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Gamestop Makes Big Money, No Whammies This Holiday Season
By Joe Haygood | January 8, 2009
While most retailers were releasing some dismal numbers for the holiday season, Gamestop seemed to defy the fiscal gloom posting some rather impressive numbers for their fourth quarter of sales.
Gamestop showed a 10.2% increase in same-store sales for shops that have been opened for at least one year, during the shopping period of November 2 to January 2. Gamestop posted a profit of $2.86 billion (USD) for the two month period, which is huge considering the fact that many people were just not spending money during the holiday season due to the current economic situation.
Saints Row 2 Drops on Steam, Direct2Drive
By Joe Haygood | January 7, 2009
After a delay of a few months, the wraps come off of the PC version of Saints Row 2. This is the first time that a game in the Saints Row franchise has come to the PC platform, and the game is available on both Steam and Direct2Drive for $39.95. It is also available at retail, but who buys PC games at retail.
Saints Row 2 picks up the story five years after the events from the first Saints Row, and has you waking up out a coma, and finding that the city of Stillwater has changed, including the gangs that now run the territories around town. You play the game through co-op, single player or in multiplayer rooms, and offers a lot of mini-games and activities to play instead of the main campaign.
50 Cent Blood In The Sand Cover System Trailer
By Joe Haygood | January 7, 2009The premise of the new 50 Cent game is absolutely ridiculous, and the action is sure to be over the top, but it will sell a million plus, just like 50 Cent: Bulletproof. All that said, I will admit that the game is starting to shape up nicely, and it is looking pretty nice. Not sure if I will find this at the top of my list, but I am definitely putting it towards the top of my Gamefly queue.
UGO Acquires 1UP, Writers Praised
By Paul Munn | January 7, 2009
The fate of 1Up has been decided, and it is an acquisition by UGO. This was one of the things I’d heard bandied about a few times, but UGO to me was never an extremely strong gaming news and information network. It does seem to have a very wide swath of affiliates, which I guess indicates strength, but all I generally pay attention to is the GamesBlog because Wombat often has pretty funny takes on gaming news over there. Joe had a more balanced view of UGO’s offerings and personalities just yesterday.
There’s a post over on the GamesBlog of UGO announcing the merger and simultaneously lavishing praise on them. I guess it’s a good thing if the writers think they’re so great. Too bad the writers don’t run the business and have to fire people.
From GamesBlog.UGO.com
Sad Chao knows that nostalgia sells
By Joe Fourhman | January 6, 2009
| Why has Rock Band/Guitar Hero not figured out that fans would go crazy over rocked-up video game themes as DLC? |
| Do you have a gaming disappointment for Sad Chao to lament? Send it to tips@aeropause.com with the subject “Sad Chao” and your mail might make Sad Chao sad enough to post it! Can you make Sad Chao happy again? Write in comments! |
So EGM May Be Cancelled, 1up Properties Sold
By Joe Haygood | January 6, 2009
The guys and gals at paidcontent.org ran a story this morning that the print magazine, EGM, and other properties of 1up have been sold to Hearst Media. With this acquisition, the rumor is that Electronic Games Monthly will cease circulation with this merger. Shortly after the story went live, paidcontent.org, pulled the story from the site, but it was still available from its feed site.
In a follow up, What They Play writer, John Davidson, who is also a regular guest on the 1up Yours podcast, decided to ask a few questions and found out that a formal statement will be made tomorrow that addresses the validity of the story as well as the future of 1up.com and its properties.
FCC To The DRM Rescue
By Joe Haygood | January 6, 2009
While DRM has been around for several years in the PC world, it was not until Spore that the DRM arguement came to a head in popular culture. Spore was a mainstream title that exposed the good and bad of DRM, and the arguements for and against having it in your game.
The FCC has kind of stayed out of the fray, allowing consumers and business users to try and solve the issue by themselves. Consumers have taken their arguement to the press, and in the case of Spore, to the courts. Publishers have put up a wall, telling the public that they need to protect their investment.
Capcom’s early 2009 release calendar a star studded affair
By Stephen Munn | January 5, 2009
Cry sequelitis all you like, but Capcom’s got something in each of a number of their key franchises rolling out in the next six months. There’s some Resident Evil, Street Fighter, Dead Rising, and Bionic Commando action coming your way, and some of that’s even coming to Wii, even if it may not be the one we really wanted.
Street Fighter 4 is coming February 17th to PS3 and 360. As disappointed as I was that the whole game doesn’t look like Okami as the original trailer seemed to imply, I still think there’s a lot of potential for some great fighting here. Unfortunately, I can’t help but wonder if there’s anything that can be done with the Street Fighter format to give it legs beyond what it was already doing 15 years ago. As interesting as it is, I’ll be waiting and trying before I consider a buy.
February 27th will bring the Wii edition of Dead Rising, subtitled Chop Till You Drop, which is still adorable. The game was expected last year, so I’m hoping the delays mean we’ll see more zombies in the game than the screens out there are showing *cough 6 killed cough*. Dead Rising on 360 was legendary for its swarms of zombies, and the idea that there might be so many fewer on Wii makes me think I’d be better off waiting for a PS3 version.
Resident Evil 5 is something of a legend at this point. In addition to being perhaps the game with the biggest shoes to fill of this lot after the incredible Resident Evil 4, it’s brought out a great deal of ongoing discussion on one of our older articles here at Aeropause. And for the record, I have the opposite opinion of whatever yours might be. Look for this one on PS3 and 360 on (dun dun dun!) Friday the 13th… of March! I’m glad to hear this, because the people at work keep asking me when it’s coming out. Now I have an answer.
Other games mentioned without release dates are the amusingly named FLOCK!, a download-only animal herding puzzle game with UFOs for PSN and XBLA and a bike-racing MotoGP game for Wii in March. They talk about Bionic Commando as well, but they keep the date on that one wide open. Like, six months wide, so we’ll see if it hits in that timeframe or not. It’s due for PS3 and 360 and I think it looks pretty slick.
Windows versions of the PS3 and 360 games are expected at a later date. Press release follows.
Topics: Nintendo Wii, PC, PS3, Playstation Network, XBOX 360, Xbox Live Arcade |
Enjoy this article? You may also like:Aeropodcast #64: Airlab 2021 FirePeaks V
By Joe Haygood | January 5, 2009
Joe, Fourhman and Stephen are back for another rousing podcast full of game discussion and TV nostalgia. After discussing our games, and some of the New Years events that we held, we talked about the upcoming year and what might be in store for gamers in 2009. Check out our thoughts, predictions and needs for the new calendar year.
Our community corner stacks in a lot of questions, including our three favorite titles for a desert island stay, favorite TV shows, forum icons, and another marry/boff/kill question that is a little less controversial than last week. In the news, we have stories around Sony’s definition of beta, a Skate 2 demo coming and two big celebs join the WiiFit crowd.
This week our bumper music comes from some of the great TV shows we recommended, including Airwolf, Sealab 2021, Firefly, V: The Series and Twin Peaks. The podcast is put together by the Aeropause Mixmaster, Stephen Munn, and his twin turntables of steel.
Download the podcast from here or subscribe to the podcast using one of the services below: Also make sure to review us on iTunes.
GTA IV Wrecks a Pixar Classic
By Joe Haygood | January 5, 2009As will be mentioned in the podcast that will be posted sometime in the next 12-24 hours, I have finally put together another video using the Grand Theft Auto IV video editor. While it is not my best work, I had a funny moment happen in the game that I decided to put to good use. Hope you enjoy, and for those that can’t get enough of her, the “harder to get caught” woman is my credits signature now.
