For the many new PSN games that were shown, the new Pixel Junk “Shooter”, previously known as 1-4 was playable on the floor. Another game shown on the floor worth mentioning was Gravity Crash. There were a few other games which I didn’t get to give them a go, such as Fat Princess and I regret that I didn’t get to try them all, but time was limited.

Pixel Junk Shooter, as you may have already known focuses on the stages of igneous. The game in theory doesn’t seem that interesting but in practice, it’s definitely fun. You are placed on a small ship and your objective is to break barriers to let the magma flow into the streams of water or vice versa to create new paths or open others. It’s not as simple as that since there are enemy lurkers floating about that will shoot you. When nearing the magma, a meter at the corner of the screen will rise up warning you that it is too hot and if you don’t cool it down, you won’t be able to get closer without using the sacs of water. The game overall was fun and if you like Pixel Junk Eden, then you’ll love Shooter. The controls are easy enough to get into and the concept isn’t hard to the point where you would feel discouraged not to play the game, in fact it’s nice and simple.

Gravity Crash was another game exclusive to the PSN that I got my hands on. The game feels like another classic remake and similar to Pixel Junk Shooter only without the water/lave gameplay. This doesn’t detract from the game as it replaces it with beautiful visuals, intense guns, good action, and small puzzles. The game also has an intense multi-player that is exactly like the single player so your objective is still simple, get the most points. All in all it was a good game.

Again there were many games on the floor as well as many games at the SCE/SOE booths so I didn’t have enough time to check them all out. Pixel Junk Shooters and Gravity Crash were two games I got to get my hands on and both were great. I wish I had more time with both games but they’ll be out soon and I’ll be able to play them then and so should our readers; both these games are a must buy if you have access to PSN money.

Well Sony and Square sure did slip one in under our noses didn’t they this year. In a year, where a lot of secrets dropped I can personally tell you that this game caught pretty much everyone in the Sony crowd off guard. There were multiple “Whats?” and cuss words yelled and mumbled out of shock when Jack Tretton revealed Final Fantasy XIV, and afterwards when he said it would be shipping in 2010. No one saw it coming.

It is quiet shocking considering that you rarely see games get revealed before the game before it hits, and a spin off is still in development. It’s like waiting for Pirates of the Caribbean 4 to drop and next week they reveal the 5th installment due out the same year. This just doesn’t happen, but hey you don’t see me or anyone else complaining about it.

It was quite a shocker at the moment, but after you think about it, it makes sense. We all knew that the Final Fantasy XI team was working on a new MMO, so it makes sense since we all know that this game was in development for at least 4-5 years. It just really makes it obvious though that XIII took a lot longer than originally expected.

This announcement was really just as big as Microsoft’s last year, but I gotta say that I don’t expect the game to stay permanently exclusive on the PS3. It may be timed exclusive until 2011, but Final Fantasy XI did very well on the 360 so I don’t see them dropping that entire group of their fanbase. This was probably Square’s way of making amends for pissing off every Cloud-cosplaying PS3 fanboy for last year’s fiasco. Also remember that even though the game is console exclusive to the PS3, it will still be on MMO’s number one platform which is PC.

Now let’s get to the game. As you can see the trailer really looks great, and personally I think it captures the feel of a Final Fantasy more than XI did just based off the character design, environments, etc. The game is not a sequel to Final Fantasy XI, but is set in it’s own unique world with a very similar character design. Most of the team from XI is working on this game because they obviously know what they are doing when it comes to the Final Fantasy world and console MMO’s. Another nice thing to know about the game is that famed video game composer Nobuo Uematsu will work on the game’s soundtrack. While Uematsu has worked on recent Final Fantasy’s his role has been diminished and he no longer works at Square Enix. It is nice to know that he will at least have some impact on the games soundtrack.

Hiromichi Tanaka talked about how in this game there will be content for people who only want to play 40 minutes a day and play by themselves, and there will be content for people who play 8-9 hours a day in large groups. They really want the game to appeal to fans of the single player and multiplayer Final Fantasy games. Director, Nobuaki Komoto, talked about the importance that the growth and development of a player’s character will be to the experience.

We are unsure on the combat system, the monthly charges, the ways characters upgrade, and the job system. Though one nice piece of news is that the game will be released worldwide simoultaneously. The game looks and sounds good so far, hopefully we will be able to get our hnds on it next year along with Final Fantasy XIII.

E3 just finished and wow were there a lot of amazing games showcased. From God of War III to the new Super Mario Galaxy there was a plethora of games for everyone, but nowadays as many of you know video game consoles are more than just gaming machines, they are home entertainment consoles. Microsoft showcased at their conference a number of new features and updates that look to change the way we interact with our consoles.

The first major thing was Twitter and Facebook. A mistake companies were making in the past were trying to make communities on their own instead of taking advantage of the already large ones. Nowadays nearly everyone who wants to connect with their friends through a network use Facebook and Twitter. These communities are for everyone, and people will be more excited to use these major networks rather than those who are only connected to gamers and only connected on their console. What this new feature does is allow gamers to connect more with their gamer friends, and allows non-gamers to get more in touch with the gaming community and maybe convince them to join. Also imagine you get home late and want to play a quick game of Gears 2, but also want to check your twitter. Instead of doing one on a computer and another on your 360, instead it’s all in one place. This feature will connect gamers more than ever before, and honestly thats a good thing because instead of bickering over silly arguments on the internet, instead we should just be enjoying our games together.

Last.fm is also a great feature for 360 owners to have. We have movies, photos, games, the internet, etc on our consoles but one thing that our systems are rarely used for is a music player. Yeah we may use music for in-game music, but with a lot of people having friends over and surround sound systems connected to their TV, do they ever take advantage of their 360 as solely a music player. Well that’s a no but now with Last.fm you have a reason to do just that. Will everyone use it? Probably not, but you gotta admit that it is nice to have. It will allow people to listen to new music based on their taste, and in such a busy world today we should really enjoy as much music as possible.

The most important thing they showed though was the instant streaming of 1080p video.Don’t even think it is impossible because I was fortunate enough to have a hands on demo done for me, and it works great. We watched the first couple minutes of Dark Knight in high quality 1080p and it only took about 2 seconds to start. After that we could fat forward, rewind, and move to different chapters at free will. No loading, the buffering, nothing. This is legit competition for Blu-Ray and it looks like both consoles. Now we will need to see how this technology works with different connection speeds, but obviously this will be a major upgrade over the current download speed

Then there are the smaller things like being able to do all your NetFlix browsing solely on your Xbox 360 and not on your PC. User ratings will also be added for game downloads so people can get an idea on what other gamers thought about the product. Of course there is also Sky TV that will be available this Autumn in the UK and Ireland. At the moment it is unknown which channels will be available to watch but Sky TV users will have a variety of On Demand and Live TV to watch straight from their Xbox.

The Xbox 360 has really grown from it’s early days. Now it has a large number of features that is slowly making other objects in your living room and office unnecessary. If you want to watch movies or TV shows you go to your 360, if you want to listen to new music or play some for your friends you can use your 360, if you want to talk to your friends about your day then you use your 360, and just the small things are making the system that great. While people have complained in the past about Microsoft charging $50 a year for Xbox Live, I think these added features make it pretty reasonable. While the Xbox will never get rid of the need for a computer or stereo system, the features they are adding make it that much more convenient to do what you want when you want it.

NEWS:

Sony has had sports franchises since the beginning of their videogame console entry. NFL Gameday , MLB The Show, and NBA The Inside. The announcement of Kobe Bryant signing with 2K Sports comes as a shock considering that no one person has promoted two different basketball games at the same time, so where does that leave the next iteration of the NBA The Inside videogame.

HERE’s 2 OPTIONS
1. Sony is going to sign up another basketball star to be the face of the games going forward (MOST LIKELY)
2. Sony is opting out of the basketball genre similar to the NFL Gameday franchise (Very Possible Considering the low sales and lack of popularity when compared to NBA LIVE and NBA 2K)

Now here’s a Quote From The Legend Himself Kobe Bryant

“I’ve been playing sports video games for as long as I can remember and honestly, I’ve never seen one come so close to replicating real basketball. What 2K Sports has done is truly incredible and I’m proud to be a partner with them and on the cover of NBA 2K10,” said Bryant, currently seeking his fourth career NBA championship. “2K Sports is constantly improving and adding something new to their game every year that makes them better and better, and that’s exactly what I try to do each season with my game. It’s as if 2K Sports has been on a sports video game championship run for several years now, and I’m not even sure there’s a word for that kind of dominance.”

Either way be prepared to cross – over and slam dunk with NBA 2K10 later this fall with the legendary Kobe Bryant.

Written By: Gerard (HipHopGamer) Williams

This E3 has had an insane amount of amazing games shown so far. It could be hard for certain ‘good’ games to stand out among a competitive crowd. Only the best of the best really stand out, and Assassin’s Creed 2 is one of those handful of amazing games. The rest of the staff and myself have had a lot of information thrown at us this week about AC2, and so far all of it has been nothing but great.

Let me talk about some of the things you guys may not know about the game. The staff had the chance to have a private demo shown and the chance to ask some questions. The most important thing we wanted to know was if the game would be less “repetitive” this time around, and the guys at Ubisoft assured us that this game would have more variety then we would know what to do with. Our presenter told us that around the office repetitive is considered the “r word”, so they know all about the complaints from the first game.

Repetitiveness is the past though and AC2 is the future, and the future looks bright. I asked if we would follow the same structure when wanting to perform an assassination such as collecting lots of evidence and then performing the mission. I was told that assassinations would be diverse and that even in the demo Ezio doesn’t collect evidence to start his assassination.

I also asked about two things people really wanted to see after playing the first game. The first was whether of not we would spend more time as Desmond in this game, and that was greeted with a happy “Yes”. The second thing I was curious about was whether or not we’d spend more time and do missions outside of the main cities, and this was also greeted with a “Yes”.

As many of you know Leonardo Da Vinci will play a role in this game. This was shown in the demo both at the PS3 conference and for us privately when Ezio uses one of Da Vinci’s flying inventions to swoop down and get to the place needed to commence the assassination. I was curious as to whether we’d see more “vehicles” or big inventions from Da Vinci. Obviously, the guys at Ubisoft didn’t want to spoil their secrets but they did say that “there will be more things in the game that you can use to your advantage. An example used were the gondolas, and that Ezio could interact with them in the game.

The first game looked great and this one looks even better. They are using a modified version of the first games engine, and the level of detail in both the city and people are incredible. There is more variety among the crowds, better shadowing/lighting, and better water effects. The guys at Ubisoft actually have a historian to make sure everything in the game is accurate for the time (with some minor exceptions for fun), and the level designers flew to Italy so they could get a feel for the environment. The game has a morning, noon, dusk, and night lighting cycle which is a nice addition from the first game.

The combat system also has some nice additions such as hand to hand combat, more alert enemies, and more weapons. In hand to hand combat you can take a enemies weapon and make it your own. We were promised that there would be a wide variety of weapons at our disposal. Also if you go into a bail of hay and a enemy hears you then they may go and check it out. This sets you up for a quick and easy kill as you reach up and take the enemy out.

That’s just what we learned in a 10 min demo. Patrice Desilets, creative director on the game, told us that he game will be 20+ hours so imagine the possibilities. There will be a large amount of side missions, and the game looks to be building off the great foundation the first game set. The first had, and still has, a lot of great things going for it. The sequel looks to be one of the better games of the generation. The game drops this Fall, and if you havent already checked out the new gameply footage that was revealed at the Sony Press Conference then what are you waiting for?