Ok this game was probably at the bottom of my “Want” list about 5 minutes ago. After watching this “dev diary” of the game over at Joystiq, I really want it. Visceral games are really using some nice tricks with the wii controls, like tilting on the side for secondary-fire. Coop work on puzzles, and some great looking graphics. I’ll move this near the top of my want list for now.

source: Boing Boing

The studio also owns the rights to film adaptations of Battleship, Candyland, and Stretch Armstrong among several other questionable nostalgia-heavy brands.

source: Film Junk

Update: Toronto Thumbs got their hand on an exclusive teaser of the movie. You can see it after the break

If Cobra Commander really was in Pac-Man, I have a feeling he’d always be running away from the player.

Nick Luckett:

This month I discovered that the iPhone had suddenly become my primary gaming platform. While I finally activated my Xbox Live account, I find myself using it more for Netflix than anything else (although I did just download Psychonauts, so I’ll be putting some time into that very soon).

So, what have I been playing on the iPhone? Pretty much anything I can get my hands on. I’m truly amazed by the quality of the games on here. Some are so simple and only require a few seconds to play… perfect when standing in line somewhere. Others though, are surprisingly deep and I find myself propped up in bed at night playing them. I haven’t been this excited about portable gaming since the GBA.

Here are the ones you must get. Edge: an amazing game. Best game on the system I’d have to say. Like a new age Marble Madness. Ancient Frog: incredibly charming and clever puzzle game. Hard too. Eliss: people have been calling this the Tetris of the iPhone. A fantastic multitouch experience. Passage: a 99c… story. Not so much a game,
but a 5 minute interactive experience that is truly art.

I have over five pages of games on my iPhone, so I’ll start reviewing some of them on the site. But one last shoutout goes to Flashback. I played the game way back on the SNES and loved it. In fact, I was recently back visiting my Dad and brothers in Atlanta and we pulled this game out and started playing it. Imagine my surprise when I came upon it in the App Store. The controls take a little adjustment, but work surprisingly well. And the game is just as captivating as always.

Jody:

The beginning of the month I started playing through Majora’s Mask. Then after a while I started getting annoyed (I hate the Goron racetrack) so I moved to a replay of Twilight Princess. TP just might be my favorite 3D Zelda game (it and Wind Waker are neck-and-neck). On the DS front, I started playing through Final Fantasy IV. I never played it in the SNES days, and just never got around to giving it a shot until now. I’m really enjoying it. Also on DSi I play way too much Paper Airplane Chase. Lastly (as of just recently) I started playing Point Lookout for Fallout 3. Fallout 3 is one of the best games ever, and PL (not to be confused with Phantom Leap) is probably the best expansion yet. There is so much to do, and the environment is a welcome change to the Capital Wasteland. Plus the things the swampfolk say are just plain awesome. If you buy any Fallout 3 DLC, make it Point Lookout (but you should really buy all of them, because they are all fantastic.)

Edgar:

This Month, I played Lost Odyssey on the 360, and I’m still playing it now. The game is one of the most mature RPGs I’ve ever played. The story is great, and the battles are awesome. Although they are random, the developers didn’t go overboard with them. On the DS front, I’ve been playing Shiren: The Wanderer to get myself pumped for the Wii version coming soon.

Shaun:

I can’t believe the month is almost over, and at the same time, this one has felt very long. Who could forget the craziness that was this year’s E3? While many of us are looking forward to new, yet-to-be released titles, I found myself keeping more than busy with many existing ones.

I had a lot of fun playing Ninja Blade - a game that takes ninjas and pits them against infected people and other such zombie-ish monsters. It’s so crazy and over-the-top that it’s hilarious, and minor control issues aside, is an enjoyable experience for ninja enthusiasts.

Sacred 2: Fallen Angel is another game I’ve spent a good chuck of time with. Running around an oversaturated world while smacking around bad guys and evil animals is a great way to spend an afternoon. Admittedly, I have no idea what the overarching plot of the game is just yet but I’m having a lot of fun with the side quests.

Ghostbusters: The Video Game has finally arrived after a little concern that the game would never see a release date. Quite nicely, its release lined up closely with the 25th anniversary of the first film. Interesting little sidenote: The Canadian Blu-Ray release of the film has the title “S.O.S. Fantomes” plastered on the box in big lettering, just under “Ghostbusters” due to language laws in the country. I feel it makes the box look ugly (as do others). But what’s interesting here is that Ghostbusters: The Video Game doesn’t have “S.O.S. Fantomes” on its box. Instead, it says “Ghostbusters: The Video Game” with “Le Jeu Video” underneath it. So what I want to know is: How are these poor French people going to know this is the game for S.O.S. Fantomes?

Anyhow, I’ve been playing the Xbox 360 and Wii versions of the game, and they’re both a lot of fun. The Wii version is cool for the pointer controls and for its co-op story mode - plus it has some neat extras in it not found in the 360 version. The humor comes across a little better in it as the game cuts away to the different Ghostbusters during conversation to show their expressions. At the same time, the 360 version does have a lot more to it - so if you’re looking to me to tell you which one you should play, but my answer is “Both!”

Also on deck this month was Prototype, a game which I’ve seen a few cool kids pan, but is really freaking cool. Experience points are built up by destroying enemies, and they accumulate fast. In turn these can be used to unlock new powers. However, I’ve found the game very rewarding by choosing to only unlock certain powers when I felt I needed them. That is, until the game starts kicking me around too much, I wouldn’t spring for new powers. This way, I get to spend some time with each new power, adjusting to it, before unlocking another. Basically this is kind of like playing as Sylar from Heroes at times. It’s a lot of fun, but I can see how unlocking all the powers you can at once can really ruin the experience.

I’m a little late to the party with this one, but Punch-Out!! Wii is simply amazing. The game plays similarly to the original, but with the motion control option it really makes you feel like you’re wailing away on your enemies. It’s a great workout, too. Plus the music is awesome and it gets stuck in my head a lot.

On that note: On the DS, I’ve been tinkering with Korg DS-10 quite a bit and using it as a musical notepad to jot down the songs that I sometimes get stuck in my head and that I hum along to. I’ve also played too much Guitar Hero On Tour: Modern Hits but I did not enjoy any of it. But to make up for that, I’ve been enjoying The Legendary Starfy. I just started playing it yesterday, so I’m only a few stages in, but it is pure platforming fun - and, it’s cute! I’m also on my second play-through of Professor Layton and the Curious Village and hope to finish it before August 24, which is when Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box is released. I got to preview it last week, and it’s awesome.

Rumas:

I mainly played two games this month. The first was Majora’s Mask on the Virtual Console. What a game, but I’m still having trouble wrapping my head around it! Either I’m stupid or it’s truly disorienting, the whole time thing. The experience feels like a weird dream. Really loving every second of it, though.

I spent the most time this month playing Link’s Crossbow Training. I got gold medals on every challenge previously, but this months I went for the platinums. And now I’m going for scores over 150,000 on each! I LOVE THIS GAME. It has the Nintendo magic. You should most definitely seek it out if you haven’t. I play it without the Wii Zapper, and it works like a charm. Perhaps my favorite pick-up-and-play experience on Wii.

While most my childhood friends had Nintendo Entertainment Systems, I somehow ended up with a Sega Master System. I was supposed to get a Nintendo, but Toys ‘R’ Us was sold out of the system the day my dad took me there. Instead, they had this other system that was kind of like a Nintendo, so we got that instead.

It’s a great system and I still love it, having eventually overcome NES Envy when my friends got to play the super cool Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game while I was left with Ghostbusters as the only licensed game in my collection. But dammit, I loved that game, and playing Ghostbusters: The Video Game on Xbox 360 and Wii has made me nostalgic for the Sega Master System version to the point where I almost want to play it.

Instead, I’ll settle for watching this speed-run of the entire game (EDIT: Here’s the second part). I was never able to defeat Gozer in that last stage, and damn that stairwell level was a bitch. The Slimers move too fast, and what’s with those elongated Slimers? On second thought, maybe I don’t want to know. If ghosts are supposed to be apparitions of deceased humans, I gotta wonder what Slimer might have looked like.

Anyhow, enjoy the clip and crank up the volume. This is actually one of the better 8-bit renditions of the Ghostbusters theme I’ve heard. Even though I’ve heard this loop thousands of times, and despite the fact that this tune makes my tinitus go crazy, I still get a kick out of it. The author of the clip has wisely replaced the music about three minutes in so regular folk like yourself don’t go crazy from it. Alas, it is too late for me.

Check out the full list of releases after the break.

Wii
June 30 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
June 30 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
June 30 - Roogoo: Twisted Towers

Virtual Console / WiiWare
Water Warfare (1-8p, 800 Wii Pts)
Reel Fishing Challenge(1p, 500 Wii Pts)
Silver Star Reversi (1-2p, 500 Wii Pts)

Fantasy Zone II: The Tears of Opa-Opa (Master System, 1p, 500 Wii Pts)

DS
June 30 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
June 30 - Harvest Moon: Frantic Farming
June 30 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
June 30 - Mega Man Star Force 3: Black Ace
June 30 - Mega Man Star Force 3: Red Joker
June 30 - My Dress-Up
June 30 - My Make-Up
June 30 - Treasure World

DSiWare
SUDOKU MASTER (1p, 500 DSi Pts)

Xbox 360
June 30 - BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger
June 30 - Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood
June 30 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
June 30 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
June 30 - Infernal: Hell’s Vengeance

XBLA
Marvel vs. Capcom 2
Worms 2: Armageddon

PS3
June 30 - BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger
June 30 - Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood
June 30 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
June 30 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

PSN
PAINalympics
Marvel vs. Capcom 2
The Punisher: No Mercy

PSP
June 30 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
June 30 - Steambot Chronicles: Battle Tournament

PC
June 30 - Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood
June 30 - Grand Theft Auto PC Trilogy
June 30 - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
June 30 - Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs

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Thanks,
— The 4cr Staff

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source: Batman Obviously

Before getting my hands on this game, I’d read a few comments online in favor of the old school controller option. But after playing it with the motion controls, I can’t imagine wanting to play it any other way. The feeling of swinging my fists to beat the pineapples out of King Hippo is unrivaled by any other boxing game I have played, and I think it has a lot to do with how well these new controls work in terms of making you feel like you’re in the game. It’s actually quite adrenaline-pumping.

The characters have their distinct look and fighting style, and the game still feels like a Punch-Out!! title. Screenshots from the game don’t do it justice, and neither does watching video of it in action. It simply must be played to be appreciated. The theme music has been stuck in my head all weekend, and it’s the perfect pump-up music during fights. The first few challengers are easy to beat down, but the difficult steadily increases till it’s quite ridiculous.

Have you played Wii Punch-Out!! yet? Do you like the motion controls, or are you a fan of the old school control option? Chime in.

The game includes the workout routines from Wii Fit but will feature a more streamlined user interface so that navigating between different activities and between different players (and exercisers) isn’t such a tedious process. But in addition to this, there seems to be a lot more in the extras department. Unlike Wii Fit, it looks like Wii Fit Plus will have a lot more in terms of games. This time around there are 15 new balance games and six new strength training and yoga exercises.

I didn’t spend a whole lot of time playing around with the various games in the non-workout part of the disc, but I was nevertheless worked out. In fact, days after the preview I began to wonder why my calves were feeling the burn so much when I’d climb stairs. Eventually, I realized it was from testing out Wii Fit Plus just days before. I also realized I’m somewhat out of shape.

Read the rest at Toronto Thumbs