Episode 573: A Very Special Returning Guest

This week, Paul fills in for Scott, who has more pressing issues than discussing videogames, though some very serious topics about them do pop up, such as how misogyny became pronounced in the hobby. The Gaming Flashback is one of the legendarily panned titles, Bomberman Act:Zero.

The news for this week includes:

  • Video game spending reaches record high during pandemic
  • Epic Games Store keyless integration with other digital stores announced
  • Minecraft sales now exceed 200 million (from PC Gamer)
  • Star Citizen will hold a free fly event starting this week

There’s also some Listener Feedback from longtime fan Ralf from Germany.

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Wii Takes US Lead In Console WarWii Takes US Lead In Console War

Just in case people were actually thinking the Xbox 360 was going to hold out against a viral console, Nintendo is now the best selling console in the United States. Anyone really surprised?

This months sales figures for consoles broke down something like this:

  • Nintendo DS: 783,000
  • Wii: 666,700
  • PlayStation 3: 405,500
  • PSP: 337,400
  • Xbox 360: 219,800
  • PlayStation 2: 188,800

Barring the crazy hand held sales of the Nintendo DS, you can clearly see Nintendo holds top-spot yet again, but this month Sony’s PlayStation 3 followed right behind. Although there was a good 200,000 difference, Sony didn’t do so bad; imagine if Nintendo had an MGS4 killer app?

Metal Gear Solid 4 sold 871,300 copies, individually, and roughly 1-million if you include those bundled with the PlayStation 3. The question is clearly answered, MGS4 helped sell Sony’s consoles. The new question will be: Can Sony keep the 2nd place rank against Xbox 360?

Until Gears of War 2, there isn’t a killer game for the Xbox 360 and GoW2 probably won’t move any consoles, those that love the series bought their console when Gears of War arrived. The next big console mover may, in fact, be Final Fantasy XIII for the Xbox 360 as it’s no longer exclusive to Sony and the 360 is a more cost effective way to get into the game.

How does Nintendo continue to keep the pace? Perhaps because their games are still in top positions with Wii Fit in 4th place, Wii Play in 5th place and Wii Kart in 7th on the June 2008 software charts.

(Thanks, 1up)

Bioshock PS3: Later But BetterBioshock PS3: Later But Better

Bioshock arrived on the Xbox 360 almost August of 2007, about one year from this month. It’s set to arrive on the PlayStation 3 in October of 2008, over one year after the Xbox 360 version. Is it too late?

For those that have decided to buy a PlayStation 3 and hold out on the Xbox 360, it will be their first time with full access to the Bioshock title. For everyone else, it’s the same game with prettier graphics and a slight update in difficulty.

Bioshock was well received by both reviewers and video game players last year, will this be a repeat or simply sit on the shelf begging to be played? Bioshock sold 490,900 copies the month of its original release, we’d love to know if it can do it twice.

Kotaku is reporting that “they’ve instead decided to cut off pretty much all of your ammo, leaving you in many instances to pick up a gun with a single bullet in it. It’ll also jack up the price of plasmids, reduce the amount of health vita chambers give you and just generally make the game, oh, impossible.”

Harder, prettier graphics but … too late?