Video Game Awards 2011

At tonight's Video Game Awards, Sony and Spike finally quit teasing us and formally announced The Last of Us, the next game from Uncharted developers Naughty Dog. Set in an America ravaged by a horrifying fungal infection that has left a few survivors in a desperate struggle for survival.

The trailer indicates a very Uncharted-looking bunch of people running from some very 28 Days Later looking infected. The Last of Us is due exclusively for the PlayStation 3 in 2012.

Konami's Metal Gear Solid: Rising is now Platinum Game's Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. Raiden, apparently channeling his unstoppable child soldier roots, has gone fully cyborg ninja in order to hack, slash and grotesquely dismember every single thing that exists.

Before this year's Spike TV Video Game Awards properly started, the event's pre-show debuted a live-action, non-gameplay trailer for Tekken Tag Tournament 2. Aside from being well choreographed and remarkably stylish, the trailer offers little insight into the title other than the fact that it will be coming to unknown consoles sometime during the 2012 holiday season.

Winners of the 2011 Spike Video Game Awards

GAME OF THE YEAR

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

STUDIO OF THE YEAR

Bethesda Game Studios

CHARACTER OF THE YEAR

The Joker – Batman: Arkham City

VIDEO GAME HALL OF FAME AWARD

"The Legend of Zelda"

GAMER GOD AWARD

Blizzard Entertainment

BEST XBOX 360 GAME

Batman: Arkham City

BEST PLAYSTATION 3 GAME

Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

BEST Wii GAME

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

BEST PC GAME

Portal 2

BEST HANDHELD/MOBILE GAME

Super Mario 3D Land

BEST SHOOTER

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3

BEST ACTION ADVENTURE GAME

Batman: Arkham City

BEST RPG

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

BEST MULTI-PLAYER

Portal 2

BEST INDIVIDUAL SPORTS GAME

Fight Night Champion

BEST TEAM SPORTS GAME

NBA 2K12

BEST DRIVING GAME

Forza Motorsport 4

BEST FIGHTING GAME

Mortal Kombat

BEST MOTION GAME

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

BEST INDEPENDENT GAME

Minecraft

BEST ADAPTED VIDEO GAME

Batman: Arkham City

BEST SONG IN A GAME

"Build that Wall" (Zia's Theme) by Darren Korb – Bastion

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE

Bastion

BEST GRAPHICS

Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

BEST PERFORMANCE BY A HUMAN MALE

Stephen Merchant as Wheatley – Portal 2

BEST PERFORMANCE BY A HUMAN FEMALE

Ellen McLain as GLaDOS – Portal 2

BEST DOWNLOADABLE GAME

Bastion

BEST DLC

Portal 2 Peer Review

MOST ANTICIPATED GAME

Mass Effect 3

GAMETRAILERS.COM TRAILER OF THE YEAR

Assassin's Creed: Revelations – E3 2011 Trailer

EA SPORTS NFL BLITZ DIGITAL COVER ATHLETE

Ray Rice

LP Underground 11 is here!

Linkin Park has launched the 11th edition of their fan club LP Underground. They have changed the entire website with many new features that the fans have helped shape thanks to all feedback from last year. The LPU has gotten a brand new members-only online community, an exclusive merchandise package and additional benefits, including LPU members' request for early admission into Linkin Park shows.

And the annual LPU CD will also be available for all the members to hear. You can buy the new LPU11 music on both digital and physical format. The LPU11 CD is filled with unreleased demos from Hybrid Theory to A Thousand Suns. Some of the songs on this CD are early versions of familiar songs, such as the “In The End” demo. Other songs on this CD never made it on a Linkin Park album and remained unfinished and in a raw form. All the songs represent the journey it takes to create an album as a whole.

The LPU11 $60 Annual Membership includes:

-A brand new website and online community EXCLUSIVELY for LPU members

-Membership package including a t-shirt, membership laminate and lanyard, LPU flag, and an earplug case and earplugs

-FREE worldwide shipping for LPU11 Annual merchandise packages

-New benefits including early entry to Linkin Park shows and downloads of LPU-TV episodes

-All existing benefits are still included such as access to meet & greets, presale tickets and invitations to LPU Summits, exclusive downloads and more

To celebrate the launch of LPU11, when you purchase the $60 LPU11 Annual membership package during the next 11 days (until Friday, November 25), you can add on the physical LPU11 CD for just $1.11 with FREE shipping. Just select the Annual Membership + LPU11 CD option in the dropdown on the purchase page.

CURRENT LPUX MEMBERS: Your LPU account is active until 1 year after you joined. Your LPU Password has been temporarily set to match your email address. Please login to your account and reset your password by going to "Manage Account", then clicking to "Account Settings". You may now specify your desired password.

If you already have an account on a different site that is powered by ground(ctrl), your password will be your usual password to login.

Linkin Park Underground Eleven (track listing)

01. "YO" (MTM Demo)

02. "Slip" (1998 Unreleased Hybrid Theory Demo)

03. "Soundtrack" (Meteora Demo)

04. "In The End" (Demo)

05. "Program" (Meteora Demo)

06. "Bang Three" (What I’ve Done Original Demo)

07. "Robot Boy" (Test Mix, Optional Vocal Take)

08. "Broken Foot" (Meteora Demo)

09. "Esaul" (A Place For My Head Demo)

10. "Blue" (1998 Unreleased Hybrid Theory Demo)

To learn more, visit LPUnderground.com.

Payday: The Heist announced for PS3 & PC

It seems that the folks at Overkill Software are fans of The Dark Knight, because their newly-announced Payday: The Heist greatly resembles The Joker's bank robbery from the film. We're not sure if clown masks are a necessity, but this squad-based team shooter will have you picking classes, robbing banks, and taking hostages.

Here are some features, as outlined by Sony:

• Six High-Intensity Heists: Whether you're blowing the roof off a building to extract a safe via helicopter or emptying the vault at the First World Bank, these action-packed heists will have players on edge and always checking their six.
• Interactive Co-op Gameplay: Whether AI or live, your crew of four must operate as one to bring get the "big score." Sharing extra ammo and med kits, helping regen wounded partners, guarding key positions, taking civilian hostages or cracking through various security measures - it's all for one and one for all.
• Endless Replayability: Dynamic environments, adaptive enemy behavior,shifting entry points, FBI agents repelling down on ropes through the skylights, SWAT teams crashing through the windows and special units crawling through the ventilation shafts makes each play-through of every heist a unique fight.
• Massive Character Progression Tree: Players choose a specialty - assault, sharpshooter or support - to gain weapons and equipment that fit their preferred form of violence. Unlock trip mines, silenced pistols, machine guns and much, much more.
• Shout Out Button: Players need to be vocal and shout commands and directions to the co-op crew, as well as hostages and the police if they want to survive to spend their cut of the take.
• Hostage Trading: Hostages can be a lifeline. If anyone in the crew is taken into custody, trade hostages to get crew members back and increase the odds of completing your objectives.
• PlayStation® or PC: For keyboard and mouse marksman, as well as handheld controller snipers, PAYDAY is the uber-FPS for a high intensity shooter fix.
• More DLC: Additional heists, weapons and equipment means PAYDAY - a digitally distributed AAA quality title for less than half the price of a retail game - is total OVERKILL.

Hopefully we'll get our hands on the game at E3 next week. In the meantime, check out the trailer below.

Konami Reveals HD Collections

In what's sure to be good news for Konami fans, the company announced in its pre-E3 press video that it will be releasing revamped HD collections of some of its most storied franchises: Metal Gear Solid, Zone of the Enders, and Silent Hill.

The Metal Gear collection features Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker.

The Zone of the Enders package will feature Zone of the Enders and Zone of the Enders 2.

The Silent Hill collection will include Silent Hill 2 and 3.

All the games included in these packs will receive full HD upgrades, including new art, textures, and sound. Also, achievements and trophies are being added. For Peace Walker, you'll be able to transfer your saves between the console and handheld version. These collections will be available for both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

The Metal Gear Solid HD collection will be out this November, with Zone of the Enders to follow in 2012. No specific date was given for the Silent Hill HD collection.

GDC 2011 (PS3 news)

I've gathered news about what Sony revealed at this years GDC. There weren't any big surprises this year but at least a few new interesting details about upcoming PlayStation 3 exclusive games. And some news about Sony's new handheld device NGP.

inFamous 2 "Play, Create, Share"

And just like that, inFamous 2 joins Sony's "Play, Create, Share" suite of games by allowing players to make their own missions. Developer Sucker Punch unveiled the surprising new feature at GDC. Using the new creation tool, you'll be able to create "any" kind of mission. Creators have "access to the same set of characters, creatures and props" that the designers have.

A "limited" public beta will be available in April. Details on how to get in will be announced on the game's official website in two weeks, on March 14th.

Resistance 3 multiplayer details

Insomniac Games has dropped the first details on the multiplayer component in Resistance 3, and those hoping the developer would reach MAG levels of simultaneous combatants after the 60-player Resistance 2 should probably be seated. Rather than escalate, the game's online offering will be more intimate, maxing out at 16 players -- eight on eight in any mode.

The dev says the move is about making the competitive experience more "personal" -- not for any technical reasons. After playing a few matches at tonight's preview event, we found the sole map being demoed, a prison in the Republic of Chad (all the multiplayer stages are set outside the US), nicely sized for the player count. Admittedly, the action was considerably tame compared to the massive battles of the previous game in the series.

Insomniac revealed -- and we tried -- some active and passive multiplayer abilities, the former represented by health/ammo drops and an electrified shield; the latter are always-active "stat buffs," such as making yourself more accurate when shooting while running. The final element we saw was the Berserk, which is rewarded for kill streaks and made our Chimeran character temporarily invisible.

Objective-based modes are to be revealed later, giving us hope that the developer has some fresh ideas lined up for them.

PlayStation 3 stats

During the PlayStation Network Analysis panel at GDC, SCEA digital distribution manager Pierre Gravereau provided some platform stats to attendees, revealing worldwide sales of 47.9 million PS3 consoles. More than 80 percent of consoles are connected to the internet and have spawned 70 million PSN accounts.

Gravereau boasted about the success of PSN in 2010, saying traffic to the PlayStation Store increased by 60 percent compared to the previous year and Sony subsequently saw a 70 percent spike in revenue. Even without exact hard figures, it's quite a dramatic upstick.

NGP at GDC 11

This slide, shown during Sony's Next Generation Portable GDC panel, shed some light on NGP's still-mysterious storage details. Unlike the experimental PSP Go, the NGP doesn't sport any internal storage. Things like save data and patches will be stored on the actual game cards themselves which, notably, will be offered in both 2GB and 4GB varieties, with 5 to 10 percent of the storage allocated to the aforementioned data. On a 2GB card, that leaves 1.8GB to 1.9GB for game data; on a 4GB card, that leaves 3.6GB to 3.8GB.

That puts the NGP's game media storage size between that of the PSP's, whose UMD discs range from 900MB to 1.8GB, and the PS3's, whose Blu-ray discs hold up to 50GB, though "many PS3 games" (i.e., multiplatform titles) remain around 9GB, thanks to the Xbox 360's DVD-ROM size limitation. Of course, this leaves the NGP with far more storage per game than a "10MB phone game."

But that's not all! As previously suggested, the NGP has another storage option, simply called "removable memory" in this presentation. "Cards will be large to support a variety of downloaded content," the slide says. This includes games available over PlayStation Network; and, thankfully, Sony says it's implementing a "single submission for both formats" to streamline the process of getting games approved for both card-based and downloadable releases.

We're hopeful this streamlined process obviates current embarassments like the continued absence of high-profile games in the PSN catalog of PSP titles, which has crippled the appeal of Sony's PSP Go handheld.

Linkin Park to play in Sweden June 14, 2011

Linkin Park played in 2007 in front of a cheering crowd on the Globe stage. Now four years later the Swedish fans have waited enough. Linkin Park returns on June 14 to the Ericsson Globe with "A Thousand Suns: World Tour" stage experience. 

Linkin Park has toured the world and gained a reputation as one of the best live bands in the world. Linkin Park visited Sweden in 2007 at a crowded concert in the Ericsson Globe.

For over ten years, Linkin Park has dominated the melodic nu-metal scene and their album "Hybrid Theory", "Meteora", "Minutes To Midnight" and "A Thousand Suns" has sold over 50 million albums. The band has also won two Grammys and been nominated four times, and won Best Rock Video and Viewer's Choice Award at the MTV Video Awards.

Linkin Park has made several world tours and faced tens of thousands of people in arenas all over the world and has earned its reputation as one of the world's best live bands. After the cancellation of three gigs in Sweden, they finally came to the Globe Arena in Stockholm on May 25th 2007 and made the entire arena scream.

We are very proud to present one of the world's biggest alternative rock bands on Swedish soil again when Linkin Park visits Ericsson Globe for a second time.

Support act is Middle Class Rut.

Duke Nukem Forever coming to PS3 May 6, 2011

It has finally come to the day when we get the real release date for Duke Nukem Forever! I've waited for this day forever. We didn't just get the release date, we got a new trailer also. The next step is to play a demo on PlayStation 3.

Watch the new trailer a the bottom of this post, it's awesome! 

Duke Nukem Forever has been in development for a little while. To give you a sense of just how much time has passed since it was first announced, Gran Turismo--a series known for its punctuality--saw releases 1-5 hit shelves in the intervening years. Skepticism turned to actual anticipation last September, when Gearbox unveiled Duke Nukem Forever in playable form at PAX. OK, so the game was really, really, real. A lingering question remained, however: When would we be able to finally take this thing home and play it?

As it turns out, we now know when that's happening.

"Somehow the guys at Game Informer magazine discovered Duke Nukem Forever's launch date before I did," joked Randy Pitchford, president of Gearbox Software and executive producer of Duke Nukem Forever. "But I cannot imagine any better video game news source team than Game Informer to reveal the moment of truth for the most inconceivable, incorrigible and inspiring turn around story in the history of the video game industry – the coming of Duke Nukem Forever on May 3, 2011."

“The moment fans all over the world have been waiting for is almost here,” says Christoph Hartmann, president of 2K. “May 3, 2011 marks Duke’s return as he unleashes his brash and brutally honest wit on the world. His return is going to be epic and one that will make video gaming history!”

May 3 is the North American release date. May 6 is worldwide. Check it out below.

Happy New Year 2011!

I'm saying the same things as last year, I can't believe it's New Year's Eve again! It feels sometimes as if I just wrote a blog post for 2009. 

2010 has been a traumatic year for me. I lost my dad in August, and I've been very sad and depressed ever since. Everyone says that "life goes on" and it does. However, I feel it's very hard to let go of my father. May he rest in peace.

The year had some good moments also. I've played a lot of video games and watched many movies and TV-shows. I've done everything I love and that's what I want with my life, to feel happy.

Maybe I haven't done exactly like I should. I've planned to do so many things, and I just pushed it to the next day! That's one thing I will try to change in 2011.

This New Year's Eve I have for the first time celebrated without my parents, better late than never. It was a lot of fun! I didn't drink so much because I don't like to drink alcohol. I also had to be sober because I was going to fire off some Fireworks like I do every year. They were very nice!

And now I'm looking forward to 2011 with new video games, movies, TV-show and other fun stuff I like to do.

Happy New Year!