My love affair with Klonoa is absolutely no secret- I played Lunatea’s Veil back in 2002, and have been looking forward to the series’s revival ever since. Of course, when Namco-Bandai announced the new Klonoa last October, I was at a crossroads. Sure, the game is a remake of  the Playstation’s Door to Phantomile, but remakes don’t always work out well. On one hand, Klonoa’s new design is kind of stupid. His new ears make his species even more questionable, and those of you that are fans of the old Klonoa will probably be distraught at his new, shiny look. On the other hand, the cel-shading is still great, and it’s still Klonoa!

Namco-Bandai recently announced that the game had gone gold, and with it, they released a new trailer for the game. Sure, it plays out more like a commercial, with an annoying voiceover and over-excited kids, but the best part is that Klonoa looks exactly the same. With any luck, this game will be absolutely fantastic, and my inevitable review will be positive, but I guess we won’t know until the game comes out. By the way, that happens May 5th, and the game’s a Wii exclusive. Hit the jump for the gallery of screenshots!

12►

Famitsu reports that on April 10th (today) you can enjoy Final Fantasy VII on the PS3 for a small download fee.

It will run you about $15 US, but it is the Final Fantasy VII International edition and is downloadable through the PlayStation Store, which is pretty cool. So for those of you that haven’t played it yet, you might need to get a Playstation Network Japan account. At least you won’t need to change discs.

Source:  Famitsu

To coincide with the newly released anime for Queen’s Blade, a slightly erotic fantasy manga, the company is releasing a fighter RPG game to give fans what they want – more service!

Coming out on April 3rd for the PSP, Queen’s Blade is a unit based game with a 2d side fighter to keep the action more interesting.  There isn’t much info on the battle system other than what is listed simply as “damage.”  As you fight you apparently have choice opportunities to destroy the “armor” of your opponent, but sometimes the “armor” is a maid outfit or some such.

If you do succeed in causing such damage to your enemy, you get a wonderful little fan service screen shot of the character you are fighting.  The RPG element sees your units get stronger as they win matches and don’t get their clothes stripped off.

Famitsu doesn’t show us much, but I am somewhat familiar with this anime and I am willing to bet it gets a lot more risqué than the screenshots at the source.

Don’t expect this one to come state side, so if you’re interested I highly suggest you import it.

Source:  Famitsu

I decided after getting my Japanese stimulus check that I should use it for something good, like video games.  I chose to pick up another new PSP and the games Final Fantasy: Dissidia, and another secret game that I will review at another time.  Dissidia turned out to be more than I thought it was, which was great.  The game looks beautiful, plays pretty well, has a mediocre story, and lots of extras to keep the player interested.

The Basics

Dissidia lets you control one of ten characters from the first ten Final Fantasy games.  Some are main characters and some are not.  There are a couple secret characters as well but I won’t be dropping any hints and ruining it, so if you wanna know who they are, sorry!  As you complete the game you can unlock the ability to play the bad guys that are also a big part of the game.  All in all, though, there are 22 characters to choose from, so it’s a pretty decent selection.

The story is a pretty standard affair.  Good, evil, crystals, and fighting.  There really isn’t too much to say about it, it’s really just there to keep the game rolling instead of moving constantly from fight to fight for no reason.

The Fighting

The battle system in Dissidia is very action orientated.  This is very different from the RPG games that the characters involved in the game are used to, but if you have played Kingdom Hearts or Crisis Core you will pick up on the combat really quick.  Combat can become repetitive if you just feel like winning as opposed to trying different things with your character. 

As you level up you unlock and master abilities.  You can completely change the play style of each character from how they act when you start with them, but it takes so long to get into the interesting abilities, you have already programmed you’re muscle memory to a certain play style so it may make you feel weaker to change it up a lot.

Each character has two modes in battle. One is your regular look which you will see most often.  As you beat on your opponent, though, they lose small crystal flashes or something which you collect to fill your EX gauge.  When that gauge fills, you can go into “EX mode” which is a buffed version of your character with a different outfit (which is usually a lot flashier).  Also, your special attacks get much more interesting in this mode. 

Square really thought about its fans with the EX attack.  Each character has their own cut scene-style special attack — you participate in this attack which reminds me of the limit break attacks.  You either do a combination button press, or a button mash, etc. to try and get a perfect attack.  Those of us that aren’t very good at these sorts of situations, have no fear — there is an ability the characters learn at later levels that does this automatically for you, but as another neat little thing thrown in by Square, until you master the ability, the character can screw up the limit break.

You also get the ability to equip armor and weapons on the characters along with rings that make the character stronger throughout the game.  Something I didn’t like about this was nothing changes on the character when you equip new stuff.  Something I really liked in FF7 and beyond was seeing a new weapon in the characters hands when I upgraded, not a big deal but it would have been nice to see.

The characters to me are very unbalanced.  This is honestly not a con to me.  It just means that I will have an unfair advantage against some characters and others will have an unfair advantage against me.  This may ruin the multiplayer mode for a lot of people, but really that mode isn’t the point of the game or even really focused.  It does make the story mode annoying sometimes when you get stuck on a character that you aren’t good against and they just mash you into the ground for hours at at time.

Some characters are able to easily tear through the game.  Onion Knight, for instance, has moves that really don’t require you to get near the enemy if you don’t feel like it, thus winning every match for you easily.  Characters like Squall and Cloud seem really weakened and are expected to get in rather close to fight their opponents.  Their specials are nice, but working up the combo takes a lot of work.  The characters can level up to 99 which I thought would take a very very long time. Luckily, as you level the stuff the character can do scales up so you are always gaining large amounts of experience for them.  I took Warrior of Light from level 45 to 89 in about two hours on a lazy Saturday.

Graphics, Music, and Other

The graphics are superb in this game.  Models look a little sharp and jagged but as this is a PSP game, this is to be expected.  Otherwise the game has very well done cut-scenes and character design in general is rather pretty.  The music is all songs taken from the games and some wonderful vocal tracks for important boss battles.  Honestly, though, if I have to hear that choir sing about Sephiroth one more time I’ll probably smash the game.

The main point of the game, it seems, is to play until you unlock everything.  One of the first things you do when you start the game is tell it what day you will play the most often and how often in general you will play.  This will help you get through the game faster and help you unlock more items in the catalog.

The PP catalog is where you unlock all of the goodies that come with the game after you finish the story mode.  You can unlock all the “evil” characters to play with them in quick battles, unlock items for the calendar, unlock icons to decorate your multiplayer card, etc.  There is a ton of things to unlock, and of course after you unlock a bunch of different things, you unlock the ability to unlock more stuff, so you need to play the game more to pay for the rest of the stuff.

All in all this is a really good game.  It is a bit repetitive, though.  You fight the same battles over and over for ten stories with five chapters each.  I think the average amount of fights per “chapter” is around five so that is 25 fights a story, at 10 basic stories that is 250 fights.  Those ten stories, though, aren’t the end of the game, and you have a few more modes to go through to clear all the fights.  To even begin to unlock everything, you better be ready to play well more than 1000 matches.

On the Ripten scale I give this an 8.  It’s easy to pick up and play whenever, and you get a lot of fan appreciation.  It can get boring, but it is just a fighting game, the only reason there is a story seems only to force you into taking a break every few minutes.

The 2.70 update for the PS3 is now available, and includes a host of new features. The update features in-game text chat for up to 16 people at one time, and allows three text chat boxes per PS3, for use with the wireless keypad, the on-screen keyboard, or any keyboard peripheral you might have that works.

Finally, Sony. Sending single message after single message to my friends when trying to set up a game with them was tedious and stupid. See the rest of the new features after the jump (and a demo from Eric Lempel).

Friends list on the XMB (XrossMediaBar)

* Sort your friends via their online status
* Attach larger files to the messages you send to your friends (file size will increase from 1MB to 3MB)

Video delivery service on PlayStation Store

* Video files you’ve purchased from the PlayStation Store can be backed up to an external storage device and then restored to PS3’s internal hard drive for playback – so you can clear up space on your hard drive and then restore the video anytime in the future
* Videos you’ve purchased for PSP (PlayStation Portable) system can now be transferred to PS3 for playback

One of Capcom’s best selling games of all time, Monster Hunter, is having its fifth anniversary party this May, and Capcom knows how to show respect for a game tha’s sold millions of copies on the PSP alone.

Set the date people!  May 6th, Tokyo; be there or be square.  That is the date for the 5th anniversary party of the Monster Hunter series.  After recently releasing the number of copies sold, Capcom wishes to show it’s respect to the title, and its fans.  The venue looks to be big just like last year.  There will be a music, wining, and dining.

I presume the music will comprise of the Monster Hunter soundtrack performed by a local orchestra: you can see pictures of their previous concert at Famitsu.

The food is the selling point for me.  Almost all dishes and drinks at the event are styled after food and drink found in game.  From Hot Meat to those wonderful health potions that keep your hunter alive.

Tickets for the event go on sale tomorrow at 10am and range in price from around 78 US dollars to 58.  Time is going be a factor, as I wouldn’t expect tickets to last much longer than the 14th.  I would love to go but I don’t see myself making it.  If you are going to be in Tokyo and have a way to get a ticket tomorrow.  I suggest you do so.

It also seems they are going to be showing off some Monster Hunter Tri(3) stuff as well, but the food people the food!

Source:  Famitsu

Great news, Sony fans. According to Kaz Hirai, President and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment America*, Sony is officially leading the console market with the PS3, disregarding silly things like sales numbers and market share.

So how exactly is Sony “officially” leading? In an interview found in the latest issue of Official PlayStation Magazine, Kaz Hirai made the following statement:

“This is not meant in terms of numbers, or who’s got the biggest install base, or who’s selling most in any particular week or month, but I’d like to think that we continue official leadership in this industry.”

Okay… barring all of that, how do you discount the massive success of the Wii?

“It’s difficult to talk about Nintendo, because we don’t look at their console as being a competitor. They’re a different world, and we operate in our world – that’s the kind of way I look at things.”

And what about Microsoft? Are they not a competitor either?

“With the Xbox – again, I can’t come up with one word to fit. You need a word that describes something that lacks longevity.”

What? So basically, Kaz Hirai feels that Sony is leading the gaming industry because the consoles that are beating it don’t count. I suppose he’s right if you follow that logic (which fanboys always do), but I still think he’s a bit delusional. I guess we can’t expect the fanboys (not regular “fans”, you guys are alright) to live in the real world if the PlayStation boss doesn’t, so I blame Kaz for all this Internet hate and douchebaggery.

Oh, guess what else? I am the father of Jessica Alba’s baby. That paternity test saying I’m not? Doesn’t count. We totally had lots of sex and stuff.

*UPDATE: His official title (according to playstation.com) is President and Group Chief Operating Officer of Sony Computer Entertainment. My B, but even kotaku finds these titles confusing.

Famitsu has some news on the re-release of FFVII:AC in March.  Square has decided to release three versions of what is called the Complete Works of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children. So, what’s that mean exactly?

New stuff will include hi-res pictures of the upcoming Final Fantasy games (XIII, Agito, and Versus), a trailer, and deleted scenes from the movies.  One of the more important scene modifications that I am interested in is apparently a much longer bike chase than what we saw in the original.  I thought it was a really interesting fight, and hopefully adding extra to it won’t make it boring.

The three versions being released are regular DVD, Blu-Ray, and PlayStation 3 (which will supposedly have a demo of FFXIII on it, though I don’t know why that’s not just on the Blu-Ray).  All three should look wonderful, but I wouldn’t mind getting my hand on that sweet-looking Blu-Ray version (I don’t own a PS3).

Source: Famitsu

Consumer trade show CES is currently underway, and after a relatively muted Sony conference accentuated by an amusing Tom Hanks and a thrusting Usher, we have a few PlayStation statistics to share with you.

Kaz Hirai has revealed that there are currently 17 million active PlayStation Network accounts, matching Microsoft’s recently announced Xbox Live numbers.  Of those, 2.1 million accounts were added in December.  Moreover, 330 million pieces of content have been downloaded from the PlayStation Store.

3.4 million people have downloaded the PlayStation HomeOpen Beta, and in less than one month, Sony has made a staggering $1 million on the sale of goods within the service.

Oh and what about Sony’s LittleBigPlanet? It has reportedly sold 1.3 million copies worldwide, with 300,000 levels created by gamers.  It’d take you two years to get through all of them, so you’d better get started.

It seems right that Sony would give Capcom a dedicated storefront on their network. After all, Capcom has been doing the most creative things with the downloadable market with ventures like Bionic Commando Rearmed and Mega Man 9. And Sony has been the most expiremental with downloadable distribution by virtue of having PSN play home to WipEout HD, Burnout Paradise, and more.

The marriage will be official come November 13, 2008.

All of Capcom’s released downloadable titles will be found in one compact convenient space. If you haven’t supported Capcom’s download titles, it’s not only in your best interest to do so, but the industry’s too. Is single-handedly dooming Capcom a burden you’re willing to handle?

Okay, so maybe that was a bit faux-dramatic but seriously, buy some stuff. Jerk.

The recent additions of Team Sneaking and Headshot Only modes to Metal Gear Online is just the beginning, since the first of the expected expansion packs is only a few days away. Let’s talk about what’s included, how it indicates some promising MGO evolution and why maybe the price (if it can’t be free) isn’t as bad as it could be.

Originally, Metal Gear Online was possibly going to be a separate game. Thankfully, Kojima Productions wisely gave everyone who purchased MGS4 a good taste of the basics that MGO had to offer in the form of the starter pack—touting coming expansions packs that would add lots more content for those wanting it.

Information on the first of these expansion packs, entitled GENE, has been posted by Konami. As they previously discussed, they look to be hitting all categories with this expansion by adding new characters, maps, a play mode, new customizability and an extra character slot.

Maps

Coppertown Conflict/City of Sorrow: Brown Town? YES! While I can’t be sure, this map almost surely looks like the reappearance of Brown Town from MGO: Subsistence, one of my favorite maps from that game. Hopefully it will find its own personality in the new MGO, as Midtown Maelstrom does hark back to its design with a wide-open street on one edge and more intimate alleyways on the other. I think there’s absolutely room for both.

Tomb of Tubes/Underground Waterway: Reminiscent of the underground Groznyj Grad sewers Snake escapes through in Snake Eater, Tomb of Tubes appears a darker, more intimate indoor affair.

Virtuous Vista/South American Power Station: Adapted from Snake’s latest adventure (MGS4), specifically the South American jungle of Act II. I get a Svyatogornyj East vibe from this one, though likely larger, which would be fantastic.

Characters

One of the things I missed most about MGO: Subsistence was the unique characters leading each squad and the fun, variety and tactics this brought to the game.

I had hoped unique characters might return and it looks like Kojima Productions had the same thing in mind.

Meryl Silverburgh: Meryl’s skills revolve around her role as a team leader.

Enemies she attacks and enemies that attack her will be displayed through SOP (perhaps something akin to Monomania and Narc at level 3).

Allies near her will regain Psyche faster, though as far as I know there’s no way to regain Psyche in MGO so perhaps she will enable this within certain proximity.

She can wake teammates quicker than usual and excels at handgun use (probably Handgun+ at level 3).

Whether or not she’ll be able to use the Desert Eagle, as she carries in MGS4, by default or by choice I’m curious to see.

Johnny (Akiba): Like Meryl, Johnny’s abilities seem tied to his in-game MGS4 persona. He’s an expert at traps.

He can see all traps in a stage and can disarm them in a special way, by pressing triangle, to turn them into items.

While he may be equipped with some special weapons or skills at using traps too, he may be less easily used given that I don’t see many trap users out there in MGO. It’s a shame because I not only had some great fun, but also success, when playing around with the likes of C4 and sleep gas mines. Most hosts sadly turn off many of the weapons.

It’s also possible that Johnny is meant as a weaker character, in-line with at least his early-game persona in MGS4 and his appearance as Johnny Sasaki in all the other MGS games. This would make him similar to Sokolov in Subsistence, who was controlled by the worst scoring player on his squad and who only had a weaker version of the optical camo to aid him.

Konami has added a note that these characters are not freely selectable, meaning that they should function similarly to the “leader” characters in Subsistence. Konami claims they’ll be assigned randomly, which would be a change, as previously the special characters were controlled by the best or worst scoring player on a given squad. To give more people a chance to play as these guys, randomizing it sounds like a good idea.

A similar change was made when deciding who becomes the next Snake in sneaking mode. No longer does the soldier who killed Snake take over his role, alleviating at least some competition within teams.

Customizability

The expansion adds the ability to create female soldiers, and with it adds a new character slot so that you can create and save a second character without having to purchase the atrocious extra character slot add-on for $7.99USD (includes 3 character slots.) You only really need one character I suppose, but still…

The total number of characters you can buy slots for now is apparently eight, if you want to waste money.

New items for your character will also be available in the Reward Shop for purchase with Reward Points.

Survival Mode and Reward Shop

I’m really curious about Survival Mode, but details are scarce. Presumably it revolves around staying alive and will probably be another fairly unique mode, very welcome in MGO. Reward Points can be earned in Survival that can be spent on items in the Reward Shop to further customize your characters. These items can be used in modes other than Survival as well.

Could Survival be a single player or perhaps cooperative experience as opposed to team vs. team? It’s an interesting possibility. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Release Date

You won’t have to wait long though as the Metal Gear Online GENE Expansion will be available for download on July 17, 2008. It will be available through the MGO shop, which probably elicits a groan throughout the world, as Konami has insisted on using their own proprietary online system for their games as opposed to the PlayStation Store.

Not easy to use through the PS3 itself, the MGO Shop is simply a barebones webpage. While only the overpriced character slot and codec pack add-on have been available up until now, the expansion should be its first real test. If possible, try accessing the store via PC and making your purchase that way. I admit though that I do not even know exactly how that works and you may still be required to access the shop to at least start the download on your PS3.

Price

Priced at 9.99EUR for Europe, there has been no revelation yet for North Americans even days ahead of release. That figure is likely to translate directly to $9.99USD, or so I’d hope. If that will be the price, then all I can think is that it could be worse. With three extra character slot running $7.99USD on the MGO Shop, I worried how much an expansion might run if it included stuff that was actually worth getting.

$10 is certainly more reasonable than $15 or $20, but it’s probably the highest price I would consider acceptable. Given the price I paid for MGS4 already and the reliance on Konami’s servers to enjoy MGO, it still gives me pause for thought. Map packs tend to run around $5. There’s more here and it’s interesting content, but Survival mode is still a mystery and with more expansions on the way, the cost of the “full” experience could get pricey.

While I’m not privy to all the intricacies of the industry’s business model, look at what Criterion is doing with Burnout Paradise. There’s a precedent for this stuff to be free, and MGS4 is a full retail game. Clearly a huge amount of work went into it, but are they nickel and diming us with the online portion?

It’s impossible to say, since we don’t know what else the future will bring. I don’t know how many hosts out there will be using the expansion, but Konami is raising the danger that the already niche MGO userbase will be splintered. Of course prices could come down or expansions could be bundled, but the price already seems to be adding up.

Maybe it’s not fair to expect this kind of stuff for free, but as a big Metal Gear Online fan this is giving me pause for thought. And that’s something Konami should be concerned about.

Other companies are releasing impressive add-on content for free, so take notice Konami. It’s in your interest to keep the community strong.

Sources: Konami, Strategy Informer

Several electronics manufacturing companies have allegedly exploited the people of the African country of Congo in order to get a rare mineral used in electronic manufacturing.  Chief among the accused is Sony, whose PlayStation 2 console helped drive the demand for the rare mineral so high that the people started killing each other.

Anyone see that movie Blood Diamond? This is pretty much exactly like that except it’s not diamonds and Leonardo DiCaprio isn’t there. The mineral in question is called coltan, which is refined into tantalum powder.  The powder is then used in the manufacturing process for laptops, cell phones, and of course, the PlayStation consoles.  The humanitarian website Toward Freedom accuses Sony as being the major force driving the demand for coltan so high, skyrocketing the value from $49 per pound to $275 per pound. David Barouski, a researcher and journalist from Wisconsin, had the following to say:

“SONY’s PlayStation 2 launch (spring of 2000) was a big part of the huge increase in demand for coltan that began in early 1999. SONY and other companies like it, have the benefit of plausible deniability because the coltan ore trades hands so many times from when it is mined to when SONY gets a processed product, that a company often has no idea where the original coltan ore came from, and frankly don’t care to know. But statistical analysis shows it to be nearly inconceivable that SONY made all its PlayStations without using Congolese coltan.”

Satoshi Fukuoka, a spokesperson for Sony Japan, told Toward Freedom that they still use the coltan-based tantalum in many of their products, but that they go through steps to ensure it is not illegally mined from the Congo. What steps? They simply ask their suppliers and trust their answers.

“The material suppliers source their original material from multiple mines in various countries. It is therefore hard for us to know what the supply chain mix is. I am happy to state to you that to the best of our knowledge, (SONY) is not using the material about which you have expressed concern.”

That’s encouraging…

A UN panel of experts investigated the situation and concluded that it’s pretty much too late at this point, as most of the coltan has already made its way into electronic devices.

Source: Toward Freedom via GamePolitics

While the Playstation was once home to all the greatest Japanese RPGs, the Xbox 360 has recently been stealing some of that star power.

Microsoft held an RPG conference in Japan today where Square-Enix announced Star Ocean 4 for the Xbox 360.

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

Subtitled “The Last Hope”, the game is a prequel, taking place hundreds of years before the first Star Ocean. The game will also contain more science fiction elements this time around, feature a brand new battle system, and the ability to travel across different planets.

Star Ocean: The Last Hope is scheduled to arrive in 2009 for the Xbox 360. A PS3 version has yet to be confirmed, but is expected to be announced for the console.

Sources: StarOceanLastHope.com, Gamersyde

Yes, I’m British. I spell “rumour” with two u’s. What U going to do about it? Well hopefully you’ll have no time to do anything, because either you’ll be embedded in Snake’s final mission on the Playstation 3, or engrossed in one of Snake’s first on the Xbox 360.

Yes, with knowledge comes…well, snappy Ripten headings, and this time it could read; “Metal Gear Solid Coming to the Xbox 360.” At least, not in the form you might expect. As we all know MGS4 couldn’t possibly fit on a measley DVD, but Metal Gear Solid 1 might fit into 350mb (though even that’s questionable.)

Indeedy do, MGS may be following its tactical steps onto the Japan PSN Store by infiltrating Xbox Live Arcade. This is not too surprising, since the series has made its way onto non-Playstation consoles a number of times, and Microsoft even published MGS for the PC release.

I expect you’re asking how we know, or who our source is. Lets just say a reliable individual tapped into our codec frequency after spying the game on a certain pre-release network. We shall say no more – nudge nudge, wink wink – except this; there are problems in bringing Kojima’s masterpiece to this new playing field.

Naturally, rumours can turn out to be false, so we’ll bring you more information as it becomes available.

*Update* – Some have responded rather violently to this story, so I must mention a few words of solace. This was posted as rumour, not fact. Nor is the rumour itself any challenge to PlayStation fans. I am not talking of Metal Gear Solid 4 being ported to the Xbox 360, but a 10 year old classic that has found its way onto a number of platforms, with Microsoft themselves publishing the PC conversion.

Of course, it’s hard to understand how MGS1 could fit into 350mb due to the lengthy dialogue, but it wouldn’t be surprising for Microsoft to make an exception.

I originally withheld our evidence due to possible difficulties, but after the response I will spell it out. MGS was spied by our contact on PartnerNet, the developers-only Xbox Live network used to beta-test unreleased downloadable Xbox 360 games.

Moreover, we’ve reported on rumours in the past and have mostly been proved correct. One notable example was our article on MGS4 using a 50GB Blu-ray, which was subsequently sourced around the web and on the infamous Neogaf forums. The news was finally confirmed by Ryan Payton in the following week’s Kojima Productions Report.

Of course rumours may offend you, for which this story is not of interest, but if they do interest you, we’re pretty confident in our sources this time.

After a long sleep, Sony’s mysterious game Afrika made an appearance on the interwebs last week through the Japanese PlayStation website. Sadly Japan is where the game might stay.

That’s right, according to SCEE, they won’t be publishing Afrika in Europe.  Why?  The Brits, for example, might feel the need to shoot Elephants for ivory trinkets, poach lions for rugs, or murder antelopes to display on their wall.  And I’m afraid that’s not what the game entails.

Afrika sees you wandering around shooting animals with a camera – whether by foot, car, or air balloon – and might not be what Europeans are after.  How the game progresses, we’re not entirely sure, but this new trailer gives you a better idea of how it may play out.

After the unveiling of the game, people always asked me “Did you actually go to Africa?” We actually went to Africa for our research. I think if we didn’t see it with our own eyes and actually experience it, we could not truly express the beauty, as well as lacking the reality when we present it to people.

I only understood this after I went, but Africa was so much more than I expected. Instead of just “Some place on earth that I’ve never seen before”, it was more like an impact of feeling time-slip into “Ancient Earth”. It was the same for the zebras, gnus, giraffes and lions, it felt like even a dinosaur was going to pop out at any given moment.

The emotional affections experienced by the staff when we were in Africa has been incorporated into many different parts of the game. It’ll mean a lot to me if after playing the game, people will feel “this actually makes me want to go to Africa.”

It’s surprising that SCEE made such a flippant statement about the game not coming to Europe. After all, it’s been a staple at Sony’s press events since 2005.  Even Phil Harrison was vocal about Afrika’s place in the PS3 library:

Video games have a function in life, and that is: wish fulfillment. You can become a mercenary, a fighter pilot. On PS3, we can expand the realm of that experience. Afrika allows you to experience a very interesting part of the world, a safari in the plains of Afrika. The gameplay is entirely non-violent. You don’t kill the animals. It emphasizes the positives rather than the negatives.

Is Phil Harrison’s departure the reason for SCEE’s move?  Are Sony trying to close their pockets on games that don’t have huge profits predicted?  Harrison was also excited about Eight Days and The Getaway, so it’s dubitable he would have let them slide either.

“Rarr, where are you Phil?”

Moreover, it was my understanding Harrison wanted to release Home in a “bare bones” form, whereas Kaz Hirai wants the project to be feature complete upon release.  The effects of Harrison’s departure may have been greater than we thought.

Afrika releases in Japan on August 28th.  You can visit Afrika’s webpage here.

12►

If you need something to tide you over before the June 29 release of Guitar Hero: Aerosmith, this might be the ticket. Activision has announced that five song packs will be released throughout this month. Starting on yesterday, two of the five packs are from Motörhead and three headline acts from the 2007 Isle of Wight festival.

The Motörhead pack contains “We Are the Road Crew,” “Stay Clean” and the self-titled “Motörhead.” The Isle of Wight pack features master recordings of Kasabian’s “Shoot the Runner”, Kaiser Chief’s “I Predict a Riot”, and The Sex Pistols’ live rendition of “Problems”.

Both track packs are now available on Xbox LIVE Marketplace and the PlayStation Store.

After reporting on the native rendering resolution of the Haze demo, some questioned my reasoning that the final game would sport the same resolution. This is despite there seldom being an example of a game’s resolution differing from its demo. In visiting Free Radical’s studio near Nottingham, creative lead Derek Littlewood confirmed our suspicions.

When I mentioned our story, Derek told me that the final game does indeed render at 1024by576, contrary to what is said by Ubisoft on the Playstation Blog; “From some other comments I read, I wanted to clarify that the game runs at 720p resolution.” Of course, Haze will output at 720p since the Playstation 3 can upscale, but this is not reflective of the game’s native resolution. Derek exclusively told us why they made the decision to render at a lower than HD resolution:

We prioritise a nice smooth framerate over a different res. Personally, I don’t really buy the whole thing. People did the same with Call of Duty, they did the same with Halo, and they say with those games ‘It’s not running at true HD!’ And it’s like, I don’t care. If the game looks good and it runs smoothly, those are the important things to me.

In asking whether the resolution was decided towards the end of development, Derek replied:

Yes. Well, as you develop an engine you’re aiming for a certain thing, but as all the pieces slot into place, you end up realising what sort of resolution you can run it at and that’s where we ended up with for Haze.

If you were to move forward with our next games, then as we optimise the engine we might be going, ‘Oh yeah, we’ll step things up and change things.’ But then different games we work on might have different requirements, so things may change there again. It’s all about how you use the resources you’ve got. But I don’t understand why people care whether there’s 20 pixels, 50 pixels, or 100 pixels more…

Naturally, I said that it’s not only a 100 pixel difference. 720p is over 300,000 pixels more than 576p:

Well, I always say, judge it [Haze] by the whole experience. Sit down with it and enjoy it. If people come away from that saying ‘Yeah, the resolution was a bit lower than I was expecting’ then I hope people wouldn’t, because it has other things it does really well.

For even more Haze goodness, our friends at PS3Attitude are holding a Haze week, starting tomorrow.

EA has confirmed that the follow-up to SKATE is currently in development for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. No release date has been set at this time.

In addition to being praised for its environments and soundtrack, SKATE featured an innovative control scheme; using the thumbsticks the player could not only move around, but could launch grabs, perform manuals, accomplish flip tricks, and every other move possible. Hopefully the sequel will bring even more new features to the table.

Nintendo will also be seeing a version of SKATE on their platform in the form of SKATE It, which will utilise Wii Fit’s balance board.

Source: MCV.UK

Although Guerilla Game’s love child has been delayed until 2009, most likely to avoid big name titles like Resistance 2 and Gears of War 2, SCEE’s Playstation day brought us the rare treat of real Killzone 2 gameplay footage. 

First off, how about a spangley new trailer?

What we really want is a full run through of the playable demo, and so we can share Jeuxvideo’s off-screen footage with you here.

If you want to gawk at some 720p gameplay footage, Gamersyde will fulfil your needs at this link.

Fear not European’s, Sony is bringing the Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots Playstation 3 bundle to Europe on June 12th.

The bundle will include a copy of the game, the Playstation 3 itself, a Sixaxis controller and cost €439.99.

The main point of contention is that a Sixaxis is included rather than the new DualShock 3. Sony claims this is “one of the most exciting bundles to date”, though I personally think it’s rather lacklustre.

Hopefully alternative MGS4 bundles will be announced down the line, which will include the DualShock3.

Even though I’m dying to get a limited edition gunmetal PS3, no rumble, no sale.

Source:  Kotaku

More Playstation Day goodies come crashing in from Evolution Studios.  In-game screenshots of the newly subtitled Motorstorm Pacific Rift.  No CGI here!

Sporting interactive vegetation, destructible environments, Monster Trucks, and water to cool down your vehicles engine, this racer’s sure to make a storm later this year.

123►

Echochrome is one of the most interesting puzzle games to come out for some time. Both due to its amazing sense of style and insane level of difficulty.  Although each version of the monochrome puzzler (it’s on both the PS3 and PSP) sports 56 unique levels, Sony has announced more is on the way.  The best part? They will be free.

The game will periodically (Sony has not confirmed how often as of yet) prompt the player to download new content, which will consist of a batch of new levels.  Since the game allows you to create your own levels, the developers have decided to pick the best of the best and make them available to all. Unfortunately, downloaded levels will only be playable until the new batch of content arrives.

While the time restriction is unfortunate, it’s still great to see echochrome being supported with fresh, new, and free content.  Let’s just hope there’s plenty of time to finish the levels before the next batch arrives.  No word on when the updates will begin, but we’ll keep you informed.

Source: PlayStation Blog

1234►

We have the first off-screen capture of Resistance 2 gameplay from Sony’s Playstation Day.  The shot shows off the new Redwood Forest level.

More images are of course to come, and official ones at that.  But this off-screen capture of one of the multiplayer levels shows off Insomniac’s Work In Progress.

No it’s not clear, but we’ll update the article with new images as soon as we can.

Playstation Day. Tomorrow. London.  Be there or be round.  Sadly we weren’t invited, but much of the top tier European press will be getting a lucky look at Playstation’s exclusive 2008 titles.  Resistance 2 is confirmed, and the slight promise of a new Killzone 2 demo should make tomorrow a day to remember.

The potential was always there for a storm, with Sony’s new worldwide president Kaz Hirai flying into the capital to give a keynote speech.  Appearances of Playstation Home, Play TV and even LittleBigPlanet are expected, but further surprises might be waiting. 

Insomniac have confirmed the first playable demo of Resistance 2, but only excited press previews and screenshots will exit closed doors.  The first gameplay footage will have to wait until June 13th. However, everything appears to be set for Resistance 2 to impress tomorrow, as expressed by Insomniac’s James Stevenson on Neogaf:

We are off to dinner, but rehearsals went well, Resistance 2 is up and running on its three kiosks and we had a nice game going with the boys in Burbank.

It’s Insomniac’s podcast host who also lifts the curtains on a possible Killzone 2 showing.  In response to a pessimistic neogaffer who said Killzone 2 won’t make an appearance tomorrow, James Stevenson simply says:

Wrong.

Consider us intrigued. So what do we get out of all this?  Well, tomorrow will see an early European Playstation Store update, with a HAZE demo at top billing.  That’s not all.  Two more demo’s, The Bourne Conspiracy and Race Driver: GRid, will take their place on the store this Thursday, along with footage from tomorrow’s event. Interest rising…

*Update* - Here’s the list of content to be shown at Sony’s Playstation day held in London’s O2 venue (the failed Millennium Dome to you and me):

Music:
* Guitar Hero 3
* SingStar PS3 Vol. 2
* SingStar Summer Party
* Dancing Stage Supernova 2
* Movement

Film and Art:
* Blu-ray / BD Live – Sphe
* Lego Batman
* Wall-E
* Kung Fu Panda
* Ghostbusters
* Siren: Blood Curse
* Photo Application
* Movement
* Sponsorships – FWIC Video

Travel:
* Go! Explore
* PlayTV – PSP
* Buzz!: The Master Quiz
* Everybody’s Golf 2
* Secret Agent Clank
* Echochrome
* Crisis Core
* Space Invaders Extreme

Sports:
* MotorStorm Pacific Rift
* Everybody’s Golf: World Tour
* GT5 Prologue
* Euro 2008
* Beijing Olympics
* High Velocity Bowling
* WipEout HD

Friends and Family:
* Buzz!: Quiz TV
* Buzz!: Master Quiz
* EyeToy: Pom Pom Party
* EyeToy: Heroes
* PlayTV
* Echochrome
* Go! Messenger / Skype
* Buzz! Junior Jungle Party
* Elefunk
* PixelJunk Eden
* PlayStation Network
* Folding@Home

Creation:
* LittleBigPlanet
* My SingStar Online
* PlayStation Eye

Intense Action:
* Killzone 2
* Mirror’s Edge
* Super Stardust HD Team

Clan:
* Resistance 2
* SOCOM Confrontation
* Haze
* Warhawk Operation: Broken Mirror
* PlayStation Home

Source: Eurogamer

It’s fun to compare consoles, especially when the comparison involves one of the biggest games of this generation. Grand Theft Auto IV has been littered with websites giving their opinions on which version looks best. Surprisingly, most had no inkling of each version’s native resolution.

Eurogamer are the first to speculate that GTA IV on the PS3 runs at 630p. When in fact, it doesn’t… It runs at 640p.

Yes, GTA IV on the PS3 is sub-HD. And if it couldn’t be any more ironic (the traditionally Playstation series runs at a lower resolution) it has the same resolution as Halo 3 on the Xbox 360 – perhaps the first game to receive the sub-HD back-lash.

The man who spilt the news? The now infamous Quaz51 of Beyond3d technical forums. PS3 GTA IV runs at 640p with 0xAA, in comparison to the Xbox 360 version at 720p with 2xAA.

Eurogamer, who base almost all their multi-platform comparisons on Quaz51’s findings, were using opinions from B3D’s technical wizard before he had received a reliable PS3 screenshot. In receipt of a high-res shot, Quaz51 had this to say:

Good news [...] it’s 1152×640p (and no AA) exactly like Halo 3, Perfect Dark [Zero] or Dark Sector PS3.

The resolution itself is unsurprising, but the side by side comparisons carried out by numerous websites tell a more complex story. For example, in IGN’s head to head, the PS3’s Anti-Aliasing is cited as being the better of the two versions, even though the Xbox 360 has 2xAA. This could be due to the upscaling and post-processing effects smoothing the edges on the PS3.

In their review, IGN continues to state that due to the PS3’s mandatory install there is less loading and less pop-in than on the Xbox 360:

For those wanting to know which version looks better, the edge goes to the PS3. The textures and framerate are comparable, but the PS3 has far less pop-in. The 360 has richer colors, but the PS3 has better anti-aliasing making it look a little cleaner. Because GTA IV can preload onto the PS3 hard drive, the in-game loads are faster. Don’t worry Xbox owners, the load times are rarely more than 30 seconds and don’t occur very often.

In another nod to differences between the two versions, EGM mentions that the “PS3 version looks slightly more vibrant and sharp.” You’d think the Xbox 360’s higher resolution would facilitate the sharper look.

Native resolution, thus, appears to have less of an impact than we might have first thought. At least, you are more likely to notice indirect differences, than the lower resolution itself. For example, upscaling on the PS3 appears to have some positive graphical results, which may explain why some websites say it looks better. Eurogamer’s Rich Leadbetter hypothesises:

It’s worth noting that due to the post-processing effects the game employs (there’s a serious amount of stuff being done to the raw frame), the PS3’s lower resolution serves to mask a lot of the nasty after effects.

For example, look at the dithering on the signs in the background on those shots. A bit ugly on Xbox 360, but smoothed and blurred away on PS3, presenting a generally nicer look.

In the end, what really matters is that both versions run extremely well and at an almost locked framerate. There are certainly differences on paper, but many will find it difficult to notice them in the game:

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

Which version of GTA IV should you buy? Due to the game’s impressive multiplayer – buy the version where your friends reside, because you could potentially spend hundreds of hours duking it out online.

Over this past weekend a video detailing a Playstation 3 fan test made its way onto the internetz. The test runs through the fan speeds, ending in a rocket boost to blow out as much dust as possible.  Sadly, it only works on the 40GB model, so many were still left with a trusty can of compressed air, or hoover.

In an act to save all the 60GB plebs, a kid shows us how to achieve the same results.  The method he demonstrates is not going to free your PS3 of dust; it’s going to kill it like a baby goat to the slaughter house.

The first test consisted of a combination of button presses that would automatically carry out the test.  This is clearly an official test installed by Sony for its technicians to carry out and so it’s not advised that you do the same yourself. At least, don’t do it weekly.

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

The next “test” sought to appease non-40GB owners.   However, it isn’t an official test, nor is it a “fan test” at all.  What is demonstrated in the following video is similar to putting your hand down a dieter’s throat to make them cough up the fat. Warning: Do the following and open yourself up to ridicule.

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

It’s worrying that the demonstrator appears to think this is an actual fan test – that somehow the PS3 has a magic level installed to detect when it’s upside-down. The fan is not meant to work upside-down, nor should the vents be obstructed. So, in reality, hot air continues to circulate through the system and the fans attempt to compensate – going all the way up to its highest speeds to desperately cool down.  In effect, you’re suffocating your console.

When this kid says “You may even get a warning that your PS3 is overheating, even though it’s not,” he’s lying.  That’s exactly what it’s doing – it’s overheating and the fan is compensating.

Here’s another chap telling us to do the same thing, this time conciously covering the vent with his hand and exclaiming that “it’s not bad for it at all” and your PS3 will be “quicker” once the dust is gone:

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

Here at Ripten, we have another tip for you. If you want the insides of your PS3 to be sparkling clean, turn it on inside a sauna.

If you’ve had your head in the sand, or something far worse, for the last year or so, then the words LittleBigPlanet may not mean a thing to you. If this is true, then maybe I can explain and get you excited about it reaching the Alpha stage of development.

2008 will be the year that Media Molecule release their game, LittleBigPlanet. At it’s heart, it’s a platform game that will go a long way in spinning that very old genre on it’s head. Exclusive to the Playstation 3, LittleBigPlanet will let players build their own playable levels with the aid of their in-game character, affectionately know as “Sackboy.” They can then share these levels with other PS3 owners, and even complete them co-operatively with 3 other players.

Allowing players the freedom of creativity, LittleBigPlanet looks to be a game with almost ultimate re-playability, and in essence shares something in common with another likely September release, EA’s editor driven game, Spore. O.K., the release date of LittleBigPlanet may not be official yet, but the hinted date of September looks to be in Media Molecule’s sights. Their most recent official blog update tells us that LittleBigPlanet is nearing the Alpha stage of development:

We’ve been slaving away pushing LittleBigPlanet toward the Alpha stage of its development cycle. Basically this means all the cool stuff we said will be in there should be playable, even if it isn’t pretty enough to release.

The game seems to change every day at the moment and it is very exciting to be able to sit down and play what feels more and more like a complete experience.

With Beta testing the next step from Alpha, there couldn’t be a better time to sign up to Sony’s Beta Trial Programme. You never know, you may just get the chance to play one of the most exciting PS3 titles of 2008 before it’s released.

Source: MM Blog

According to clues found by a prestigious PS3 owner, we may all see Home v1.00 available in time for the Playstation Store redesign.  Although this is pure speculation, the new store does require a new firmware update.

On the topic of firmware updates, Sony are yelling from the rooftops of the impending PSP update that will bring its firmware version up to a nice v3.95. Instructions for how to download Home after the break.

Weighing in at a hefty 200MB, the reported v1.00 of the much anticipated Playstation Home user interface is available for download, once certain tweaks have been made. The version number sounds final and the ability to grab it now adds to the possibility of an open release very soon.

Full credit for the discovery goes to xtianoPL and credit for instructions goes to Sword of War, both at the PS3News.com forum.  This is how you download Home:

First, download each of these files to your computer:

http://select.ww.home.playstation.ne…uct-select.xml
http://select.ww.home.playstation.ne…try-select.xml
http://pkg.ww.home.playstation.net/h…00000001-E.pkg

Open each .xml file with notepad and change all the “off words to “on”…then save it.

(Right click then and click save target as and dont change the file name when you save it….make sure you put it on your desktop so its easy to get to!)

Now download and install PS3 Proxy, PS3 ProxyServer Installer, or PS3 ProxyServer Installer (ENGLISH).

Once you start the PS3 Proxy program (find it in the program files folder if there is not a shortcut to it) select the box that says PS3 mode, and in the ip box put 192.168.1.96 and click start.

Now go to the Replace Files tab and click on the add button 3 times so you have 3 lines. On each line there [are] 2 boxes. Put the original link for each file in the left box, and put the link to the file on your computer in the right side box.

Now restart the PS3 and if everything is correct you will see an icon to install HOME Beta.

Enjoy.

Of course, it won’t be “playable” until the service goes live, but at least you’ll get a head start on all the fools who’ll have to download it when it goes live, right? Right! If you attempt launching it, it will crash like this:

 [There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

In regards to PSP firmware v3.95, Sony are calling it a “quick update” and one that will be “available shortly”, and they weren’t joking:

* While playing PSone games on your PSP, you can now customize how the buttons are assigned by going to [Controller Settings] > [Assign Buttons] and select [Custom].

* You can now quit Remote Play and choose to turn off your PS3 or leave it on after quitting. This is useful if you are performing a download and want to quit Remote Play, but still want your download to continue on the PS3. Select [Quit and Turn Off the PS3 System] or [Quit Without Turning Off the PS3 System] from [Quit Remote Play] when you press the HOME button on the PSP system.

But any update, is a positive update. Although, I’m sure PS3 owners are hungry for their firmware update that will include Playstation Home and the oft-promised in-game XMB…

Source PS3News.com and Playstation.Blog

It’s hard to put exclusivity disputes to rest. What’s worrying is that there are disputes – anger and seriousness over the possibility of losing a game to the “competition.” There’s been buzz around Metal Gear Solid 4, Bioshock, and most certainly HAZE.

Free Radical’s script writer, Rob Yescombe, attempts to put the bickering to rest in this interview we held at Sony’s Playstation 3 Rooms.

What makes HAZE (and to a lesser extent Bioshock) more complicated than MGS4 and Final Fantasy XIII, is that it was originally announced for three platforms. Moreover, the game’s producer turned a presumed Playstation 3 exclusive, Assassin’s Creed, into a multiplatform game. Ubisoft don’t appear to be the exclusive type.

This begs the question, why did Free Radical choose Ubisoft as their producer this time around rather than Sony, or the previous Codemasters? Rob Yescombe had this to say of their decision:

Well their pedigree for shooters is pretty good. I mean, they’ve got a good gambit of things under their belt. And part of the pleasure of being an independent studio is you don’t have to work with the same guy every time.

It’s not that we’ve had problems with any other publishers, it’s just that in order for us to remain…er…vigilant in the market that we occupy, it’s important to know what it’s like working with various people. Ubisoft have been bloody great, I mean they’ve put us here [Playstation 3 Rooms, London.] This is nice.

Still, as a result of Ubisoft’s indecisiveness over console exclusives, there has been a continuous cycle of reports saying Haze is no longer exclusive, to it being a timed exclusive, and then to exclusive again. So what is the truth of the matter? I asked Rob whether HAZE really is Playstation 3 exclusive?

Why does everybody keep asking that? It’s a Playstation 3 exclusive. Buy a Playstation 3 and play it. I want it to be the reason people buy a Playstation 3.

That’s all well and good, but will this really put the rumours to rest? Couldn’t it just come out on another platform further down the line?

We’re a Playstation 3 exclusive. If by some magical wave of the wand that happens, I won’t be complaining. But we’re a Playstation 3 exclusive.

Rob has certainly put things into perspective. Like any good business decision, I presume it’ll all depend on the game’s sales on the Playstation 3. Still, as obvious as this sounds, people will still be talking about whether HAZE really is Playstation 3 exclusive. In reply to the sentiment that everyone is talking about HAZE’s exclusivity, Rob muses:

I find it so confusing that some people are so offended at the idea that it will be format exclusive. But it’s like people get angry about it. What are you angry about?

Indeed, what are people angry about? I expect most are annoyed by the conflicting reports from both news sites and Ubisoft/Free Radical themselves. It would help to know who’s decided on the gam’es exclusivity. Perhaps it wasn’t Ubisoft’s decision, but Free Radical’s choice to concentrate on one platform?

No, it’s not our decision.. It’s a publisher decision. And it’s not like this bizarre practice of gamers kind of demonising publishers like they’re some evil guy. Ubisoft have helped us out a lot on this game, in terms of being very supportive to the decisions that we wanted to make and to approve it.

They allowed us to delay it. You know people are so furious “Oh god, I pre-ordered this game and it’s delayed.” The fact of the matter is, what we want for people to do is not just to have a knee jerk buy at Christmas. You know, we want people to feel like they spent $50 and it was worth that money. You know, that’s what that delay was about.

In addition to delaying the game, changing focus from three platforms to just the Playstation 3 must have helped the game’s quality also:

Originally it [development] was kind of open ended. The fact of the matter is our pedigree at Free Radicial, when we were doing Timesplitters, all of that started out on Sony hardware. And so those guys have a lot of experience working in that realm.

Starting on any new hardware has its quirks, and Playstation 3 is no different, but it meant that we were able to hit the ground running maybe a little bit faster than some of the other developers that found it a bit tricky.

Hopefully such focus would enable Free Radical to concentrate more on the Playstation 3’s quirks, such as the Cell Processor:

Well, I mean, it’s something that those guys, the technical guys, are very capable of doing.

Even then, Sony’s technical wizards have been relied upon by some developers, especially before the arrival of improved Playstation 3 tools. So have Free Radical had any support from Sony’s techies?

Well to be honest with you, we haven’t really needed that kind of tech support. I mean, they’re willing and able to provide it, but we just haven’t run into that problem.

Which is pleasing to hear, since this is one game where the framerate won’t falter. Expect a locked 30fps on release. We all hope that this little interview has put HAZE’s exclusivity into context and will potentially put the bickering to rest. Then again, we’ll only be able to guess at why Ubisoft made this decision.

For more information on Haze please follow this link, or have a gander of our gallery. Stand by for our incoming hands-on preview.

Geoff Keighley of Gametrailers promised “something special” from Insomniac and Sony in this Friday’s GT:TV episode, along with a number of other exclusives (Star Wars: The Force Unleashed being the stand-out.) Many hoped it would be the first trailer of Resistance 2, and those hopes have not been dashed.

A Resistance 2 teaser trailer is on its way this Friday, as confirmed in the below ad for GT:TV. In it we hope to see the first in-game footage of Insomniac’s upcoming shooter, since this developer rarely releases CG footage.

The trailer reveal adds to the increasing reliability of this leaked release schedule, which penned the Resistance 2 trailer for April 15th – which we’ll re-pen onto the relaunch of the Playstation Store – the 17th.