Mondo Gaming

Q4 2009 VS First Half 2010

2009-07-16T19:53:00.000-07:00

Well 09 has been a rollercoaster year and it’s going from being one of the greatest years ever to maybe the biggest year of gaming as far as games and announcements for gaming. I mean come on the vitality sensor will change gaming forever.........ok maybe not but let's not forget these were the people that sold over 6 million bathroom scales and outsold all "AAA" titles, so you'll never know. Now that we are in July and officially in the second have of the yea, I think it pretty safe to mention what I'm looking forward to this year without fear of it being bumped to 2010. The question now is which games stand out from the group, but wait......is there a problem it’s not really looking too crowded anymore. Most of the blockbuster hits we assumed at the beginning of the year are finding their way to next year which is a good thing but it’s also bringing up a new question. Are there too many games coming next Spring? Sounds weird right? How about this for weird, is Spring going to have a better line-up then the Fall. So before I get to my must haves I'm going to do a Q4 2009 vs. Q1 2010.

Q4 2009 (Sept. through Dec.)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves
Halo: ODST
Splinter Cell: Conviction
Modern Warfare 2
Left for Dead 2
Assassins Creed 2
Bayonetta
Dragon Age: Origins
Dark Void
Max Payne 3
Rock Band: Beatles
Alpha Protocol
Brutal Legend
Ratchet and Clank: A Crack in Time
M.A.G
Tekken 6
Borderlands
DJ Hero
Tony Hawk Ride
The Saboteur
Forza 3
Muramasa: The Demon Blade
Dead Space: Extraction
Spyborgs
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories
New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Red Steel 2

Q1 2010 (Jan through June)
Mass Effect 2
Bioshock 2
God of War 3
Darksiders
Dante's Inferno
Singularity
Split/Second
Ghost Recon 4
Final Fantasy XIII
Alan Wake
Brink
Mafia II
White Knight Chronicles
Heavy Rain
No More Heroes 2
Sin and Punishment 2

Now the list for Q4 09 is much larger than the Q1 2010 but its too early to tell what will happen with the line ups. Even though the list for 09 is larger the fire power that Q1 2010 is packing is a tough act to compete against. With titles like God of War 3 and Mass Effect 2 Q1 is packing heat. In the end it’s the opinion of the gamer, but one thing is for sure we are not lacking great games anytime soon and I personally can't wait until I'm pulling my hair out at what to spend what little money I have on. As I was saying earlier 09 is an amazing year in gaming and it seems more and more like we are saying this every year which makes me happy to be a gamer, just sad to be unemployed.

ONE DAY AWAY!!!!

2009-05-31T17:58:00.000-07:00

Well E3 starts tomorrow with Microsoft Press Conference followed by EA & Ubisoft Press Conferences shortly after. To be honest I can't wait and even though I'm not there all my connections with twitter and live feeds on G4 will make me feel like I'm there. The leaks continued since my last post' Nintendo was the victim this time. Supposedly a report from Japan's Nikkei newspaper reports that a new Mario game is set to release in Japan this fall for the Wii, and also Wii fit plus is gonna be shown at E3 this year and so far the improvements are on the software side. The rumor is that it will have new exercises and really push online, so you can go against friends and family without sharing one board. Lets hope this opens up for some multi player workouts and competitions.

Microsoft's predictions:

1. New camera

2. NXE update

3. New Halo: Reach

4. Forza 3, Alan Wake, Splinter Cell, and Halo: ODST

5. Microsoft Handheld "xyz"

6. New lionhead studios game

7. New studios to show their games (Big Park and Ruffian)

8. New primetime shows

Pre E3 My thoughts Blog!

2009-05-30T12:26:00.000-07:00

E3 is a few days away and I can't wait. I'm completely geeking out on this years E3, my previous post was my Nintendo E3 prediction post, this time I'm gonna do Sony plus talk about some of the leaks that have been released.

Let's start with the leaks because it affects the next two topics I'm covering today. Well today was a biggie, the PSP Go! was officially confirmed through a leak earlier today, and in that leak there was another kinda big one. The leak was off what looked like a camera phone at a advance screening of the June episode of Qore the PSN monthly based subsciption show, and in this episode which is to be released after E3 they were talking about the PSP Go! and while describing the benefits Sony's John Koller also pointed out a new Metal Gear Solid and he said Soild not acid or some other version. The PSP Go! will not replace the PSP 3000 currently being sold at retailers it is for a different market of customers. This UMD less PSP will feature a built in 16 GB hard drive, Bluetooth connectivity, and a slide out controller. The control will not feature a second stick as previously rumored, and as of yet there is no word on some of the other rumored features such as, the touch screen and phone capabilities. The second part to this leak is the Metal Gear Solid for the PSP. If you follow gaming closely you would know that Kojima has been teasing with countdowns for over 2 weeks now. Ending countdowns only to start a new one and driving gaming new mad at the same time. The latest countdown ended with a picture of Big Boss from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake eater for the PS2, So now comes the question is this the same game to be coming to the PSP? Although it wouldn't surprise me much to see a new Metal Gear for the PS3 announced this year I believe it won't be the case and the countdown will be for the PSP game.

The other some what big news is the leaked videos from two of Ubisoft's biggest titles, Splinter Cell: Conviction and Assassin's Creed 2. These 10 second clip are all CG and show no actual game play but I did see that they completely remade Sam Fisher the main character from the Splinter Cell games. In the previous trailers we've seen he looked to be in his 30's with and full beard and long hair, and this game has been delayed so many times its starting to show. In the new CG clip of the E3 trailer for the game the character I'm assuming is Sam Fisher looks to be much older (late 40's early 50's) and he is still very much a stealth character again when it looked like in the old trailers that he was gonna be more out in the open. The Assassin's Creed 2 clip showed nothing out of this world, but to the fans of the game it just bring us one step closer to the real thing. That's it for the leaks of today if anything pops up tomorrow I'll try my hardest to get it up on the blog A.S.A.P.

AS for Sony, as I just pointed out the PSP Go! will be a highlight at the show and yes, the fact it was leak will take some of the wind out of the sails but I'm sure Sony still has more to keep us excited. Along with the PSP Go! I see that they will unveil their own app store type store for the PSP. Something like a mix between the IPhone's App store and the PSN Store. It will offer a huge library of not only PSP titles for download but also PlayStation one games and PSN games like Pixel Junk monsters among others. then they will reveal the original games for the PSP available for download made just for the PSP Go!. For the PS3 will see a lot of the big already announced titles like God of War 3 and Uncharted 2. I have a good feeling we will get more information and possibly release dates for M.A.G., Ratchet and clank, Final Fantasy XIII, FFXIII Versus and GT 5. As far as new games I don't see much on that front. The end of the show will talk a bit about third party support and Home finally coming out of Beta and what new upgrades are coming to it. My hopes aren't high for Sony I think they blew their load with all the games announced last year. Now the rumors of a motion control and the PS3 Slim I don't see being part of this show. They might be real but they will be announced at another time, and I completely rule out a price cut, but we will see just a few days away.

Assassin's Creed 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9-ZNgm0j7I
Splinter Cell: Conviction: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGejBtXAzYQ
PSP GO!: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykJFpWzj7eY

3 Part E3 Predictions: Part1 Nintendo

2009-05-10T13:33:00.000-07:00

Well I will be having my first ever 3 part E3 prediction post starting today. I'm gonna start with Nintendo, lasts year E3 will go down as one of the worst showings ever! So to no surprise my hope are not high for this year. Nintendo has seemed to focus all of there attention to the casual gamer and its paid off big time for them. Nintendo itself has remained pretty quiet this year aside from announcing the new ds Zelda game nothing has really been new. Don't get me wrong this is by far not a bad year for the core gamer because third party companies are steping up their game with such titles as Madworld, House of the dead: Overkill, and deadly creatures already on shelves and many more to come this year. The problem is the company missing from this influx of games is Nintendo themselves. Aside from Wii sports resort the lineup so far from Nintendo for their cash cow is weak.
So how can they turn this around? 2-3 mega titles and I'm not talking pikmin I mean Mario, Zelda, and a toss up for the third spot who knows maybe even a new IP. I think its only fair for the core fans to expect this seeing that both Sony and Microsoft and created new IP's and even produced sequels for them (Gears of war and Resistance) while Nintendo has only done one of their main titles so far this generation, and the thing I don't understand is how can Nintendo be having such a hard time when they have have the simplest of the tech and have been doing it the longest. For those that like to bring up the controls remember this, Super Smash Bros Brawl doesn't use motion controls at all while Super Mario Galaxy uses it very little. My point being they are not afraid to make games without motion controls. Not to mention that they should be the best at working with the tech they brought out.
Let's move on to this year's E3 I hope Nintendo brings its "A" game and it's a huge possibility that this is the year for them to really win back their core fans. Let me just list some of the things I think we are gonna see at E3.

1. Wii Fit Plus a.k.a. Wii fit 2
2. Releasing a flood of GB and GBA games for DSi ware
3. A lot of focus on Motion Control games
4. Pikmin 3
5. New wave of Wiimakes

Now for my wish list of announcements for Nintendo E3 09:

1. Nintendo announcing first party support for Wiiware
2. A new Mario DS and Wii game
3. A New Wii Zelda with motion controls
4. New Donkey Kong, Kirby, Star Fox, or any other abandoned first party game.
5. Wii HD
6. New Nintendo IP

I know my wish list is highly unlikely, but its just a few things I would love to see and think about it if only one of those things come true it will make this year better than last. That's it for Nintendo today, let's hope Nintendo finally starts to listen to their fans and they finally finish their vacation and get back to work and give us something to be excited about.

2009-04-25T11:03:00.000-07:00

Well, while I'm here waiting for the NFL Draft to start let me explain a little bit about me. I'm a pretty big gamer I currently own an Xbox 360, PS3 (60 GB), Nintendo Wii, PSP, DS lite, Sega Dreamcast, SNES, NES, Sega Genesis, N64, and my phone is the T-Mobile G1. I'm very into finding out the latest news on all of gaming including consoles, PC, and mobile games. Out of all the systems the 360 is what I play the most and is my prefered system of the big three. Well I'm sure I've covered most of this in my previous post so I'm going to move along and get into the news for today.

As I previously stated, today is the NFL Draft and speaking of the NFL the very popular NFL game from EA Sports, the Madden series did something out of the norm yesterday when they announced that this years edition of the Madden series, Madden 2010, will feature 2 NFL superstars. Troy Polamalu the Pittsburg Steelers outstanding safety and the stand out wide reciever from the Arizona Cardinals, Larry Fitzgerald will share the cover this year. The real question now is how will this effect the game? The cover usually promotes the biggest improvement of that years edition, for example a few years back the all pro linebacker from the Baltimore Ravens Ray Lewis was on the cover and that was also the year that Madden introduced the "hit stick" in the game. Lewis who has become feared in the NFL for his disasterous hits on the ballcarriers of all teams was the perfect advertisement for that new feature. Now the first thing to come to mind is that maybe the new feature is an improved cover system and also more control of your widereceiver, but another thing to take into account is both of these players play in the Superbowl earlier this year. The one new feature we do know is that the new infamous Wildcat offense made famous again by my Miami Dolphins, will be in this years Madden.

In other news latest news on the Bioshock movie is that it is going to be on hold due to the huge price tag. I really think this is a bad move, they just signed on the director of the Pirates of the Carribean movies to head the movie. Had they started filming soon the movie would've been coming out about the same time as Bioshock 3 which would of built up enough hype for the movie.