Hello Monstervine. It’s been awhile since I’ve been posting news here. I sincerely apologize for my absence, but as school, personal issues, and other things in my life have occured, I became distant of my duty here. I have to say that I personally haven’t been more out of touch on video gaming than in the past few months. BUT, I now seem to have everything in hand in my life and I’m ready to begin bringing news to the gamers of this site. I also have a few reviews ready, such as Fable II, Fallout 3, and in the upcoming week: GEARS OF WAR 2! But, as I’m finalizing everything on the reviews, I’ll also be able to bring in launch centers, such as the Left4Dead Launch party at Hastings in Gillette, WY. It might not be that epic, but damn well it will be fun. Anyways, great to log in once again and see the site.

Glad to be back again VGS,

Donnie

After receiving the Edge Award for Interactive Innovation, Halo 3 creators Bungie have thanked the publication via a highly entertaining video.  In it there are hints towards a new Halo development, but not a new game as many have been suggesting.

We suspect that when Luke Smith says, “Even though in Halo 3 you finished the fight, it doesn’t necessarily mean the ride’s over,” he is referring to the often teased Halo 3 online expansion. For example, a few weeks ago this was said on Bungie’s very own blog:

While a lot of the changes done this month were backend things that players will never notice, you would be right to think that August’s changes feel very minimal. The reason for this is that we’ve been focused on preparing a larger series of changes to Matchmaking for September. Much larger.

Much, much larger.

No, really. It’s huge. You should see how giddy Luke gets when I talk about the tentative plan.

And even before then “major changes to the Halo 3 Online experience” were teased. Check out the video below.

After the controversy of E3, where Bungie were stopped from making a new game announcement by Microsoft, it seems all they can do is hint and tease.  Well, we’re taking notice and we expect to hear more about an online expansion very soon.  September maybe…

At the Edinburgh Interactive Festival today, Bungie beat competitors such as Nintendo and Rockstar to win the Edge Award For Interactive Innovation for Halo 3.

We hand out this accolade to the title released in the last 12 months that does most to further the creative culture of gaming – in other words, to mark out new directions for the form.

This year’s Edge Award For Interactive Innovation was a closely fought affair, Bungie proving victorious in a shortlist that also included Grand Theft Auto IV, Portal, Rock Band, Super Mario Galaxy and Wii Fit.

Ultimately it is the integration and coherence of Halo 3’s online content that makes the game stand apart. From its Theater mode to Forge, and the way a party playing through Live can seamlessly manoeuvre between them, here is an experience that demonstrates an unparalleled understanding of the potential for console online play. Outside of the game, Bungie.net has been engineered to become a remarkable resource for Halo 3 stats and communities, providing life for the game even when your Xbox 360 is switched off. Halo 3, just as Halo 2 did before it, presents a roadmap for the way online will be integrated in videogames in the coming years.

In the light of its incredible success and the number of fans it has attracted, it’s easy to overlook all of the ideas that are present in Halo 3 and the remarkably robust manner in which they are implemented, but we hope that this award serves to help credit Bungie for its achievements. Naturally, congratulations also go to the makers of the games that also made the shortlist.

Braid is one of the highest-rated Xbox Live Arcade game of all time (out of about 150 games!) Geometry Wars 2, released a week prior, is the second-highest. There are some strong games coming up in the next few weeks, so we’ll see if these positions hold.  In fact, Braid is currently the 10th highest-rated Xbox 360 game of all time – including all AAA high-budget games…

If Braid receives just one more Metacritic point, it will jump to 8th place on this list.

Of course, it’s possible that Braid’s rating will go down, too. Time will tell!

I don’t want any of this to seem like bragging. I do want it to serve as a clear and useful data point: an indie game made by a very small team can compete with giant games that had huge budgets at their disposal. (I don’t know how much Mass Effect cost, but it surely was a lot. Just licensing the Unreal Engine 3, before even hiring anyone or doing any work to create a game, cost probably 3x-5x Braid’s budget.)

This is important — I have been a proponent of indie and experimental game development for a while, but the attitude toward it always seems to be that they are interesting toys, but not real games. Well, perhaps that is changing. And perhaps some of the indie developers out there who are making cheap clones of PopCap games will realize that if, instead, they go out on a limb and do something interesting and different and important to people, their work will be recognized.

Now, about sales. They are surprisingly good!

I have noticed people on forums looking at the number of entires in the leaderboards and multiplying that out to get a total income for Braid. That doesn’t work, for a number of reasons. There are thousands of free copies of the game given out to the press, and once someone buys an XBLA game, other profiles can play from the same Xbox and they get leaderboard entries. So the leaderboard is always an overestimate.

However, vgchartz.com has Braid at 28.5k sales currently, and that seems to be in the right neighborhood.

This is a very good sign, for a few reasons! First of all, it means that in addition to getting recognition from critics, Braid is also being played by a lot of people. We’ve all heard of games that are critically-acclaimed but that hardly anyone plays. That doesn’t seem to be happening with Braid so far. But, that could change — a lot depends on what happens to sales on Wednesday when Bionic Commando: Rearmed is released on XBLA. Will Braid’s sales keep up, as with Geometry Wars 2, or will they drop off?

But right now, Braid is selling as well or better than any massive highly-anticipated XBLA game by a major publisher. So, that is very cool. I would like to thank everyone out there who purchased a copy of Braid, for supporting independent and experimental game development.

People have asked me how many sales Braid needs in order to be profitable. The answer is, a lot more than it has gotten so far. (There are many reasons for this, which I may be motivated to talk about in the future). However, things are looking promising now — if Braid keeps selling, I’ll be able to afford to make the next game, and that will be good.

Well, for you RPG and 360 junkies, here is the achievement list for the upcoming Fable II, Xbox 360 exclusive.

The Paragon -15g
Reach 100% Good or Evil.

The New Hero -50g
Defeat your first great opponent.

The Whippersnapper -25g
Collect 5 gold pieces during the Hero’s childhood

the Pooch Pamperer -5g
Play fetch with your dog.

The Archaeologist -5g
Dig up something your dog has discovered

The Dog trainer -5g
teach your dog a trick.

The persuader -5g
Convince a villager to give you a present

(more…)

After E3, Rare showed a total of TWO games at the conference. Now, everybody knows Rare had been in a decline after their great exclusives on the Nintendo64(Killer Instinct; Banjo; Conker; PerfectDark), but it seems that many of your old favorites and sequels to them are inevitable. Here is the list that has been going around Microsoft gaming industry and publishers.

• Kameo 2
• Conker 2
• Banjo Kazooie(XBLA)
• Banjo Tooie(XBLA)
• Killer Instinct Arcade(XBLA)
• Killer Instinct II Arcade(XBLA)
• Killer Instinct III
• Perfect Dark(XBLA)
• Perfect Dark 3
• GoldenEye 007

Now, as a personal Rare fanboy, if these are to be announced within the near future, then I have one thing to say… I will beat your ass in Killer Instinct!

The story of Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe revolves around some kind of cataclysmic event, a major rift in space and time which causes Mortal Kombat and DC to suddenly run into eachother. Not too much on the story is featured, but that’s not a big factor on this game. What IS though is the gameplay, like any other game.

What the developers have told us so far is that the Mortal Kombat characters(Scorpion, Sub-Zero, etc..) all have various fatalities from previous games and a couple of new ones. The DC characters(Superman, Batman, etc..) have something called “Brutalities” in which they will beat the living sh*t out of their opponent.

The great thing is that they didn’t mess around with any of their appearances. Sonya looks like how she’s supposed to, as does the Flash. The DC heroes and villians have their own powers and will reflect how they fight in the comics and movies/cartoons. Superman has his laser eyes, and Batman fires off Batarangs. The physics are astounding!  After many hits to Scorpion with Batman’s weapons, Scorpion’s clothes were torn and faded just like in an actual fight.

A grapple button has replaced throws. Grappling will engage both fighters in close combat, with one of the four face buttons available for various punches or kicks. The defender has a one in four chance to counter with the same face button, turning the tables on his opponent. A similar system is in place for sequences where the fighters battle whilst falling from a cliff. It seems very dramatic how they are beating eachother senseless whilst they fall to a possible doom.

This game isn’t going to be a button masher if you expected it to be. They expect you to use a brain, yeah the thing lodged in your noggin, with “Pro” moves that haven’t been discussed much.

Well, this game looks great, and with Soul Caliber IV and Street Fighter 4 not too far away, hopefully this one will stand out like the others!

Banjo-Kazooie was acclaimed one of the funnest and best adventure games on the Nintendo 64, and it was one of Rare’s last games by most of the original developers and designers. Now, eight years after Banjo-Tooie’s release we’re now treated for gameplay of Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.

Now, if you’re not an original fan of the originals, you probably won’t get a great feel on this game as much as the others. The races and collection of puzzle pieces were great, but not what would keep you over for that long.

The graphics were amazing, especially since it directed away from the gray and brownish look. The controls were probably the most solid out of the demos at E3. Few vehicles were annoying and tedious at first, but they got much easier to control.

The vehicle editor is one of the greatest features shown. You can hop into the garage and started tearing apart the Rare-provided ride, stripping it down to its base components to then modify it into your own pure racing machine. It’s completely intuitive as far as the physics engine when your vehicle is destroyed, and the multiple add-ons.

There is no two vehicles alike. They are all completely different from what was shown at E3. Every last part is specifically placed by the player with some of the funnest vehicle modifyer in a game.

Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts still can’t be ruled as a great game or not, but from the gameplay shown, it’s going for one of the funnest times Rare will give us this gen.

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