After an eternity in development hell, 14 years after it was first announced, Duke Nukem Forever has returned to knock LA Noire off the top of all formats chart. Despite Duke's PC heritige, that format accounted for only 14% of sales, with the PS3 taking 30%, and Xbox 360 56%.
 
PS3 exclusive Infamous 2 reached number 4, just behind Zumba Fitness which gained a place despite dropping sales, though that is a place higher than the original debuted at two years ago.
 
The only other new release to crack the top 10 was 'Red Faction: Armageddon, which saw 70% of sales on the Xbox360 compared to just 26% and 4% on PS3 and PC respectively.
 
01.    Duke Nukem Forever (Take-Two)
02.    LA Noire (Take-Two)
03.    Zumba Fitness (505 Games)
04.    Infamous 2 (SCEE)
05.    Lego Pirates Of The Caribbean (Disney Interactive)
06.    Dirt 3 (Codemasters)
07.    Brink (Bethesda)
08.    Red Faction: Armageddon (THQ)
09.    Call Of Duty: Black Ops (Activision)
10.    Portal 2 (EA)

 
12 years after the original Starcraft, Activsion-Blizzard's long awaited sequel Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty stormed to the top of the UK charts.
 
Whilst the original managed only as high as 24 and wasn't even the highest placing PC game then, beaten by Lucasarts’ Star Wars Supremacy, Starcraft II became the first PC game this year to top the All Formats chart, astonishingly managing to garner more sales in it's first week on sale than Starcraft managed in it's entire lifetime in the UK. Whilst digital copies aren't accounted for, that Starcraft can still be found for sale on the high street makes Wings of Liberty's achievement all the more impressive.
 
Last weeks top 4 Disney’s Toy Story 3, Rockstar's Red Dead Redemption, Ubisoft’s Dance on Broadway and Warner Bros. Interactive’s Lego Harry Potter: Years 1-4 all slide down a place, whilst Just Dance and Dragon Quest IX: Sentinals of the Starry Skies both climb two places, reaching numbers six and seven respectively. A surge of sales for another Acitvision-Blizzard game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 see's it return to the top 10 at number eight, whilst Nintendo's Super Mario Galaxy 2 drops two places to nine. In tenth place, another re-entry is EA's Battlefield Bad Company 2.
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In it's second week of release, Toy Story 3 climbed to the top of the UK all formats chart, dethroning xbox 360 exlusive Crackdown which dropped to 10 after two weeks on the top. It's the first time since 2007 that Disney have topped the charts.<!--break-->
 
Red Dead Redemption jumped back up to 2 and Tiger Woods 11 moved up three places to 5 whilst the only new entry was Dragon Quest IX, which debuted at number 9.
 
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 fell out of the top 10 for only the second time in 37 weeks, but is closing in fast on the all time UK sales record currently held by Dr Kawashima's Brain Training.
 
01. Toy Story 3 (Disney)
02. Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar)
03. Dance On Broadway (Ubisoft)
04. Lego Harry Potter: Years 1-4 (Warner)
05. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 (EA)
06. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo)
07. 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa (EA)
08. Just Dance (Ubisoft)
09. Dragon Quest IX (Square Enix)
10. Crackdown 2 (Microsoft)
 
Source: Chart-Track

All your votes are in and counted. So who were the winners of the Game Hub Games of the Year Awards 2009? There are a few surprises amongst the obvious ones.  Fortunately for all the nominees, nobody got zero votes (somebody got one though). So here are the Top 3 for each of the 13 categories:

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Uncharted 2: Among Thieves has surpassed 1 million sales worldwide since its release on October 13, according to publisher Sony.

In the face of the day one sales of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (7 million according to Activision), this might seem small, but Infinity Wards’ shooter is something of an anomaly Read More  »

Brendan Griffiths takes a look at some of the best upcoming games at the Leeds leg of the Eurogamer Expo including: Aliens Vs Predator, Avatar, Bayonetta, Dante’s Inferno, Dark Void, God of War III, Heavy Rain, Saboteur and Split/Second.

It’s not often that UK gamers get to go to an expo; it’s even less often that a show manages to climb its way north of London, so it’s no surprise that the Eurogamer Leeds Expo sold out in advance for its two dates at Saviles Royal Armouries Square for the 27^th/28^th October.

While the queue went around the building it didn’t take long to get in once the doors opened and despite the event being sold out it never seemed overcrowded in the two halls used. The gaming areas were made up of stools in front of TVs or playing stands like you might see in shops like Game and HMV. There was a mix of HD screens for each game. Some medium sized, others 50 inch monsters. Although, sitting on a stool two feet in front of 50 inches of brightly coloured Ratchet & Clank was a bit overkill, I had to lean back to avoid my face melting.

But on to the games I managed to get a bit of extensive time with. Read More  »

Ten years ago, turn based RPG action ruled the gaming world. Titles such as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest had gamers craving multiple discs, turn based battles and logic defying haircuts. Not only were these games massively popular with both their fan boy audience and casual gamers but, in the case of Final Fantasy, were some the best games of their generation. Due to the fact that the majority of these games originated from Japan and shared similar themes, the genre was affectionately crowned the ‘JRPG’. Hours were chalked up, bosses were beaten and potions were thrown, all in the name of this eccentric and engrossing brand of gaming.

It’s no exaggeration to say that in its golden age, the JRPG really was the most popular gaming genre of its time. There’s not a gamer in their twenties that hasn’t at least heard of Final Fantasy VII and almost ten million of those gamers bought the game.  This giant fan base has inspired everything, from the standard geek fare of cosplay, to the big budget heights of films and energy drinks. This success allowed other JRPGs to break into the mainstream, with Pokémon becoming a global Gameboy phenomenon and Square going on to release a host of other Final Fantasy titles, each gaining commercial and critical success.

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The monkeys once again return to Wii. Sega has revealed today Super Monkey Ball Step and Roll... Read More  »

Recent monthly sales figures now show that the Playstation3 has outsold the Wii in Japan for the first time in just under eighteen months with the PS3 achieving individual sales figures of 146,948 compared to the 99,335 units sold by Nintendo.
 
Is this a downward spiral for the Wii in Japan?
 
In my opinion no. It was recently announced that the Wii was now the fastest selling games console in history, outstripping the previous record held by Sony's Playstation2. The Wii has now clocked up unit sales of over 50 million consoles which is a staggering amount of units sold in such a relatively short space of time and amply demonstrates the appeal of the Wii across the consumer spectrum, a point alluded to by Nintendo. The family and friends orientated appeal of the Wii is something that the PS3 and Xbox360 cannot seem to compete with and with the release of the new DSi looking to set new sales records across the globe, I don't see this as anything but a market blip and nothing connected to a potential downfall for Nintendo. In fact, recent software releases are seen as the driving force behind this upturn in sales of the PS3 with Capcom's Resident Evil 5 being cited as a main reason.
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Here are the results from the BAFTA video games awards 2009:
 
Game play: Call of Duty 4
Casual: Boom Blox
Sports: Race Driver: Grid
Story and Character: Call of Duty 4
Strategy: Civilisation Revolution
Best use of Audio: Dead Space
New Talent: Boro Toro
Multi-player: Left 4 Dead
Best Technical Achievement: Spore
Original Score: Dead Space
Hand held: Professor Layton and the Curious Village
People's Choice: Call of Duty 4
Artistic Achievement: Little Big Planet
Best Action and Adventure: Fable II
Best Game: Super Mario Galaxy
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While it may not seem very obvious point blank, the women that are featured in video games have a large affect on the gaming business. Afterall, would the Dead or Alive games ever sell if it weren't for the girls' scant outfits? Why was Tomb Raider able to crank out so many sequels? Wasn't it Chun-li who forced hordes of gamers to spend loads of quarters in the arcade? These pixelated vixens hold a lot more weight in game sales than most gamers take note of. So, the question isn't their importance in games, but their portrayal. Would games sell if the girls were in normal outfits? Would the Mario have had nearly as much success if the roles were reversed? In this an analyzation of women's roles in games as well as their affect on the industry, we will see how they have come, and if they really do help sell games...
 
PART 2
 
The 90's is when women really started to get more exposure. The Final Fantasy games allowed for strong characters such as Terra, Rydia, and Celes to make a name for themselves; however they always played second fiddle to the male characters. In a bold step for fighting games, Chun-Li stepped into the fray in Street Fighter: World Warrior, showing the gaming community that she could take Ryu and just how powerful her thighs of steel really are. The awesome thing: both of the series' maintained staying power. Chun-Li is still one of the most easily recognizable characters in gaming, and any Final Fantasy game is a high profile release.
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With the news that Activision and Neversoft are to release Guitar Hero: Metallica, its a good time to look at how close the music and video game industries are now intrinsically linked. Its a win win relationship for both industries; the video game gets signed bands for background, menu music etc, many familiar, many not so familiar and retrospectively the bands, whether globe conquering metal gods like Metallica (this is me being biased as I am a rather big Metallica fan......) or newly signed bands, both get exposed to people that wouldn't ordinarily listen to certain genres of music and thus new fans are made, more albums bought, more gigs filled to capacity. The advent of games such as Guitar Hero and Rock Band has taken this symbiotic relationship to further heights – the music isn't just in the background anymore as you thunder round streets in supercharged race cars or while creating a formation in the Fifa series, now the music is the game and you are, to a degree, making that music.
Throughout both Guitar Hero and Rock Band editions, you get to play hundreds of songs, many that you wouldn't ordinarily go out of your way to listen to yet having to conquer those songs to continue and beat the game means more and more exposure for the bands concerned as you get further and further into the game, more songs are unlocked, and yet more exposure for the bands featured. Even guitar brands themselves are now getting in on the action with many replicas of famous guitar brands now available for the Guitar Hero/Rock Band series, Guitar Hero 3 actually comes with a replica Gibson and you can also purchase guitars in-game for your guitar wielding avatars to play. Read More  »

While it may not seem very obvious point blank, the women that are featured in video games have a large affect on the gaming business. Afterall, would the Dead or Alive games ever sell if it weren't for the girls' scant outfits? Why was Tomb Raider able to crank out so many sequels? Wasn't it Chun-li who forced hordes of gamers to spend loads of quarters in the arcade? These pixelated vixens hold a lot more weight in game sales than most gamers take note of. So, the question isn't their importance in games, but their portrayal. Would games sell if the girls were in normal outfits? Would the Mario have had nearly as much success if the roles were reversed? In this an analyzation of women's roles in games as well as their affect on the industry, we will see how they have come, and if they really do help sell games .
 
The typical idea of women in games is that they are objectified, used as sexual objects. I used to feel this way too, and I always used to question things like why Jill Valentine would be fighting zombies and Nemesis in a tube top and mini skirt. I mean, the more skin she shows, the more likely she is to get bitten, right?? Yes, this is the thing you often hear feminist gamers talking about, and although I do agree with them for the most part, I don't think women in games are treated nearly as poorly as made out. A look at gaming history over the past twenty-five years, the female counterparts of games have really come a long way from what they were to begin with. Although they are still used as a ploy to sell games (Rumble Roses anyone), there has been a definite increase in the usage of females in games, almost to the point where lack of a main female character may result in a loss of sales.
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Square Enix Inc., the creator of huge franchises such as Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy, and Dragon Quest, has announced that they have entered a new partnership with another company. Gas Powered Games Corp. and Square Enix are entering what they are calling a "strategic partnership".
To consummate their joining, the companies are working on a sequel to the Supreme Commander, an award winning strategy-based series. The partnership is one of the first steps in hopes to increase western development efforts for the global market. Considering how Enix has exclusively worked with only Japanese based companies before this, a location outside of Japan comes as a bit of a shock. However, working with western companies is the going to be one of the "cornerstones" in creating games geared toward North American and European markets.
"We see great opportunities in North American and European markets, both of which are expected to be maintaining sustainable growth over these coming years," said Yoichi Wada, president and a representative of Square Enix Ltd. "Therefore, it is crucial we create alliances with proven developers such as Gas Powered Games in order to serve these significant markets better by providing products and services in tune with customer tastes."
John Yamamoto, president and chief executive officer of Square Enix and Square Enix Ltd., Square Enix's sister company in U.K., says that, "We are extremely excited to begin working with Gas Powered Games' talented personnel and see this strategic partnership as a significant step in our efforts to bring Square Enix titles to a broader global audience." Read More  »