Oh, you still haven’t seen the latest trailers for Final Fantasy XIII and Versus XIII? Man, we thought everyone had seen those old things by now. We guess you weren’t hip enough to get into Square Enix’s “Closed Theater” at the Tokyo Game Show earlier this year. Well, no worries, said trailers were recently released on the Re: Final Fantasy XIII DVD and, following Newton’s Fourth Law of Gaming Media Distribution, were unceremoniously ripped off their discs and launched into the internet. For as long as they remain unmoderated, we’ve got both posted after the break. Just make sure you’re wearing appropriate protective eyewear, as many of you may find them eye-meltingly gorgeous.

Posted in Everything, PS3

BioWare has unleashed the first in-game footage from its upcoming Star Wars MMO, The Old Republic. Presented in documentary format, it’s quite heavy on lightsaber dueling (thankfully with ones less chubby than those in the above screenshot). The footage also shows a few brief glimpses of world traversal and combat against NPC creatures, including a K’lor’slug. Unfortunately, the video quality doesn’t show off the game’s visual nuances all that well, but LucasArts has told us that an HD version of the documentary will arrive on Monday, December 15. You can watch the current video (warning: it autoplays) after the break. And for the deep analysis, head over to Massively.
Posted in Everything, PC

Quick Rundown
+great graphics
+good story
+BLOOD!
+chainsaw on a gun!
+achievements are slightly easier to get
-still limited to 2 people split-screening in multi-player
-new characters disappear without need
Basically since the launch of Gears 2 it has been pretty much all I have been playing, other than that I work.  This game is awesome! Gears of War 2 includes a total of 10 new multiplayer maps, plus a code to download five remastered maps from the original game. The new maps take inspiration from the locations in the campaign, whereas new environmental effects change some of the maps as you’re playing. For example, th map “Hail” features razor-sharp rain that gradually kills anyone out in the open. Furthermore, “Day One” has a huge emergence hole in which a beast can take swipes at any surrounding players. Finally, “Avalanche” is completely transformed when a snowstorm hits, turning it from a multi-tiered level into one flat plane. These environmental effects aren’t feature in every map and game mode, but they definitely liven up standard deathmatch-style multiplayer game types such as Warzone.

The original Gears of War was a spectacular-looking game, and the sequel maintains this high technical and artistic quality. Instead of pushing for increased visual fidelity, the graphics engine adds a couple of other dimensions to the presentation, with walls that crumble under gunfire and dozens of enemies onscreen at once. These new features don’t necessarily affect the gameplay, but they look good and help add to the dramatic scale that the designers have chosen. The new organic capabilities of the Unreal Engine make for one particularly memorable level in which you literally have to kill a giant enemy from the inside. Gears of War 2 also has impeccable sound design, with terrific voice acting, meatier weapon effects, and another beautiful cinematic score.
Gears of War 2 has a lot in common with its predecessor, but the new environments, darker

Most players like to think of their 360 and PS3 as safe havens from the scurrilous tricksters who like to mold PC games to their own will with all manner of hacks and mods. Apparently, though, their vile influence has seeped into the the 360 version of Left 4 Dead. Yes kids … the console version. We don’t know how they’re doing it (witchcraft?) and frankly, we don’t want to know. The Ars Technica piece about the issues includes terrifying details like witches spawning in the safe room and giant player characters. (We’re told there’s also human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together and mass hysteria.) Witness the horror for yourself below.

Posted in Everything, PS3, Xbox 360

Look, we’re lazy. We’re content to wait for the Resident Evil 5 demo to come to us. X3F? Sure, our Xbox brethren are lazy, too. But they’re also fanboys. And fanboys leap at the chance to play anything, no matter what the cost (in this case, a 48-hour Xbox Live trial code), before the other guys. So, without further ado … (here’s the part where you press “play.”)
Posted in 1

Developer Terminal Reality isn’t ruling out the chance that the final holdout from the original Ghostbusters cast, Rick Moranis (Louis Tully), will lend his voice to its upcoming game. Still, he’s not present or accounted for in the latest trailer for the Xbox 360, PS3, and PC version of Ghostbusters: The Videogame. But oh is it dripping with Ghostbusters vibe like so much ectoplasm. Atari, the new publisher of this June 2009 title, has also released a handful of new shots from the next-gen and Wii vers

Assuredly, one of the biggest complaints about Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune was the lack of precipitation in the form of ice crystals, mainly of theintricately branched, hexagonal form. In a 30-second teaser trailer for the now-revealed Uncharted 2 (via GameTrailers), developer Naughty Dog has assuaged that concern by proving once and for all that Nathan Drake can exist in a frosty tundra. Don’t believe us? See for yourself (video is embedded after the break). As hinted by the trailer, more information is

Fan-made movies typically fluctuate in quality from “total waste of time” to “amusing, but probably still not a great use of time.” But we have to admit that the trailer from Eddie Lebron’s upcoming Mega Man flick has us intrigued. You can see it just after the jump. Though we’re excited to see the robo-battles, we’re a little nervous about being exposed to Dr. Wily’s mustache for any considerable span of time. Is he serious with that thing? It looks like he let Mr. Snuffleupagus sleep on hi

If you’ve been champing at the bit to play some Guitar Hero, but have found that the music contained therein just doesn’t meld with your Christian values, you may be in luck. Digital Praise, a maker of Christian computer games, has released Guitar Praise, which is basically a Christian rock version of Guitar Hero. The game replaces such Guitar Hero staples as Primus, Rage Against the Machine, and Butthole Surfers with artists including Nate Sallie, Petra, and Jonah33. As far as I can tell from the promo

Not sure what to think about Square Enix’s newly unveiled DS title Blood of Bahamut? Well, we’re pretty sure the Japanese debut trailer isn’t going to provide much in the way of answers. What you will get: snippets of dual-screen gameplay showing off massive enemies that are highly reminiscent of Shadow of the Colossus’ lumbering giants … except with laser eyes. You can size up the trailer after the break.
Posted in DS, Everything

Quick Run-Down
+Story
+Graphics
+Options
+Comedic
-Options
-Fairly Short

Fable 2 picks up 500 years after the first game, taking place in a version of Albion that has advanced to repeating rifles and grand downtown villas, although magic and fantasy are still very much intact. The evil Prince Lucien, struggling with the death of his wife and child, has embarked on a twisted mission to locate and eliminate the remaining Heroes in Albion, whom the main character must eventually rescue, reunite and collaborat

Little Big Planet captured players’ hearts and free time with its unmistakable mix of ingenuity and cute. Now it appears that Microsoft has its own plan to tap into players’ creative wellspring with Boku, a new XNA project billed by The Seattle Times blog as a “visual programming language for kids.” Hello World. Following a previous demonstration of the project in 2007, Boku was officially unveiled this week by project lead Matthew MacLaurin during Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference in

If you’re a fan of Sonic the Hedgehog’s non-video game outings, you’d be wise to check out the trailer for an upcoming animated short featuring Sega’s spiny mascot, titled Night of the Werehog. The movie, which will be available online sometime before the launch of Sonic Unleashed, features the speedster (in his new, lupine form) battling all manner of unmannerly ghosts. Though the trailer (which we’ve courteously posted after the break), doesn’t do much to tell how the short relates to the stor

Last week, a trailer surfaced on YouTube purporting to be for Guitar Hero: Metallica. Reported as an unlockable Easter egg in Guitar Hero World Tour, the 27-second spot trailer offered only a tiny taste of what the game might hold, with a brief snippet of the speed-metal quartet’s 1986 hit “Master of Puppets.” After telling viewers to “Unleash your metal god,” the trailer flashes the logo for the game, due out sometime next year. Now, with the expiration of the press embargo on Guitar Hero: World

If you’re interested to see how Rock Band 2 and Guitar Hero: World Tour’s 16 shared songs match up to one another, look no further than YouTube. While there are certainly others (and undoubtedly more to follow suit), user Gurra100 has a playlist of comparison videos (embedded after the break). Everything we’ve seen so far looks unsurprisingly identical (update: scratch that, we just watched “Go Your Own Way,” not so identical at all). Take note how GH:WT handles a Rock Band 2 set, namely, it’s s

Blizzard has created a new weapon for World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King that temporarily transforms you into into Bergrisst, the rhythm guitarist of cross-medium metal group Level 80 Elite Chief Tauren, complete with a shred-tacular guitar solo. The axe, dubbed the Arcanite Ripper (based on the Arcanite Reaper), is dropped by Tenris Mirkblood in Karazhan. We’ve embedded video of the Ripper, courtesy of WoW Insider, after the break. Here’s hoping the rest of the band makes an enchanted item cameo

After forcing us to settle for some blurrycam footage of the BioShock 2: Sea of Dreams teaser stuffed into the PS3 release of BioShock’s capacious BD-ROM, 2K Games has finally wised up and released a direct-feed trailer (which we’ve wrangled into a Flash-prison for you above). If you’d rather check it out on your Plasmatron holovision, you can take a look at the Xbox Live Marketplace and/or the PlayStation Network … really, we won’t mind. Now, as to whether or not the sequel will see a simultaneou

We’re sure it’ll be endlessly debated, but the Gears of War 2 ad “Last Day” may have just topped the moving and oft-parodied “Mad World” ad for the first game. The 60-second commercial features the track “How it Ends” by DeVotchKa (available from your preferred online music store). Before screaming that the ad “totally rips off” the original Gears ad, it’s probably good to know that it was created by the same team that designed the first. Check out “Last Day” after the break. Now,

With the handheld’s Nov. 1 release just around the bend in Japan, Nintendo has released a new “informational video” showing off the user interface, camera functionality, and DSi store for the Nintendo DSi. As expected, there’s a lot of wacky face-stretching and bestickering of cute photos to be found, along with some hah-larious pitch modulation of recorded voice clips. You know, like the voice changers you’ve tried on XBL and PSN for all of two minutes. The DSi store and the DSi’s revamped UI a