Weekly Round Up 01: Week Commencing 13/09/2010

Last week was a quiet one for me gaming wise, purely because I got into a couple of TV series that I’ve started watching the box sets of, but that’s now why you are here. I did have a good weekend before last week in that I managed to gain the last few achievements for The Secret of Monkey Island. Last week I did get an evening on the Xbox on the Wednesday, a mate was over and I showed him a couple of indie games including AppleJack, which got voted OXM’s best Indie game, so it’s not just me that thinks it’s great. The other Indie game I should him was The Impossible Game. A really simple to pick up and play game that is very addictive but as I only had the trial it didn’t take long for us to reach the end.

I did get some more time on Dragon Age: Origins towards the end of last week. I’m still working on my second full play through and I’ll admit I’m starting to get a little bored of it, weather that’s because I’m playing as a Mage or because it’s just the same over and over. I know that you can go either way on some of the major decisions in the game, but I’ve completed all of the origins stories so I know which origin will make the story more interesting when I come to make those decisions. I think I’m going to have to complete this play through and have a rest from it and pick up Mass Effect 2.

What else has been happening? The Tokyo Game Show 2010 was last week and while a few new connect titles have been announced, I can’t think of any major that was announced, but then again I can’t say I was paying much attention. I’m still looking forward to the EuroGamer Expo which is in a couple of weeks. With Fable 3, Fallout New Vegas, Brink, Assassins Creed: Brotherhood, Crysis 2 and Dead Space 2 all playable on the show floor, I’m very excited. Nothing has been announced for Kinect yet, but I’m hoping they do so I can see for myself how well it reacts to your movements.

Another thing worth mentioning is the fact that Microsoft has announced that it will be raising the price of some Gold Membership options at the start of November. For where it matters the most, here in the UK, we get of very lightly the price change only affects the 1 month option. And raises it from £4:99 to £5:99, so an extra 12 pound a year, which makes a full year’s subscription out right cheaper but about 20 quid. So what are you waiting for?

Monday Catch Up 01: Project Natal is Named!

It's Monday and I hope everyone had a good weekend.


Mine was good, I managed to get a few more achievements on Red Dead Redemption so I've only got the multi-player achievements to get. I also played some more Half-Life 2 and I've got to say my review probably won't be very favourable. I'm not going to go into great detail at the moment as I need something to talk about in my review. Aside from those and a tiny splash of Applejack I didn't play much on the Xbox.


So last night was the big reveal of Project Natal or as it's now officially going to be marketed as 'Kinect'. I had heard a rumour that it was going to be called 'Wave', and I wasn't that impressed with the name and I'm not overly impressed with 'Kinect' either. I know a lot of people are comparing the name change with the Wii, which was called Revolution while in development. 


So does the name aim to try and bring families together in their gaming, Kin and ect? Or is it a play on Kinaesthetics? Or kinetics? Or all of the above? There may have been something in the unveiling last night and if there was it's not been reported anywhere I've looked. But will the name mean anything? I'm thinking no, as it will depend more on how the games interact with it.


So far we have only seen marketing video clips of families playing together and how they are all playing high energy games, but I don't tend to play with my family I tend to play on my own and I want to know how 'Kinect' will affect me! Yes the various 'Kinect-' games will probably be bundled with it much in the same way Wii Sports and Wii play were but they don't interest me. What about people like Bethesda, like Epic, like Lionhead, like Treyarch? How are these big name developers going to make use of 'Kinect'? This is what will make or break it for me.


Lionhead have already said that Fable 3 will include 'Kinect' functionality, this is a good start, the fact that Fable 3 has a "Touch System" that will allow the character to interact with other characters as well as Non-player characters (NPC's) will probably have something to do with it. But this is all I've really heard I'm hoping that tonights live streamed show will hopefully reveal some more games from some of the better known developers and fingers crossed some functionality using 'Kinect'.