For some this will be a great reminder of a game from their youth, however that’s probably all it will be. Anybody who are taking this as their first introduction to the arcade title, then they’ll find moments that encourage a smile, but ultimately it’ll tire quickly thanks to its incredibly repetitive nature and simple gameplay. Seeing as the gameplay hasn’t actually been modified from the original in any overly noticeable way, it plays out very similarly to your old school side scrolling Beat-em-ups, and (thanks to knowledge from wikipedia’s) the gameplay is still modelled on Konami’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade games.

For an arcade game to repetitive gameplay is largely fine, however when that title is brought across t a home console it just begs the question of why bother? You can finish up the games 8 levels in around half an hour, and you can do it without breaking a sweat. Replay value is largely non-existant beyond online or same screen play, and honestly we couldn’t see any difference between the ‘USA Room’ or the ‘Japan Room’ that you unlock after completing the game. As mentioned, the only replay value on offer comes from being able to play with three other friends both online and offline. It’s these moments where the game shows the level of enjoyment that it really possesses, as enemies come thick and fast and chaos ensues. However as amusing as these moments are to share with friends it only serves to emphasise the button bashing nature of the controls. Visually there isn’t a lot to talk about as it emulates the originals 16bit graphics, but updates them with HD clarity so they just look like your typical sprite based Simpsons characters but a bit sharper. They aren’t bad by any means, but at the same time they are far from spectacular, especially as they take the look of retro Simpsons cartoons, as opposed to the newer and more refined drawings.

Despite all these negatives, the game does begin to come into its own when you focus solely on The Simpsons franchise. Every level is peppered with homages to old episodes and creations from Matt Groening’s head. Fighting off hairy squatches that all resemble Homer, or fighting in Moe’s bar whilst Barney sits drinking for a little while before running off. The boss designs are inventive, even if fighting them is a repetitive chore, and every character does feel like the creative minds behind the TV series have invested time in creating them for the game. Quite nicely too are the voices used in the game, with every character being voiced by their original voice actors to really bring quality to the game.

Essentially this is a well produced and carefully reproduced version of The Simpsons Arcade, however its downfalls all come from removing it out of its bite-size arcade environment and thrusting it into the hands of home console players. It’s a title that essentially hasn’t aged all to well either, with many side scrolling beat-em-ups now offering outrageous combos and moves, on top of a reasonably engaging story, The Simpsons Arcade seems incredibly lacking, with The Simpsons universe being the only safety net it has. It seems that if you loved the original in your youth, then this wouldn’t be a bad way to relive it all; however if you’ve not played it before you really aren’t missing out on much more than a sub-par beat-em-up adventure.

Final Score: 2/5

Taking up the role of either The Resistance or The Government you can expect to battle across maps set within the future city of Tokyo, or its new slums where the poor reside. Just one look at this trailer will show you how polished the shooter looks, it’s certainly one we’re looking forward to!

“The project has been making progress, but slow progress. So that’s tough, but we haven’t changed any focus. It’s still a really important project and a vision we want to see realized, and Fumito’s vision is really causing a very difficult challenge for the developers, so there’s some scrapping and rebuilding — iteration in the process. That’s why [it's taking so long].”

Speaking at Cologne’s Gamescom event in August, Yoshida said that the game was “still making progress” and saying that Sony would still “continue to support” it.

Yoshida also commented on Ueda leaving the project full time, stating that it was actually a way for him to do more creative work on the project, and that he still comes in and works the hardest on the game.

“Well it’s confirmed in terms of the status of his relation to the company — he was an employee, and now he’s working on a contract basis,’ said Yoshida.

“You know, we discussed an arrangement so he could focus on the creative side. But his work and his presence on that team never changed, so it was just more a contractual rearrangement, and that was taken as ‘he left’.”

“He comes in every day, and he’s probably one of the people who works the longest hours.”

It seems that The Last Guardian is still alive, which was many peoples worry, however we probably wont be seeing much of it (again) in 2012.

Source: VG24/7

Today via the new information exchange that is Twitter Sony came out to say that the racer “is in fact in development” and that they  ”look forward to sharing more on the game soon!”

The title itself is being made for PS3, there has been no announcement officially made about the game and a Vita version of the title.

Rumours have been circulating that Mod Nation Racers developer United Front Games will be producing the title, however that is still yet to be confirmed.

Image Courtesy of CVG

Source: CVG

Here are some of the best, and arguably worst, adverts for games and consoles forever locked in print. They are in no discernible order so just enjoy them as they are. Click the Image to get a larger version.

1.  Virtua Tennis on the Dreamcast

2. Nintendo Gamecube

3. Sega MegaDrive with Joystick

4. Street Fighter II Turbo on the SNES

5. WipEout Fusion on PS2

6. Super GameBoy for SNES

7. Phantasy Star Online for Dreamcast

8. Mortal Kombat for Arcades.

9.  Original GameBoy

10. Atari Lynx

11. WipEout on Playstation

12. Nintendo Game Keeper

When the game is eventually complete, you’ll get to take up the role of the ring-bearer and follow the quest line in a similar fashion to the Tolkien books. You aren’t limited to just being the hairy footed Frodo, you can in fact choose from one of ten playable races, races that include elves, hobbits, dwarves and men.

You can still play the work that the team have done for Oblivion by downloading the Mod.

The Skyrim mod will no doubt be very impressive thanks to the new quest and voice features that Bethesda have brought in for the TES V Construction Kit

Source: Kotaku

The Game Jam allowed the developers to just experiment with their creativity, the only condition is that it took place within the confines of the Skyrim universe. Some of the creations they came up with were incredible, such as dragon mounts, seasonal weather, spears and horseback combat, and building your own home from scratch!

Todd stressed that these are just ideas for the Game Jam and that many of these may never see the light of day outside of this video montage.

“How much of this stuff sees the light of day? To be determined. Could it be in a future DLC? We don’t know. Could various parts of it just be released for free? We don’t know.”

The shoes, confusingly named Super Mario Bros. X Converse One Star Ox shoe, come in black or white, and feature a red mario sprite and inset yellow star. They look really rather swish, and a great way to bathe your feet in classic geekdom.

The shoes will be available from March

Source: Edge

Early copies of the game will come with a ‘Ridge Racer Gold Pass’ that grants access to five extra cars, three race courses, two additional music tracks and an ‘extended music mix’.

The DLC will come for free with both boxed and digital copies of the game up until March 31st, at which point you’ll have to fork out €6.99 to get it. Namco say they are planning to release more DLC through April in the form of a ‘Silver Pass’.

Personally we think this is a little cheeky, specially seeing as the content on offer with the game is reportedly quite meagre.

Source: CVG

Confirmed via twitter the 360 patch is now available on Xbox Live, whilst PS3 users will have to wait a little longer for it to arrive.

The patch will deliver some significant fixes, most importantly the save file issues on the PS3. You can read the full patch notes here.