The Big 10

Well, the next 10 Xbox Live Arcade titles have been announced by Microsoft so we all know what to look forward to over the next 10 weeks or so!

I've been enjoying playing on a few of them for a few weeks now like Worms and Luxor 2 and been writing reviews for them which you can read up on BXB now.

The first I wrote and published was the Worms Review and I've got to admit that this is one of my most awaited games on the XBLA. I have some fond memories of playing this on the Mega-Drive with my mates for hours and can't wait to play it over Xbox Live.

Next up was my Paper Boy Review which is another real classic game to hit the arcade and while it is fun at first it can get pretty old pretty fast.

Anyway, I've also tried out Root Beer Tapper from Digital Eclipse and Midway and it's another one of those "classic" games that really should stay in the past while Luxor 2 from devs MumboJumbo LLC is pretty much exactly the same as Zuma except with added crazy stuff. So, they're not on my list of "Most Wanted".

I'm still a massive Xbox Live Arcade addict with my most played games being titles like Lumines, Zuma, Hexic HD and Outpost Kaloki X!

Take a look at the reviews now, because they're down right exclusives!

Live Ambassadors

So, Microsoft have launched their Xbox Live Ambassadors program in Europe that allows n00by Xbox Live gamers to get into playing on Live without risking all the potential verbal abuse from the yanks!

Great idea. It's obviously worked well in the States and now they've brought it across the pond! If you want to find out more then read the story on BXB!

There has been this kind of thing going on for a long time, in fact, BXB started out very much in this capacity as a forum to visit and add cool people from the community to your friendslist. In many ways, this is how BXB became the site it is today.

Of course, now we've got our own Clan BXB which is open all members of the community whether they're in a clan or not and is basically a kind of way of gaining a good list of friends who are all trusted members of our forum!

Clan BXB is run by our very own Samantha Gardiner who was the first ever female member of BXB and joined many many years ago now! She's a great gamer, lots of fun and always tries really hard to make everyone feel welcome and enjoy themselves!

If you'd like to get involved with Clan BXB then check out our Clan BXB forums!

HD-DVD Baby!

So, after a long wait and a hard search I finally got my 360 HD-DVD player and I'm really pleased with it! I've written up a review with some of my thoughts and that can be found here.

So, I've bee watching some of my HD movies on it and currently my collection looks like this:

Superman Returns
The Last Samurai
Pitch Black
The Chronicles of Riddick

TCoR has to be the best HD Movie I've seen so far and I genuinely delight in watching the scene where the Necromungers attack Helion Prime as the visuals are just so stunning!

They actually look a hell of a lot better on my 32" HDTV compared to Ash's HD-Projector!

So far, the special features have been ok. The Superman Returns extras are cool while the Riddick ones just seem to be the original DVD features and aren't anything new. I'm yet to try The Last Samurai special features.

I think I'm going to get Jarhead and Full Metal Jacket next!

Setting an Example 2...

As I predicted in my blog entry a few days ago entitled Setting An Example?, Bill Gates himself has come out fighting with strong criticism of both Sony and Nintendo.

In an article on the San Jose Mercury News Website Bill Gates tells Dean Takahashi that the original Xbox was "20% better than it's rivals". I'd like to know how he arrived at that figure?!

He goes onto say that Nintendo and Sony's strategies are all wrong and in particular he believes that Sony have really made a cock up with the Cell Processor. He also says that the Xbox 360 strategy is working "perfectly".

The final sentiment I'll have to agree with. Shame he had to mar that positive comment by bad mouthing his competitors. At least it wasn't just unprovoked mud slinging this time.

Read more at Games Industry.biz

I think I've made my point.

BXB E-drama Episode 356: "The Leak"

Well, over the last few days we've had somewhat of a crisis on our hands at BXB and we've been struggling to come to terms with what it all really means for us.

A few days ago I was made aware that a member of the BXB team had been leaking screengrabs of our staff forum to people not authorised to see them. I'm not going to go into detail about who or what because that's not really important.

What is important is simply how bad this had made myself, Ash and the BXB team feel about the whole thing. Due to the fact we don't know exactly who did leak the screens we've had to remove nine members of staff from their roles as reviewers and mods to try to ensure this doesn't happen again.

Basically, the BXB team has been reduced to the bare minimum we can run on and hence things might get a little ropey for a while on the site while we try to readjust to the new situation.

We'll be letting the dust settle a little on the whole affair for a while but could potentially look at recruiting new members of staff. These will be recruited entirely from the forums and from nowhere else as I believe that being part of the community means the person cares about the community and would never do such a two-faced act as what has happened this week.

We're also undermanned as Bill Bennett is taking a well deserved break from the site along with one of our news writers leaving to write for another forum which means extra pressure is put on the exsisting team to keep the content fresh.

I'm certainly going to be upping my game on BXB over the next couple of weeks to try and balance out the losses we've suffered recently.

I think the whole affair is rather sad as the acts of one person have really affected a large number of people. 9 people no longer work on a site they love, doing something they love and the remaining 12 are feeling angry and frustrated that this could have been done by someone they thought they could trust.

Filth. Utter filth.

It seems Microsoft are upping the ante on Sony across the world by using sleazy sex based tactics! The Redmond based company hosted their Adult Games Festa last week in Japan and, hold us back, there was a bikini model there.

The event featured Xbox 360's Cero X rated games like Gears of War, Dead Rising, Onechanbara VorteX, The Godfather and forthcoming title Vampire Rain. These games are essentially rated the same as porn in the Japanese rating system.

The over 18s only event required photo ID to enter but looks generally quite tame except for bikini model Mariko Okubo's shockingly untasteful tartan corset and classy shiny leather gloves. To top off the cheese fest she innocently admitted: "I haven't touched an Xbox 360 before this." before going on to thrash every single Gears player like a pro - no doubt.

Of course, no Microsoft event would be complete without Xbox 360 babes who, this time round, had the words Xbox 360 slapped across their asses. Sadly, they didn't do the same at X06 because I would have had a good excuse for gawping at the asses of all the hot 360 ladies I saw from a distance while talking to other geeks - including that one that was eyeing me up...I swear.

And in other news I've just published two reviews on BXB. First up is my Lost Planet review and secondly is my Heavy Weapon: Atomic Tank review! I'm currently playing Worms and I'll have the review up soon for it! It's fantastic!

Chilly Willy!

Why is it that playing games set in the snow make me feel extra cold? My bedroom is pretty chilly anyway, so trying to hammer my way through the single player game of Lost Planet is making me feel extra cold. My feet are like blocks of ice!

But am I impressed with Lost Planet? Yes. Despite a few niggling problems with the occasional vcisual slip up and a slightly shoddy storyline (not improved by rather "square" voice acting).

On the plus side, I love that they don't bother with massively long levels and you just enjoy a very intence, short blast of action and then end that with a very exciting boss fight against some of the best monsters I've seen ever!

I'm writing my review right now, in between working my way through the campaign, so it'll be up sometime this week! I'm going to score it 10/10!

*flees*

Halo 3 Winners...

Oh yeah!

We just made the days of 100 Halo fanatics on BXB! What an amazing day this is!

Check it!

Setting an Example?

Oh dear, they're at it again. Once more, the tiring and meaningless war of worlds between Sony and Microsoft hits the headlines as Sony President Kaz Hirai talks royally out of his arse about the PS3.

Highlights are claiming no-one has done a worldwide console launch before; that Resistance: Fall of Man would be impossible to achieve without blu-ray drives and then he makes some weak excuses about the lack of blu-ray diodes. Yawn.

Again, Sony Executive's comments come across as embarrasingly arrogant. These comments appeared in the Blu-Ray Daily publication and presumably Hirai thought that no-one would be reading a daily publication about a "doomed" format and could get away with saying what ever he wanted!

And Microsoft are no better. Give it a couple of days and one of their executives will be saying the PS3 is for lepers or something along those lines. All very grown up guys.

It's increasingly dissapointing to see these top business men squabbling like fansite owners over who's console is best. It's cock waving at it's highest level.

So, I ask this? If Microsoft Executives are willing to sit there and publically slag off their opponents in the East. Why is it that the same behavoir isn't tolerated at lower levels? What a joke! If the Games Industry's top bods can't behave and be professional then why should mere fansite owners like me bother?

They're hardly setting a good example and undermining their own companies rules by having a pop at each other. Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo are all guilty parties in these embarrasing little wars of words and in my opinion they should shut up and get on with making awesome games consoles.

Blagman Sidekick...

I'm proud to say that I've just landed myself on a website that I'm actually a very big fan of!

If you've not heard of Blagman.co.uk then you're seriously missing out on some top quality blagging and writing action!

As part of Blagman's new Blagman Sidekick competition, I got sent a random freebie to review which turned out to be a DVD boxed set of Bob Monkhouse stand up. Not exactly my cup of tea, but a good reviewer can turn his craft to anything.

Plus, I have an opinion on about pretty much anything going so it wasn't too difficult and despite thinking it might be crap or boring - I actually quite enjoyed the whole experience.

As much as I like writing about games, it can get a little dull and samey.

So, get over to Blagman.co.uk now and check out my review plus have the chance to be the next Blagman Sidekick!

On another note, I've been trying to jazz up BXB with Lost Planet stuff but bloody Prosource isn't working (and hasn't been for three days). Talk about not giving you the tools to do the work!

Free with Frosties next?

So, first post of 2007 and I thought I'd start with something that made me laugh somewhat!

Someone posted this great little photoshop up on BXB relating to getting Halo 3 Beta Codes with Crackdown! Click it and have a giggle.

Now, I've played Crackdown and it's certainly not as bad as the photoshopper here makes out but, then again, compared with the opportunity of playing Halo 3 is does kind of pale in comparison!

Personally, if Real Time Worlds pull off what they intend with the game then we could be looking at another great game for the 360 but at the same time it could go horribly wrong. Luckily, Beta Codes will shift units.

It seems to me that everyone has access to their Beta Codes these days! When it all started it felt all exclusive and exciting but you'll probably be able to get them with your Frosties soon!