Kevin Butler Actor Was Sued By Sony

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Of the many titles Kevin Butler has donned during his tenure at Sony, VP of Lawsuit Defendant would probably be the last thing on his mind. The lawsuit was sparked after Jerry Lambert, who plays Kevin Butler in Sony’s Playstation 3 ads, appeared in a Bridgestone commercial as one of the scientists testing out tires. The ad was part of Bridgestone’s GameOn campaign where a tire purchase could net you a free Nintendo Wii. In the commercial itself, the scientists, including Lambert, are seen playing Mario Kart Wii. Sony wasn’t too fond of the man playing and advertising a competitor’s game and console, and on September 11th they filed a lawsuit against him citing IP violation. Bridgestone proceeded to remove Lambert’s image from all of their ads for the remainder of their campaign. This begs the question though: are they suing him for portraying a very similar character, or are they suing him for that plus associating himself with a competitor. I have a feeling that they would’ve let him be if he was doing something else as the character. But since he was playing a Wii, that probably wasn’t flying with Sony.

Either way, it looks like both parties might be coming to an out-of-court settlement. In a filing, the lawyer representing Sony called the courtroom deputy and said that they were coming to an agreement. The court then ordered Sony, “by October 12, 2012, to either: (1) withdraw the ex parte motion; or (2) file a status update describing the current status of the dispute and whether a ruling on the motion will be necessary.” So currently the case is still ongoing, but it looks like it’ll all come to an end soon. I guess we can rule out Kevin Butler being in Playstation All-Stars then huh?

SCEA sues Bridgestone and Jerry Lambert (Kevin Butler actor) over Game On promotion [NeoGAF, via VentureBeat]

Night-Time Listenings Wrap-Up: Week of 10/1/12

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The month of horrors and diabetic candy began on Monday, and we came out swinging! This week was all about Battle Themes. Shots were fired with Wild ARMs 3, jobs were changed with Final Fantasy V, got funky with Persona 3, made music with Eternal Sonata, and became demons with Digital Devil Saga.

If you want to see the music as it goes up (and not wait every Saturday for these wrap-ups), remember to go to our Tumblr page and follow it. Music for Night-Time Listenings goes up every weekday at 10PM

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New Shin Megami Tensei IV Trailer Looks The Same, But Has A Few Things Added

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I was about to chastise some sites for being ultra late on news that we already broke weeks ago. Then I noticed something off with this trailer. The trailer for Shin Megami Tensei IV looks the same, starts the same, sounds the same. Then things seem off once the Titan shows up onscreen and doesn’t have that… er, titanic voice. Then you hear that line some seconds later. I thought there was a lag in the audio. New stuff becomes apparent at the 2:24 mark. For those who don’t know Japanese (or were fighting over how some of those names were spelled), they finally introduce the characters and their names in Romanji characters. Considering they’re supposed to be samurai, the names sound rather western. International samurai perhaps? A new character, Steven, is briefly shown sitting in a chair in some demonic looking chamber. A bit more fusion is shown off as well.

『真・女神転生IV』セカンドトレーラー ノーカット版 [Youtube, via Kotaku]

Nintendo Direct UK: Release Date Narrowed Down For Fire Emblem Awakening, Guild 01 Games Coming To eShop

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From left to right: Liberation Maiden from Suda51, AeroPorter from Yoot Saito, and Crimson Shroud from Yasumi Matsuno

Today Nintendo of Europe held a Nintendo Direct Press conference for European fans focusing primarily on 3DS software. It touched on a few things like New Super Mario Bros. 2 add-on content, Virtue’s Last Reward, and a new Pushmo game. I won’t cover the whole thing, but if you want, you can see the entire presentation here. One of the more notable announcements is that Fire Emblem Awakening now has an approximate release date of Q2 of 2013. Another bit of awesome news is that three of Level 5’s Guild 01 games are coming to Europe. They are Suda 51’s Liberation Maiden, Yoot Saito’s AeroPorter, and Yasumi Matsuno’s Crimson Shroud. Many had doubts that the games, or Guild 01 for that matter, had little chance of coming westward due to the quirkiness of the project. It’s nice to see that the download space is still a viable venture for these types of games.

Again, watch the video for the full lodown for things to come in Europe. Just remember that not all your hear may not apply to the U.S. And… real quick for us in the U.S…. Pullblox is Pushmo, Style Boutique is Style Savvy, New Art Academy is just Art Academy, and that Koopa Shell trophy is awesome.

Nintendo UK Announcement [UStream]

Ain’t No Love Lost Between Oddworld Inhabitants Founder And EA

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In an interview with GamesIndustry International, Oddworld Inhabitants founder Lorne Lanning dished some dirt about his company’s fall after the release of Stranger’s Wrath, and the poor marketing and business choices made by the game’s publisher, EA. In the interview, he mentions how the money made on games EA publishes don’t go back to making more games and funding developers. “Our agreement is, you won’t be seeing our profit being spent on Ferraris and shit like that… Our profits are going back into games so we can ultimately raise to the point where we can grow our audience…” He went on to state, “The owners [EA] are flying jets, do you think they care about the customers just one fucking per cent? Not at all.”

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Project Giana Title Finalized, Release Date Announced, And A New Trailer Is Up

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Previously on Project Giana news, I made a small mention about Black Forest Games letting the fans decide on the project title. Well lest week, voting ended, and the game will be called Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams. They even showed off their snazzy new logo for the game as well. Along with this reveal, they announced that Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams will be released for PC on Tuesday, October 23th. The game is still vying for a Steam release through Steam Greenlight.

Moving on to the trailer, we can that some elements from Giana Sisters DS are coming back, like the bubblegum power-up and those weird, snake-y suction-cup vines. And it looks like Machinae Supremacy and Chris Huelsbeck will be providing more than just that one song heard in the initial trailer and demo. A couple of bosses and a snow level is also showcased. There’s even a swimming section in the game, which is surprising considering all water in Giana Sisters DS was instant death.

Still no word on any other platforms Giana will be launching on.

[Via Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams Facebook page]

Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams – Available October 23rd [Youtube]

Hurst And Kirkhope, Among Others, Want To Make A Real Banjo-Tooie Successor

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Once again, Rare is in the spotlight over something fans are just clamoring for since the lukewarm release of Banjo-Kazooie Nuts & Bolts. A small group of former Rare developers (who run game developer Crash Labs), including Steven Hurst and Grant Kirkhope, want to make a new Banjo-Kazooie game, or at least somewhat. The Twitter account MingyJongo was started to gain support for the idea from fans. In the profile, it states that they want to create a “spiritual successor” to Banjo-Tooie, the second game in the series. So this may or many not be an actual Banjo game, but play very similar to one. Maybe it could be a Sabreman game? Who knows. One Twitter user asked why these guys don’t use Kickstarter instead to bring the project to life, to which Mingy replies “You’re spending other peoples money & what happens when you need more time/money? We’ll worry about funding when we know exactly what IT is.” A good point. The other question would be that IF they do make a Banjo game, is Microsoft going to keep it or let it go? Maybe those rumors a while back might mean something…

For now they only need support on Twitter. So if you want to see something happen with this idea, go there and hound them!

Ex-Rare Developers Join Forces To Create A Spiritual Successor To Banjo-Tooie [Nintendolife]

MingyJongo Twitter account

The Wired Fish Podcast S3 – Episode 7

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Ahoy one and all! It’s the Season Finale of The Wired Fish Podcast (which is one month late. Sorry about that…). In this belated episode, we talk about Nintendo Power’s end and how we grew up with the popular Nintendo mag. I’ve also added a slideshow of all the pages to Nintendo Power’s first issue for you to read while we talk. Next we pick apart Alex Hutchison’s comments about how Journalists give Japanese developers a free pass when it comes to storytelling.

As you know, the time table of contents are after the break.

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Night-Time Listenings Wrap-Up: Week of 9/24/12

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Another Weekend is here, and it’s time fro another Night-Time Listenings Wrap-Up. This week we covered originals and remakes. The way it worked was that I talked about the first appearance of a song and put it together with its most recent version. Only the recent versions got the embeds, so I can still showcase the originals on their own in the future. This week we met Gilgamesh on the Big Bridge. Then we had a Deadline to meet in Revelations Persona and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment (PSP). We explored an endless battlefield in the World of Mana with Final Fantasy Adventure and Dawn of Mana. We went underwater in Mega Man X2 and X5. And finally, it was a throwback day with Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Galaxy 2.

If you want to see the music as it goes up (and not wait every Saturday for these wrap-ups), remember to go to our Tumblr page and follow it. Music for Night-Time Listenings goes up every weekday at 10PM

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Tekken Producer Proposes Project X Zone Localization, Cross Your Fingers

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Ever since the news of Project X Zone‘s small chance of localization caught steam, the efforts of the PXZ Localization Community have picked up. According to an FB post, the leader of the Facebook Group, Anthony, took to Twitter to ask Katsuhiro Harada, the producer of the Tekken series, what it would take to convince Namco (the game’s devs) to bring the game Westward. His response was “I think they don’t localize that. That is unpopular out of Japan.” Not a good sign, but it almost echoed the statement from that Namco rep in the previous article. However ten minutes after that, Harada came back with this tweet, “I’ll ask project marketing team. ‘Let’s localize.'” Things were starting to look up. Finally several hours later, Harada did the deed and followed up with, “I proposed localization of Project X Zone.”

This is an unprecedented move in the efforts of the PXZ Localization Community. Harada is a well respected man in the videogame business, especially in the eyes of the Tekken community (and harbinger of shuttin’ fools down). Not sure how much involvement he has in the project, but his characters are in the game. Not that his characters in the game might matter, but his position in the company might have some kind of impact. Still, there is a chance that is proposal may not be considered. But the fact that it’s even being proposed in the first place by someone in the company might give Namco enough of a hint that people outside Japan want the game as well. It could be the beginning of something big. Fingers crossed guys!

PXZ Localization Community (aka 100,000 Strong to Localize Project X Zone) [Facebook]

Night-Time Listenings Wrap-Up: Week of 9/17/12

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After a one week break, Night-Time Listening made a comeback. This week was the week of Remixes. We kicked things off with Stickerbrush Symphony remis “Brambles in the Breeze.” We then battled to the bitchin’ riffs of S.S.H. and his remix to Final Fantasy VI’s Boss Battle. Vincent Rubinetti makes his second appearance on Night-Time Listenings with his remix of DKC3’s Nuts N Bolts, “Grinding Gears”. We played some demonic pinball with Sword of Justice’s remix of Devil’s Crush’s main board theme. Then we wrapped up the week with a trio of remixes from three unlikely sources. What were the? Well hit the break and check it out!

If you want to see the music as it goes up (and not wait every Saturday for these wrap-ups), remember to go to our Tumblr page and follow it. Music for Night-Time Listenings goes up every weekday at 10PM

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The Breakdown: Eryi’s Action

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System: PC/Publisher:Nyu Media/Developer: Xtal Sword/Players: 1/Release Date: 9/14/12

Around the beginning of my college years, I was introduced to a romhack called Kaizo Mario. I wasn’t playing the game, but we were watching someone else play the game. Basically Kaizo Mario took Super Mario World and made it extremely hard to the point of parody. To a select few, this was a good way to test one’s gaming mettle. To the rest, it was comedic! I Wanna Be The Guy, an indie game, took things to the next level by incorporating assets from old games like Kirby, Castlevania, and MegaMan, and making the game downright sadistic. Then came Syobon Action, which was a re-imagining of the first world of Super Mario Bros. and added some twists to intentionally kill the player. This one was more parody/puzzle than actually difficult. That brings us to today’s game, Eryi’s Action, one of the first (if not, the first) officially published game from this ilk of games. Is it worth buying just to die, or are you better off watching another schmuck die constantly and just laugh at him? After the break, I review Eryi’s Action.

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Missed Module’s Shatter Live Performance? Watch It Here!

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Last night Jeremiah “Module” Ross performed at the San Francisco Bath House in New Zealand. He was doing the music from Shatter, which was rife with Electronica goodness. Since the concert was in New Zealand, the time difference was pretty immense, and most of use were either sleeping or at work. But Module was nice enough to archive his performance on YouTube for the public that missed it. The actual performance begins around the 1 hour mark. Before that is the opening act. So have a listen and enjoy. And remember that Shatter is available on PSN, Steam (I believe), and is part of the current Humble Indie Bundle.

Module Shatter Live (Archive)

No More Gamefly In My House: What I Rented, And What I Bought [UPDATE]

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Well, the time has come to end Gamefly in our house. We’ve had fun with the service, but due to some circumstances, it was time we ended it (for now at least). I’ve had my gripes with the service, but I got my chance to play games that I would otherwise not consider (or not pay full retail price for). There were some games that were pretty damn awesome, and a few that made me happy that I only went as far as renting it. One thing I wished I would be able to do was to actually review these games within the time I had them. But several things (namely Xenoblade) would come up and I would be unable to review them fully. Other times, I began to forget the premise of the games, the gameplay, the stories, and any specific things that may have occurred while I played. So I would like to take this chance to at least talk about these games and how I felt about them. I would also like to reveal the one game I eventually bought as a result of Gamefly. So after the break, the games I bought.

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New Trailer For Shin Megami Tensei IV Surfaces

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Some time ago a trailer for Shin Megami Tensei IV surfaced. It didn’t show much in the way of gameplay and story, but it did show some scenes that looked to take place in multiple eras. But now a New trailer has surfaced, this time from Atlus themselves. We can see more actions being performed with the armbrace that was shown briefly in the previous trailer. From the looks of it, it looks like a augmented reality device the main character wears to get info on his surroundings.

On the action side of things, the dungeons are your usual MegaTen demonic fare, with battles reverting back to the old-school first person view (instead of all characters being visible like in Nocturne, the 3rd mainline SMT game). Very briefly (around the 1:35 mark), we can see that battles are not random and are initiated by pixel-men. The enemies themselves are sprite based. A little bit after that, we can see what looks to be a fusion taking place, a series staple. The music from the website can also be heard.

More info on Shin Megami Tensei IV will be divulged this Saturday during the Tokyo Game Show.

『真・女神転生IV』セカンドトレーラー [Youtube]