chart for the week ended April 25, holding off debutant Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Athena - the only new entry in the top ten - despite the Nintendo title's sales sliding by 11 per cent in trend repeated across the board.

Atari's Riddick title managed second place on its first week on sale according to data from Chart-Track, but all of the other titles in the top ten saw sales fall significantly.

The Godfather II fell to third, with sales dropping by almost half compared to last week, while FIFA 09 also dropped one place to fourth, as sales fell by a quarter.

Resident Evil 5 held onto its position at number five, despite sales dropping 17 per cent, as did Professor Layton and the Curious Village at six, down 31 per cent, Mario Kart Wii at seven, down 32 per cent, and Wii Play at eight, down 27 per cent.

Meanwhile, Call of Duty: World at War stayed at number nine, with sales dropping by 29 per cent, and Carnival: Funfair Games saw sales slip 25 per cent to close the chart at ten.

The full UK software sales chart follows:

01. Wii Fit
02. The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Athena
03. The Godfather II
04. FIFA 09
05. Resident Evil 5
06. Professor Layton and the Curious Village
07. Mario Kart Wii
08. Wii Play
09. Call of Duty: World at War
10. Carnival: Funfair Games
11. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games
12. Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training
13. Guitar Hero: World Tour
14. My Fitness Coach
15. Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection
16. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
17. Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party
18. Grand Theft Auto IV
19. Ben 10: Alien Force
20. Lego Indiana Jones: Original Adventures

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...gainst-riddick ...

Horror movie director James Gunn has condemned Microsoft's handling of original video content for Xbox Live, describing the platform holder as "the most dreadful, non-talent friendly company".

Gunn wrote and filmed a number of short movies for Microsoft as part of Xbox Live's Horror Goes Comedy series. When signing up to the project he was promised "a lot of freedom", but according to Guun his films soon became subject to conservative content cuts and rejections.

"I still love Xbox gaming, but I think their original content plans are DOA, precisely because of situations like the experience I and some of the other directors had on the Horror Goes Comedy series," Gunn wrote on his blog.

Gunn pointed to Grand Theft Auto IV and downloadable episodes of South Park as proof of the popularity of adult content on the console.

"Microsoft wouldn't let us get close to the extremity of that material, so I don't know how in the world they planned to create their own successful original content," he explained. "People didn't want to see our shows, which were barely a half-step removed from something you'd see on the Disney Channel.

"It's a shame. I really think Xbox could have been its own Network, as well as a gaming console, DVR, and way to buy movies. I saw them as the future."

He concluded: "Because of the small-mindedness of the Microsoft executives, who pre-emptively censored a lot of our scenes for fear of freaking out stockholders, they crushed the potential for something that would have kept them relevant for a long time to come. It seems, instead, the visionaries have landed at other companies."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...lams-xbox-live ...

Konami has decided to pull out of publishing Atomic Games' controversial Six Days in Fallujah game, which had originally been slated for release next year.

The decision comes following a significant public backlash, specifically in the US, led by the families of soldiers who died in the conflict.

"After seeing the reaction to the videogame in the United States and hearing opinions sent through phone calls and email, we decided several days ago not to sell it," a PR representative from Konami told Asahi. "We had intended to convey the reality of the battles to players so that they could feel what it was like to be there."

The game tracked events in November 2004, a month that saw heavy resistance from insurgency fighters against the US occupying force, with over 2000 people killed.

It's not known at this point whether or not Atomic Games will seek an alternative publisher for the title, or whether Konami owns the IP.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...-fallujah-game ...

We've been down this path countless times, but rumors are once again heating up that Apple and Verizon are actively discussing the possibility of creating an iPhone to work on Big Red's airwaves, according to USA Today's infamous "people familiar with the situation." The juicy gossip claims that discussions kicked off a few months ago when Steve was still running the day-to-day show out in Cupertino, but that the conversation has continued in his absence -- and they'd like to get a product on the shelves next year, likely much to AT&T's chagrin. The article claims that this would be a CDMA product, but given that Verizon boss Ivan Seidenberg himself ruled out a CDMA iPhone and opened the door for an LTE one, we're inclined to believe that the carrier would like to see this product help inaugurate the first slivers of its commercial 4G network in 2010. Since AT&T (along with the rest of the world) is moving toward LTE, an LTE-powered iPhone is a forgone conclusion -- it's really just a question of when Apple will make it happen and whether Verizon will be able to seal the deal.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/26/a...for-next-year/ ...