Grand Queue Auto

This is my local Asda at midnight. Over 300 people queuing, according to staff. For 260 copies of GTA4.

I went hurtling off to Tesco only to find there was - relatively - nobody there. I grabbed two copies for the 360, made my way to the self service tills, scanned them, opened my wallet…

And realised that my wife still had my Switch card.

Swearing like a trooper, I hurtle back to my house, grab said card, leap back into the car, call Tesco on the way, establish they have three copies left, discover that no, they won’t save them, and yes, they’ve put them on the shelf now, but it’s ok, because there’s nobody here. I want to scream “THEY’RE COMING! DON’T YOU SEE?!?” but I don’t. I just drive. Quite fast.

I arrive at Tesco, sprint into the store, and manage to retrieve the very last copy from their shelves.

Hopefully Game will deliver mine tomorrow. At least I know Dad’s got his copy.

E3 Reaction: Console Monogamy?

E3 is now well underway; each of the three key players have finished their press conference events and revealed their new toys. Sony and Nintendo - and Microsoft, to a certain degree - arguably have a lot riding on E3 this year. Both Nintendo and Sony have new systems on the horizon, and Microsoft faces a challenging holiday season in the face of competition from their two rivals. But the average gamer must ask: Where does that leave me?

With the launch of the Xbox 360, I took a long hard look at my gaming habits and made some changes. I've been an avid gamer ever since I can remember, starting out with a Commodore Vic 20, upgrading to Commodore 64, and then onto an Amiga (with one megabyte memory upgrade, no less). I've owned a SNES, a Megadrive (or Genesis, if you prefer), the ill-fated MegaCD, the even more ill-fated Atari Jaguar and more. I've been playing games long enough to have played  a little game called Karateka, and remember being awestruck by a demo of Jordan Mechner's exciting new game "Prince of Persia" at a gaming conference in London.  I still own a Dreamcast, I've tried and discarded the PSP, DS, and other handheld systems. My insatiable hunger for every gaming system on the face of the planet knew no bounds. Until now. It seems my insatiable hunger is somewhat satiated.

In the past, the prospect of only owning one system seemed ludicrous. There have always been games which are only available on one system, classic titles like Ico that allow you to easily justify ownership of a system. In order to be able to play every single one of these titles, it's necessary to own every system. But these days I find myself with less and less time to play games. Perhaps that's not strictly true; A more accurate description might be that I find myself less inclined to spend what little free time I do have playing games. Some might say I've finally "grown up", but I've never considered gaming to be a childish interest so I wouldn't subscribe to that. Unless by "grown up" they mean "got a job, had a child, and bought my own home". 

Er…Nintendo?

So Nintendo's new console is no longer called Revolution…which is a pity when you find out what the new name is: Wii. Pronounced "we".

Er…guys…honourable Nintendo masterminds…you do know what that means over here don't you? It's one of the more polite slang terms for urine, for anyone reading this who isn't from the UK. Now, while I'm amused by the seemingly limitless possibilities for taking the…er…Wii here, you have to admit it's a pretty terrible name. I can just picture the scene in Game this Christmas: "Hello, yes, I'd like to buy some Wii for my son, he's been pestering me for months", or on Christmas day: "Yes, Mummy and Daddy bought me a Wii for Christmas", and my personal favourite: "I'll be there in a minute Mum, I'm just playing with my Wii".

And if the console itself is named Wii, what does that make the controller?

PlayStation 3 delay confirmed

Oh dear, oh dear. This could potentially cost Sony an aaawful lot of money. Oh, and another post from Digg - getting bored yet?

Edit - Let's add a little more meat to this post shall we?

What does this mean for Sony? Quite a lot, I would think. Europe won't see the machine until well into 2007, Christmas 2006 will see a newly launched PS3 up against an established Xbox 360 with all the trials and tribulations that a new hardware launch brings (limited stock, incomplete line-up of games, potential bugs and hardware problems). Not to mention the fact that the launch price is extremely likely to be far higher than the 360's price point at that time.

And none of this takes Nintendo into account. Sony better have a pretty stellar launch line-up, and a price point that can't be refused…

Update - As Joystiq have said, the article doesn't say much. I stand by what I said though, and still predict a late 2006 launch for PS3.

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The voice of Lara

Team Xbox are reporting that Eidos have made an annoucement regarding Lara's new vocal chords. British (of course) actress Keeley Hawes (best known, by me at least, for her role in Spooks) will be on talky duties. Not a bad choice, although I still think Alex Kingston should have done it…

Dead Rising Screenshot

I was just flicking through the screenshots of Dead Rising on C+VG and was quietly entertained by them (the clown with twin chainsaws looks interesting). This particular one is a thing of wonder though: