G-pinions

Tom was definitely right about our lack of updates and Halo 2's multiplayer goodness having someone to do with one another. Not that it's a good thing. I'm over the initial hump of addictiveness though, I've settled into an easy-going two hours a night. I can stop any time I want to...and I actually would like to finish the single-player game so that I can A) finish San Andreas, B) play through Ratchet and Clank: UYA, and C) purchase and play through Metal Gear Solid 3. In that order, ideally. I'd also like to get to a couple other of the seventy-five thousand games that came out this/last/next week, but as you can see, my gaming plate is full.

It's been hard to follow much news with the deluge of games recently (and their subsequent reviews and whiny bitch threads), but one piece that caught my eye yesterday involved Tekken 5 being multi-platform. It's since been debunked as not having been official (even though it came from Famitsu), but I can almost guarantee it will end up happening regardless. Soul Caliber did well on all three systems, and hey, free money for Namco. But I swear to fuck, if PS2 gets stuck with Heihachi again as an exclusive character while Gamecube gets Charles Bronson and Xbox gets Jesse Ventura, I'll be less than pleased. Who plays fighting games on those systems anyway? Mormons?

Another choice piece of news - EA is about to snap up Digital Illusions (DICE), the developer of Battlefield 1942. That, I do not care about. What I do care about is that their next casual purchase will apparently be Free Radical, creators of the fantawesome Timesplitters series. And Second Sight. In what's sure to be viewed as a pro-EA comment, I'm fine with it. EA can't really get much more popular/powerful than they are now, so I don't think it affects them much outside of sheer ducket intake. But, as with Criterion, it gives a great, underappreciated developer the money and marketing that they need to get noticed from here on out. Not that either company's games were sleepers, per se, but they certainly weren't on the top ten either. I suppose EA could just publish both developer's next several games and not have to buy them outright, but if they can afford it, it makes sense. Hell, EA should just jump into the console race at this point. They have more (and better) second party developers than Nintendo, and only they have the license to make a console shaped like John Madden's head.

I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but Stubbs the Zombie in "Rebel Without a Pulse" is going to rule. The developer, Wideload Games, is founded and led by Alex Seropian, the founder of Bungie. And the game is being published by Aspyr Media, who published lots of awesome Mac games back in the day (well, back in MY day of playing Mac games). Wideload is all about making funny games, and it sounds like hilarious fun so far. Check it, straight from IGN: "Stubbs employs numerous means of attack including his zombie strength to bust down doors, the ability to eat brains, transforming enemies into his own personal horde, the ability to possess humans and to use your body as a weapon. On this last front, he's got explosive gut grenades, zombie sputum, a severed hand (that can crawl through tight spaces and possess the living), a head (that doubles as an unholy bowling ball), and powerful flatulence. That's zombie power!"
Sounds like a winner. Plus, it uses the fucking Halo 2 engine, so it looks tits too.





And, based on the soundtrack that they announced today, it will sound incredible as well. It consists of some of my favorite indie/regular rock bands such as Ben Kweller, Death Cab For Cutie and Cake doing covers of 50's songs, such as "Lollipop", "Earth Angel", and "Strangers in the Night", respectively. In a zombie game. Made by the founder of Bungie. Does anyone not think this game will be awesome? Can this great gaming year finish so another one can start already?