I bet that’s a headline you never expected to see again.

The 4cr Podcast returns, sort of. Yeah, that’s noncommittal, but while we plan to do these every two weeks or so, we also don’t want you to be disappointed if it takes another two and a half years to put the next one out. I’d like to say that we’ve been planning this for a while, but this really came about from Jamie and I deciding to just record something and get it out there.

What should you expect from our premier episode? Well, we’re a little rusty, so we’re starting off slow. No real segments, no Vinnk (there goes 75% of our audience) - just three of us chatting about recent gaming happenin’s.

Topics discussed: 2010 Game Developers Conference, Playstation Move, Metroid: Other M, our irrational love for Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, the comfort zone of the casual gamer, Tucker’s crippling Tron addiction, and - oh god - Nick Rumas is holding me hostage at gunpoint.

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One of the most interesting things to come out of this year’s GDC for Nintendo fans has been Metroid creator (and Other M producer) Yoshio Sakamoto’s openness regarding just about everything. He’s talked about the fabled Metroid Dread, his diverse inspirations and body of work, and he’s even shed some positive light on the prospects for Kid Icarus Wii, while seemingly shooting down any rumors of its existence in the process. He’s also hinted that Other M may have been on-rails featured classic controls if not for Team Ninja’s input, and provided a comical demonstration of his Japanese hit Tomodachi Collection for GDC attendees. This guy runs the gamut.

Doctor Who, the quirky British science fiction series about a time-traveling drifter and his human companions, is pretty much my favorite thing on television. I’ve always loved its characters, humor, and brains - it isn’t a show about shooting aliens, and I kind of appreciate that from time to time. Ever since the rumor popped up that Telltale was seeking the license, I’ve been craving the chance to play an adventure game based on The Doctor’s travels.

Well, it looks like a game is coming out and, while Telltale isn’t on the case, the BBC might have found an even better caretaker. According to an article published today in The Sun, Nintendo has signed a £10 million deal to develop a Doctor Who game for the Wii.

Don’t expect a shooting fest from the deal, according to the showrunners, they want a game that captures the Doctor’s more cerebral style. As former Doctor, David Tennant put it:

“The video game was quite actively developed, but it’s difficult to nail as the Doctor doesn’t blow things up. He’s not Batman, who goes around smacking people in the head.”

No screenshots have been spotted yet, and Nintendo has yet to officially confirm that the game is in development. In fact, I’m still expecting that the newspaper was confused and that a 3rd party is working on the game, and that it will just happen to be on the Wii.

The article states that the game is being aimed at a Christmas release in the UK. I’m praying that BBC America can bribe Nintendo into bringing it out here. We’ll give you guys an update when this either confirmed or busted.

source: The Sun

You’ve heard all about it, you’ve seen the pictures, and you’ve witnessed the backlash.

Sony’s PlayStation Move launches in the fall of this year, and for all intents and purposes, it appears to be a more technologically advanced take on what Nintendo did with the Wii four years ago. Its flagship title is a PS3-style take on the Wii Sports concept, and other launch titles cover the standard bases — party game, shooting game, fighting game, etc.

So what do you think? Is this something you find exciting, or is it too similar to what’s come before? Do you dig the lollipop design, or are you put off by it? Will games like SOCOM and LittleBigPlanet be enough to justify the estimated 100-dollar price tag? Chime in.

This would make an awesome video game. Just like it is, with giant MK characters chasing down LEGOs in meticulously detailed classic cars. The spiritual sequel to Toy Commander.

source: PhotoTuts+ via Twitter

Our friends over at Klei Entertainment just released a new trailer for their upcoming game The Shank. They’ve recently signed a deal with EA to publish it on PSN, XBLA and PC.

Macs are great - pretty much every single person on the 4cr staff uses them religiously. Unfortunately, they still fall short in one key area (again, especially for the 4cr staff). The games just aren’t there, and booting into Windows to play them is at best a major annoyance.

Well, Valve may just be the key to changing the face of Mac gaming forever. Yes, the same company famous for their PS3 putdowns has officially confirmed that their entire catalog of Source Engine games will arrive on the Mac this April, complete with a Mac-compatible version of Steam. The ability to play Left 4 Dead 2 without rebooting my computer is enough to make my day, but this news gets even more exciting when you dig into the details.

Mac gamers are used to the awful emulation-based ports of games like Civilization 4, and Valve is fully aware of this. These are real, honest-to-goodness ports, running natively in OpenGL. All of Valve’s future games (and updates to those games), starting with Portal 2 will launch simultaneously on Windows and Mac. Additionally, all of Valve’s multiplayer games will be cross-platform, allowing games to compete regardless of operating system.

All of that is incredible, but where Valve could truly revolutionize gaming on the Mac is through the port of their Steamworks APIs. Every single one of the existing tools has made it over to the new platform, along with one new feature - Steam Play. Building on the Steam Cloud, Steam Play allows a gamer on their PC to save their game to Valve’s servers and pick up exactly where they left off on their Mac.

The sum total of this? Any developer using Valve’s tools (and that is a significant number of them) can put out a game on both platforms that is truly cross-compatible, sharing saved games and putting players on both platforms in the same multiplayer games. If that doesn’t get you excited, you probably don’t have a pulse. If they can get those Mac versions running on Linux, I’ll really be a happy gamer.

source: Rock, Paper, Shotgun

I was lucky enough to get a key to try it last weekend with the rest of the press, and I am completely addicted. Here’s my one sentence take on it.

Take licensed cars, render them in beautiful graphics, add in the insanity of twenty players racing against each other, and mix that with Mario Kart (without the cheating weapons - I’m looking at you blue shell).

From what I’ve been hearing, Activision and Bizzare Creations are calling it the Call of Duty of racing games (mainly because of the online mode). They’re probably not far from the truth. Winning races and doing stuff like dodging attacks, drifting and taking down others will score you Fan points. Fan points are your experience - once you get enough you level up. Leveling will give you access to new cars, and new mods. It works just like the perks in Call of Duty, and it is pretty awesome.

I have more fifty keys for you after the break. The beta starts today, so go redeem them!

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We were all expecting it after all of the attention that the first game received, but it now looks official - Scribblenauts 2 is coming!

Details are still scarce, but it looks like the DS sequel will feature improved controls, 120 new levels, 10,000 new words, a new hint system, and new merits. Also, the par limits have been removed, and the developers are adding in a new “adjective” system.

Honestly, all of that sounds awesome to me. The controls were my biggest issue with the first (well, that and the fact that some items just didn’t work). Add in d-pad control and make sure that the objects interact as they should, and I’ll be in heaven.

Scribblenauts 2 will hit the DS this fall. No word yet on the Wii version that was leaked a little while back.

source: Tiny Cartridge

We here at 4cr take our gaming seriously — that’s why we only play in Official Nintendo Sweat Pants™, which we stocked up on in 1990. Read on to find out what kept us busy during the month of February, and be sure to let us know what you’ve been playing, too.

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Something that BioWare said about the nature of Mass Effect 2 versus Dragon Age really irked me, and it launched into a question: what is the function of a video game narrative? Similarly, what does it mean when a game’s creators tell you that the way you relate to a game is flat-out wrong?

(I’m not talking about Indigo Prophecy or, by extension, Heavy Rain, but I suspect I could be)

The Powet panel discusses these ideas and many more! (After the Jump.)

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Just in case you haven’t heard of it, the folks over at GameSpite.net have been putting out a quarterly print book all about games. Their writers have been consistently producing some of the best, most ‘grown up’ (for lack of a better phrase) writing about games out there today. I’ve been buying the books since Greg mentioned the first one in one of the 4cr staff emails, and I have read each one from cover to cover. If you’re looking for an entertaining, interesting look at video games, check ‘em out.

You can either buy the print versions or read them online, as the contents are slowly posted to the site. If you do decide to actually buy one, I highly recommend Issue 3. The books are well put together and definitely worthy of a purchase.

source: GameSpite Quarterly Issue 4

WHAT?? Isn’t Famicom Dojo supposed to be about Nintendo? It is. Sort of. This is the story of the beginnings of Sega’s entry into the console home market as told by a Nintendo.

…Huh?

Stay with us, it will all make sense.

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Hey Rebels! We just got our hands on 250 keys for the Blur multiplayer beta. Well, ok, we actually stole them from some dude crossing the street outside our office. He was asking for it!

Anyways, we’ll be giving those codes away over the next few days on the website, our twitter feed. Keep an eye on our sister site Tiny Cartridge, they will have some later this week.

Want a chance to win? Read on to get one of the first fifty keys.

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One of my favorite things to do is to track down old video games that I missed when they were released. Most of the time I find Super Nintendo or Game Boy titles, but recently I have been moving toward more GameCube, GBA, and DS material. Often times I overlooked these games because they didn’t look so great in previews, or I passed them up because I was too busy with other games. Once I end up discovering some of these overlooked gems, however, I wonder how I ever could have thought that they wouldn’t be worth my time.

Recently, one game that’s really struck me this way has been the sublime Yoshi Touch and Go for DS. Despite the praise that it receives here at 4cr from Nick Rumas, I’d never bothered with it until now. Five years later, I’m kicking myself over not trying it sooner.

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