Archive for September, 2008
Buzz Impressions
Posted by Darrin in Uncategorized on September 30th, 2008
Pros
- Great Trivia Game I haven’t played a triva in years, and I’ve forgotten how much fun they can be. I played with several non-gamer tyeps and they loved it. If you have social, non-gamer-type friends over, or want to play with kids (my step-daughter can hold her own in the cartoon category), this game is perfect.
- Buzz Controllers Wireless, simple, easy to use, and fun. They’re perfect trivia controllers.
- Large Question Bank I haven’t seen any duplicate questions yet. Very impressive. The game also has some photo and video questions which are fun as well.
- Great Extras Fun couch-photos with PlayStation Eye, user created questions, online modes, DLC trivia packs. (I haven’t had a chance to play with all these extras yet).
- Polish, Presentation, Interface All the animations, transitions, question-modes, and character selection adds a lot of polish to the core game.
Cons
- Wireless USB Dongle This is a minor nitpick, but worth mentioning. The PS3 has native wireless. Why do all custom wireless controllers need a dongle? I think I know the answer but it’s not a good excuse. Bluetooth is more expensive and simple wireless controllers want to use cheaper, simpler RF. Ultimately, the PS3 should have been designed to support custom wireless controllers (whether it’s Bluetooth, RF, or whatever) without the need for USB dongles.
- Limited variety of inter-question transitions, announcer chatter, and animations
Bottom Line
This is a surprise hit. The core trivia game is so utterly simple, I’m surprised how fun it can be. This title pushes the genre with all the polish and extras.
Nice KZ2 Footage
Posted by Blackstaffer in Killzone 2 on September 29th, 2008
It’s small, and there are no enemies, but it’s still fun to watch:
Killzone 2 Beta Keys
Posted by T0SH in Killzone 2, QuickNews on September 26th, 2008
Source – If you live in Europe check your e-mail to see if your lucky enough to get into the Killzone 2 beta. No word on other regions .. yet.
WipEout HD ImprEssions
Posted by T0SH in Wipeout HD on September 26th, 2008
I heard people having issues with the game freezing and online not working. But I didn’t have a chance to play this game until later last night. So maybe it was fixed by then, because I played for over a hour and it played flawlessly. I even tried online.
I created a game and I noticed there is a friend reserve type option. I thought cool, I can invite and reserve a spot for friends. But no, you can not, or I’m not seeing how to do it.
Anyway the gameplay is great, classic WipEout action in gorgeous 1080P. The have a few new weapons which are fun. The pilot assist mode is perfect for people new to the series, it helps steer you away from the walls. You can turn if off if you want. I finished the first 2 sections of the campaign, and got a few trophies for it already.
Click for full size
The photo above is from the zone mode which looks amazing in motion. The walls and street are just a huge music visualizer. You can see it in the photo. In the zone mode you are alone on the track and with each zone you clear your ship gets faster and the neon looking highway your on, changes color in front of your eyes, it’s a great effect! You just keep going until your ship takes enough damage to fall apart.
WipEout has been around since the PS1 days, I actually remember playing the demo that came with my brand new PS1 long ago before I got my first PS1 game (which was Twisted Metal for the curious).
I’m excited to put together a custom techno playlist for WipEout. In fact NeoGAF has already done that, check it out here.
In short buy this game. It’s a steal at $19.99. It’s everything you want in a futuristic racer and more.
Calling out the Blu-Ray Haters
Posted by Darrin in Uncategorized on September 25th, 2008
It’s doesn’t get more clear cut than this, folks. Engadget is calling out tech blogs for hating on Blu-Ray.
Engadget is accusing sites of cherry picking a single 13% week over week decline and spinning that into an overall trend, while ignoring neighboring weeks where the format shows much stronger gains and also ignoring other stats showing bigger picture rises in blu-ray sales.
They call out ArsTechnica and Slashdot by name. Engadget writes:
for some reason, the 13 percent drop in Blu-ray sales last week got a lot of attention. What we can’t figure out is why the 30 percent increases during the two weeks before (combined) went unnoticed. It boggles the mind why so many so-called tech evangelists only pick up on the bad weeks
Either way, when movies like the Forbidden Kingdom and TV shows like Terminator are stealing double digits away from DVD, sales are not down. But hey, predicting the end of Blu-ray is just so much more fun than actually analyzing all the data, isn’t it? Ah well, we’ll let the haters hate — meanwhile, we’ll continue to enjoy the highest quality hi-def around.
A report from August on afterdawn.com cites Home Media Research, showing a clear rise on Blu-Ray disc sales:
According to Home Media Research compiled by the Redhill Group, it appears that Blu-ray sales are actually quite solid for the year, and up 300 percent year-on-year from 2007.
The research says that Blu-ray movies are selling at about 1.14 million per month on average for the year, for a total of about 8 million. The combined total for 2006 and 2007 was about 6 million discs sold.
ITWorld also paints a negative picture without citing any market research or any data whatsoever. In an article titled, “Blu-Ray hits the skids, numbers continue to decline”, they write:
The cause could be a variety of factors, from the failing economy to the summer gaming doldrums, but the effect is clear: Blu-Ray as a media format is in decline.
As a side note, here is a tutorial, that just come out today, for writing your own BD-J applications in Java that can be played on any Blu-Ray player.
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