Carmines Fate

The previously mentioned avatar shirts that will decide the fate of Clayton Carmine in Gears of War 3 are now available. Your favourite shirt will set you back 80 points, but all proceeds go to Childs Play. So head over to the avatar marketplace to place your vote on whether Carmine should live or die.

For anyone wondering, i eventually decided to go with...

Super Awesome Elite Spartan Squad GO!!!

Microsoft have announced that they are starting a search for the UK's number one Halo player. The person deemed the number one halo player will then lead a team of 5 celebrities into battle against 6 runners up when Halo: Reach is released. The celebrity team will be made up by the number one halo player (obviously), presenter of 'Gadget Show' Jason Bradbury, Manchester United player Rio Ferdinand, R&B artist Jamelia and two more celebrities who are yet to be named. The celebrity team name? Elite Spartan Squad. So, in short, Microsoft have announced a special competition that the majority of the world won't care about, for a prize that no-one really wants.

Betahood

I recently received the usual newsletter email from Ubisoft and noticed it has a button saying 'Get access to the PS3 limited multiplayer beta' of Assassins Creed: Brotherhood. Sadly, when i click said button i'm taken to a Ubisoft 'page cannot be found' page. I'm sure Ubisoft just accidentally put out the email earlier than they've put the actual page up (considering i haven't heard the beta mentioned anywhere else yet), but this does tell us that the beta should be here soon and it will only be available to PS3 owners.

Characters Sourced

While i'm not a fighting game fan, i am looking forward to Marvel vs Capcom 3. The characters included in the game have been slowly being announced since the game was first mentioned, however someone may have spoiled Capcom's fun. A user at french website PS3Gen, managed to dig up a list of characters left in the source code of MvC3's Japanese website. This is definitely unconfirmed and shouldn't be taken as fact, but for those interested, click 'Read More' for the full list of 38 characters.

Teasing Icarus

Irrational Games (the developer formerly known as 2K Boston, who in turn was formerly known as Irrational Games) has put up a website to advertise their upcoming title, currently named 'Project Icarus'. The game is set to be revealed on August 11th and judging by the teaser website, you'll probably have to wait till then anyway. The site (whatisicarus.com) shows a black screen, what looks to be some mist and a small white dot. My first thought is the moon, but you should probably never put faith in my thoughts. There is one interesting thing the site HAS turned up though. The site has been registered to Irrational Games' parent company Take2 Games, but also to fellow subsidiary, Rockstar Games. So i still have no idea what 'Project Icarus' is, but you can bet i'll be checking out that little white dot every day until August 11th.

Going Going Gone

Dutch game developer and publisher Playlogic have filed for the Dutch equivalent to bankruptcy. You could be forgiven for asking who Playlogic is, as the majority of their released games were never really big (Fairytale Fights & Infernal: Hells' Vengeance). Apparently Playlogic is behind on payments to some of their vendors and while they claim they're still owed some money from Koch Media (a European distributing partner) the outlook for the company is not looking so good. Personally i'm not really a big fan of Playlogic's work, but regardless it's sad to see them go under. Seems like many games companies are struggling to break even and i'm hoping i don't have to make many more posts like this one in the near future.

Alpha Protocol Review

Here is my review for Obsidian's stealth/3rd person shooter/RPG hybrid, Alpha Protocol...

Caught In Limbo

The first game of the Summer of Arcade (Winter of Arcade for fellow Aussies) is a game called Limbo. I'd heard absolutely nothing about the game, but my friend picked it up and kept raving about it so i figured i'd check it out too. Now i can only wonder how i didn't know about Limbo. The game is very simplistic in nature... There is no real story, no actual background music, the game is a 2D puzzle game and the entire game is presented in a stylised monochromatic look. Basically you take control of a little boy (who i've heard is named Limbo, for for simplicities sake, i'm calling him Bob) who has to traverse a strange environment filled with deadly creatures, sharp spikes and countless places for him to plunge to his doom. That's really all there is to it... You have endless lives and the real fun of the game is purely from trying to figure out the best way to help Bob make his way through Limbo without ending up as a spiders dinner. The puzzles are really well done, the look is something quite unique that also helps make the puzzles that much harder and despite having no soundtrack, the ambient noises are enough to give you the creeps at times. Limbo manages to focus itself on the puzzles, and leave everything else up to your imagination... Maybe Bob is questing through a dark land to rescue a princess, maybe he's lost and trying to find his way home, it doesn't really matter because the only goal the game gives you is to keep him alive. I haven't enjoyed a puzzle game this much since Portal.

Follow The Signal

The first piece of DLC for Alan Wake, The Signal, is now available and i've already played through it and figured i'd let you know what i think. Firstly, The Signal takes place after the ending of the game, so make sure you finish that off before starting this. When i found out it was following the ending i was a bit disappointed because i liked the ending of the game and felt that explaining it would take some of that away... After finishing The Signal though, i'm not at all disappointed. i won't go into details to avoid spoilers, but while there isn't much plot to The Signal, it does manage to explain bits and pieces of the ending, but still leaves just as many questions. A gameplay element that turned up near the end of the normal game (shining your light on words to make objects appear) has been brought back and is used rather extensively. Not just in ways you'd expect either. Anything can now be summoned from words including, weapons, ammo, helpful effects (such as explosions and fireworks) and even enemies. The Signal will only take about an hour to complete (much like the standard games chapters) but manages to cram quite a bit into that hour. Plus there are a heap of collectibles thrown in, just to make sure you play through more than once. Overall i'd say The Signal is a nice piece of DLC that expands upon and experiments with the original gameplay, but still manages to feel like it belongs within the game. At 560 MS Points, anyone who liked Alan Wake, NEEDS to get The Signal.

More Mass Effect

One of the better games when it comes to DLC is Mass Effect 2. It's already had heaps of DLC released for it ranging from alternate costumes to entire quests, but don't think that will stop Bioware from dropping more. It was revealed that there was another DLC pack on its way (Lair of the Shadow Broker) but when people started noticing the weapons in the screenshots aren't in the current game it was also revealed that prior to the Shadow Broker release, there will be more guns heading to the game in DLC form. Mass Effect 2 is quickly becoming the game with the most extra content available (excluding music games, obviously) but i think i'd rather see the team working on Mass Effect 3.