While Mario continues to dominate video games, his other at one time much loved company icon, Sonic the Hedgehog isn’t doing as well. Even when packaged with Mario in that Olympic Games game Sonic can’t seem to win anything.

So here’s an idea, get one of the best RPG developers, Bioware, to make a Sonic the Hedgehog RPG. Yep that’s right sometime in 2008 Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood will be released on the DS. Really a Sonic RPG??

Thanks Videogamer.com.

Check out the other screen shots.

YES! YES! YES!!! Thank you EA. They are a bit pissed about the total joke and travesty that was Fox’s report the other day on their newly acquired master piece that is Mass Effect. We already posted the video here, take a look if you wanna get mad about something.

Anyways EA sent a letter to the good folks at Fox asking them to correct some miss-statements that were in their report. Here’s some of the letter :

Your headline above the televised story read: “New videogame shows full digital nudity and sex.” Fact: Mass Effect does not include explicit or frontal nudity. Love scenes in non-interactive sequences include side and profile shots - a vantage frequently used in many prime-time television shows. It’s also worth noting that the game requires players to develop complex relationships before characters can become intimate and players can chose to avoid the love scenes altogether.FNC voice-over reporter says: “You’ll see full digital nudity and the ability for players to engage in graphic sex.”
Fact: Sex scenes in Mass Effect are not graphic. These scenes are very similar to sex sequences frequently seen on network television in prime time.

FNC reporter says: “Critics say Mass Effect is being marketed to kids and teenagers.”
Fact: That is flat out false. Mass Effect and all related marketing has been reviewed by the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) and rated Mature - appropriate for players 17-years and older. ESRB routinely counsels retailers on requesting proof of age in selling M-rated titles and the system has been lauded by members of Congress and the Federal Trade Commission. In practical terms, the ratings work as well or better than those used for warning viewers about television content.

Remember that little wrap up they had after cutting off Geoff Keighley with the ignorant people who have no business talking video games? They mention them to here “They have had zero experience with Mass Effect and are largely ignorant about videogames, the people who play them, and the ESRB system that governs their ratings and sales.”

Then they finish the whole thing with this :

“The resulting coverage was insulting to the men and women who spent years creating a game which is acclaimed by critics for its high creative standards. As video games continue to take audiences away from television, we expect to see more TV news stories warning parents about the corrupting influence of interactive entertainment. But this represents a new level of recklessness.Do you watch the Fox Network? Do you watch Family Guy? Have you ever seen The OC? Do you think the sexual situations in Mass Effect are any more graphic than scenes routinely aired on those shows? Do you honestly believe that young people have more exposure to Mass Effect than to those prime time shows?

This isn’t a legal threat; it’s an appeal to your sense of fairness. We’re asking FNC to correct the record on Mass Effect.”

Sincerely,

Jeff Brown
Vice President of Communications
Electronic Arts, Inc.

Thank you very much EA. You may be a huge video game company eater but you showed that you do care about the products your recently acquired developers produce. You chose not to let just the online gaming sites and gamers be the voice for this travesty and put some real weight behind this matter.

Thanks Kotaku

Ah, how many puns can you get out of one game title? Good stuff.I know it’s Fox News, but wow that’s ignorant. Just watch the video and you’ll see what I mean. Fox News decides to take on yet another subject they know nothing about. Funny thing is, they get one panelist that actually does know what’s happening. Enter Geoff Keighley, SpikeTV and GameTrailers.com video game journalist.

I have to say, watching this really just fills me with ragohol. To see a bunch of people with no knowledge of a subject whatsoever bash and tear it apart makes me a little sad. However, all is not lost. Game journalist, Geoff Keighley, took a stand for truth, justice, and Mass Effect. The “news” piece attempted to take on the growing controversy over the highly popular (and sweet) Xbox 360 game Mass Effect and it’s “sex scene”.

I could go into all the reasons why these people are wrong and stupid. I could go into why they all suck and don’t know what they’re talking about because they’re all to busy pimping their own book or promoting their own agenda, but I won’t. I’ll let you do that. As a gamer, having played Mass Effect or not, what do you think about this atrocity of news journalism? All I have to say is, Bravo for trying Mr. Keighley. Bravo.

Source: GamerNode

Boom!

With all the stories that flow around the Internet about how video games are making kids kill. How they are ruining America’s youth it’s nice to hear this little story. Video games can save lives to. Paxton Galvanek was the first on the scene of a rolled over SUV. He pulled the pair of passengers out of the SUV and then took care of their wounds.

Want to know where he got his training? How about from the video game America’s Army. Yea that’s right from a video game. A recruitment game for the US Army no less. Maybe some of those ignorant journalists that claim video games are evil will choke on their words for just a second before they decide games are evil without even playing them.

Check it out at Yahoo.

A few chaps over at BusinessWeek discuss if video games are still for kids. In other word….are gamers losers still? Or is gaming a viable form of entertainment?

Humankind’s epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet.” However stellar the game play, that’s basically the 1990 movie Tremors minus Kevin Bacon.

-Derek Thompson on Gears Of War.

So wait….I’m slightly confused here….Is he saying it’s a bad thing to be similar to Tremors? That’s news to me! Does he realize that it had Reba in it? Probably not.

Take for instance, last year’s sleeper hit, BioShock from 2K Games, a first-person shooter. The game’s narrative and dystopian setting wove an argument about the relationship between power and freedom, ultimately building to a rejection of Ayn Rand’s objectivist philosophy. Not exactly Mario territory.

-Matt Vella

Gaming in general is becoming more and more sophisticated. So….how long before “Gamers” loose the stereotype of….well…lets have Derek describe it since he did so magnificently in the article.

Today, the average gamer is 33, part of a $7 billion national industry, and, well, possibly still living with his parents.

[slow clap] Yes……ooooh yes! How very comical indeed! You sir are marvelous! Now where was I? Ah yes! Reading my Shakespeare!

Source - BusinessWeek

The word epic is tossed around allot today. I for one have been reluctant in the past to use epic when describing video games. Well today I choose to use epic for a video game. That game is Mass Effect. The shear scale of this game is pretty amazing. I feel I must start this by saying that I am not the biggest RPG fan out there. Yea I loved KOTOR, but that was Star Wars and I like me some Star Wars. Besides KOTOR I’ve never played a RPG I loved until Mass Effect. I really wasn’t even all that stoked on this game in the first place, but in the spirit of equal opportunity I gave Mass Effect a chance. I sure am glad I did. More…

Well file this under no surprise. Make a game that everyone praises. Put it in a great atmosphere with a great story and next thing you know its a movie.

This comes for Joystiq they said:

” A reliable source within a major film production company has told Joystiq that the two have been getting along famously, with a movie adaptation of 2K’s successful franchise already being discussed by the Big Daddies internally.”

I could make the usual “video game movies suck” speech but hey you all already know they suck.

So Thursday night I was heading home at about 9 o’clock. With thoughts of Mass Effect swirling in my head I pushed the gas to the floor only to run into some traffic a mere 1/4 mile from my home. As I crested the hill I noticed at least 20 or more flashing police cars. Something is wrong, this can’t be good I thought. As my car creep closer to the nearest police car I noticed traffic was being diverted away from my road.

“Excuse me officer can I get to my road from the other side?”

Officer “Yea I think its open”

So I made my way around to the other side only to be stopped by another police officer who informed me that I cannot go home. Why, why can’t I go home? I need my Xbox 360! So I headed to a local Publix parking lot. I spotted a policeman and pulled up next to him.

“Excuse me sir, whats going on?”

Officer #2 “Two police officers were serving a warrant, when they were fired at and wounded”

What followed was a 14 hour standoff in which the suspect barricaded himself in his room firing at SWAT teams that tried to enter the home on several occasions. “Tear” gas was fired into the house as well as concussion grenades. The next morning they stormed the house to find the suspect dead in a closet. The standoff was over and both officers that were wounded were both in stable condition and are going to make a full recovery.

But what’s this got to do with video games? Well with a combination of being late and a little laziness mixed in, I LEFT MY XBOX ON! Oh no 16 hours of my beloved baby just sitting there heating up waiting for the dreaded RED RING OF DEATH to set in. What was I to do? “Ummm officer do you think I could be let through the barricade so I can turn off my Xbox? I swear I’ll come right back out!” So I spent the evening at a friends house keeping up with the standoff and worrying about my baby. I spent the night sleeping on the floor only to wake up and still not be able to go home yet. There was a story of a doctor who lived on the street, who had a helicopter fly in and pick him up. Sadly my helicopter crew wasn’t available so that option was gone.

Finally though the standoff ended and we were allowed to go home. I rushed to my house with fear and anxiety rushing all over me. I bounded up the stairs like a gitty school girl that had a pony waiting for her. Would my baby’s beautiful green eyes be turned to red?

I burst through the door and was nothing but relieved as I saw the green light still burning bright. I couldn’t turn it off fast enough. I let it cool down for about a day and turned to back on. I am proud to say it is still working today. I guess I’m lucky. The horrific epidemic that is the red ring of death has not struck me yet. I know of quite a few friends who have been afflicted by it. One guy 5 times, no lie folks 5 times.

I know that the red ring of death could strike at anytime but I feel like I got away with one on this occasion. To all who have had to get a cardboard coffin and be without your Xbox for 4-6 weeks I salute you.

The swirling tornado of Xbox 360 rumors that has been tearing its way through the Counter Agent offices for the last week is starting to die out. So far there has been no announcement from the folks at Microsoft at CES about the much hyped HD/DVD integration on the 360.

According to Kotaku Microsoft issued this statement concerning those rumors:

“We have reiterated multiple times since launching the Xbox 360 HD-DVD Player that we have no plans to integrate an HD-DVD player in to the Xbox 360. We feel that offering the drive externally is the best way to give consumers the ultimate choice to create their own high-definition experiences.”

Makes no sense to me but hey I’m just a guy who plays video games.

Thanks Kotaku

Street Fighter 4 (or IV for all the Romans out there) is being hyped like crazy. The folks over at 1up.com have managed to get some exclusive playtime with the upcoming fighter. The information is very limited and stretched out to 3 pages of not much more than “the game looks very good” and “we can’t wait” or “they couldn’t tell us more than that”. They do tell us a little about a new “saving system” (not save as in save your game’s progress, but save as in block/parry), a “revenge gauge”, and new “ultra combos”. Read the full article over at 1up.com for the details.

All of the new screens they’ve just posted are the same ones the entire internet had their hands on last week, including us. In case you missed it, here they are.

[Show as slideshow]

Boom!