Month: May 2010

Howdy pard’ners. I don’t know about you, but I’m going crazy waiting for the release of Red Dead Redemption. In fact, I got so bored of checking my watch to see if it’s May 21 yet that I decided to go and revisit some Wild West video games of yesteryear.

It’s surprising that the Wild West has never really taken off as a game genre. It lends itself to action, adventure and excitement, yet few developers managed to capture the spirit of the old West in a computer game. There have been a few gunslinging games that have proved successful, however.

1971

The story of cowboy computer games began in the early Seventies, when The Oregon Trail was created for the Apple I. This pioneering pioneer adventure proved one of the most successful early video games, spawning releases on a dozen different platforms over the years.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgPmYd4cLro[/youtube]

  Continue reading “The evolution of Wild West video games”

iPhone: PewPew is an arcade shooter that uses dual thumb controls to move and shoot around neon vector graphic arenas. There’s no shortage of so-called dual-stick shooters like Geometry Wars on the iPhone, but PewPew manages to stick out from the crowd by being both free and featuring four varied game modes that require different skills to succeed.

Windows: From the creators of GOM Player, here comes GOM Encoder, a comprehensive video conversion tool. It helps you convert videos from and to a wide array of formats and devices, including many ready-made conversion profiles and support to create custom profiles as well. Conversions are surprisingly fast, even when you’re working with HD videos.

Mac: After many months of anticipation, Steam for Mac is finally here. Like the Windows version, it allows you to buy and download any of Valve’s games like Left 4 Dead 2, Steam also has a huge library of titles from other big developers, as well as free demos and videos. The list of games is ever increasing, and it also supports non-commercial things like game mods.

There are only a couple of days to go until Google’s I/O developer event. Which means that it won’t be long before we see some official news about the latest version of Android, 2.2 (aka: Froyo which is San Franciscan for ‘frozen yogurt’, I believe).

But if you can’t wait for I/O and you simply must see what Android 2.2 probably looks like, check out the last few frames of this very enlightening video about Flash on Android devices. Posted by Adobe Evangelist, Ryan Stewart, the only non-browser bit of the video seems to show that he’s rocking a Froyo device – which would make a lot of sense.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0y7XJI4NN7k[/youtube]

Continue reading “Android 2.2 Froyo seen in the wild!”

EA’s PGA Tour Golf might soon be the last Tiger Woods branded product out there, and with his current form, who knows if we’ll see another. Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online is a massive surprise – a (mostly) free online multiplayer golf game, that’s actually really good.

Once you’ve got an account, there’ll be two courses to choose from (they change on a rota basis) and you can dive straight in. EA have stuck in some MMO features, so you also get loads of stats and earn in-game money to upgrade your player. The in-game chat window, lets you talk to other players on the course, giving it a nice community feel – a great addition to a round of Golf.

Watch out with Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online, you can get sucked in really easily. It may not be as funny as the Tiger Woods game feature in South Park recently, but it’s incredible that there’s this almost fully featured Golf game out there you can play for free.

You’ll need the Unity browser plugin, which you can download here.

Not content with getting Blackpool FC to the play-off final, boss Ian Holloway has now taken a job as the first ever virtual soccer coach. Olly, as he’s affectionately known, has signed with Sports Interactive to become a motivational coach in Football Manager 2010. He will pop up on screen offering pep-talks to players of the soccer sim in order to boost their morale, or give them the famous hairdryer treatment.

Holloway’s video avatar is now available to view at Footballmanager.com. It’s good to see his virtual self full of the one-liners that have made him a fans’ favorite in the UK. Some of his classic football quips include:

Some weeks the lady is good looking and some weeks they’re not. Our performance today would have been not the best looking bird but at least we got her in the taxi.

I love Blackpool. We’re very similar. We both look better in the dark.

If you’re a burglar, it’s no good poncing about outside somebody’s house, looking good with your swag bag ready. Just get in there, burgle them and come out. I don’t advocate that obviously, it’s just an analogy.

I couldn’t be more chuffed if I were a badger at the start of the mating season.

To say I’m gutted is an understatement. I’m that low I could walk under a snake’s belly with a top hat and not knock it off

I reckon Sports Interactive is off to a winner with its idea to include a virtual coach. I’d love to see other games developers recruiting stars to help players. For example, Bruce Campbell could guide you through Left for Dead 2; Clint Eastwood might give you pointers in Red Dead Redemption, or Kiefer Sutherland could provide some tips in Streetfighter.