Gamertell

The upcoming graphic novel turned film The Watchmen will also be made into a videogame in 2009. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment announced July 24,2008, that the game will be based on the movie with an emphasis on the character personalities. Warner Bros. promises The Watchmen videogame will be an episodic experience available on Playstation Network, Xbox Live and PC.

Warner Bros. is taking a slightly different approach to producing a videogame tie-in to a movie. Given that history of movie-based games as being, well, less than stellar, Warner Bros. has decided to release at least two…

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For those of you still playing Rock Band, Harmonix has announced that The Cars’ 1978 album will be available for download for the PS3 (May 29, 2008) and Xbox 360 (May 27, 2008).

Each downloadable song will set you back $1.99 or $14.99 for all nine tunes in the Playstation Network or 160 and 1200 Microsoft Points, respectively, through Xbox Live.

The album, simply titled The Cars, includes nine songs…

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MTV is going to be hosting another “Gaming Day” on June 13, 2008. (Ooo, Friday the 13th!) All day MTV will feature programs related to video games and gaming. It’ll be a nice change of pace - because you know people can only take so much reality TV.

According to Gamefront.de, quite a bit of special programing is planned. Two amazing South Park episodes will be shown - “Guitar Queer-o” and “Make Love Not Warcraft.” Some other notable shows announced are a “MTV Videogame Special” discussing the history of games and consoles, women and games and video game movies, a “Digital Heroes” special which will talk about the most popular heroes and anti-heroes and “Digital Heroes: Strike Back,” which will have Jade Raymond as a special guest. (On a personal note: I love Babelfish.)

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Coming to theaters near you in 2009, two of Marvel Comics best known and most popular mutants will be getting their very own movie spin-offs to the X-Men trilogy, they being Wolverine and Magneto.

While rumors of the two X-Men stars getting their very own origin stories have been humming around the web and your local comic book store for the past four years, it looks like both will be in theaters very soon with a Wolverine movie being released first…

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While no official word has been given yet by either 20th Century Fox or Marvel, in an interview with MTV, Chris Evens (who played Johnny Storm, AKA the Human Torch in both Fantastic Four movies) said, “I’m pretty sure we won’t do [another] one” and “Fantastic Four. I’m assuming that one is a closed book.”

Marvel has already stated that, the Silver Surfer spinoff movie, which had already been rumored since early 2000, will focus on the origin of the Surfer and the monstrous cosmic being, Galactus, who disappointed legions of fans in…

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Good news for wannabe drummers - Harmonix has just announced that stand alone Rock Band drum kit bundles have shipped to US and Canadian retailers. The peripherals come with a copy of the game, and carry an MSRP of $79.99. The new package is available for the existing Rock Band platforms (PS2, PS3 and Xbox 360). According to the press release, drummers can participate in all of the usual Rock Band goodness, including local or online play, versus, score duel, and tug-o-war modes, and the company assured that the drum-only title will work with all DLC tracks.

Otherwise, Rock Band is available as stand alone software, or in the full bundle (which includes the game itself, a guitar controller, mic, and drum kit).

So, this is good news and all, but how about a guitar or mic only package? Or the Wii version of the game?

Read [GameSpy]

Makena Technologies and MTV have opened virtual skate parks based on popular television shows Rob and Big and Life of Ryan where visitors can create their own boards, perform various tricks on different ramps and discuss the hit shows via text messaging or voice chat.

Brought to the net by the makers of There.com, another virtual world community, virtual skateboarders will be able to participate in skating events online, join teams and enter into competitions. Players can create their 3D virtual selves as well as design their own skateboards, just about everything is…

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A lot of industry watchers were skeptical when Sony opted for the proprietary Universal Media Disc (UMD) as the PSP’s exclusive media storage format. And, as it later turned out, there doubts were not unfounded as Sony’s choice of format didn’t really go down well with the gamers for various reasons. However, a major factor for UMD’s notoriety was Sony’s inability to provide enough games and media for the PSP.  But the company is certainly rectifying its follies by making more content available, and now popular MTV programming will be available on the UMD.

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Digital content distribution is the order of Games 3.0, the current era of gaming, and Microsoft was one of the earliest adopters of this model with its Xbox Live service. Microsoft is ensuring that there is no dearth of content on Live, be it games or any other media. It has signed a major $500 million deal with Viacom, which will make more downloadable games and movies available on Xbox Live and MSN.

A lot of content from Viacom’s media bouquet has already been available on Live for download, including content from Comedy Central, MTV Networks and Paramount. This 5-year deal will open the floodgates for more Viacom TV and movies on MSN.com, and Xbox Live users can soon expect to download BET Network content as well.

This fresh deal is not only about content but will go a long way in strengthening the relationship between the two companies. Under the agreement, Microsoft is going to provide its Atlas AdManager solution to Viacom, and it will heavily plug MTV and BET Network award shows. Viacom is also looking to become a more prominent casual games publisher across Microsoft’s game platforms.

Read [Next-Gen]

Rock Band and Guitar Hero are two of the leading musical video game franchise and, just because they are both musical games, don’t expect the competition to be nice. In fact the competition seems to be quite fierce with the developer and publisher of Rock Band, MTV and Harmonix respectively, accusing the rival publisher, Activision, of blocking a patch aimed at making the Guitar Hero III controller (PS3) compatible with Rock Band (PS3).

MTV told Next-Gen that Harmonix had handed over a patch to Sony for approval around two weeks ago and it was subsequently approved for release on December 4, 2007. He added that this patch was supposed to make the Guitar Hero III controller compatible with the PS3 version of Rock Band, however, Activision didn’t like the entire idea and vetoed it.

This patch was supposed to be a stopgap arrangement as Harmonix has plans for individual Rock Band peripherals – currently none are available. So the GHIII controller could have provided an easy alternative to gamers, who have to buy the entire $169.99 Rock Band bundle if they want an extra guitar peripheral. Activision hasn’t reacted to the allegations so far.

Read [Next-Gen] Also Read [Kotaku]