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The Top 5 Things We Learned At E3 2009

donniek — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 16:42:25 +0000

Ethrizzle—the name alone holds godly. Yesterday marked the end of this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo (a.k.a. E3) in L.A., where the biggest monsters of video-gaming come together in L.A. to meet, greet, and sell their wares to the press and each other. We’ve condensed the entire convention into this informative post about what you can expect in the video-game world for the rest of this year and beyond. Between Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo, who had the best E3 showing? What titles are the most promising for the coming year? And what the fuck is a Project Natal? Find out these answers and the other top things we learned at E3 below…

Text by Nick Marroni

5. NINTENDO’S ACTUALLY MAKING SOME GOOD GAMES.
• Busting out with Super Mario Galaxy 2 and the completely new and unexpected Team Ninja collabo of the re-imagined Metroid, NINTENDO finally demonstrated that they still have some love for the O.G. gamers that put them on the map. After a past couple years of very disappointing nonsense like Wii Music and other stuff that not too many real gamers really care about, Nintendo’s shown that they’re still down for the cause and that there’ll be at least a couple good reasons to dust off that Wii—the Wii MotionPlus is none too shabby either and really steps the waggle game up a notch.

4. THE PS3 IS SERIOUS BUSINESS, BUT SONY STILL DOESN’T QUITE GET IT.
• With exclusives Heavy Rain, Uncharted 2, God of War III, and MAG on the way, the PS3 looks to have plenty to distract folks. Still, SONY failed to announce a price drop and the rumored PS3 slim doesn’t appear to exist; unless these things change before holiday madness, this generation’s console war will be all but decided. To make matters worse, the new PSP Go’s two main talking points seem to be (1) at $249.99, it costs about 80 bucks more than the original PSP and (2) people can’t play their old PSP UMD discs on it—go ahead and purchase the extended warranty while you’re at it. Heavy Rain is very, very cool, though, and gamers, people, and penguins everywhere should pay close attention to it when it launches early next year.

3. MICROSOFT IS IN IT TO WIN IT.
• All of the big three had strong showings at E3 this year, but MICROSOFT emerged as the overall winner. With Alan Wake, Halo 3: ODST, Left 4 Dead 2, Mass Effect 2, and former PlayStation exclusive Final Fantasy XIII all dropping within the next year, the 360 is still the cat’s pajamas. The no-delay, instant streaming, full 1080p video service through Xbox Live and the new, beyond state-of-the-art camera-based motion recognition that they’ve got going on (see above) pretty much solidifies Microsoft in the pole position for the current and next gen (if the streaming 1080p actually works as advertised). Microsoft has eliminated the need for a Blu-Ray disc player and one-upped the Wii in its mainstream, motion-recognition appeal—Grandma won’t want to waggle a remote anymore when she can just scan a golf club and get down to business.

2. THE FUTURE IS A BIT CREEPY.
• Along with Microsoft’s camera comes a scary advanced kid named Milo as part of Lionhead Studios head and Fable series developer Peter Molyneux’s new Project Natal (they’re trying to get people to say it Nuh-Tall, but, for real talk’s sake, let’s keep it Nay-Tul, please). Natal and Milo use the new motion recognition camera to simulate the most advanced, ostensibly real world yet seen in the interactive entertainment space (or any other space too, for that matter) and it’s downright creepy and just a bit unsettling to see how effective and immersive the simulation is. When this thing really reaches critical mass, WoW addictions may end up looking downright tame in comparison to the socially deprived children who might end up getting attached to Milo and his other soul-sucking little buddies.

1. THE REAL E3 IS BACK!
• The one thing everyone will agree on about this year’s show is that a big Electronic Entertainment Expo is a fun Electronic Entertainment Expo and that the more the merrier—things still aren’t back to E3’s peak years of the early ’00s and some companies probably wouldn’t have minded a bit more traffic and congestion, but it’s plain to see that this is the way things are supposed to be and the mistakes of the past two years now stand corrected. Especially cool is that surprises were actually left as surprises (though we already knew about the Em/Jay-Z DJ Hero performance) without everyone knowing ahead of time during the press shows exactly what to expect—Final Fantasy XIV pretty much came out of nowhere at the Sony show and the new Castlevania received a loud round of approval. Things should be good to go again for next year and beyond and E3 looks set to stick around. Video games are the business, and business is good.

Daily Style & Design News: February 25, 2009

Bradley — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 17:01:42 +0000

The Nintendo DSi isn’t even out yet in the U.S., and Japan already has LE colorways. Oye. [Crunchgear]

Dior Homme “Blow” Sunglasses. Going absolutely nuts, in an awesome kind of way. [High Snobiety]

Reyes of the graf collective The Seventh Letter just finished a mural for the upcoming Marc Jacobs “Weekend at Steven’s” exhibition at the LV store in San Francisco. Is a bag in the works? [Juxtapoz]

Barack Obama better get shit moving before we destroy ourselves. Fig. A: the Chanel Segway. Holy crap. [Pedestrian]

Moncler Spring. [Marcus Troy]

What is it about living in Asia that allows you to act all wierd with your product design? Surrender Arts x Medicom Be@rbrick. Cool, in a transgender Fridays kind of way (?). [Freshness]

D.I.Y. Mega Man Animation Totally Rocks

treats — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 17:50:35 +0000

After a 12-year break, this year’s WiiWare title Mega Man 9 (a.k.a. Rockman 9) marks the official return of the video game franchise that hit NES in 1987. And if you had any doubts about the dedication of the humanoid robot hero’s fans, you won’t after watching this D.I.Y. tribute video from college student Nicolas Menard.

Using stop-motion animation, Menard re-created a level from the game with simple obstacles like LEGO bricks, cereal boxes and a harmonica. In this photo-trickery game, Mega Man’s must defeat Menard, who plays as “Fork Hand,” a giant fork. Watch the video below to see what we mean…

[TechEBlog]

Punch-Out!! Hits Wii Without Mike Tyson

dscott — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 22:29:23 +0000

When it dropped in the 1980s, we clocked many, many hours on our Nintendo playing Mike Tyson’s Punch Out!!. Iron Mike was the heavyweight champion of the world, and the pixelated classic was the hottest game not featuring a character named Zelda. And although we reluctantly kept rocking with it when they dropped Mike (after his loss to Buster Douglas) and introduced Mr. Dream, we always had a special place for it in our hearts.

So you already know we got amped when we heard that they were working on a updated version of Punch Out!! for the Wii, which will drop at the top of '09. Our hopes are high, and after peeping the new trailer for the game, with its trademark over the top animation, we’re even more excited. Watch it below…

Marisa Miller Will Help You Sell Things

Joe — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 23:12:54 +0000

Who cares what the perfume smells like, with M-squared's endorsement we'll cop for our chick. [Bastardly]

Surprise, surprise…Joe Budden's Padded Room album got pushed back. [Nah Right]

Buy these sneakers…and you'll be a lot cooler. [Daily Drop]

Nintendo might introduce a real life Kirby. [Das Gamer]

This comedian has Denzel, Chris Rock, and Morgan Freeman down pat. [DoubleViking]

Nintoaster Reheats Original NES Console

treats — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 17:16:35 +0000

The Wii might be all the rage these days, but the O.G 8-bit Nintendo system that debuted back in 1985 is still being re-invented. Nintoaster, the latest D.I.Y rendition of the machine that had us all blowing our brains out, was constructed using a simple pop-up toaster.

An industrious engineer named Richard DaLuz (who previously created an all-in-one system with Atari 2600, NES, SNES and Genesis) recently gutted a toaster, inserted an old Nintendo’s parts (controllers, AC adaptor), orange LED lights (for the cooking effect) and made it into a fully functional system. Watch a video of him recreating the process below.

[Stupidfingers via dsgnwok]

Press Your Girl’s Buttons In The Geekini

jerwin — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 20:17:30 +0000

Hey Gamer: the time has come to crawl out of your basement hovel and get your calloused thumbs on these buttons. From the fertile mind of French designer John Nouanesing comes the “Geekini,” a classic two-piece bikini featuring strategically placed A, B and directional buttons from the original Nintendo controller. Okay, it’s a little cheesy, but it beats those shorts with “Juicy” embossed on the ass.

Unfortunately the Geekini strictly a concept piece at the moment, but that’s okay, because you’ll probably need a little time to round up a girl to put in it in. After the jump, see full photos and find out where they put the “Start” and “Select” buttons.

Shaun White Snowboarding Comes To The Wii

treats — Wed, 28 May 2008 22:54:14 +0000

Winter sports are undeniably fun, but sometimes the frigid weather makes us question whether it’s worth making the trek to the top of the mountain. And like most tedious activities, we look to video games to provide the lazy man’s alternative.

It’s been a while since a truly great snowboarding series emerged (we see you, SSX Tricky), but Ubisoft might have next: Shaun White Snowboarding is dropping this winter. Skip that trip to Vale and try to achieve world-wide acclaim in the Olympic Gold Medalist’s signature game. It will also be available for Xbox and PS3, but the Wii version is the most dynamic, using the new Balance Board to simulate the actual deck. See some more screen shots below.

[Kotaku]

V-Sports Is The Poor Man’s Wii

bfred — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 20:40:08 +0000

Even though Nintendo’s Wii is way cheaper than any of the other current generation of consoles, that $300 price tag might still be too steep for some. Well, penny pinchers are in luck, because a Japanese company has been selling a knock-off called V-Sports for only $89. Sure, the gameplay is probably a joke, but the price isn’t the only selling point for the V-Sports. The console is available in white, blue and pink, and it comes with 11 games (in one!) plus a bonus game that features 10 more. It might never go on sale in the U.S., but Wired recently spotted it at some shopping malls in the Akihabara section of Tokyo. After the jump, check out screenshots of all the games and the different colors that V-Sports comes in.

[Click on an image to view full size]

BAPE x Nintendo DS Lite Hits Japan

bfred — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 22:30:59 +0000

We don’t quite get the limited-edition craze in the video game world these days, with all the branded Xbox 360s, PSPs and the like. Assuming you already own one of these consoles, are you really gonna shell out for another just because of a pretty graphic? The novelty has to wear out pretty quick. Unless you’re the type to cop something like this…*shaking head*.

All that said, we briefly suspend our cynicism to big up the new A Bathing Ape x Nintendo DS Lite collab, which officially dropped in Tokyo on April 1. Four reasons: (1) BAPE has been so universally shunned by cool guys that itÃ’s actually almost (almost) cool again. It’s the circle of life. (2) Japan-only. Suckas! (3) We own a DS, and even we would cop this. Shoot, DS could do a double collab with Halliburton and Exxon and we might cop it. DS rules. (4) The design isn’t bad. Sure, the white one looks like a regular DS with stickers on it, but the gold one is top-notch. Good luck on eBay with that one, folks. Check out a few more shots after the jump.

[Click on an image to view full size]

[Wired]

Strong Bad’s Wii Game Is Only For Attractive People

bfred — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 19:38:42 +0000

If you’ve never visited homestarrunner.com, you’re missing out on one of the most consistently funny (and totally bizarre) shows on the internet. The most popular part of the site is when Strong Bad (pictured above in a wig) answers reader emails, which always leads to some sort of hijinks (Click here to watch a classic). Well, now all the characters are coming to a video game called Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People, which will be available for download on Nintendo’s WiiWare service in June. Three different trailers have been released, so check them out after the jump.

TRAILER #1: The Introduction

TRAILER #2: Shows Actual Gameplay

TRAILER #3: Strong Bad’s Wii Safety Message

[Destructoid]

Christina Aguilera Worships Donkey Kong

Joe — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 17:15:29 +0000

Sure Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes may be grooming baby Suri to becoming a polished Scientologist, but genie-in-a-bottle turned milf-of-the-moment Christina Aguilera seems to be focused on bringing up her newborn baby Max with the religious guidance of the Nintendo entourage. It's been reported that this “Last Supper” painting by artist Misha hangs from the wall of the Aguilera nursery. You too can own a piece of the Donkey Kong-Jesus dynasty, the 18×10 inch print is in its 2nd run, limited to 75 pieces, and comes hand signed/numbered by the artist. $75, www.nineteeneightyeight.com

[Kotaku]