The Full Circle: 360 News Report 11.28.08

Posted by Joe Roche on 11.28.2008

Put down that leftover pumpkin pie it's time for a Black Friday Full Circle Special. This week Joe Roche is talking XBLA deals,

Welcome one and all to the Black Friday edition of The Full Circle. I hope that everyone out there had a wonderful Thanksgiving full of turkey, football and the awkward moment around six o'clock when that particular Aunt has that final glass of wine that changes her from fun Auntie to embarrassing story teller. We have now entered was should be the holiday stretch run (even though for video games and seemingly the entire world Christmas started about three weeks ago), and there are some pretty major things on my list I know that. Before we get to the news though let's just take a quick trip down my week in review.

- Pretty low key week for me with the 360 because believe it or not I started a real job this past week. While writing this column (and anything else I've been able to do) here at 411Games has been a blast (and continues to be) the occasional review copy of "Deadliest Catch: Alaskan Storm" that would show up on my doorstep wasn't enough to keep the lights on at the TFC Castle. So I started a job that I was probably woefully unqualified for, but lucky for me having been sworn in to the Massachusetts Bar as an Attorney I think people just assume I know what I'm doing.

- What I did keep an eye on this week though was a flood of information regarding Prince of Persia. The game is set to release on December 2nd and because of that I am holding off on writing about my biggest moments in gaming of 2008. I have expressed my love of Ubisoft in this column before but this game just looks amazing, and if it can possibly live up to the hype surrounding it then some of my GOTY candidates might not want to get to comfortable.

Enough about my week lets get down to it shall we?

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Good News for Fable II

One of the games on my Christmas wish list is going to be Fable II, and apparently that puts me in the minority because Microsoft and developer Lionhead have announced that the game has sold over 1.5 million units worldwide in its first two weeks. This has to be considered very good news for everyone involved as the original Fable sold about 1.4 million units in its first three months, making the sequel much more successful in the short term. On top of the numbers being impressive it's also important to note what Fable II is not – namely a first person shooter. Let's face it, when you think about the most popular exclusive Xbox 360 titles you immediately think of Halo and Gears of War. What Fable II has been able to accomplish by being so successful in its first two weeks of release is show people that with the right people behind a project you don't have to be all about frag grenades and online multiplayer deathmatches to move units on this console.

In related news Lionhead also made good on their promise of some major Fable II news this past week when they announced the first, and second in a series of DLC. The first announcement involved some free DLC coming in December that would add extra items. Obviously this was just a tiny announcement to wet your appetite because the real meat and potatoes announcement came in the form of the "Knothold Island" DLC which will be available on December 12th for 800 MS points ($10). The information on this DLC is pretty sparse but apparently you'll open up some new quests which you must complete to save the island. All in all I'd say this has been a pretty big week for the crew at Lionhead.



Fallout 3 DLC

Speaking of games that will be in contention for Game of the Year, Fallout 3 is set to get some DLC in the first part of 2009. Bethesda must have seen what Rockstar has gone through with their DLC issues and decided to strike while the iron is hot (as opposed to let a game collect dust on the shelf before releasing the first set of DLC) and start the hype machine for three pieces of downloadable content exclusive to the Xbox 360 and Games for Windows Live. All three pieces of content appear to be expansion pack in nature adding new missions and people to interact with/kill, and they are as follows:

Operation: Anchorage. Enter a military simulation and fight in one of the greatest battles in the Fallout universe – the liberation of Anchorage, Alaska from its Chinese Communist invaders. This action packed battle is set to release in January.

The Pitt. Journey to the industrial Raider town called The Pitt, located in the remains of Pittsburgh. Choose your side. Scheduled for release in Feburary.

Broken Steel. Join the ranks of the Brotherhood of Steel and rid the Capital Wasteland of the Enclave remnants once and for all. This DLC continues the adventure past the main quest and is scheduled for release in March.



Halo 3: Name Change Edition

Apparently someone as Bungie had second thoughts about calling their Halo 3 expansionish release Recon as that name has apparently been scrapped in favor of the much worse sounding Halo 3: ODST. For those who would rather not guess at what the hell their game titles mean, the ODST stands for Orbital Drop Shock Trooper (although I imagine every Halo 3 fan already knew that). No real reason was given for the name change – although it is being chalked up to being "a more straightforward account of the experience that awaits and the role you will assume as you explore the streets of New Mombasa." So there you have it kids, apparently Recon was just flat out too confusing for you to understand so enjoy the rhythmic sounding Halo 3: ODST when it comes out sometime in Fall 2009.



Netflix Mostly Available on NXE

It looks like we're dangerously close to TFC having a full Netflix library to stream at the Castle as it appears (as of Wednesday morning) that almost all Columbia Pictures Netflix content is now available on the Xbox 360. There are still some stragglers that remain unavailable (Superbad) but I have a feeling that by the time you're all reading this column everything will be up and running on the NXE. This is good news because frankly with the limited number of titles available on Netflix for live streaming anyways taking out a huge chunk of material made the option to even use the feature a little less appealing.



Alien Exclusive Cow Probes

Ok so it's not exactly making Sony fans cry out in anger but it appears that Destroy All Humans: Path of the Furon will no longer be a multi platform title. According to Shacknews, DAH:POTF has been cancelled on the PS3 due to "development issues" as the main reason. There is however some good news for you Xbox 360 fans who love to probe cows, because the game will still be coming out on the Xbox 360 during the first week of December. That's right folks, Microsoft now has exclusive Destroy All Humans, take that Metal Gear Solid 4.



We Can Has No Banjo Kazooie

If you are one of Xbox Live Arcade fans who wasn't that interested in Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix, but were instead counting down to this week so that you might get your hands on the original Banjo Kazooie – well you probably already know the news. Rare had previously promised Banjo Kazooie on November 26th, but as it is now November 28th and you're still not playing the game I can assume that we'll all aware that this promise was not kept. As it turns out you won't have to wait much longer as Rare seems to be certain that Banjo Kazooie will release on December 3rd making it a full seven days late, but much like turkey even after a week it's still pretty fantastic.



Black Friday on Xbox Live

As it is now Black Friday, and you're currently reading this column I can only assume that you either passed on hitting the holiday rush this morning, or you've just stumbled home from an early morning trip to Best Buy. Either way you're in luck, because Microsoft is having an Xbox Live Black Friday sale and you won't even have to leave your couch for this one. Major Nelson posted the entire list (below) of games, themes, and pics that will be slashed 37.5% to commemorate the busiest shopping day of the year. One thing to remember is that once Friday ends, this sale will continue throughout the weekend – a very good opportunity to pick up some XBLA titles that you might have missed during the normal portion of the year.

Type Content Black Friday Price
Arcade Rez HD 500
Arcade Arkadian Warriors 500
Arcade Assault Heroes 250
Arcade Catan 500
Arcade Brain Challenge 500
Arcade Boogie Bunnies 500
Arcade Golf: Tee It Up! 500
PDLC GH3 Metallica "Death Magnetic" Full Album 1000
PDLC Forza – March Car Pack 250
PDLC Crackdown – Getting Busy Bonus Pack 500
PDLC Rock Band All That Remains Pack 01 290
PDLC Lips – The Remedy (Jason Mraz) 100
Theme Gears of War 2 – Last Day 180
Theme Sonic Unleashed 180
Theme Castle Crashers Premium Theme 180

Legends of Wrestlemania Box Art

As part of my contract with 411mania I am required to do at least one wrestling game story per month, luckily for me there is something that borders on actual news this month. The picture below my friends is the official box art for Legends of Wrestlemania, I was going to write something more but if you keep reading this article you'll come to it.

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Reader Rants:

Rod Oracheski says: I think you kind of have it backwards on installing games. Most game see a fairly sizable reduction in load times - The Orange Box goes to 1/3 the load time - while only two games that I know of have issues with caching making it load slower - Halo 3 and one transition in Dead Rising. Even the PGR4 audio issue was found to be fixed simply by clearing the cache.

I am willing to concede this point to some extent. Having now experimented a few times with downloading the HDD I can see the benefit of the feature. I never meant to say that I didn't think it worked, and as such I do admit that Rod is right – downloading to the HDD for the most part (save for Halo 3) does improve the speed of a game. Plus you do not have to listen to the ridiculous Xbox 360 drive which is enough to make a person mad. However, I'm still not convinced that the load times that I've experienced (outside of Lost Odyssey which saw minimal/no change) while playing the 360 have ever reached a point where it took away significantly from the experience. It is a nice feature, that is fun to have available but in the end I'm just not sure how often I'll find myself downloading directly to the HDD.

Rod Oracheski also wonders : Oh yeah, and who put "CRICLE" on the main page? LOL

If anyone ever needed to be reminded of the lack of respect I get around these parts then they simply had to notice that my column title is every so often misspelled through no fault of my own. Sometimes I feel like Rodney Dangerfield around these parts – maybe if I start talking about wrestling more. And just to clarify folks this is a joke, as one of the Top 100 currently employed 411Games writers on this site I have agreed to let them call this column whatever they feel is warranted. So stay tuned for The Completely Irrelevant Circle in a few weeks.

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The Hot Button:

Topic: Legends of Wrestlemania

I had planned on doing a Holiday Shoppers Guide this week but with my anticipation for Prince of Persia at an all time high I thought I'd wait a week and give that to you all next Friday. Instead this week I wanted to talk about the upcoming Legends of Wrestlemania game which was just given some beautiful new box art. If you missed it (and I'm not sure how that would be possible seeing as it's about half a page up your screen) the Legends on the cover of the game are "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, The Rock, Hulk Hogan, Andre The Giant, Bobby Heenan, and Jimmy Hart.

Frankly I love the idea of doing a Legends of Wrestlemania game. I know that for the most part Legends games come off as rehashes of the more polished regularly scheduled WWE video game release, but with the state of the industry as it is it seems like a no brainer to make a game featuring all of your favorites from when wrestling still seemed to matter. So in theory I love the idea of this game, but I'm wondering who the lineup is going to be. I figured this week for the Hot Button I'd throw in my two cents about who should be included in this game, and I'd love to hear from you on your thoughts. I should also mention that I realize Randy Savage can not actually be in this game, but that doesn't matter for the purpose of this article, he has to be in there so he counts. Also I am going to put 30 total Legends, so keep that in mind.

The List:

Hulk Hogan (already confirmed)

Andre the Giant (already confirmed)

Jimmy Hart (already confirmed)

Bobby Heenan (already confirmed)

The Rock (already confirmed) – Here is an interesting fact that may only interest me, did you know that The Rock is only 4-3 in Wrestlemania matches, and that his three wins came against The Sultan (WM13), Ken Shamrock by reverse decision (WM14), Hulk Hogan (WM X8) and Steve Austin (WM XIX). Doesn't that seem strange? I'm not saying he doesn't deserve to be in this game, but really The Rock is more memorable for the World Championships that he lost at Wrestlemania, and the match with Hogan where the crowd basically turned Hogan face against his will.

Steve Austin (already confirmed)

Randy Savage

Rowdy Roddy Piper

Shawn Michaels

The Undertaker

Bret Hart

Mr. T – I understand that he won't be in the game but if this was truly meant for just the Legends of Wrestlemania don't you have to put Mr. T in there? Of course this same sentiment could be used for Lawrence Taylor.

The Honky Tonk Man

Jake "The Snake" Roberts

Ricky Steamboat

Ted DiBiase

Bam Bam Bigelow

Ultimate Warrior – The only guy other then Savage who cannot possibly be in this game, but c'mon how can you have a Wrestlemania game without the power of the Warrior?

Jimmy Snuka – Somehow Superfly doesn't have many great Wrestlemania moments, but c'mon.

Sgt. Slaughter – Here's the thing about Sarge, he headlined a Wrestlemania. Sure it was a stupid angle, but as a kid I ate it up with Hogan waving the American flag after taking down the Iron Sheik and that Iraqi loving Sgt. Slaughter.

Razor Ramon

Diesel – Won't be in the game, but the man basically headlined a Wrestlemania.

Owen Hart

Yokozuna – Headlined back to back Wrestlemania's

Sid – Frankly just the thought of playing this game as Sid makes me happy.

Mick Foley – I don't see any chance of him being in this game, but he belongs there.

Ken Shamrock – not a great in ring Wrestlemania presence but he did call for the bell during the Austin/Hitman match which might be my favorite Wrestlemania match of all time.

Maven – C'mon folks, Wrestlemania X8 he won the Hardcore title twice that night.

Brock Lesnar – Won't happen, but he did win the World Title as the headliner of Wrestlemania.

Eddie Guerrero – Why would Vince care about respecting the dead now?

Obviously from this list there is a lot missing. If they're going to include women then it'd have to be something like: Luna, Sherri, Trish, Lita, Sable, Mickie. Also if you're going to include tag team wrestling (as a take off on the improve tag team experience in SVR09) I'd go with: Demolition, The British Bulldogs, The Legion of Doom, The Dudley Boyz, The Rockers (by adding Jannetty), and Money Inc. (add IRS).

Frankly there are a lot of different ways you could go with this one. I'd try to keep the current wrestlers (and playable characters from SVR09) out of the game, but I honestly don't see how you make this game without the Undertaker and Shawn Michaels. The again for current generation fans if you don't have The Hardy Boyz, and Edge & Christian in this game they probably won't even understand how this could be a Legends of Wrestlemania game. I'm not sure how they feel about putting in recently deceased wrestlers (Curt Henning), or drug fueled psychopaths (Jake Roberts). Oh and if there is any way to use computer technology for good, then please spend some time creating a Gorilla Monsoon replica voice because that would be perfect for this game. In the end if they put The Mountie in this game then I will pre-order it and wait in line overnight to pick it up because that would be just to hilarious to not have in my collection.

So who would be in your Legends of Wrestlemania game?

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Punching Out

B3yond the Report by Derek Robbins

Coming Attractions by Drew Robbins. This is Drew's final CA as he is taking over the PC Centric Extravaganza.

The Working Title by Jordan Williams

The Select and Start News Report by Vincet Chiucchi

Achievements Unlocked by Rod Oracheski

The 10th Hour by Derek Robbins

The Hall of Shame by Vincent Chiucchi.

Nintendophiles by Theo Fraser