A Preview of The Sports Anomaly Bids Farewell with Epic Three-Hour Finale from 1up:

After more than three years, The Sports Anomaly is going out in a blaze of glory.

Clocking in at more than three and a half hours, Todd Zuniga is joined by Greg Ford, Mike Suszek and Andrew Fitch as well as David Ellis, Chris Baker and Bryan “The Fragile Eagle” Intihar for interviews with Madden 11 developers Mike Young and Ian Cummings, Backbreaker demo impressions and a Star Wars draft.

Yankees legend Babe Ruth reportedly said, “If there was a podcasting Hall of Fame, the Sports Anomaly would go in on the first ballot, there’s no question about it.”
Go to Source

A Preview of EA’s New Wii Hockey Game is Played With a Mini Hockey Stick from 1up:

EA Sports has gone ahead and renamed its NBA Live franchise, and now it’s unveiled its new Wii-exclusive hockey game, NHL Slapshot. Bearing the likeness of NHL legend Wayne Gretzky, Slapshot includes a miniature hockey stick peripheral that will hold both the Wii remote and nunchuk while you use the stick to emulate hockey movements like wrist shots, slap shots, and poke checks.

“I think we wanted to wait [to do a Wii hockey game] until we could get it right,” NHL Slapshot producer Joe Nickolls told Canoe.ca (via Joystiq) in an interview. “The Wii is kind of a challenging console because it’s so different from anything else.”

“The stick is the key differentiator,” added creative director David Littman. “Just the motions of the wrist shot and the slapshot and checking somebody, to be able to actually do those in your living room, it’s hockey in your living room as opposed to just playing with a controller.”
Go to Source

A Preview of Sony May Consider More PS2 Game HD Collections from 1up:

Sony answered the wishes of many gamers when they re-released the two PlayStation 2 God of War games on PlayStation 3. It now looks like God of War might not be the only series of PS2 games to be given the HD treatment on PS3, if a survey question from Sony is any indication.

A reader sent the above image, from a Sony survey on God of War, to Kotaku. It asks for suggestions on any other games PS2 games that they’d like to see be “upgraded with similar features to God of War Collection.” The reader came up with a fine list of suggestions, including Metal Gear Solid, Grand Theft Auto, and Yakuza.

If Sony were to do another HD collection, it seems likely they’d go with first-party titles, but that still leaves open quite a few options, including Ratchet & Clank, Jak and Daxter, and Gran Turismo, not to mention Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, which are rumored to be coming in a collection early next year. Should Sony go with a third-party series, the number of choices for an HD collection would be hard to count. Whichever way they go, more HD collections seems like a good thing — especially for PS3 owners without a system that supports backwards compatibility.

Go to Source

A Preview of First look at Sengoku Basara Samurai Heroes (Sengoku Basara Samurai Heroes) from GamesRadar:

You’d be forgiven for not knowing what a Sengoku Basara Samurai is. Like Samurai Warriors 3 from Koei it’s a military action title set in ancient Japan, its legendary heroes loosely based on real figures… …

Go to Source

A Preview of First look at The Conduit 2 (Conduit 2) from GamesRadar:

The original Conduit’s major problem was that it was just so uninspired: drab shooting in drab, corridor-like environments with drab alien enemies that seemed like they’d wandered off the set of some drab Sci-Fi Channel TV movie. Your enemies were called the Drudge, for heaven’s sake… …

Go to Source

A Preview of Treyarch Now a "100% Call of Duty Studio" from 1up:

There was never much thought about whether there were more Call of Duty games in Treyarch’s future after Black Ops, but it is a bit of a surprise to learn that’s apparently all that now lies in Treyarch’s future. Speaking to CVG, Treyarch studio head Mark Lamia said they’ve become solely dedicated to Activision’s blockbuster FPS franchise.

“Treyarch is a 100 percent Call of Duty studio — and it has been for a long time now, long before any of [the Infinity Ward] events occurred,” Lamia said, immediately dispelling speculation this newly revealed exclusive focus may be a result of CoD creator Infinity Ward’s gutting earlier this year. “We focused all of our efforts on creating the best Call of Duty game we possibly can and what that meant is not working on anything else.

“We are a multiple team studio and focusing on Call of Duty and Call of Duty gameplay meant focusing all of our teams on that,” Lamia continued. One result of this has been the formation of a dedicated multiplayer team inside Treyarch, which is something the studio didn’t have for their past Call of Duty games, Call of Duty 3 and Call of Duty: World at War.
Go to Source

A Preview of 360′s Brunswick Pro Bowling Getting Project Natal Support from 1up:

It seems there’s an unwritten rule that you can’t release a new method of motion controls without an accompanying bowling game, and Crave Games is making sure Microsoft isn’t in violation. The developer has confirmed (via MTV Multiplayer) that their upcoming version of Brunswick Pro Bowling for the Xbox 360 will support Project Natal, making it one of the first official Natal games announced.

The Natal-equipped 360 version of Brunswick Pro Bowling will be adapted from the PlayStation Move-supported PS3 version of the game, although obviously the Natal controls will have one major difference: There’s nothing to hold onto when mimicking a bowling ball roll. Could you potentially be able to hold onto, well, anything (a small beach ball, say?) without messing up the controls? Hopefully we’ll be able to see the full extent of how the controls work at E3 in a few weeks.

While multiple tech-demos have been shown for Project Natal, there haven’t been many other official titles announced for the technology outside of Brunswick Pro Bowling: Peter Molyneux has previously confirmed Fable 3 would support Natal, and a potential river rafting game has previously been leaked as well, but otherwise no other Natal titles are known. That will, however, certainly change after E3 next month.

Go to Source

A Preview of Developer Playdead Says Limbo Not Coming to PS3, PC from 1up:

Yesterday, the ESRB posted a rating for Limbo, a visually inventive puzzle-platformer from developer Playdead, that listed the game for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC — curious, since the game was only ever announced for release on Xbox Live Arcade. As it turns out, though, the ESRB listing wasn’t a leaked announcement but rather a simple error: Playdead has confirmed Limbo will not be release for the PS3 or PC after all.

“We are only launching the title on XBLA,” said Playdead’s Dino Patti to Joystiq. “You won’t see a PS3 or PC version this time around, sorry.” Patti also said he’s “not sure where the mistake was made” in the ESRB having the game listed for the PS3 and PC, but Playdead has already requested the ratings board remove the platforms from their ratings listing.

Presented entirely in black-and-white and with characters shown as silhouettes, the 2D sdiescroller has players guiding a young boy past environmental puzzles in an effort to find his lost sister in a sparse and, well, Limbo-like world. Limbo was last planned for release in the summer, though no specific date has been set.

Go to Source

A Preview of Michael Pachter Outs Jaffe’s New Twisted Metal? from 1up:

At this point, we really don’t know what to believe anymore. Not long after David Jaffe himself publicly denied his current project is a new Twisted Metal game, Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter has evidently accidentally slipped out that David Jaffe’s current project is a new Twisted Metal game.

The apparent slip occurred on GameTrailers’ Bonus Round (in the “Pachter on the Move” segment), where Pachter joined in on a roundtable discussion with Game Informer’s Andy McNamara and Giant Bomb’s Jeff Gerstmann about what to expect at E3 next month. When talking about how he thinks Sony’s Move will be overshadowed by Microsoft’s Natal announcements, Pachter says, “unfortunately, Sony really does have good first-party content, non-Move first-party content, like Jaffe’s Twisted Metal 2 game.”

Host Geoff Keighley immediately responds by saying, “It’s not announced,” at which point a slightly uncomfortable laughter breaks out in the room. “Whatever it’s going to be called,” Pachter then says. “Sorry, Jaffe. Jaffe called me his bitch the last time I saw him, so bitch that, Jaffe.”
Go to Source

A Preview of Sony Shows off 3D Gran Turismo 5 to the Public…in Tokyo from 1up:

Sony wants their new line of 3D Bravia televisions to make a splash in the market, and they’re using 3D augmented PlayStation 3 games to make it happen. The electronics giant displayed their new TV line and several PlayStation 3 games this week in Tokyo’s Roppongi neighborhood.

In addition to concerts and events featuring 3D footage being filmed live, Sony turned a local coffee shop into the “3D dot cafe,” where they provided playable Gran Turismo 5 demo stations and displayed game and film trailers alongside sports footage. We had the chance to check out the cafe during it’s from from May 21 to 25.
Go to Source