This week, Split Second is pumping a ridiculous amount of adrenaline into the racing game genre. On May 25th, two more racers are coming out with very different approaches. Let’s just quickly compare the three.

Split Second: Race opponents and your friends over chaotic courses that anyone can blow to smithereens at any time, totally changing the course and taking racers out.

Blur: The only one of the three with real licensed cars, it’s more realistic than the others as well while still being arcade-y. Racers still try to perform stunts and use power-ups to take down the other cars.

ModNation Racers: Think LittleBigPlanet meets Mario Kart. It’s a kart racing game where you get to make the characters, the karts, and the tracks, all with incredibly detailed tools that anyone can use.

There wasn’t even enough room to describe everything in Skate 3 in this week’s post. So here’s a more complete list of all the cool new stuff.

• A new city! You’re not in San Vanelona or New San Vanelona, now you’re in Port Carverton! Plus there aren’t any security guards to beat you up this time…
• New tricks! You can now do probably the coolest trick ever, the DARKSLIDE. It’s like a boardslide, but with the board upside down. Along with that, you get underflips and stuff related to that.
• Teams! You create a skate team and your own skate company in Skate 3. You can invite your friends into your team, and have your team graphic on their boards and shirts and stuff.
• Board sales! Every objective you complete is to sell your company’s boards. You’re in big business now, and it’s about the sales just as much as your skating.
• Co-operative gameplay! Invite a friend to skate along with you, and you can complete single-player objectives along with him. He’ll get credit in his game, too.
• Create your own skate park! Pretty self-explanatory. It’s your team’s HQ.
• Easy mode! The physics are easier, and you get some help landing on rails.
• Hardcore mode! The physics are tougher, and you get no help at all on landing those grinds.

This week’s gaming news post covered the release of the Iron Man 2 video game. A couple of weeks ago, I visited the Chicago Comic & Entertainment Expo, where they were auctioning off various props from the Iron Man 2 movie. None of the props were ridiculously cool, like the actual suit worn by Tony Stark or anything, but they sure went for ridiculously cool amounts of money. Here’s how much the stuff sold for:

• A battle-damaged and crushed Iron Man helmet: $11,000
• The left hand of the Iron Man suit: $5,500
• The right foot of the Iron Man suit: $1,900
• Iron Man suit butt plate (yes, really): $700
• A random boom box from a Humvee: $500
• A California license plate that reads “STARK6″: $900
• A newspaper that reads “WHO IS THE IRON MAN?”: $1,000

This week, we talked about the new FIFA World Cup game. Given my limited expertise in international soccer, I’m going to go ahead and predict the results of the entire World Cup, right here, right now. Not by simulating it in-game, no, I’m just going to guess. At least no one can really laugh at how terrible the picks are until July. Two teams advance from each group.

Read the rest of this entry »

Monster Hunter Tri came out this week for the Nintendo Wii, so here’s a quick rundown of all the game’s weapon classes for those who are interested.

• Bowgun: Projectile weapon with all kinds of different ammunition and all kinds of different uses.
• Sword & Shield: Sounds traditional and normal, but actually takes the most smarts to use, because you can use other items while still having your weapon out, so items are vitally important.
• Hammer: For those who don’t even care about blocking, and would rather just keep smashin’ ’til the job is done.
• Long Sword: Like a really huge, awesome katana.
• Great Sword: Powerful and able to block, but very slow.
• Lance: Shield that can’t be stopped combined with a huge long spear. Pretty tough for monsters to get around that!

The next season of Sam & Max adventure games starts this week, and in the Kidzworld gaming news post I mentioned that the company that makes Sam & Max, Telltale, has a ton of hilarious adventure games you can play.

• Tales of Monkey Island - actually sequels to a much older series of also hilarious adventure games involving pirates.
• Sam & Max – Dog and rabbit team up as freelance police. Regular police have a hard enough job, as it is.
• Wallace & Gromit’s Grand Adventures – Great British humour, based on the claymation series of the same name. The dog, Gromit, never talks, but he gets more laughs than anybody on facial expressions alone.
• Bone – Based on Jeff Smith’s series of graphic novels.
• Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People – Strong Bad, from the online series called “Homestar Runner,” faces problems in the everyday life of a… Mexican wrestler-type guy?

This week’s gaming news post covered Cave Story for the Wii, an independent game that’s recently hit it big. A lot of indie games are awesome like Cave Story, and even free to download or play online! Here are a few free indie games that are just as good as a lot of regular games.

• Spelunky – Maybe the best free game ever made. You explore randomly generated caves for treasure and adventure, and the game just never gets old. I could play this until the end of time.
• Knytt – Explore a new world with sweet platformer gameplay. Give it some time to grow on you.
• RunMan: Race Around the World – It’s been described as “what an even better Sonic game would be like.” That’s some high praise, there.
• Dino Run – Escape the apocalypse! Also, dinosaurs!

How to Train Your Dragon was this week’s big game. The game is based on the movie which was based on the book, so I’m going to give a quick list of recommended books about games for all the gamers on this blog. If you can find them in a bookstore, flip through and see if it’s something you’ll like.

• Guinness World Records 2010: Gamer’s Edition – Solid gold (not actually made of gold, that would cost too much). Let me just flip to a random awesome record here: “Most Popular Puzzle Game Series of the Century”: Bejeweled. Here’s a cooler one: “New Super Mario Bros. DS Fastest Completion”: 44 minutes, 2 seconds. Full of records and other awesome gaming stuff.
• High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games – A little old now (released in 2002) but fun gaming history with plenty of pictures. I’ll be your dad even played some of those old systems in this book.
• The Book of Games Vol. 2 – A little tougher read, but really awesome info on the gaming industry. Why Volume 2? ‘Cause it’s better than Volume 1.
• The Art of the Video Game – Nothing but awesome pics of great games. Beautiful book.

Next week, Pokemon HeartGold & SoulSilver are storming North America, immediately after selling like (no, even better than) hotcakes in Japan.  For a remake, the game is getting unbelievably good reviews, too, so I’m collecting the ones that have been published so far right here.

• GamesRadar: 8 out of 10 – Believe it or not, this is the lowest score the game will get, and people were actually pretty mad that it was this low. Wow.
• IGN: 8.5 out of 10
• Nintendo Power: 9.5 out of 10
• Famitsu (Japanese magazine): 37 out of 40
• Games Master UK: 88 out of 100

Add to that the fact that the game’s sold over 3 million copies in Japan already, and, whoa… Sometimes I forget the awesome power of Pokemon.

You got the info on Final Fantasy XIII, Rocket Racing, and Muscle March in this week’s news post. Muscle March is, as I said, kinda really super unbelievably weird. But now, for your entertainment, I provide the Top 10 Weirdest Games I Have Ever Played *in no particular order* (with some awesome links!):

1. Bust-A-Groove 2 - Oh boy. I remember playing this when I was younger, and being just scared of this final boss. To begin with, he’s a tiny panda. Then he suddenly transforms into a creepy panda man, and it just starts getting surreal right there. *shudder*
2. Noby Noby Boy – You can read my review here on Kidzworld. The trailer released to sell the game was just gameplay, though it may not look like there’s any gameplay going on here.
3. PaRappa the Rapper – Awesomeness. Weird, but still awesomeness. Video for the best song.
4. Umjammer Lammy – Slightly less awesome than PaRappa. Slightly weirder, too, as you can tell from this level.
5. Katamari Damacy – C’mon, you know about this one, right? Still, it had to make the list for this kind of stuff.
6. Rez – Crazy rhythm/shooter game. Nothing makes a whole lot of sense, but it’s entrancing. Here’s a video.
7. Q-Bert – Arcade/Atari title. WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE?
8. Taiko Drum Master – Another rhythm game, this one came with a taiko drum peripheral, rather than a guitar or something. Best yet, you could play the Katamari Damacy theme song in it!
9. Jade Cocoon – The most underrated RPG ever, and also a very odd one. This boss battle gives you just a taste of the oddities.
10. Super Mario RPG – If you think about any Mario game long enough, it becomes clear that they are REALLY REALLY WEIRD. Why is a plumber from Brooklyn in rather colorful clothes saving a kingdom of mushroom people who have a human princess from a spiky turtle who leads whatever goombas are? Also, why is Samus Aran sleeping in Super Mario RPG? Why?!