Namco Bandai has registered trademarks in Japan for Pac-Man Kart Rally — and Pac-Man Rally Kart. It just couldn’t decide! Siliconera notes that the previous Pac-Man kart racer, Pac-Man World Rally (not Rally World) was never released in Japan, so if this one is intended for Japan, it’ll be the nation’s first Pac-Man vs. ghosts racer.
As for what Namco Bandai will use this trademark for, we have no real information. It makes sense for Namco Bandai to be thinking of releasing new Pac games on the 30th anniversary of the arcade original. Were we to guess, we would point out that there have been a lot of iPhone games out of Namcolately, and Konami recently put a mascot kart racer on the platform.
Recently two different movies have included their own versions of the world famous Leeroy Jenkins video in their DVD extras. Year One is the first — the video, which you can watch after the link below, isn’t a perfect reproduction, but it is funny to see Vinnie Jones and the other actors (including McLovin as Leeroy) try to wrap all of the WoW jargon and nonsense jokes from the original into their idea of a scene that makes sense.
There’s another Leeroy Jenkins related extra on the Monsters vs. Aliens DVD — this one’s just a set of storyboards, but it does feature the voice cast, including Kiefer Sutherland and Seth Rogen, doing their own little version of the scene. It’s not quite as faithful as the Year One version, but it does feature Rogen doing the Leeroy yell, and that’s worth watching by itself. You can watch that video after the break as well.
Both are worth a chuckle — it’s wild to see a meme like Leeroy sneak out into mainstream media.
After numerous trailers for the upcoming Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition’s zany costumes, Capcom has finally released a trailer focusing on both of the extra DLC story chapters. “Lost in Nightmares” takes place before the events of Resident Evil 5 and includes a mansion inspired by the setting of the very first RE game. “Desperate Escape” takes place during the end of Resident Evil 5, as Jill and Josh race to save Chris and Sheva from the endgame’s exploding volcano.
With Jill serving as the “main character” for the additional content, the Gold Edition expansion looks like a genuine sequel, a la Resident Evil 3: Nemesis. Most importantly, we’re glad to see Jill’s masterful unlocking skills put to good use in this trailer. The first batch of RE5 DLC will be available on February 17.
We thought we’d pass along a courteous reminder from Activision informing the gaming community that Guitar Hero: Metallica began rocking store shelves today. If you haven’t found current full-band simulators to be punishing enough, Metallica promises to deliver with an “Expert +” mode, double kick pedals, and guitar solos capable of turning even the sturdiest fingers into tiny puddles of red goo. If you’ve got $59.99 lying around (or $49.99 for the Wii version, $39.99 for the PS2), you can simulate “riding the lightning”* with unparalleled accuracy.
*Warning: Riding lightning can lead to unintended health consequences in the groin region, including serious unsightly burns and impotence. Consult your doctor before deciding to mount any arcs of electricity.
Zg thinks, quite unreasonably, that 99% of players in the game are “keyboard turners”– people who use the keyboard to turn their characters rather than holding down the right mouse button and moving the camera to turn. It’s hardly anywhere near 99%, but given that WoW is a game that attracts casual players (a.k.a. people who aren’t experienced videogame players), I wouldn’t be surprised if there are more people in Azeroth than in, say, Counter-Strike, who use the keyboard to do most of their navigating.
Personally, I’m one of those that come from a CS background, and so I use the mouse for pretty much all movement whenever possible– I’ll often just hold down both mouse buttons if I need to run for a short distance (and anything longer gets the run lock key from me). I also think that circle strafing is pretty much the best game mechanic ever made, but I know that there are those who disagree with me– back when I worked at Gamestop, one of our employees there just couldn’t seem to wrap his head around the fact that he should turn and move at the same time, and as a result just got dominated in our Halo matches.
But habits are a powerful thing, and so keyboard turning is probably around to stay. I won’t go so far as to say that fast-turning with a mouse is required to be a good player, but certainly that kind of reflex is required to be a really great player. So keyboard turners, pick up that mouse and start looking around– you’ll thank me later.
This week’s Rock Band Weekly comes a day earlier than normal, courtesy of the Rock BandCommunity Zine, which has announced that next week will be an Alice-travaganza thanks to an Alice Cooper six pack. Not only that, but four of the six songs are live tracks and, if Alice Cooper isn’t your thing, there’s also a Taking Back Sunday three pack for the taking. Prices aren’t revealed, but we don’t expect them to deviate much from the norm. Come on, a live version of “School’s Out” has got to be worth a punt, right?
Alice Cooper 6-pack
“Billion Dollar Babies (Live)”
“I’m Eighteen (Live)”
“School’s Out (Live)”
“Under My Wheels (Live)”
“Poison”
“Vengeance Is Mine”
Taking Back Sunday 3-pack
“Liar (It Takes One To Know One)”
“MakeDamnSure”
“What’s It Feel Like To Be A Ghost?”
All tracks are masters and will be available for download next Tuesday and Thursday for Xbox 360 and PS3, respectively. Rock Band Wiikly will wii-lease its plans on Monday.
Today is Groundhog Day. I would recommend you all go watch the like-titled movie with Bill Murray in it while doing your dailies. A quick scan of my TV guide reveals its on just about every cable network. For those of you that haven’t seen the movie, I’ll give you a spoiler: Bill Murray repeats the same day, Groundhog Day, over and over again, somewhere in the neighborhood of 3,650 times.
While the game play itself can be very fun and exciting, no one can really argue that at times it’s nothing more than a long grind. This is okay to some extent, but has the game moved too far into grind mode?
There’s a lot of reasons to think that it has. First, we have the dailies that for most players are their primary source of income (in the game, we hope not in the real world). Every morning I wake up about an hour early just to hit the dailies on a couple alts to make my gold. It’s really a necessity for me; there is no way that I could afford the two hundred plus a week in repair bills without it.
Brash Entertainment was promoting some of the movie based licenses in their pipeline yesterday and, unsurprisingly, they discussed one of their biggest guns, a game adaptation of the Saw horror series. Brash’s co-founder Mitch Davis let slip that the game (reportedly headed for PS3 and Xbox 360) is being developed by Zombie, the studio behind America’s Army.
This would be their first now-gen game, but we guess everybody’s got to start somewhere. Hopefully all questions will be answered when the game’s released in October 2009.
The 2008 Blizzcon is coming rapidly, and with it, of course, comes exclusive Blizzcon swag. In addition to the goody bag, the Blizzcon store will also be open for business, and Blizzard’s previewing the loot you can buy. Among the highlights:
You may remember that the goody bags will come with either an inflatable Frostmourne or an Inflatable Paladin-in-a-Bubble. Luckily, if you don’t get the one you want, you can buy it at the store.
It ain’tUma Thurman (thank goodness), but Batman’s plant-loving adversary, Poison Ivy, has been revealed as a baddie in the upcoming action title, Batman: Arkham Asylum. A new trailer (posted after the break) for Rocksteady and Eidos’ impressive Arkham features the green thumb merging with a giant piranha plant with the intention of killing The Batman. Kill Batman, huh? Why hasn’t anyone ever thought of that before?
Namco registers Japanese trademark for ‘Pac-Man Kart Rally’ originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 20 Jan 2010 10:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Zg thinks, quite unreasonably, that 
Today is 
