Gamernode: Latest Industry News

GTA IV ads go big. Really big

There's a saying that goes, "a picture is worth a thousand words." If this adage is true then the campaign for Grand Theft Auto IV is reaching mammoth proportions as far as the size of ads are concerned.

In downtown Los Angeles, the Hotel Figueroa sports three gigantic murals on the sides of its buildings proclaiming the word that Grand Theft Auto IV is truly coming. The scope of the murals is truly amazing--the artwork spans at least 12 stories high.

Thousands of commuters pass these murals daily and no doubt, there will be at least a few gamers driving by that will pick up the game because of the ads. For a peek at what they look like, look below.

[via nextgen]

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Are videogames destroying your life? No.

"What is it about games like 'World of Warcraft,' 'EverQuest' or 'Call of Duty' that turns good people into bleary-eyed zombies who forget to pay the gas bill? And do game developers design games to be addictive?"

When MSNBC starts off an article on their site with the above paragraph I do two things. I pause, taking a deep breath. And I make sure there is nothing too sharp near my desk that could injure a roommate if thrown in their direction.

Kristin Kalning, whose title is "games editor" for MSNBC.com, brings up the guy in South Korea that played Star Craft until he died and the couple in Reno Nevada that neglected their kids to play D&D Online. It gives me reason to be suspicious. To give her credit, she does go directly to a game developer and a doctor to get the answers to her above...

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GTA IV ads pulled in Chicago due to Fox newscast

Where would we be without Fox telling us how to live? Over the years, they've attacked numerous aspects of the gaming world--from blowing a non-explicit 5-second sex scene in Mass Effect out of proportion by reporting false information, to advocating that gaming teaches you to kill and nothing more.

Now, in Chicago, they are telling the gaming industry how to advertise.

Fox, reacting to recent shootings in Chicago, questioned the CTA why advertisements for the "unapologetically violent" Grand Theft Auto were popping up on buses and train platforms. In their report, Fox spoke of the game as if it caused the shootings and was altering children into mindless killing machines.

Their dreadfully lopsided report contained three street interviews, only one of which said they didn't care, statin...

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GTA IV: Which version will dominate?

April 29th. On that day the long awaited blockbuster title, Grand Theft Auto IV, will be unleashed upon the gaming world. From recent reports, GTA IV will have no problems selling out.

What some people are wondering about is which version of GTA IV will be more popular...the Xbox 360 version or the PS3 version of the game?

Microsoft and Sony aren't taking any chances and are actively promoting their versions of the game so as to gain as much market share as possible. Over in the UK, retail outlet HMV is offering 1000 Microsoft Points to sweeten the deal for those who opt for the Xbox 360 edition.

The PS3 version of GTA IV is outselling the 360 version by a large margin at UK's Asda stores. "Both titles have generated great interest on the Asda website, with strong pre-orders, and the PS3 ver...

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Heavenly Sword developer working on a new game

If you ask Ninja Theory co-founder and chief developer Nina Kristensen about the videogame development landscape, she will tell you that it is a "brutal environment" for an independent studio. Lucky for Ninja Theory, however, they have been pardoned from that brutality, and have already signed with an unnamed publisher for an upcoming multiplatform title.

"It's a brutal environment out there for an independent, particularly considering the size of the games that we're developing," said Kristensen, "but we've now signed up the new game and the future looks pretty rosy for us."

Unlike Heavenly Sword, this new game will grace the Xbox 360 as well as the PlayStation 3, so the publisher won't be Sony Computer Entertainment this time around.

"Yes, our new game is going to be PS3 and Xbox 360. We ...

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Mechner trademarks "Prince of Persia Prodigy"

About one week ago, Prince of Persia creator and franchise rights owner Jordan Mechner registered a new trademark for "Prince of Persia Prodigy" in relation to "game software and electronic game programs..."

Given Mechner's trademarking history (Prince of Persia; Prince of Persia The Sands of Time; Prince of Persia Warrior Within; Prince of Persia The Two Thrones) this is likely the title of an as of yet unannounced piece of software - maybe even a tie-in with the upcoming Prince of Persia film.

When Mechner was questioned about possible movie-related Prince of Persia games back in December, he refused to comment, leading many to believe the tie-in speculation.

[via Trademork, Gamasutra]

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Bethesda says "no way" for a Fallout 3 demo

If you are a Fallout fan or someone who is curious in seeing how Fallout 3 will play like through a demo, Pete Hines of Bethesda Software has crushed your wishes. Hines said that there is "no way" to pull a piece of Fallout 3 from the main game code and have it functioning by itself.

"When you build it as one thing, there's no way to portion off a section and have it stand on its own without putting the whole game in the demo, which we're just not going to do. And it doesn't really capture the fun of a game like an Elder Scrolls or a Fallout, where you can go where you want and do what you want. So no demo, sorry."

Sorry indeed. With no demo slated for Fallout 3, Bethesda may be the one that is sorry because of possible lost sales because of the lack of a demo. While Hines' explanation of no...

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Blizzard: No WoW for you, Uwe!

We, as gamers, all know and love the charismatic film director Uwe Boll (ok, maybe by "love" I really mean "can't friggin' stand"). The man has an affinity for making videogame-based movies, but somehow they all come out looking, smelling, sounding, and tasting (tasting? sure, why not?) like crap.

He has slain many-a-franchise with deplorable big screen adaptations, and most recently set his sights on the heroin of the videogame industry, World of Warcraft. Could the biggest thing since the microchip be the the next victim of Boll's evil pen of DOOM?

No. Luckily, Blizzard is familiar with Boll's past work, and pretty much bitch slapped him when he approached them with the idea. Boll describes the exchange:

I got in contact with Paul Sams of Blizzard, and he said, 'We will not sell the mov...

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Microsoft slams PS3's GTA IV install time

A Microsoft press release circulating around the tubes is making fun of the installation procedure that the PS3 version of GTA IV requires.

Specifically, they're mocking the time the installation takes. Here is the full press release. Keep in mind while reading this that GTA IV's PS3 install takes a whole five minutes.

"With the OXM review hitting streets today, and your own preview impressions which are looking great, hopefully you'll all be a bit wiser as to the ins and outs of GTA IV now.

I'm sure you've all seen the chatter from the 1up GTA IV Preview on the PS3 install time....just a few thoughts on what you could do in this time if you were actually playing the 360 version from the moment you insert the disc....

· Steal your first dozen or so cars and test out the improved vehic...

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Kid vs. Mom. Part II

We reported a story this week regarding a 13 year-old boy who broke the family vacuum cleaner in order to get out of his chores so he could play video games. The mom punished his son by putting his Xbox 360 on eBay for sale.

Some questions arose when the listing on eBay was suddenly delisted as "The seller ended this listing early because the item is no longer available for sale."

People immediately speculated that the mom caved in and returned the Xbox 360 to her errant and disrespectful son. But according to a post on Digg, a person who claims to be the mom in this interesting drama says she pulled the ad because Dyson gave her a free vacuum cleaner.

In the 130th comment allegedly from "The Mom," it says:

"Here is the real story on why the action ended early...I got a free Dyson...so I no l...

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DC Comics and Mortal Kombat to collide

At Midway's Gamer's Day in Vegas, they made an announcement that instantly changed the order of my "Games I Want to Buy Most" list: the next Mortal Kombat will feature DC Comics heroes. So far, the only confirmed characters are Batman and Sub-Zero, but really, do you need any more? A DC vs MK game has always been one of my dream mash-ups, and now it's a reality.

Outside of the inclusion of DC, little is known about the project other than it won't contain the traditional Mortal Kombat fatalities. (DC doesn't want Batman or Superman being torn apart, I suppose; no word on the less-fatal -alities.) Who wouldn't give up fatalties for a chance to have Batman kick Scorpion's ass, though? Even with no real information on the game, I'm going to go ahead and say it's going to be the most badass gam...

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GTA4: The Aussies Strike Back

The Aussies are mad as hell and they won't take it anymore... well at least that's what some gamers feel like. The highly awaited Grand Theft Auto 4 will be hitting Australian shores on April 29. But the big difference between their version and the US version is content. 

In order to pass the Australian media classification system, which does not have a rating of R18+, Rockstar had to tone down a lot of the game in order meet the MA15+ rating so the game could be sold in OzzieLand.

Outraged gamers have retaliated by canceling their pre-orders for GTA4 and will be resorting to purchasing import copies that are cheaper and have its content uncut.

Victorian deputy premier and attorney general Rob Hulls said, "It seems inconsistent that in Australia adults are allowed to view adult-only films, w...

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GTA IV bundled with graphical problems

With the new installment of the Grand Theft Auto series, Rockstar Games is bumping up the graphical prowess of GTAIV in order create a one of a kind, realistic perspective in a huge sandbox environment. With such a large persistent world is it surprising that GTAIV is suffering from graphical difficulties?

According to multiple previews, GTAIV contains grainy framerate issues, buildings and cars that popup out of nowhere, and long-distance fade outs.

So when you are being chased by the cops and you need a getaway car, hopefully you won't have to run into the trouble of waiting for a street car to pop up in your view to hijack. Also when you are driving fast in your car through a busy, traffic filled downtown street the framerate tends to dip a bit.

The reasons why these graphical hiccups po...

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Infogrames wants to be Atari...

David Gardner, the CEO of Infogrames, told GamesIndustry.biz that he will be thinking about leaving the Infogrames name in favor of a switch to the Atari brand that everyone knows.

"I'd like to consider that, I think that would be the final mark of the transformation from Infogrames to Atari," said Gardner. "We have a new board of directors, a new management team that's less than a year old - so yes, it's really continuing.

"We like to think of Infogrames, instead of being the tired, old company, we like to think of it as the best-funded, best-branded, most energetic start-up in the history of computer gaming."

Phil Harrison, former head of SCEE, had this to say about the new direction of Infogrames, "[Gardner and I] had a very interesting series of dreams, of discussions, about if we were t...

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Guess what? A study shows games are good

So I just spent the better part of an hour looking through a study conducted by Project Tomorrow.

The study (pdf here) is all about technology and its effects on the wee ones. Not the Wii ones... just so we're clear. Basically it covers those from grades K-12 (students, teachers, and parents) and their likes and dislikes about the restrictions and freedoms of technology in and out of the classroom. Did you follow all that? Good. Lets move on.

The most interesting facts (and most relevant to this site) were the ones in the electronic gaming section. Putting aside the fact that 64% of the students said they played "online and/or electronics based games regularly" I was way more interested to learn how many students and teachers wanted to bring gaming into the classroom.

51% of students t...

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How do you feel when playing video games?

International Hobo, a game design consultancy company, asked this very question in a survey on their website. They wanted to find out just how gamers felt while playing video games and whether they were even aware of any emotions going on during gameplay.

The questionnaire also asked if gamers actively purchased games to fulfill these emotions.

The survey received 1,040 responses and of the top 10 answers, people put "amusement" as the top emotion they get from playing video games. The word obviously could also be another word for "fun."

Chris Bateman, managing director for International Hobo said, "The fewest number of people responded that they had no experience of amusement in videogames (just 1.7 percent) while a whopping 92.6 percent gave this emotion one of the top two responses, and...

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3D HDTV is here. Where are the games?

Gaming graphics have come quite a way when compared to games of yesteryear when eight bit graphics were the norm. Today graphics are pushing the realism envelope and we'll soon be playing games that will offer so much reality that it will be hard to determine what is digitally made and what is real.

With that said what is the next step for graphics and video games? The answer to that question may have been answered with a new 3D HDTV made by Hyundai. The new 46" set sports a resolution of 1920 x 1080 and produces the 3-D effect by displaying two stereoscopic images at once.

But in order to see the 3-D effect a user has to wear special Polaroid glasses that can separate the two images. The technology for 3-D broadcasts is already available in Japan and the new television will set you back ap...

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Iron Man gets some fresh looking threads

We all know that Iron Man is set for the silver screen soon, but along with the movie will be a tie-in video game scheduled for release on May 2.

We're not too sure how good the game is going to be but we do know that Tony Stark will have a wide range of nice suits to adorn himself with while fighting crime and saving the world from disaster.

The specific outfits will be for the PS3 and 360 versions of Iron Man. The armor suits look really nice and hopefully the gameplay will be just as good. Now without further ado we present a few of the Iron Man outfits.

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Most powerful Iraq leader was a hard-core gamer?

Gaming reaches people of all classes, cultures, and creeds. You can also add to this list the political and religious categories.

GamePolitics reports that one particular individual, Muqtada al-Sadr, is a hard-core gamer. Al-Sadr earned the nickname of Mullah Atari while he was a student of religion in Iraq.

"As a young seminary student, his nickname was Mullah Atari, because he preferred video games to studying the Quran. Now, Muqtada al-Sadr is a radical cleric revered by millions of poor Shiites as a modern-day Robin Hood. He also may be the most powerful man in Iraq."

USA Today said, "He says defeating the United States in Iraq is his top priority, but his cease-fire and other political maneuvering helped the U.S. military accomplish some of its key objectives, such as reducing violence...

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Ewe Boll says, "I'm not a f*cking retard!"

A few days ago it was reported that a petition was started to stop Ewe Boll from making any more movies. Boll first reacted by saying if the petition could get one million signatures, he would quit.

But it seems that the petition has gotten under his skin and he has reacted pretty forcefully regarding the campaign by slamming various movie luminaries and defenfing himself as an excellent film director.

His comments were obviously not meant for little children, Girl Scouts or small animals, but his rant is still pretty entertaining and funny even though he probably didn't mean it to be.

"I'm not a f*cking retard like Michael Bay or other people running around in the business or Eli Roth making the same sh*tty movies over and over again. If you really look at my movies you will see my real ge...

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