Its Been A While

We are sorry for not updating our blog because of our busy schedules. Now we're on hiatus but definitely we'll be back after we're done to our works. :D

2nd Update: Collect the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection Limited Edition

The Metal Gear Solid HD Collection adds much fancier in-game visuals to what were once PS2 and PSP games. And now Konami is adding some cosmetic enhancements to the packaging, as well, at least for those willing to splash out a little more.

The HD Collection will be available in a Limited Edition, with new box art by series artist Yoji Shinkawa and an exclusive art book. No pricing details have been announced -- but, then, no pricing details for the standard retail or downloadable versions have been announced either. So whatever the standard one costs, this one will cost a little more than that.

Credits: Joystiq

Need For Speed: The Run At First Look

Review:

At first look, you will notice how the game differs from the predecessors,
it's similar to God of War's system which where you will press the corresponding button commands appearing on screen during action scenes.

It was also rumored that this game will be a combination of the previous top selling Need for Speed games like Underground, Most Wanted and Hot Pursuit.

This game was also made by Black Box, hopefully they haven't forgotten what we loved: Free-roam in a city with customizable cars!

The game is expected to be released on November 15, 2011.

Platforms:

iOS
Microsoft Windows
Nintendo 3DS
PlayStation 3
Wii
Xbox 360

Namco Bandai Games began streaming a three-minute trailer for the upcoming North American PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 release of Naruto Shippūden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations on Friday. A one-minute promotional video for the game began streaming on Namco Bandai Games' official website in June.



On the same day the previous promotional video began streaming, Namco Bandai Games announced the North American license of the game to be released next spring. Online retailer Amazon.com lists a February 28, 2012 release date and a US$59.95 retail price for the PlayStation 3 version.

Developed by CyberConnect2, the ninja fighting game includes various online battle modes and characters from throughout Masashi Kishimoto's Naruto manga storyline. This release will include the original Japanese voice acting. Naruto Shippūden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations is the third installment in the Naruto Shippūden: Ultimate Ninja Storm game series.

Credits: AnimeNewsNetwork

Evil kid got crazy over a Pokemon Card

Blasttttoiissseeeeee!!

Final Fantasy XIII-2's Tokyo Game Show Trailers Posted

The game developer Square Enix began streaming two Tokyo Game Show trailers for its upcoming role-playing game sequel Final Fantasy XIII-2 on Tuesday. (The Xbox 360 version of the trailer cannot be embedded, but can be viewed on YouTube's website.)

Square Enix will release the game for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles in Japan on December 15, along with a limited-edition PlayStation 3 Final Fantasy XIII-2 Lightning Edition Ver.2 bundle. The United States will then receive the game on January 31, and Europe will receive it on February 3.


Credits: AnimeNewsNetwork

Brainlink lets you control your toy robots, Roombas, before they control you

Let's be frank for a minute -- we need to gain control of our robots before they get control of us, so why not start with the robots you've already got taking up space on your shelves at home? At this year's Maker Faire in New York, BirdBrain Technologies showcased a way to hijack your toy robots, Roombasand other bits of home electronics: the Brainlink System. The forthcoming little triangle hooks up to your existing technology, letting you program commands, add sensors to the device and generally teach it new tricks. The company's chief robot designer, Tom Lauwers, showcased the technology on aRobosapien, a TV and a Roomba, the latter of which you can see in the video after the break.

Source: Engadget

Skrillex on "Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites"

Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites is the second EP by electro house/dance artist Skrillex.

The EP was released for purchase on Beatport on October 22, 2010, and is his first major release since being signed to Deadmau5's label mau5trap Recordings. The EP was an immediate success taking over 8 of the top ten positions on the Beatport home page. Skrillex has revealed in interview that he made this EP in his apartment using a laptop.

A sound clip of Rachael Nedrow's aka speedstackinggirl exclamations are used in the songs "Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites" and "Rock n' Roll (Will Take You to the Mountain).

The song "Kill EVERYBODY (Bare Noize Remix)" was used in the Uncharted 3 multiplayer beta trailer.

A remix companion & follow-up EP was announced on June 2, 2011, entitled More Monsters and Sprites. It was released on June 7, 2011.

The song "Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites" was used in a TV Ad for the GoPro Action Camera featuring a Kayak going over a waterfall. The title is a reference to David Bowie's album Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps).

Credits: Wikipedia


Coming from the dubstep genius Skrillex a.k.a. Sonny Moore. Sonny came from post-hardcore band From First To Last then became a solo artist name Sonny up to the point he changed his name into Skrillex. When I listened to his album that had been released last year, He's evolved from a Techno Electro artist into a Dubstep genre he's very creative and dedicated on music composition. I love the way he drops the bass in each and every song in his album. My most favorite song from the album is "All I Ask of You" this one of a kind house music with a little sip of bass-lines is just so epic, the rest of the song in the album was also good. You will never regret spending money on buying his album.

Gintama

Genre: Comedy, parody, humor, sci-fi, historical, drama, action.

Episodes: 200+ (On going)



Plot:



The story of Gin Tama takes place in Edo (known today as Tokyo because of its name change in 1868), Japan, which was conquered by aliens called "Amanto" (天人?, "Sky People") in the late Edo period. The samurai of Japan fought the aliens,
but after their defeat the Amanto placed a ban on carrying swords in public. The plot is focused on an eccentric samurai, Gintoki Sakata who helps a teenager named Shinpachi Shimura save his sister Tae from a group of aliens who want to make her part of a brothel. Impressed with Gintoki, Shinpachi becomes his apprentice and works with him as a freelancer in order to pay the monthly rent where Gintoki lives, as well as to know more about him. The two of them rescue a teenage alien girl named Kagura from a group of Yakuza who wanted to use her superhuman strength to kill people. Kagura joins Shinpachi and Gintoki to work as freelancers and the three become known as "Yorozuya" (万屋?, "Jack of All Trades"). While doing their job they encounter the police force Shinsengumi several times, who normally ally with Odd Jobs Gin in their work since they commonly involve dangerous criminals. They also come to meet Gintoki's former comrades during the Amanto's invasion, including the terrorist Kotaro Katsura who maintains a friendly relationship with them despite his ambitions to destroy the bakufu. On the other hand, Shinsuke Takasugi acts as a major antagonist throughout the series, as he wants to destroy the bakufu in a more violent way than Katsura does.

Source: Wikipedia

Review:

For those who are depressed watching the same old plot style of anime, here's a good anime for you. Gintama is a hilarious gag show that had a lot of parodies taken from different sorts of anime/manga. The first episodes are quite boring due to the fact that they're just introducing every characters, but just wait until you watch the later episodes.

Gintama is so funny in a random way because they all act stupid and ignorant. Every character of Gintama had its uniqueness in terms of personality which was why some fans that watched the show were kind of idolizing them.Gintama sometimes had vulgar and harsh scenes but this was one of the reasons why the show became unique.

There are also short story arcs that will proceed to the real plot which is VERY appealing to us watchers.

Look! I made a wallpaper of Gintama! XD




Best ways to watch:

If you have watched a lot of mainstream anime or can relate to humor and comedy genre.

Rating: 8.5/10

Terraria Review

Terraria is an action-adventure/RPG indie game released by independent game studio Re-Logic. The game features exploration, crafting, building structures and combat with a variety of creatures. The game's slogan was previously "Shut Up and Dig Gaiden", a reference to another indie game, Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden. Released on May 16, 2011, the game is estimated to have sold about 50,000 copies during its first day of release, with over 17,000 players online at the same time during the first day's peak. Over the course of a week, 200,000 copies of the game were sold, making it the top selling game on Steam for the week, "ahead of games like The Witcher 2 and Portal 2." It remained number one on Steam for the first six days of its release before it eventually dropped to the number two slot.

Source: Wikipedia

Review:

The game was only 5mb when it was first released; the graphic was a 2D 8-bit Super Nintendo Style when I started playing Terraria. To be honest, I was not intrigued by how it looked since 8-bit era extincted nowadays.

I got bored when I played it alone. I started out on the middle of nowhere with a red moon on the background and got pawned by a huge bunch of zombie with flying eyes, and whenever I got killed, my character spawned on the same spot repeatedly!

So what I did was, I pressed Alt+f4 and then played another game. After a few days, my friend asked me to play Terraria with him using Multiplayer mode via Hamachi. So I created a new character and thank god it's not midnight, because it's the time when monster spawns.

We played for a few hours and finally! I'm starting to understand why it became top on the list, "It was good" - I said to myself. After all I haven't even played the whole game yet, though my friend explained the mechanics of the game that's why I made some ideas to my head or should I call it prediction that's why I felt that it was going to be a great game.

He also told me why every character starts out with an axe and a pickaxe which I only used for killing zombies when I first played the game. Axes are used to farm wood by cutting trees required on building a house to fend off monsters during the night, while Pickaxes are used for digging.

Building a house is your first important objective in order to survive. So after we built my wooden shelter, we dug downwards below the surface of my house to find ores that we can use in order to make an anvil which is another essential tool throughout the game.

What's exciting about it is you can explore below the ground. There are treasures, monsters, and different kind of ores to forge items such as weapons and armors using the anvil. It's like there's another world when we explored the underground. My friend finally left me alone playing when I learned the basics of the game.

I played non-stop for like 12 hours and got addicted to it and I was right on my prediction after all. The first treasure I got was a Cloud Bottle accessory, which allows you to gain the ability double jump when equipped, it was a similar ability from other 2D platformer games like Megaman and Castlevania.

There are also weapons that had different abilities, for ex: A sword that had the ability to summon shooting stars and damage monsters on an open area. There are also long ranged weapons like a Hand gun for example that fires bouncing bullets. My favorite item was the Rocket Boots, which allows you to fly but drains your mana slowly while you are using the ability. Unfortunately the developers changed the ability of Rocket Boots after a couple of patches, even so, there's a lot of Item to hunt and to forge with different cool abilities and that's one of the biggest factor why I loved the game.

If you think land and underground exploration is the only thing this game can offer, then you are wrong, because you can dig all the way down to find hell, it's where you can find the rarest ore to make weapons and armors. If you are starting from the land, you make a ladder all the way up and say hello to the sky world where you can find the sky islands with rare treasures on every one of those. You can also build up your secondary headquarters in mid air just for fun.

The gameplay was very enjoyable despite of how the graphics looked. In my opinion, Terraria is very fun game to play, there's a lot of things you can do, specially the multiplayer mode where you can help your friends on their own world, you can also do PvP with other players.

Rating: 8.5/10

Thor(2011)

MOVIE INFO

The epic adventure Thor spans the Marvel Universe from present day Earth to the mystical realm of Asgard. At the center of the story is The Mighty Thor, a powerful but arrogant warrior whose reckless actions reignite an ancient war. As a result, Thor is banished to Earth where he is forced to live among humans. When the most dangerous villain of his world sends its darkest forces to invade Earth, Thor learns what it takes to be a true hero.-- (C) Paramount Pictures

Review:

Another great movie from Marvel franchise brings a bad-ass hero, costumes and visual effects that were used in the movie are pretty good especially the background music and sound effects. The casts that portrayed in the movie are awesome and the last thing I wanted to say about this movie was entertaining in the way they pleased the audience because the film is incredibly top in terms of action.

Ratings: 7.0/10.0

Charice has been chosen to sing the theme song for the international version of Final Fantasy XIII-2

‘New World’ will serve as the international theme song for ‘Final Fantasy XIII-2!’ Congrats, Charice!



TV, movies, music, and now video games? It’s true – Charice truly is on her way to becoming a master of all media. According to multiple reports, our girl Charice will be providing the theme song for the international version of Final Fantasy XIII-2, which is expected to hit stores in North America on Jan. 30, 2012.

Popular Japanese singer Mai Fukui will sing the theme song for the Japanese version, while Charice’s “New World,” as the title appropriately suggests, be heard worldwide.

Another huge accomplishment for Charice!
— Andy Swift

source: www.hollywoodlife.com/

MGS HD Collection coming to Japan on November 23

So much for a stealthy infiltration to retail: Konami has announced that the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection is slated for a Japanese launch of November 23 (as reported by Japanese games blog Game Jouhou). Word came during Konami's stage show event during TGS 2011 today -- err, that may be tomorrow. We're still not sure how the whole time thing works over there.

Outside of launch window, Konami revealed the game would have a special feature allowing players to view select scenes in either traditional full frame (4:3) or in the now-norm widescreen mode (16:9). Additionally, the PS3 version will come with a download voucher for the original Metal Gear Solid on PSN. An Xbox 360 incentive is currently being decided.

Metal Gear Solid HD Collection is slated to launch in North America "this winter."

Credits: Joystiq

Sony outs trio of limited edition PlayStation 3 consoles, keeps it fresh with a few paint jobs

How do you keep selling a five-year old system? You slap a new coat of paint on it and call it a "limited edition," that's how. Which is precisely what Sony's gotten up to with three newly colored versions of its PlayStation 3. Hitting the electronics giant's homeland this November 17th are a duo of 320GB consoles, offered up in either Splash Blue or Scarlet Red, that come paired with a similarly hued DualShock controller and ¥29980 ($390) asking price. The prettiest of the bunch, however, won't be released until December 15th in Japan, and that's the Final Fantasy XIII-2 Lightning Edition Ver.2. Timed to coincide with the retail debut of the Square Enix-made sequel, that console (pictured above) also boasts a 320GB HDD, bundled copy of the game and a plain old black controller -- all for ¥37960 ($494). If you need to add a little spice back into your gaming life, it might be time to get your import on.

Via: Engadget

Need for Speed Underground 2

Plot:

Need For Speed Underground 2 takes place in Bayview after the events of Need for Speed: Underground. The prologue begins with the player driving in a Nissan Skyline R34 in Olympic City (though the racing scenes are actually in Bayview), the setting of NFS:UG. He then receives a race challenge from a rather ominous personality who offers him a spot on his crew, but "won't take 'no' for an answer." The player races off — despite Samantha's warnings — only to be ambushed by a mysterious driver in a rage that totals his Skyline. The driver, who has a unique scythe tattoo, makes a call confirming the accident, and the flashback fades out.

Fast forward to the present day, where we see the player arriving in Bayview via airplane, with a note from Samantha referring him to her friend Rachel (Voiced over by Brooke Burke), who will set the player up there. He also has the keys to Rachel's Nissan 350Z, which is waiting for him outside the airport. The player then has the option to complete a few races in the car before inevitably returning it to the car lot, where Rachel will give him an earful for being late before allowing him to choose his first car. This one is free, as it was paid for by the player's insurance from his totaled Skyline.

It is then that the player embarks on a quest to become the top racer in Bayview and eventually take down the man who sabotaged his ride in the flashback, who turns out to be Caleb. After winning many races, the player runs into Caleb's street racing crew, The Wraiths. The crew has the same vinyl, paint, and rim set. The player challenges them to a series of URL (Underground Racing League) races and eventually gets Caleb's second in command, Nikki, to join his side. Rachel tells the player that Caleb has been manipulating the sponsorship deals throughout Bayview towards him. After the player beats The Wraiths, an infuriated Caleb challenges the player to one final race in his custom Pontiac GTO.


Review:

I might be a little outdated on doing this review, but if you want a PC racing game recommendation, Need for Speed Underground 2 is the best game for you.

THE GOOD - Career mode in my opinion is the best mode of this game, just think of Grand Theft Auto's free roam and errand quests combined with the elements of a pure racing game; the only thing is, you cannot steal and get out of the car unlike the Grand Theft Auto series. There are many things to do on career mode, you can race with random racers you pass by the road/highway by tailgating the car and pressing the challenge button. You can do quests to earn money and unlock cars, performance, body kits and other visual upgrades so you can have the advantage against other players on LAN game mode.

What I like the most about this game is you can change almost every detail of your car. You can also combine every option available on the market, like the body kits (for example: you can combine the side skirts with a different set bumper.) In my opinion, this is the only Need for Speed game with deepest customization system yet, not even the newer Need for Speed titles can compete to Need for Speed Underground 2's customization system. The controls and handling is not too hard, unlike other racing games.


THE BAD - The thing I hate about the game is when you reach the maximum performance of your upgrades, the speed becomes too fast and exaggerated; technical slower setups for technical courses becomes no match due to the fact that you can use the guard-rails to turn on sharp corners without losing too much speed. The cars are like toys; there's no car dent/damage or even scratches. Maybe its time they make improvements if ever they're planning for a new NFS title.


There are many racing modes to choose from;

Circuit - A circuit race is a standard race that involves up to four cars driving around a track that loops back to the start line of itself. A circuit race is typically a maximum of four laps and minimum of 2 laps. A sprint race is just like a circuit race except that the track does not loop back to the start line. It's a race from A to B involving a maximum of four vehicles, and because of the track design there is only one lap.

Sprint - A sprint race is just like a circuit race except that the track does not loop back to the start line. It's a race from A to B involving a maximum of four vehicles, and because of the track design there is only one lap. Street X races are similar to Circuit races, but they take place on closed courses similar to Drift races. Drifting is one of the easier types of racing (depending on difficulty level) in Need for Speed Underground 2.

Drift - Drifting is one of the easier types of racing (depending on difficulty level) in Need for Speed Underground 2. One difference to the drifting mode compared to the original Need for Speed Underground is that the player drifts with the other competitors at the same time. Players race against a maximum of three competitors. Points are awarded when the player successfully slide the car and finishes the drift without hitting any walls.

Street X - Street X races are similar to Circuit races but they take place on closed courses similar to Drift races.

Drag - Mostly straight line courses, you compete with other players by reaching the finish line similar to Sprint. You can only use manual shifting on this mode.



Rating: 9/10 ( Probably the best Need For Speed game ever. )


Additional info: The EA online servers are not working anymore, although you can still play via LAN using the program called Hamachi.

China has entered Diablo V

The Chinese are once again ahead of all. While the world eagerly awaits information on the timing of release of Diablo 3 from Blizzard, in the Middle Kingdom has already entered a game called Diablo V.

What exactly is this mysterious project - an enigma. But judging by the cover, which next to the logo emblazoned Diablo V Blizzard, the story tells the familiar story of news about the heroes and demons. Blizzard reaction to the emergence of this fake is unknown, but it is unlikely the studio will find a council for Chinese pirates.

Source: http://forum.garena.com/

"Men in Black 3" to be releasedin IMAX 3D

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - In case "Men in Black 3" wasn't big enough, Sony's making it even bigger: The studio will release its big-budget 3D feature in IMAX, it announced Monday.

In a written statement, Sony Pictures president of worldwide distribution Rory Bruer said that releasing the movie in IMAX 3D "signals an event release."

It's the first "Men in Black" film to be released on IMAX. "Men in Black 3," starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones will be released May 25, 2012.

Barry Sonnenfeld is directing the movie, which Etan Cohen wrote. "Men in Black 3" also stars Josh Brolin, Jermaine Clement and Emma Thompson. Walter F. Parkes and Laurie MacDonald are producing.

The movie has a budget estimated at more than $200 million and has been beset by delays and other issues.

The film was supposed to begin shooting last October, but that date was postponed by about a month. Soon after, producers announced they would film the movie in two segments -- the first would begin in November and be finished before Christmas and the second would begin in mid-February.

Instead, shooting began again on March 28.

Credits: Yahoo! News

The most awaited PS Vita handheld Console

The PlayStation Vita is an upcoming handheld game console under development by Sony Computer Entertainment. It is the successor to the PlayStation Portable as part of the PlayStation family of gaming devices. It is set to release in Japan and parts of Asia in late 2011, and in Europe and North America in early 2012.

Credits: Wikipedia

Review:

To be honest I'm excited to see this console once they've released it in the market. So far, what Sony does is tease us all and unveil some of the new features that will make your mind blow.

There are so many features that we have to expect regarding PS Vita, one is the PS3 graphics engine, and the Sony PSP backwards compatible system so you can play PSP games on your PS Vita console, it can play PSOne classic games as well. The other feature that will attract the gamers is the Touch Pad which is similar to platforms such as the iPhone and iPod Touch.

So far, The PSP Vita is a big improvement to its predecessors and it seems like it's worth the wait because of the new features and the device capabilities.

Windows 8 debuts at Microsoft Build

Steven Sinofsky, president of Microsoft's Windows and Windows Live division, gives a preview of Windows 8.
(Credit: Microsoft)

ANAHEIM, Calif.--Just when many folks are getting used to running Windows 7, Microsoft's latest operating system, the software giant plans to unveil the first details of the upcoming Windows 8.

Microsoft will start taking the wraps off its next operating system at its Build conference Tuesday at 9 a.m. PT, and we'll be there to bring you the news, live from the Anaheim Convention Center. Microsoft holds these types of events--they used to be called Professional Developers Conferences--to give software developers guidance to create new applications for the next generation of its operating system.

This conference comes at a crucial time for Microsoft. PC growth is slowing as tablets, notably Apple's iPad, are displacing PCs for some applications. Until now, Microsoft has had no real competitive response. Build will be its best effort to change the conversation.

The company has already given a few peeks at Windows 8. At the D9 conference this spring, Microsoft unveiled a new interface that uses the same look--which Microsoft has dubbed Metro--as its Windows Phone 7 operating system. At that conference, Microsoft also gave a glimpse of its new touch interface.

Source: CNET

Fairy Tail Manga Volume 31 to Bundle 3rd New Anime DVD

The official website of Hiro Mashima's Fairy Tail fantasy adventure manga confirmed on Tuesday that the 31st manga volume will bundle an original anime DVD when it ships next February. The DVD — the third original anime DVD to come with special edition volumes of the manga — will contain an all-new original story storyboarded by Mashima himself.

The manga and anime follow the adventures of world's most notorious mage guild, Fairy Tail. The manga's first original anime DVD shipped with the 26th manga volume this past April, and the second original anime DVD shipped in June.

Shinji Ishihira directed the previous two original anime DVDs at A-1 Pictures Inc. and Satelight, just as he does for the ongoing television anime series. Similarly, the television anime' script editor Masashi Sogo and character designer Aoi Yamamoto were also involved in the first two original anime DVDs. The television series is entering its third year this month.

Del Rey published the 12th volume of the original manga in North America last September, and Kodansha resumed publishing the manga with the 13th volume this past February. Crunchyroll streams the television anime into several countries as it airs in Japan, and Funimation will release the first DVD/Blu-ray set in November.

Via: Anime News Network