Extreme-Gamer Info

We've recently seen augmented reality used in some pretty clever ways in the gaming space, but Sony subsidiary ConnectedED has come up with a way to turn real-time graphical overlays into an educational tool. Using a PSP equipped with a camera, the "Second Sight" technology allows tags embedded in textbooks or magazines to cue relevant audio or video clips directly on the PSP. The program can also create interactive 3D models which the user can examine by changing the orientation of the PSP. Check out the video after the jump to see a video demonstration of what we're talking about, and then imagine how awesome school is going to be in like, fifteen years. [Via Siliconera]

Continue reading 'Second Sight' turns PSP camera into an augmented reality learning ..read more

The latest episode of PlayStation Network's Pulse revealed the top ten downloaded PSP games for 2010 so far. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that Square Enix's classic PSone RPGs have topped the list in the first quarter of the year. Only one mini makes it into the top 10: Tetris, whose steep $10 price tag apparently hasn't scared everyone away. 1. Final Fantasy VII (PSP/PS3) 2. Final Fantasy VIII (PSP/PS3) 3. Tetris 4. God of War: Chains of Olympus 5. Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories 6. LittleBigPlanet 7. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories 8. Madden NFL 10 9. Gran Turismo 10. Resident Evil 2 (PSP/PS3)

Final Fantasy and Tetris top PSP's sales charts for 2010 (so far) originally appeared on Joystiq on Sat, 20 Mar 2010 00:00:00 EST. Please see ..read more

It's official: Aksys Games is localizing BlazBlue: Continuum Shift for North America. Continuum Shift, the sequel to Arc System Works' high-resolution 2D fighting game, will be released on Xbox 360 and PS3 this summer. Like the Japanese release, this updated version adds new characters. It also adds new modes, including a Beginner Mode, which simplifies the control scheme, a Challenge Mode with specific missions for each character, and Legion Mode, a mini-strategy game in which players fight enemies to gain control of a map. "If you're not on the hype train this time, you're missing out on the latest greatest 2D game from Arc", Aksys marketing director Gail Salamanca said in a quote we can't help but pass along, "GET HYPE, CHOO CHOO!"

Aksys announces North American release, ..read more

If our comprehensive video preview of Fat Princess for PSP whet your appetite for more, you'll be glad to know that the full experience isn't too far away. Fistful of Cake will be appearing on both UMD and PSN on April 27, promising "new game modes, new maps, a new extended storyline for single player." And although the single player options have been greatly expanded, multiplayer remains a big focus for the game, with 8-player Ad-Hoc and Infrastructure support. The PlayStation.Blog features a Q&A, a new trailer (posted after the break) and box art. Curiously missing from the announcement, however, is a price. An SCEA rep told us the price has yet to be "100% confirmed," and that an announcement would be forthcoming.

Continue reading Fat Princess: ..read more

On the same conference call earlier this week in which it talked about its new rewards program, GameStop Executive VP of Merchandising, Tony Bartel, said that stores currently experiencing Wii and PlayStation 3 shortages probably won't find relief very soon. While the retailer is always bugging Sony and Nintendo for more units, Bartel said that GameStop "could sell a lot more hardware than what we have on both the PS3 and Wii platform," and that situation probably won't change until early summer of this year. He did say that the Wii is due for a re-supply first, but he believes that both Nintendo and Sony are "still scrambling to catch up from the surge" of the last holiday season. But a shortage like this isn't unprecedented ..read more

Watch as the always unlikable duo of Kane and Lynch (that's Bruce Willis and Jamie Foxx to you People magazine types) get reunited on the streets of Shanghai and, before catching up over a couple cold ones, find themselves caught up in a shootout and chasing a naked person through the streets. This is just how these guys get acquainted after "a while" apart! Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days welcomes you to Shanghai on August 24.

Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days trailer welcomes you to Shanghai originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The thing about Wii MotionPlus is that there haven't been a whole lot of games supporting it. Outside of last summer's Wii Sports Resort (and upcoming Red Steel 2 and Flingsmash) there's really only some sports games utilizing the tech. According to a recent interview with Reggie over at MTV Multiplayer, it's because Nintendo isn't really pushing for any kind of control scheme from third parties. "What's unique with Nintendo is we don't force our developers to stick to a particular type of control scheme, and you've seen that -- everything from the new Metroid title to be single remote driven to FlingSmash utilizing the Wii MotionPlus," he said. "So it's all about what's right for the game." While we're inclined to agree with the latter ..read more

The Official Nintendo Magazine UK is hanging out at tonight's BAFTA Video Game awards, and has punched into its Twitter account that not only did it get to talk to one Shigeru Miyamoto, but that he's confirmed Pikmin 3 is in development and "well under way." Over a year ago, the game was rumored to be released a week-and-a-half from now, but we'll presume it's not quite that far along in development. Still, good to hear that the game is still going on, considering that we've only seen the barest sprouts of information about it so far. Maybe Miyamoto should give his team a 30-day time limit within which to finish the game, and see how they feel about that.

Miyamoto confirms Pikmin 3 development 'well underway' ..read more

Nintendo designer and Donkey Kong creator Shigeru Miyamoto was in London today to pick up his BAFTA fellowship award, an honor he reciprocated by delivering his acceptance speech in pure English. What did Miyamoto have to say, specifically about Pikmin?

According to the tweet-reporting of the Official Nintendo Magazine UK, Mr. Miyamoto offered the briefest of Pikmin updates. He says the third game in the series, which originated on the GameCube, is "well under way." Sure, we've known for some time that Nintendo is making another Pikmin game, but that it's "well under way" (and not forgotten) is at least comforting.

Hopefully, Miyamoto and Nintendo will have something more substantial for us at this year's E3 show than just an apology. We'd love to be able to ..read more

North American fans of the two-dimensional fighting game will get their fisticuffs fix with the release of BlazBlue: Continuum Shift on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 this summer, the follow up to last year's BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger.

While not a full-fledged sequel to Calamity Trigger, BlazBlue: Continuum Shift's incremental updates—three new playable characters, Tsubaki, μ-12 and Hazama—will make the new release that much more definitive for the serious fighting game follower.

Western publisher Aksys Games hasn't nailed down a specific date yet for Guilty Gear maker Arc System Works' arcade port, but it has reminded us of the new features, which include new moves, new Tutorial and Beginner modes, and additional fresh but more superficial trimmings, like new music and stages.

It's the perfect holdover for your next ..read more

Great. We're pretty certain Square Enix is going to make another one of these videos now. With sales of "more than one million units in North America over the first five days," Square Enix has good reason for that smug look on its face. Taking into account European sales, Final Fantasy XIII has "recorded the largest first-week sales in franchise history." A number of factors undoubtedly contributed to the record-breaking success of the latest iteration of the JRPG series. Not only is it the first numbered Final Fantasy game on a current generation system, but it's also the first game in the franchise to appear on two platforms -- and two continents -- simultaneously. Finally, it's been nearly four years since the release of Final Fantasy ..read more

The stylish, HD-retro PixelJunk games are among the highlights on the PlayStation platform. But another cult favorite, Demon's Souls, beat the series to its latest clever innovation.

The spring update to the first PixelJunk game, PixelJunk Racers, will add the ability for players to summon and race against the ghost of any player on their PlayStation friends list or anywhere on the game's leaderboard.

How?

Dylan Cuthbert, chief of PixelJunk studio Q-Games, told Kotaku at a recent live showcase of the add-on that PixelJunk Racers: 2nd Lap takes advantage of a PlayStation 3 "user data" service. The technology, he said, popped up on his radar last year. His team wanted to use it in one of their games. The user data service can pull player data from anyone ..read more

In a recent interview with CVG, Sega West president Mike Hayes spoke briefly on the future of the company's portfolio of intellectual properties. Hayes explained, "If you think about it, we can sequel-ise Bayonetta, AvP, Alpha Protocol and we can make a hit of something like Vanquish." Those are some mighty bold plans, considering only two of those games have actually been released. We're fairly unsurprised by Sega's interest in a follow-up to Bayonetta. Not only because it's been a commercial success for the company, but also because the developers need another chance to do all the crazy action sequences they couldn't fit in the first game. Like, for instance, throwing a church at a dragon. Wait, they did that in Bayonetta? How about riding a ..read more

Every week, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them. After a week of being under the weather, we're back with to explore the depths of Murmurs' mailbox and to find out just how much junk he really has in his trunk. It's another week. Another week and I still don't have my 'OP' version of Starfall to play around with. Do you have any idea how upset this makes me? I mean, honestly, all I really want to do right now is slap on my PvE gear and run screaming through the Horde turtle in AV and watch as Starfall obliterates everything in my path. Is that asking too much? Since I don't have legions of dead Horde bodies to entertain ..read more

We wouldn't have thought a digital video recorder attachment for the PS3 would be a particularly hot seller in Japan, but the neverending lines spiraling from the front doors of Japanese retailers are proving otherwise. Andriasang recently passed along a Famitsu report explaining how shops are quickly selling out of the standalone version of the torne DVR peripheral -- though the 250GB PS3 which comes with the device built into its frame isn't selling quite as expediently. If the device's popularity has inspired you to import one, you should know that it's only capable of recording Japanese terrestrial TV signals. As such, we also suggest you simultaneously purchase around 5,500 miles of coaxial cable.

Japanese retailers selling out of PS3 'torne' DVR peripheral originally appeared on Joystiq ..read more

I care little for kart-racing games and seldom generate any user-generated content. So, to be honest, I did not rush at the chance I was given last week to play ModNation Racers at Game Developer's Conference 2010. My mistake.

ModNation Racers is indeed a kart-racing game built on a foundation that supports and encourages user-generated content.

The game's features no longer scare me away, because the 20 or so minutes I spent trying it and hearing about it from Dan Sochan, producer at ModNation development studio United Front Games, convinced me this game can be a lot of fun.

Sochan first had me try "Drive to Create," possibly because this is a delightful element of the game. Using the PlayStation 3 controller's triggers and thumbsticks as if I ..read more

The video embedded above, WoW.com's Lich King Tutorial, marks the arrival of Jerome Phillips (also known as Vodka's Kinaesthesia) to our team. He has a lot of talent and a lot of ideas, so we're happy to have him. You've probably seen some of his work before, most notably his trailer for Patch 3.3's Frozen Halls. This Lich King tutorial is just the first of many projects we'll be doing together, so we hope you enjoy it and find it useful. Due to the length of the encounter (and thus the tutorial), it has been split into two parts. The first part is above, and the second part is behind the cut below. As is true with all things in life, these videos are best ..read more

Commander Shepard can pick up the keys to the Hammerhead hover tank on March 23, the official release date of the Firewalker pack. The new wheels, er, propulsion things are the latest piece of free Mass Effect 2 DLC. Available through the game's Cerberus Network, the pack includes five missions that utilize the new vehicle -- which will hopefully handle a little better than the first game's infamous space car. (Of course, a drunk Krogan successfully engineering a Geth self-destruct algorithm was more likely to yield success than the Mako's control system ... )

Mass Effect 2 'Firewalker' DLC coming March 23 originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The eagerly anticipated follow-up to the game that launched the puzzle-RPG genre, Puzzle Quest, will be playable at PAX East next weekend, if you can manage to pry us away from the controls.

Now I can't speak for Stephen Totilo, my partner in PAX crime, but Puzzle Quest is more than a game for me. It's an obsession. I've played the game on every platform available at this point, and when I recently introduced it to my girlfriend, she quickly surpassed my efforts, leveling past fifty and collecting this set of armor that I wasn't aware of the makes the entire screen explode if you so much as sneeze .

She's not going to Boston with me, which is just as well; she'd never come back.

Visitors ..read more

Last week, game developer Tommy Refenes publicly called Apple's app store "awful" and "horrible." This week, Apple yanked his game from their store.

There are a couple of reasons that may have compelled Apple to remove Zits & Giggles, a pimple-popping game for the iPhone and iPod Touch, from the App store:

Possibility 1: Its co-creator did spend five minutes at last week's Game Developers Conference "Indie Gamemakers Rant" to declare that he "absolutely fucking hate[s] the iPhone app store." He likened the iPhone gaming market to that served by the low-quality Tiger handheld gaming systems of the 80s and 90s, handheld devices that played crude Mega Man and Street Fighter games.

Possibility 2: Zits & Giggles' creators also kept raising the price of their game — as ..read more

Nethaera hit the forums this morning, asking for feedback from tanks around the globe. Ghostcrawler has been having a lively discussion with tanks (most specifically protection warriors) recently, and now they seem to be formalizing the discussion for the wider audience. Nethaera We're currently working on the tanking cooldowns for tanks in Cataclysm. We're interested in feedback from the community on what makes cooldowns fun and useful. For example, what is the sweet spot in cooldown duration between an ability with such a short cooldown that you must mash it constantly versus an ability with such a long cooldown? Which current abilities are fun? Putting aside any rose-colored glasses, were there cooldowns in Burning Crusade or classic WoW that you miss in Lich King? What, ..read more

You already know all about our love affair with Metro 2033, don't you? It's true, we're smitten with the admittedly less-than-perfect, but atmospheric, FPS. And the game's publisher (THQ) is probably living it up right now, several games deep into what could be called a roll at this point. What did other outlets have to say about it? Well, they tend to agree with us ... mostly! Game Informer (9.0): "Metro 2033 is an impressively polished and extremely linear experience that makes for an excellent debut ... From the second you start the campaign, you follow a straight line to the finale with only a handful of opportunities to explore alternate paths or side missions. What a glorious straight line it is." ..read more

Splinter Cell: Conviction is having a little premiere on April 1 at ten GameStops across the US -- no, this is not an April Fool's joke; we made sure. Before the game hits stores (and the head ... and heads) on April 13, a premiere event will take place in Los Angeles on the high holy joking day. GameStop will concurrently host "first-to-play co-op demo events" at select stores. The LA event will take place at the Les Deux Nightclub in Hollywood. First-to-play sessions will occur between 2-6PM, prior to the "celebrity red carpet premiere" at 8PM. The event will feature the "Search for Sam Fisher" live interactive game, in which 15 attendees (21+) who attend the co-op event earlier in the day will be ..read more

The Care and Feeding of Warriors is about warriors, those lovable, squeezable, strokeable bundles of pure joy who seethe with a burning inner fire, a rage that can only be quenched in blood. Matthew Rossi tries quenching it in delicious caffeinated beverages. You'd be surprised how often that works. Honestly, believe it or not, I'd actually like to talk about DPS today. My current raiding guild has between three and four regular tanks who show up for most every 25 man raid. As you might expect, you don't need three to four tanks for ICC. At this point in the raid's life cycle, if you have two tanks you can get through most everything except Putricide and maybe Blood Princes. (We have used two tanks and ..read more

We have a hard time watching films where people get caught being in places they totally shouldn't be. We get no enjoyment from watching a Misery or a Rear Window, for example. That kind of scenario is the bread and butter of Heavy Rain's first downloadable chapter, "The Taxidermist," which pre-orderers of the game have already gotten their hands on. The rest of us will have our chance to grab the suspenseful scene on April 1, when it hits the PSN storefront for $4.99. Check out the video above for a brief teaser of the chapter's events. Actually, it doesn't look that scary to us. Madison climbs in a window, walks up some stairs, and accidentally intrudes on a woman taking a bath. What's that? ..read more