Behold! The Slurpee of Fuuuuuuryyyyy!!!!!111!!!11!!!!

Do you like Slurpee's? Do you like furious bald men?

If so, you'll just love 7-Eleven's newest promo for their ever-present line of brain-freezers (drink slower dammit!). The fruity yet furious drink will be dubbed 'Kratos Fury' and will assault your gray matter in February and March at participating Elevens.

Now, that in and of itself might not sound all that great, but take heed reader- there's more to this story! The cups will have codes on them- you see where this is going don't you?  Get your codes off the cups, head to Slurpee.com, redeem for supposed
ly cool stuff.

Hit the break for some shots of the GoW3 DLC you can score. I might have to take part in this- that armor looks kind of cool...

Xbox LIVE update

Due to some email demand I'm going to try to update everybody on the LIVE content that was released in the previous week every Friday. Major Nelson is nice enough to list this stuff in his blog so I'll be compilig is all here for your perusal.

To kick things off we've got AC2's Battle of Forli, Halo Wars and Dead Rising on demand, and a deal of the week featuring everyone's favorite smarmy computer.

Enjoy.

Playstation Network Update - 'LBPtothePSPtotheDLC' Edition

Yay! Little Big Planet DLC for the PSP! Huzzah!!

We get some stone age and 'gardens' levels, stickers, and costume packs to play with- but there's a lot more cool stuff this week too.

There's a mini called Dracula that may or may not be of any interest, but the name is cool- there's also a skin pack for Uncharted 2 that has a bunch of characters from other first and second party Sony games that you can shoot each other as.

It should also be noted that the first Assassins Creed 2 DLC pack is now available. It has a little scenario called 'The Battle of Forli'. It's set near the end of the main game in the uber-dumpy town of Forli. It's no great shakes but it sounds fun and it does after all extend this excellent game a little farther.

I have to ask again though: What the hell happened to the PSOne classics? Man, are they pumping out some crappy ones lately.

iPad is go

Yes, Apple's new toy is called the iPad, and even though it's missing the second 'D' at the end (Star Trek: TNG fans know what I mean), it's pretty cool.

Things I like:

• Starting price point is $499 (yes, I know it doesn't have 3g & it's 16gig- it's still good)
• The Games- NOVA looked great and so did NFS. This will be a great gaming machine, I have no doubt.
• eReader- magazines and books in color look great
• iWork

Things I don't like:

• Movies display in letterbox but look teensy because the iPad is pretty much 4:3
• The iPad is pretty much 4:3
• No disc Drive
• No USB ports
• No camera of any kind

Overall, it's a nice little machine and it is fairly groundbreaking in quite a few ways (what a meh of a statement huh?)- it's just that Apple missed out on so many things that should have been obvious inclusions in the hardware/software that it's really difficult to recommend the iPad right out of the gate.

But it does look cool. It's got that.

Nintendo Download -- 'Meh' edition

Wow, not much from Nintendo this week. The highlight of the week is... uh... UNO?

Yeah, I guess...

Halo : Reach tidbits

There's a nice little piece on Reach over on Edge about how Bungie is stretching the Halo engine and really maxing out the 360 to get the best performance. In my mind, it really shows. Reach looks fantastic and the 'Impostor' tech is shaping up to be a terrific idea for cramming tons of soldiers on the battlefield with no loss to the frame rate.

If you don't know what 'Impostor' is, it's a new system developed at Bungie that substitutes highly detailed models for simpler ones when they're seen at a distance. In short, that Jackal taking pot-shots at you from up on the top of that Covenant sentry platform has way less good looks than the Grunts that you just wasted right in front of you- only you never notice the difference. And if you were to approach said sniper? The engine would scale him up to look appropriatly more awesome the closer that you get. Nice stuff.

If this truly is the max level of graphical quality for the 360 though, I have to wonder how far away a neXtBox could truly be. Might we see something announced at e3? Maybe something incorporating the Natal tech natively? It certainly is possible, but I doubt that Microsoft would want to temper any excitement whatsoever for the impending 'Holiday 2010' launch of the Natal with a new console- even if it were to be a ways off.

E3 2011 though? I'd be shocked if there wasn't something being cooked up for that.

It's got that nice new map pack smell

The new Halo 3 Mythic map pack will land on LIVE on the second day of February 2010. On that day, many polygonal men and squid faces will perish. We toast you brave warriors... with flame grenades.

PS3 3.15 Firmware out

Doesn't really do anything if you upgraded in December when it was optional.

Start Transmission

Just a quick note to let you know that firmware update 3.15, an optional update that was released in early December, is now a mandatory update. You can read about the contents of the update in the original post here. In addition to the features that were communicated back in December, the update also improves system stability during use of some PlayStation 3 software. If you’ve already performed the update, there’s no need to do anything. If you are using an older version of the firmware, you will be prompted to update when you start up your system and when you access any network features.

Stop Transmission

December? Yeah it was pretty good for Nintendo

It was, in fact, pretty good for the industry in general. Nintendo though, they had a particularly merry one.

Start Transmission

Nintendo Finishes 2009 with Multiple Sales Records
Wii Has the Best Month in Video Game History, Nintendo DS Has the Best Calendar Year of All Time
A holiday shopping frenzy helped both of Nintendo’s video game systems make history: Nintendo’s Wii^™ home system sold more than 3.8 million units in December, a new all-time single-month U.S. sales record. The Nintendo DS^™ Lite and Nintendo DSi^™ hand-held systems combined to sell more than 3.3 million, the second biggest month in U.S. history.
Those strong December numbers helped propel the Nintendo DS franchise to more than 11.2 million sold in 2009, a new U.S. calendar-year sales record for any video game system – ever. The Wii console finished 2009 with 9.6 million sold. Of all the Wii consoles ever sold in the United States since its November 2006 launch, nearly one-fifth (18.7 percent) were sold during November and December 2009.
“Wii, Nintendo DS Lite and Nintendo DSi combined to sell more than 7 million units in the month of December alone,” said Cammie Dunaway, Nintendo of America’s executive vice president of Sales & Marketing. “Clearly there is overwhelming consumer demand for fun games, motion controls and value. This remarkable hardware sales surge presents a tremendous software opportunity for Nintendo and its third-party partners as we head into 2010.”
Lifetime U.S. sales for Wii have now surpassed 27.2 million units. No other home console has ever sold so many so quickly. Lifetime U.S. sales for the Nintendo DS franchise have topped 38.8 million units, surpassing lifetime sales of the Game Boy^™ Advance franchise.
As always, great software drives hardware sales. In December alone, consumers placed six Nintendo games in the top 10 best-sellers of the month. These include New Super Mario Bros.^™ Wii at No. 1 with more than 2.8 million sold, Wii Sports Resort^™ at No. 2 with more than 1.7 million sold, Wii Fit^™ Plus with the Wii Balance Board^™ accessory at No. 3 with more than 1.7 million sold, Wii Play^™ at No. 6 with more than 1.0 million sold, Mario Kart^™ Wii at No. 7 with more than 936,000 sold and Mario & Luigi^™: Bowser’s Inside Story for Nintendo DS Lite and Nintendo DSi at No. 10 with more than 656,000 sold.
For all of 2009, Nintendo finished with seven of the top 10 best-selling games of the year. These include New Super Mario Bros. Wii at No. 2 with more than 4.2 million sold, Wii Sports Resort at No. 3 with more than 4.2 million sold, Wii Fit^™ at No. 4 with more than 3.5 million sold, Mario Kart Wii at No. 5 with nearly 3.1 million sold, Wii Play at No. 6 with more than 3.1 million sold, Wii Fit Plus^™ at No. 8 with more than 2.4 million sold and Pokémon^™ Platinum Version at No. 10 with more than 2.0 million sold.

Stop Transmission

Very merry indeed.

Playstation Network Update - 'You don't really need an update, do you?' edition

Well, yet again there just isn't very much on the PSN update train this week.

Seriously, when the highlight of the week is the Lunar demo for the PSP yu know there ain't much going on. And what the hell happened to the PSOne classics?!? What, did you guys forget how to port them?

And wow! What a sale on a game no one gives a poop about! Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Splinter Cell Conviction MIA

From the 'dear God why?!?' department, Splinter Cell Conviction has been delayed yet again. This time until April.

For anyone who didn't know, the game was due (after about a bazillion delays) at the end of February. Conviction looks absolutely amazing and is still a day one purchase for me personally but come on, eventually you have to finish the damn thing guys.

Like a little chaos with that Slurpee?

Kratos is coming to 7-11 in a move that many recent big time games have made, the hotly anticipated God of War III will be sold at the convenience chain. Breaking the trend will be what's offered along side the game-

Don't go looking for a Slurpee cup enblazoned with the Blades of Chaos, instead you'll be getting a pretty cool poster as a pre-order bonus. Yes you read that right, a pre-order. At 7-11... huh.

Here's what the poster (top) and the in-store display (bottom, duh) look like:

Transformers: War for Cybertron

Two words- Omega. Supreme.

Video Games | Transformers: War for Cybertron | Exclusive Debut Trailer HD

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Celebrate the biggest auto show of the year with Forza 3

Just don't expect anything for free.

Developer Turn 10 is releasing a special car pack onto LIVE this week to coincide with the show up in Detroit. Lots of nice cars, 400MSP, official scuttle after the break.

Nintendo Download -- 'Objectionable Content' edition

When You See This Week’s Downloads, You Will Have No … OBJECTION!
Courtroom intrigue with everyone’s favorite Ace Attorney leads this week’s Nintendo Download. For the first time, players can use the Wii Remote^™ controller to help them balance the scales of justice. Six other games join this week’s lineup, including some temporal adventures and a puzzle game based on shadows, not to mention new twists on solitaire, billiards and word searches. A classic Genesis mahjong video game rounds out the list.

Gamestop Coupon of the Week

Not bad...

You get an extra 30% trade in value on any Wii game you bring in. That's not bad at all seeing as it was just the holidays and I'm sure some of you got a few Wii clunkers you're wanting to get rid of.

Dark Void prequel

While I'm talking about DV, I just wanted to remind everybody that a Dark Void prequel will be coming shortly for the DSi shoppe. It's a classic 8bit side-scroller in the mold of Mega Man 9 and looks really fantastic.

Video Games | Dark Void: Zero | Debut Trailer

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Playstation Network Update - 'What happened to the PSOne classics?' edition

Standouts this weekend include the 'Dark Void' demo -been looking forward to that one- and 'Matt Hazard: Blood Bath & Beyond', which is a kinda cool looking 'old school' side-scroller based on the massive failure that was the first Hazard game last year.

Nintendo looks pretty good in red & green

Mainly because they had a merry little Christmas for themselves.

Sales figures (mainly guesses) anyone?

• Although official U.S. sales data for December and all of 2009 will be announced by the NPD Group on Jan. 14, it appears that U.S. consumers responded enthusiastically to Nintendo’s Wii^™ home console in December. Nintendo estimates that December sales in the United States will exceed 3 million units.
• Nintendo estimates that the portable Nintendo DS^™ lineup, including the Nintendo DSi^™ video game system, set a new all-time calendar-year U.S. sales record for any console or hand-held system.
• Nintendo software also continued to perform well. Although the NPD Group will provide the full sales numbers for each game, Nintendo estimates that lifetime U.S. sales of New Super Mario Bros.^™ Wii are approaching 4 million. The game, which is the first Super Mario Bros. game to include simultaneous four-player action, launched in the United States on Nov. 15. 

Impressive! Or not, your call...

Cell tower... we have a problem

So the Nexus One was having these reported 'issues' with it's 3g reception. I honest;y didn't think it was going to turn out to be all that big of a deal.

I might have been wrong. It seems that Google forums are all abuzz over it and quite a few folks are complaining about the problem. You can check out the whole sorded story on Engadget, and I'll keep you up to date on it if there are any further developements.

Needless to say, this isn't really something that you need if you're touting your device as being head and shoulders better than all the other Android handsets out there... or for that matter, if you're going up against the iPhone.

Razer branches out to Xbox 360

Famed (?) peripheral maker Razer has hopped on the console train and will begin producing controllers and accessories for the 360. When exactly these will be out and how much they'll cost remain a mystery at this point. I would bet on 'fall' and 'a ton'.

More here or pics after the break.

Heavy Release

Hey, psssst, you over there...

'Heavy Rain', that interactive whatever that looks so, so, good? You know, the one for the PS3? It'll be on store shelves on the 23rd day of the month of February. Yup.

Alright, that's all I've got...

I am the Nexus One

Google's Nexus One is doing two things right now.

The first thing is it's looking very, very, cool; The second is that it's being sued by the estate of Philip K Dick because of the 'Blade Runner' android designation of 'Nexus Six'. Now, I don't so much get that second one (a lawsuit that doesn't make any sense? Can't be...), but that first one is working quite well for me.

One of the main knocks against the Android OS has been the lack of a truely integrated experience that's able to utilize the software to it's full potential. That isn't the case with the N1.

This great little phone has a nice fast 1ghz processor, touch screen, a 5mp camera (with a flash! how novel...), and the prerequisite audio and video playback. Right now it's on TMobile and will be coming soon to Verizon. The tech specs also include Bluetooth, A2DP, wi-fi, blah, blah, blah... 

It's nice. Bottom line. Bravo Google- your move Apple.

Read more here.

Mother of all Netbooks

Sort of a netbook anyway... The Alienware M11x just came out of CES and it is beautiful. This 11" piece of delicious is going to come in at a sub-$1000 price point and be able to crank through all of your games. It can even play Crysis at 50fps.

Hopefully more to come on the M11x- I'm trying to get some more info for you guys ASAP.

You can check out their preview page here - but there ain't too much there.

Nintendo Download -- 'How many times can a Fight be Final?' edition

Start Transmission

Should old acquaintance be forgot? We can’t remember. But what we can remember is that this week’s downloadable lineup from Nintendo asks a lot of questions. The Nintendo DSiWare^™ service wonders if you can master missiles with Trajectile^™, lead animals to their proper pens with Animal Puzzle Adventure or match wits with TV chef Gordon Ramsay in Hell’s Kitchen Vs. The WiiWare^™ service puts you in charge of maximizing your rubber duckie output with Heron: Steam Machine, asks you to aim for the bull’s-eye with Pub Darts and wonders if you have an itchy trigger finger with Fast Draw Showdown. Finally, Final Fight^™ 3 on the Virtual Console^™ service makes you wonder if the fight is ever really final.

Stop Transmission

Asking if the fight can ever be final is like asking if the fantasy can be final. You already know the answer- when the sales slump, it's over Jonny...

Numerous Duke Nukem games in developement

Ahhh, what's better on a bright new day in a bright new year than a nice whiff of vaporware?

This story was actually run by Edge magazine online a little while ago but for some reason I missed it. Now, I'm a pretty big fan of the Duke- and don't get me wrong here, I'd love to see a new game since the debacle of 'Duke Forever', but I don't really have a lot of hope here.

I won't rehash the Edge piece, but the gist of it is that there are multiple Duke projects out there right now and that all of them are unannounced. The gentleman being interviewed, Scott Miller, seems to emphasize 'casual gaming' as one of the areas that Duke will be appearing in. Casual games are not what I think of when I hear the name of one of the more outrageous and over-the-top shooters of all time. Casting the uber-macho Duke in a casual gaming environment, presumably one that is crafted to cater to the mass gaming (and non-gaming) community, just doesn't seem like a very good idea.