More Details About Namco Bandai’s Afro Samurai

High-style action comes to the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system this fall with Afro Samurai® from NAMCO BANDAI Games America Inc. Join Afro in his tale of revenge as he searches for his father’s murderer and the holder of the coveted number one headband. Based on the hit animated series starring and co-produced by Samuel L. Jackson, Afro Samurai blends modern hip hop and technology with traditional Japanese culture into a brutally fresh cinematic experience.“Afro Samurai’s unique mash-up of urban hip hop culture with traditional Japanese aesthetics and innovative combat mechanics provides a fresh new approach to the action adventure genre,” said Todd Thorson, Director of Marketing and Public Relations for NAMCO BANDAI Games America. “Afro Samurai delivers an episodic experience with addictive, immersive and compelling gameplay that’s literally dripping in style.”

Follow Afro Samurai as he fights to become the number one warrior, a title currently held by Justice, the man who killed Afro’s father when he was a child. The game follows the plot of the original series with added material and background for fans and new comers alike.Blood is beautiful™ in this hip hop infused action adventure as Samuel L. Jackson reprises his role as Afro and Ninja Ninja. A striking art style gives Afro Samurai a truly unique look and feel across beautifully animated open environments as he wages war against his adversaries to become number one. Using an innovative gameplay system, enemy AI is affected by the beat of the musical score produced by RZA of Wu-Tang Clan fame. These dynamic battles ensure stylized encounters throughout the game that affect the overall tone of gameplay. Slice and dismember opponents as Afro acrobatically leaps from one location to the next, interacting with anything and everything in the environment to help him on his journey.

Sega Dreamcast’s Soul Calibur Coming to XBLA

While Namco Bandai was busy pitching all their upcoming projects and games to the media, they broke out some new that they apparently didn’t think was that big. The Sega Dreamcast classic – Soul Calibur – will be available for download later this year

Cowon iAudio D2 Review

The D2 is Cowon's first ultra portable video player and their first foray into the wondrous world of touch screens. Although similar in appearance to the iriver clix, the D2 sports some significant differences under the hood: things usually not found in this class of players like TV output, support for lossless audio codecs, and an SD/SDHC card slot for unlimited expansion.

Spiritlorre recommends Cowon D2 mp3 its awsome, amazing sound & features in this small beautiful package.

full review below

http://www.anythingbutipod.com/archives/2007/04/cowon-iaudio-d2-review.php

GTA IV DLC to Decide Fanboy War?

http://www.gameplayer.com.au/Home/FEATURES/FEATURE/tabid/1488/Default.aspx?CID=c18ac13e-3223-4568-8124-4808ed9072eb

The Incredible Hulk pics

http://www.gamesradar.com/xbox360/the-incredible-hulk/screenshots/g-20080314102413234091/pic-5787E411-9946-4318-990B-F9E838C3D8E6#autoPlay

New Mafia 2 screenshots

New Halo 3 Map Pack On Marketplace

The new Halo 3 "Legendary" map pack is now up on Marketplace and ready to be downloaded. This map pack will cost you 800 Microsoft points and will bring three new maps to Halo 3. The new maps are titled: Ghost Town, Avalanche & Blackout.
On Ghost Town the best game types, according to Bungie, seem to be Team Slayer, One Flag CTF, Multi-Flag CTF & One Bomb. On Avalanche the best game types seem to be Multi-Flag CTF, One Flag CTF, One Bomb, Team King & Team Slayer. Finally on Blackout the best game types seem to be Team Slayer, One Flag CTF & One Bomb.
Don't forget that the Halo 3 "Heroic" map pack is also available on Marketplace and that particular one is a free download.

Kane & Lynch New DLC Arriving This Week

Beginning on April 17th there will be some new downloadable map packs for the controversial game, Kane & Lynch Dead Men. You will be getting four new maps four maps entitled: Clean Cut, Flying High, Hooker's Trail and Hasta La Vista. Check out the trailer below and if you are a fan of the game keep your eye out for when these new maps show up on Marketplace.

Bourne Demo coming to Xbox Live...

it looks very much like it does justice to the film and book franchise, taking action gaming to a whole new level. Thankfully we won't have long to wait to get our hands on it, as Sierra have confirmed they'll be releasing a Bourne Conspiracy demo to Xbox Live Marketplace early in May, giving gamers the chance to experience the frenetic action for themselves.

OXM Gives Grand Theft Auto Perfect 10

You won’t need to take a seat for this one as there shouldn’t really be any shock involved. The first reviews for Grand Theft Auto IV are leaking out and the results are positive. The first official review leaking out is that of Official Xbox Magazine.
OXM has given the game the distinguished 10 out of 10. This would be a bigger deal if Future Publishing, the parent company of OXM, hadn’t brokered a deal to publish the first review. Whenever a deal is made to publish a review, we fell there might be a little bias. This isn’t to suggest the game isn’t a 10 though.
The OXM review praises GTA IV’s storyline, while also giving a big thumbs up to the new visuals and huge multiplayer environments. According to OXM, it’s all good. This is definitely good news for Take-Two (Rockstar’s parent company).
OXM did have one criticism. The magazine did find the new cover system, similar to Gears of War, a bit confusing. While we’re not sure how a cover system inspired by a popular cover system can be confusing, we’ll have to wait and see for ourselves. The review also claims that the backdrops seem to be filled with far too much repetition in the form of burning trash cans, burning cars, and bodies. That’s nothing new and something we expected. So no biggie there right?
As for the exclusive DLC headed to the Xbox 360; OXM claims these downloadable missions will provide an additional 10 hours of gameplay. Sounds pretty good to us.
You can check out the latest OXM when it goes on sale this week

TOO HUMAN FRESH PICS

Gamers already camping out for GTA IV

Still weeks away from Grand Theft Auto IV’s release date of April 29, cold weather hasn’t prevented those eager to be the very first to play Rockstar’s highly anticipated title from setting camp.

Artist rendering of Xbox 360's 'Newton' controller

New Fallout 3 screenshots

Gears of War 2 - New faces, new places, new vehicles...

...but this time he's brought some new pals along for the ride. Gears of War 2, the hotly anticipated sequel to the original million seller, takes the fight directly to the Locust. Sure enough, Fenix is heading underground...

The way your character takes cover is much improved over the original, ensuring that sneaky Locust scum can't pop off a shot at you and hit you when you're hiding behind a wall or peeping round a corner. Weapons are tweaked though all the oldies but goldies are there of course. There's a new dual-wield chainsaw gun ensuring that Marcus and the other characters in the game can get up close and personal, and spill some alien blood. Underground levels aren't tight twisty dark dank little corridors but vast subterranean spaces, breathtaking in scale and scope and much improved over the originalA new enemy, the Kantus, can use focussed sonic attacks on the player, causing damage and loss of energy. These focus chant attacks are probably the newest most lethal weapon in the Locust arsenal. If you're looking for something bigger to pick a fight with, Cliff Bleszinski promises monsters that will "make the Brumak from the original game look like a baby panda bear."With vast improvements to the original spec Unreal 3 engine used for the sequel, the gushing Cliffy B also added that far more enemies would be on-screen at once, making you really work for your achievements and those end of level encounters with big nasty bosses. Along with Fenix, Baird and "The Cole Train" will be reappearing in the sequel, along with new characters like Tai Kaliso, a spiritual warrior chick, Chairman Prescott (no he doesn't own two jags), the previously unseen head of the human government, and Dizzy, a human vehicle specialist with rather too fond an attachment to his truck - one of many new vehicles in the game. Multiplayer has also been universally expanded and improved over the original. Can't wait. Tune in towards the latter half of the year for the game's release, and keep 'em peeled here - we'll bring you more details, screenies and movies when we've got 'em.

PS3/360 Cry Engine 2 to Look Near High Settings on PC

It almost sounds too good to be true. Almost? It is too good to be true. Could Cry Engine 2 on consoles really look any where near as good as Crysis on the PC? Crytek’s Engine Business Manager, Harald Seeley, states that they expect the console versions to “look like they’re running at high settings, or nearly high settings, on a PC.” *Shock.*
When asked what differences there would be between the PC and console versions of the Cry Engine 2, and whether the engine will be tailored to each platform, Seeley replies:

Yes, we definitely tailor the engine specifically to each platform. More than just the difference in CPU and video hardware capabilities of PCs and consoles is at play here. So are the much smaller memory budgets we must work with, the lack of a hard disk on some models, and the acceptance requirements of the hardware vendors themselves. All have an effect on how we approach each version of the engine.
The surprising thing has been how well the consoles can perform visually, once this tailoring is in place. We expect the final outcome will result in games that look like they’re running at high settings, or nearly high settings, on a PC. Actually, we found it as much or more challenging to address the memory limitations of the consoles when converting our current AI system, as we did while converting our rendering engine or physics system, which was not something you might have expected at the start.

by Patrick Steen on April 7, 2008

New info and shots of Gears 2

Gears of War 2 begins six months after the deployment of the Lightmass bomb at the end of part one. Read more here

High infernal priest Dark Radai from Ninja Gaiden 2

Exclusive shot - You've seen it here first!

The story follows as (the guy on the right in the picture) the high infernal priest Dark Radai is trying to restore the arch fiend - aka the Devil which could see the end of the human race. Helping Dark Radai is a female from the CIA (to the left of the shot).

The game begins when a mystirous lady called Sonia tries to find Ryu to tell him about the arch fiend. She is kidnapped by the spider clan who seem to be working with the fiends, but then later rescued by Ryu. Sonia who also seem to be with the CIA then tells him that his village is under attack for the demon statue. Ryu Hayabusa is out to once more save his clan and the human race. Exclusive NG2 content is supposed to hit XLM on April 15, the demo in May and the game release on June 6.

new NG2 pics!

GTA Vs PS3 bounus round

http://www.gametrailers.com/bonusround.php?ep=20

GTA IV More Popular on Xbox 360 according to IGN Poll

On March 28 IGN created a poll on IGN.com asking readers the following question: "If you're buying GTA IV, which platform version will you purchase?" Surprisingly the Xbox 360 version beat out the PlayStation 3, despite the fact that the series was popularized on previous Sony consoles where past iterations have sold tens of millions of copies.

Xbox 360 to hit 2m in UK

Xbox 360 to hit 2m in UK "next week"
The Xbox 360 is on course to record 2 million sales in the UK next week, according to Chart-Track.
Boosted by the recent official price cut and bumper Easter sales period, Microsoft's console hits the milestone in the midst of a fierce scrap with Sony's rival PlayStation 3 in the key European territory.
Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz, Dorian Bloch, director of UK sales monitor Chart-Track, said: "We are very close to clocking through 2 million 360s in the UK. It should be next week."
The Xbox 360 launched in the UK in December 2005 and reached 1 million sales after 60 weeks. Sony announced that PlayStation 3, which launched in the UK last March, had sold through 1 million units by February of this year. According to Microsoft, the Xbox 360 has sold around 18 million units worldwide since launch.
Following price reductions to all three models of the Xbox 360 across Europe, GamesIndustry.biz revealed that 360 enjoyed a 40 per cent uplift in sales within the first weekend after the cut.
After a further leap over the Easter weekend, Bloch said sales dropped by 11 per cent for week 13, while PS3 enjoyed a jump of 14 per cent, coinciding with the launch of the heavily advertised Gran Turismo 5: Prologue hardware bundle. Microsoft was unavailable for comment at the time of writing.
"The Xbox 360 is extremely well liked in the UK and very strong," added Bloch. "Sony has a long way to go to overtake it in the UK."

Gears of War movie slated for 2010

The film adaptation of Epic's Gears of War has been slated for release in 2010.
"We've got our script on and a director we're about to attach. We'll hopefully make that early next year for the summer of 2010," Twilight producer Wyck Godfrey has told ComingSoon.net.
It was revealed in March 2007 that New Line Cinema has nabbed the rights to a Gears movie, with Stuart Beattie handling the script.
Beattie later described the Gears movie as being an "enormous film."
"There's no way to build that world any other way, really," he said. "That's a huge world. It's a planet and it's a bubble and it's a building. It's an epic sci-fi war and an enormous film. To get it made at all, the only way to make it for a price is to be on a soundstage. But the game also has that look, which is really interesting, so I think it will dovetail really nicely."
Courtesy of CVG.

Sheng Long To Appear In Street Fighter 4

EA Buys Take Two And Gets The Whole Kaboodle

by Torrence Davis
It’s finally happened. EA has purchased Take Two for a lump some of 5 billion dollars. They get all the IP’s including the GTAIV series and all of the Take Two sports games. Say goodbye to NBA2K because EA is not only sticking with the Live brand, but also the Live development team. This means Visual Concepts is now a free agent. The same holds true to all of the 2K sports franchises. EA has completely fucked over ever person who buys 2K sports games because of their greed. They also control the GTA market as well. It’s a sad day for gamers and a great day for EA.

Breaking News: GTAIV delayed for 360 ONLY

Sources close to XE have told us that Rockstar is halting production and delaying the release of Grand Theft Auto 4 for the Xbox 360 due to a late night conference call that happened late this evening. Details are scarce, but it seems as if a former disgruntled Rockstar employee managed to leave hidden data on the Xbox 360 version of GTAIV. Rockstar immediately halted production of the discs to ensure that another “Hot Coffee” type uproar would not occur within the public and media again. Details are very scarce, but word is spreading that the content was a hidden mission involving violence, drugs, and sexual innuendos. Apparently the ESRB missed this content even after a very rigorous review of the entire game. The ESRB even requested a printout of the game code to be reviewed by their own independent research team. This “printout” is rumored to be around 1.7 million pages of data that was read by 14 independently contracted programmers. How they still managed to miss this content is not yet known. This source, who wants to remain anonymous at this time, has also told us that the PS3 version will NOT be delayed. The source states that the content which is causing this mess could not be put on the PS3’s blu-ray discs due to the amount of redundant uncompressed audio that was needed to fill the disc.

GTA4 running on screen shot

TOO HUMAN

Major analyst predicts Xbox 360 GTA IV will outsell PS3 version by a 2 to 1 ratio

Michael Pachter, the biggest analyst in the video game industry says the superior Xbox 360 version will outsell the PS3 version by a 2 to 1 ratio.
Pachter: "We expect around 6 million copies of GTA IV to be sold to Xbox 360 owners"

Janco Partners' Mike Hickey said that Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto IV would likely sell 5.8 million units in its first week. Now, in his latest research note on Take-Two, Wedbush Morgan Securites analyst Michael Pachter has issued a similar forecast, predicting that the game will ship six million in its first week and could sell more than nine million during Take-Two's fiscal year, which ends on October 31.

"We estimate that GTA IV is likely to sell over 9 million units during the fiscal year, and think that the company will likely ship 6 million units in its first week, and will sell 3/4 of that amount in a brief period of time. The performance of GTA IV will thus be responsible for more than 100% of Take-Two's earnings for the year, and the game is likely to mask the underperformance of the rest of Take-Two's portfolio," he said. "We think that GTA IV will generate around $450 million of the company's expected $1,073 million publishing revenue this year, and will generate an operating profit of around 30%, or $135 million. At the high end of company guidance, Take-Two will generate operating income of around $130 million, meaning that the game is responsible for 103% of overall company operating profit."

Pachter also questioned the profitability of the downloadable episodic content for the game: "[We think] Take-Two will have to generate over 2 million downloads (assuming a $15 per download price) on the Xbox 360 before it sees any more cash from this content. We expect around 6 million copies of GTA IV to be sold to Xbox 360 owners, and believe that around 65% of Xbox 360 owners are Xbox Live members, so the company has to sell a download to 50% of its addressable market in order to generate cash from the first download. This is possible, but not highly likely."

Elsewhere in the report Pachter noted his disappointment in Take-Two as a whole. GTA IV is the "one glaring exception," he said.

"We think that it is important to point out that U.S. industry software sales have grown by over 58% from the November 2005 – January 2006 period through the November 2007 – January 2008 period, while Take-Two's publishing revenues have declined by almost 23%. This is clearly a company that is losing market share, and as we review the lineup for the balance of 2008 and 2009, we see more of the same type of games we have seen over the last three years," he said. "The company's sports lineup continues to underperform, generating only $32 million of sales (26% of publishing revenues) for the key holiday period. This figure calls into question whether Take-Two can deliver sports revenues of $250 million for FY:08, as management implied in a prior earnings call."

IKARUGA coming to XLM April 9th

# 800 MS Points
# LIVE Co-op + leaderboards
# Replay mode
# Horizontal mode (letterboxed) is higher resolution than even the arcade version
# Vertical modes (tilt) supported, both left and right rotations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToBdzV7w5Pc

UEFA EURO 2008 demo now available

By Neil Vaughan - 27 Mar 08
The demo for UEFA EURO 2008 is now available on the Xbox Live Marketplace.

For those not familiar, UEFA EURO 2008 is the official game for the European football/soccer championships taking place this summer.

All Xbox LIVE regions are able to download the demo, which weighs in at 1.10GB.

NINJA GAIDEN 2 DEMO IN MAY ON XLM

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/splash/n/ninjagaiden2/

Bourne Combat Action

Sega Leaks First Screens of Sonic Unleashed

http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/16036/Sega-Leaks-First-Screens-of-Sonic-Unleashed/
Looks amazing

Is Race Driver the Future of Driving Games?

Codemasters claims your favorite racing games, the Gothams, Forzas and Gran Turismos, aren’t actually about racing at all. What are they about? Maybe ownership, or glamour, or simple iterative realism. Anything but what they’re meant to be.

“Gotham 4 was cool,” admits Ralph Fulton, chief designer of Race Driver: Grid. “But when we started looking at what this game’s ‘thing’ was, we looked at our competitors and found that, as a whole, they were concentrating on everything but the racing experience. We concluded that our strengths, historically, are in providing that experience. We do excellent AI, excellent physics, world-leading damage systems. We look at the competition and they’re palpably not doing what we do really well.”

If it sounds like a rather flat description of a game about the innate buzz of racing, it’s understandable; Grid’s ‘thing’ is hard to put into words. It’s a truly generational sequel, as unlikely a TOCA game as Dirt was a Colin McRae Rally. What it hopes to capture is something ethereal: an air that exists wherever there’s a race, an electricity that runs through the mere notion of taking the wheel. Imagine a storied, charismatic driver – Kowalski, say, from the movie Vanishing Point – looking back over a life spent chasing that high, wherever it’s to be found. Grid has that same deep, universal, uncomplicated love.

Its issue with modern racing seems, primarily, to be its obsession with science and technology. Too many facts and figures. Too many publicized polygon counts. Too much telemetry written across the screen. In its three territories, Europe, America and Japan, Grid seldom stares at the intricacies of vehicle manufacture; it never feels like a Haynes manual. Despite inheriting Ego (formerly Neon), the most sophisticated engine a racer could have, its attention is drawn more to the bonnets themselves that what’s beneath them.


“I’m not sure anyone could argue there’s a chasm in the racing market,” laughs Fulton. “Last year, we saw AAA racer after AAA racer come out, and obviously we were thinking then about how we’d differentiate ourselves. With many franchises, particularly racing, each iteration becomes an exercise in box-ticking: more cars, more tracks. We didn’t want to go down that road.”

Not to sound too obvious, but roads are a big thing here. Rather than a fetish for clinical, famous straights and bends, its reverence veers towards the iconic. And in its treatments of Haruna (the celebrated hill-climb from Initial D), Milan (a sun-struck, hazy dash through and around the Galleria) and San Francisco (a sepia-toned tribute to Dirty Harry) it gives renewed meaning to that overused term. The open-wheel touring cars of European circuits, belching muscle cars of US cities and tuned drift cars of illegal Japanese street-racing all convey an uncommon sense of heritage.

Unlike the era of Colin McRae 04 and Race Driver 2, where the two companion brands ploughed damagingly through each other’s turf, this game is healthily unique. “There’s healthy competition, maybe, but no overlap in terms of content,” insists Fulton. “We’ve gone out of our way to make a clear distinction between the two brands; although they’re noticeably from the same studio, they’re palpably different. There’s an overlap of personnel in the art team and programming, and obviously our outsource studio in Kuala Lumpur is heavily involved. But the key personnel differ from project to project.” And he should know: a lead designer here, he wasn’t even involved in Dirt.

What the games share most of all now is experience. And, of course, shockingly powerful technology. Burned somewhat by the weak multiplayer and meandering singleplayer of Dirt, Grid hopes to make no such mistakes. “It was at pains with its literalness, wasn’t it?” Fulton laughs of Dirt’s career mode. “That you were climbing, literally, a pyramid. It’s a fair criticism. I think we’ve tried to ground our career mode much more in the notion of a world which evolves. And while a lot of racing games have the pretence of choice, where really you’re just moving in a linear direction, we want the player to choose his career path and what to do next.”

Review: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas 2

By Brandon Hofer - 22 Mar 08
In Rainbow Six Vegas 2 you are once again tasked with the mission of saving the city of Las Vegas from a group of terrorists. As you quickly learn, the events of Rainbow Six Vegas 1 & 2 are running concurrently, therefore you are fighting against the same group of terrorists in both titles. Going through the story mode you will encounter the familiar locations such as casinos and such, however, you will also go through an MLG convention hall, a theater and a few other new locations as well. Much like the first title you can go through the story by yourself or with a friend via co-op. Going through co-op this time around has been improved over the first game making this co-op experience a more well rounded experience. The “Terrorist Hunt” mode also makes a return and you can choose to tackle that either solo or with a buddy over co-op. Then of course there is the multiplayer aspect which features your standard fare of team deathmatch, attack & defend, total conquest and other modes that are similar. Customization is also a big part of the game as you can choose to customize your equipment, armor & clothing. Once you choose your weapons you can even customize those, choosing which type of attachment you would like to use and things of that nature. Going through the game you can choose to customize them even further by choosing whether or not you want to put a silencer on your weapon so that you can sneak up on enemies easier. As you progress through the game you will gain more experience, which will then unlock new gear that you can use to customize your character. You also have the feature to import your face using the XBox Live Vision cam, similar to how it worked in the original Rainbow Six Vegas. There is even an achievement for doing that so be sure to do that if you want some easy gamer score points.
One new addition that Ubisoft put into Rainbow Six Vegas 2 is the sprint button. While it seems like such a simple concept, when you went through Rainbow Six Vegas you were not able to sprint ahead. This lead to a lot of deaths when you couldn’t get to cover in time because your guy would simply walk over there instead of running. It should also be noted that a couple of the controls were changed for this sequel. In the first title you would tag enemies for your allies to take out using the “back” button. In this game Ubisoft changed it so that you have to use the “LB” button. To sprint ahead you also have to hold down the “LB” button instead of clicking the left stick like some other shooters. You still control your allies in much the same way that you did in the first title. You can still have them stack up against a door and then order them to clear out a room and all of that fun stuff.
Going through the campaign mode you will notice that graphics do look better than its predecessor, however, it is not a huge leap forward. They just tend to look a little more crisp and detailed in some areas. Another thing you will notice is that the frame rate tends to dip in certain areas of intense action. It is surprising that Ubisoft was not able to lock down a steady frame rate, especially considering I don’t remember the first Rainbow Six Vegas having that issue. With that being said, the frame rate dip does not happen often and only occurs in certain areas of the game. It is definitely not enough to ruin the game, it is just a minor annoyance. The online play in this title, however, seems to run smoothly. I have gone through the entire campaign with a friend over co-op and it ran without a hitch. There was no lag at all except for the aforementioned frame rate problems. If you went through Rainbow Six Vegas and still have the save file on your hard drive then as soon as you boot up Rainbow Six Vegas 2 you are immediately rewarded for being a “Veteran”. You will receive some extra XP which will help you unlock items in the game along with a flight helmet, ballistic goggles, a tactical helmet & Balaclava. In addition you can unlock a free map to be used alongside your other Rainbow Six Vegas 2 maps by using the code that we revealed earlier in the week.
Overall, if you were a fan of the first Rainbow Six Vegas, then you should enjoy Rainbow Six Vegas 2. There is nothing groundbreaking here however Ubisoft did improve on what was already there. The storyline follows the first game pretty well and closes everything off neatly as you finish the campaign. If you weren’t a fan of the original Rainbow Six Vegas then you probably won’t like this title either as it is more of the same. However for gamers who are fans of this series you should have a lot of fun going through the game’s various modes and trying to unlock everything in the game.

Game Ratings
Graphics
9
Audio
10
Gameplay
9
Longevity
9
Online Play
9

Overall 9/10 another great shooter!