Sony confirmed during their GDC presentation that SOCOM 4 will be MOVE-enabled when it released in the fall. The controls appeared similar to the Conduit, which was released last year, but with more precision and better use of on-screen pointers. SOCOM 4 will also be playable with a standard Dualshock 3, so don’t fret if pointer controls aren’t your cup of cake.
At GDC 2010 tonight, Sony officially unveiled the MOVE motion controller. Shu Yoshida, President of Sony’s Worldwide Studios, unveiled the device and described it as being a “more precise experience” than any other motion controller.
While the main portion of the controller is the now infamous glowing orb, one of the available (not included) components of MOVE will be a wireless controller containing an analog stick and buttons and called the Playstation MOVE Sub-Controller. Yes, very Wii Nunchuk at first glance, but Wi-Fi.
Sony displayed several interactive sports games and mentioned that the MOVE would also appeal to core as well as social gamers.
The maps that came along with the initial game guides in Nintendo Power back in the 80s for games like Dragon Warrior (Dragon Quest) and Final Fantasy were always a sort of interesting phenomenon to me: someone out there had to plan the world that characters would walk across, and the terrain they would walk over or interact with. This would start with highly-detailed and beautiful maps… which would be turned into grainy blocks that represent grass or swamps and placed on a grid. Even though the visuals weren’t exciting, their placement was perfect and pivotal to the experience. That one block representing a town? I couldn’t wait to make it across the swamp to get to there.
Artist Brett Camper takes his love of games and media to new levels when it comes to the classic 8-Bit map. His creation, 8-Bit NYC, is a scalable map of New York that is entirely done with classic graphics. Complete with locations for New York schools, landmarks, and parks, the map is just begging to be placed into game itself. The labor of love has become so popular that Camper is looking to make similar maps of other cities, if there is enough interest.
Now, anyone good with RPG Maker want to help me out? I have an idea for Brooklyn Quest that’s floating around in my head.
[Image courtesy 8-Bit NYC]
Holy crap! Holy crap! Holy crap!
Well, that’s at least what I was saying when I got done watching the brand new trailer for TRON: Legacy, the follow-up to the 1982 classic. Click on through for my impressions, and a link to all the trailery deliciousness.
Welcome to the SideQuest, your semi-weekly podcast devoted to gaming, culture, and gaming culture, with the occasional tangent.
This show is vulgar, disgusting, irrefutable, vile, and will probably stop me from EVER holding public office. Its also pretty entertaining, and we do talk a little about video games… Dali still has a baby, Kevin and I (Yaniv) were at the Olympics, and Mike, well he’s not doing anything special at all. THIS is The Sidequest. Or maybe its the SideQuesting podcast, the Sidecast? Whatever.
Hosts:
Yaniv Pereyaslavsky, Dalibor Dimovski, Ryan ‘Pat Pat’ Gan, Mike Wehner, Kevin Hustler, Tub Girl.
Music:
Main Finger
Links:
Twitter.com/MikeWehner
Twitter.com/kewlrats
Twitter.com/keveviathan
Twitter.com/yanivp
With PAX East around the corner, we’re trying to stay on our toes. SideQuesting Alpha Team (Dali and Ryan) will be in Boston covering the event next month. Since there will be several panels and games to try out, we may be a little swamped. Therefore, we’re turning to the readers. If you can’t be at PAX East this year, we’ll try our best to be an extra set of eyes and ears for you in addition to the other blogs covering the event. Are there any games that you’d like us to give impressions on? Are there any panels you’d like us to hit up?
Check out the event schedule and let us know! You can leave a comment here or @reply us on Twitter.
For every game that gets created, there are dozens that get put on the chopping block. Here are a few that didn’t quite make the cut.
Are there a new Wii and DS in the works from Nintendo? In all probability, the answer is “Yes.” Typical business and product-development cycles dictate that work begins on a new iteration once the current version “breaks even”. After this point, the current product is generating pure profit and a successor is prepared for the next sales cycle. This is why companies like Apple create new versions of their iPods every year, why Microsoft began developing Natal as a possible pseudo-successor to the current XBox 360, and why Nintendo itself created the DS Lite and DSi.
It should come as no surprise, then, that Nintendo has more than likely been developing an update to its current consoles as long ago as early 2008 in preparation for an announcement at this year’s E3 Expo.
It’s been a long road. The smashing year 2009 came and went, and now here we are: choosing our favorites of the year. After a long month of arguing, fist fights, high fives, and liquor, we’ve come to the conclusion that we all have some pretty varied tastes here at the ‘Quest. We’ve managed to play great games across the majority of consoles, hand-helds, mobile, and PC, and have created our list of our Top 5 of the year.
A little inside baseball: For this list we’ve used the 5-4-3-2-1 grading scale for our picks. We realize that there are other methods, but in the end we utilized the simplest one. We also realize that this list may not have satisfied everyone on our team or even our readers. We’ve decided to list our editors’ and authors’ individual picks at the bottom, to allow our readers to see just what got us to the final 5 and to allow everyone to know what we’ve been playing and loving all year.
With that said, let’s begin with #5!
Read the rest of this entry »
Our friends over at the newly re-minted EGM have announced that subscriptions are now available for the upcoming new issues. The plans include a split between digital and print issues of the magazine, with the print issues retailing individually for $6.99 and billed as a higher quality. Subscriptions run from $14.99 to $24.99 for 32 and 64 issues, respectively. We have a soft spot for EGM, with all of the turmoil and drama that had plagued their cancellation last year.
It’s nice to see the recent renaissance in gaming magazines continue. Both Game Informer and GamePro saw updates to their traditional formats, and with EGM back in the game (#pun) the only “big” magazine left to begin anew is Nintendo Power. Come on, NP… I want another Dragon Warrior pack in.
