For better or worse, Metal Slug 7 is a capable, familiar entry in the twelve year old series. It’s squarely aimed, like most SNK Playmore stuff, at a small subset of fans of old-school gameplay. The new Metal Slug vehicles, particularly the Metal Gigant, are a blast to pilot and add a much needed dose of variety for anyone already six Metal Slugs deep. The graphics remain top notch and the gameplay is still solid.

Elven Legacy, the sequel to Fantasy Wars, is promising to deliver a world filled with magic and a nonlinear storyline, gauged to provide many hours of gameplay for strategy fans or just fans of Fantasy Wars. Through an epic quest aimed to restore the former glory of the Elven race, the game promises both depth and scope, and from the looks of the new screens we just go in–a colorful and inspirational one at that.

In the game you an play for elves or humans in two primary campaigns or for the orcs in a wide variety of bonus missions. Using the accompanying tools players may create their own missions and campaigns and share them in multiplayer mode.

The game features a new Elven race along with new opponents; unique character talents, spells and artifacts; improved AI (one of my beefs with Fantasy Wars) additional maps for multiplayer mode, role development of characters and units, and various tactical opportunities.

Elven Legacy is expected to be released sometime in March 2009, so until then check out the very pretty screens for the game here and here. I am hoping that they fixed all the bad things about Fantasy Wars this time around, because I am really wanted to give it a try.

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• Warhammer Age of Reckoning Zone Overview: Ellyrion
• More Eternal Sonata Screens from NAMCO BANDAI
• Star Wars: The Legacy Revealed

Microsoft optimistic as Xbox 360 has record Euro month; Sony claims overall lead originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It is once again GameTap Thursday, and what a great week it is! Not only is a new episode of American McGee’s Grimm Volume 2 now available to play free for the first 24-hours, but subscribers can also download Gothic 3 and Kingpin. Metal Slug fans who have signed up on GameTap are in for a treat because Metal Slug X is the latest free game to be added to the growing roster (145 free games total).

Here are the details for each game added this week:

• Grimm Volume 2, Episode 14: Iron John: A strange iron man living in the forest befriends a young man hoping an act of kindness will free him from his iron curse. With Iron John’s help the boy marries the princess and lives happily ever after—well, not really because Grimm hates that sort of thing.

• Gothic 3: Piranha Bytes’ third in the series of fantasy-themed role-playing games. In this installment, The Nameless Hero arrives on a continent overrun with orcs, who have enslaved most of the humans in the area. The Gothic series thrives on choices and reputation, and this installment is no different - players can side with the orcs, save the humans, or both. Gothic 3 also boasts a beautifully-rendered open world, with lush jungles, deserts and intricately detailed icy tundras.

• Kingpin: Life of Crime: Publisher Interplay and Redneck Rampage developer Grey Matter Interactive present Kingpin: Life of Crime, a first-person shooter set in a gritty, crime-ridden city. Players enact their revenge against drug kingpin Nikko Blanco using whatever weapons are available. Gameplay includes weapon modification, interactive conversations with non-playable characters, and the ability to hire gang members to join in the fight.

• Metal Slug X: (Free to play for one week only) Morden’s Army is at it again, and only the Metal Slug team can stand in its way. But taking down Morden and his troops won’t be easy. Fortunately what the team lacks in wits, it makes up for with ordnance: they’ve got about ten zillion bullets and grenades, plus the ultra-advanced (and stylish) Metal Slug super vehicles. Released in 1999, it is something of a remixed, upgraded, “director’s cut” version of Metal Slug 2. Gentlemen, start your war.

December 11 will see the release of Grimm Volume 2, Episode 15: The Pied Piper which like all Grimm episodes, will be free to play for the first 24-hours. In it, the Piped Piper uses his siren call (or flute if you will) to lure a kingdom’s children to a watery grave. Just how much more horrible can Grimm make such a tale? Tune in next week to find out.

In the meantime, to play Metal Slug X for free or any of the other games in GameTap’s wide variety of free titles, head on over to the website and sign up. While you are there, if you decide to become a subscriber, you can sign up for that too.

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Related Articles at Gaming Today:

• American McGee's Grimm: Volume Two Release Schedule Announced
• GameTap Thursday: More Grimm Along with Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
• GameTap Tuesday: Grimm Gets His Hands on the Golden Goose
• GameTap Thursday: Grimm Volume 2 Goes Live with Fallout Tactics
• GameTap Thursday: Grimm Violates Cinderella's World; Lionheart and Elements of Destruction

While most videogames are based around the idea of causing massive amounts of death, a team at Duke University is working on a game in which the goal is to save it. Virtual Peace is a simulation game intended to help train a new wave of negotiators, where players use diplomacy and work together to deal with a variety of world-changing catastrophes.

They first convene around a virtual conference table but later break into smaller groups. Their task: to negotiate the specific commitments of cash, in-kind and personnel donations that will address immediate needs such as medical assistance, security, water, shelter and food. They also respond to larger issues such as logistical coordination and political rehabilitation.

It's an interesting idea, especially considering this game was helped along by the same studio responsible for America's Army. Project leader Prof. Tim Lenoir says: "We’re trying to train people how to collaborate in groups -- particularly in internationally sensitive situations. The goal is to create an environment where people can practice their negotiation skills -- and it’s a whole lot better use of the gaming engine than shooting ’em up."

I don't know. Organizing relief for devastated families might be noble, but is it as satisfying as shooting an alien in its face? I don't think so.

The organizers of the Independent Games Festival Mobile have revealed a total of 107 entries for the second year of the event, more than doubling the amount of entries seen in the inaugural competition.

The entries were bolstered with a strong showing from the emergent iPhone and iPod Touch platform, but entries spanned platforms including mobile phones, DS, PSP and the Zune.

The event (organized by GameSetWatch parent Think Services) is a sister competition to the long-running Independent Games Festival, which announced record entries last week.

IGF Mobile itself, founded in 2007, has seen a host of notable independent projects enter the contest -- for which $30,000 in prizes are to be awarded at GDC 2009 next March. Nvidia is Platinum and Founding Sponsor for the event, and the prize pool includes a Best iPhone Game, presented by Gold Sponsor ngmoco.

A full list of IGF Mobile 2009 entries is now available, including screenshots and details on each of the entries. As always, many of the top IGF Mobile games will only come to the fore during the judging process -- and there are many high-quality titles not listed below.

However, a diverse set of entries have come from many different mobile formats and multiple continents, with the diversity of mobile platforms being reflected in some of the following entries:

Zen Bound [iPhone/iPod Touch] (Secret Exit)
"Zen Bound is a calm and meditative game of wrapping rope around wooden sculptures -- a simple task that can become surprisingly complex."

Soul Trapper [iPhone/iPod Touch] (Realtime Audio Adventures)
"Soul Trapper is a 3+ hour interactive audio adventure that follows the turbulent life of Kane Pryce, a 27 year-old drifter who possess a mysterious device known as the Soul Trap, a supernaturally charged object that allows him to hunt down, capture, and send ghosts from the earthly realm to the afterlife."

Picopoke [MMS] (Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab)
"Picopoke is an interpretive photo game which brings flexible play to a new level. The game revolves around weekly challenge rounds, involving fulfilling challenges by taking photos and voting to determine winners. Picopoke takes advantage of the social networking community. Picopoke can also be played with mobile phones via multimedia messaging service (MMS), capturing moments spontaneously with camera phones."

Rhythm of War [Playstation Portable] (SME Dynamic Systems)
"Rhythm of War is a rhythm action strategy game where the player must travel through different time epochs to fight aliens and saves the planet. The struggle takes place on the four tracks, where the player has to defend himself in accordance with musical rhythm of each track."

Ruben and Lullaby [iPhone/iPod Touch] (Song New Creative)
"Ruben & Lullaby is a story you play like a musical instrument. Two lovers are fighting. You can control what they're feeling, where they're looking, when they speak, and when they listen. Your actions conduct a moody jazz soundtrack that reflects the feelings of the characters as they change in real time."

UZA: The First Journey [Nintendo DS] (Multiple:Option)
"Arcade action meets abstract art in UZA: The First Journey, an arcade action game similar to Robotron/Geometry Wars. Watch as your gameplay performance creates a piece of real-time abstract art. With only one life, how long can you survive, how much can you score, and what will your actions look like?"

FastFoot_Challenge [J2ME] (urban team)
"FastFoot-Challenge is a multiplayer GPS action game. 4 to 5 players with mobile phones and GPS receivers play in an area of 1km radius. One player escapes, the others have 25 minutes to catch him. His advantage: continuous updates of the chasers' positions, while those only see his position every 6 minutes. "

Wardrive [Nintendo DS] (and-or)
"Wardive captures the wireless networks in the immediate area, like a wardrive tool, and creates a game. it reads the names of the hotspots in your immediate area and turns them into enemies which try to take your wardrive-crystal."

Laser [Flash Lite] (CreatePlayShare)
"Creation and customization, community and sharing, single and multiplayer; endless levels with a variety of gameplay. Laser."

Circuit Swap [Zune] (Teabag Games)
"Circuit Swap is an exciting new puzzle game targeting mobile devices. Players are given the task to power up the city as they move battery pieces and get them inserted to the socket 'goal' pieces."

Finalists in the IGF Mobile competition will be announced on January 26th, 2009, and more information is available on the official IGF Mobile website.

So I'm going to try to layer in some more game links from time to time - Kian Bashiri's 'Metro' being the first of these wonders, but accompanied by Braid's David Hellman mentioning a Spike TV indie game special, romantic co-op games, Giant Bomb info, Troy Goodfellow on game reviews, and more.

I respectfully decline:

The Plush Apocalypse » Blog Archive » The love story(game)
LMNO's Borut Pfeifer in fine editorial form, as per normal: 'I wanted to write about the lack of a certain type of coop game - a romantic coop game.'

gameslol » Blog Archive » So I Guess GiantBomb Did Not Bomb
I've seen very little media buzz about GiantBomb, which is odd, because it's the future of game information, pretty much. And awesome.

A Game From Life: Metro Rules of Conduct | GameCyte
Kian Bashiri's latest IGF entry is spotted by the GameCyte folks, and it's awesome+: 'The goal of the game is to make it the five stops to your final destination while obeying the metro rules of conduct, which is essentially only one rule: Do not make eye contact with other travelers. In between stops, you can rack up points by moving your viewfinder over the various accoutrements of your fellow passengers — MP3 players, cell phones, ties, scarves and even brassieres.'

Boing Boing: Offworld: 'Why Left 4 Dead has the best tutorial ever... and why you never noticed it had one to begin with'
Excellent John Brownlee piece on the subtle learning in Valve's latest.

David Hellman » Blog Archive » Fueled by Dieu
The Braid artist reveals: 'Earlier this month, a Spike TV crew came to my apartment to shoot an interview which is going to run close to (or perhaps immediately before?) the awards. I’m told it will be part of a half-hour feature on indie games of 2008.' This sounds most excellent - maybe on GameTrailers TV?

NYC Game Industry - Be part of the evolution!
Good to see a local scene-specific website (of some sophistication) for the sometimes struggling (but always adorable!) New York game development scene.

Flash Of Steel: 'Reviewing, Criticizing and Games Media'
Troy Goodfellow is a smart cookie, and skipping mercilessly to the conclusion, he hits the nail on the head, for me: 'The best games writing is usually not found in the review/preview morass and it’s pointless to look for it there at the expense of all the good feature, interview and analysis work being done elsewhere.'

Brash's Wall Street MMO - The Cut Scene - Variety.com
Some good sleuthing here by Fritz - rare to see a good autopsy of a failed publisher.

The guys who founded “World Gaming,” a website that lets gamers win money while sitting on their couch, thought it was a great idea.

But they weren’t the only ones who thought so.

Woodrow Levin also had a similar idea. Levin is the founder and CEO of BringIt, another new website dedicated to helping gamers set up matches in order to win (or lose) money on a variety of games and tournaments.

So what’s the main difference between BringIt and World Gaming? You’ll be able to wager on games played on the Wii right from the get-go. But how? Levin told me it was simple…

Since there’s no automated reporting system for the Wii like those used for Xbox Live and PlayStation Network games, players will have to self-report the outcomes of their games. So if you win or lose a bout of “Mario Kart” against an opponent (who you must’ve shared a Friend Code with already), it’s up to the you to report it. Players can also communicate using the site’s messaging and chat system.

“It’s a relatively easy and simple process to self report,” Levin said. “We use the eBay-like player feedback system to weed out bad apples and have transparency on the site. If there’s a dispute, we have a proprietary dispute resolution system which is directly connected to our trained, 24-hour, seven-days-a-week customer service center. Based on the dispute and proof provided by the players, we’re able to quickly and fairly resolve the issues.”

I can see throngs of “Super Smash Bros. Brawl” players ready to lay their money down, but I wasn’t so sure about the core Wii user — namely, casual gamers. In our meeting last month, Levin told me that he thought the Wii would be great for BringIt because of the installed user base. “There’s so much opportunity [with the Wii] because everyone is playing,” he said. “And it’s easy to use; there’s not such a steep learning curve.”

“I think we can be an asset to the Wii community, and a tool which fellow ‘Mario Kart’ and ‘Rock Band‘ players will welcome.”

While there are indeed many people playing the Wii, I asked Levin if they’d be interested in betting money with a website like BringIt. “Absolutely, I think that the Wii is an awesome console, but they made it a bit difficult to connect with other people who want to play online,” he said. “I think we can be an asset to the Wii community, and a tool which fellow ‘Mario Kart’ and ‘Rock Band‘ players will welcome. Whether you’re hardcore or more casual, there is a shared trait of wanting to interact and compete against your friends or other players — throw in the mix the opportunity to play for real cash and it gets really fun.”

And although the U.S. economy is now officially in a recession, Levin wasn’t worried about his start-up thriving. “I think the economy is tough for everyone right now, so it’s probably not the perfect environment for anyone to launch any business,” Levin admitted. “I’m not an economist so I can’t say whether it will hurt us or not. But video games are a really fun form of entertainment for a low cost. People already bought the consoles and the games… so hopefully we can provide a service that people are going to enjoy and use a lot.”

“I’m not concerned with what the competition is doing because I know that we’re going to be the best product out there…”

As for the competition, I asked what really makes his site different than World Gaming. He wasn’t too worried about them either. “I’m not concerned with what the competition is doing because I know that we’re going to be the best product out there and people will migrate to what the best product is,” he said matter-of-factly. “Additionally I think this is a huge market. We would be naive to think that there won’t be other companies out there, but we’ll just continue to deliver more and more for the gamers.”

BringIt is currently in open beta in 41 states and supports various titles on Xbox 360, PS3, PS2 and Wii. Those who are 18 and over can use the site with major credit cards and PayPal, and wagers can range from $1 to $100,000 with a 10 percent service fee.

Do you see yourself using a service like this to place your bets?

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