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Noteworthy: Scribblenauts ships a million
WBIE announced today that Scribblenauts, 5th Cell's puzzle adventure game that spawns any object a player writes in, has now shipped one million copies worldwide. According to WBIE, which, as publisher, has an admittedly biased view of the situation, Scribblenauts has now reached "blockbuster status." Keeping in mind that the reported figure is one million units shipped (and not necessarily sold), it's still an impressive number for a third-party DS game -- especially one as weird as an adventure game that features puzzle solving through the use of one's vocabulary. How are other developers expected to rip off that formula?
New Sesame Street games on the way, saysa Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has inked crayoned a deal with Sesame Workshop to produce a new series of games based on the beloved edutainment property, Sesame Street. According to an AP report, the partnership is designed to capitalize on a "big open hole in the market," which is easily filled with children and their open-minded parents. "This is the first generation of parents who grew up as gamers," said WBIE senior vice president of marketing, Russel Arons. "Unlike prior generations where people weren't sure of the value of video games, these are people who know there's value and fun for the whole family." Warner Bros. has yet to announce specifics -- like target platforms or release dates -- but has allegedly expressed interest in the motion controllers set to arrive on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 later this year (presumably, the desire to work on Nintendo's Wii goes without saying). Terry Fitzpatrick, Sesame Workshop's executive vice president of distribution, believes that the casual-friendly input "makes it very easy and is developmentally appropriate for preschoolers, as opposed to dealing with a very complex controller." With Microsoft's Project Natal eliminating the controller entirely, we're sure to see some wonderful numeracy games involving Cookie Monster shoveling as many baked treats into his face as possible. We do that in front of the TV every day, so we may as well get points for it.
Best of the Rest: Dave's Picks of 2009
Resident Evil 5 I've long been a fan of the Resident Evil series, and while the campaign here has problems and should never be played solo, the Mercenaries mode is what kept me coming back. Those action-packed levels spent trying to survive while running low on ammo and health were some of my most chaotic, yet highly enjoyable, experiences of 2009.
New Lego Harry Potter trailer has us rowling with laughter
TT Games has been at it for some time now with its Lego-themed games, taking on everything from Star Wars to Rock Band, each entry coupling the same goofy, self-referential comedy with a family friendly low barrier to entry. The new trailer for Lego Harry Potter: Years 1-4 takes these recurring tropes and adds them to the world of Hogwarts, Muggles, and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, sprinkling in iconic moments from the first four blockbuster books throughout. Without a release date for the game – and with the first half of the final Harry Potter film not hitting theaters until next November – we worry it might be awhile before we get our hands on this block-breaking version of Harry.
'Tis the season for new Scribblenauts artwork
Click to download in Santa-sizeWe thought the Scribblenauts Halloween wallpaper was a one-off, an excuse to promote the game a bit more in the period immediately following its release. But, to our delight, 5TH Cell has delivered the Christmas present we didn't dare hope for: new Scribblenauts artwork by character designer Edison Yan. It's a Christmas miracle! Well, okay, it may not be miraculous, but it's really nice! We don't even care if it is a promotional effort to remind people to put Scribblenauts on their holiday shopping lists. There are also two new Christmas-themed screenshots in our gallery. In retrospect, it was a pretty clever idea to make a game that includes multiple holiday-themed items as part of its nature. %Gallery-39784%
Warner Bros. will swap your antiquated DVDs for Blu-ray Discs (for a price)
In the spirit of such programs as Cash for Guns and, more recently, Cash for Clunkers, Warner Bros. has begun its "DVD2BLU" program, offering owners of its films in the antiquated DVD (a.k.a. drink coaster) format to exchange them for their proper Blu-ray Disc equivalents for a charge of $7.95 to $9.95 per film. The program's site currently lists 50 titles, with a limit of 25 disc swaps per household. You may recall that, earlier this year, Warner Bros. launched a similar program -- RED2BLU -- to let consumers exchange their HD-DVD copies of the studio's films for Blu-ray Disc versions. That's still going, and currently offers a catalog of 125 flicks to choose from with an "upgrade fee" of $4.95 per title. Yes, Warner Bros. really released (at least) 125 movies on HD-DVD. And no, we don't know what it was thinking. [Via Blu-ray.com]
5th Cell on Scribblenauts' control scheme, and more insights
In a postmortem article for Game Developer magazine (excerpted by Gamasutra), 5th Cell co-founder Joseph Tringali offered some inside information about the development of Scribblenauts. The control scheme, one of the major complaints about the puzzle-adventure title, was something that 5th Cell wanted to fix in a couple of ways. However, the developer ran into time and budget constraints. "We knew this was going to take a big hit from reviewers," Tringali said, "but we could only spend a limited amount of work on it. We discussed a secondary D-pad control option midway through development only to come to the conclusion it would take a single person 3-4 weeks to integrate it. On our self-funded schedule, that route was not an option." Tringali said that to free up time to tweak the controls, another feature, like online connectivity, might have had to be lost. But when those decisions came up, it was already too late.
Scribblenauts achieves noteworthy 194K sales in September
In its first two weeks on the market in North America, Scribblenauts sold 194,000 units, making it the third highest-selling DS title in September, behind Mario & Luigi and Kingdom Hearts sequels. That's 105,000 more copies than Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars moved in its first month. We asked 5TH Cell creative director Jeremiah Slaczka if it met his expectations. "I didn't have any expectations," he told Joystiq. "I just hoped it'd do well. It's awesome for a completely new, original 3rd party IP on DS to do so well." Does this strong debut mean a sequel is guaranteed? "Way too early to tell that," Slaczka said. "We've only seen 2.5 weeks of sales." He told us that Drawn to Life, which went on to break a million worldwide, only sold 40,000 copies in its first month, with one more week of sales in that month.
David Bowie invites us all to dance in latest Lego Rock Band trailer
No, really, that's David Bowie. Click for a higher-resolution peak Warner Bros. today announced the inclusion of David Bowie as a second playable character in upcoming music/rhythm game, Lego Rock Band, and also handed over a mess of new media seen above and below. Coupled with last month's Iggy Pop announcement , the game's playable-musician-who-probably-shouldn't-be-in-a kids-game quotient has officially been doubled. One major plus for Bowie: Lego character gender ambiguity is all the more fitting. Bravo, MTV Games! Now that's synergy. %Gallery-74836%
Steam Weekend Deal: F.E.A.R. 2 and Reborn DLC
If you've been too frightened by the prospect of Alma's return (or too frightened by the prospect of dropping $50+ on her new game), know that this weekend's Steam deal is none other than F.E.A.R. 2 and the recently released Reborn DLC. If you fall into the former grouping, we suggest you draw the shades, turn off your computer for the weekend and even take the phone off the hook just to be safe. However, if you're in the latter group, now's the time to pounce as Valve has slashed 50% off of the price of each, offering them at a reduced $24.99 and $4.99, respectively. You can't be in both groups though – if you spend the weekend hiding, you'll miss the deal which is available for "this weekend only."
Mega64 uses Scribblenauts technology to change the internet forever
Being a blog on the internet, we're big believers in the power of commenters. Whether it's the beloved "First!" or the always refreshing "Slow news day, huh?," each and every person who enters a string of text into a comments field and hits submit has undoubtedly changed the course of history ... forever. Mega64, the comedic troupe with a taste for video games, has finally realized this and, in combination with the item-spawning gameplay of Scribblenauts, has created something that will change the internet forever. We'd go into more detail, but then we'd be taking away from the surprise. So, head past the break and see what's in store for the future of the intertron.
Scribblenauts Facebook page teases 'special announcement'
The Facebook page for 5TH Cell's Scribblenauts is teasing ... something. "Get your rooster hats ready!" a message posted on the game's "Wall" reads. "We have a very special announcement coming very soon..." We have no idea what's being announced, or even when, but it seems really early for a sequel announcement. Maybe another platform? Or maybe something outside the game, like a contest. In any case, if you like Scribblenauts, 5TH Cell is going to tell us all something that will probably be delightful. Speaking of delightful, the pictured object is "Game of the Year" as rendered by the game. That's just adorable. [Thanks, Josh!]
WB thinks Scribblenauts will have 'Layton appeal'
Warner Bros. says it's counting on Scribblenauts to start a new puzzle franchise, getting a taste of the same success that a certain top-hatted DS puzzler has enjoyed. "What Scribblenauts offers is something akin to Nintendo's Professor Layton – an addictive and challenging game that has real mass-market appeal all wrapped up in a uniquely stylised package," said WB marketing manager Phil Lamb. He seems to be making a logical argument until dropping this bon mot: "Many forum users are saying the game is the biggest incentive they've had to revisit their dormant DS in a long time." So ... umm ... did they not know Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box was out or what?
5TH Cell: Scribblenauts' scandalous-looking 'sambo' item is a misunderstanding
Reader Zachary spotted a rather unfortunate term in Scribblenauts entirely by accident: "sambo," which summons ... a watermelon. We thought there was no way 5TH Cell would intentionally hide racist, or even racially charged, imagery in its game, so we contacted creative director Jeremiah Slaczka to figure out what happened. It turns out that like Zachary's discovery, the item was an unfortunate accident. Slaczka explained to Joystiq that "sambo" is used in the game as an alternate term for "fig leaf gourd," an ingredient in the Ecuadorian dish fanesca. "Sambo" is the local term for the gourd. As for the watermelon-like appearance? "We reuse art," he said. "Fig leaf gourd looks a lot like a watermelon. It's just an alternative name in a giant list of tens of thousands of names." Slaczka noted, offering evidence to the contrary of calls of racism, that many of the human characters in the game, including the fireman, winemaker, and dancer, manifest as black, as does "Brandon," the in-game representation of a 5TH Cell "wordsmith" (one of the employees tasked with finding words for the database), who is of course black in real life. He also mentioned Isaiah, a major character in the developer's last game Lock's Quest. We must admit, a random, potentially slightly embarrassing art/word pairing in the game seems a lot more likely to us than endemic racism expressed through antiquated epithets. Slaczka told us he didn't even know "sambo" (the slur, not the gourd) until tonight.
5th Cell: Leaked Scribblenauts word list is incomplete
Of all the criticisms that could fairly be leveled against Scribblenauts, the fact that it only recognizes 22,802 words is not among them. 5TH Cell creative director Jeremiah Slaczka told Fast Company that the leaked word list was not comprehensive, though he said it much more colorfully than we did: "That was leaked by a hacker who does not know anything," Slaczka said. "It's more than that." Slaczka also revealed the last word to be added to the game's database: "Low Rider." Presumably this was added at the insistence of his friends, all of whom love a low rider. [Via VG247]
Review: Scribblenauts
There's this part I love in the movie Ratatouille where a critic says, "The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends." It's something I always try to keep in mind and it's moved me to first, before we do anything else, celebrate what a staggering accomplishment Scribblenauts is. It's a game where you solve simple puzzles with almost any object you can dream up (as long as it's not libations, licensed or lascivious) and every item acts the way you'd expect: bears chase honey and dogs chase cats. It's a game where you can spend hours just messing around to see what creatures can beat God in a fight (zombies: no; vampires: yes). As a technical achievement and as a toy, it's really brilliant. Scribblenauts is a thing of wonder. %Gallery-68669%
Reminder: Early Scribblenauts launch today at Nintendo World NYC
Friendly reminder for Scribble-natics in the tri-state region: the Nintendo World store will begin selling Scribblenauts today at 11AM as part of a special early launch. For those who don't want to wait until their retailer of choice gets the game sometime this week, now is the time to get on the LIRR, Metro-North, MTA, ferry or paddle boat and head on over to Rockefeller Plaza. The 5th Cell team should be on hand for autographs (hopefully for longer than an hour) and demos of the game. Scribblenauts will allegedly only be sold between 11AM-2PM, so take that into consideration. If you're reading this post from the line at Nintendo World, feel free to let us know how long the queue is in the comments.
There are 22,802 words in Scribblenauts
Some scurrilous vagabond somehow managed to get their hands on the supposed complete dictionary from 5th Cell's upcoming everything generator, Scribblenauts. We sincerely urge you not to go through the illicitly obtained list, looking for particular nouns of interest and internet memes -- why not save that fun for the actual game? However, everyone should absorb the final tally of words present in the final build of the game: 22,802. Also, if the list is legit, then "Plumbob" finally made it into the game -- as per our suggestion from E3. As we see it, we're owed around 0.00005 percent of Scribblenauts' total profits. We'll be waiting on the check, 5th Cell.
The Batman remains atop UK sales charts
For a second consecutive week, Batman: Arkham Asylum has countered the incoming blows of Wii Sports Resort, leaving the brooding hero perched at the very top spot of the UK sales charts. Chart Track notes the Dark Knight's sales are down 27 percent in the second week, a slide softened by Sony's PlayStation 3 price drop.The real beneficiary of Sony's slim console is Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, which shot up seven spots on the charts with a 128-percent increase in sales. The PS3 versions of COD: World at War and Fight Night Round 4 also got a bump after the drop.Source -- Batman hangs on to No1 (Chart Track)Source -- All formats chart (Chart Track)
FEAR 2's 'Reborn' DLC priced at $10
FEAR 2 is almost ready to be Reborn with new DLC, which Eurogamer notes will set you back 800 or $10. The addition of Reborn to the supernatural FPS is so momentous, it warranted a demo last week. The single-player add-on, set to be available on Xbox Live Marketplace, PlayStation Store and ... the internet for PC, joins the free, slo-mo multiplayer update scheduled for September 3rd. Don't let Thursday sneak up on ya.
