Gamestop sells demo disc as new game

An angry NeoGAF poster bought what he thought was a new copy of Steambot Chronicles from Gamestop, only to find out later that the US retailer actually sold him a demo disc for the game, with the "Demo: Not for Resale" watermark scribbled out with a sharpie marker.

Thanks to Gamestop's policy of holding discs from new games behind the counter, this sort of thing is inevitable. The customer brings the empty case up front when purchasing, and the underpaid Gamestop employee finds the corresponding disc and puts it in the box. The problem with this system becomes plainly clear with incidents like this -- consumers have no real way of knowing if the disc they're being handed is the one that Gamestop originally removed from the packaging.

Our advice? Always double-check Gamestop purchases for scratches, scuffs, or sharpie scribblings before leaving the store. The onus falls on you, the consumer, since I seriously doubt Gamestop's policies are going to be changing anytime soon. Why the customer chose to buy the decidedly bland Steambot Chronicles in the first place is unclear.

PS3 Assassin's Creed Patch Coming

Assassin's Creed has a lot going for it, in spite of some bugs in the game. The problems are a bit more severe for owners of the PS3 version, with the game freezing, locking up consoles and generally assassinating the gaming experience. Luckily, that should all be changing shortly with a new patch for the game coming to the PlayStation Network.

The recently announced patch for the PS3 version of Assassin's Creed will improve the stability of the game, and fix a few freezing issues which plague the title. Now if they would fix that duplicity bug and the (disturbing) hilarious "humping guard" glitch we'd sleep better at night. Of course, if you could use the latter to create a diversion for the other guards, that would be both classic and useful.

Ubisoft UK Boss says industry "Crying Out" For New IP's

Such is the opinion of Rob Cooper, the man in charge of Ubisoft UK following the debut of Assassin's Creed at the top of the UK charts. The ambitious "hitman in sandles" game became the third-fastest selling Xbox 360 game ever, something Ubisoft sees as confirmation that not everyone wants more lousy licensed games and sub-par sequels. "I think the success worldwide of Assassin's Creed absolutely proves that new IP can live and prosper within the sequel and licensed based competition," said Cooper, speaking to MCV. "The industry is crying out for new and compelling content and we're delighted that AC has lived up to its expectations."

November has been a good month for new IP's with Assassin's Creed, Mass Effect and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune all making big splashes in their respective debuts. Common sense dictates no entertainment industry can sustain long term growth without a constant influx of new properties. Even the best franchises can only sustain sequels for so long before they eventually whither and die. It is exciting to see three new franchises of such high quality arrive on the scene in quick succession. If publishers give developers greater opportunities to capitalize on out-of-the-box thinking -- including spending the marketing dollars necessary to cement new properties in the public consciousness -- we might end up with more classics and less trash.

Reminder of the Day - Get a Wii before Black Friday or not at all

Nothing says "spirit of the holidays" like trampling fellow holiday shoppers in an effort to secure the season's must-have toy for your personal little angels. Once again the Wii looks to be that item, and since we are always looking out for your welfare, we implore you to heed our advice -- if you would like to avoid bloodshed this Black Friday, I suggest you get to your local retailer today because, after tomorrow, Wii's are going to be scarcer than an honest politician.

The Associated Press is echoing last week's report from the BBC that the Nintendo Wii is the focus of more than a few Black Friday sales this week. So common sense says, if you can get to your local retailer today while everyone else is distracted buying Thanksgiving supplies, you have a much better shot at being greeted by smiling angels Christmas morning instead of an angry mob.

Super Mario Galaxy sells 500k Units in North America week one

Plumbers make a decent living, even if they can't seem to afford proper-fitting pants. And the most most famous plumber of all, Mario, is once again showing us he knows how to print money with the best of 'em.

According to Nintendo, Super Mario Galaxy sold 500,000 units in its first week on US store shelves, making it the best selling Mario game of all time in its first week. It was more good news for the mustached one following his Japanese debut where the game sold 250k units in the same time frame.

PS3 firmware update 2.01 (causes) fixes problems with 2.0

PS3 owners are starting to feel like the proverbial unwanted red-headed stepchild. Last night's new firmware update for the PS3, version 2.01, seems to be the latest slap in the face. If you haven't already downloaded it, don't be in a big hurry. The ".01" just denotes a few bug fixes for those who said they've been experiencing game freezing errors with 2.00. However, it turns out there is a trojan horse in them there updates.

Unfortunately, it appears as if the patch may have created problems for Call of Duty 4 players, who took to the official forums (registration required) in force to complain of critical errors while trying to play the game online following the update. Many also report getting the same error: "DW update file error 102 - 'BD_EXCEPTION_IN_DB' " when trying to start a new character. Neither Sony nor Activision have responded to the issue. We also don't know if this extends to any other games. Are any of you having similar problems with the update?

They Deserved Better, Part Four - Psychonauts

In the fourth, and final part of our They Deserved Better series, Adam Montgomery takes a look back at one of the most unique, visionary and just plain fun games ever created - Tim Schafer's Psychonauts.

Psychonauts is the last, and best, of the games that Deserved Better. The game's creator, Tim Schafer, proved himself a master of mind-melding; he allowed us into his mind to play in a detached world of psychics and sinners, with characters as disjointed and witty as his mind could muster. The Psychonauts are some of the first to touch down on the 360 as part of the new Xbox Originals download service coming with the December 4th firmware update, so it’s an ideal time to revisit this sorely-missed classic of the last generation.

Razputin, the lead character, spends as much time bouncing off the cast in sharply-timed and written dialogue as he does bouncing off the earth on his mentally-projected ball. “Levels” are contained within the minds of characters. Their fears, wants, and well-being are all portrayed in the mental landscape you traverse and contend with. Pleasingly, the comedy continues, and perhaps climaxes, with the internal monologue and private commentary transpiring due to your mind-tampering.

The psychic abilities Raz learns and hones during his time at the Psychonauts’ camp are a joy. From basic attacks, to more interesting abilities, they are key to completing the game’s many memorable challenges and puzzles. Clairvoyance, for instance, allows you to view yourself through the eyes of another – allowing you to judge the effectiveness of your disguise. These abilities raise the game above its rather generic roots, and without them, Psychonauts would feel like any platformer with a theme.

It’s fortunate then that the psychic theme is so well executed; woven expertly into the characters, the world, and the gameplay. It’s simply a joy to play; a well-executed spin on a genre which has suffered greatly in recent times.

What makes Psychonauts truly special, keeping it from becoming just another platform-puzzle game, is that it’s a sparkling example of wit and a quirky, joyous romp through a world like no other.

Search for it and you can find a Schafer quote: “genre isn’t important, quality is.” His game builds on a firm foundation of stable convention, with a gentle shuffle around “generic”, and becomes an enjoyable, polished oddity which is as fun as it is catatonic.

And that’s it. That’s all I have to say about Psychonauts and all I have to say about the games that Deserved Better. There are a lot of great games out there that have been shunned, and wrongly so. If you take a look back and enjoy Beyond Good and Evil, Oddworld:Stranger’s Wrath, Okami, or Psychonauts, then take a chance in the future. Otherwise, I offer only the sad guarantee that a number of future classics will be cast aside as the masses scramble for yet another licensed sequel.

Pick that game up off the floor. Choose quality.

Adam Montgomery

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune - The PS3 has arrived

With all these blockbuster games hitting in my birthday month (Nov 20th, thank you Mass Effect!), it's been a busy two weeks of gaming at my house. In the past two weeks, I've finished Call of Duty 4, Assassin's Creed, I'm working on Super Mario Galaxy and Saturday saw me complete Uncharted: Drake's Fortune.

It's no secret that my Xbox 360 gets a lot more play than my PS3, but let's face it, if there were more games for the system I'd spend more time on it. Well, if Sony can bring more games like Uncharted to the system, I'm going to have a tough time ignoring it in the future!

I've seen a lot of footage of Uncharted over the past six months, so my anticipation was running high before I put the disc in the console. I had read reports of how it could only be developed on the PS3, and while I took those with a boulder-sized grain of salt, I was curious whether the final product would validate those claims. In short, it does.

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune is everything a great game should be. It grabs your attention with the opening frame and holds it firmly to the end credits. It's filled with memorable characters, both pro- and antagonists, that drive the story forward and leave you wanting more. Technically, it is a showcase for the hardware it is designed for, in this case, the PS3. For the first time, I finished a PS3 game and wondered if it could have been done on the Xbox 360. Honestly, I don't know the answer to that question, but the fact that I even wondered about it is a testament to the quality of Naughty Dog's work on Uncharted.

Is the game perfect? What is perfect? If you are looking for things to pick apart in the game, you could do that with anything. The Mona Lisa has a crooked smile, but isn't that what gives "her" her charm? Yeah, the grenade explosions could be bigger in the game, but then you couldn't avoid them as well. There could be more platforming in the game, but I only say that because the platforming that's there is as good or better than in any previous game. It could be a bit longer, but only because when it ended I wanted to keep playing. It could be a bit more difficult, but that might detract from the fun. Clearly, the developers want you to finish Uncharted and they give you help to that end.

When I form my opinions of a game there are a few basic criteria I look to as the basis of comparison. Graphics, gameplay, ability to mesmerize, story, and replay value. On all these fronts, Uncharted is an unmitigated success. Rarely does a game with no multiplayer component warrant subsequent play-throughs, but Uncharted does.

Excuse the cliche, but if you're one of the 94 million or so gamers straddling the fence of buying or not buying a PlayStation 3, Naughty Dog has just made you an offer you can't refuse. Uncharted: Drake's Fortune is a game worthy of the $460 you will spend for the combination of a PS3 and the game.

Assassin's Creed - A Glorious Mess

After last week's early reviews of Assassin's Creed hit the web, I wasn't sure what to make of them. Game Informer gave it a 9.5 and then IGN called it "one of the top five most disappointing games of all time." How do you balance those disparate opinions? These are two media outlets I usually respect, yet clearly they both saw this hugely anticipated title completely differently. Who was right and who was wrong?

Well, now that I've had a few days to play Assassin's Creed myself, I've formed my own opinion of it, and I also have a clearer understanding of where my esteemed colleagues were coming from with their polar opposite views.

Right away I will let you know, I like Assassin's Creed, and yet I am very disappointed by it. The parts of Creed that work well, work very well; like the amazing climbing and free-running. When you scale the heights of cathedrals and various other towers or free-run across rooftops while escaping pursuers, the feeling you get is one of immense power, both the power of lead character Altair (pronounced al-tie-ear), and the power of the Xbox 360. (I have not played the PS3 version of the game, so I will not be commenting on the negativity surrounding it here.) Regarding Altair, Game Informer noted in their review, "Rarely has a character without superpowers or magic been quite so powerful and exciting to vicariously inhabit, whether he’s perching on a high tower of the Acre Cathedral or countering the blows of a Templar knight." As for the Xbox 360, it handles the vistas, combat, hundreds of characters and huge, seamless cities beautifully with hardly a stutter.

I found the game's combat to be very enjoyable. It is definitely not going to be liked by hardcore hack 'n slash fans, but anyone who enjoys a bit more thinking in their swordplay will be very pleased. The combat is also very cinematic, keeping it fresh over time. I never got bored thrashing four or five foes at a time, even the hundredth time I did it.

The vistas you see from those previously-mentioned high perches, as well as Altair's movements and pretty much all the other graphics in the game, fully demonstrate Ubisoft's ability to develop a great game from the code up. For the most part, Assassin's Creed looks really good! Consequently, the parts where the game falls flat are even more baffling to me.

The voice work in Assassin's Creed, at least that of the actor playing Altair, is absolutely abysmal. Very surprising considering this is almost universally a strong point in Ubisoft games. Just look at the Splinter Cell or Ghost Recon franchises. Making Altair's voice even more grating is the fact that most of the other voice work in the game is actually quite enjoyable. While virtually all the ancillary characters have mostly-accurate accents of various middle-eastern origins, Altair sounds like he was born and bred in Indiana. Topping off this vocal crap sandwich is the fact that his lines are delivered with all the flair and emotion of a narcoleptic spelling bee judge reading the dictionary. Therefore the blame falls squarely on the shoulders of the person responsible for casting the game's actors.

The gameplay is far from perfect. As great as the combat and climbing are, the investigative aspects of the game are tedious and overly repetitive. When you save various citizens from a beating or kidnapping at the hands of ruthless town cops, you're thanked by having to hear the same three lines of canned dialogue over and over again. Boring with a capital WTF!?! Same for the "eavesdropping" and "pickpocketing" mini games...they are overly simplistic and occur far too often.

As far as the writing in the game is concerned, I found it largely forgettable. Without spoiling it for those who've yet to play it, Creed's "hook" is cliched at best and just plain lazy at worst. The story is further gimped by the fact that the story's one major plot twist is revealed before you even actually play the game. Someone needs to take a "Fiction 101" class.

As bad as all that sounds, it didn't stop me from playing Assassin's Creed. I would take a break from it only to find myself thinking about the swordplay or climbing another tower. It also helps that the Xbox 360 version has achievements tied to it. I seriously doubt I would've finished this game if not for the opportunity to fatten my gamerscore. Even though I dreaded playing parts of the game later, my achievements addiction brought me back for more.

As you can see, Assassin's Creed is a somewhat frustrating game to review. It's an enigma, wrapped in a riddle, sprinkled with some wonderfulness and nearly ruined with some craptastic design choices. If I have to give it a numeric score (which I loathe), I'll give it an overall score of 7 out of 10. I actually enjoyed the climbing and fighting aspects the more I played it, but the other stumbles in game design and casting really hurt the overall experience. On the bright side, I see the potential for an absolutely fantastic sequel.

UT3 for Xbox 360 only "on hold"

There was some confusion going around the nets yesterday regarding the Xbox 360 version of Epic's Unreal Tournament 3. A couple of well known game sites had reported that Epic's Mark Rein had said work had not yet begun on the Xbox 360 version, which was not correct. What he meant was, the game was put on hold (apparently a while ago) so that they could focus on getting the PS3 and PC versions out the door. Joystiq got verification from Rein himself.

Joystiq quotes Rein as saying, "What I probably should have said was 'start working on it again.' We had the game up and running on all three platforms up until last spring. In fact Official Xbox Magazine came out and played the game for a great cover story they did on it. We stopped working on the 360 version so we could concentrate our efforts on shipping the various PC and PS3 versions. Once we get those out of the way, and take some time to enjoy the holidays with our friends and families, we'll start working on the 360 version again. There's still a decent bit of work to do. For example we have simple LAN play but no Xbox Live implementation yet and we need to work with Microsoft to figure out how to accommodate mods on their platform."

You Xbox 360 owners can stop worrying, not that you were all that worried with Mass Effect dropping next week. PS3 and PC gamers need some positive mojo right about now. Especially PC gamers, I swear, except for Crysis and World in Conflict, it seems like there hasn't been a great PC game since Half Life 2.