There was a story in Asahi Shimbun, one of Japan’s largest newspapers, from 70-year-old Kuniko Tsusaka who recounted how her mother always played Tetris on a Game Boy, but when she turned 95, it suddenly stopped working. It was her third Game Boy since she started playing, but unfortunately, there are no stores in Chiba selling a new or used unit, nor were any shops able to fix the broken device. Tsusaka’s son knew that Nintendo has had excellent customer service, and the rest is history. Read more for an unboxing video and additional information.
Disney’s The Mandalorian may appear to shoot on location in many scenes, but in reality, they’re using digital sets, in addition to practical, in-camera effects. Epic Games stepped in to develop an innovating technique combining digital sets projected on LED displays with the Unreal game engine for some amazing real-time camera trickery rendered with NVIDIA GPUs. Read more for a video and additional information.
HTC’s Vive and Vive Cosmos line of PC-tethered VR headsets are well known in the gaming community, but now, the company is looking to expand into 5G cellular devices. First up, we have Project Proton (above), which is essentially a display headset that pairs with a portable external device for processing and connectivity. It will most likely utilize passthrough video, which is live video overlaid with virtual elements. Read more for a video and additional information about the other headsets.
Hasbro is bringing back the Tiger Electronics LCD handhelds that many remember from the early 90s, and rather than have swappable games, each one was based on a character or franchise / series, like Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, Sonic the Hedgehog, Transformers, etc. This Fall, the company will be released four LCD games: The Little Mermaid, Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Transformers: Generation 2 and X-Men Project X. Read more for a video on the originals and additional information.
Hasbro’s Monopoly Gamer Sonic The Hedgehog Edition lets you move around the game board as Sonic, Tails, Amy, or Knuckles, while buying iconic properties such as Planet Wisp and Rooftop Run, all for $15.89, today only, originally $24.99. Pass go to trigger a cooperative boss fight, drop to collect rings on board spaces, earn chaos Emeralds as well as Chao tokens, and activate characters’ Unique powers. Product page. Read more for a hands-on video review and additional information.
Despite all the early issues with Sonic not looking like his video game counterpart, Paramount’s latest movie dominated global box office charts after debuting to $100 million worldwide. Filming took place between September and October 2018 in Ladysmith and Parksville, both on Vancouver Island. The film was initially scheduled to be released in the United States on November 8, 2019, but after an overwhelmingly negative reaction to the first trailer, Paramount delayed the film to redesign Sonic. Read more for two videos, including the after credit scene.
Photo credit: Andrew Borman
StarCraft fans rejoice! This unreleased military science fiction stealth-action video game previously under development by Blizzard Entertainment, but several delays in development caused the developers to move back the release date and the game has not yet materialized, that is until…today. Apparently, this leaked footage is from an Xbox dev kit and grabbed from a modded Xbox 360. Read more for the clip and additional information.
Microsoft has been known to create their own special Xbox One designs, but this time, they’ve teamed up with Nike for a console boasting a custom red finish, complete with the iconic Jordan elephant print and matching red Jumpman controller. The design was inspired by the new Air Jordan III Retro Unite sneaker, which is set for release during the NBA All-Star weekend in Chicago. Read more for an unboxing video and additional information.
Dating sims are nothing new, but Bloom Digital Media’s Later Daters might be the strangest one yet. Put simply, it’s an episodic game series based around senior dating that takes place inside a retirement living facility. Players will be able to customize their character’s look, name, romance history, gender, and even their pet. Read more for the announcement trailer and additional information.
Want a piece of gaming history unlike any other? Then you might have to pony up a hefty amount for this Nintendo PlayStation prototype from 1992. Not even a full day in and the bidding has already reached $6,000+ with 22-days left to go. It’s allegedly the last remaining prototype of the 200 that were made from the failed joint-venture between Sony and Nintendo. As you can see, there’s a cartridge slot as well as a CD-ROM drive that was meant to play disc-based media and presumably video games as well. Read more for a video and additional information.