31 mai 2009

15:27

“PSP Go box design lends more credibility to slim PS3 rumors”

Note the similar font, horizontal band, and general placement of device specs like memory capacity.

Well, there you go.

On the PSP Go, I was waiting until the official announcement to comment, but then I’m gonna have enough stuff to write about when E3 starts, so here it is: I find it rather ugly, without the tech charm of the original PSP; and you don’t need me to tell you that it’s ridiculous it still only has one analog nub.

 

27 mai 2009

16:05

“Rockstar Announces GTA: The Ballad of Gay Tony”

That’s another GTA IV DLC I’m not gonna want to buy — for a different reason than the bikers one. There’s no way in hell that thing isn’t gonna be insultingly offensive. (As opposed to the good kind of offensive, e.g. South Park in its quality years.)

 

23 mai 2009

02:17

Overlord II

gamevideos.1up.com:80

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I am currently playing and loving Overlord; the sequel seems to be more of the same with even finer graphics and a couple of nice new mechanics, and that works perfectly for me.

I may or may not actually write a review for Overlord, but you should buy it right away — you can find it for quite cheap these days, and it was worth the full price.

 
01:53

Burnout Paradise: Big Surf Island

All of a sudden, Burnout Paradise is a buggy racer? Those guys are the other kind of insane — the good kind.

 
01:44

Heavy Rain

David Cage interview, and new “gameplay” footage — more quick-time events than you could ever imagine. The acting and motion capture aren’t great, facial expressions are awful (weren’t they supposed to be revolutionary?), and “if all four of your characters die you’re encouraged not to restart from a saved game but just accept that’s the way the story unfolded.” This guy is insane. Perfect fit for a Sony exclusive.

 

20 mai 2009

21:42

Need for Speed: Nitro

Le trailer en images de synthèse, sorti plus tôt dans la journée, était assez cool ; ces screenshots montrent le jeu de voitures le plus moche que j’ai vu ces quinze dernières années. Impressionnant — vive la Wii.

 

Enfin une fuite du prochain jeu de la Team Ico ?

kotaku.com

Je ne sais pas quoi penser ; la vidéo me semble bien trop barrée, et trop complexe, pour être un hoax — surtout le dernier tiers, qui donne l’impression d’une vidéo prise avec un caméscope foireux par un papa-YouTube lambda de son gosse qui joue avec son aigle-chihuahua géant dans le living-room du temple abandonné.

Vu que ça doit être un rendu très préliminaire (il y a des problèmes de textures, de modélisation et d’aliasing — ce qui tendrait à prouver que ça sort bien direct d’un moteur de jeu), et que l’une des principales caractéristiques de Shadow of the Colossus était la façon dont il poussait la PS2 au-delà de ses limites (et en-deça d’un framerate régulier), la version finale risque d’impressionner.

Visiblement, le but de cette vidéo est de montrer les animations de la créature, et putain ça fait vrai.

 

19 mai 2009

05:24

“PS3 "Slim" Photos Result In Cease & Desist From Taiwanese Lawyers”

J’ai réalisé en écoutant le Listen Up de la semaine dernière que la police différente du “PS3” était justement le point qui rendait ces supposées fuites plus crédibles : la police Spider-Man était ridicule dès le départ, et Kutaragi n’est plus en position de choisir quoi que ce soit, donc c’est le moment de passer à quelque chose qui ait une tête moderne sans référencer un vieux film passé de mode.

Oui, ce design est moche, mais la PS3 d’origine n’a jamais gagné de prix de beauté. Et on voit un peu la ressemblance avec un croisement de PS3 et de PS2 slim.

 

Terminator: Salvation

gametrailers.com

Je suis très curieux de voir ce jeu tourner. L’univers de Terminator ne se prête a priori pas tellement à un shooter, ou à un jeu d’action quel qu’il soit (vu que les robots sont censés être légèrement indestructibles, si vous vous souvenez un peu du premier film — même si l’action se déroule avant la sortie des modèles les plus aboutis, les robots ne devraient pas être en sucre), mais les graphismes ont l’air assez irréprochables et l’ambiance pourrait être au rendez-vous.

Venant d’un studio qui a sorti à la fois GRAW et Wanted, le résultat pourrait aussi bien être excellent que bien médiocre, et c’est le genre de choses qu’on ne pourra juger que sur pièces.

 

P.S. Ok, peut-être pas.

 
01:56

“The Crossing ‘On Hold’”

We ran into an unexpected financial challenge some months ago and we had to put The Crossing on hold

That’s funny — “unexpected” is the last word that comes to mind to describe their failure to produce their revolutionary “crossplayer” game or find a distributor. (Remember, that’s the one where online gamers are supposed to take the place of your enemies in the single-player game. And grief you. In the single-player game.)

That’s too bad, though, because I’d love to play a game like this that takes place in Paris.

 

16 mai 2009

02:00

“Ian Bogost’s Guru Meditation comes to iPhone”

Remain motionless and your guru score rises, move a muscle and you crash back to the ground and start again. The iPhone [game] requires the player to hold the device in both hands, and uses the mic as well: in this version, you have to remain silent as well as motionless.

I love the idea; haven’t decided yet if I’m willing to pay $0.99 for it.

 

14 mai 2009

02:33

Free Realms

J’avais entendu dire que c’était un peu niais, et pour un MMO gratuit je m’attendais à du niais moche avec des modèles 3D de merde et une interface foireuse — mais c’est joli ! On dirait There, avec une couche de finition en plus, et un business model, et quelque chose à faire dans le jeu. J’en veux ! (Et bien sûr il n’y a pas de version Mac.)

 
02:27

“Microsoft Xbox 360 3D webcam tipped for E3 unveil”

Microsoft’s Xbox 360 webcam could be announced as early as at E3 next month, according to the latest sources talking to the WSJ, using 3D camera technology believed to have been acquired when the company bought start-up 3DV Systems.  3DV developed the ZCam, a 60fps 3D-capable camera that is reportedly low-cost, and which can track a gamers movements and gestures.

I remember when I first read about cameras with depth perception (that was for professional video, using depth instead of a green screen to isolate a subject, and it doesn’t seem to have gotten a market). If Microsoft’s gesture interface uses this, then I might go from meh to nerdgasm.

 

13 mai 2009

16:01

Did they forget to turn the "Xbox Live Gold only" switch off for the Bionic Commando demo?

 

12 mai 2009

14:29

“Users asked to design their own MMO levels make up really easy games”

When City of Heroes released its user-created mission generator, it was mere hours before highly exploitative missions existed. Players quickly found the way to min-max the system, and started making quests that gave huge rewards for little effort. These are by far the most popular missions. [It’s] very hard to find the "fun but not exploitative" missions, because they get rated poorly by users and disappear into the miasma of mediocrity.

This was not what the designers hoped for. Somehow they had convinced themselves that the number of exploiters would be relatively low – certainly not the vast majority of the users.

How quaint. You can be an MMO developer yet remain delusional enough to expect good things from your audience.

 
02:13

Plants vs. Zombies has nice mechanics, but I can't see how having to collect resources manually isn't a fucking drag.

 

7 mai 2009

17:52

Red Dead Redemption

The creators of GTA IV are making the west wild again.

I’m absolutely not interested in westerns (and Rockstar is dead-to-me anyway for not fixing the griefing and quitting issues of GTA IV’s online mode), but what the hell is that title anyway? Is it about commie cowboys?

 
13:37

“Hidden option in Bionic Commando demo”

Capcom has highlighted the fact that there’s a private match option lurking in the Xbox 360-exclusive Bionic Commando multiplayer demo released last week. [It] means you can practice without being killed repeatedly.

Oh, it’s so cute, someone found a bug and Capcom decided it would be announced as a feature. (When they could just have let it morph into messageboard buzz.)

 
13:35

“Project Gotham Racing Devs Explain Last Days With "Corporate, Cocky" Microsoft”

We were getting disillusioned with Microsoft and they were getting corporate and cocky as well because of the shift in power between them and Sony.

 
01:35

Red Steel 2

Visiblement, ils ont tout mis à la poubelle, sauf le titre (et son aura de… euh, succès ?), et ce n’est pas plus mal. Je suis impatient de voir à quel point les graphismes et le gameplay seront loin en-deça de ce que montre cet excellent trailer.

 

6 mai 2009

18:25

“Why Richard Garriott Is Suing NCsoft”

I always thought the way he left was weird; that version is indeed more credible.

 

2 mai 2009

23:22

Lost Planet 2

Looks like someone has decided to go all in with the Shadow of the Colossus inspiration. Shooting at weak points isn’t as fun as stabbing them, and Shadow owed much of its success to an art direction that bears no comparison to Lost Planet, but the Team Ico has taken so long to even hint at their next game that, at this point, anything goes.

 

1 mai 2009

02:07

Flight Control: yeah, right, I'm gonna register with my e-mail address just to post my score to your board.