Sega may not be into making consoles anymore, but look! Zippo has gone and picked up the slack for them. Sort of. Check these out - Zippo has rolled out two new designs for us gamers: the old Sega consoles now bring a different kind of heat into your lifestyle.

It's been 13 years in the making, but now it's finally here. Yes, the 1996 Sega Saturn/ PS1/ 3DO original, Konami produced, Kojima-created Policenauts has finally completed its English localization process. Again, FINALLY.

Sony Computer Entertainment president Kaz Hirai was recently interviewed and was asked what he thinks of the console war right now. Hirai admitted that the PlayStation 3 may still be behind its rivals, but after 10 years, he says they'll be the ones laughing. More details after the jump.

Get ready to blast off with the Rocketmen once again as Capcom recently announced that the next chapter in this downloadable action series will be arriving on the Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network next week. Rocketmen: It Came from Uranus will feature three new maps, as well as several new toys to zap all the new enemies with. For more details regarding this upcoming game, read all bout it in our full article.

 Waiting for Sega releases in Europe? January has a lot of goodies in the bag for everyone. Condemned 2 (Xbox 360, PS3), Superstar Tennis, Viking: Battle of Asgard (Xbox 360, PS3), and NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams are all coming soon. See the detailed version to find out when these will drop and what else is inbound.

We have reported to you numerous 2007 predictions about gaming, specifically about the next-gen wars. We've heard about what analyst Michael Pachter had to say and even ordinary people like Benjamin Willcock said his piece about the matter.

Count this bit as something off-topic. European website, Games.Blogo featured a different take on the Wii vs. PS3 vs. Xbox 360 scenario. How different? Well, they consulted the expertise of Astrologer, Elizabeth Hathaway, and she came up with an astrological analysis based on the horoscopes of Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony. Well, we told you that it's a different take. Here's what Ms. Hathaway had to say (cue weird, gypsy music):

On Sony and the PS3:

Sony's sun in Taurus in sextile with Saturn reflects a culture where hard work is inherent to its success: strong work ethic. Sony makes durable products. The PlayStation is in fact a little black box – and this is a very Saturnal earthy image. The product is sturdy – designed to last...Sony's weakness is probably that it is not inclined to "change a winning team". This is it's Achilles' heel. At the top - there will be a conservative culture.

On Nintendo and the Wii:

Nintendo is intelligent, good in positioning itself on the market, and it makes attractive products. There is a lot of attention given to the form (Venus in Libra)...Then the Wii, this launch horoscope once again shows- in this case a particularly strong Scorpio theme. This is interesting, because Scorpio is a fixed sign and the Nintendo Wii is an active product. Gamers are used to sitting down to play, with the Wii, you have to get out of your chair...Also Nintendo's birth chart shows that the company has its progressed Sun in square with its radix Saturn. This suggests that in general, the company will have to work hard – very hard – to book results.

On Microsoft and the Xbox 360:

This could be a good year for Microsoft. Jupiter's entry into Sagittarius heralds a year in which Jupiter will transit Microsoft's radix Sun and Mars. This shows expansion, activity, and optimism. Sagittarius is good at adjusting to new circumstances and will aim for big, bigger, biggest...Success will come slowly – Microsoft needs to take a long breath. It will take them some time to establish the Xbox 360. People need to connect with the product first. But it will come for sure.

So in the end, who will emerge victorious? She mentioned that Sony has the lead, but in the long run, all of them have something different to offer. But the horoscope that sits most uncomfortably with the product is the Wii. Are these things something to consider? Well, we all have different beliefs so tell us what you think.

There's a lot of grief in Europe, North America, and Japan over the recently-reported setbacks in Sony's PS3 launch, from being postponed to spring next year (Europe), from initial numbers being cut (North America), and from initial numbers being cut way back (Japan). As the streets run red with blood from both the PS3's jilted supporters and vindictive skeptics, it pays to calm down (on all sides of this so-called "console war"), take a step back and see things from a bigger, and historical, perspective. Botched launches are a dime a dozen in this industry, and they happen to the best of the lot as often as they do to the worst.

Even the most recent launch, that of the Xbox 360, had its own share of problems. Today, Microsoft's game console is running steady - all the more given that its closest competitors have yet to launch - and in most accounts, smoothly. Its launch was anything but flawless in the eyes of some observers: first with having only a limited number of units available for the launch, then with hardware problems from hardware issues and that Ring of Death popping up unexpectedly, to disk scratching issues (although the latter was admittedly caused by users who didn't pay attention to the manual).

But such things are not new to the industry. Like what's written above, it happens to the best of us, it happens to the worst of us. Even the legendary PlayStation 2 had a just-as-limited initial North American release of 500,000 units. Even the revered Sega Dreamcast had hardware problems at launch - not to mention a number of games that simply refused to work as advertised, such as Mortal Kombat Gold (remember that "Hot! New!" label they added to the re-release?). Both Panasonic's 3DO and the Sega Saturn also fell apart at the gate, but in those cases they became mere footnotes to gaming history. And it's not unique to the industry, either. Even Apple, for example, had to contend with a host of issues that came up after the MacBook's debut.

Call it the price of innovation and competition. Nothing in life is perfect, no matter how much we may demand it be. There may be a lot of grief in the streets of gaming tonight, whether we're talking about the supporters or skeptics of the PS3. But, having taken the long view, we would prefer to think in the long-term. All the bad press, in the long-run, is noise-deafening, yes, but noise nonetheless. We can't speculate or concentrate on noise.

As with all the other consoles in gaming history - and all other innovations in the history of technology - we will simply wait and let the PS3 prove itself come launch day. We don't have to expect perfection, we just expect it to work decently. It's the only fair thing we can do.

source: IGN


First there was Genesis versus SNES versus Turbo Grafx. Then came Saturn versus PlayStation versus N64, followed a few years later by PS2 versus Xbox versus GameCube. And now, we're gearing up for the most intense fight yet: Xbox 360 versus PS3.

As hardcore gaming types, we all love to scrutinize screenshots and movies of multiplatform titles in order to determine which system has superior capabilities. Many a flame war was fought, and many innocent lives lost, over the likes of Street Fighter II Genesis versus SNES, Tomb Raider PlayStation versus Saturn and, most recently, Resident Evil 4 PS2 versus GameCube.

And now, we at last have our first chance at taking the battle to the next generation. From Software is in the process of bringing Armored Core 4 to both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and has released a pair of trailers, each said to be running on one of the machines. The PS3 trailer was first shown at the PS Meeting where the game was known as Project Force, but now we have a direct feed version. Likewise for the Xbox 360 trailer, which debuted at the Tokyo Game Show but is now available for the first time in direct feed form.