BitSnark

The conceptually highly promising and visually creative star of Nintendo’s stellar E3 Wii lineup, Kirby’s Epic Yarn, has at last been given some sort of release window.

American gamers can expect to play the standout Wii title this Autumn, whereas the rest of us in the EU have to wait till next year to get our hands on this superb looking platformer.

Next year? Really? I mean, what do they have to localise?

Kirby doesn’t speak and the game has less text than an Early Learning Center Level 0 reading book.

Bitter?

Nah.

Just disappointed.

There is no need in this day and age for territorial release windows on a game such as this to be this far apart.

*Grumble*.

Bourne out of the twisted and entertaining dev that brought us such off-beat gems as Psychonauts and last year’s Brutal Legend, comes Costume Quest, a downloadable title for PC, 360 and PS3 platforms.

Billed as an adventure RPG, costume quest puts you in the unusual shoes of a trick and treater on Halloween night. Your quest is simple; complete mission assignments and accumuluate sweets, stamps and other collectibles by scaring the local neighbourhood with your ghoulish get up.

All of these items can then be used in the touted Combat Mode, where you find yourself transformed into something monsterous allowing you terrorize the local neighbourhoods, malls and carnivals with due aplomb.

Costume Quest is due for release this Autumn.

2K Games today has announced that a demo for their forthcoming crime epic Mafia II, is now available for download on PC (through Steam), Xbox Live and PSN+, with regular PSN users able to download the demo a day later tomorrow.

The demo itself takes place in the level known as ‘Buzzsaw’ in which protagonists Joe and Henry are tasked to place a hit on a mob boss known only as the ‘Fat Man’.

Much violence, swearing and American-Italian accents will no doubt ensue.

Mafia II itself will launch later this month on August 27th for PC, 360 and PS3 platforms.

Hot on the heels of the red-hot unveiling of Criterion’s Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit at this year’s E3 2010, comes the announcement that the next installment in the franchise will be Need For Speed: Shift 2 and is due out sometime late next year.

Heralded by many as a high-point for a series struggling to find it’s identity, 2009’s Need For Speed: Shift seemed to hit the sweet spot for the long running racing series; boasting superb visuals, customisable cars, greatly improved handling and a well constructed race progression system.

Hopefully next years title will capitalise on those solid foundations and give us a racer credible enough to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Gran Turismos and Forzas of this world.

No other details, including destination platforms, are known at this point.

EA today have announced ‘Create’, a title which allows the user to create cutesy platforming style worlds which can be customised with the use of ‘stickers’ and then uploaded for other users to play on and comment on.

All sounds a little bit too much like LittleBigBandwagon to me.

No offical date has been announced for Create, but the title will eventually ship on all major home platforms.

The trailer for Create can be seen at the link below:

More on this as and when.

This is awesome news.

Electronic Arts has today confirmed that folks who purchase the limited edition of their forthcoming Medal Of Honor reboot, will recieve an automatic beta invite to Battlefield 3 on their respective platform.

Ok. Mind = blown.

So,

1) Battlefield 3 is still in development = Win

2) It’s far enough along that they are prepping a beta = Win

3) It’s multiformat!? = Win

Incredible news indeed. Hopefully, this means that the Battlefield 3 floodgates are beginning to creak and will open very shortly.

Medal Of Honor is due to arrive on PC, 360 and PS3 formats this October, with the PS3 limited edition boasting a HD-remake of Medal Of Honor: Frontline.

More as this develops.

In a statement to Bloomberg Japan, the Kyoto based console manufacturer confirmed that it will reveal the release date and pricing details of their highly anticipated 3DS handheld two months from now on Sepetember 29th.

Nintendo has been quiet regarding these details since their show stealing unveiling at E3, but NOA boss Reggie Fils-Amie did confirm that the handheld would be released in all territories by March 31st 2011 at the latest.

The countdown begins now.

After being rumoured for the best part of the last month, Capcom and Namco Bandai unveiled their newest gaming megaton today in front of an awed audience at the San Diego Comic-Con.

Envisioned as two separate titles, Street Fighter Vs Tekken pits Capcom’s top street fighting pugilists against Namco’s top Tekken combatants. One title shall be using the seminal ‘2.5D’ Street Fighter IV fighting engine and unique ink-blot graphical style, while the other does so from the Tekken perspective, with the 3D fighting engine and graphical style of the latter used.

Predictably as a result, Capcom are working on the Street Fighter X Tekken title, while Namco Bandai are hard at work on the Tekken X Street Fighter title.

Most joyusly, the first media of this groundbreaking crossover has surfaced too, with VG247.com hosting the first images and debut trailer as can be seen at the link below:

http://www.vg247.com/2010/07/24/capcom-vs-namco-announced-at-comiccon/comment-page-1/#comment-199021

The media is currently only representative of the Capcom effort, but even at this stage my inner fanboy is exploding out of my eyes and ears.

The crossover titles are due to arrive on 360 and PS3 at a time to be determined.

This is just… superb.

Just over two weeks before their crime epic sequel hits the stores, 360 and PS3 owners will be able to get themselves a taste of 2K’s open-world crime epic with the demo which will be available to download on PSN and XBL on August 10th.

No news on a PC demo unfortunately folks.

Yesterday evening Microsoft finally confirmed that their forthcoming Kinect motion control solution would be priced at the previously rumoured £129.99, but stopped short of confirming an exact UK release date for the peripheral.

Expected to launch ‘sometime in November’, the £129.99 pricetag not only gets you the Kinect hardware, but also a copy of the mini-game esque collection Kinect Adventures.

£129.99 huh? Even with the ‘free’ game it’s a bitter pill to swallow indeed and certainly provides a tangible barrier for the market penetration of perhiperhal. It’s unlikely that we’ll see a last minute price drop; Microsoft seem bullish and wholly confident in the pricepoint and as a result this is unfortunate.

Stifled by an overbearing price point and the distinct lack of any must-have titles at launch (with the possible exception of Dance Central), make no mistake, Microsoft face an uphill battle here to win the hearts and minds of gamers and non-gamers alike.

Sort that price out.

Please.