SideQuesting

8:15 AM.  July 26th.  Somewhere in the Pacific… we think.

We were somewhat knowledgeable of our predicament: search out the passengers of a flight that went lost in May, some of which were on the fated Oceanic flight that went down 3 years ago.  Something tells us that lightning doesn’t strike twice all too often.  Our search and rescue team was implemented with Wii Motion Plus, a special tool attached to a Wii remote that can track true 1:1 location… something that would be needed, should we suffer the same fate as the castaways.

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Need for Speed has always been one of those franchises that said to players: Yeah, we have some realism in there, but we like to make sure you have fun, too. This allowed the game designers to subvert the laws of physics and engine mechanics a bit in order to make some of the most popular racing/driving games around.

The new installment, ‘Shift’, takes a hard left turn toward realism. Consulting with real race drivers in their chosen discipline, striving for as close to a real-life feel as they can get. Hopefully, they can pull this off without pushing the difficulty so far that casual players won’t enjoy the experience.

I’ve been personally playing ToCA: Race Driver 3, a hyper-realistic game, lately to get myself ready for September 9th’s release of Colin McRae: DiRT2. Looks like I made a good choice now that Shift is coming later that month, as well.

Looks like my wheel is going to get a real workout soon. Good times ahead.

With all of the great things I’ve heard about Demigod, I wanted to give it a whirl.  Giants? Check.  Monsters?  Check-a-rooney.  The fantasy setting is something that appeals to me, especially with the massive battles and detailed visuals.  Money issues (damn economy!) have prevented me from purchasing it, though, so I was left godless.

Well now I no longer have an excuse!  Rejoice!  Stardock has released a demo of the game on FilePlanet (weighing in at around 600mb) that should satisfy anyone looking to take a dip into the Cloverfield-sized waters.

The final installment of the Wallace & Gromit adventure game by Telltale Games was released today for PC.  If you’ve been following along with the episodes then you’ll be saddened to know that in The Bogey Man Wallace is doing the best he can to avoid marrying his neighbor lady, Felicity Flitt, by admitting himself into Prickly Thicket country club.

Poor Felicity.  Always a bridesmaid, never a bride.

This marks the end of Telltale’s take on the stop-motion animated Wallace & Gromit series.  Here’s hoping that this is just going to be a hiatus until a season 2 comes along at some point, or Aardman be damned!

The game is available now on PC.

Welcome to the SideQuest, your semi-weekly podcast devoted to gaming, culture, and gaming culture, with the occasional tangent.

Episode 112 starts off horribly.  In fact just fast forward to the end and hit delete.  Our summer vacation is over and we’re back at our abnormal podcasting pace.  We talk about Elaine from Seinfeld, Bruno, Fight Club, something and about some games.  Jonah Gregory magically appears online and saves us, as we engage in an actual conversation about what the Joystiq Podcast Appreciation Group (Facebook) has managed to spawn.  Namely, many infectious websites such as ours.

Hosts:
Yaniv Pereyaslavsky, Dali Dimovski, Ryan Gan, and Jonah “Spambot” Gregory

Links:
http://www.wingdamage.com
http://herethereberobots.com

Music:
Intro – Main Finger – Disco Link Returns
Outro – Main Finger – Doomsday Village (Thin Sliced Mix)

 

 The SideQuest - Episode #112 - Spammed by the Spambot [63:42m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (339)

When The Conduit was first announced it was hyped and heralded as a killer app for the Wii, one meant to revolutionize FPS controls forever.  Developed by High Voltage Software, the game’s hype was nearly overwhelming.  Gaming blogs and websites were abuzz with the details of the shooter for nearly a year.  The game has since then been released (June 23rd in the US) and I was able to spend some fair amount of time with it.

Did it live up to the hype?  Was it the experience that I was hoping it would be?

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When I was in college, I helped organize a few game nights for my buddies and I.  After college I helped organize a couple charity gaming events for my church (Madden tournaments, Mario Kart, etc).  I never had the gumption to go any further than that.  That didn’t stop friends Chuck Whitby, Adam Harvey, and Rob Faraldi from beginning the East Coast Gaming Expo in 2004.  Since then, the expo has changed hands and is now known as Game Core.

Game Core focuses on vendors and gaming tournaments, allowing the attendees to engage in several events throughout the day while shopping for their gaming needs.  The expo will take place on September 12 at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center and is expecting upwards of 2000 attendees.  Also featured will be a gaming-themed concert.

Small town gaming expos and conventions have been popping up more and more since the early 90s, when they were once rolled into PC expos.  I always loved visiting these events as the more personal atmosphere allowed me to meet local folks who were interested in the same things as I, as well as scoring some great rare gaming finds and deals.  Maybe it was nerd-bonding or just general geekery, but they were always something to look forward to for a Saturday or Sunday afternoon.

For more info, check out their official website at GameCoreCon.com

Splinter Cell: Conviction. Red Steel 2. Final Fantasy XIII (pretty much).  Singularity.  Bioshock 2.  And. Many. More.

These are just some of the several games that have slipped from a 2009 release to an “early 2010″ window.  And with the rate that we are going, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see other games follow suit (we’re looking at you, Army of Two: TFD).

What’s causing this mass exodus from twenty-oh-nine?  Is it something we said?  We posed the question to the members of this week’s #gamechat and have assessed what this all does and doesn’t mean.

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#gamechat number 3 came and went, and we chatted about all things motion gaming.  This week we talk about the biggest news (or non-news?) of the year: the vast amount of game delays from the end of this year into the beginning of next.  What’s causing games to be delayed, and who wins & loses?  Join us!

#gamechat begins on Twitter at 9PM EST every Tuesday.

Want to know how to get included in #gamechat?  Read here to find out!

ComiCon has been giving us a lot to chew on for the next several months. Our previously mentioned TRON: Legacy trailer had us all (well, me at least) squirming for more. Next up, the trailer for Command and Conquer 4.

While the trailer doesn’t tell us a whole lot, it does give us a little bit of insight into the world in which the game takes place.

Kane is (still) alive. Tiberium is continuing to infest and take over the world. Kane sees an opportunity and approaches the world leaders with a proposition. A proposition that involves a mysterious orb, which goes unexplained.

I’m personally really looking forward to the new C&C installment. These are the games that first introduced me to RTS combat, and I’ve been loving every minute of it. I can’t wait to see how they continue the universe and the franchise. I’m just sad that, like TRON: Legacy, I’ll have to wait until 2010 to get my hands on it.