The Xbox One revealed!!!
Nintendo claims monetisation rights on Let’s Play videos, YouTubers respond
While this is hardly beneficial PR for NIntendo, it’s not surprising in the least bit. The funny part about this, is that people are pissed off about losing money for work THAT IS NOT THEIR OWN. You play a copyrighted game and upload content of said copyrighted material online without a license from the company of said copyright. WHAT DID YOU EXPECT WOULD HAPPEN?
Besides, it’s not like people don’t use Ad-Block for YouTube.
Here’s the other thing, if you’re passionate about doing your videos, you’re doing it out of love, not for financial gain. If that’s the only thing of importance to you, well, how much of a fan could you possibly be? Nintendo’s not taking the videos away, but their claiming the right to the content, and given that these are Nintendo’s games, they’re well within their rights.
Sonic All Stars Racing Transformed: Arcade Racing At It’s Finest

I was never a big Sega fan in the early 90’s. Having sided with Nintendo, anything Sega was just not good enough to Mario in my childhood. Ironically, I loved reading Archie’s Sonic comics. It wasn’t until some of Sega’s games were released on PC (Sonic 3 & Knuckles: Y2K Compliant, Soinc R and countless others) that I started to really like Sega games. Sonic All Stars Racing Transformed almost makes me wish I was a life long Sega fan from the start.
While Sega’s mishaps are well reported, lately, nobody seems to keep dwelling on the negative. With the re-releases of Jet Set Radio, Nights, Sonic Adventure 2, and Daytona USA, let it not be said that Sega fans aren’t well served. All these re-releases are great, but Sonic Racing Transformed, is akin to a gigantic love letter with a box full of the best chocolates money could buy. Yeah, it’s that good.
Sumo Digital’s racer isn’t all about Sonic, it’s also about Gum. Monkey Ball, B.D. Joe, After Burner, and Skies of Arcadia. The game even has a stage dedicated to Burning Rangers, a Saturn game that only the hardest of the Sega fan recalls. It’s also a standout track in the myriad of other great courses. Every stage and character is handled with the most exquisite care possible. It was even reported that Skies of Arcadia’s original producer was moved to tears on seeing the course play out.

Mario Kart was undoubtedly a major influence on this game with Mario Kart 7 being the biggest influence on the title. But the game takes the transformation aspect further. Upon entering specific rings, your race kart transforms to either a watercraft or an aircraft. While still borrowing from Mario Kart’s aspects of items, and drifting, the game does it better. There are no unfair items to be found in the game: no Blue Shells or Thunder Clouds (not the lightning bolt). Each craft handles exactly as they should: the water craft bobs along the waves, the air craft a smooth flight as long as can maintain control, and the kart, with Sumo’s pedigree proven from OutRun 2’s console ports, handles exceptionally well
While there are regular championships to engage in, the game also has a career mode, where you’ll earn experience points to upgrade your racer. As you increase your stats, you unlock modifications that will give your racer a boost in certain categories (and could also decrease other stats in the process). It’s little wonder that the brilliance of the former staff of Bizarre creations (Project Gotham, BLUR) contributed WELL for the game.
And an aspect that I simply can’t overlook in this game, is the music. The game nails this so well that I’m already looking out for the soundtrack for it. Sonic’s courses have tinges of “Toot-toot Sonic Warrior”, Jet Set Radio’s got the funky rhythmic beats, and the Golden Axe stage gives off a feeling of an epic roller coaster.
There’s a lot to love about this game, even if you’re not a die hard Sega fan, if you love racing games, this will undoubtedly quench your hunger for a meaty challenge. After playing through this game, NIntendo’s next Mario Kart has A LOT to live up to, and that’s honestly the biggest compliment that I could ever give to this game.

As a heads up, the PC edition is probably the best edition of the game, it includes an additional three characters: Football Manager, TF2 as seen above, and a Shogun from the Total War series. And undoubtedly, the game runs just a bit smoother on the PC as well.
Late to the PS3 party: Wish I got to it sooner. And thoughts on Xbox today.
(Sorry for the long hiatus, I’ve been extremely busy with work and life in general, I’ve had little time to really do any writing or artwork.)
A few weeks ago I purchased a PS3 (the super slim model), my main reason for doing this was to go and play the games that I missed this generation. The fact that the PS4 has NO BACKWARDS COMPATABILITY with any previous PlayStation games was also a big factor into it. It’s not that I don’t think that a lot of the good games won’t appear on the streaming service that Gakai is providing, but I have no doubts that there will be games I want to play that won’t be on there.
However, one of the things I dislike about the system is the constant updates I’ve been subjected to. That is mostly my own doing since I’m picking up games that are several years old. My downgraded internet speed doesn’t help in that either.
My point in this post is that after having played around with the system, and getting familiar with the great titles I’ve played so far, and reading through the PS Plus program (I’ll be signing up for this at some point), I can’t believe that I didn’t buy this system sooner. I feel incredibly foolish for having went with Xbox and its Live program at all. At first, I went along with it, since we were all told that it pays for servers for multiplayer, and allows cross game chatting.
We all know how Microsoft has consistently changed the interface for the 360, and for better or worse (depending on your point of view), it finally brought us to having ads on almost every page you go to. Well, those ads are so successful, that Microsoft is planning on dolling out more!
Since you don’t actually have to go into those ads, I don’t think it really bothers me that much. But if you’re paying for Gold, you shouldn’t have to have ads at all on there. It’s bad enough that they force you to pay Gold just to access Netflix or Hulu, when these services are NOT EVEN running on Microsoft’s servers. Never mind that they wanted you to pay just to use Twitter and Facebook when they were still on it (not features that anyone I know of that cared to use it on an Xbox). All of this could get even worse with the next Xbox console, especially since it’s rumored to run on a Windows 8 core. To top all this off, there’s rumors of doing some sort of “cheaper” console package, in that you have to sign up for 2 years of Xbox Live to get it at a cheaper rate. So are consoles are going to become just like cell phone contracts? Where you pay more for less?
Never mind the rumors that the system will require an online authentication, or trying to kill off used games. If those latter rumors are true, don’t bet on people being so willing to buy it, even if it has a new Halo game in its launch.
I’m sure most of you think by now that I’m just turning into a Sony fanboy. That’s not too terribly far from the truth, but I’m not blind to the fact that there have been good titles on the Xbox. I loved playing through Halo 3’s Co-op campaign with three of my friends online. I loved playing through Mass Effect 1 and 2. Scott Pilgrim VS. The World was a blast, as was Castle Crashers and Pac-Man Championship Edition DX.
As you can see, my experience differs greatly from other people on the console. I spent more money on the Arcade games than I did on the actual physical games (I often borrowed or rented games), the only game I ever bought full price for my Xbox was Portal 2, and I reserved it simply to just pay it off before it came out.
I won’t be in a giant rush for next gen. Most of my friends are in agreement on this as well. We can see the graphical leap for sure, but it just doesn’t appear as significant as it was when it was in compared to the Xbox/Xbox 360 or the PS2/PS3. Plus, with all the hassle from Red Rings on the Xbox, to the PS3 losing backwards compatibility within two years of its shelf life, it’s little wonder that people would be hesitant to buy a new console without fear of it dying on them quickly. Let’s not also forget that most people can’t afford to spend their extra cash on a system so frivolously when the economy is still in shambles. Or the fact that most are content to play games on their smartphones now.
Ladies and Gentlemen, your next X Box.
In all honesty, I’m curious how long it’ll be before journalists defend this blatantly stupid decision, IF Microsoft is going to require an internet connection to the system. Judging by how Microsoft Office runs, it’s a good possibility.
I’m glad I don’t own a 360 anymore, and even if this doesn’t turn out to be true, I’m still not buying their next console. The whole structure of X-Box Live is ridiculous. Want to watch Netflix? Have to be a Gold Account. Amazon Instant? Gold. Want to play a BRAND NEW DEMO? GOLD. I rest my case.
With the recent announcement of the original ducktales game being remastered, I thought I’d play the original NES classic, it’s a short, but fun and challenging game. Love the 8bit rendition of the theme song. And yeah, I beat it if you couldn’t tell.
