Another month, another episode in the ongoing Tales of Monkey Island saga. It goes without saying, but if you haven’t completed the previous episodes yet, you probably should avoid reading this review and looking at the pictures. I will, however, try to keep spoilers to a minimum, with the worst ones contained in this wee paragraph right here:

Here be spoilers!

In Episode 3, our hapless heores Guybrish and Winslow, and would-be assassin Morgan LaFlay, find themselves inside the belly of the giant manatee which swallowed The Screaming Narwhal in the closing scenes of Episode 2. We quickly learn that the manatee is on its way to the ancient mating grounds which are also home to Le Esponja Grande, but of course, there are a few puzzles to solve before we can make it there. We’ll learn a lot more about Morgan, as well as De Cava, and we’ll also meet up with an old friend.

You can look now!

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The Sullivan-Barnes family are sent back in time to experience a life of technological advancements through the Seventies, Eighties, and Nineties. Before you run outside to scream at the top of your voice that we have finally cracked time travel I would like to point out that the family didn’t actually go back in time. Technology is not the only thing which changes in each episode as the family wear clothes, and their home is decorated, in a style fitting of that particular decade. There is a technical support team on hand to help and advise the family as they tackle the changes in each episode. The three experts are Brits Tom Wrigglesworth and Dr Ben Highmore plus American ex-pat Gia Milinovich who I happen to find very sexy in a geeky kind of way. The narrator is none other than Robert Llewellyn, most famous for playing Kryten in Red Dwarf, and his familiar voice has a comforting effect.

In the first episode the family find themselves back in the 1970s. This was a decade dominated by horrible wallpaper and equally garish furniture. Adam and Georgie have memories of growing up in the Seventies but the experience is a whole new world to 13 year old Hamish, Ellie and Steff, both 12, with 2 year old Jude having no opinion at all.

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Cave are world famous for their Japanese “bullet hell” arcade shooters, which are slowly but surely all getting ported as full retail titles to the Xbox 360.  Sadly though, to date all of these titles have been region locked meaning you need a Japanese Xbox to play them.

Kotaku recently caught up with Cave’s Makato Asada at the Tokyo Game Show and asked him if they had any plans to change their policies with the upcoming release of Mushihime-sama Futari on the 360, and whilst the response is not a direct yes, their is still good news:-

“We had a lot of good feedback from overseas users,” Asada told Kotaku, happy with the strong response to the insect-themed, vertically-scrolling shmup. “So for this time, as a test, we’re going to make the game region free so that overseas users can play it.”

“By making Mushihime-sama Futari region-free, what we’re doing is measuring the amount of overseas users,” Asada explained.  “This will have a direct impact on whether Espgaluda II and other titles will be localized for America,” Asada warned us. “So it’s probably a good idea to pick it up!”

Whether “region free” will include Europe remains to be seen, but at least our American brethren will finally be able to get in on the action when Mushihime-sama Futari gets its Japanese release on 26th November.

(source)

French gaming site JV247.com have snagged some screenshots of a new character for Street Fighter 4, Juri, along with returning favorite T-Hawk.  This all ties up nicely with Capcom’s promise of some SF4 related news today at the Tokyo Games Show and this mysterious new page that has appeared on the Capcom Japan website.

It remains to be seen whether this will be paid DLC, a free update or the announcement of a complete new game in the SF4 saga.  All will be made clear tomorrow.

More pictures of Juri & T-Hawk after the break.

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Sometimes a fresh set of eyes brings a different perspective, so here for your reading pleasure is a 2nd look at Codemasters latest off-road adventure, Colin McRae: DiRT2 – ed

A part of me hopes that the rights to use the name of Colin McRae run out soon as my first reaction was that this serves as a morbid reminder of the shocking last events in the man’s life. However, this also has the ability to serve as a positive reminder of Colin’s greatest rally achievements. I would prefer to focus on the second memory and it’s a damn good thing this game is good enough to do the man justice. My initial experience with DIRT 2 wasn’t a particularly happy one. I like to be very aggressive in driving games and at first I had some difficulty getting used to the fact that I couldn’t avoid being punished if I chose to drive around like O.J. on crack. Those earlier concerns were squashed as soon as I got to grips with the controls and ever so slightly reigned in my aggressive streak.

The first thing which struck me about this title is the slick presentation. I personally feel the presentation is far too flashy for a rally game. It has been a while since I last played a Colin McRae game, and it’s been even longer since I played Sega Rally, but I much prefer a no-nonsense approach. DIRT 2 feels more like a Need for Speed take on a rally game than the older games I have fond memories of.

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A five pack of songs from alternative rockers Alice in Chains joins “Man in the Box” from the Rock Band 2 disc as part of this weeks DLC fest. The five pack features the band’s new single, “A Looking in View” from the band’s first album in 14 years, titled Black Gives Way to Blue and featuring Comes With the Fall frontman Willam DuVall on vocals, which will be released day-and-date with the DLC pack.  Along with the new single the pack will also contain some of of the bands greatest hits, including  “Rooster” and “Would?”.

Post-grungers Breaking Benjamin will also star in this weeks DLC with a 3 track pack spanning the bands career to date, including “I Will Not Bow” from the bands upcoming album Dear Agony.  Also releasing this week is 2 tracks from 90’s britpop act Kula Shaker, who contribute their classic track  “Hey Dude” alongside “Knight on the Town” and finally Just Kait make their RB debut with “U Suck”, which will only set you back half the normal cost to download!

The Alice in Chains pack will set you back a tidy 680/$8.50 for all 5 sings, with the Becoming Benjamin pack costing 440/$5.50, and as always all of the songs are available individually for 160/$2 each, except the Just Kait track which will only cost 80/$1, when they release this Tuesday for Xbox 360 and Thursday for Playstation 3.

Full tracklisting with video links after the break.

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*Yawn*

It’s yet another collection of uninspired minigames for the Wii, which use the console’s motion controls in “exciting” and “innovative” new ways. You’ll never be as good as Raving Rabbids or WarioWare, so why bother?

These were my thoughts when I first got wind that a review copy of Wacky World Of Sports was on its way to us (as well as thoughts of wanting to stab Vince, our gaming editor, in the eye for even suggesting such a thing).

So, around came the friends and out came the Wii – and you know what? Within a few minutes, I was actually starting to enjoy it. So were the others present. It was *almost* like a Raving Rabbids session as far as the level of enjoyment was concerned, and on we played into the night. It soon became apparent that Wacky World Of Sports was – dare I say it – actually pretty good.

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Rest in peace Colin McRae. With our respects paid, we can move onto Codemasters’ off-road sequel. Much like its predecessor, you’re tasked with working your way through a variety of events in the effort to better McRae. You start off at the bottom with a single car. As you progress through the game’s assorted events (Rally [X] Trailblazer, Gatecrasher, etc), you’ll get new cars, unlock new areas of the world (there are 9 in total) and slowly gain fame.

Ken Block and co will begin to appreciate your talents, you’ll start racing in the X Games and eventually you’ll compete in World Events. It’s a linear career mode, but you’re free to pick which events / continents you race on. This means you never really get bored and it emphasises the diversity of DiRT2. Purists will lament the fact that there’s less Rallying this time around, but for the casual game, DiRT2’s sheen and overall user friendliness will counterbalance any community moans.

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Halo 3 ODST… Say what you will about it (an expansion pack for the price of a full retail game? Hmm), but one thing’s for sure – it doesn’t actually work for a lot of people, with random errors popping up throughout the game’s campaign. Rumour has it that the dreaded “disc unreadable” errors are especially affecting older 360s, and users of Bungie’s forums are up in arms about the issue.

Some users report that installing the game to your HDD may be a way around the problem, but some people are having issues even with this method. You could always try returning the game to the supplier for a refund, but I doubt most of them would accept it (although AFAIK they would legally have to if it was technically faulty – no retailer is above the law).

Of course, the best option would be for Bungie to release a patch, but as this problem apparently relates to the physical media itself, I don’t think that would be technically possible.

Stay tuned.

The lovely people over at Sub Pop have responded to our request for more information on the upcoming Flight of the Conchords track pack for Rock Band with some exclusive information.

The 3 tracks will consist of 2 songs from the bands self titled debut album along with a track from their upcoming album ‘I Told You I Was Freaky’, but they are unsure at this moment as to whether they will be released as a pack or only as individual songs.  They aim to have the tracks released around the time that the new album releases on October 20th, with the songs being released via the new Rock Band Network feature.  Interestingly, the RBN was mooted for a November general release so maybe Sub Pop know something we don’t.

Finally we asked what the feasibility was of seeing the entire first album make its way onto RBN in the future, to which we were told that it will depend on the success of these first tracks.  So there you have it folks, if you want more than 3 FotC tracks in Rock Band then vote with your wallet when these release next month.