Troubled Tecmo President Resigns!

Today, Tecmo Co. Ltd. announced that Tecmo president Yoshimi Yasuda will resign. The Board of Directors accepted Yasuda's resignation — which was for "personal reasons". Starting September 1st, Chairman of the Board Yasuharu Kakihara will assume the position of Tecmo's president.

Yasuda has been at the center of the Itagaki vs. Tecmo legal suit. Dead or Alive creator Tomonobu Itagaki is suing for unpaid DoA 4 wages. These were "special incentive" wages that Itagaki claims were agreed to by the former Tecmo president and the board of directors, but the current president is claiming these "special incentive" wages were made single-handedly by the former president and not approved by the Tecmo board.

Meet Your Sexy New Red Alert 3 Cast

EA announced at its Leipzig Games Convention press conference today additional details on the cast of Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, including the casting of Jenny McCarthy, pictured, as Tanya, the staple special ops unit. But that's not all. The leaders of the three factions — Allies, Empire of the Rising Sun and the Soviet Union — will be played by JK Simmons, George Takei and Tim Curry, respectively. In the trailer we were shown, Takei's lines appear to be dubbed with his own voice, dialogue intentionally out of synch with his lip movements.

Also announced was the appearance of Kelly Hu, who will join Gina Carano and Gemma Atkinson as the Empire of the Rising Sun's obligatory sexpot. EA's definitely going straight for the groin with this one.

Finally, in the cinematic trailer shown at Leipzig, it appears that Peter Stormare will play a part in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3. Oh snap!

During EA's press conference in Leipzig earlier this morning, it was announced that the game destined to sell a gagillion copies - The Sims 3 - has a firm release date. And that date's February 20, 2009. That's a global, simultaneous release as well, mind you, just in case you're in Europe and were going to bug us about that in the comments section.

GC08: Live blogging the EA press conference [VG247]

Remember when we thought the Xbox 360 was sold out at one Japanese store? That's not all. It's sold out across the whole damn country. Like, sold out sold out. It's so sold out that Microsoft Japan actually put out an official statement about the situation in The Land of the Rising Sun, apologizing for the lack of consoles. Since demand has eclipsed supply, Microsoft's supply has gone totally dry. The company is ramping up production, and the console will not be shipped to stores until next month.

We've translated the full statement after the jump.

Another Snowboarding Title Enters the Fray

It looks like Shaun White may have a bit of competition. While Destineer's upcoming snowboarder Stoked wasn't built using the Assassin's Creed engine (and it doesn't sport a Wii version with Balance Board support), it does have some things going for it. First off, it was created with the help of snowboarding movie creator Absinthe Films.

“It’s all about defining your riding style and crafting the line that suits you,” said Peter Anthony Chiodo (“Tony”), Destineer’s Director of Product Development. “Stoked leaves well-worn resorts behind and gives players absolute freedom to ride wherever they want and trick off of anything they can find in some of the most famous backcountry locations the world has to offer. Gameplay is focused on style and finesse, not button mashing; Destineer and Bongfish have created a game that looks and plays like a snowboarding movie.”

Adds Patrick “Brusti” Armbruster, co-founder of Absinthe Films: “Developing a snowboard video game has always been a dream of mine. There are endless synergies between a snowboard film production and a game developer that were just waiting to be activated. Bongfish and Destineer have realized this potential, and have shown a real passion for snowboarding, and together we’ve worked to bring snowboarding luminaries from across the planet together for this project.”

Stoked includes five famous mountains featuring over 45 square miles of open terrain in each location, hidden drop points for helicopter starts, dynamic weather, multiplayer support and tons of real world pro riders. Among the list: Travis Rice, Nicolas Mueller, Wolle Nyvelt, Annie Boulanger, Romain de Marchi, Tadashi Fuse, Gigi Ruef, and Bjorn Leines.

Stoked is scheduled for release in November. More details on the jump as well as a chunky gallery.

Mad Catz Making Official Street Fighter IV Controllers

Typically when a Mad Catz controller press release crosses my desk I don't spend much time worrying over it. But this, this is much different. Mad Catz today announced that they've secured the license to make controllers and accessories for a number of Capcom games including Bionic Commando, Resident Evil 5 and (gasp) Street Fighter IV.

That's right, Mad Catz are making the Street Fighter IV fighting sticks. I hope that makes you as nervous as that makes me. I've never been a big fan of Street Fighter on a console. Why? Because frankly it's not a game meant for console gaming. Sure you can play around with it at home, but SF is a arcade cabinet game and it always will be. Don't bother arguing with me, I will stubbornly refuse to listen and may even start making blah, blah, blah noises.

So when I started talking to the Capcom folks about Street Fighter IV (Ok, gushing), I told them how I fully expect the console version to suck. Really suck. No Brian, they told me, that's not true. Wait until you see the controllers. They're really going to be something special. Then comes the news today, Mad Catz is making them. Lies, LIES, I tell you. But after a bit of hyperventilating I touched base with some friends in the know and have been reassured (at least they tried to) that the controllers are still going to be filled with delicious awesome.

I wait, arms crossed sternly in front of chest, to be surprised.

Too Human has been in development for more than a decade by Denis Dyack and the crew at Silicon Knights. The kick-off for the Cybernorse trilogy was critically panned when previews hit and Dyack was quick to attack those who dug into the early code. But now the game is in stores and there's no more room for excuse making. We've gathered together a cross-section of critical analysis from across the web to try and find a bit of insight into whether the game is worth buying and playing.

Hit the jump for our Epic Frankenreview.

2K Games masterpiece Bioshock hits the Playstation 3 in North America on Oct. 21 and internationally on Oct. 24, Take-Two announced today.

Developed by 2K Marin, 2K Boston, 2K Australia and Digital Extremes, the Playstation 3 version of the game includes new content that "augments and extend the experience in exciting ways."

"We are proud to introduce 2K Games' showcase title, BioShock, to an entirely new audience," said Christoph Hartmann, president of 2K. "With the addition of the new Add-On Game Content we are able to extend the award-winning adventure while maintaining the perfect harmony that millions of players around the world have fallen in love with."

New features include a Survivor difficulty mode, trophy support and add-on game content. The PS3 version also gets Challenge Rooms, by way of downloadable content after launch, which requires gamers to "utilize the knowledge and skills they have learned while traversing the halls of Rapture."

Make sure to check back this week when we get a chance to check out the first Challenge Room in person at the Games Convention in Leipzig.

Sick of Valve's water-torture Heavy updates? We were. Just a little. Was starting to feel like a dojo, and boy, are we all dojoed out. So it's great to see the proverbial floodgates open with this latest announcement, because not only are they introducing an all-new gameplay mode into the game - Arena mode - but five new maps to go along with it. Arena's designed for small, quick, tactical engagements, and will take place on new (well, newish) maps that emphasise this new approach. Three of the maps are existing ones that have been remade to suit Arena (Well, Granary, Badlands), while the other two - Lumberyard and Ravine - are all new (and are pictured below).
Arena Mode [Team Fortress 2]

Because Chop Till You Drop runs on the Resident Evil 4 Wii engine, the controls feel similar — differing mostly in the pacing, since Resident Evil is, in most cases, a slower shooter, while Dead Rising's a faster beat-em-up/shooter/choose-your-own-adventure-through-the-crowd game. That means you hold down a button and point the Wii Remote to shoot, and you can choose between pressing the A button or flicking the Wii-mote for an up-close attack.

Top Gun Director Was Attached To Canned Midway Title

When Midway scrubbed their Austin studio and binned a game nobody had ever heard about - Career Criminal - many people were left, well, nonplussed. After all, it's a bit hard to get worked up over a game that you've never heard of. But a few retrospective tears may be in order today, as Variety brings word that Hollywood director Tony Scott was attached to the project. Don't know Tony Scott? Dude directed Top Gun. And the last of the great corny action movies, True Romance. He was working as a kinda creative consultant, continuing a recent trend/fascination Midway have had with getting Hollywood types working on their games (John Woo/Stranglehold, for example). So while we may never see Career Criminal, we can at least rest assured that if we had, guitar solos, sexually-charged one-liners and dimly-lit sex scenes would have featured prominently.

Tony Scott was attached to Midway's canceled Career Criminal game [Variety] [Pic]

Anybody remember the days of yore when you could go to an arcade and play Time Crisis? They might still do that in Japan, but here in the States, arcade shooters have sort of died a quiet death somewhere between those hideous orange guns for Time Crisis 5 and the Wii Zapper with its lame lineup of games.

You might think Nerf N-Strike would be just one more nail in the coffin, but I’m pleased to report after my hands-on time that the game and its flashy controller that it is actually not made of suck. In fact, it’s almost the opposite of suck with it’s old school on-rails gameplay and simplistic graphics. If you liked the last Time Crisis or are looking for a bloodless version of it, Nerf just might be your thing.

For a long time, it seemed like all EA made were Sims games and sports games. So it was surprising to see all three Sims titles confined to one corner of the showroom – but it made it easier for me to cover them all in one fell swoop.

First up was My Sims because I got it confused with My Sims Kingdom. My Sims is already out on Wii but the upcoming PC release introduces new community features (like shared Gardens where you can hang out) and six new character NPCs that sort of (but not really) tie into My Sims Kingdom. My Sims on PC looked to be more user-friendly for the builders among you than it was on Wii (or maybe I say that because I’m a klutz with the Wii Remote) and I noticed that the terrain now has different elevations. Terraced garden, here I come.

The star of EA’s 08 Showcase is easily the underdog. Not much has been said about Henry Hattsworth and the release date remains firmly fixed in the far off haze of 2009; so I wasn’t expecting to see so much of such a cool game when I finally got my turn to try the dual screen adventure-puzzle hybrid.

I get why I haven’t heard too much: the game is kind of hard to explain. It uses both screens at all times of the game – the upper is the adventure game where you’re Henry Hattsworth and you’ve got some bad guys to take out. The lower screen is the puzzle, a basic block-slider like Bejeweled. The screens are connected in that the enemies you take out up top fall into and become blocks in the puzzle on the bottom. If the block puzzle fills up because you’re too busy adventuring, the baddies climb out of the puzzle and back into the adventure world to attack you.

Jumpgate Evolution Playable at PAX

Upcoming space massively multiplayer online game Jumpgate Evolution is getting its coming out party at this year's Penny Arcade Expo, NetDevil announced today.

The game will be fully playable at the show on Alienware laptops.

“We are ecstatic that NetDevil will be taking Jumpgate to this year’s Penny Arcade Expo. This is an amazing opportunity for visitors to come and try the game still early in its development. We look forward to the game’s showcase at the event and look forward to the hearing the players’ feedback first-hand. We know they will love it!” said Edward Relf, Director, Marketing, Codemasters Online.

I'd be sure to check it out when I'm there. I can't wait to see how much it has improved since my last time with it.

Don't forget to let me know if you want to drive along with me next week on my trek to the show.

Halo Laser Tag Impressions

Last week I received a Halo Covenant Plasma Pistol pack in the mail. The laser pursuit gaming set comes with two Covenant pistols and two targets.

I spent a bit of the weekend playing around with them and came away fairly impressed, though their are some things that make using them for honest to goodness gameplay a challenge.

The developers of the toys seem to have spent quite a bit of time incorporating a Halo 3 flavor into not just the way the devices look, but how they operate.