Nintendo Is King

For the first time since the SNES, Nintendo is now dominating the console wars. According to The Financial Times, Nintendo has surpassed Microsoft as the top selling next-generation console. The sad thing for Microsoft is that the Wii has been on the market for less than 1 year unlike the Xbox 360! Analists attribute the Wii dominance due to it’s low cost and broad gamer appeal. The Wii surpassed the PS3 worldwide sales since July 2007.

It’ll be interesting to see how long Nintendo can hold the #1 spot, especially with the imminate launch of Halo 3. The question that is on every analyst’s mind is, have all the Halo fans already purchased a Xbox 360? If they have, the Xbox 360 might be #2 for potentially the rest of the console cycle.

Mario

Tron sequel, and no I’m not talking Tron 2.0

Tron, one of the first movie to use digital effects instead of practical effects, and probably the first to do it well. It’s been a cult classic for many years, and a point of inspiration for many game designers and digital effect engineers, yet we’ve never seen a sequel. Well it seems that some development is a brewing with in good ‘le Buena Vista. In recent years there have been attempts at making a sequel to the original movie, a notable one being that CGI studio Pixar was going to make one. Now, however, we have a report from the Hollywood reporter that the Light Cycles, MCP and Tron will be returning to the silver screen.

The report says that the original writer and director, Steven Lisberger, will be producing the movie with a man named Sean Bailey(producer of Matchstick Men). The movie’s writers will be Eddie Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, of Lost fame. The director? A relative no name, Joseph Kosinski, who will be directing the 2010 remake of Logan’s Run. There’s no set date or year when we’ll see it, but I doubt it’ll be soon.

Personally, I’d love to see a sequel. The first movie stands up well for a movie about video games before the big Nintendo boom. The movie’s art style blends beautifully with the digital effects they used for the movie. A sequel’s also troubling though with how video games are seen today. The first Tron was a fun, family friendly sci-fi classic, but I fear they might make it a preachy anti-violent game movie, or even worse, a cliche’d video game geek comedy-sci-fi fusion. Hopefully, with the original director and Lost’s writers on the project, we’ll see a sequel that’ll stand up as well as the original… but if they ruin the light cycles the wrath of thousand’s of people’s childhood memories will come crashing down around them.

[Via: Hollywood Reporter]

Ninja Gaiden 2 – the teaser, the screenshots, the announcement.

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This whole saga starts yesterday, when several gaming sites got their filthy hands on screenshots of Ninja Gaiden 2, which was reportedly on the Xbox Japan website before it disappeared. Apparently, someone at Redmond Japan had screwed up the site, because the big anouncement was supposed to happen at the pre-Tokyo Game Show Presser. You can find the concerned screenshots at the bottom.

At the top, you can see the teaser of the game, which was shown off at the Presser. It shows the game’s protagonist, with chic graphics and stuff, but it’s just a godforsaken teaser. The screenshots, on the other hand, are full of blood, gore, decapitations and other ninja-ness.

What will it feature? A brand new engine and a “finishing blows” system have been guaranteed. There will be a sort of health regeneration feature with “semi-permanent damage restored at save points”, whatever that means. You will fight as Ryu again in Ninja Gaiden 2 for a good 30 or so hours of story-mode gameplay. Ninja Gaiden will be Xbox 360 exclusive and will come out somewhere in 2008.

Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 1 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 2 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 3 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 4 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 5 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 6 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 7 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 8 Ninja Gaiden 2 Screenshot 9

Guitar Hero III for PC, Mac is for real!

Guitar Hero 3

Now, if you’re a PC-purist like me, you’ve probably been goaded endlessly by console fans for not possessing a Guitar Hero game. Fear no more PC enthusiast, salvation is at hand. Aspyr Media has announced that they will be churning out versions of Guitar Hero III for the PC and Mac platforms this very fall!

What will it have? Read it straight from the press release:

Being developed and published exclusively by Aspyr, the PC and Mac versions will match their console counterparts with explosive new content and features including a multiplayer action-inspired battle mode, grueling boss battles, a host of exclusive unlockable content and visually stunning rock venues.

With more than 70 songs in the set list, and more original master tracks than ever before, players will be able to shred from many of the freshest and hottest artists today, along with many of the most popular rock songs ever recorded.

Expanded online multiplayer game modes will also allow PC and Mac enthusiasts to rip head-to-head against players around the world and across either platform, raising the level of competition for true legendary rock status.

Impressive, indeed! For more details, head over to Aspyr’s page!

Halo 3 Midnight Launch Schedule

While 10,000 retailers across the nation will be opening at midnight to sell Halo 3, only four will have a true “Midnight Madness.”

Halo Silverlight

New York City – Best Buy, 529 5th Ave, New York, NY, 10017
Seattle – Best Buy, 457 120th Ave NE, Bellevue, WA 98005
Los Angeles – Gamestop, 1000 Universal Studios Blvd, Universal City, CA 91608
Miami – Circuit City, 8575 Northwest 13th Terrace, Miami, FL 33126

Will all feature free merchandise and get a chance to play Halo 3 with local celebrities in on-site Game with Fame sessions!

If you’ve ever watched the StuffWeLike.com Podcast before – you’ll know where we’ll be. We’ll be doing the podcast at Universal Citywalk (seems like we always do…)

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Microsoft continues the Halo 3 propaganda with several other sweepstakes:

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