Quake Live open beta

Yep, the glory day for FPS gamers everywhere has arrived. The Quake Live beta opened live to players last night. I've been attempting off and on to connect to the site, but so far to no avail. If the line for this thing could be visualized, I imagine it would be stretching out of several doors. Hopefully I'll have more interesting things to report on about the live beta later tonight.

Jack Black and a little illicit cross-platform action

Video embedding was disabled for this clip, so follow the still shot for the full thing. Pretty much NSFW.

Dead Space to take gore-filled, interstellar horror to...the Wii

Remember Dead Space? One of the scariest, (and definitely goriest) games to come out last year. Good game. Filled with claustrophobia and panic moments. EA Redwood Shores did a good job.

Now then.

You remember the Wii? Nintendo's cute 'lil family-oriented console that's largely geared towards kids and casual gamers? The one that has probably five good games for hardcore gamers that aren't ports from other systems?

Well, as weird as it may sound, there's going to be unholy marriage between them. That's right: today EA announced that a new Dead Space game is coming this year to Nintendo's child-friendly console.

The news broke during the company's fiscal third quarter earnings call today, when EA CEO John Riccitiello said that the intellectual property will be making its way to the Wii sometime this year. Riccitiello also stressed that the new game will feature the same elements that made last year's adventures through the abandoned Ishimura so damn scary on the PS3 and Xbox 360. Although no other details are known at this time, the new title will be its own unique take on the series built to take full advantage of the Wii's motion sensitive controls, according to an article on IGN's Wii page.

New Crystal Chronicles trailer released

Nintendo has released a new trailer for Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers. Please, God, talk them out of using that music anywhere in the game.

Purple is the new ZOMG-cute

I downloaded The Maw the day it was released on X-box Live Arcade, and I'm happy to say that this Arcade direct-download indie game has so far outlasted Fable 2 in play time and interest. Yes, a simple $10 arcade game has surpassed a fully-funded big-studio $60 360 title. Someone please give these kids at Twisted Pixel buckets of money, so that they might continue to develop their bundles of epic win.

It seems like it's always the simple-concept games that have the most impact, and The Maw is no exception. The premise is about as simple as it gets: You are a cute little alien. You have a pet alien that is even cuter than you are. It likes to devour things that are cuter than both of you mashed together. It is your job to help your pet, named Maw, to fangoriously devour everything in sight.

Over the course of this feed-fest, you and Maw encounter puzzles that must be solved using your laser wristband and Maw's insatiable appetite. Sometimes that appetite leads to interesting temporary changes in Maw, such as the ability to float or zap things.

Or, to develop a dozen more eyes and the ability to shoot laser beams:


Maw's nom-nom-nom noise gets my vote as the most adorable sound effect in a video game ever.

Related articles

• The Maw getting 'deleted scenes' downloadable content (destructoid.com)
• The Maw Micro-review: A Frank And His Blob [Review] (kotaku.com)

Chrono Trigger: Timeless

After almost 14 years, countless overwhelmingly positive reviews and a status that borders on legendary, I can tell you there’s not much I can say about Chrono Trigger that hasn’t been said already.

The game was an instant smash when it was released in 1995, peaking the twilight years of the SNES. Fans and critics alike loved the concept, which took the masterminds behind Japan’s twin role-playing colossi, Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy, and fused them together to create a sprawling, time-traveling epic. They loved the execution even more.

Six years went by. Square decided to re-release the game for the ps one, complete with a vastly improved translation and an assortment of flashy new anime cutscenes from the game’s character designer, Dragonball’s Akira Toriyama. Gamers everywhere went ga-ga, myself included.

Now, with the treads of the Square-Enix remake machine running arguably past full power as they have since 2006, Chrono Trigger is back for round three, this time on Square-Enix’s perennial favorite, the DS.

This new, travel-friendly edition has all the bells and whistles included with the ps one release, plus a touch screen mode which unclutters the game’s battle screens, an improved (read: richer and more nuanced) translation and a goofy monster battling mini-game reminiscent Dragon Quest VIII’s monster arena, among a few other surprises.

And while I could spend this review saying what’s already firmly been established—that Chrono Trigger is without a doubt one of the best RPGs ever made, as many so fervently believe—that would be a proverbial waste of breath.

What I can tell you is this: when you have a host of next-gen games at your fingertips and you still find yourself gravitating towards a 14-year-old game that made its debut before today's run-of-the-mill gaming technology had really even been in use, you know it’s something special.

The remake angle is not a new concept for Square, who have been re-releasing past Final Fantasy’s and other titles since well before they gave Chrono Trigger another chance in the limelight.

But unlike even past Final Fantasy reworkings, Chrono Trigger has arguably retained its damn-near immortal status not because just because it’s good, but because it’s a game with personality and character.

Sure, there’s plenty of games that have great characters or an engaging story, but few can pump the kind of blood into a tale like this one does—a tale of friendship, heroism, and good old fashioned good and evil. Like revisiting a classic film, the straightforward charms of both the game’s characters and gameplay will bring a smile to the face of even the most jaded gamer, something few games can pull this off this well, even today.

So, can you really improve on a classic? That seems to be the question that Square-Enix is driving at (or attempting to) with the changes pumping blood through this new iteration.

The new translation is, for the most part, a much deeper and more subtle script that adds to the overall experience, if in a slightly superfluous way.

The ps one’s translation was perfectly fine, and in some cases even better—for example, the decision to eliminate Frog’s quasi-Shakespearean mode of speech, present in the ps one edition a la Vagrant Story or the PSP’s Final Fantasy Tactics redux The War of the Lions, is a definite tragedy.

However, this is a minor complaint amidst a host of new or improved features.

The DS edition’s touch-screen capabilities are a nice touch, as is the handy and ever-present map that occupies the lower screen. The sweeping score remains an aural treat, and the anime cutscenes, ported over from the ps one release, look cleaner and (for the most part) sharper than ever. Even the little pauses that cropped up in the playstation edition after winning a battle have been (seemingly) reduced, and drastically.

And while its important for those of you who haven’t played Chrono Trigger to know that it plays like a game that was made in 1995, that shouldn't be a deterrent. In all likelihood, games wouldn’t be the same today without the important innovations Square first unveiled here.

Aside from the game’s engrossing clockwork narrative, Chrono Trigger set precedents with its multiple endings, unique battle system (goodbye, random battles) and new game plus, a concept that allowed you to take your leveled-up characters and play through the game with them again. All of these concepts have since been used in countless other RPGs.

The best form of praise (or perhaps the most paid attention to) I can give the game, however, is that it’s still a blast to play. Now that Square has seen fit to re-release it for the next generation of gaming tykes, I only hope they too can look past age and experience firsthand all the heart and soul this game has beating inside it.

Chrono Trigger may be well into its own twilight years now, but believe me—it’s still got it.


Chrono Trigger
4.5 out 5 stars
Square-Enix
Nintendo DS
$39.99

Prince of Persia: Big budget art?

When Ubisoft relaunched the Prince of Persia series six years ago with its titular hero reborn as a rugged, strapping prince who had more in common with Shinobi than Ali Baba, you’d probably never have guessed the visage the character has now taken on.

Enter Prince of Persia, 2008’s confusingly self-titled next chapter (and latest reboot) of the series, starring a new prince who is evidently steeped in legend. Although the prince is simply known as just that, he isn’t a nobleman as his predecessor was in 2003's The Sands of Time. Actually, the new prince has little to with the princes of old.

No, the new prince, delivered via the series' development team at Ubisoft Montreal, is everything the old one wasn’t—a dusty, smartass scoundrel who earns a ragged living robbing tombs. He’s part Aragorn, part Indiana Jones and part Captain Mal Reynolds of Firefly fame.

The prince is good at climbing. This is a good thing, 'cause there's a lot of it.
The prince’s new rough-and-tumble look is only part of the equation, however. Although handy with a sword, his combat skills are tempered by the presence of Elika, a devoted princess (and priestess) who wields magic powers against the ‘corrupted,’ demon-like beings who pledged their loyalty to the dark god, Ahriman, who is (sort-of) let loose from his prison at the beginning of the game.

Together, Elika and the prince must cleanse the corrupted lands of…wherever they are, and when not effortlessly swinging and clambering across gorgeous landscapes, they're forced to face off in a series of heavily-cinematic battles with Ahriman’s would-be brood in order to save Elika’s nigh-abandoned kingdom.

Combat has also been modified and tweaked in the new Prince. Far more artistic than technical, there are only two attack types (gauntlet and sword), acrobatics and Elika’s magic. The result are often-climactic, film-like deathmatches that show the prince and his companion in various dazzling acrobatic signatures which highlight the game’s stunningly stylized art direction.


Unlike it's predecessors, combat in Prince of Persia is a one-on-one, cinematic affair.
So, if you’re expecting to find an evil vizier in this Prince of Persia, you won’t.
Call it the Batman Begins of the gaming world—And like Christopher Nolan’s take on the Dark Knight, Ubisoft Montreal’s recreated prince is emblematic of just how much everything old is new again in this game.

It’s actually a near-completely different interpretation of the series, similar in some respects to when Japanese director Ryuhei Kitamura reimagined Hideo Kojima’s PS one classic Metal Gear Solid in the Gamecube’s MGS remake The Twin Snakes (although a bit more drastic).

But unlike The Twin Snakes, which could have been called “Metal Gear Solid: Ridiculous Action Movie,” (a jab I make lovingly—games wouldn’t be the same today without Kojima’s precedent-setting series) Prince of Persia may actually be something else entirely: an “art” game.

Take, for example, Elika. Her presence seems to draw some vague parallels to Sony’s PS2 title ICO, which paired a hero (a little boy with horns) with Yorda, a defenseless princess, on a quest to escape a mysterious castle.

Despite its fantasy setting, ICO feels and plays like an indie film (and rightly so, considering the game has been lauded for its unyielding originality, and many feel it’s responsible for starting the whole ‘games as art’ debate). And while Elika is an actual asset in battle, Prince of Persia doesn’t exactly feel like your run-of-the-mill adventure game, either.

The prince and Elika's travels take them through beautiful, lush environments.
The game actually has more in common with Shadow of the Colossus, Team ICO’s “boss-battle-only” spiritual successor-cum-quasi-prequel to ICO—also added to “art game” canon because of its unique combat structure.

Like Colossus, fighting in the new Prince amounts a series of simply-controlled, one-on-on boss and mini-boss battles that pit the prince and Elika against the guardians (as well as the occasional minion) of each of the game’s distinct, open environments, whose areas become more accessible as you progress.

Also like Team ICO's god-killing masterpiece, Prince of Persia’s open-ended world is vast and beautiful, although you won’t be felling monstrous beasts on horseback. Instead you’ll be spending most of your time traversing across an increasingly vertical world, whether you’re exploring, talking with Elika or healing corrupted lands, in a mix between adventure game exploration and straight-up platforming.

But perhaps the biggest thing about Prince of Persia which is suggestive of “art game” status is that you can’t die. Every time you fall down an endless chasm or are about to feel the rough blade of a corrupted in your chest, Elika’s mysterious light-based powers intervene.

In theory, this isn’t really that much of a departure from most any other game—you make your way through the game, fall down a pit, get attacked by a monster, are shot up by terrorists, whatever—after game over, you either start from a checkpoint or a savepoint.

Without Elika, the prince would be dead. A thousand times over.
It’s understandable why some might throw up red flags over my claim that a Prince of Persia could really be an “art game” to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Team ICO's efforts or those of Killer 7 creator Suda 51. To some degree, I wonder how it could be possible, too.

But hear me out: it's all in the game’s approach. Since the prince can't die, you can’t lose. And if you can't lose, the developers were obviously hoping gamers would find another emphasis on something other than the challenge.

Luckily, there’s myriad parts of the game with which to distract you. Gameplay is smooth, the world sumptuous and absorbing, and its unique mechanics, with a focus less on crossing blades than on running across cliffs and leaping over chasms make for an exciting time.

The prince himself is well developed, swashbuckling, and unlike his predecessors, often laugh out loud funny—particularly during in-game banter sessions you can choose to have with Elika (which makes sense, given that his vocal cords are supplied by none other than Nolan North, who brought Nathan Drake to life with same smart-ass personality in PS3’s Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune).

The game’s script often has the spirit reminiscent of the original Pirates of the Caribbean, complementing the new Prince’s high-end production values, its gorgeous cel-shaded character models and the wonderfully organic world rendered around them. The result is a game brimming with humor and heart.

Clearly, the prince has been through a lot. And he's got a smart mouth, to boot.
Ubisoft Montreal are also clearly a bunch of cinema lovers, which is evident in more than just the combat. Watching Elika cleanse the corruption from filthy, polluted wastelands into brightly lit, lush, colorful landscapes is a major visual treat that show off the game’s technical prowess and artistry, as are some of the game’s epic setpieces. Both bring to mind the kind of unique vision and execution of rousing adventure films.

Would the old prince ever have been able to springboard through the sky between giant globe-like flying machines ripped from the imaginations of Jules Verne and Tim Burton? I don’t think so.

However, as fun as the new Prince is, it isn’t perfect. Some players may find it hard to subscribe to the game's no-death philosophy, and others may be turned off by its “tap a button”-style combat and the general ease given with essential immortality.

Healing corrupted lands is just one of the many unothordox things you'll spend your time doing.
In it’s own way, Prince of Persia does still feel like you’re living out an ancient legend, albeit one that displays a different kind of storytelling than in The Sands of Time. But if art is defined as “thinking outside the box” then Prince of Persia is certainly worthy of such a description.

Like Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, which Russell Crowe once called “an arthouse movie with a big budget,” the gameplay in Prince of Persia isn’t your typical mainstream industry fare. Hell, the villain isn't even really present, aside from being a much talked about malevolent force.

There are snatches of industry standards, to be sure, but what Ubisoft Montreal has really done is taken the series, stripped it down to its bare essence, and rebuilt it from the inside out with a new, completely different body.

When not dealing with dark gods, the prince enjoys quiet walks in the countryside.
True, without the promise of death, the presence of real tension in the game is questionable, but maybe it’s not the point, either. If more games would take more risks like this, video games could very well develop into the same kind of multifaceted medium that film industry has become.

And if Ubisoft can do it to the new Prince, an unabashedly high profile game which wears its budget on its sleeve, maybe more companies should be able to take such chances. It’s likely that's precisely the message the game is trying to get across, otherwise such drastic changes probably wouldn't have made it beyond the stage of concept art.

It’s rare that art games move that many units, but it doesn’t make them any less important—such may well be the case with this game.

So, will the industry listen? Only time will tell. But even if Prince of Persia isn’t perfect, it too is important. It's bold and brassy, and most notably, tries something different. Do yourself a favor—don’t ignore this one.

Prince of Persia
4.5 out of 5 stars
Ubisoft
PS3, Xbox 360
$39.99

• Princely quips
  
  The prince definitely has a way with words, as is clearly seen in his conversations with Elika and elsewhere in the game. Here's some of our favorites:
  
  P: - "Ugh! I was on my way home. I had more gold than you could--I'd'a had wine! Women! I'd had carpets this thick!"
  
  P: - "Hey, you're cute, but not 'stay and fight a dark god' cute."
  E: - "Would you have helped my father if he had asked you?"
  P: - "He's not that cute, either."
  
  P: - "Anything else you think you should be telling me?"
  E: - "You're an idiot."
  
  P: - "I like your top."
  E: - "I think I have a spare if you'd like it."
  
  E: - "Just be patient. Patience brings rewards."
  P: - "So does walking into a harem covered with chocolate."
  
  P: - "Do you often go falling out of the sky on to men? I mean, you're a good-looking girl and all...obviously pretty high maintenance, but you shouldn't need to go dropping out of the sky on to men."
  
  P: - "Do corruption stains come out?"
  P: - "Gods, monsters, crazy women...what's the difference?"
  P: - "Run, jump, die, repeat. Run, jump, die, repeat. I'm starting to get the hang of this!"
  P: - "She's not my girlfriend, she's my donkey."
  

Sheer beauty

Benheck's PC Mod of the Day yesterday was absolutely stunning. Usually PC mods just don't do it for me beyond the initial "wow look at what someone else far more talented at making shit than I will ever be just made" reaction. They (usually) are awesome, yes, but my second thoughts are usually "damn that has to be a bitch to dust" or "yes but how do you feed the gold fish in there?

But this one..? My God. Wolfenstein 3-D was my first FPS ever as a kid. This case mod is magic. Pure, Nazi-gutting, magic.

Cheap Fan Service

You know, for a development team comprised mostly of men, you'd think the team behind Fable 2 would get tired of hearing "we're through already?"

And yet, once again, Lionhead Studios has produced Fable content that is disappointingly short and sparse. To illustrate just how short the "extended" (really it should be called simply "additional" or maybe more appropriately "Haiku-esque in length") content that was released on the 13th is:

Yesterday afternoon, I logged in to Xbox live, forked over $12.50 to buy enough points to download the content, and waited 30 minutes on PSU's internet connection for my download to complete. Another hour after that, I was done with 2 out of the 3 new quests the expansion comes with, and I'd purchased all the new items in the (admittedly neat) surprise shop.

If I had known, after that hour that I was nearly done with the $10's worth of game I'd just purchased, I might have dallied a little longer. Stood on a cliff, maybe, and taken in the scenery with my trusty dog, Mr. Grrr.

As it is, it took me a few minutes to realize I'd already beaten it this afternoon, after merely one more hour of play, which included a stop back in Bloodstone to look after my family and get distracted at the gambling table.

It was only after I'd made one last, pitiful, hopeful round of Knothole Island that it sank in: I had finished all available quests and essentially paid $10 so that my character could wear sunglasses and a top hat. Really, Lionhead? That's all you had in you? Really?

Come on fellas. You built us one of the most beautiful sandbox worlds to play in, now please, put a little more effort in to the content before I leave you for good for a game that can go all night.

FFXIII in North America? Not before 2010, says Square

Now that 2008 is officially over, Square-Enix is ringing in the new year with a major, and completely expected, delay. The victim? Final Fantasy XIII, at least in North America.

Don't say I didn't predict this.

Hot off his announcement that the next proper installment of Square's trademark series is expected to be out in Japan this year, company president Yoichi Wada is now saying that if you're expecting to see FFXIII this year in North America, you're out of luck. Wada confirmed as much in an interview with Reuters, saying the game won't see it's North American debut until at least April 2010.

But hey, FFXII took 5 years to come out right? Don't be surprised to see this pushed back until Summer 2010...at the earliest.