Have you ever been in a situation where you had this really funny joke but, due to whatever circumstance, your timing is off and it falls flat on it’s face?  This trailer is kinda like that by appearing 1 year and two months too late.  Nevertheless, it’s still pretty ingenious and a sight for sore eyes. The world’s longest-running horn ball franchise finally makes a return on the PS3, 360, PC and mobile markets this Fall.  If you don’t recall the Mad World remix of the Gears of War trailer you’ll probably want to hit that before watching. I hope the boss (last boob?) in the window actually makes it in the game. So what does the plot have in store for us?

In this 3rd person adventure game, Larry takes a summer job working on his uncle Larry’s movie lot doing odd jobs and trying to uncover a mole from another studio who threatens to air the studio’s dirty laundry in the tabloids. Leisure Suit Larry Box Office Bust is a rollicking, innuendo-laden lampoon of Hollywood that features open world sand box game play that includes exploration, platforming, racing and puzzle-solving to complete missions. Additionally, the game will feature an all-new Directors Game that allows the player to create their very own “Larry Feature.”

I’ve always wanted to direct half-balding men in softcore porn in the comfort of my own living room. The game also casts a few notable Hollywood B-hotties (presumably voice over appearances) including Shannon Elizabeth, Carmen Electra, Nikki Cox and Jane Lynch with Josh Keaton as the voice of Larry and Jay Mohr presumably doing his usual likable yet sleezy guy you can’t trust thing. The return of the adventure format comes as no surprise as LSL: Magna Cum Laude’s minigame mess was an utter failure. In a recent interview the producer promised that nothing is being carried over from the previous game. 

Despite the game’s promise to return to its roots I’m a little weary about the art direction of Larry (who’s makeover lifted 20 years and 200 pounds). Was Jon Lovitz not available for work?

Hi the jump for the full press release. 

A few months back I mentioned that The Arcade Flyer Archive, an amazing collection of vintage and new arcade flyers, would be liquidating their collection. They’ve already been through one portion of the sale which we unfortunately missed out on. But never fear, there’s still plenty more to be had. The flyers cover Arcade Video Games, Pinball machines and other types of arcade amusement machines. Everything you need to know about the sale including the list of available flyers, prices and shipping can be found at coinopvideogames.com. These guys have put a ton of hard work into cataloging this amazing collection so help support them by buying a few flyers. They’re going cheap!

From nhk.or.jp:
[QUOTE]
Toshiba Corporation has decided to withdraw from next generation high-definition DVD production.

Market observers said that Toshiba could suffer a loss of hundreds of millions of US dollars.
[/QUOTE]

Full Story: nhk.or.jp

Artist Rolito, the man behind the stylish graphics of Patapon has produced this vinyl toy based on the upcoming PSP game. The toy, which is part of the custom BearBrick series, will be available in stores on Feb. 26th. There’s no word on the price, but given the size and what I’ve seen of other BearBrick prices it should be around $5.99 or so. But, don’t quote me on that.

[via A Little Bit of Awesome on the Side]

As if Jack Thompson’s little showcase wasn’t bad enough, it’s now the turn of the New York Post to bear its fangs at the videogame industry in the wake of the NIU shooting. With the amazing headline (in all caps, yes) of “COLLEGE KILLER CRAZY FOR VIOLENT VID GAME,”  a pair of  sensationalist  so-called “journalists” have decided to paint unstable killer Stephen Kazmierczak as an “obsessive” Counter-Strike player.

This unbelievable piece seems to use the fact that Kazmierczak played a videogame four years ago as a way to implicate gaming in the killing spree. Although purely incidental to the entire case, the New York Post has taken it upon itself to make Counter-Strike the focal point of the entire story. 

In the game, players use imaginary money to buy shotguns, pistols and other equipment they need to move around an imaginary world in which they’re constantly under threat of being killed by roving terrorists.

In real life, Kazmierczak - who had become “erratic” recently after shunning medication for an undisclosed illness - purchased weapons like those used in Counter-Strike, including a Glock handgun and a pump-action Remington shotgun, which he bought legally on Feb. 9.

GamePolitics reminds its readers that the New York Post is owned by Rupert Murdoch, who is also responsible for the game-demonizing abomination we call Fox News. There’s obviously no evidence to suggest that this is all part of Fox’s anti-games agenda, but since Fox started using tenuous links and conjecture as valid news a long time ago, I hereby proclaim that Rupert Murdoch personally had this story written and is also planning to assassinate Hal Halpin. Mainstream reporting — the evidence is always there if you make it up.

It seems that World of Warcraft is the cause of yet another relationship breakdown. A gal named Jocelyn has divorced her husband of six years citing a crippling Warcraft addiction as the main cause.

“He would get home from work at 6:00, start playing at 6:30, and he’d play until three a.m. Weekends were worse — it was from morning straight through until the middle of the night,” she told Yahoo! Games in an interview. “It took away all of our time that we spent together. I ceased to exist in his life.”

The sad thing is, Jocelyn herself had an unwitting hand in her marriage’s downfall. A former Blizzard employee (she didn’t work on Warcraft), she gave her husband the game as a Christmas gift when it first came out in 2004. Nine months later and their relationship was already beginning to crumble. According to Jocelyn, her husband’s obsession caused him to not only ignore her, but he stopped taking on any household responsibilities in his quest for the next big raid.

So, word of warning Warcrafters: be sure to make time for your loved ones. No game, raid or copious amount of in-game currency is worth the loss of your relationship.

Wedding Woes: The Dark Side of Warcraft [Yahoo Games]

Here is the clip of Jack Thompson on Fox News this morning, explaining how the Northern Illinois University shooting was the result of violent video games. My favorite bit is right at the beginning.

“Jack, welcome on this tragic day.”
“Yeah, I wish I weren’t here.”
“You know? Us too.”

We wish you weren’t there either Jackie boy, but there you are anyway, immediately hijacking the interview for your own purposes. The interviewer starts by asking what the shooter’s age (27) tells us about him, seeing as he is more of an adult than the usual late teens that perform these sorts of crime. Jack’s answer? “If you get started playing - for example - violent video games you can uh…you are more likely to copycat the behaviors in the games.”

It’s like he doesn’t even hear the question the guy is asking. The question merely served to pull the string on JT’s back to ready the anti-gaming rhetoric. It’s classic Thompson every step of the way. “You can rehearse these type of massacres on simulators which are called video games and you can…therefor made more proficient in doing this.” He explains that “Counter-Strike Half-Life” was that Cho, the perpetrator of the Virginia Tech Massacre trained on in High School, suggesting that the behavoir of the NIU shooter had the same sort of training. He also cites the shooter’s attire…all black…was also similiar to what the hero in Counter-Strike wears. He certainly couldn’t have gotten the idea to wear all black from anywhere else, could he? What kind of bad guy wears all black, other than a good 50% of them throughout the history of fiction?

Then Jack loses his train of thought for a moment, the gnomes inside his head desperately trying to recover any for of cohesive thought tossing a plug for one of his books out and…did he just suggest that he predicted exactly how the shooting occurred? Why yes - yes he did.

To his credit, the Fox News anchor seems to realize how full of shit JT is and ended the interview with a dismissive, “Well clearly you connect this to games, and we’ll find out more about the suspect Steven Kazmierczak..” only to have Jack speak over him with a smug, “Well we’ll see…we’ll see.”

So far what we know of Kazmierczak counteracts the profile of previous school shooters. He was a well-adjusted, well liked student who received honors in classes and was in the chess club while growing up. He owned a gun permit, purchased his handguns legally, and only really began to show any signs of trouble a few weeks before the shootings when he stopped taking medication for an undisclosed condition.

Will Jack wind up with mud on his face once more? Is there any more room for mud? Why the hell do major news agencies still contact him when this sort of thing happens? The world is full of crazy people. Some shoot up schools. Others blame that on violent games without proof.

Thanks to Andy for pointing us towards the clip.

Below you will see a “make-shift” game case for the upcoming Guitar Hero: Aerosmith from GameStop… but it appears to have the official logo for the game on it.

What do you think about the logo?

(Via GoNintendo)

In the latest “Iwata Asks” on Nintendo’s website, the company boss is still talking Wii Fit, specifically how the dev team came up with the concept of the balance (balance, not fitness) controller. At first, it was only going to register your left-and-right movement. Not good enough. So the team expanded it, crafting one able to detect movement in eight directions. Better. Now all that needed work was the design, because the initial prototype looked rubbish. So, living in constant fear of having their tea table upturned by a furious Miyamoto, the team obliged, ending up with the squat, square-ish shape the board is today. Captivating reading for Nintendo fanboys and industrial designers alike.

The Wii Balance Board [Nintendo]