Microsoft has tonight officially revealed a new Xbox 360 hardware bundle, almost a month to the day it was inadvertently leaked via some packaging shots.
The bundle includes a 250GB Xbox 360 S console, the Kinect motion-control camera and a copy of Kinect Adventures. You get all that for $399 (or £300 if you're in the UK).
The bundle will go on sale in the US on November 4, and November 10 in the UK.
It seems that Keita Takahashi, the man known for Katamari Damacy, has left Namco Bandai.
Takahashi's departure was confirmed by website Play.tm.
In recent years, Takahashi has seemed increasingly disinterested in gaming. In an August interview with the Official PlayStation Magazine, the game designer said, "At E3 I saw people putting on speeches but I thought the future seemed a bit dark. The 3D games didn't spark my interest. I think motion control's a bit old now."
Last week, Takahashi gave an interview with tech blog The Setup in which he said he makes video games "for the so-so Namco Bandai Games Inc."
In the 11 years he worked for Namco Bandai, he made 4 titles. As the Katamari Damacy series became more popular, Takahashi became less involved with the subsequent sequels.
"Now, I'm participating in a project to re-design an old park in Nottingham, UK," he told The Setup.
Keita Takahashi leaves Namco, calls it a 'so-so' company [Play.tm] [Pic]
There were some who scoffed at Dead Rising: Case Zero, amused at what they considered to be a paid demo. After hundreds of thousands of sales over the past week, though, who's laughing now?
Capcom's Dead Rising 2 prequel, which in the US cost an approachable $5, was deemed by plenty to be worth the price of admission, as it's racked up over 300,000 sales (328,290, to be exact) since its release last week.
In the wake of those kind of numbers, expect a lot of companies to follow suit, particularly for games like Dead Rising 2 that many people may have been on the fence about. Or anything from Activision or EA.
Dead Rising: Case 0 Sees Over 300,000 Players In Its First Week, What Does That Mean For The Future? [GamerBytes]
Hideo Kojima, creator of Metal Gear Solid, has a verified Twitter account. He uses it to post pictures of his lunch. Boring, dull stuff. But today, he spiced things up by posting a picture of a girl in her underwear.
Kojima writes that it is raining, and he is having lunch in Tokyo Midtown.
To Kojima's credit, he claimed after the girl image went up that he did not post the pic on purpose. Kojima actually has no idea how the image appeared in his Yfrog image tweet. Perhaps it snuck into that tweet, all stealth-like. Or perhaps it is a bug in the image uploader.
The game designer did another image tweet with the intended image (lunch), instead of the previous lunch image (underwear lady).
Kojima later tweeted that he didn't think he was going to use Yfrog anymore. So you can look forward to the daily pictures of what Hideo Kojima is eating and not photos of barely clothed women. Sorry!
小島監督のツイッターIDから下着姿のセクシー美女画像が投稿され話題に [はちま起稿]
There's been criticism that Microsoft's Kinect suffers from lag. But what about Sony's rival PlayStation Move? How laggy is it?
In a FAQ section on the PlayStation Blog, Sony come close to actually putting a number on the thing, stating "The PlayStation Move has similar sensing latency as the DUALSHOCK 3 controller - for many PlayStation Move games, this is about 22ms".
Of course, Sony then points out "Modern HDTVs unfortunately have much more latency, usually on the order of 60-160ms", so yes, in short, the Move isn't - at least according to Sony's own internal testing - very laggy at all. Good to hear!
PlayStation Move: The Ultimate FAQ [PlayStation]
Back in 2008, Japanese game company Square Enix revealed that role-playing game Final Fantasy XIII was coming to the Xbox 360 — everywhere except Japan. That has changed.
The game was originally thought to be a PS3 exclusive. Last winter, it was released as a PlayStation 3 exclusive.
In August 2008, Microsoft Taiwan's Grace Chou apparently confirmed that an Asian Xbox 360 version of Final Fantasy XIII was getting released in Taiwan. This Asian version (which would conceivably be released in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea and Singapore) made Japanese Xbox 360 owners excited as it possibly meant they might be able to import FFXIII and play it on Japanese Xbox 360s. Microsoft contacted Kotaku at the time, telling us that this statement GNN Gamer was actually incorrect.
When Kotaku asked Xbox Japan boss Takashi Sensui whether Final Fantasy XIII would be coming to the Xbox 360, he replied, "Ask them [Square Enix]."
Square Enix remained steadfast on the PS3's exclusivity and even went as far as including "For PlayStation 3 Only" after trailers for the game in Japan.
When asked by Dengeki Online in 2008 about the possibility for an Xbox 360 release in Japan, Final Fantasy XIII producer Yoshinori Kitase replied that an Xbox 360 version of the game would not be released.
Fellow Shinji Hashimoto addressed the same issue later that year, saying that Square Enix had "absolutely no plans" to bring Final Fantasy XIII to the Xbox 360.
Even as late as late fall, the game's director Motomu Toriyama was asked by Dengeki Playstation about an Xbox 360 version going on sale in Japan. He replied, "We definitely will not release it [in Japan]."
Then last August, Japanese language Xbox 360 Achievements for the game started popping up online.
A recent issue of Japanese game magazines Dengeki states that Final Fantasy XIII is finally coming to the Xbox 360 in Japan.
What's more, the Xbox 360 is going to be a budget version and priced at ¥4,980 (US$59), which is nearly half of what it cost on the PS3. The game will feature a new "Easy Mode" as well as an English voice option.
The game will be released in Japan on December 16, a year after it hit the PS3, under the name "Final Fantasy Ultimate Hits International".
Plans change, companies take inventory and make new decisions according to the business environment. Yet, after repeatedly denying something for years, Square Enix has decided to release Final Fantasy XIII on the Xbox 360 in Japan.
Sounds like expanding the amount of showroom floorspace for the 2010 Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle has paid dividends, with a new attendance record set for the weekend's festivities.
Last year, 60,750 turned up for a weekend of video games and more video games, but this year, Penny Arcade's Robert Khoo has told Big Download the number shot up to 67,600.
That's pushing things, though, so don't expect next year's to be, like, 150,000. "We're always looking to see what can work, but I personally feel we're closing in on our limit to the show in regard to physical space", Khoo says. "There are a few more venues we're looking at, but at the end of the day we just want to improve the PAX experience in any way we can. If it helps, we'll consider it. If it hurts, we won't."
PAX Prime 2010 brings in 67,600 attendees [Update] [Big Download]
This week's North American PlayStation Store update may sensually seduce you to drop some dollars on new Rock Band tracks or invest in something new, like the side-scrolling, puzzle-solving, physics-based game TerRover.
There's plenty of downloadable content for Dragon Age: Origins, Mafia II and Transformers: War for Cybertron if you feel like playing something fresh in a game you already own. Snoop Dogg's debut in Rock Band is here for PlayStation 3 owners, which you can see, track by track, in the full update below.
TerRover ($14.99)
TerRover demo
Sengoku BASARA: Samurai Heroes demo
Quantum Theory demo
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'hoole demo
Ace Combat Joint Assault ($39.99)
Hannspree Ten Kate Honda SBK Superbike World Championship ($9.99)
PSP minis: Ace Armstrong Vs. The Alien Scumbags ($6.99)
BUZZ!: The Puzzle Quiz ($5.99)
Dragon Age: Origins – Witch Hunt ($6.99)
Mafia II – Jimmy's Vendetta ($9.99)
Transformers: War For Cybertron – Map and Character Pack #2 ($9.99)
Clash Of The Titans – Hade's Challenge Quest Pack ($1.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 – Fantasy Pack ($9.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 – Favorites Courses Pack ($19.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 – New Courses Pack ($9.99)
UFC Undisputed 2010 TUF Pack ($1.99)
Guitar Hero tracks
Rock Band tracks
Qore Episode 28: September 2010 ($2.99)
Pulse 9/7 Edition
NBA 2K11 – Premiere Trailer
Bioshock 2 – Minerva's Den Trailer
Dragon Age 2 – ‘Destiny' Trailer
Dragon Age: Origins – Witch Hunt Trailer
Red Dead Redemption – Legends And Killers Pack trailer
TerRover Trailer
Killzone 3 Multiplayer Trailer
TerRover Theme (free)
Shank Blood Red Theme ($0.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – LSU ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – Tennessee ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – California ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – Florida State ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – Colorado ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – Missouri ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – Penn State ($2.99)
NCAA Dynamic Theme – Virginia Tech ($2.99)
Hot For Teacher Theme ($1.99)
Mechatron Theme ($1.49)
Bianca Premium Theme 2 ($1.99)
Wendy Premium Theme ($1.99)
Lights Theme ($1.49)
TerRover Wallpaper (x5)
Street Fighter Alpha 3 Avatars ($0.49) (x2)
Street Fighter Ryu Avatar ($0.49)
Super Street Fighter IV Avatars ($0.49) (x2)
PixelJunk 3-in-1 Bundle ($19.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11: Emerald Dragon – Permanent Price Drop (now $6.99, original price $9.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11: River Course At Blackwolf Run – Permanent Price Drop (now $6.99, original price $9.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11: The Highlands – Permanent Price Drop (now $6.99, original price $9.99)
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11: Waialae CC – Permanent Price Drop (now $6.99, original price $9.99)
Resident Evil 5: Untold Stories Bundle – Sale (now $5.99, original price $12.49)
Wolf Of The Battlefield: Commando 3 – Sale (now $4.99, original price $9.99)
Hero Of Sparta – Minis – Sale (now $0.99, original price $6.99)
Qore Episode 28: September 2010 (Free to PlayStation Plus Subscribers, regular price $2.99)
Warhawk Game Trial (Free and Exclusive to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
Warhawk: Booster Combo (Free to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
Warhawk Dynamic Theme (Free to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
UFC Undisputed 2010 – TUF Fighter DLC Pack (Free to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
God of War: Ghost of Sparta PSP Demo (Early Access to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
Blast Off – Minis (Free to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
Mystical Fractals Theme (Free and Exclusive to PlayStation Plus Subscribers)
Ratchet & Clank Dynamic Theme (PlayStation Plus Price $1.50, regular price $2.99)
After a long weekend, we like to get back into the swing of things with a little off topic conversation, now happening nightly (more or less) at Kotaku. What shall we discuss tonight?
Here are few things that maid my weekend go more smoothly than others. One, El Pollo Loco, which served as my dinner on Saturday evening. It was my first experience with crazy chicken and I liked it. Two, Peep Show, which I discovered was available for streaming via Hulu. Three, coconutWifi, a wireless hotspot detector app for Mac OS X. What an enriching trio.
Let's turn this into a mini-Lifehacker post and discuss the things that make our lives better, more productive or more amusing.
