Second Story Gamer

Microsoft has officially announced (through Major Nelson) that the Fall Dashboard update will (finally) be released on December 4th. It will add, previously posted, Xbox Originals and a new Friend of Friends feature. This feature allows you to view the friends list of people on your friends list. You can enable or disable this through privacy measures. Overall it looks to be a much more substantial update than that released in the Spring. As soon as I get a tv I will tell you what its like. Wow this tv issue is seriously hurting my blogging capabilities.

I have made my decision. I can cross Guitar Hero III off of my list of games I’m getting this holiday and add Rock Band onto it. After watching them play it on The 1up Show and listening to remarks about the game on various podcasts it looks like Rock Band will be getting my money rather than Guitar Hero.
One huge reason it will be is that I have two other gamers in the house. I don’t want to have to fight with them over who gets to play now. It will be better pool our money to get Rock Band and we can play at the same time.
Another reason is I want to play other instruments. Don’t get me wrong I will probably spend much of my time with the game with the guitar, but I would love to try the drums and singing. The drums look hard but could be very fun if you learn how to play them.
Well as soon as I get the game (see post below) I will post my personal review.

Unreal Engine 3 is to be ported to the Nintendo Wii, but not by who u would expect. Epic’s Vice President Mark Rein has repeatedly said that they would not port the Unreal 3 Engine to the Nintendo Wii. The Engine has been known for great games such as Gears of War and Rainbow Six:Vegas. This Engine will be ported over by an unnamed licensee.
He said, “”It’s their own port, in the same way Ubisoft brought Unreal Engine 2 to the Wii (Red Steel). I just don’t see a big market there to bring this big hulking memory intensive engine over to a much smaller system.”
Now the only question is how much better will the graphics be. Obviously the Wii isn’t the powerhouse that the 360 and PS3 are but is it possible for the graphics to be substantially better than the graphics for earlier Wii games (you better hope so)

I recently found out that Miniclip.com has a section optimized to use on your Wii’s Opera web browser. I didn’t realize this till just now. It seems like these games will be used with the Wiimote. Some games include: Black Knight, Hot Air 2, Sub Commander, etc. Miniclip did a great job putting these up. If you are bored with your Wii collection (hard to believe now that Mario is out), check these out. They may not be world-class titles but we salute Miniclip for its effort.

Since the iPhone and iPod Touch (called iTouch by strange people) will soon have third party application support, here are my top 5 most wanted apps for the iPhone/iPod Touch (I’m going to just refer to the iPhone for the rest of the article even though the apps would be for both).

5. Art App

This application would basically be paint on the iPhone. Could you imagine flicking your finger across the touch screen and see pretty colors pop up (ahh). This would be a kid favorite and a good way to keep the kids occupied for a while. It would be even more amazing if you could mix the colors. Imagine all of the masterpieces you (or your kids) could make.
4. Shopping App

This application could be basically an online store similar to Amazon. Actually it could even be Amazon but in an easier to use User Interface than the online Amazon store on Safari. This would be even better for Apple as they could negotiate with Amazon for a percentage of the revenue. As if they needed any more money.
3. Games App

This application should have been implemented in the iPhone since launch. It seems ridiculous that the other models of the iPod, which have smaller screens and more limited user controls have games while the users of the iPhone have absolutely no games. Most of the games would be even better with touch controls and a huge screen that the iPhone has. Oh yes and there is also an accelerometer in the iPhone for a six-axis like experience.
2. Game Emulation App

This app would be a bit more shady than the other apps as emulators are known to use illegal digital copies of games on their emulation systems. But think how cool it would be to play your favorite SNES, N64, and PS1 games on your iPhone. I’m sure the iPhone processor could handle it as it isn’t that hard.
1. Streaming Music from Personal iTunes Library App

Yeah, I couldn’t think of a short name for this one so I had to describe it in the title. Basically this application would allow you to stream your content in your iTunes Library onto your iPhone. This is important because Apple has only given you 8 gigs (16 for iPod Touch) and most peoples’ libraries are much bigger than that. If the EDGE network couldn’t handle it, it could only happen when connected to Wi-Fi. This is a must have in my opinion.

Well there you have it, my most wanted apps on the iPhone. Let’s hope that these will be implemented in due time.

Tomorrow, you will be able to download the Halo theme from the Xbox Live Marketplace to play on Guitar Hero III. It was rumored to be on the Guitar Hero II song list but never appeared there or on Guitar Hero II’s downloadable content. It was again rumored to be on Guitar Hero III’s song list but again did not show up to the party. Thankfully, it decided to come to this party even though it’s late. And the best part: It costs absolutely nothing. Just go to the Live Marketplace and download it.

Haze, a first person shooter for the PlayStation 3 (and other consoles) was originally set to be released in December. It has now been delayed to first quarter 2008. Since that was moved to the first quarter, Rainbow Six Vegas 2 has most likely been pushed out of that quarter. Another major Ubisoft release for next year, Splinter Cell: Conviction, still looks like it will come out first quarter but it is uncertain.

Bungie is set to release the “Heroic Map Pack” for their insanely popular game Halo 3 on December 11th. It includes three maps and will sell for 800 MS points (10$). That seems a bit steep to me as I was hoping for a price of around $6-8. I mean the Halo 2 maps were usually priced about $2 a piece so why can’t these?

Gears of War, a tenth month Xbox Live most played game leader, has slipped to third in the matter of a month. It was obvious it could not stand in the way of Halo, but a little more surprising is the fact that Call of Duty 4 has now outpaced it and is in second place right behind Halo 3 on the most played games on Xbox Live. Maybe I will have to check it out.

Super Mario Galaxy is now the best rated game of all time on gamerankings.com.  It edged out Ocarina of Time as it has an average 98.8 score and OoT has an average score of 98.6.  One bad review will kill this score though.

Microsoft announced that starting in early December you will be able to download original Xbox games and play them on your Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Marketplace as part of their Live is 5ive celebrations. There are a total of seven games on the list as of now. They include:

• Burnout 3:Takedown
• Crash Bandicoot:Wrath of Cortex
• Crimson Skies
• Fable
• Fuzion Frenzy
• Psychonauts
• (of course) Halo: CE

One major dissapointment in these games is that they don’t have achievements in them that we have come to love with regular Xbox 360 games. This is done “In order to preserve the integrity of the original gaming experience they provide” so “they will have the features available at the time of their initial release” according to Major Nelson. Hopefully these will be available to add later on via a patch or something. Oh yeah, they cost $15 a piece, which is reasonable I guess, although you could pick up these games in a local Gamestop for less.

Yes, the PS3 has done the previously unthinkable: It has outsold the Nintendo Wii in the land of the Rising Sun. Apparently the PS3 sold 55,924 units compared to the Wii’s 34,456 units. The rest of the sales go as follows:

Nintendo DS: 78,884 units
PSP: 58,964 units
PS3: 55,924 units
Wii: 34,456 units
PS2: 9043 units
Xbox 360: 5817 units

The Wii’s sales went down 10% while the PS3’s went up 38%. Super Mario Galaxy couldn’t even help them I guess.

Wow I may have to think twice about picking up Assassin’s Creed after looking at this review of it. It seems like the biggest problem with the game is that it is repetitive and doesn’t change that much. Also it looks like there should be a sequel coming out sometime. Well I probably still will get it but this is making me hesitant.

I just got my fix of juicy gossip today when I was listening to the 1up Yours Podcast (amazing podcast by the way) and Shane Bettanhausen, one of the hosts, suggested that a big first-party Microsoft Xbox title for 2008 has been canceled. He said, “a big Microsoft first-party title that has been in the works for a very long time, that people are very excited for, sounds like it’s being canceled.” We will have to wait and see how this turns out. Alan Wake, Too Human, Halo Wars, and Banjo Kazooie 3’s developers have all come out and said that it isn’t their game. What else could it be? Discuss at will

I’ve heard a couple rumors swirling around the internet dealing with the Elder Scrolls turning into an MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online). I have never played any MMO before, such as World of Warcraft, as I don’t want to get sucked into that world that I have heard is very addicting and hard to turn away from. I don’t have enough time to sit in front of a computer for that long. But this news story interests me. I loved the Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion and would love to see where an online version would go but I, being stingy with my money, would probably not buy it unless it was a new iteration and had a quality single player too. This probably won’t come out for several years so we have time to wait.

Guitar Hero has come out and the reviews are out as well. 1up gave them a 9/10 and gamespot gave them an 8/10. Those seem like pretty decent reviews. And seeing as how I’ve never owned a Guitar Hero game (only played them in Best Buy and was hooked on them) I’m looking forward to getting it and then another guitar for co-op play. My personal review should be up any day now as I should be getting that. I really want to also pick up Orange Box, which got amazing reviews but I need to save up my money for Assassin’s Creed and Mass Effect. I’ll probably pick it up later this year after its on a slight discount price. I can’t wait to play Portal.

Yah sorry about that again guys its just been really hectic. I should get back to normal starting next week sometime. Oh yah and Happy Halloween for all you people!
Well back to somethings that are important. I hope to be getting Guitar Hero III sometime this week or so and it looks amazing. I’m also looking forward to Assassin’s Creed which comes out November 13th, I think. That looks like a fun game as well. And then topping off the lot is Mass Effect, which comes out November 20th and that looks amazingly amazing. I’ve been told its like Oblivion in Space and also that its like Jack Bauer in space. Oblivion is one of my favorite games on the 360 and 24 is definetly my favorite show. Can’t wait till that comes out by the way. Tony Almaida back again?!?!?! Anyways, i should be posting my personal review of those games within the next month and as I said, getting back to normal posting in a week or two.