Alrighty I have A LOT to talk about today, and it's all over the place so rather then splitting it off since there's not much console specific news as there is development news, I'm just gonna lay it all out. I'll try too keep it all organised as possible though. Enjoy!
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XBOX 360
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Originally Posted by Gizmodo
It's not the first time we've heard rumblings of a new Xbox 360, but apparently this time around it's pretty close to official. A store in Australia has confirmed that Microsoft reps have been showing a new line of black 360s with 120GB hard drives. Rumor has it the new 360s will also have HDMI. The black 360s will go for $584 (US) a pop. Microsoft won't verify the rumor, but considering the PS3 is about to make its debut down under, this ain't that far-fetched at all.
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That's quite a price tag, especially since it won't have an HD player built in. While it is double the amount of space then the PS3, that would be a tough sell back home after most ppl already have one.
HALO 3 NEWS
Bungie says that Halo 3's single player is now completed, and they just need to go over it working on difficulty and adding polish. They had already released pics a while ago and ppl weren't impressed. Most ppl say that was a bad move on their marketing as you kinda feel let down since it's nowhere near what you expected. Bungie still says that it was very early on but from what we see it just looks like Halo 2 only slightly prettier.
GAMES
Age of Conan: Hyborean Age could possibly be the MMORPG 360 fans are looking for on the 360, especially after WoW has been taken over as the best MMORPG ever made, we'll see how that goes once it's released.
Blue Dragon, the one sole Japanese title for the Xbox is finally coming to the states by the end of the year. I read it's a great RPG, one the 360 definitely needs, and fans of DBZ well be happy to find out that it's based on Toriyama's art style.
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SONY PS3 & PSP
With that said, theres a possible price break coming along for Sony's PS3. They're talking about either scrapping the 20gb version or lowering the 60gb version, which they see would be more effective. In the end they know that it is software that will help pay for their losses of the systems, but right now they just need them to sell first.
And in other pricing news, in preparation for the PS3's launch in Europe next month, a UK retailer stated to take preorders for the PS3 ONLY if you buy a PSP. And not any PSP, but a PSP bundle that comes with more crap. So all in all, you would be spending close to $1300+ when this launches out there. F*ck that.
PS3 ONLINE
Sony is also having online issues with the PS3. They're still having many problems getting games to work online. When asked about whether the same games that are on the 360 would be playable online for the PS3, the developers sorta shrugged and said, "I guess theoretically it could work". And another nail in the coffin
Virtua Fighter 5 will not be online play as of right now for the PS3. So hold on till the 360's version!
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NINTENDO
DS NEWS
The DS is now the most selling system in Japan, followed by the Wii, PS3, then 360.
Talks about whether Nintendo would try and again redesign the DS with a larger screen seems to point to NO, buuuut, that might be because they are working on the next generation DS portable. Don't worry it won't be coming out anytime soon, but the word is, it will pretty much be the Gamecube in portable form since they have already successfully shrunk the GC's chipset. This would definitely ramp up the graphics on the DS producing even more detailed games.
Also this Sunday there will be a massive shipment again everywhere for Wii's and DSs since both systems now are incredibly hard to find. I suggest you get both! But if you can't, a DS is the way to go. Toy's R Us would be the safest bet, since they get larger shipments. Call to make sure.
Guitar Hero is heading to...actually they don't say! While at first it's obvious it's coming out for the Wii there's speculation that there might be a Guitar Hero for the DS. How is that possible? Well anything's possible with that little gizmo...
Pokemon Battle Revolution will be the first Wii game to be online enabled. And while you're not exactly fighting in realtime, since it is turnbased it's still considered online multiplayer.
Sonic and the Secret Rings should be out by the end of this month as well as
WiiPlay next week. And then
Cooking Mama: Cook Off soon to come.
Mario Party will be pushed back from March till who knows when.
VIRTUAL CONSOLE NEWS
Super Mario World,
Link to the Past,
Mario Kart are on the VC now, with
Paper Mario making it's way by the end of April as well as a new Wii version of it to come out as well.
One and half million games on the VC have been sold around in America alone.
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DEVELOPMENT NEWS
This month of February is the official month of which they will cease production of the GDROM discs that were so popularly used by the
Dreamcast. So this in fact is the official month that the DC dies. Sad I know.
Blizzard has stated that their next big project might involve
Diablo or
Starcraft! There's a toss up of whether their next big MMORPG will be based in the world of Starcraft. No one knows for sure, but that they will be working on something new for both series.
Currently while Microsoft brags about how well Gears of War sold and how quick,
World of Warcraft's expansion pack Burning Crusade outsold Gears in less then a week, it was singly the most sold expansion/game so far. That's alot of geeks.
2K is finally getting back into the game. The football game that is. The popular
Visual Concepts team 2KSports is coming out with a fictional football league game after being pushed over by
EA when they bought the exclusive rights to the NFL. This is great news since we know how great their games were. Many ppl say because Visual Concepts sold their games for $20 it forced EA to by out the rights because they were losing that much off Madden's football. While sad as it might be, lets hope we can create our own teams in the new game.
I might have mentioned this last time but
Rare will be developing a new game for Live Arcade. This is just the beginning for developers that will start creating games soley for the Arcade.
Speaking of online downloadables, there's a chance
SegaCD games might make it to Nintendo's VC. While it's a bit odd, they're not ruling it out. There is also speculation that
SuperScope games might make it out to the VC using the Wiimote but that's still up in the air. There's also a high demand for them to release
Saturn games. But the problem is the Wii does not carry enough internal memory to save games of that size. But if you do have larger SD cards that would solve the problem.
And finally unfortunately
Goldeneye would never see the light of day on the VC, or Live Arcade, as the licensing and rights are split all over the place it would be impossible to get it on one system alone.
As for
Perfect Dark 64 it's up in the air whether it would be on the VC or Live Arcade if at all.
And
DVD Empire is having a massive blowout sale on games, due to the fact that they are getting out of the gaming dealing bizniz. They feel as though the gaming industry is screwing them over as far as small dealers go and see not enough profit coming from selling them. So head on over there to see what you can pick up!
That's all for now. It didn't seem alot when I wrote it all down but once I add the old Ghost charm it adds up! Hopefully you'll find something of interest. Until next time!
