Sonic isn’t a werewolf, he’s werehog. At night Sonic turns feral with stretchable arms used to grab ledges and punch the daylights out of enemies. Sonic has an upwards repeating punch attack for pseudo-air juggling and some basic claw slashes. A combo meter tells you if you're kicking ass or not. However, Sonic doesn’t “run” [...]

I saw Lego Batman yesterday which didn’t pull any surprises. Using the Wii remote to point and aim the batarang was neat, but Lego Batman is really an extension of the existing Lego games with the Batman license. Like Lego Indiana Jones, Lego Batman won’t have any online play. Richard Earl explained the reason for [...]

Capcom doesn’t have any plans to make a PlayStation Network version of Mega Man 9 with high resolution sprites from Mega Man 8. The game will be an 8-bit sequel on the Wii, PlayStation Network, and Xbox 360 when it comes out this fall. A release date has not been set, but Mega Man 9 [...]

WiiSpeak is great for communicating online, but it doesn’t ease the chore of letter writing letters. The animal neighbors love letters. I imagine typing them with the virtual keyboard will be tedious. Fortunately, Nintendo has another option for “core” Animal Crossing players that speed up the internal clock to get more mail, Animal Crossing: City [...]

The Korg DS-10 is a six track synthesizer for the Nintendo DS, based on the classic Korg MS-10 model.  To publicize the ease of the music creation software in Japan, Nobuyoshi Sano of Drakengard (aka Sanodg of Ridge Racer) gave a YouTube demonstration on how the ability to tweak everything, from the notes, to the [...]

Sega is making authenticity a high priority with Yakuza 2, a tale of the underworld of Japanese organized crime.  The sixteen chapters of the upcoming Playstation 2 title were penned by Hase Seishu, a writer of popular crime novels, and the North American release on the show floor of E3 will include the original Japanese [...]

Last week I wrote impressions of Hilde, the new female character with a pole and a short sword, so when I got to play Soulcalibur IV again I went straight for the Star Wars characters.   Darth Vader, Darth Vader’s Secret Apprentice, and Yoda have a second meter underneath their life bar which is linked [...]

At Microsoft’s Monday press conference I saw Duffy sing “Mercy” in Lips, but the performance didn’t explain much about what is in the game. I started asking questions, lots of questions, and got some answers.   Zune / MP3 connectivity is only functional with DRM (digital rights management) free music. I couldn’t get any details [...]

Brandon Sheffield from Insert Credit asked me why Banjo moved so slowly while I was playing the E3 demo. I didn’t have an answer for him at the time, but after completing a few puzzle piece challenges I figured it out. Rare designed Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts as a game where you drive you-construct-them vehicles [...]

I stepped into Infinite Undiscovery at the wrong time. Another player just put down the controller and I grabbed it in the middle of an event with Capell, the protagonist, stuck in a castle. Capell defends himself against waves of armored soldiers with sword slashes and flips. He also plays songs with his flute. None [...]

Similar to Final Fantasy IV DS, we played Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen and the experience of playing Dragon Quest IV at E3 is limiting. I cut to the chase and asked a Square Enix representative if they made any changes from the Japanese build.   The Japanese version of Dragon Quest IV [...]

The localized version of Final Fantasy IV DS is coming out next week in North America and we gave it a lengthy hands-on. Actually, two hands-on sessions, if you include the mini-feature with some of the tricks the bosses learned for the Nintendo DS remake.   When I met up with Square Enix I asked [...]

Way before Xseed announced they were localizing Populous DS we discovered Electronic Arts has a stage called the Bit Plane which features Nintendo hardware as civilizations. You start out with a Game & Watch progress to the Wii. Since Populous DS was designed for Japan the Famicom and Famicom Disc System are part of the [...]

I believe the Wii manual states a fresh set of alkaline AAs last around 30 hours. The number is a rough estimate since the amount of time the batteries last fluctuates depending on how you use the remote. I asked a Nintendo representative how the 1:1 the newly announced Wii MotionPlus accessory will affect the [...]