Katamari Gaiden

I don't normally record videos or post about game demos, but I just played one that I've been highly anticipating, and another that surprised me with its quality.

I've enjoyed the Katamari Damacy series since it first debuted as a limited release budget title for the PS2, and I've been looking forward to trying out Katamari Forever on the PS3, because its controller makes it the best current gen platform to play it on. The new game, soon to be released exclusively on the Playstation Network, upgrdes the look of the franchise with cel-shading, and in my opinion, it's a perfect fit. Gameplay is enhanced with the new ability to jump your Katamari using either the R2 button or a flick of the SIXAXIS controller. Download the demo now and try it for yourself, or buy the full game when it hits the PS Store this week.

I never got into the Ninja Gaiden franchise when it was reborn on the Xbox, so I didn't really expect to be thrilled with the Ninja Gaiden 2 Sigma demo, but boy was I ever! This PS3 exclusive essentially amounts to a director's cut of the Xbox 360's Ninja Gaiden 2, featuring improved imagery, better camera work, and lots of bonus content. But it was actually directed by a protege of Ninja Gaiden 2's director and former head of Team Ninja, Tomonobu Itagaki.

It runs at a steadier 60fps and is now a full 1280x720p, but gore has been toned down, reportedly for artistic reasons. It's still a violent game, with lots of blood, decapitations, and dismemberment, but you won't see severed limbs scattered everywhere and geysers of blood painting the environment as it did in Ninja Gaiden 2.

Combat is fluid and deep, though novices can button mash their way through the easiest setting. Those who take the time to learn the intracacies of the combo system and strategic use of their weapons will be rewarded with a richer experience when dispatching gangs of foes.

Unfortunately, the demo is currently only available via the Japanese Playstation Store, but don't let that stop you. Create a Japanese PSN account and go download it immediately! I'm sure you'll too be dying to buy the full game when it comes out next week.

Check out the HD videos I captured of the Katamari Forever and Ninja Gaiden 2 Sigma demos after the jump.

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Posted by Tiger on Sunday, Sep-20-2009 15:18 PM

GD is going HD

Just thought I'd give an update, because it's been way too quiet around here. I'm hard at work between my day job and projects I intend to share here on GD. Much headway has been made in upgrading my equipment and sharpening my skills, so I can show off my projects in beautiful HD video. My upgrade uncertainty is gone, as I've got the last bits of hardware on order to make my (current) main rig a video capturin' monster, powered by the Blackmagic Intensity Pro. I say "current" because I'm also building a new, much faster system, which will be running a watercooled and overclocked Core i7, an SSD drive running Windows 7 Professional, 2x HDDs in RAID 0, a Radeon HD 5870, and at least 6GB of RAM. I haven't decided yet whether to go with an X58-based LGA 1366 platform, or the upcoming P55-based LGA 1156 yet, but I'm not in too big of a hurry, with the video card and the OS not yet available for purchase.

There's more going into that build that I'm not ready to discuss yet, but there will be some interesting surprises for GD readers. There will be a few hints in upcoming videos that I'm editing right now.

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Posted by Tiger on Monday, Sep-07-2009 16:51 PM

Nerd detective

I was watching Green Wing, a British hospital comedy, on Hulu when I saw this guy carrying around a motherboard. It was nothing more than a prop in the scene, but it had me fascinated enough to try and find out what brand and model of motherboard it was. There's no prize for figuring it out, other than the satisfaction of knowing that my nerd sleuthing skills are still sharp. The CPU socket looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't remember if it was Socket A (Athlon), Socket 478 (Pentium 4), Socket 754 (single channel Athlon 64), or Socket 939 (dual channel Athlon 64). Two sets of two memory slots usually indicates dual channel, so I ruled out Socket 754. The square orientation of the northbridge means it's not an nVidia nForce2 chipset, which was, for my money, the only dual channel Socket A chipset, so I ruled that out.

Then I realized that the organization of the RAM slots wasn't like the standard for dual channel, so I was back to square one, with 4 possible routes to look down. I focused on the CPU socket and, after browsing a few pics, determined it was a Socket A. So I looked for Socket A motherboards that had the same color northbridge heatsink. I narrowed it down to around a dozen choices that were all very similar, but it was the blob of letterson the heatsink, which is all but invisible in the above screengrab, that led me to the answer. "Elitegroup" distributed the ECS-K7S5A motherboard you see below, and it's a miracle I could find it at all.

Back when I was all about AMD, I kept up on all the chipsets, but the nForce2's features and performance made it supreme in my mind, so every other chipset was easily forgotten. This motherboard's chipset was the SiS 735, and with support for both DDR and SDR RAM (hence the two pairs of differently colored and keyed RAM slots), making it a transitional board not unlike the ones we see today sporting both DDR2 and DDR3 slots. This allowed a budget-constrained upgrader to ease into an upgrade with a faster chipset and CPU, while retaining their old memory for a while longer. If you're reading GD, this is probably stuff you're well aware of, but I found it interesting to remember how things used to be and realize how some things never change.

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Posted by Tiger on Sunday, Jul-12-2009 12:58 PM

E309: Gran Turismo on PSP

When I ran into Kazunori Yamauchi at E3, I thought that was going to be the extent of my Gran Turismo experience for the show. But on the last day I found where they were hiding (in plain sight) all the GT Portable kiosks, and found a PSP Go unit running the game. Check out the video of me driving (badly) after the jump.

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Posted by Tiger on Friday, Jun-12-2009 11:38 AM

E309: Booth Babes

There's a time and place to ogle women. Most of the time, and almost every place. But when I hit this year's E3 Media & Business summit, it was mainly with business in mind. With a schedule full of appointments, this games show leaves surprisingly little time for fun. Yet, as the first day was wrapping up, I started easing back into man-mode and beginning to let myself enjoy everything that was on display. I was getting ready to Pokemon Snap some booth babes, but at the G4 booth I saw the hottest of these hotties and seized my opportunity to get a pic with Olivia Munn.

She was kind enough to go along with my request for a peace sign, and I have a feeling she would have still been agreeable if I shared with her my not-very-PC reason for the request. (Sorry folks, it's private.) So with that, I figured, I really don't need to get pics of anymore girls. I'd gotten the best, so why bother with the rest? But then I thought, I just have to get more pics. For you guys. Hit the jump to check out the gallery.

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Posted by Tiger on Sunday, Jun-07-2009 14:49 PM

Project Natal: A Reason to Believe

I wasn't convinced by Microsoft's presentation that they had the right kind of visionaries working internally on Project Natal. "Gimmick" is a word often associated with Wiimote-wagglefests, and most of what was shown seemed worthy of that descriptor. But now my concerns are somewhat put to rest. Johnny Chung Lee, a true visionary who has demonstrated Wiimote uses that were brilliantly inventive and seriously interesting, has announced that the reason why we haven't heard from him lately is because he's been busy working behind the scenes on Project Natal.

Click here to read all about it in his blog, and make sure to check out his previous projects and let your imagination start running wild over all the possibilities this guy may bring to light through Project Natal.

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Posted by Tiger on Tuesday, Jun-02-2009 21:28 PM

E309: Mario & Sonic and the Balance Board

I spotted this while cruising past Nintendo's booth at the as yet unopened show. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games will use the Balance Board in addition to the Wiimote and Nunchuk.

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Posted by Tiger on Tuesday, Jun-02-2009 09:11 AM

E309: Microsoft Project Natal

Well, E309 seems to be starting with a bang. Highlights of Microsoft's E309 press conference include confirmation of the rumored Metal Gear Solid game, Forza Motorsports 3, Halo: Reach, and the Zune Video Marketplace, but undoubtedly it will be best remembered for its wrap-up where, with the announcement of Project Natal, Microsoft stepped into Nintendo's Wii ring to duke it out, motion-a-motion.

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Posted by Tiger on Monday, Jun-01-2009 16:11 PM