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Unable to wait an entire work day, I turned on my 360 and downloaded the Spring Update this morning. The process took all of thirty seconds. At first glance you wouldn’t know anything was different. Visit a few blades and you’ll get the idea pretty quickly. Without reiterating what you all already know, it’s pretty nice. This feels more like what we were promised back in November. On the whole, it just makes things more seamless. Which is great, because seams really suck.

Hey, Xbox Team, for the next update, let my downloads keep running when the system is off.

I opened up my RSS Reader (a blogger’s best friend) and every post from every site was about the same thing: the upcoming Ultra-Mega-Super Xbox LIVE Update ™. So, I might as well mention it here. Long story short, when you wake up tomorrow morning, it should be available for download. So, that’s nice.

 —via everyone and their (blogging) dog. And Major Nelson.

A new report states that the PS3 will initially include the original PS2 chipset for emulation of PS2 and PS1 games. This statement goes against Ken Kutaragi’s previous statements that emulation would be handled through software a la the 360. While this will no doubt allow for smoother emulation, it’s probably also one of the factors in the PS3’s rather enormous price tag.

 The chips will apparently be removed in further iterations of the PS3 hardware once the software emulation is ironed out.

—via Evil Avatar

Some fresh new shots of Dead Rising surfaced today. I must say, these look significantly better than in the past. The lighting in particular has improved dramatically. Also, the above shot is either an amazing coincidence, or someone at Capcom really loves Pee-Wee Herman.

Find the shots at Xboxyde.

According to Louisiana news website 2theAdvocate, Louisiana Sheriff’s Capt. Spense Dilworth seized videogames from the home of a teenage murder suspect, Edward Neher, believed to have slain a West Feliciana Parish man on Tuesday. That in itself isn’t too disturbing. What’s disturbing is why this officer decided to seize said games. The reason: Jack Thompson told him to. That’s right, everyone’s favorite zany jackass suggested a link to violent videogames. According to published reports, Nehrer killed the man because he wouldn’t allow him to borrow his car. Thompson says this follows ”the same scenario in Grand Theft Auto.” John Bruce also had this to say:

“Nobody shoots anybody in the face unless you’re a hit man or a video gamer”

To put this in (sarcastic) context, I give you Kotaku’s Eliza Gauger:

“Man, I hate that one mission in GTA, you know the one where you’re trying to borrow that guy’s car and he won’t let you, so you just totally stomp his ass and blow his face off and score mad points. I always have to tank cheat my way through that one.

As a hilarious aside, the shooter was home alone because his mother, the exquisitely-named Happy Morris, was booked last week on “simple battery of a juvenile and unauthorized entry into an inhabited dwelling”. The specifics? She broke into a house and slapped a fourteen-year-old girl.

There’s undoubtedly a video game at the root of that particularly heinous crime, too. Nobody slaps fourteen-year-old girls in the face unless you’re a Hot Dog on a Stick employee or a dating sim enthusiast.”

In conclusion, there are now three constants in this world: death, taxes, and Jack Thompson wackiness.

—via Kotaku. Read the news article here.

As you might infer from the above picture, Cubed3 conducted an interview with Opera Man Executive Vice President with Opera for Devices, Scott Hendrick. The interview covers a few different topics, though—as usual—the most popular answer is “We can’t comment at this time.” Still, there are some juicy bits here and there. For instance, the Opera browser will be embedded on Wii’s memory itself. No extra software is required. This will allow Opera to be run at any time, even used within games. Exactly how this could be implemented in a game design is anyone’s guess.

Find the interview here.

 

Behold! A screen from Command & Conquer 3! I found it on Kotaku! Exclamation!

The chaps over at Eurogamer are batting 1000 today. They have a preview of both the upcoming F.E.A.R. port for the 360 as well as the PC expansion, Extraction Point. This is one that I’m really waiting to play. As I’ve mentioned before, my PC is woefully inadequate for games that came out since, oh, 2000. Suffice it to say, it’s probably time for me to upgrade.

My computer’s shortcomings aside, it’s a nice little preview. It allays some—ahem—fears about the game’s graphical quality compared to the PC. The preview also details some of the new single player content, most notably the Instant Action mode which has players blasting through as many enemies as possible. High scores will be posted on LIVE. Be warned, there are spoilers for those of you who haven’t finished the original. There is a warning though, so you can read up to a certain point without worry. Check it out right here.

On the outside chance that anyone gives a crap, there are new maps available for Perfect Dark Zero. What’s that? Nobody cares? Oh, well never mind then.

Eurogamer sat down with Keiji Inafune, creator of Rock Mega Man, Onimusha, and the upcoming Lost Planet for 360. He spoke at length about the arctic 3rd person action game. He also had some interesting things to say about game development in general. Speaking on developing games for a worldwide market, he had this to say:

“The way that most Japanese developers used to work was of course that you’d focus on what you know. So we’d always focus on Japanese players. But we’re adapting to the international market, and trying to make games thinking of gamers overall – we’re not looking at it in terms of national groups any more, because we can’t afford to. Right now I’d say Asia has different tastes to the rest of the world, so there’s this gap that’s making it tough for us, but there are games that everybody likes and we need to start focusing on that as an industry.”

Check out Eurogamer for the full interview.