I don’t know which captivated my attention first, the trailer, or the tongue-firmly-in-cheek advertisements using negative reviews from comment trolls such as “this game sucks and anyone who likes it sucks. penny arcade sucks and is as funny as something that’s not funny at all,” but I found something absolutely captivating in the marketing for Penny Arcade’s On the Rain Slick Precipice of Darkness: Episode One, and found myself compelled to give it a try.

(more…)

You remember the Prince of Persia games, right? Prince of Persia: “Shadow & Flame”, “Prince of Persia 3D”, “Sands of Time Trilogy”, etc. The Middle Eastern Prince, swords, fighting, saving the princess from the evil Jaffar, traveling through time, etc. Well, in the upcoming version, the Prince gets a facelift and also some nice looking weapons in the new version coming out for PS3 and 360. The art work looks more Middle Eastern than the last version of the game. One of the new artwork for the game can be seen at:Team XBox

~Charlise

Some new details about the monthly Halo comic have been announced at the New York Comic Con. Joe Quesada, editor in chief of Marvel has named Brian Michael Bendis, known for his work on the Marvel Ultimate Universe, as the writer of the upcoming comic, and Alex Maleev, who’s noteworthy works include New Avengers and Daredevil, as the painter. This powerhouse team ensures that the Halo brand will be well represented in comic form.

Via teamxbox

-MIKE KURZ

After choosing the winners of our custom faceplate contest, we didn’t hear back from all of the winners in the allotted time. So, we delayed the announcement until we heard from people who actually want cool prizes.

So congratulations to our 1^st place winner Imadogg, who won a custom painted faceplate and our 2^nd place winner Travace, who won a Fight Club faceplate. For those of you who don’t remember, the contest was open to anyone who commented on posts at WTG. Here were the winning comments (which were randomly selected):

Imadogg Says:
December 15th, 2006 at 9:23 pm

Well I’m obviously commenting here for the first time to try and have a tiny shot at winning a faceplate. My 360 looks dull without one, and it looks like you (Jenni) have amazing talent… I would love to see one of these babies on my 360! Great work on every single one of them

Travace Says:
December 18th, 2006 at 10:37 am

i cant say when or what it will drop too but all i know is considering i have a xbox 360 to keep me entertained ill be waiting for a price drop like this before i even start to think about picking up this system.

So check back to see what faceplate design Imadogg comes up with. And don’t forget to enter our current contest to guess Mike’s favorite game for a $100 Gamestop giftcard.

-JENNI CHASTEEN

As technology advances, video games become more and more immersive. When I sit down to play Gears of War on my HD TV, I’m presented with stunning visuals, 5.1 surround sound that makes it seem as though bullets are whizzing by my head, and I get tactile feedback from my controller. So what’s next? How do we improve on the already immersive experience? With the upcoming ForceWear vest from TN Games. PSU did an interview with Mark Ombrellaro (CEO of TN Games) and found out some interesting facts about the upcoming product:

PSU: The vest is customizable, how so?

Mark: The vest will have options to customize its look. At present, there will be versions geared towards shooter games (black tactical jacket and Camo look) as well as a look for racing (flame suit appearance). There will be accessory products for adding additional contact points to arms, legs, and the head. There will also be the ability to add parts to the jacket to
customize its appearance to tie specifically with game content. At TN Games we feel passionately that players be part of the action

The vest is capable of applying 10lbs of pressure to any of it’s contact points. No price has been announced, but the vest will be available in November. So what do you think? Would you like to feel the bullets hit you? Would you spend extra for the add ons for the arms legs and head? Personally I don’t know if I want to feel the headshots.

-MIKE KURZ

Rumors have been circulating for a couple of days that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game is coming to XBLA. This video seems to lend credibility to these rumors. Here’s the deal: I can neither confirm nor deny these rumors, as I am not on partnernet (hint hint MS). Both the screenshots and the video could be easily faked, so until we get confirmation from an official source, I’m leaving this one in the rumor bin.

-MIKE KURZ

The highly anticipated Crackdown for the Xbox 360 was released last Tuesday, and I’ve had a chance to play through it. Does it live up to the hype? Or is it just another fancy GTA clone? Read on to find out!

(more…)

Luke Smith over at 1up recently sat down with Aaron Greenberg, Group Product Manager for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, and asked him some questions about XBLA. Greenberg had some interesting things to say. For one, he confirmed the release of Alien Homonid for this week. He also admitted that the last few weeks of XBLA hadn’t gone as planned, and went on to say that March would make up for it.

There was one horrible little sentence that I can’t get my head around:

“People shouldn’t expect anything different from Xbox Live Arcade going forward“

To say something like that in the same interview where you acknowledge the fact that you are aware of your customers feedback and complaints is like seeing a friend on fire, and letting them know that you see it happening, but you’ve got no intention of getting them some water. It’s common sense in the business world that if a product is meeting with negative feedback from consumers you need to make changes to said product.

It’s clear that there are problems with XBLA. Greg Canessa (group manager) and Ross Erickson (portfolio manager) have both jumped ship from the XBLA team recently, and seasoned developers like Team17 are frustrated by how many times their games are failing certification. Unhappy customers, employees that feel it’s time to move on, and angry developers are all clear signs of a greater problem.

Read the interview - it’s interesting

-MIKE KURZ

IanJ over at the Something Awful forums had some free time on his hands at work today, and he ended up using it to draw a wide variety of consoles as ducks. Yup, ducks. I have no idea what made him think to do this, but I’m glad he did. Go, click the link, and see if your favorite console or handheld underwent the duckification process.

-MIKE KURZ

Electric bill getting higher and higher? Ever wonder how much electricity you’re using to power your new gen console? Well Hardcoreware.net has the answer. They conducted a test on all three new gen consoles and the results were interesting:

• In video games, both the PS3 and xbox 360 were relatively low compared to a mid-to-high range PC.

• The Wii is amazingly efficient, using no more than 18 Watts in any of our tests (although it really shows in visual quality in games)

• Both consoles are power hogs when it comes to playing movies.

• XBOX 360’s Dashboard console is power-hungry (and slow). PS3’s is slick and uses a lot of power, but no more than playing a DVD.

The findings (as well as the tests themselves) are very interesting. It’s nice to know that the Wii isn’t just affordable to buy, but to power as well.

-MIKE KURZ