Wednesday, November 17, 2010

PSP2 leaked?




The rumor-mill never stops turning as leaked images have found their way onto the great white expanse that is the internet. We've already covered the supposed images of the PSP Phone, now we finally have an idea on what the PSP2 could conceivably be.
VG247 has two images of what looks like a PSP Go with TWO THUMBSTICKS!

Hell, it truly is about fuckin' time!


Bioware will announce newest game at Spike VGAs

Bioware has announced that it will reveal its newest game at the Spike Video Game Awards on December 11th. A trailer from Spike has been provided with very brief glimpses of the new game. Nothing else is available but people have come to the conclusion that it is Mass Effect related. As the soldier in the image is holding a rifle that apparently is available in Mass Effect 2. It's far too early for it to be Mass Effect 3, so it's possibly a spinoff of Mass Effect 2. Or a continuation of it, much like Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood. We have 4 weeks to go till we find out.

Fallout: New Vegas DLC named and detailed

George Washington's corpse approves.

Bethesda has announced the name, date and content of the first DLC for Fallout: New Vegas. The DLC is titled "Dead Money" and will feature a new area, possibly new companions, new quests and more of the stuff you want from the game. It is scheduled to be released in December 21st. Don't forget this DLC is exclusive to Xbox 360. Though this is expected to be temporary.

Monday, November 15, 2010

Diablo 3 coming to consoles? [UPDATED]

On the official job listings page for Blizzard Entertianment's official site shows a laundry list of positions. Most surprising is a listing for game programmers for the Diablo 3 section. However, these are listed as programmers for consoles. Does this mean that console gamers can expect a port of Blizzard's next big game? I'd say it's quite likely, as the first Diablo game was ported over to the original Playstation way back when. And with Diablo 3 being touted as being so easy you can control it with only a mouse, a console port could be real simple.

UPDATE: Blizzard has come out and clarified their job postings as a "Diablo-Related Concept" that they are interested in exploring. Not so much Diablo 3.

Naturally the PC snobs of the world were pissed off at the idea of the dirty console scum suckers touching their glorious pie. As if giving them a piece would sully the pie as a whole, but Blizzard has assured that the PC and MAC version will be their priority and no console interpretation will affect the final product in anyway.

Marvel vs Capcom 3 dables into Marvel C-listers with She-Hulk...oh and Zero too

The crossover fighting game Marvel vs Capcom 3 has just announced two new challengers. Zero from the Megaman series, and She-Hulk? Really? Well whatever, the videos of the two new fighters are available online.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Sly 4 Teaser Trailer Discovered


A teaser trailer for Sly 4 has been uncovered today from the Sly Cooper HD Collection for the PS3. Turns out if you can achieve a platinum trophy for all three games, an option appears in the main menu that takes you to the trailer. A pretty nice easter egg, if we do say so ourselves.

The Sly series has always been developed by Sucker Punch, however they are currently still hard at work with Infamous 2- which is still a full year away. So it's unsure when Sly 4 will be released, unless it's being developed by another developer, but it's far too early to speculate.

Here's the shaky cam video of the teaser.


Saturday, November 13, 2010

"What went wrong with Metroid?" Nintendo wants to know.



Here's an ironically funny- if not sad story. According to Kotaku, Nintendo is looking into what exactly went wrong with the sales of their latest Triple-A title Metroid: Other M.

Sales for the new Metroid game have been modest but Nintendo was expecting to sell at least a million copies. As it stands now, the game has sold half that, and their initial goal is no longer expected to be achievable. Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime told Kotaku
"We're not going to get there, not through the holiday. And we are doing a lot of thinking as to why. Because it's a great game. The consumer reaction because of the quality has been strong. We're doing a lot of thinking about why we didn't get there. I think the marketing was strong, advertising was very good, the social media we did was very positive."
Reviews for the game really have been mixed overall. Most have praised the game for it's visuals -especially for a console that has not been known to produce beautiful graphics. Many have also been warm to the unique gameplay as a mix of third person brawling and first person shooting. However, there has been equal parts criticisms of the game, from the story, the controls, voice acting and what is perhaps the most heavily criticized aspect is the characterization of famed video game heroine Samus Aran.

When asked about the handling of the Samus character, Reggie Fils-Aime added,
"First off, I have nothing but the greatest respect for the development team. Mr. Sakamoto (co-creator of Metoid) did a wonderful job. His partnership with us in promoting the game was stellar. Team Ninja is absolutely fabulous. I'm not going to sit here and criticize a style of the game, but have I read the same feedback that said, broadly, that the portrayal of Samus felt different than how the player in the past had internalized the character? I've heard and read the same feedback. Do I think it's warranted or not? I'm not quite sure yet... I don't yet believe that that is the driving factor to the performance of the game."
Game Cop isn't a site run by Game's analysts but we can offer a list of things that could have contributed to the unexpected sales for Metroid: Other M.

1. Wii owners are not interested in big budget action games.
2. People who were interested in the game don't want to play it on the Wii.
3. The voice acting is horrendous
4. The story is needlessly melodramatic
5. No one knew what sense to make of the game despite the commercials.

We'll be posting a Metroid: Other M Post-mortem before the end of the year. So you'll know exactly what we thought of the game in the near future.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Nintendo files trademark on 'It's on like Donkey Kong?'


According to CNN, Nintendo has filed a trademark with the patent office in order to secure the trading rights to an Ice Cube lyric in which Ice says, "It's on like Donkey Kong."

More than likely this is a result of Donkey Kong Country Returns being released soon. Of course we're surprised why it took them this long to act. But we're even more surprised that you can at least file a trademark on something that is already copywrited by another artist. Who knew?

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Armed Robbers make off with over 100 copies of COD: Black Ops



Well today marks the release date for one of 2010's most anticipated titles Call of Duty: Black Ops from Treyarch.

Unfortunately two men were a little too excited and decided to roll on into their local Gamestop in Hardford County on Sunday, armed with handguns and demanded the store hand over their entire stock of the game. The Baltimore Sun says that they carried out four crates full of the game, making well over 100 copies of Black Ops. They must be big fans.

The Baltimore Sun also suspects that these men were involved in other gaming related robberies in the nearby area. Looks like Gamestop is quickly becoming the new 7-11 in terms of robbery hot zones. Which is quite sad considering that Gamestops are terrible places to pick up slushees while robbing.

Heavy Rain Behind-the-Scenes video fills some plot holes

We here at Game Cop are fans of Quantic Dreams' interactive drama Heavy Rain. Despite this however, the game is still broken from a narrative perspective. Plot lines were brought up early on and then quickly forgotten about, characters knew things they shouldn't and even Helen Keller could tell that the child actors couldn't speak with a convincing American accent.


But the following video was posted on the Playstation Network showing some concept art and deleted scenes in which some of the plot holes were at one time filled.

Let this be a lesson to aspiring writers, it's ideal not to cut important plot elements out of your story at the last minute.

Of course it's up to you to decide what's worse: aggravating plot holes, or inexplicable paranormal elements?

*Spoilers ahead*


Monday, November 1, 2010

Direct TV drops G4, like the bag of bricks that it is.


Well apparently Olivia Munn leaving G4 was all that was needed for Direct TV to drop the *cough* video game network that we all know and love. Apparently, ratings have been at an all time low for too long. The satellite provider has decided that it will no longer carry this...awesome? network about...video games?

Direct TV representative clarifies,
Since G4 is among the lowest rated networks based on the latest Nielsen data, we decided that it made sense to focus on preserving programming that is more relevant to our larger customer base.
A G4 rep replied with the following statement, no doubt without a straight face.
We have been trying to engage DirecTV in fair and reasonable discussions to continue to carry G4. G4 offered DirecTV the same basic deal we have had for the past three years. However they still plan to drop the network and deny G4 fans the only network that focuses on the popular gaming lifestyle.
Truly this is a disastrous event for humanity. Where else will Direct TV gamers get their nonstop reruns of shows people stopped caring about a decade ago? Truly these are the end of days!