That’s right, the $20 Wii Blaster that mysteriously showed up on GameStop’s product pages earlier last month, is indeed real. GameStop now has a picture of the device along with an estimated ship date of June 26. Though the Blaster is being developed by third-party manufacture Core Gamer, not by Nintendo as we originally anticipated.
Now the only question is, which games will use it.. hmm.
Wii Blaster [via GameSpot]
Sony announced today that everyone’s favorite hip-hop hero will be heading to US PSPs this July. Previously released in Japan, PaRappa The Rapper for PSP contains all the characters, levels and songs from the PSone original, but also brings some PSP-specific features to the table such as ad-hoc rap battles, and an infrastructure mode enabling you to download eight additional playable remixes.
According to a recent Famitsu interview with Capcom director Minoru Nakai, the company’s philosophy on Wii development is “Easy and Exciting”. He states that most Wii users are beginners, and as such, game controls must be simplified and the difficulty factor needs to be toned down. But don’t get too worried now: Nakai says there will still be optional difficulty modes in upcoming games like Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition that should provide a challenge to even the hardcore gamer.
Good to see Capcom catering to the mainstream Wii market, while not forgetting about us enthusiast gamers.
You can view the full interview, with subtitles, below:
New direct-gameplay screenshots from Climax’s Silent Hill Origins. Some of these we’ve seen before, but there’s a few new screens in the bunch. Looking absolutely amazing for a PSP title (on-par with PS2 graphics I would say).
Today EA announced the development of Burnout Paradise, a new entry in the company’s crash-centric racing series. Except this time, it’s not just about racing. Paradise will be totally open ended, giving players the chance to explore the city, discover events, and look for the best opportunities to crash, jump and pull signature takedowns.
Burnout Paradise is slated for release this Winter for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
Microsoft announced today that three new games will be available on the Xbox Live Arcade this Wednesday. The invasion begins with the classic arcade games Centipede and Millipede (400 MS Points), each with a new "Evolved" game mode which features high-def graphics and immersive special effects. Also heading to XBLA is the hugely popular board game Catan (800 MS points).
Nintendo has added three more games to the Wii’s Virtual Console catalog today, including the legendary NES title Castlevania (500 Wii Points), SNES action-adventure The Legend of the Mystical Ninja (800 Wii Points), and Hudson’s TurboGrafx16 action-adventure known as Shockman (600 Wii Points).
A Sony UK spokesperson has revealed that the company is conducting an internal inquiry over the use of an decapitated goat at a press event for God of War 2. Sony is appalled to see that the article appeared in the Official PlayStation Magazine and are taking preparatory measures to ensure that an event like this does not happen again.
Sony to conduct internal inquiry following dead goat incident [GI.biz]
Good news for N64 emulation fans! StrmnNrmn, author of the PSP N64 emulator known as Daedalus, has posted a new entry on his blog regarding the impending release of R11. The focus on R11 has been mainly towards increased game compatibility, but after fixing a small resource leak in the texture cache today, he noticed a 4-5% speedup!
Overall, StrmnNrmn says we should see a 5-10% speedup over the previous release, R10. Add this to the numerous game compatibility fixes and minor tweaks and we’ve got ourselves a winner. Expect a release this coming weekend.
R11 Almost Ready [StrmnNrmn's Blog]
Today the talented Nintendo DS developer Simon Hall has graced us with an update to his DS port of id Software’s Quake. Preview 2 features some major additions and changes, including faster rendering, full control configuration, support for game saves, vertex lighting and light animations, WiFi network play via access point, and an improved sound system.
Download QuakeDS Preview 2 / Changelog
QuakeDS Preview 2 Released [Simon Hall]
