Big thanks to Jon for taking over Roundup duties while my body was, inadvisedly, shooting all its liquids out of one orifice or another.
Yesterday, Kotaku dropped a big rumor about the PS3, which set game discussion forums ablaze, except for those which have installed government-mandated hearsay retardation systems. Kotaku’s story served up information on a potential PS3 network service, styled by the story as "Home." Within a few hours, the story was all but confirmed, with details emerging about the service’s amalgamation between the Xbox 360’s achievements system and the Wii’s avatar Mii system. 1up runs down the chronology of this emergend news, which is largely unimportant to me, since I’m not much of an achievement hound, and I use a default Mii. Is this the sort of thing that inspires you?
Following Kotaku’s publishing of their story, there was a fallout with Sony, blown way out of proportion, which you could read about at Kotaku, or, for a more interesting and pointed take, at GamePolitics.
There. With that kerfluffle out of the way, we can get on to more pressing matters, such as whether or not you like your console controllers with the capability of stimulating your genitals. Once the bitterest of enemies, Sony and Immersion have signed a deal that will allow the latter’s rumble technology back into Sony-produced hardware. Patent disagreements led to the tacticle feedback feature disappearing from the Sixaxis controller, in favor of the as-yet underutilized motion sensing technology. Now there’s the distinct possibility that PS3 owners will get the best of both worlds, and be able to achieve orgasm.
This week we got the sublime Alien Hominid HD for the Xbox Live Arcade; next week, Worms HD! Joystiq reports that my favorite hotseat combat game of yore will finally make its appearance on the download service. I’m happy to note that it does have local multiplayer, which assures my purchase. Hopefully these releases are indicative of a more regular schedule for the XBLA.
Let’s hear it for Norway! I’ve shared with you all my love for adventure games, and my conflicted appreciation of Dreamfall: The Longest Journey. I was sad at the end of Dreamfall because it left its great protagonist in an awful position and possessed story that ended without resolving any damn thing. Well, the Norwegian Film Fund has awarded developer Funcom with a grant to produce episodic content for Dreamfall to continue (hopefully conclude) the epic story of world hopping. I hope they prepare enough in advance to emulate the Sam and Max episodic schedule. A new chapter of The Longest Journey every month would be cool, if I may be so bold. Here’s the news straight from the horse’s eloquent mouth.
Finally: SimCity DS will be stateside in June!