Gaming – Page 19 – rgbFilter

Video games can’t be art? Why Ebert is wrong and should gamers care?

April 19, 2010April 19, 2010 Doug Groves AC II, art, Assassin's Creed II, critique, editorial, Kellee Santiago, Mass Effect II, photography, Roger Ebert, TED X, TEDx, Venice5 Comments

Back in 2005, famed film critic Roger Ebert posited that ‘video games can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful”, but “the nature of the medium prevents it from moving beyond craftsmanship to the stature of art’, or, as many online at the time boiled it down, ‘Roger Ebert hates video games’. Numerous video game fans replied to that column, and to this day I’ve seen references to his ‘hatred’ crop up from time to time. This is usually when he pans a movie that a gamer liked, with…

Canadian Video Game Awards finalists announced

April 16, 2010 Doug Groves Assassin's Creed II, Canadian Video Game Awards, CVGA, Dragon Age, finalists, Prototype2 Comments

Last month, we told you about the nominations for the Canadian Video Game Awards, and now the finalists have been posted for voting. The five overall finalists are Assassins Creed II, Dawn Of War, Dragon Age: Origins, FIFA Soccer 10 and Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes. Assassins Creed II has been nominated in the most categories, at 7, with Dragon Age following behind with 5. Although not nominated for Game Of The Year, Prototype appears as a finalist in 5 categories. Though I don’t find this surprising, because I…

Microsoft & Epic announces Gear of War 3, coming April 5th 2011

April 14, 2010 drsquid epic games, Gaming, gear of war 3, Microsoft, Xbox 3601 Comment

What has been called “worst-kept secret in the video game industry” has finally been official announced – Gears of War 3, the conclusion to the trilogy, is coming from Epic Games and Microsoft on April 5th 2011 on the Xbox 360. Cliff Bleszinski, from Epic, appeared on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon on Monday night, and talked about some of the new Gears 3 features, including a playable female solider, new weapons and new aliens. He also tweeted later that the game will have four player co-op! Cliff was supposed…

Very Cool: Class 3 Outbreak Flash Zombie RTS!

April 9, 2010 drsquid Binary Space, Flash, game, iPad, RTS, Zombies5 Comments

Built on their first release, the Zombie Outbreak Simulator, Binary Space has release their first game, the Zombie RTS Class 3 Outbreak. The game is a browser based flash game, running over Google maps, where you control 3 squads of police to try to hold back a zombie invasion. Like many flash games the graphics and gameplay are deceptively simple, but the game is highly addictive, and under the hood Class 3 is surpising sophisticated: Game designer, Jay Weston says, “We set the bar pretty high with our previous release,…

XBLA Inventory Blowout Sale

April 1, 2010 Doug Groves Arcade, marketplace, XBLA, Xbox 3600 comment

Even though it’s all bits in the datastream, Xbox Live Arcade is having an Inventory Blowout Sale starting today, and ending on April 7th. Title Regular Price Discounted Price Save South Park 800 400 50% Super Street Fighter II HD Remix 1200 560 53% Defense Grid 800 400 50% Rocket Riot 800 400 50% Mad Tracks 800 400 50% Track & Field 400 240 40% Lumines Live 800 400 50% Age of Booty 800 400 50% Schizoid 800 400 50% Wallace & Gromit episode 1 800 400 50% I haven’t…

Steam on Mac and E3 predictions

March 31, 2010 Doug Groves Mac gaming, PC gaming, Portal 2, PS3, Steam, Valve4 Comments

Alex and Doug talk more on Steam for Mac, and make some E3 Valve predicitons. Will the company reverse it’s position on PS3 support?

Game With Fame: teh_pwnerer wants to pwn you

March 23, 2010 Doug Groves Game With Fame, Microsoft, Pure Pwnage, Xbox, Xbox Live0 comment

Every week or so, Xbox has been hosting the Game With Fame series, where you can have a chance to play against, well, someone famous, be it musicians ranging from Busta Rhymes to Weird Al Yankovich or game designers and UFC fighters. This Thursday, Xbox Canada’s Game With Fame is none other than teh_pwnerer himself Jeremy, known IRL as Jarett Cale, and the game of choice is EA’s NHL 10. You have to send a friend request to the GamerTag PurePwnageGWF at 7:30pm Eastern, and the session itself starts at…

Warner Interactive coming to Montréal

March 22, 2010March 22, 2010 Doug Groves Montreal, Warner Bros., Warner Brothers, WBI0 comment

According to a report from Game Focus, it looks like Montreal can add a new game studio to its roster. Warner Brothers Interactive announced that they will be opening a new studio that will focus on making games based on DC Comics licenses. It’s not surprising, given the initiatives that various provinces and the Canadian federal government have been using to lure studios over the past few years. The new studio, to be christened WB Games Montreal, and plans on a staff of over 300, headed up by current Warner…

Ben Heck’s Bill Paxton Pinball

March 17, 2010 Doug Groves Ben Heck, Bill Paxton, mod, pinball, video6 Comments

Ben Heck is well known as a game console modder, arguably THE most well known console modder. He’s worked on dozens of projects, ranging from crafting a portable Atari 2600 that uses full cartridges all the way up to a portable version of the PS2 and multiple versions of an Xbox 360 laptop. The latest creation is less about portability though, and more about the coolness of one of geekdom’s favourite actors, Bill Paxton… Since 2005 I have been working on building my own custom pinball machine and now it…

GDC: Part One

March 17, 2010 Doug Groves Mac gaming, Portal, Portal 2, Show, Valve3 Comments

In this segment, Alex and Doug discuss the Portal update complete with embedded SSTV images and Steam for the Mac.

Crysis 2 trailer from GDC 10

March 13, 2010 Doug Groves CryEngine, Crysis 2, Crytek, PC gaming, PS3, Xbox 3600 comment

“Does it play Crysis?” is almost on its way out as a meme. That’s because Crytek has shown off Crysis 2 at GDC this year, with a not-surprisingly stunning video showing off the capabilities of not only the game, but the latest iteration of the underlying engine, CryEngine 3. Even though the footage is from a cam put up by gametrailers.com, it looks spectacular, especially since a lot of the footage is labeled as being rendered by the console version. The game is coming out later this year for the…

Prince Of Persia: The Forgotten Sands gameplay video

March 13, 2010 Doug Groves DS, Nintendo, Prince Of Persia, PS3, PSP, Sony, The Forgotten Sands, Ubisoft, Wii, Xbox 3600 comment

The new Prince of Persia, due out in May, helps fill in the seven year gap between The Sands Of Time and Warrior Within, as seen in the new trailer, which has both gameplay footage and developer commentary. From the looks of it, it’s very much in the Warrior Within vein design-wise. Interesting to note that to build the game, Ubisoft Montreal made use of their in-house Anvil engine, which allows for up to 50 enemies on screen at one time. Besides the classic parkour style action, there’s some new…