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Japan gets some sweet Halo apparel
Our sadistic overlords at Joystiq managed to snag the super spiffy T-shirt you see above at the Tokyo Game Show yesterday. The shirt was being given to attendees of Microsoft's International Press Party. Supposedly, the Japanese text reads "Save Cortana." Of course, sex sells. We all know that, but we're not sure if it's enough to sell Halo 3 to Japan (even if Famitsu loves it). Still, it's a pretty nice shirt, and one we wouldn't mind adding to our collection. If you agree, then keep an eye on Joystiq, as they'll be giving it away one of these days. The rest of us can head over to the Bungie store, repeatedly mash F5, and hope.
New Metal Gear Online trailer is airborne
Even if you aren't sold on this Metal Gear Online trailer after a few minutes, just hang in there. We don't know why you wouldn't be excited though, what's both on display and implied in the trailer is pretty cool. It appears you'll be able to tell the location of teammates who are in trouble or just needing backup, whether or not there are walls in the way. It looks neat, but that sort of teamwork-encouraging stuff may not be up your alley.What will be up your alley though is that last five seconds of this trailer, which we don't even want to describe for you for fear of ruining it. Let's just say it's like a carnival ride, but at the end, there is likely death. Yeah, you should probably just go watch.
New Afrika trailer is not very helpful
OK. So, we get it. Officially. The animals in Afrika [working title] look really fantastic. Like, probably the best animals ever. Wow, are these animals ever great. Now, is there an actual game here? We certainly hope so, because, like we said, those animals look awesome, and it would be a shame not to get to hang out with them.This new TGS trailer probably gets closer than ever before to suggesting that you'll actually need a controller to take in the Afrika [working title] experience. If this clip is any indication, you will be taking pictures of animals, and also driving a jeep through a herd of them, which seems inadvisable at best. Don't miss TGS 08, when Sony will unveil Afrika [working title]'s petting mechanics.
TGS07: fl0w team's next game, fl0wer
It's amazing to see what adding two letters to the end of a word can do. thatgamecompany, creators of the fan-favorite fl0w, is working on a brand new project. Not much is know about the new project, but considering the unique atmosphere created by the team's previous endeavors, we're excited to see what they can bring to the table. [Via Joystiq]
TGS07: An evident U.S. release for Dungeon Explorer
Dungeon Explorer was a Gauntlet-esque dungeon-crawling RPG that was released on the Turbografx-16 at launch. It's hardly the biggest franchise in the world, but it's one that Hudson has decided to resurrect for the DS and PSP in two different games.Siliconera's Spencer Yip noticed that some of the demo stations were running an English version of Dungeon Explorer: Warrior of the Arts, which led him to conclude that the game will be released in the U.S. at some point. Being Turbografx-16 nerds, we welcome any future Dungeon Explorer games-- especially if the villain is still named Natas, and if the ending is as satisfying as the original game's secret ending. We don't actually expect the new game to fulfill either condition. Modern gaming can be so depressing. Gamespot has character art and even a trailer. The trailer mentions Wi-Fi multiplayer and voice chat. Could that be enough to make a big hit of a dungeon crawler?
TGS07: Scribbling mustaches on Zack and Wiki
Game|Life's hands-on impressions of Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure at the Tokyo Game Show uncovered a pretty interesting pseudo-multiplayer feature: up to three of your friends can draw on the screen with their remotes. They'll be able to direct you to clues, point out characters that resemble C-list celebrities, and doodle enlarged genitalia over every square inch of the adventure title. Remember when you used to watch your friends or siblings play a video game while you idly waited your turn? Unless they were playing something like Sonic 2, you didn't have much to do except hope that they would died soon, both in the game and in real life. Now you'll have something else besides murderous plots to keep your mind busy! Capcom's effort to turn spectators into participants really speaks a lot of the developer's commitment to making Zack & Wiki as fun as possible for everyone.
TGS07: Neo Geo VC games already obsolete
This announcement from SNK comes in a close second to the Family Trainer in the Weird Wii Game Timing awards. Not even a whole week after the first Neo Geo game was made available on the Virtual Console, SNK is announcing a compilation disc of 16 Neo Geo games for the Wii. 4 Color Rebellion's Vinnk got the news firsthand from SNK, and what you're seeing above is genuine, unfiltered "fanboy glee" from the news. To be honest, we'd be a lot happier to buy a regular compilation disc than to pay $9 per game. We imagine a lot of other people will be as well. It raises a lot of questions, beyond the obvious "what games will be included?" Specifically, why SNK planned downloadable games on the Wii if they're going to sell them on discs as well. Is this for people without Internet access, maybe? Will it focus on game series that SNK wants to bundle together? Does SNK's home games division just not talk to the downloadable content people?
TGS hands-on: Metal Gear Solid 4
Imagine yourself, surrounded by hundreds, nay thousands of people, bustling about. A constant murmur rings in the background, as the sounds of endless explosions, gunfire, and bouncy anime music intertwine in a cacophony of disarray. Finally, come to the grasp that you must navigate a complex game in a language which you are completely unfamiliar with. It was under these extraneous circumstances that we've come to play Metal Gear Solid 4 on the Tokyo Game Show floor, having survived the hours-long wait for a brief time with Hideo Kojima's latest.Simply thrown into the game was a daunting challenge, one that borders on insurmountable. Once again, Snake has an incredible variety of moves at his disposal -- and he must use them in order to survive the challenges at hand. Metal Gear Solid 4 is far from the most intuitive game we've played, and unguided play didn't lead to much success in the battlefield. It's clear that, in spite of its warlike setting, the game remains true to its "tactical espionage" roots. Stealth is highly rewarded, and bravado will usually lead to some trialling battles that undoubtedly end in death. For example, a tank will be able to gun down Old Snake in all but a few seconds: sneaking past the tank, and the troops that support it, is essential for mere survival. Navigating through the environments felt natural, and the context-sensitive icons that appear at the bottom of the screen are certainly a refreshing addition. Snake will be able to walk, crouch and crawl with relative ease, and with the improved camera, navigating the environment has become far easier. The box and barrel, in which Snake can hide, both appear in the TGS demo, and give Snake a few options in remaining hidden in the environment.But, it's not like Snake will be helpless in the face of combat. Old Snake still has access to his CQC moves, and when faced with enemies one on one, they'll likely face a quick death. The gunplay has been improved, though. The game's over the shoulder mode feels natural, allowing Snake to move and shoot at the same time. The targeting reticule is surprisingly intelligent, indicating when objects and walls get in the course of your shot. Although some may be able to play MGS4 as a quasi-FPS game, the number of enemies will make that a daunting challenge.
Yakuza 2, Dinosaur King, Mystery Dungeon coming to U.S. from Sega
It seems like it was just yesterday we were jealously watching the Yakuza 3 trailer, wishing that we could at least get our hands on the second game in the series. Now, it seems our prayers have been heard by benevolent overlord Sega, which announced last night that Yakuza 2 is among three Japanese developed games coming stateside in 2008. Needless to say, we're excited to get our hands on it, if only to try to make sense of the game's chronological relocation to feudal Japan in the three-quel. Either way, the press release promises "punching hundreds if not thousands of people really, really hard", so a good time will be had by all. Also included int the announcement were two DS games, Dinosaur King and Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer. Dinosaur King asks players to collect 100 dinosaurs, each with special moves, and battle them against each other. ("Not Pikachu, please don't sue!"). The other title, Mystery Dungeon is part of a massively popular franchise in Japan that hasn't made much of a splash in the U.S. ... save for Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. Is anyone else seeing a theme emerge?
TGS07: Joystiq finds the NiGHTS demo lacks motion control, validation
A man who is equally loved and feared around these parts, Joystiq's own Ludwig Kietzmann, got his grubby little mitts on the floor demo for NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams. What came as a shock was his reporting that the title lacked any kind of motion controls whatsoever in its TGS07 demo form. This very well could be changed (and, honestly, probably will) come the title's time for release into the wild.Ludwig's major concern is the validation for the title on the console. If the groundbreaking motion-based controls of the Wii aren't utilized, what makes Journey of Dreams any better or appealing than its Saturn parent NiGHTS: Into Dreams?%Gallery-4673%
Today's most flowery video: 'fl0wer' trailer
If the title looks like a blatant ripoff of indie fave fl0w, that's because it's actually the same developer. Thatgamecompany, that game company which brought abstract underwater battle to PSN, is working on a new game, announced via a short, artsy trailer at the Tokyo Game Show. We don't know much (okay, anything) about fl0wer -- only that it's being developed for PS3, and that it's not yet playable. Based on the name, we expect that it will at least be a spiritual successor to fl0w, which started as game designer Jenova Chen's graduate thesis. View the serene teaser after the break, and let the speculation begin.
TGS07: No More Heroes says yes to more videos
Now that we know that one of our favorite games has a publisher outside of Japan, we undertook the watching of the latest footage from TGS with a particular zeal. While neither offers sound, we do get a glimpse of the controls and a long, lovely look at the game in motion, which puts all the short clips offered by the official site to shame. Before, we were excited; now a new word will have to be created to communicate the passion with which we approach tSuda 51's offbeat No More Heroes. If anyone has any linguistic suggestions, please let us know. In the meantime, hit up the videos after the break.
TGS07: Lost Odyssey is crazy big: 4 DVDs, 50 hours
Japanese developer Mistwalker apparently looks at larger storage capacities as some sort of challenge. Unsatisfied by the three discs of DVD content filled with their previous RPG Blue Dragon, Mistwalker has announced that the upcoming epic Lost Odyssey will span four DVDs, reminding us that razor blades aren't the only medium that benefits from a steady increase in quantity. The four discs are stuffed with a 40-to-50-hour RPG adventure, told using a mixture of CG and real-time cutscenes. Also contributing to the bloating are separate audio tracks for Japanese and English voices, allowing us to switch to the Japanese languages when we inevitably grow tired of the awful anglicized voice-acting (see also: Soul Calibur). Lost Odyssey is due out in Japan in early December, with the North American and European releases pushed to February 2008. [Via AMN]
TGS hands-on: White Knight Story
White Knight Story is a game we've kept in our peripheral vision since we first saw its trailer at TGS last year. Today we got the chance to get a hands on with the game. The demo guides you through leading a giant ox creature, and its suspiciously Taru-Taru-like owner, down a road filled with dangers. The dangers come in the form of evil armoured humans and animated vegetation. Similar to Mandragoras. We're drawing a couple of parallels to Final Fantasy XI but, thankfully, the similarities stop there.The slightly cel-shaded nature of the earlier trailer has been toned down a bit so that now the world looks more realistic, whilst still maintaining its obvious anime inspiration. The game dropped jaws with its incredible stylised JRPG graphics when it was revealed at TGS last year and is still graphically stunning.The first thing we noticed when we started the first combat segment was what first appears to be an aiming circle. This is what we affectionately call the "Wait Circle", which has a loading bar elongate along its circumference. Once it finishes the circle you can perform your next action. The Wait Circle also helps you out with your combo timings.
Swagwatch???: Japanese Halo shirt (feat. Cortana)
This is the shirt Microsoft was handing out to attendees at their Community and International Press Party. All they had left by the time we strolled in were mediums, but we'll be giving this shirt away to one lucky reader who can hopefully squeeze their massive girth into its slim width. Our remedial Japanese translates the text as "Save Cortana." But if she's software, does Control-S count?
TGS07: NiGHTS gameplay video swoops in to save the day
It's no secret that Wii games (heck, insert your Nintendo system of choice there, really) often look better in motion than they do in screenshots. Even Metroid Prime 3 had its jagged moments in stills pre-release, but once we saw it in our living rooms, all doubts and questions disappeared forever. So it shouldn't come as a surprise that NiGHTS looks absolutely amazing in this latest gameplay footage. Sure, we've seen some real inconsistencies in screenshots, but this footage is not only lush and beautiful, but it serves as a lovely send-up of the original. We've read a lot of impressions from various sources this morning as well, and people seem universally pleased with the title, except for one issue -- the framerate seems a little slow. Otherwise, the game seems to move and control like a dream. One of our Joystiq operatives on the spot reports that reps on hand stated that there are no motion controls in the game, but we're also being told that there may be multiple control schemes. We hope to clarify just exactly what's going on here soon.[Via NeoGAF]
TGS07: The Microsoft Community and International Press Party
Since Microsoft jumped the whole TGS gun a little early with their Pre-TGS press conference, the international press – who, we think it's safe to assume, probably didn't arrive a full week early – may have been feeling a little left out. To make up for any perceived slight, the software behemoth threw a bash at the adjacent Hotel New Otani's Shell Room, a tropical-themed pavilion past the parking lot. After being given a press badge and a Japanese Halo 3 t-shirt, we made our way in, chomped on some eats, talked to some industry folks, and quickly realized we felt out of place. We have to say, for an American company that's having such a difficult time breaking into the Japanese market, they certainly managed to throw a party that made us feel like foreigners. Outside, the Japanese emcees yelled so loudly we sought refuge in the empty adjoining area that housed a good dozen or so 360 units. At one point, we turned to see an explosion of confetti celebrating who knows what. Regardless of the who's who, we quietly took our leave, eager to clamber back onto the JR Keiy? line and drag ourselves back to Shinjuku.
TGS hands-on: NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams
After clamoring for a NiGHTS: Into Dreams sequel for years and clinging to creator Yuji Naka's legs even as he propelled himself through the doors of his own studio, many fans of the acrobatic airborne harlequin were delighted to see their dreams come true in the form of a new Wii title. Journey of Dreams had found the perfect platform, where boundless motion controls would exquisitely express the freedom of flight. Right?Bizarrely, tellingly and somewhat amusingly, the Tokyo Game Show demo of NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams makes no use of motion controls whatsoever. The analog stick on the nunchuck controls movement, the A-button speeds you up and.... well, that's pretty much it. While several control schemes are likely to be in the works for the completed game, the lack of Wii-specific abilities seems to worsen the lack of differentiation between NiGHTS and its sequel.%Gallery-7638%
TGS07: Snake in Smash Bros Brawl
Konami invited some lucky press folk who've been at TGS to sit in on a kind of Snake retrospective. Chronicling the career of the big guy, they even took some time to chat about his upcoming foray into the world of smashing. Kojima showed off Snake traversing some of the levels in Smash Bros. Brawl, as well as utilizing some of the game's unique items.We can't wait until his dojo update ...[Via Go Nintendo]
TGS07: Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep impressions
Remember this? This is the original Birth by Sleep trailer that was hidden at the end of the Japanese release of Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix. But this is not Kingdom Hearts III for PS3. No, it's not what you were expecting at all.Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep, revealed at Tokyo Game Show today, is a brand new PSP game that expands the story of the franchise not by looking forward, but by looking back. This prequel stars a character that strongly resembles (but is not) Zack from Final Fantasy VII (and most recently, Crisis Core). In addition, we see a character that appears to be a clone of Roxas -- but that's impossible, considering the massive time difference between Birth by Sleep and the original console games. Certainly, there's a lot of mysteries surrounding this upcoming title. As this preview video shows, the game features a much darker and sinister feel than the console predecessors. The character designs feature a rougher look, especially the main villains, featured above. The new hero, being of a much older age than the previous heroes, also adds a much more mature feel to the overall presentation. The new keyblade also feels much more menacing, being able to shoot projectiles rather quickly. From the little we got to see at Tokyo Game Show, it seems as though the gameplay of Birth by Sleep will most closely follow the PS2 originals of the new Kingdom Hearts games announced today.This is easily the most technologically impressive Kingdom Hearts game announced today, and although it's not a next-gen sequel, this PSP iteration looks to satiate the needs of the Kingdom Hearts gamers everywhere.
