When I saw the teaser trailer for the Oneechanbara movie, I immediately knew it had potential, since putting boobs, violence, and zombies together in one epic movie seemed like the best idea since putting boobs, violence, and machines together. While the premise is almost flawless, my excitement was only based on a brief, unrevealing teaser and speculation. Now a longer trailer (embedded above) has been released, and it’s definitely looking awesome. It has all the scantily clad cowgirls and over the top, campy, bloody, violence I was hoping for and the combination of boobs, violence, and zombies should make for some good old fashioned mindless entertainment.

Cruis’n USA (Nintendo 64, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone, 1,000 Wii Points) is literally the greatest racing game ever made. I have absolutely no idea how this game became one of my favorite racers of all time since it really isn’t that great, but it is. Maybe it’s because I only owned an N64 so the variety wasn’t that great to begin with, and I played this game non-stop over and over. Now that it is out on the VC will I be downloading it? No. I think the fond memories I have of the game need to stay that way as I’m 100 percent positive that playing it now would only ruin them. Alas, time is a harsh mistress and I do not think that Cruis’n USA has aged well at all. Oh, for the days when race tracks weren’t made of real city streets and national monuments and landmarks were all closely grouped together on fictional race courses.

*wipes a single tear from eye while looking wistfully out the window*

Sigh. Well the other game is Wonder Boy (Sega Master System, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone—Comic Mischief, 500 Wii Points) which is just Adventure Island on the Master System. Legal stuff happened. Same game made twice. What’s the point. I’m too depressed to go on.

Download these games at 9 a.m. Pacific time. More after the jump if you can bring yourself to read.

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This past week saw the release of what I expected to be the most awesome Rock Band tracks of all time. Did they live up to expectation? Hit the jump.
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Rockstar has just released the final trailer for the hotly anticipated Grand Theft Auto IV, titled “Everyone’s a Rat.” It shows a lot more varied locales and vehicles than previous trailers, and I’d wager that all of the graphics are in-engine. This is going to be one good looking game. The game hits stores on April 29 for the 360 and PS3.

[UPDATE: 1UP has already posted their frame-by-frame analysis. Hit the jump for the video]
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Word of a very pretty tech demo on the PS3 hit the internet a few days ago and a bit of buzz started swarming around it. Of course, pretty and PS3 go hand in hand as we’ve seen with plenty of games coming out for it. Good, complete, non-glitchy and best version are all totally debatable descriptions of games on the system, but pretty is something that the PS3 has down pat. Still, this tech demo was rumored to be truly impressive as all the graphics were gorgeous and totally in game. Today we get some video of it, which you can see above, courtesy of Youtube and Gametrailers, and a name to go along with it: Linger in Shadows.

As a tech demo the thing is pretty impressive. Graphically it looks strikingly good and the physics are spot on. The dog looks a bit funny but it still seems really interesting. But rumor now has it that this is more then just a tech demo and is actually a game itself. If that is the case…What!? I don’t even know what could possibly be going on here to make a game. My best guess is you’d play as one of the characters shown in the beginning of the video and that the dog and the cat were just there to show off how well the system can handle hair (a true sign of any great game). Otherwise would you be battling shadows the entire time, or just robots who can’t seem to stop bumping into things? I guess it doesn’t really matter, tech demos are set up to show stuff off not make sense and the reliability of the source for this being an actual game is a bit in question. Nothing wrong with watching a very interesting tech demo though and hoping it turns out to be a truly interesting game.

When lawl first clued me into the fact that a new Battlefield beta would be arriving on the 360, I was immediately skeptical. I had never before played a Battlefield game, and from what I had heard, there was nothing special about the series. Regardless, I applied for a beta and was accepted. How does the Battlefield: Bad Company compare to other war shooter games out there? Hit the jump to find out!

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Following the recently unsuccessful bid by EA to buy all outstanding shares of Take-Two’s stock at $26 a share, the company has received offers from a few third-party companies that are now interested. However, you can rest assured that there won’t be any buying or selling of Take-Two stock until after the release of Grand Theft Auto IV at the end of April.

According the chairman of Take-Two Strauss Zelnick, “Our Board, after careful review, has unanimously determined that Electronic Arts’ offer continues to provide insufficient value and remains opportunistically timed to capture the value of the upcoming Grand Theft Auto IV launch at the expense of our stockholders.”

To put it bluntly, screw you and the horse you rode in on EA, after GTA4 comes out, you can’t afford us!

Zelnick continues his verbal pwnage, “We are effectively working toward a process to review all available options to maximize this value, either as an independent company or in combination with a third party, and are open to beginning informal discussions starting now. Our stockholders’ interests would hardly be served by accepting an offer from EA at the wrong price and the wrong time.”

So in short, it doesn’t look like EA planned on their offer to buy Take-Two backfiring as much as it did. Fortunately the shareholders of Take-Two are smart enough to realize that the release of GTA4 is going to make the stock surge as long as there isn’t any “hot coffee” included.

A while back it was announced that the Japanese hack-and-slash game OneeChanbara was being made into a movie, and now we have a brief trailer (embedded above). It may not show much, just some dark shots of the decidedly hot protagonist tilting her hat, doing expressive dance in a field, and staring at the camera, but it’s only a teaser after all.

While video game movies are notorious for just sucking in general, this one has potential. First, there’s no Uwe Boll in sight; and second, the game’s plot seems simple enough that it can’t be ruined by scriptwriters who think they know better than the people who created the game. Which brings us to where the real potential lies: the game is about a Japanese cowgirl who runs around in a bikini gorily killing zombies and other creatures with her katana.
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The gist of it: Coming out on June 22, it’s the special edition, $170, comes with the drums, mic, and a wireless guitar. Unfortunately, no DLC has been announced yet, which really blows, yo. Looks like Nintendo fans are finally going to be able to get a chance to play one of the best games of 2007 though. Hopefully the GHIII guitar will be compatible, eh? Hit the jump for the full press thingie.

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Bleck, bleck and triple bleck. You would think the day after Easter would be the perfect time for Nintendo to celebrate the second coming of a great game. You know, bring back some hard to get game from death and let it rise from the ground to walk the earth once more, much like the Christ purportedly did way back when. But instead of raising Christ, who for the sake of this metaphor is representing Mother 3, the lord (Nintendo) seems to have accidentally raised the two thieves crucified along with JC: KING’S KNIGHT (NES, 1 player, Rated E for Everyone - Mild Fantasy Violence, 500 Wii Points) and POWERBALL (Sega Genesis, 1-2 players, Rated E for Everyone - Mild Fantasy Violence, 800 Wii Points). I think that metaphor worked out pretty well.

King’s Knight is a landmark game in that it was Square’s first release in the U.S., but the game is more of a sign of the greatness to come than greatness itself. It’s a shooter (yes, another shooter) with RPG elements and leveling up but it never really jumps out at you in any way. Powerball on the other hand jumps out by being a totally made up sport about the power of balls. Never played this one but from the youtube videos it isn’t looking like a must buy either. Pretty damn uninteresting week if you ask me.

If you like to read press releases hit the jump.

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