Splinter Cell Conviction demo drops March 18

If you're not worried about spoiling the demo for yourself (which, we suppose, would lead to spoiling a very tiny portion of the game by extension), you can see some of the gameplay the demo covers in the video. Or you can wait until you get to put yourself into Sam's goggles for yourself. Oh, did we say Sam's in it? And that there would be goggles? Whoops, spoilers!
[Thanks, Daniel!]
GDC: Harmonix on the ups and downs of creating the Rock Band Network

At GDC, Harmonix senior sound designer Caleb Epps and Rock Band Network producer Matthew Nordhouse sat down to speak about the challenges that came with opening up the game to user-generated content, and how its dedicated community has organically evolved the song-sharing process.
Xbox 360 Fancast 157 -- Derailing the Thought Train

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Hosts: Alexander Sliwinski (Sli Xander) and Dave Hinkle (KnifefightYaDad)
Produced by Dave Hinkle
Music: Intro/Outro: "Electromooq" by Uma Floresta. Break: "Rat is Dead" by CSS
For fans: Xbox 360 Fancast Facebook group
EA completes Battlefield: Bad Company 2 server maintenance

[sugree]
EA assures us via Twitter that, after a rocky launch period, the Battlefield: Bad Company 2 online servers have now been stabilized. Pretty much every iteration of Bad Company 2 has seen issues arise when connecting to EA's servers for online multiplayer, with Xbox 360 kicking some users all the way out to the Dashboard and PC users experiencing authentication issues with PunkBuster.
The developer now says that those issues have been addressed, due in no small part to new servers being added over the weekend. "All new hardware is in place and ready to serve your BFBC2 needs," the tweet reads, backed up by a Q&A on the Battlefield Blog with more info. While some players may still experience a stat loss issue, EA and DICE are actively looking into a fix and encourage anyone who experiences said glitch to report it online. Now, if you'll excuse us, we've got dudes to sneak up on and knife in the back.
Source 1 - Twitter
Source 2 - Battlefield Blog
Hands-on: Limbo

To describe Limbo in great detail would be a huge disservice to gamers. What makes Limbo so mesmerizing is its mysterious quality: the game simply begins, and continues. The abstract narrative is told simply through the journey; don't expect long Jonathan Blow-esque prose throughout. Presented in black and white and silence, Limbo's simplistic style carries a foreboding atmosphere unlike any other game. It's gorgeous, with detailed animations giving life to every object in the world. Were it not for its interactivity, one might be hard pressed not to think it's a painting.
Limbo offers players little direction, nor does it need to. A GUI would ruin the simple beauty of developer Playdead's project. The controls will be immediately familiar to most gamers: A to jump and X to grab. It may seem a bit too simplistic, but Limbo offers some rather unique puzzles that take advantage of the environment in unusual and unexpected ways. Timing and precision is a necessity -- as is repetition, with death an unavoidable part of the gameplay. Traps, enemies, and pitfalls will make this a perilous journey, and the graphic depictions of death will keep you uncomfortable and on edge for hours.
It was hard to resist the urge to continue playing through the entire adventure. While I found myself stuck at a few devilish puzzles, I never found myself too frustrated to go on. Limbo is a gorgeous game that explores emotions so rarely found in games: not just terror, but a distinct sense of helplessness and longing.
Gallery: Limbo
Now Playing: March 15-21, 2010
Xbox 360 Arcade currently $130 in Canada
If you've been holding out on buying an Xbox 360 for the last five years you live in Canada, you'll be totally psyched to hear that the Arcade bundle of Microsoft's console is currently on sale in for $130.
The Xbox Canada site lists the price drop for both Futureshop and Best Buy, though we also found it over at Amazon Canada and GameStop Canada. Get 'em while you can! We've followed up with Microsoft to clarify whether or not this is a permanent change for our Canadian friends, and, of course, if we'll be seeing a similar sale/price drop in the US.
The Xbox Canada site lists the price drop for both Futureshop and Best Buy, though we also found it over at Amazon Canada and GameStop Canada. Get 'em while you can! We've followed up with Microsoft to clarify whether or not this is a permanent change for our Canadian friends, and, of course, if we'll be seeing a similar sale/price drop in the US.
Comic Jumper first video!
What a treat! Tucked away amongst the South by Southwest Screenburn Arcade was a humble booth for Twisted Pixel Games. Sure, they were demoing The Maw and 'Splosion Man (one of Joystiq's top ten games of 2009!) for curious passers-by, but at 4pm CEO Mike Wilford demoed the first ten minutes of the heretofore unseen Comic Jumper. The price for this early look at the video: shaky cam footage! Wilford promised us some direct feed video this week; but, in the interim, enjoy this first look at Comic Jumper.
Alan Wake: several DLC episodes this year, second 'season' dependent on audience

"I think it'll depend a lot on the audience, but certainly we want to -- if we're successful -- we want to do a large 'Season 2,' if you will, at some point," he said in an interview with Joystiq. "Right now, I'm not allowed to say what we're doing exactly this year. But we're going to have more than one episode come out this year."
Once the full game is complete and the team has a chance to gauge acceptance and feedback, Remedy Entertainment will shed some more light on its plans. We'll share ours with you right now: Expect to see the full Matias Myllyrinne interview on Joystiq later this week.
PSA: Fable, other Xbox Originals are 'Deal of the Week'
This week's Xbox Live Deal of the Week finds a few Xbox Originals at a 33 percent discount (sounds so much more substantial that way). As previously noted, the promotion includes the original Fable for 800
($10), along with Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas at the same $5 discount.
Before you impulse buy, make sure you aren't interested in next week's Deal of the Week, which finds all of Fallout 3's DLC (Operation: Anchorage, The Pitt, Broken Steel, Point Lookout and Mothership Zeta) at 400
($5) apiece. Broken Steel is a must-have for the level cap increase, but all the packs help deepen the already epic game.
($10), along with Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas at the same $5 discount.Before you impulse buy, make sure you aren't interested in next week's Deal of the Week, which finds all of Fallout 3's DLC (Operation: Anchorage, The Pitt, Broken Steel, Point Lookout and Mothership Zeta) at 400
($5) apiece. Broken Steel is a must-have for the level cap increase, but all the packs help deepen the already epic game.New Dragon Age Awakening character needs to go eat a sandwich or something
Justice takes center stage in the latest, and perhaps last trailer for Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening (which is due out this week). Justice is actually a "person," and not the principle -- a ghost trapped in a human body by a sorceress. Uh-huh, it's up to you to help him escape this mortal dilemma.
To make things worse, Justice's "new" body is basically Christian Bale's body (and not the Batman one). In other words, he's a skeleton tightly wrapped in skin. We're surprised Justice can even lift that shield and mace! Forget Elfroot, somebody get this guy some delicious Corpse Gall to fatten him up.
Bethesda & InXile announce 'Hunted: The Demon's Forge,' a co-op 'roots' game

Click to descend into the Lair of Screenshots
If you and your friends are eager to dive into a monster-filled dungeon -- and who isn't -- then Bethesda has a thrilling announcement for you: The publisher is handling a new co-op fantasy action game, Hunted: The Demon's Forge, developed by Interplay founder Brian Fargo's InXile Entertainment.
Fargo describes Hunted as an "upcoming release that takes us back to our roots," and the screenshots (in our gallery below) paint a pretty clear picture of what that could mean: warriors and archers putting holes in orc-looking things with sharp objects and magic.
Hunted: The Demon's Forge is in development for Xbox 360, PS3 and Games for Windows (PC). We'll have some impressions of the game later today.
Gallery: Hunted: The Demon's Forge
Final Fantasy XIII tops UK sales chart, Just Dance shows stamina
In its first week at retail, Final Fantasy XIII charged up the UK sales charts like a Lightning bolt, becoming the "fastest selling" game of the year -- a record set by Bad Company 2 just last week. According to Chart-Track, the console sales split for the latest edition in Square Enix's flagship series was fairly even, with a 54 to 46 percent split on PS3 and Xbox 360, respectively.
Bad Company 2's sales slipped 38 percent last week, bringing EA DICE's fantastic multiplayer title (wait, there's single player, too?) down to second place. And, in third -- there it is: Just Dance. The game is unstoppable and has the stamina of a six-year-old hyped up on Pixy Stix. Like we noted last week, Just Dance just keeps going and going. We're just waiting to see when this epic sugar rush wears off.
Source – Lucky XIII for Square Enix [GFK Chart-Track]
Source – Latest UK Software Charts [GFK Chart-Track]
Bad Company 2's sales slipped 38 percent last week, bringing EA DICE's fantastic multiplayer title (wait, there's single player, too?) down to second place. And, in third -- there it is: Just Dance. The game is unstoppable and has the stamina of a six-year-old hyped up on Pixy Stix. Like we noted last week, Just Dance just keeps going and going. We're just waiting to see when this epic sugar rush wears off.
Source – Lucky XIII for Square Enix [GFK Chart-Track]
Source – Latest UK Software Charts [GFK Chart-Track]
Crackdown 2 touches down July 6
Microsoft has announced the date for your return trip to Pacific City ... when you'll tear it to shreds in the name of justice! Crackdown 2 will launch in North America on July 6, with Asia, Australia and New Zealand releases following on July 8, and Europe's on July 9 -- narrowly missing the "first half of 2010" release estimate.
Producer James Cope previously said that a demo will be forthcoming before the release of the game, so we'll be playing some small portion of Crackdown 2 sooner than July 6. We're going to start playing even sooner than that, actually -- our dreams are littered with orbs.
[Update: New multiplayer ViDoc embedded above.]
Producer James Cope previously said that a demo will be forthcoming before the release of the game, so we'll be playing some small portion of Crackdown 2 sooner than July 6. We're going to start playing even sooner than that, actually -- our dreams are littered with orbs.
[Update: New multiplayer ViDoc embedded above.]
Gallery: Crackdown 2
Modern Warfare 2 'Stimulus Package' costs $15
We've read all the available info about the new Modern Warfare 2 map collection "Stimulus Package," but we still didn't have an answer to the big question on everyone's mind: "Is that the game with a bunch of guys or the one with the beards?" That, we still don't know. However, we've gotten an answer to the second biggest question from Xbox Live's Major Nelson: The five maps (three new, two remakes) will run you 1200 MS points or $15.
As a basis for comparison, the "Variety" map pack for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare ran 800 points ($10) for four new maps. Whether or not the new offering is a stimulating enough value is a decision you'll have to make for yourself when it arrives on March 30.
As a basis for comparison, the "Variety" map pack for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare ran 800 points ($10) for four new maps. Whether or not the new offering is a stimulating enough value is a decision you'll have to make for yourself when it arrives on March 30.





















