Via Kotaku

Pikachu is not your friend. Doesn't matter if toy maker Tomy has dubbed this torture device "Tomodachi Pikachu" (Friend Pikachu), the yellow pocket monster is the enemy and must be destroyed. And the 150 plus Pika words this stuffed demon speaks, thereby encouraging small children like my son to repeat over and over again? Hogwash. Those red light-up cheeks are a mere foreshadow to the blinding rage the product will ultimately unleash. That being said, I'll probably buy it for my son's birthday

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Via IGN

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For those totally clueless and/or entirely new to the scene, ChaosZero has returned with some new “noob-friendly” installer packages for the latest 2.71 Special Edition firmware. Although it’s as simple as copying files to the correct location on your memory stick, this method is even easier — you cannot mess this up! Download whichever installer package you desire, connect your PSP to an available USB port, and run the executable. Of course some additional goodies are included with each…

SE-A to SE-B Update
Self explanatory.

SE-B New User Build
Straight install 2.71 SE-B with DevHook (2.71).

SE-B FULL Build:
Upgrade from SE-A to SE-B
Install 2.71 SE-B with DevHook (2.71)
Install 2.71 SE-B with DevHook (1.50) GUI Mod and 2.71 Firmware (In SE-A, this played games 2.71’s DevHook wouldn’t)
Just SE-B, no DevHook
Just DevHook (2.71), no SE-B
Install RECOVERY Folder for downgrading to 1.50.

SE-B LITE Build:
Upgrade from SE-A to SE-B
Install 2.71 SE-B with DevHook (2.71)
Install RECOVERY Folder for downgrading to 1.50.

Notes:
Game menu freezing error:
you MUST have a GAME folder and a GAME150 folder…
Then you can boot Recovery Mode, enter Configuration, Change “Game folder homebrew” to 1.50 kernel and exit.
Only after that you can make a GAME and a GAME271 folder.

Game menu responding slow at times:
Whenever you do an update to the ISO folder (add, delete, change files, first SE-B execution), a little delay will occur when entering in memory stick games. While the ISO folder is not changed, this won’t happen.

Download Links Via Comments ...

Phil Harrison, Sony's president of worldwide studios, has apologised for the severe delay to the launch of PlayStation 3 in Europe, but reckons that the March release can still be a positive thing.

Harrison has also revealed that the decision to hold back Europe's induction into the PS3 club was only made "literally a few days before we made the announcement," suggesting Sony did everything it could to avoid letting us down.

"We are better to do a launch in two markets, rather than do a diluted launch in all three," Harrison states. Sony "couldn't predict the quantities [of a critical component]" and so "did the analysis and had to make the decision to delay Europe".

In an interview with gaming mag PSM3, Harrison explains that with only one language in Japan, and three in the US, it was easier to focus on those areas. Harrison also proclaimed, "I'm really sorry that we had to delay the launch".

Finally, PSM3's grilling brought up a confirmation of Sony's online plans: "As we've said before, it's free. Video chat, voice chat, text chat, web browsing, friend lists - all of that will be free," Harrison stresses, adding that "[Sony's] strategy is to deliver multiplayer gaming free of charge". Although he also mentioned that we may see World of Warcraft-style MMOs that "will require additional fees".

For more from super-tall spokesmouth Phil Harrison, click your way over to PSM3's official blog. Or for the full info-packed interview session pick up issue 81 of PSM3, on sale today for £3.99, which also includes reviews for Canis Canem Edit, Vice City Stories, Splinter Cell Double Agent and Scarface - plus 10 things you've never seen in Lego Star Wars II - and loads more.

Still majorly pissed over the Lik Sang incident - wraggster ...

Many high profile games for Nintendo's soon to be released Wii console will go on sale for less than £30 at the machine's launch, including Far Cry Vengeance, Super Mario Galaxy and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

All three games are on sale for £30 with web retailer ChoicesUK.com, and other big games like Call of Duty 3 are priced at an also-reasonable £33.

The bargains don't stop there, either, with Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, Red Steel, Sonic and the Secret Rings, Super Smash Bros Brawl, Splinter Cell Double Agent and Wario Ware: Smooth Moves also offered with a wallet-friendly £30 price tag.

The full retail price for these titles is quoted as £40 but ChoicesUK aren't the only site to give decent discounts, with Play.com also slashing the cost of many Wii games to £33.

With Wii arriving at a more-than-expected £180, it's great to see that the games - which, although boasting motion-sensitive gaming, can't compete with the visual clout of 'true' next-gen titles - will turn up at an impulse-buy price. ...

Further filling out Xbox 360's ranks of terrorist-clobbering military shooters, the creator of Oblivion will be bringing gun-fest Rogue Warrior to the console next year, reports Official Xbox 360 Magazine.

Hold those 'Counter-Strike meets Oblivion' thoughts, though, because the grunt-work on the game is being done by developer Zombie, not the RPG bods at Bethesda that we know and love. However, there's still a touch of that one-million-hours-of-play spirit in Rogue Warrior's Live multiplayer aspect - its 24-player shootouts can take place in hybrid levels with over 200 possible combinations.

At the start of a match, both teams choose their favourite chunk of level, while a third is picked at random to be plonked in with them in the final environment - so even veteran players won't know quite what they're getting into.

We'll have more on Rogue Warrior when the official media blitz is deployed next week. ...

The uncovering of songs in a game's soundtrack is hardly newsworthy--unless it's for an installment of Guitar Hero. The rock-god simulator from RedOctane and Activision is getting a new incarnation on the PlayStation 2 early next month and the Xbox 360 next year.

Guitar Hero II is already chock-full of rockin' tunes from big-name bands like Danzig, Wolfmother, Van Halen, Rage Against the Machine, and more, but it appears a heap of cultish bands will also be included in the game.

On the Guitar Hero forums, a camera-happy retail employee snapped some pictures of all the songs available for purchase in the in-game store. While there aren't any bands that have mainstream success in the lot, there are several bands that have a devoted following.

The most eyebrow-raising inclusion is the theme song of Trogdor the Burninator--better known as a character from the popular Web comic Homestar Runner. Also on the list is Dethklok (from Adult Swim's Metalocalypse) and Buckethead--best known as the guitar god who plays with an empty bucket of fried chicken on his head.

Artist--Song
The Acro-brats--Laughtrack
All That Remains--Six
The Amazing Royal Crowns--Mr. Fix-It
Anarchy Club--Collide
Bang Camaro--Push Push (Lady Lightning)
Breaking Wheel (formerly known as Artillery)--One For The Road
Brian Kahanek--Gemini
Buckethead--Jordan
Count Zero--Radium Eyes
Dethklok--Thunder Horse
Drist--Arterial Black
Every Time I Die--The New Black
Freezepop--Less Talk More Rokk
Honest Bob and the Factory-to-Dealer Incentives--Soy Bomb
The Last Vegas--Raw Dog
Made in Mexico--Yes We Can
Megasus--Red Lottery
The Neighborhoods--Parasite
Shadows Fall--The Light That Blinds
Strong Bad (of Homestar Runner)--Trogdor
That Handsome Devil--Elephant Bones
Vagiant--FTK
Valient Thorr--Fall of Pangea
Voivod--X-Stream ...

Akitoshi Kawazu took over as producer on Final Fantasy XII in August 2005 after the original producer and director, Yasumi Matsuno, had to leave the project due to health problems. One of the original founders of the hugely successful Final Fantasy RPG series, in 1988 Kawazu moved on to create the SaGa series. He's also currently working as executive producer for the up-coming code-named Final Fantasy Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers for the Nintendo Wii and Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates for the Nintendo DS.

GameSpot sat down for a chat with Kawazu during his whirlwind visit to the UK.

GameSpot: Was it difficult to take over a project partway through?

Akitoshi Kawazu: Yeah, it definitely was difficult. While it's not at all unusual to help out on a number of different projects, to come in at a producer level role and oversee things was definitely something that was hard to do. That having been said, the original directors that were there from the beginning of the game, Ito-san and Minagawa-san, did a great job and since I only had to oversee the general flow of the project, and they were there doing such a wonderful job--that did make my job a lot easier.

GS: Can you take us through the high and the low points of the project?

AK: It's probably something that's true of a lot of projects in general, not just Final Fantasy XII, at the early stages of the project of course everyone's raring to go, and everyone's excited about what they're going to be working on. Then as time passes, you start to fall into a routine and it starts to become more of a daily grind and up until the point where you have an actual playable version of the game that you can see, people's motivation starts to fall off quite a bit.

You can even hear people blame each other, you know it's your fault that we haven't got this done yet, or it's your fault that we haven't got that done yet... But once you actually get that first [playable code] and you can touch it and play it and see the fruits of your labor, then from that point on the motivation really starts to pick back up again, which is really useful in getting through that last push because the very end stages of a game are very difficult. But because you can start playing it and realize that it's actually turning into a good game, that gives you the extra bit of motivation to cross the finish line.

GS: Was there any point where the project seemed like it had just got too much, where you were overwhelmed and worried that you wouldn't be able to finish it?

AK: Certainly, since the project was very long, there were times when just about everyone couldn't really see the end in sight, and so part of my role as producer is to go in there and say well, as long as you work on your area and do the things that we need you to do, then we will be able to finish and see it through to the end.

GS: How did working on Final Fantasy compare to working on SaGa games?

AK: Well, coming in as a producer halfway through, the biggest difference really between FFXII and working on the SaGa titles is as a producer my role is very much to make sure that the project as a whole is going smoothly and everything that needs to be done is getting done. On the SaGa titles, where I was a director, I was much more involved with the game itself, working on the systems of the game and the gameplay and all of those details, but in the producer role I'm really just overseeing the project in general so there are other people there that are working on the game itself.

GS: Do you feel more attached to a project when you are the director?

AK: Certainly as a game creator myself, I'm very interested in seeing my own things show up in the game. But as a producer for FFXII, I was very careful not to let that happen--I didn't want my own likes and dislikes to show up in this game, I was there to make sure that the people making the game were able to get the things that they wanted to see into the game. So, there is that difference.

GS: Is there anything extra in the European version of FFXII?

AK: From a feature perspective the biggest addition to the overseas versions is of course the 16:9 screen support. As for scenes, there was one scene that was added because for ratings issues in Japan we couldn't have the scene there and get the rating that we wanted, and that's been restored for the European and North American versions. And there were also several scenes that were added because we didn't have time to finish them up for the Japanese version, so with the additional time we had during the localization period we were able to add those in.

GS: Can you tell us about the contents of the scene that you originally cut to get a lower rating in Japan?

AK: It's a scene where Penelo, who has been kidnapped by some characters in the game, and at the time right before the Japanese release there were various incidents in the real world which...basically there were some similarities there that would have made it a difficult thing to release at the lower age rating that we wanted.

GS: Why did you make the decision to move away from the turn-based systems of previous ...

In less than a month, the Nintendo Wii will be available across America. However, it now appears that retailers are already setting up retail displays for the next-gen console, which itself won't be available until Sunday, November 19.

According to a series of online reports, the local Target in Lafayette, Louisiana, has already launched displays offering Wii merchandise. Called "endcaps" in retailer parlance, the display offers a variety of accessories for the next-gen console, including colored sleeves for the so-called "Wiimote" controller in red, blue, green, and black. Also on display are booklets for Wii game discs, which will be the same size and shape as regular DVDs, even though the console does not offer DVD playback like the Xbox, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, or PlayStation 3 do. ...