CES just ended this past weekend, and putting aside all the 3D movies, Blu-ray news, and Project Natal stories, Microsoft announced one more place where its Xbox Avatars will have something to do. The new Xbox Game Room will be a free virtual room for Live players to customize, decorate and deck out with Avatar-playable arcade cabinets of yesteryears.

What’s the big deal?

These older-gen retro arcade games will be preserved to play and look almost exactly as they did back in their hey-days. We will be charged Microsoft Points for plays beyond our second time, and more to “keep” the cabinet in our own virtual Game Rooms. Games for Windows will enable these to be played on PCs.

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The gift-receiving holiday of your choice has passed by this weekend. Being the gamer, some clueless soul has bestowed upon you most un-fun, WTF-were-they-thinking-when-they-made-it game to you as a sorry excuse for a present (or some other mediocrity of similar sentiment).

It is clearly not the game you wanted this season, but how could they have known? This does not enthuse you, but you grin and accept it. Now that this “thoughtful” person is gone, what do you do with this near AOL-disc coaster? (watch out, 90’s reference!) And how do you get started on the game you actually want? Read More »

During a recent trip to Japan, I encountered an arcade cabinet that many would call a gimmick: a rail-shooter with sliding doors, named Elevator Action Death Parade. Having read about the game earlier this year, and with it right there in front of me, I couldn’t resist but pop in a coin to try it out.

A pair of physical doors slide open and shut like an elevator, which blocks and exposes the play screen.  The doors get “stuck” and even shake at times in cue with the on-screen action behind it. Read More »

Final Fantasy sure has changed over the years.

These days, Square is substituting surface flashiness for that unique FF element that, in earlier titles, conjured genuine wonderment. This is especially evident in the new trailer for XIII. The original FF magic has been lost, and unfortunately, it’s in Square-Enix’s best interest to cultivate the evolution.

Some fans claim the franchise peaked around VI, others that XIII will be the best one yet. One thing’s certain: no matter how much the older fans miss bygone FF eras, the games will never be the same again.

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Demon’s Souls releases tomorrow exclusively on the PlayStation 3. Check out my review here to get a feel of what it’s going to be like.

With the assistance online component of the game going live on October 6, Atlus has also smartly decided to start a wiki page about Demon’s Soul as a real-time strategy guide that will assist in a different way than Demon’s Souls online function.

This couldn’t come at a better time because gamers are going to need to help each other to complete sections of the game.

Be sure to bookmark the wiki here.

Audiences love macho men. Video games cater to this need by providing us with strong heroes, and we love to step into their shoes.

It makes gamers feel like badasses.

Whether or not all gamers have dreams of power trips, there’s no doubt an interesting protagonist is usually a plus. That said, here are some of the most memorable video game characters, presented in all their manly glory.

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Comic lovers everywhere are worried over Disney’s recent $4 billion purchase of Marvel. Granted, other comic fans, far from scared, are excited or even indifferent — the whole spectrum of emotions comes into play with big news.

Nothing is concrete yet, but this merger’s possibilities are endless. Let alone odd mashups, it could change the way we view comics, for better or worse, or even spell a new era of Marvel movie madness. Here’s a look at just three things that could happen.

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Since the trailer for James Cameron’s Avatar was released, opinions have shot back and forth, mostly from extreme ends of the spectrum — either it looks like trash or it’s going to be the best movie ever made. One particular opinion that stuck with me was my friend’s when he said, “This looks so fake. It looks just like a video game.”

Which was interesting, because to many an outsider that’s all Avatar appears to be: a glorified video game. But that doesn’t mean it’ll suck. And not to contribute to the hype machine, but there’s a lot of potential riding with the release of this new sci-fi epic.

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