The eight most talked about stories of the week (18-22 Jan 2010)

Publisher Konami announced that the game’s weapons can also speak to each other using something called VOCALOID technology. Supposedly, this will make them über smart. Forget bringing international terrorists to justice with Solid Snake, as long as his armory can hum us a few bars of Jay Z’s Empire State of Mind, we’ll be set.

BBC wants its TV shows turned into games


Above: Coming to a console near you soon

The good old Beeb is keen to have some of its most popular programmes turned into (hopefully not shit) video games. Apparently the broadcaster is making googly eyes at a number of potential developers in the hopes of getting Dr. Who and Top Gear titles churned out.

We don’t know about the time-travelling doc with the questionable medical credentials, but caning a virtual Top Gear test track with the Stig would be all kinds of win.

Tony Hawk boards the hype train for new game

Everyone’s favourite middle-aged totally extreme Activision spokesmen – eh, we mean skateboarding legend – has ollied back onto twitter to announce his next project is in development and admitted “…it’s much better than I expected.”

The as yet unnamed title is being made by Robomodo – the same guys and gals who made Tony Hawk: Ride (yay?). Short of this new game popping out of our disc-drives, sexually harassing our significant others and then stealing the contents of our wallets, there’s no way it can be worse than Ride, right?

Crysis 2 headed for the Big Apple

A few days ago the US Official PlayStation Magazine excitedly tweeted that the sequel to Crytek’s super solider-sponsored shooter would be set in New York.

Hang on, wasn’t the original the FPS that ran on the CryENGINE? You know, that super new fangled bit of ninja programming that could never EVER run on scummy consoles. Anyhoo, expect this to look real purdy and allow you to twat annoying commuters in the face with massive sci-fi guns.

Girl wins award for Pok%26eacute;mon obsession

Do you like Pokémon? If so, probably not as much as Lisa Courtney. She's just entered the Guinness World Records 2010: Gamer's Edition for having amassed 12,113 different items of Pokémon tat. She appears a well-balanced individual – that big Pikachu easily counterbalances her certificate in that heavy frame.

When quizzed about which one was her favourite, she said it was a doll of the Pokémon Absol which she bought off eBay. She probably doesn’t realise it’s short for ‘absol… ute waste of money’.

Rockstar's LA Noire to be revealed next month

It's been almost four years already since we first heard about LA Noire. 'A new Rockstar game?' we thought. 'Count us in.' And then count us more and more frustrated and disillusioned after months of no-shows and a worrying 'delay' which usually means 'canned-but-we-don't-want-you-to-know-that-for-ages-yet'.

But it hasn't been canned, it IS on its way and we should be hearing all about it very soon. And with the promise of 'amazing new technology' and 'ground-breaking gameplay', we're excited all over again. No, we never learn.

Xbox Live more mouthy than PSN

It comes as no surprise to us that a man making a Sony multiplayer game would claim that a competitor's online game service is in some way inferior to the PlayStation Network.

Ben Jones, a developer working on MAG, or Multiplayer Action Game, or the game with the most unimaginative name in the history of the known universe, reckons that in his experience gamers on Xbox Live are more foul-mouthed and 'juvenile' than those on the PSN.

We tend to agree. Just recently we had to quit out of a Modern Warfare 2 game because a child of about 12-years-old spent the whole time singing in a nasal voice. It was so loud that he can only have had the microphone inside his stupid juvenile fat mouth. Then there was the 'older' sounding man who just stood in the same spot all game, asking people how old they were. But that's a story for another time.

Apple's new Tablet will get involved with games

This is conjecture on numerous websites’ part, but we've managed to get ourselves sucked into it - the word on the street is that Apple's new Tablet will have some life-changing game ability that could well give Sony and Microsoft something to worry about.

What is it? We don't know yet, but a bunch of privileged game journos have been invited to the official unveiling of the device on 27 January. So we'll find out from them.

Jan 22, 2010

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