Microsoft managed to pack 90 minutes with some tasty looking games and the newly named Kinect motion control camera. The slimline 360 makes a late appearance too. Here’s the No Sleep Gamer summary of what looked good and a bit of what didn’t. Read the rest of this entry »
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Features, Game-Hub.co.uk, News, Xbox 360 | Tagged: 360 Slim, Call of Duty Black Ops, Codename Kingdoms, Dance Central, E3 2010, Fable 3, Forza Kinect, Game-Hub.co.uk, Gears of War 3, Halo Reach, Kinect, Kinect Adventures, Kinect Joyride, Kinect Sports, Kinectimals, Metal Gear Solid Rising, Microsoft Press conference E3 2010, Star Wars Kinect, Video Kinect, Your Shape | 
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Posted by Brendan Griffiths
It’s all about the Spring Sale this week as Matt explained in the first part of this week’s Roundup. The obvious PSP deals to go for there would be the excellent God of War: Chains of Olympus which is a prequel to the first PS2 game. Go on; go through all four games in a long, blood-soaked weekend. The three GTA reductions are pretty good looking too. The rest of them can be found cheaper on UMD though to be honest, not necessarily second hand either.
There are some permanent reductions too. There’s only one PSN game in there, Inferno Pool which might be worth a gamble at the price. The PSP title reductions are typically a waste of time for anyone happy to buy UMDs still. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | Dealspwn.com, News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PlayStation 3 | Tagged: Dealspwn.com, DLC, PS3, PSN | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
There are 100,000 public Betas for ModNation Racers available on the European PSN Store now. It’s a first come, first served limited download for European users to get an early taste of Sony’s Mario Kart-style racer where players can build their own tracks then share them online.
The download is just over 2GB and includes the track editor for Alpine levels. You’re going to have to be fast to snap up a code, so do it now!
Leave a Comment » | News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PlayStation 3 | Tagged: Beta, Brendan Griffiths, ModNation Racers, Sony | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
All your votes are in and counted. So who were the winners of the Game Hub Games of the Year Awards 2009? There are a few surprises amongst the obvious ones. Fortunately for all the nominees, nobody got zero votes (somebody got one though). So here are the Top 3 for each of the 13 categories:*
*I wrote this article for game-hub.co.uk after I arranged the voting categories a few weeks earlier.
Follow this link to be taken to the article at Game Hub.
Leave a Comment » | Features, News, PC, PSN (PlayStation Store), PSP, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360 | Tagged: Battlefield 1943, Brendan Griffiths, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, FIFA 10, Game Hub Games of the Year Awards 2009, Little Big Planet PSP, Need For Speed Shift, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time, Tekken 6, Uncharted 2 | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Ok, so the new Video Delivery Service has been online in the UK for a couple of weeks now and the collection of titles is fattening up nicely so it’s about time we got stuck in.
First up I tested an SD version of Escape from LA (101 mins) starring Kurt Russell. The file size was 1570MB and my ‘20 Mbps’ broadband was running at its typically poor Friday night rate of around 10 Mbps. Wanting to test how good the film would play while it was downloading, I gave it a few minutes head-start, during which time it got up to 5%. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | Features, News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PSP, PlayStation 3, Reviews | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, Escape from LA, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, online film rentals, PSN, PSN VideoStore, X-Men Origins: Wolverine | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Well, it took more than a while but UK PS3 owners can now rent and buy films over the PlayStation Store by downloading them straight to their hard-drives.
The new part of the store launched at a Soho London party this week with a live performance from Little Boots and a set from radio 1 DJ Annie Mac in what essentially felt like Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | Features, News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PSP, PlayStation 3 | Tagged: Annie Mac, Brendan Griffiths, Little boots, PlayStation Network Video Store, PSN, Sony, Video Delivery Service | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Nintendo have generously (finally) decided to give away the internet browser feature on the Wii. And as PS3 users will attest, browsing the web from your sofa is awesome.
There’s even better news for those of you about to explode in fury for paying 500 points for it in the past. Nintendo has said you’ll be able to help yourself to a 500 point NES game from its Virtual Console range around the end of October. There has also been a Flash update meaning better video viewing for some sites such as YouTube. You might want to download it to an SD card rather than the Wii’s memory though as it takes up over 200 blocks. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | News, Wii | Tagged: BBC iPLayer, Brendan Griffiths, Facebook, free internet browser, Gmail, Nintendo, Virtual Console, Wii | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Anticipation has been high for the next instalment in the World War II Battlefield series. Following on from the huge success of Battlefield 1942 on the PC, here at the No Sleep Gamer we couldn’t wait to get our hands on the next title in the series, Battlefield 1943, that thankfully will be released on consoles. So when EA and DICE invited us down to the Tamari club in London’s Covent Garden, we answered the call to arms.
After realising that perhaps video games hadn’t taught me as well as I thought about map-reading (actually, I’ll say Google Maps screwed me over) and reluctantly heading for the Underground instead, I eventually managed to arrive in time for the mission briefing. Well, a complimentary Battlefield-themed cocktail. Sunset Sniper anyone? Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | Features, News, PlayStation 3, Previews, Xbox 360 | Tagged: 43 million kills, Bad Company 2, Battlefield 1943, Battlefield Modern Combat 3, Brendan Griffiths, Coral Island, Dice, EA, Frostbite, Iwo Jima | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
New York, New York. The city so nice they named it twice. Except poor old Max Payne doesn’t seem to agree if these screenshots are anything to go by.
After the moderate success of the recent movie which used New York for some great noir elements it’s surprising to see Rockstar ditch the Big Apple for this sunny, possibly South American setting. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | News, PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, Bullet time, Max Payne 3, Rockstar, Stranglehold, Uncharted | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
*Recently re-named The Last Guardian.
*Make sure to click the HD option on the video after pressing ‘play’ to get rid of the smudgy picture. Works on standard definition monitors too.
Well, I don’t think anyone expected that. Outrageously stunning and a perfect example of a fantastic change of pace to radically alter the tone of the whole spectacle. But what else would you expect from Team Ico but the unexpected?
I don’t know what was more surprising, the creature itself initially (should we be scared, amused, confused?), or the flood of relief that hits as you realise it’s not intended as a fearsome creature as it picks up the boy, presumably his young master, and lovingly nuzzles him. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | News, PlayStation 3, Previews, Video | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, Ico, Project Trico, Shadow of the Colossus, Sony, Team Ico, The Last Guardian, Trico | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Well the date’s finally here. Pack your bags (think up a good excuse to skive work) because June 11th we’re all heading off to Big Surf Island with Burnout Paradise.
We’ve all tried getting a peak from the car park roof across the water to see what’s going on and the recent videos from Criterion have ramped up the excitement considerably over the last few weeks. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 | Tagged: Big Surf Island, Brendan Griffiths, Burnout Paradise, Criterion | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
This is possibly a leaked video from Ubisoft, showing actual gameplay from Beyond Good & Evil 2.
It’s already drawn comparisons with Assassin’s Creed and Mirror’s Edge. But even at this early stage it looks like it handles itself much better than the former, with fluid animations and a Bourne film style frantic looking chase-camera.
However, for many it looks a little too good. Is this more Killzone 2 style ‘target footage’ that Ubisoft plan on getting the final game to look like? Either way if the game itself is half as good as the original it will be stunning.
Speaking of which, if you haven’t played it you can get it for under a fiver on eBay so go on, you’ll thank us.
And thanks to Kotaku who were one of the first sites to put the video up.
Leave a Comment » | News, PlayStation 3, Video, Xbox 360 | Tagged: Beyond Good & Evil 2, Brendan Griffiths, Kotaku, Ubisoft | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Sony have teamed up with Sprint to give away their PSN download only game, Rag Doll Kung Fu: Fists of Plastic, on the US PSN Store. You better be quick though as it’s only for one week.
No doubt people that have already forked out $9.99 / £7.99 will be annoyed as hell, but if you’ve not got the game already, you may as well try it out. It’s free! Trophies are supported too!
It’s a pretty shallow game on your own and it doesn’t have any online multiplayer options but does feature offline multiplayer for you and up to three of your mates you actually see in person; which makes a nice change considering the fun party games out there without the option, yes you Crash Commando.
Again, the European store is left outside in the rain with its face pushed up against the warm glass of the other regions stores, but we’ll hold off the moaning for now and suggest you set yourselves up a US account and bag it. Have a look here for a useful guide on how to do this. Note you’ll need a different e-mail address from your European account.
On the UK PSN Store this week, Bionic Commando Rearmed has been reduced from £6.99 to £3.99 and Bejeweled 2 has finally been released over here for a mildly annoying £6.29.
Leave a Comment » | News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PlayStation 3 | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, PSN, Sony, Rag Doll Kung Fu, Sprint, Crash Commando, Bionic Commando: Rearmed, Bejeweled 2 | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Final Fantasy VII has finally been put on the PSN Store for PS3 and PSP! Unfortunately the most celebrated RPG of them all is only currently available on the Japan or Hong Kong stores.
Even though the Hong Kong store is in English it is listed as the Japanese version of the game. The game’s full title is Final Fantasy VII International, which indicates a few extra features, but also an unlikely European release as we never get the ‘International’ FF games.
The game costs ¥1500 / HK$118 or about £10 to us. Not bad seeing as used PS1 copies on eBay are going for at least £20.
Sony seriously dropped the ball not giving us Metal Gear Solid on the store, hopefully they’ll realise what a huge European following FFVII has and sort it out. Oh and we wouldn’t mind that Blu-ray of Advent Children with the FFXIII demo either.
Leave a Comment » | News, PSN (PlayStation Store), PSP, PlayStation 3 | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, Final Fantasy VII, PSN, Sony | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
Brendan Griffiths looks at the competing world of magazines and websites for video games journalism.
Leave a Comment » | Games Journalism, Interviews, News, Online Journalism | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, CVG.com, IGN.com, Journalism, Magazine Journalism, Online Journalism, PlayStation the Official Magazine | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
"I can't believe nobodies noticed we're playing Manhunt!"
Brendan Griffiths looks at the future of video games age ratings.
Video games age classifications are to be given the same treatment as cinema films and DVDs. This is a result of the Byron Review, commissioned by Gordon Brown, who has been quoted as saying that he is not interested in censoring the industry. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | Interviews, News | Tagged: Age Classifications, Age Ratings, BBFC, Brendan Griffiths, Byron Review, PEGI | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
A brand new Kingdom Hearts game is set to appear on the PSP in 2009 entitled Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep. It is a prequel to the first game, taking place ten years earlier. Read the rest of this entry »
Leave a Comment » | News, PSP | Tagged: Brendan Griffiths, Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, PSP, Testuya Nomura | Permalink
Posted by Brendan Griffiths
