
Top 9 Video Game Vixens
December 14, 2009
It’s a Chiptunes Holiday!
December 14, 2009It’s that time of year. Halls are decked, bells are jingling and the sounds of Christmas music seemingly ooze from every speaker you happen to be near. Now not everyone likes the sounds of the holidays, but there are two things I am an absolute sucker for: Christmas songs and Chiptunes music. What happens when you combine 200 year old holiday standards with the bleepy bloopy sounds of classic game systems? You get a CD so full of awesome that it will win over the ears of even someone who loathes Christmas music. Click on through to download your very own copy for free!
8 Bit Weapon and ComputeHer have just released “It’s a Chiptune Holiday!” and have been kind enough to let us share those songs with you clever people reading this. Feel free to download them from the link below or just stream the samples we have for you. The EP features eight holiday classics rendered in the Chiptunes style, opening with “Deck the Halls,” featuring a robotized vocal line over a bouncy melody
The disc closes on “Ave Maria” played in a style that can only be described as if it had been composed by Nobuo Uematsu instead of Bach. The multiple layers of electronic melodies combine to create a beautiful piece which sounds like it could have come right from Final Fantasy V.
Other stand out tracks are “Hanukkah” which sounds like a long lost song from Tetris or Dr. Mario. I challenge you not to imagine frantic falling bricks or pills when you hear it. Then there is “Greensleeves,” which, when Chiptuned, would be quite comfortable haunting a vampire’s castle or as background music for a dungeon explored by a blonde haired dude wearing green tights. Really, there isn’t a bad song here and even with characteristics of classic game music at their depths, 8 Bit Weapon’s and ComputeHer’s arrangements are a great example of how Chiptunes music is rapidly evolving as a genre.
If you would rather have a physical copy of the disc, you can pick one up from 8bitweapon.com. And just to make things even cooler, the music is burned on a black CD, packaged inside a 5 ¼” floppy disc. (No floppy drive required.) Now who is this for? If you love unusual Christmas music, this is a must have release. Even if you hate Christmas music to the point of wanting to stuff your ears with candy canes (don’t try this at home!) but you are into the Chiptunes scene, then you should find this a most enjoyable listen. And should 8 Bit Weapon and ComputeHer decide their fans are on the nice list and record them a volume 2 of holiday songs, “O Holy Night” or “Ding Dong Merrily on High” would be perfect fits for their sound. You can download the complete album for free from here.
Source: G4 tv

Video Games Christmas Gift Ideas
December 2, 2009Hardcore Gamers
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| Halo 3: ODST (Xbox 360) Microsoft |
Fallout 3 – Game Of The Year Edition (PS3) Bethesda |
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising (Xbox 360) Codemasters Limited |
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| Dragon Age: Origins (Xbox 360) Electronic Arts |
Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360) Electronic Arts |
Dragon Age: Origins (PS3) Electronic Arts |
Batman: Arkham Asylum (Xbox 360) Eidos Interactive |
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| Batman: Arkham Asylum (PS3) Eidos Interactive |
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (PS3) Activision |
The Saboteur (PS3) Electronic Arts |
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| Dragon Age: Origins (PC) Electronic Arts |
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360) Activision |
Assassin’s Creed II (PS3) Ubisoft |
Assassin’s Creed II (Xbox 360) Ubisoft |
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Family Games
List from www.amazon.co.uk |
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Borderlands: The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned
November 30, 2009While it may be mixed up about which holiday season it belongs in, The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned is right on target when it comes to entertainment. This undead-themed add-on freshens up your Pandoran adventuring with swampy new environments that provide a great backdrop for satisfying gunplay. Your innumerable zombie targets crawl, lurch, and run at you from every direction, and bigger, quicker Halloween-flavored foes spice things up in some clever ways. There’s a lot to do on the Zombie Island, and though you can complete the main quest in a little over four hours, side quests can extend your play time significantly. While there are some minor issues to consider, the overall package is strong. And with much more humor per pound than the original game, The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned is a lot of entertainment for only 800 Microsoft points ($10). When you download The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned, a new location becomes available from any fast travel kiosk, even if you haven’t unlocked fast travel yet. Jakob’s Cove is a mill town owned by the gun manufacturer (“Remember, if it took more than one shot, you weren’t using a Jakob’s!”) and is set on a swampy island covered with massive trees. These gnarly plants loom overhead, and dark green vines dangle from their branches, creating a gloomy, verdant atmosphere. Other environments feature hillside graveyards, ramshackle towns, and familiar zombie-filled streets. Throughout your adventures, you are treated to a much heftier dose of humor than you are in the main game. Amusing recordings give you silly glimpses of other adventurers, and a cheerfully coldhearted company representative reminds you to never, under any circumstances, engage in oral contact with the undead. Dr. Ned himself has some great lines, and he preserves his general apathy throughout the revealing campaign to hilarious effect. This liberal dose of humor, combined with the new environments, helps create a healthy variety both within the add-on and when compared to the main game.
Pretty much every place you go is crawling with zombies. They drop down from trees, emerge out of the ground, and otherwise stand around waiting for fresh brains to wander by. You’ll fight torsos that crawl, midgets that leap, and shambling workers with beer helmets. Some zombies spit on you to cloud your vision and slow your movement, while another sprints toward you and explodes just after ripping his own arm off like a gruesome grenade pin. Many zombies explode more enthusiastically than their living counterparts, and you’ll see limbs popping off in a variety of amusing ways. These variations can be humorous as well as strategically relevant. Scoring a headshot on a zombie will cause its brain to pop out, and these can be collected as part of an amusing quest, provided you find the right fellow. And the hulking Tankensteins don’t just look like their cinematic inspiration, but they share his affinity for electricity, so you’d be wise to avoid dealing them shock elemental damage. Though sometimes the hectic action can result in visual slowdown, these moments are few enough that they won’t hinder your enjoyment.
review from gamespot.com

Guitar Hero: Van Halen hot for retail Dec. 22
November 4, 2009
Between Guitar Hero 5, DJ Hero, Band Hero, and Guitar Hero: Van Halen, the rest of 2009 will be crammed full of Activision rhythm games. With so many offerings in such a short window of time, the publisher wants to give its games as much room to breathe as possible. Activision’s rhythm game gauntlet kicks off with Guitar Hero 5’s September 1 launch, and today the publisher told GameSpot it will end with the North American launch of Guitar Hero: Van Halen on December 22. The game is set for release on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and PlayStation 2 and previously had only been given a “second half of 2009″ launch window.
Like the Metallica and Aerosmith dedicated Guitar Hero games before it, Guitar Hero: Van Halen will feature 25 tracks from the hard rock group, as well as three playable solos by its famed guitarist, Eddie Van Halen. The game will also feature 19 other musical acts, including Queen, Weezer, Blink 182, The Offspring, and Queens of the Stone Age.
The complete Guitar Hero: Van Halen on-disc set list follows below:
Van Halen tracks:
“Ain’t Talkin Bout Love”
“And the Cradle Will Rock”
“Atomic Punk”
“Beautiful Girls”
“Cathedral” (solo)
“Dance the Night Away”
“Eruption” (solo)
“Everybody Wants Some”
“Feel Your Love Tonight”
“Hang ‘Em High”
“Hear About it Later”
“Hot for Teacher”
“Ice Cream Man”
“I’m the One”
“Jamie’s Cryin”
“Jump”
“Little Guitars”
“Loss of Control”
“Mean Street”
“Panama”
“Pretty Woman”
“Romeo Delight”
“Running with the Devil”
“So This is Love”
“Somebody Get Me a Doctor”
“Spanish Fly” (solo)
“Unchained”
“You Really Got Me”
Songs by other artists:
Alter Bridge – “Come to Life”
Billy Idol – “White Wedding”
blink-182 – “First Date”
Deep Purple – “Space Truckin”
Foo Fighters – “Best Of You”
Foreigner – “Double Vision”
Fountains of Wayne – “Stacy’s Mom”
Jimmy Eat World – “Pain”
Judas Priest – “Painkiller”
Killswitch Engage – “The End of Heartache”
Lenny Kravitz – “Rock and Roll is Dead”
Queen – “I Want it All”
Queens of the Stone Age – “Sick, Sick, Sick”
Tenacious D – “Master Exploder”
The Clash – “Safe European Home”
The Offspring – “Pretty Fly For a White Guy”
Third Eye Blind – “Semi-Charmed Life”
Weezer – “Dope Nose”
Yellowcard – “The Takedown”

Legendary Band Queen to Appear in LEGO Rock Band
October 20, 2009
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and MTV Games today announced that LEGO Rock Band will feature the likeness of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee and multi-platinum selling group Queen. Appearing in the game as LEGO minifigures, front man Freddie Mercury, guitarist Brian May, bassist John Deacon and drummer Roger Taylor will be seen jamming to their hit anthems “We Will Rock You” and “We Are The Champions.”
Guitarist Brian May said: “This is IT! I wanna play! When do I get my toy LEGO man?”
Today also marks the release of the Queen pack for the Rock Band Music Store of downloadable content, featuring 10 of the band’s most loved songs including “Killer Queen,” “Somebody to Love,” “Fat Bottomed Girls” and the Queen/David Bowie collaboration, “Under Pressure.” In addition, Queen will release Absolute Greatest on Nov. 17, featuring 20 of the band’s biggest hits.
LEGO Rock Band puts the power of rock into the hands of tweens, teens, families and gamers of all ages as they go on a wild journey to stardom as they “Build a Band and Rock the Universe.” The game is developed by TT Games in partnership with Harmonix for the Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, PLAYSTATION 3 computer entertainment system and Wii home videogame console. LEGO Rock Band for Nintendo DS is co-developed by TT Games and Harmonix in partnership with Backbone Entertainment, a Foundation 9 Entertainment studio. All versions are scheduled for release holiday 2009. thank you to IGN for the story





Nikki/Emmanuelle Vaugier (Need for Speed: Carbon)


































