AndrewTS

I GOT IT!!! Here's the thing--when you activate the death blow, once it's "triggered," if you repeat the motion again before you strike (i.e. while "winding up"), you'll get a powered up deathblow strike (with those white triangles and electricity and stuff). You may have been flailing repeatedly and activated it by accident. So for example, you get the "up" arrow. You move the wiimote "up." Then right as you're about to do the uppercut slice, motion "up" again before it goes out--there's your powered-up strike. BTW, if you drive the motorcycle into the river you warp back to the hotel.

I've been using the Tsubaki since it was first available and switched to the Tsubaki II, and it doesn't ring a bell. I'm currently ranked number 3, so I'm not too far from the end of the game. However, I've been doing some side missions although I have enough cash for the next fight, because a) I love hacking up these nameless thugs, and b) I am a consumer whore. I've bought like half the shirts available in Area 51. The 100 man massacre is just pure chaos and fun, and it's worth a heck of a lot of cash, too. Some of the more recent encounters were a lot different from the earlier ones. Except the game to throw a lot of weird surprises near the end at you. Sequel, plz.

Yeah, the art style and insane bosses are the bulk of the killer7 influence, while gameplay is entirely different. Plus it's pretty quick to earn the cash if you just want to do the missions and move on. I've been racking up cash and doing upgrading, because I had a tough time getting to #7. However, I am getting way better at crowd control, too. I did it, though, and am currently ranked 7. I took the Mild difficulty (sweet is Easy, Mild's normal, and I assume a hard mode is unlockable), FWIW, but even so it's never been nearly as tough as God Hand.

EBstop says Feb. 1 for Canada, probably because of dual-language requirements.

Despite complete lack of faith at first, I'd heard a lot of positive things about it and picked it up when it finally was available in store today. Apparently it's been released in limited quantities. Very, very limited. The reviews have been good: http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/wii/nomoreheroes After 6 1/2 hours of actually playing it--it's damn good. It has technical issues out the wazoo (the free roam mode? Loaded with pop-in, slowdown, and framerate issues, despite having few people or interactive aspects of the environment). Its art style works for the game but isn't terribly impressive. There are also some strange design decisions that betray the developers' lack of experience with this sort of title. Despite that, the meat of the game, the combat and boss encounters, is a blast. Standard beam attacks are A, wrestling moves/grabs are B, and finishing strikes are either a quick swipe with the wii remote (for beam finishers) or a combination of wiimote/nunchuck motions for the wrestling moves. Depending on the position you hold the wii remote, you'll either attack with High strikes or Low strikes, which extend to your combos and your charged beam attack. For example, in a typical encounter you might back up 3 guys against the wall, slashing at them until you've stunned them all. Your finishing strike window pops up, you slash from left to right, decapitating two of them (resulting in geysers of blood of Kill-Bill-style proportions), leaving one behind. You might get in close, hold B for a hold, and thrust the wiimote and nunchuck upward together, suplexing the remaining baddie. When you stand up, a tap of the B button will finish the job with a downward stabbing attack. The action scene level designs, which vary from level to level, may repeat themselves a bit during that level, however. Enemy variety is good, although it seems like the weapons make basically all the difference (unsurprisingly, the biggest threats are projective-equipped baddies). Your typical action level is basically going to be combat-heavy, although there are some nice twists like a home-run derby set of encounters (where you can go to bat with the wiimote, and knock down a row of thugs in "Warrior" baseball uniforms--say, that's a confusing reference...), and a scene where you have to haul ass past some sprinklers that are shocking you due to your beam katana. The AI is pretty stupid; enemies with stand off in the distance down the hallway, waiting until you get close enough before they'll act. Using the scenery to exploit these weaknesses is fun though. The humor and boss encounters bring to mind both Grasshopper Manufacture's Killer 7 as well as God Hand. You're got your idiotic pervert main character, bitchy tease of a female lead, bombastic and windbag bosses who seem to all gotta have a gimmick, and naturally, comedic levels of over-the-top ultraviolence. The most spectacular is the Dark Side modes (all named after...Travis' favorite desserts), like one where Travis fires energy from his sword, that cause enemies to be blasted in half, or another where the screen goes black and white, and you can single-strike kill on screen enemies in a flash. The free roam city hub world, while it does the job, is probably the weakest part of the game. You can get from mission to mission fairly quickly thanks to your bike, but you ofter have to trek back to a job office to trigger a new one, and there does not appear to be any warp stations. You can collect cash and items to upgrade your abilities (training at a gym, learning new moves by buying wrestling tapes, etc), but strangely the "free fight" missions reset if you fail one, seemingly reappearing at random. For the most part, you can bypass buying extra stuff and quickly earn the money you need to challenge the next boss. However, you can take your time and try to collect a lot of the other bonuses (which seems to be a joke in and of itself). Overall, a strange, strange, somewhat wonderful game that I'd fully recommend to Killer 7 fans and God Hand fans, and cautiously recommend to anyone else. The game could have done with a little less quirk and a lot more polish, but the end result is a still a great trip. Well, if you can find it.

Well, this is Fox News, where the idea of "fair and balanced coverage" is putting on a guy like Alan Combes, a liberal (assuming he's not just a character) who seems to be so spineless his body must be held up by a system of weights and pulleys. I'm hoping that Jon Stewart has a take on this, but I guess it doesn't even require jokes. It makes its own gravy.

I want Nintendo to release the most controversial Virtual Console games they can find so these idiots can freak out more. River City Ransom with Partial Nudity descriptor (The GBA upgrade did get a T rating, incidentally...)! Count on it!

Okay, agreed on that. I think tag team modes make up for it, mostly (and I'm glad heel and face versions of characters are available at all times once unlocked), but I don't know why they broke something that didn't need any changes. That would be sound reasoning if all those kids grew out of it. Thing is, a lot of them didn't, and you need only look to PC gaming and the HD systems to see that. Or look at the popularity of Youtube videos like the AVGN videos. Or look at the sales of Halo 3. Your average console gamer today is probably in their 20s. I know that was the general area for the demographics on the consoles last generation. My colleagues at work are virtually all 18-35, and nearly every guy there at least has some interest in gaming. Hell, I have a supervisor who plays ROMs on his custom firmware PSP on his lunch. I know there's figures pointing out that the average gamer age is much, much older, but that's usually skewed by counting people who play solitaire and bejeweled on their computers.

Nuh-uh. I'd say the control and collision are much tighter than the flippy-floppy Smackdown games, and I notice far fewer graphical glitches overall. Other than that, it's practically the same game as those, minus the completely broken stat system, cheap-ass AI, and fewer game modes. XX added way more gameplay modes, but the replacement for the story mode (that freaking tedious career mode) does indeed suck. The original Rumble Roses was thick with lesbian overtones in the story mode, but it was played for laughs anyway. Losing that was the biggest thing that lost it points for the folks who liked RR. Rumble Roses 3 with returning story mode, plz.

It's actually quite unusual for a game to come out this recent and then the freak outs beginning. Usually it's either so long after that it isn't even relevant, or way before the thing even comes out (see: Bully, 25 to Life, and whatever game that idiot lawyer ends up crusading over).

http://www.joystiq.com/2008/01/21/keighley...sexbox-sexpose/ I have no words... "What happened to Atari, and pinball!!?" Geoff Keighley is there to provide a level-headed, informed perspective that is repeatedly interrupted and completely ignored by "experts" babbling on about this pr0n game they dreamed up that doesn't exist.

Some people swear by Turbo, but Super SF2 (released today) is the way to go, I'd say.... However, that's if we're just talking VC. Super Turbo is available in various forms for other systems.

I thought the internet collectively goes "the Lair guys? Oh, crap." I'm hoping it's a DS side scroller, though.

TOPIC SUBTITLE (cuz the board cut it off... : = Crackdown + Hulk: Ultimate Destruction + Assassin's Creed + Akira?) Sneak-peek before X-Play: http://kotaku.com/346304/prototype-trailer-is-raw-jumpy X-Play showing of the demo: http://on-pause.blogspot.com/2008/01/x-pla...otype-demo.html Some other game info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype_(game) I'm pretty much sold...

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=229565 If previous SNK collections are any indication, it'll probably retail $15-$20 (aka, Gamestop will charge that extra $5). Most of these games have superior sequels in better compilations (Metal Slug Anthology), but it's a solid mix of games in many genres.

Game is published by Eidos, and was supposed to come out ages ago, on PS2 and Xbox. And the developer (at least this current incarnation) is Widescreen Games, who developed such fine titles as Dead to Rights II and Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer. Maybe with Eidos' high publishing standards, they'll really crack the whip on--HAHA, just kidding. I'd say we can write this bitch off.

Maybe, but it's probably because the T-1000 didn't pull something random and insane out its ass. It stuck to the movie/character's own internal logic fairly well. T-X could do anything T3's shitty writing called for it to be able to do, except when you needed a reason for the movie to actually continue. The rule's been called into question ever since T2, with excuses for T-1000 supposedly arriving via something like a "skin bag" or somehow being so advanced it passed for "living." However, T2 never mentioned it one way or the other, I don't think. Did SCC ever address it directly?

This week's Virtual Console releases are Pac-Attack for SNES, and Riot Zone for TG16. Pac-Attack is a decent little puzzle game. Riot Zone appears to be a beat 'em up where some blond guy who wears a white shirt and jeans and/or a roid freak in a mohawk walks right and punches bad guys, because said bad guys kidnapped blond guy's girlfriend.

Dreamcast had a great launch, actually. It was the PS2 E3 hype and subsequent publisher abandonment that dug it an early grave.

Silt: Man in Blak Ripper Venkman Matt Young Rock: NYU KOAB Slayer Treble Culture: Alfdogg Kinetic VX Bob Barron Powder: Black Lushus E. MacPhisto Al Keiper Scroby

Earth Defense Force = big fun, even though it's a ridiculously cheaply-made and stupid game. Earth Defense Force + playing split-screen co-op + one friend who is also a sci-fi/b-movie nut + playing the Misfits' Famous Monsters album through the harddrive = big, big, big fun.

So they can claim higher "damages."

Googling this company returns absolutely no results other than stuff in relation to this lawsuit. "The parasite asks, 'Where is my share?'" Hooray for vague patent squatting and lawsuits from companies that don't make anything.

Oh, and Resistance 2 has a Game Informer cover story.

I await gameplay footage. This may surprise some, but I never played a real Lego Star Wars game (just a demo that didn't strike me as all that great), so I'm skeptical.