Super-Stardust-HD
Latest
Super Stardust HD interview is super starry
We're not very secretive about it: the latest selection of PS Store games are lackluster. While it's nice for the two people who actually want to download classic arcade titles, we'd all like to see some new, original games that actually benefit from a high definition experience. One such title, we anticipate with cautious optimism, is Super Stardust HD. The guys at Housemarque sat down for a very lengthy interview, perhaps too lengthy for a downloadable title. With that in mind, we'll summarize for you. You should already know what the game's about. If not, let us educate you on the basics. The temptation to put the title on the PSN instead of a budget PS2 title was too great! Online distribution, the developers claim, is so much more efficient for these types of games. We can see their point. As with most virgin PS3 projects, Housemarque had trouble programming for the PS3 from the PC version, but after hacking away and not giving up (see F.E.A.R., Splinter Cell: Double Agent), they got the hang of it and are pleased with the console and their results. What does the Cell bring to the table? Glad you asked: "the physics, collisions and particle effects run natively on Cell ... We are able to get over 10,000 active objects with physics and collisions and over 75,000 particles simulated and drawn @60fps." Wow! You can have real friends play with you! A shared-screen co-op mode will be available. No word on future downloadable content for the game, but we've got a feeling we'll see something. We have been assured that we won't be disappointed with this game and heaven help us, we believe them. The game is due out by the end of June, but we'll be having dreams about it every now and then. If our brains can actually dream up "over 10,000 active objects with physics and collisions and over 75,000 particles simulated and drawn @60fps." That would be a challenge.
SGD '07: Super Stardust HD gallery shows how planets survive
How do planets survive, you ask? Well, you shoot a rocketship into orbit and force it to fly around your planet and shoot a bunch of rocks, debris, intruders, and other assortments of material to keep it safe and sound. That's basically the premise of Super Stardust HD and while simple on the surface, the gallery we've got shows that there's actually a lot going on on-screen at any time. We're excited for this one, because while Blast Factor was fun, it just didn't deliver on the Asteroids-style game we truly wanted. Maybe this will. %Gallery-3208%
PSP Fanboy Theatre: Volume 18
PSP Fanboy offers the latest and greatest movie and game trailers, formatted for the PSP in this new weekly feature. Check it out every Saturday. PSP owners can download files wirelessly via m.pspfanboy.com.Instructions: Save all movie and thumbnail files to the VIDEO folder. These high resolution 480x272 videos require firmware 3.30 or above. (Note: OE custom firmware will also play these videos.) Devil May Cry 4 [PS3, 360]Download MP4 (5.6MB) | Download JPG The following videos are featured after the break: Balls of Fury, Superbad, Super Stardust HD (PS3), SWAT: Target Liberty (PSP)
Two new PSN games: Snakeball & Super Stardust HD
We've covered the upcoming Super Stardust HD before, so we're not going to focus on that one quite as much as the newly announced Snakeball game for the PlayStation Network. The former, SSHD, features the systematic annihilation of asteroids, avoidance of the resulting debris, and the destruction of enemy units who want to stop you from annihilating asteroids. Just look at it! It looks pretty fun, but will it deliver what Blast Factor wasn't quite able to? Let's find out in June. Snakeball seems pretty cool. It's like... bumper cars meets Snake meets rugby meets children minus the children. It makes more sense if you check out our gallery. You glide across a funky disco flooring, collect colored balls to increase the length of your snake car thing, and slap other players with your tail or some kind of weaponry. Along with the recently announced PlayStation Eye, you can map your own face onto a rider to get a more unique experience. There are three modes of play which we'll paraphrase: make your snake as long as you can, master the different arena challenges, or play against 8 other people online. It's coming in July. [Via Joystiq]
Snakeball, Super Stardust HD en route to PSN
Sony has officially announced the impending arrival of two more PlayStation Network titles, each of them boasting hyper-rainbow visuals that are likely to induce a mental state similar to that following ingestion of a hallucinogenic substance. Not that we have any experience with that sort of thing. We do have some familiarity with Snake though, which you may remember as that slithering self-extension exercise available on every electronic device known to man. In Snakeball, you pilot a "bizarre hoversnake" across an "outlandishly dazzling disco floor," all the while devouring delicious spheres, blasting other players and whacking them with your bizarre hoversnake tail. The game supports online multiplayer, as well as the newly announced PlayStation Eye camera, ideal for plastering a face over your bizarre hoversnake pilot. Three Speech expects the game to arrive in July. %Gallery-2812% Super Stardust HD, to which the Sony blog gives a 15 June release date in Europe, is an arcade shooter built around the high concept of blasting defenseless asteroids to smithereens. A two-player co-op mode (it's unclear if this is local, online, or both), online rankings, 1080p resolution and a "seriously catchy soundtrack" are mentioned in the game's list of features. No word yet on what it costs to shoot at space rocks or pilot bizarre hoversnakes. %Gallery-2813%
What's coming to the PS-Store near you?
ThreeSpeech, the semi-official blog under Sony's umbrella of ultimate justice, have posted a quick reminder of what titles are coming to the PlayStation Store in the next month or two. Not surprisingly, more delays! Awesome. Calling All Cars - May 18th Nucleus - May 25th Super Stardust HD - June 15th Will Calling All Cars ever come out? Probably not. Will the US ever get Super Rub-a-Dub? Of course. While it is surprising to see the two crazy spaceship-ish shooters coming out so soon, we really wanted to get our hands on Calling All Cars back on March 22nd. Jaffe, you're a crazy guy, but you shouldn't drive us to insanity, too.
Sony unfurls Q2 release list for PlayStation platforms
Prompted by a panicked glance at a nearby calendar, Sony has blasted out a list of "key titles" slated for release on all manner of PlayStation devices during the second quarter of 2007. Starting over two weeks ago and ending on the last day of June, this period of time sees us paralyzed by F.E.A.R. and having to resort to Calling All Cars to save us from The Darkness brought by ninjas, pirates and Transformers. We'll likely run the Gauntlet in a Final Fantasy of Harvest Mooning... oh forget it. Just read the list. PSN Calling All Cars -- 18 May Nucleus -- 25 May Super Stardust HD -- 15 June Championship Sprint Gauntlet II Joust Mortal Kombat II Rampage World Tour Super Puzzle Fighter II HD Remix Rampart [Note: PSN release dates as published by "semi-official", semi-accurate Sony blog, ThreeSpeech.]
