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Posted by Ian 

Sony have now confirmed that the PSN store will indeed get a new lick of paint in mid-april and CVG have the first official screens up on their site.

I’ve not borrowed them for our site as it appears this was a bit of an exclusive, so instead I’ll just give you the link straight to them on CVG.com

Click here to view the screens and read the CVG article

Posted by Ian

Well, it’s been on the cards for a while now, and slowly, bit by bit I’ve got together the stuff for my new gaming room.

I’m happy to report tonight that the room is now fully carpeted, my new home gym will be finished by tomorrow and I’ve moved the PS3 and Wii upstairs and set them up on my brand new TV.

It’s all looking rather spiffing, though it will look (and sound) a whole lot better when my surround sound system arrives from Amazon. However, there’s been a delay on that front. Apparently Amazon are having trouble processing my payment, though god knows why - I know I’ve entered my details correctly and I know I have the funds to pay for the item.

Anyway, I will getting my nice new sofa bed on Tuesday and then all I will need is a new tv stand. I’ve abandoned my original idea of wall-mouting the TV as I prefer it on a nice stand.

I’ll upload some pictures of the room once the gym is built and upload them.

Word!

Posted by Rob

Eagerly awaiting the impending release of GTA IV I started to question just how “sandbox” is sandbox gaming. Im beginning to question the limited nature of some open world environments, this type of gaming is hitting us from all directions now starting with on foot rpgs and rpg-alike gaming and more recently fully fledged driving titles. All of these games are extremely linear in design albeit with a very roundabout way of approaching tasks, don’t get me wrong im a massive fan of open world titles and snap them up when available but these games do just…….well……..end. Its great to be given a task and then left to approach it in any way that feels right the buzz you get from being given a smash and grab mission that ends in a botched assassination attempt followed by a messy car chase then a painful limp out of harms way to lose the police and get back to the safe house, a second attempt at this sees you mastermind a daring scheme filled with award winning headshots a heart stopping car chase through cross town traffic making the police look like fools as you slide unseen into your safe house. However my problem is this these games still have a goal you have five missions that can be done in any order until then you are invited to the wondrous pleasure of having nothing else to do when will developers take advantage of randomly generated events also having a game continue to let you explore the city after the final mission is sometimes wasted as THERE IS NOTHING LEFT TO DO OR SEE.
My life is sandbox I have to get up, go to work fulfil all tasks given to me in any order I decide best then go home after all this my time is my own but if I have nothing left to do I may as well go back to my safe house go to sleep and start the next days missions. This has all been a petty little rant I suppose but until single player titles take a leaf from the “BIG BOOK OF MMO BUILDING” they will always be an open world that you can complete.

Posted by Ian 

Eurogamer.net have a very nice article up at their site detailing all of the games released this week across all formats and we’ve gone and ‘borrowed’ the list for our site too so you can check them out for yourself:

Click on over to Eurogamer’s site to read their rather nice article in full

Word!

Posted by Ian

The US version of the Playstation store has had a couple of new maps for Unreal Tournament 3. Best of all they’re FREE!

There are 3 maps included in the pack:

• Morbias
• Facing Worlds
• Searchlight

Both Morbias and Facing Worlds are ideal deathmatch maps, whislt Searchlight is one for Capture the Flag games.

As listeners to the podcast may already know I’m sorely tempted to get the game for myself, but I’m waiting for the price to drop before picking it up. These free maps are a good indication that support for the game will continue (which is something I was worried about) so maybe now I will get it.

It’s already reduced to £29.99 at a couple of online sites I’ve noticed.

However, Sony Europe has yet to confirm whether us brits will be getting the maps for free on our store.

Hmmm….

Posted by Ian 

The C64 channel has now been released to the world via the gift of Nintendo’s Virtual Console.

The first two games for the new channel appeared today and are the previously announced Uridium (a horizontal, super smooth side scrolling shooter) and International Karate, the legendary kung-fu fighting game by Archer Mclean. I remember both C64 games fondly, and International Karate has some fantastic music

Both titles will set you back 500 Wii points (about £3.50).

In addition to these titles, Cruis ‘n  from the N64 has also been released. The normal costings for an N64 title apply here i.e. 1000 points (£7.50 in real money).

Posted by Ian 

At 10pm tonight the latest and last trailer for GTA 4 before it’s release next month went live.

Having watched the trailer several times now I can honestly say that I’m more excited about getting my hands on this game than I’ve ever been. Whilst the trailer follows in the tradition of the previous ones, i.e. no actual gameplay is shown, it’s comforting to know that all of the amazing visuals being presented are all running using the in-game engine.

The title of the trailer is “Good Lord, What are you doing? AKA Everyone’s a rat!” and the reason for this becomes clearer having now seen the trailer. It appears to give hints that some kind of double cross is going down in the game and that no-one can be trusted. Indeed, within the first few seconds of the movie an undercover cop (dressed in cool Hawaiian get-up) pulls a gun out shouting LCPD, just after a bank robbery has taken place. Also, the names of a number of gangs are announced with scenes seemingly depicting the leader of each gang claiming they’re the ones in charge and that this is their town.

Later, a large lady proclaims to Niko that “Everyone’s a rat!” “Not me” replies Niko.

I won’t ruin everything in the trailer by divulging the details of it all here, however, I will say that the graphical standard for sandbox games just got much higher. Explosions, gorgeous lighting, smoke trails, particle effects and smooth animation are all present and correct here.

Whilst there are a couple of occasions with slight slow-down, the game, on the whole appears to be running nice and smoothly - and this was confirmed a couple of weeks ago too by 1Up editors who’d been given the chance to play the game.

So GTA 4 is coming and it’s coming with a bang.

I for one cannot wait.

Watch the trailer now

You can watch the trailer at the official site by clicking here or by logging in to Xbox live, where’s its also available in HD.

Posted by Ian 

It’s a mere 2(ish) weeks away from release, the potentially biggest game of the year GTA 4 is nearly upon us.

To further celebrate this fact (or ram it down our throats), Rockstar will be releasing their final trailer of the game tonight at 10pm. The trailer entitled “Good Lord, what you doing? AKA Everyone’s a rat!” will be made available online (that’s the Internet) and presumeably Xbox Live too, seeing as that’s how all the previous trailers have rolled out.

No details have been provided about what we might see in the trailer, so to me it feels like Christmas Eve. Also, there’s been no word on when the trailer will appear on PSN either.

Posted by Ian

I was just trawling through the fine website that is Kotaku and noticed they had a picture up of Tanya Byron, the lady commissioned by Gordon Brown to produce a report detailing a new age rating scheme (amongst other things for games) - you can read more about that issue here

Anyway, I noticed that Kotaku actually had a picture of Ms. Byron. She’s actually pretty tidy. So tidy in fact that I decided to post the exact same picture of her here on our website.

So maybe this is the government’s new strategy to get us minions to sit up and take notice. Get your reports written by a hottie, that’ll get people interested in what you have to say. Just ask Ubisoft about that and Assassin’s Creed!

Posted by Ian 

There I was minding my own business, sitting in a northerly direction when all of a sudden there was a knock at the door!

Who could that be? I pondered as I made my way through the living room and into the hallway. As I approached the shining silver handle of our new UPVC door (white on the inside, brown on the outside - y’know like wood) a thousand thoughts raced through my mind, would it be something good, or would it be a middle aged woman asking for her Kleeneze kit back that she’s shoved through my letterbox the previous monday? This was all too much to take, so I just bit the bullet and opened the door.

Well blow me (no, not that way) it was only a UPS guy bravely battling the elements in order to return my repaired 360. What a man. Like an excited child who has just learned to write I scribbled my signature across the screen of his PDA delivery system thingy and snatched the box from his rain soaked mits.

As I opened the box I dared imagine the feelings I would soon experience if, instead of simply repairing my broken unit Microsoft had seen fit to raise me above the masses and elevate my status to ‘important’ by giving me an updated brand new 360 with a HDMI port.

Nope - it was my exact same 360 which, according to the enclosed documentation had had a new motherboard fitted.

So there you have it, I’m just run-of-the-mill scum to Microsoft and got my 360 repaired just like anyone else.

And irony of ironies I don’t even know if it works (and probably won’t find out till the weekend) cos I’ve just had GT5 Prologue drop through the door too. PS3 all the way for me later today.

WOOOO!