Weekly News Roundup: 2/28/2010

Games

When awesomeness like this is involved, I guess it's better late than never.

• The next DLC for Mass Effect 2 will bring back a drivable vehicle, something ME2 was sorely lacking compared to the first game. The vehicle is an all new hover tank thing called the Hammerhead which will be featured in the five missions in the Firewalker pack.

• The PlayStation 3 version of Castle Crashers is still on it's way... sometime this year. Be patient! To help with the wait The Behemoth is adding a volleyball mini-game with huge volleyballs.

• Death Smiles II will be heading to the Xbox 360 on May 27th. Unfortunately, due to Cave's recent announcement of Espgaluda II being the last region-free title, don't expect this to be region-free.

• A new trailer for Transformers: War for Cybertron shows off a little gameplay footage, along with some new screenshots. It certainly looks good, but how will it play? Better than the Revenge of the Fallen game hopefully.

• The better and classier Heavy Rain box art is now available to print off. I hope you have a good printer.

• Capcom has revealed the Lost Planet 2 box art and it looks great. Resident Evil's Albert Wesker is no longer a pre-order bonus character for Lost Planet 2; now he'll be available to everybody. Because of that, GameStop's pre-order bonus will now be two multiplayer maps with underwater combat. LP2 will also have split screen 2-player modes. Remember when split-screen was a normal part of games and not a special feature? I miss those days.

• There will be some sweet new alternate costumes for Super Street Fighter IV, like Fei Long as Kato. Meanwhile, GameStop has a pre-order bonus of Super Thumb Fighters to keep your thumbs. I guess they're kind of neat. Want more SSFIV? Hadoken.net has an interview with Seth Killian all about the game.

• Mega Man 10 has release dates! March 1st for Wii, March 11th for PSN, and March 31st for XBLA.

• In case you were wondering, here's the anatomy of a $60 videogame.

• The Wii version of the Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands will include the SNES version of the original Prince of Persia. Will the PS3 or Xbox 360 versions have a classic game included?

• Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker was originally MGS5. Kojima says that despite the removal of the 5, it's still a MGS5-level game.

• After some delays, Dragon Age: Origins' Return to Ostagar DLC will be available on PlayStation Network on March 11th.

• Videogame nerds have spoken; the Derby inner ring road is now called Lara Croft Way.

- Shawn - 2/28/10

Weekly News Roundup: 2/21/2010

Games

Wow, there's a Street Fighter IV coming out?! I can't wait to read about it!

• EGM will be returning this year, but before it re-arrives on newsstands The Lost Issue will be available online using new ScreenPaper tech. A preview of issue 237 is online now complete with animation and sound and serves as a preview of EGM's digital content. The links don't work yet, but they should be soon. Even though the issue is over a year old and all the news is old news, I can't wait to read it.

• The regular edition of Espgaluda II will be region free, but not the limited edition. Cave didn't have enough time to get the region-free code in before the LE went to press, but at least we can all play the regular version. Unfortunately, Espgaluda II will be the last region free game for a while. Why, Cave? We thought the region-free games were selling well for you.

• Capcom has made it officially official: Ibuki, Makoto, and Dudley are returning in Super Street Fighter IV. Awesome, the three new characters from SFIII that I actually liked. Check out the load of new videos and screenshots showing the trio doing what they do.

• In Resident Evil 5's Lost in Nightmares DLC you can unlock the classic Resident Evil style camera. That's super cool.

• Tech Digest has an interview with Final Fantasy XIII's director Motomu Toriyama and producer Yoshinori Kitase about FFXIII and their views on Mass Effect and Fallout 3. They also address the question of a Final Fantasy VII remake: If it can be done in a year, they will do it. Since a remake would takes years and years to complete, it doesn't look like there will ever be one.

• It looks like Sony has filed a patent for a Universal Controller that would work on every system.

• Soon, PlayStation Home users can have their Home person run around with a Star Wars lightsaber, Stormtrooper armor, or Indiana Jones gear. Why do people keep buying this fake stuff?

- Shawn - 2/21/10

Weekly News Roundup: 2/14/2010

Games

Hard Man was never very good at expressing how he felt without feeling a bit awkward.

• It's Valentine's Day, so enjoy or give someone one of these hilarious Mega Man Valentines, or one of the Street Fighter IV Valentines.

• It's a smorgasbord of new Mega Man 10 weapons. Many of them are pretty similar to weapons in other Mega Man games, but that's okay.

• THQ has revealed what the mysterious code included with DarkSiders is for: a digital art book and a free copy of Red Faction Guerilla. Wow, a free game is very generous.

• There are some new Lost Planet 2 screenshots showing the legendary team-up of Wesker, Marcus, and Dom.

• The Halo: Reach beta begins May 3rd.

• NIS was forced to change the name of Holy Invasion of Privacy Badman! What Did I do to Deserve This? to What Did I do to Deserve This, my Lord? because of a conflicting interest with an existing IP. Gee, I wonder what that existing IP could possibly be. This has also delayed the release of the second game.

• Dead Rising fans will be able to download a Dead Rising 2 prologue on Xbox Live before the game comes out. Dead Rising 2: Case Zero will bridge the gap between DR1 and 2.

• A new female cyborg character called μ-12 is coming to BlazBlue later this Summer, but only in Japan for now.

• The Wii title Dead Space: Extraction and the brand new Dead Space: Planet Cracker could both be heading to PlayStation Network and Xbox Live before Dead Space 2 arrives.

- Shawn - 2/14/10

Weekly News Roundup: 2/7/2010

Games

Nothing but good old-fashioned Sonic action.

• Sega's Project Needlemouse is Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1. Episode 1? Why not just make the whole game at once? At least Sonic is returning to proper form. The game will be downloadable from PSN, Xbox Live, and WiiWare this Summer.

• The debut trailer for Fallout: New Vegas is looking quite different than the wasteland that was Fallout 3.

• Sir Patrick Stewart is addicted to technology like the rest of us. He loves email and the internet, but he has not opened any of his videogames because he's afraid he would be finished.

• The original Xbox Live service will be ending and on April 14th Halo 2 will see its last hoorah. Wow, I didn't even know original Xbox Live was still going.

• New screenshots from The Last Guardian feature more of that adorable griffin-cat-thing.

• You can get the Dr. Pepper Mass Effect 2 DLC without having to drink any delicious Dr. Pepper.

• BioShock 2 will be here soon, so here's the launch trailer.

• Check out this fan-made Final Fight movie trailer. Okay, it's more of a scene than a trailer, but it's pretty cool.

• Mario and Sonic's recent reunion is a bit awkward.

- Shawn - 2/7/10