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Need for Speed: Shift is somewhat of a return to form for the NFS series. Unlike the last few games that had you open-world cruising the city while running from cops in your nitrous-infused, mostly illegal street racer, Shift is all about real racing on actual tracks and stuff. You know, the kind of racing that doesn’t involve any slutty girlfriends. Read more…

Perhaps the best way to begin this review would be to say that games based on a film license, in my mind, can be treated in two ways. The first is to compare the game to the movie — does the plot and overall quality translate into the game well? An example (perhaps the only one) of this would be GoldenEye on the N64- the game was as ridiculously over the top and silly as the film, and retained all of the charm, too. The result was a fantastic game.

GoldenEye was, however, not a great game because of the aspects of the film it borrowed, but because it was a great game first and a movie game second. This brings me to the second way of looking at a movie game (and my preferred angle): to ignore the film completely. A game can be judged on its own merits, and this is precisely what I’ll be doing in my review of the Godfather II.

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BattleForge is a PC game that blends so many genres and games into on big-assed acronym your head will spin.  So get your neck brace ready to find out if the world’s first MMORPGRTSCCG is as awesome as the letters make them sound, or is EA just a genius at figuring out ways to steal your money while you thank them for it. Make like Sam Beckett and hit the jump.

Okay, maybe Sam Beckett didn’t jump so much as leap, but you get the idea.  I would have said Hayden Christensen but you all would have thought it was a Star Wars reference or something.

Enough with explaining the bad jokes…  On with the review!

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 To no surprise, we all knew that it was bound to happen, Electronic Arts officially announces Mass Effect 2 for the Xbox 360 and PC gaming platforms. Read more…

A few days ago we brought you the cover art, now check out the first gameplay footage of the upcoming Fight Night Round 4. The game will hit Xbox 360 and PlayStation in Summer 2009, preceded by demos on their respective systems.

Well, here it is — your first official look at Mass Effect 2. As far as teaser trailers go, it certainly has me excited about the game already, even though (like most teasers) it reveals pretty much nothing. Have a gander at the teaser… now!

No wait… now! Read more…

Left 4 Dead is the kind of game that helps you figure out who your friends really are. Do they run off to pick up that pipe bomb while you get bamboozled by zombies? Do they stray from the group in search of personal glory? Do they accuse you of kill stealing after you just saved their ass? Left 4 Dead helps you sort these things out while also managing to put the “survival” back in “first-person shooter with zombies and a cooperative attempt at survival”. Read more…

Despite what’s been a rough holiday season for Electronic Arts both in terms of sales and company layoffs, EA reassured us today that it remains commited to keeping its two new intellectual properties, Mirror’s Edge and Dead Space, moving ahead. Read more…

Skate It, EA’s Wii version of their popular Skate series, introduces some great ideas and new ways to play a skateboarding game, but doesn’t necessarily succeed in all areas.

Before I get into this review, though, I just want to let y’all know that I wasn’t able to play Skate It with the Wii Balance Board, well, because I don’t own one. Instead, I used the Wii Remote and Nunchuk combo, which I honestly found to be a fun and suitable way to play, but far from being perfect. I’ll get to that later in the review. Read more…

Mirror’s Edge has been one of the most highly anticipated games this season. It takes the tried and true elements of the first-person perspective, mixed with an artistic style and frantic gameplay to make a unique type of game. But is this game worth shelling out the $60? Read more…

Need For Speed Undercover is like a greatest hits album from a band you used to love. They put together all the stuff you remember listening to for hours, and they meld it with the best of the newer stuff that originally turned you off but finally starts to grow on you — you know what I mean. Need For Speed Undercover has the customization of Underground, the gameplay of Most Wanted, and that traditional Need For Speed middle ground that combines simulation and exaggerated physics.

“You’re not good. And you’re not bad.” That simple, even sublime phrase, one that you’ll see over and over (and over and over and over) during loading screens, is really telling of what you’ll come to see during your stay. Read more…

Electronic Arts has apparently teamed up with Brad Borne (of Borne Games) to create a flash version of the just-released Mirror’s Edge. The beta is playable now online, and even though it’s essentially just a repeating level, it’s a nice taste of what the full release may be when it lauches in “a week or two”. Read more…

Facebreaker is a new boxing game from EA sports. Normally when I think of an EA sports game, I think of a game where they strive to get a realistic look and feel. I think of Madden and Fight Night and how the designers try to make the environments and characters as real as possible. The moment I looked at the cover of this game, I knew I was going to get something completely different. Read more…

Pandemic’s sandbox destruction plaything Mercenaries 2 is apparently getting an additional installment (and then some), according to John Riccitiello. The announcement reared its expected head during a post-earnings conference call, in which Riccitiello said:

There will be a Mercenaries 3 and, if I have anything to do with it, there will be a Mercenaries 10.

A bold statement for an otherwise completely unsurprising business strategy, as EA had announced sequels for Dead Space, Battlefield: Bad Company, and Army of Two only four days earlier. Read more…

Economic hardships have officially hit the previously thought to be untouchable games industry, as Electronic Arts has announced that it will lay off 600 of its employees. This comes as an effort to conserve development resources and expand profit margins, as Mariam Sughayer explained to Kotaku.

“All parts of EA have reviewed their team sizes to adjust employee numbers. The goal is to ensure we’re resourced in a way that allows us to continue to grow our revenues while at the same time keeping our costs under control and improving profitability. These changes will be announced to affected staff starting October 30.”

Sughayer continues to cite the economic turmoil that the American, and much of the global economy, has been experiencing as of late. With more gamers keeping their wallets shut, studios have been forced to cut back on expenses to simply survive. Read more…

Game auteur Will Wright attended the Popular Mechanics Breakthrough Awards ceremony in New York, and Jim Reilly of Kotaku was there to ask him what he thought about the controversy surrounding his game. Read more…

Something in this image shows how the Celtics cheated, I’m just not sure what it is.

Electronic Arts has released a demo of NBA Live 09 today. New features like the Pick and Roll Control, Defensive Lockdown Control, Signature Playcalling, and Quickstrike Ankle-Breakers will make the NBA Live experience so much more fun. Read more…

Dave Chappelle once said, “Nobody likes getting their ass beat to a soundtrack.” Dave never played FaceBreaker. EA’s arcade-style boxing game’s soundtrack has been announced, and it’s full of Grateful Dead and Jack Johnson. You know — good, mellow stuff.

OK, I lied. The FaceBreaker soundtrack contains tunes with such auspicious names as “Sucker Punch,” “Knock Me Down,” and “Girl Fight.” How appropriate.

Hit the jump for the full list of songs that make you want to punch your friends in the face. Read more…

PS3 finally gets some exclusive DLC TLC.  Sony has entered into an “exclusive marketing agreement” with Mirror’s Edge publisher and evil overlords Electronic Arts to bring downloadable content to the title via PSN.  How’d they manage that without the exorbitantly deep pockets of Microsoft?

Sony has also gone on record to squelch rumors that Mirror’s Edge would be a timed exclusive, stating that the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC versions would all release on the same day. Read more…

After being nominated as some of the people in videogaming that need to “shut the fuck up“, Cliff Bleszinski and Mark Rein take it to the ring to decide which of the two of them wins the right to shut up more. Using the photo upload tools in EA’s new game Facebreaker, I was able to poorly reconstruct these two mammoths of mutilating machismo and let them do their thing. Video follows. Read more…