Mad Moxxi gets the last word.

Moxxi makes it clear you - and some old friends - are her playthings.
Have a Happy Xmas/Holidays peeps, see you all in the 10's

[mobiletone]

Tis The Season.. To Get New Games

Well as Jebus celebrates his 2009th birthday this week we can all look back on the last year and reflect on the important things in life, family, beer and gaming! For without these things our lives would be truly hollow and meaningless.

2009 was a great year for gaming starting off with the ThreeSpeechRegulars going on a massive run of death and humiliation (ours usually) in the great Killzone 2 online, it sure as hell lived up to the hype before all the whiney COD players knackered the controls online! I tend to play bot matchs or local LAN on it these days. Then came the sadness of the death of the semi-official ThreeSpeech and with it, a plucky young commentor decided to knock up his own tribute out of old cereal boxes and stickytape which was to become what you read today, this launch was overshadowed by Sony finally getting it's arse in gear and launched the Eeeew.blog much to the delite of forum fanboys and the prepubesent.

Sometime during the summer i finally stopped playing Fallout 3 after knocking up over 200hrs of gameplay on it, if that doesn't rate it as an Epic i don't know what will. I remember those first faltering steps out of the Vault101 and gazing across the bleakest most desolate hell hole i have every seen in a game armed only with a boilersuit and a bb gun. little did i know the great and wonderful adventure i would go on to have, the weird folks i'd meet scraping a living from the radiated earth and all the stuff i'd steal from them. My house in Megaton ended up filled with junk and a pile of old money that was beyond counting. good times indeed my friends.

i guess those were the two biggies for me out of the many i bought and played, other great titles were the reworked DiRT2 for letting beat the pants off a guy in a Subaru Impretza in my Mk2 Escort online, Red Faction for the obscene levels of destruction, inFAMOUS because how could shooting lighting from your fingers not PWN! Condemned 2 for it's weird take on the horror gene and letting me beat homeless people to death with lengths of lead pipe. i guess there are others but those are the ones that come to mind first.

so what did you think of 2009? what games are you getting/playing this season?

[mobiletone]

Enhance Sunday

[mobiletone] is bored and fed up of the snow already *hugs his kittin tighter*
to the people who aren't reprographics monkeys, our jobs really are this sexy
*ahemcoffcoffspluttercoff* yeah :)

This is How i Roll :)

Modnation Racers Public Beta Codes!

Thanks to all the fans who have registered for a chance to win an Online Beta Voucher Code! Randomly selected registrants will be emailed their voucher codes on December 17th*.

The Online Beta begins December 18, 2009 and runs through January 10, 2010. (If you registered before 12/3/2009 you are automatically in!) See below for other ways you can get on the Online Beta!

*NORTH AMERICAN BETA ONLY. Participation in the Beta is only available to North American PSN account holders. No Purchase Necessary. Void Where Prohibited. Must be 13 years+ to enter.

Be one of the lucky few to get an early test-drive of ModNation Racers for the PS3™ system. How can you score an Online Beta Voucher?

- Check out the PlayStation.Blog on December 18th for an announcement!

- Visit the PlayStation®Home Movie Theater on December 18th to see a special offer!

- Vouchers included in specially
marked copies of LittleBigPlanet™: Game of the Year Edition

- Be a current Qore subscriber or subscribe on
or before December 15th and get a Voucher!

[mobiletone]

Blu-ray 3D spec's, your PS3 is ready

In case plans by AMD and a slew of other tech vendors planning to showcase 3D Blu-ray compatible products at CES wasn't a tip-off, the updated specifications are done. The key details? First, that the Blu-ray Disc Association has chosen the Multiview Video Coding (MVC) codec to store 3D, so that even though it is now providing a full 1080p frame for each eye, it will only require about 50% more storage space compared to the 2D version, and all discs will be fully backwards compatible, in 2D, on existing players. Better than backwards compatibility, the PlayStation 3 will be forwards compatible with the new discs -- a new HDTV setup (the spec promises to work with plasmas, LCDs or projectors equally well) with IR emitters and glasses will still be necessary. According to the PR we can expect Blu-ray 3D-stickered products in 2010.

Red Dead Redemption: Gameplay

GT5 Demo Bruummmmmmm

Someone's managed to get their hands on the time trail demo before Thursday. Here's what to expect...



[pabloamigo]

what "Resident Tone" would be like?

Borderlands: Life is a Cabaret

Gearbox has today confirmed the second DLC pack for Borderlands in the shape of Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot. The new pack will be available on December 29 on the PlayStation Network. The pack will also be available for the PC, but no specific details have been released yet.

According to the official release on the subject;

Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot is an intense single-player or cooperative experience that expands the mayhem by adding three new Riot Mode arenas where players will endure an onslaught of Pandora's baddest enemies. Working together, players will fend off the masses as they fight for fame, honor, and more importantly, loot. Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot also adds a new bank feature, which allows players extra storage capacity for when they encounter one of the more than 16 million weapons that Borderlands has to offer; and the ability to acquire two additional skill points as quest rewards, making their characters even more powerful than before.

Riot mode, according to Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford, is "like Smash TV in coop FPS, but in the Borderlands". Sounds good to us, and if you're too young for Smash TV, think Halo 3's Firefight mode... i think i just did a small sex wee.

[mobiletone]

ps: http://futureradio.co.uk/ now has a new radio player. listen, and browse you dogs! they just dropped our linkage on teh air, we are mediastars! -haha-

The Saboteur - Pandemic's swansong

What an amazing game idea: Steal cars from the French, and then run them over. OR climb tall buildings, and drop on the passing French people. Or even shoot them! Why did no-one ever think of this before? Oh, and once in a while you have to shoot a Nazi or two, or rescue someone or something trivial.

Following the initial 7 minute install, I decided (for the sake of testing) to use the nudity patch. Lots of effort, as downloading it didn't work properly - I believe it is now on the PSN store instead. Makes no difference to the game, and not really much of a difference anyway.

The game itself...

You play the part of an Irishman in occupied Paris. The city is in black and white, with Nazi propaganda being a very vivid red. As you gradually go through missions, the area you are helping comes alive by regaining some of its colour. Initially, there are Nazis everywhere, and the French people cower before them. This changes too, as the number of patrolling Nazis shrinks, and the French openly complain about the Nazis - kill a Nazi during this time, and the French will often stick the boot in too. It's fun watching an old woman kick the dead soldier, muttering "bastard" as she does.

As well as the main missions there are side objectives - shown as white dots on the maps you can purchase. These involve destroying Nazi AA guns, sentry-posts, fuel depots and stuff. Destroying these gets to be very addictive ("I'll just get one more").

Graphically, it is very impressive. Pandemic appear to have used the SPUs very well to handle most of the graphics processing (as can be read here: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-saboteur-aa-blog-entry). I'd even put it on a par with the Uncharted games for quality.

The AI is somewhat lacking, unfortunately. When you are driving around, the NPCs will often walk in front of the car, especially when you turn a corner. If you steal a car, and then drive off, the previous driver frequently gets in the way, and ends up dying.

The hand to hand combat is a bit flat, not feeling very well implemented. That might be down to me just button mashing when I melee the Nazis though! Melee a Nazi to death, and you can then steal their uniform, enabling you to enter restricted areas. The disguise part works well, and has you studying the area to make sure no enemies get close enough to see through it.

Climbing buildings works well, and your character seems to be as athletic as any assassin, no matter their creed!

Overall, in my opinion, it's a good fun game. Yes, there are flaws, but most can be overlooked. I'd rate it a comfortable 8/10, though you might want to rent it to see if you like it too.

IT may not be on a par with Borderlands (is anything?), but it definitely keeps me going back for more.

[mugglemind]

PixelJunk Shooter is here!

I've been waiting for this one. Played for an hour or so and it doesn't disappoint so far. In fact it's extremely good - maybe even PixelJunk Monsters-good! Will post some more thoughts on it when I've had more chance to play. In the meantime check out the video to see me opening a can of whoop-ass on the first stage :) Are you guys playing it too? What do you think so far?

[reakt]

Team ThreeSpeech builds a PS3 Portable

and if you'd like to check out some other videos we have [Escort Mission : Foamy The Squirrel] in which Germaine rants about pointless missions in gaming (contains sweary words!) and also Yahtzee does a double header this week in [Zero Punctuation: Left 4 Dead 2 & New Super Mario Bros Wii] So i guess there's a lil' something something for everybody today.

[mobiletone]

Avatar: The Final Words

DIRECTOR James Cameron last night insisted his trillion-dollar epic Avatar 'will set a new standard for films with colourful cat people made by computers'.

Cameron defended the project amid growing concerns he has spunked the GDP of a medium-sized country on a three-hour animated version of a progressive rock album cover.

Cameron said: "Avatar is a visual feast for anyone who likes blue pretend cat people in suede loincloths, alien foliage and a quasi-political allegory that doesn't make sense. And that's everyone, right? Right? Right?"

He added: "You can't tell me it looks shit. But please tell me it doesn't look shit. Because it doesn't, does it?

"Oh God. Blue cat people. What have I done? No, it's fine, it's fine. Breathe deeply, Jim. Go to your safe place."

Film critic Roy Hobbs said: "Cameron's been through this before with Titanic, which everyone said looked like it was going to be shit. And to be fair, it was shit.

"But that didn't stop all of you pond scum going to see it and cooing at the pretty shapes and colours as you shovelled floating-dead-person-flavoured popcorn into your drooling maws with your stupid, spade-like hands."

Hobbs added: "However, the previews suggest that Avatar does not include even a nanosecond of Winslet nipple, which could be where it comes unstuck. There's probably some cat person nips, but that's not really the same."

Office worker Tom Logan, who watched the trailer for Avatar during his lunch break, said: "Despite a lifetime of cultural conditioning to believe that massively expensive things are inherently good, I can honestly say the thought of spending three hours watching glorified Thundercats lobbing stones at robots makes me want to pull my foreskin up over my head and bark like a dog.

"That said, I'll probably still go and see it."

Wipeout running in 3D on a PS3 Slim

AMD and CyberLink, which recently integrated SENSIO 3D technology into its PowerDVD player, are already touting a 2010 CES demo promising to show off their implementation of "the forthcoming Blu-ray stereoscopic 3D standard." While the world continues to wait for an announcement on what the 3D Blu-ray standard will actually entail (backwards compatible 2D combo discs, and Full HD stereoscopic technology are definitely on the list) AMD is ready to leverage its position as a contributing member of the Blu-ray Disc Association and make sure that when discs hit the market -- likely around the time Avatar is released at home -- it has compatible software and hardware available.

We're prepped and ready for the glasses-required trials that promise to be featured at many booths during next months Las Vegas experience, so a note to potential exhibitors: sports and videogames are the best bet for an impressive 3D showing, bring Space Harrier 3D for extra bonus points.

[mobiletone]

Happy 15th Birthday Playstation

even though we didn't get it until nearly a year later in Sept 1995... typical.

Man Finishes World of Warcraft, Needs a Life!

A Taiwanese man has been named as the first player to 'finish' World of Warcraft.

'Little Gray', as his character's known, is the first to successfully complete all of the MMO's 986 achievements listed in the armory, reports MMO Champion.

To reach the milestone the Taiwanese power-player killed 390,895 creatures, accumulated 7,255,538,878 points of damage, completed 5,906 quests (that's 14.62 quests per day, apparently), raided 405 dungeons and hugged 11 players.

The achievement hasn't arrived without some controversy though; WoW-heads point out that technically he's still missing one illusive, event-tied achievement (called "BB King"), but he's managed to dodge it via a glitch awarding one extra, false achievement point.

We say he's not a man until he tracks down and gets that last achievement legitimately.

blagged by [mobiletone] from CVG.com

suddenly i don't feel so bad about my Borderlands addiction :D

AVATAR: gameplay footage

well, what do you think then now you've seen it in action?

In The Na'vi You Can...

ah fuck it, i was going to write a full feature about James Camerons Avatar here seeing as JC himself has emphasised the closeness between his CGI 3D wankfest of a film and the accompanying game, pinpointing the sharing of computer-generated assets and the game's role in fleshing out Avatar's back-story.

This raised hopes that Avatar (the game) could strike a blow against the poor esteem in which games-of-films are held. The reality, although not without merit, is ultimately faintly disappointing. Like having Ant'n'Dec come over and wanting to play nothing but Ninty DS games instead of shooting the faces off zombies with your Lv43 SMG in Borderlands.

so here's Yahtzee with his take on Modern Warfare 2 for you all.

Helper Kittin Iz Helpings

Thank you for writing us in regards to your audio issue with Borderlands [5.1 output over optical] on the PS3 platform and for providing the workaround steps! We are aware of the issue and have good news - a fix has been discovered for the problem and is pending deployment in future update! [SCEE QA no doubt!]

Regards,
Gearbox Software Support

/// now don't let anyone say we don't do anything constructive on this site :)