Gamersnewsbits.com

I’m kind of skeptical of how this will work, but $10.00 coupons towards a real DDR game is a pretty good thing, and will bring the game down in price, which usually runs $40-80 depending on where you purchase it and for what system (some examples below).

Kids can dance into the New Year at Subway restaurants with the all-new DanceDanceRevolution promotion. Konami and Subway restaurants today announced a partnership that will help promote a healthy lifestyle for children by delivering the fun and excitement of Konami’s best-selling get-up-and-move video game to children everywhere. From December 29, 2008 thru March 29, 2009, participating Subway restaurants will offer one of six exclusive, high quality DanceDanceRevolution branded premium toy accessories along with a $10 coupon good on any of the newest DanceDanceRevolution games with each purchase of a Subway Fresh Fit for Kids meal.

Available for a limited time while supplies last, the Subway Fresh Fit for Kids meal premiums include, DanceDanceRevolution branded Action Armband, Water Bottle, Disco Revolution, Pencil Pal, Dancemania and Break-it-Down. The kids meal and each premium will come in four color DanceDanceRevolution kid’s meal bags that feature DanceDanceRevolutionimages on one side and details about the Subway Fresh Fit for Kids meal program on the other.

The Subway promotion is the latest in a series of initiatives that has made the DanceDanceRevolution franchise a fitness phenomenon that has received a tremendous amount of recognition for helping people of all ages lose weight and achieve better health. DanceDanceRevolution has truly pioneered the latest trend in gaming that takes players off of the couch and away from the joystick. Each version of the game has a Workout Mode that allows users to track calories burned and monitor their own fitness regiment. Additionally, DanceDanceRevolution has been an official part of the physical fitness curriculum in multiple school districts throughout the United States including every school in the State of West Virginia. The game has also been a valuable tool used in numerous research studies on fighting childhood obesity and has been a mainstay in health clubs and libraries across the nation as organizations look for new and innovative ways to fight childhood obesity.

The promotion will run December 29, 2008 - March 29, 2009 with commercial TV spots airing on major kid focused broadcast stations February 9, through March 29, 2009.

For Wii: Dance Dance Revolution Hottest Party 2 with Dance Mat $59.99

For PS2/PS3: Dance Dance Revolution X $49.99

Xbox 360: Dance Dance Revolution Universe 3 with Dance Mat $69.99

Still about 3 1/2 hours here on the West Coast, but I know some of you are already into next year! Here’s wishes for a great 2009 from the Gamersnewsbits.com family!

Yikes. Looks like we have a couple of Gamestop robbers here in Sacramento, CA. Yep, gamersnewsbits is done in the capital of California in the good old USA. Gamestops in the southern end of town have been held up a few times over the past couple weeks, and not only are the robbers stealing money, they’re grabbing hardware. Hopefully the people over at Gamestop are keeping track of the asset tags built into those systems, so when they go live online, the idiots get busted….wonder if they thought of this??

Here’s a full article from the Sacramento Bee http://www.sacbee.com/static/weblogs/crime/archives/018190.html

FYI, the comments section has turned into some whacked-out gun-control debate…

Here’s a tip guys. They’re gonna catch you.

If you are buying hardware from people for prices too good to be true, better make sure it’s not hot. You might wind up with more trouble than you expect!

A new version of the indie strategy game MAGI was released. The developers lowered the price to $15.95, and announced that every owner of MAGI will get a 50% discount for ArcMagi, its upcoming sequel.

www.getmagi.com, December 30, 2008 – Tom Grochowiak, independent game developer, released a new version of MAGI, a downloadable strategy/rpg in which the player takes a role of a dueling wizard. With the new release, the price of the game was lowered to $15.95.

The developer also announced that every owner of the full version of MAGI will get a 50% discount for ArcMagi, its upcoming sequel. „This promotion is my token of gratitude towards all the great folks who bought the game. Without them there would be no ArcMagi. All the money I raised through MAGI sales were used in the development of updates and now the sequel. Thanks, guys.” – explains Tom Grochowiak, the main developer of the game.

ArcMagi is a promisingly good looking cross between RPG, strategy and a fighting game. Much like the original MAGI in its premise of taking part in wizard duels, but with beautiful and detailed 2d art, live-recorded soundtrack by Rob Westwood and several gameplay improvements.
„It’s more of a rework than a sequel. We took all the money and feedback we’ve got from MAGI and used it to make something really great. It’s going to be dynamic, strategically deep, playable in short bursts as well as long sessions, well presented and, hopefully, fun as hell” – Tom promises.

ArcMagi was announced on September 21, 2008 on the MAGI community forums. The exact release date is still unknown but the developers say they aim for summer 2009.
„We’re indies, we’re free to work on the game as long as we feel is necessary, and we’re going to use that to our advantage. We would like ArcMagi to be available on Q3 of 2009, but we’re more focused on making a great game. And if it will need a few more touches, we will take our time to add them”.

The GameTunnel Independent Game of the Year awards have been established to honor ingenuity, innovation and excellence in Independent Games. This year’s awards began December 6th with the Sports Game of the Year award and have continued through 3 weeks and 13 categories finishing with the Top 10 Independent Games of the Year and World of Goo taking the top spot.

“World of Goo is one of those games that really shows what Indie is all about,” said Russell Carroll, editor-In-Chief at GameTunnel. “It was created on a shoestring, fueled by the passion of two people who did whatever it took to make their game. Their passion is evident throughout the game. It’s a fantastic game to play and it has been tremendous to see World of Goo getting so much mainstream awareness. It was an easy pick as our Independent Game of the Year winner this year.”

While World of Goo was the winner, it was only one of 40 different games that were included in the 2008 awards.

“In covering something as unique as Indie games, it’s always been our pleasure to highlight a large number of games in our awards. The fact is that many of these games are not as fortunate as World of Goo and are completely unknown to the gaming public. There are hundreds of Indie games released each year, and we’re happy to be able to do these awards to make the public aware of a few gems that they might have otherwise missed.”

An article of the Top 10 games that also provides reviews and links to all the award winners can be found at: http://www.gametunnel.com/article-705.htm. The list of all award categories and winners is as follows:

Independent Game of the Year - World of Goo

Genre Winners:
Action Game of the Year - Everyday Shooter
Puzzle Game of the Year - World of Goo
Adventure Game of the Year - Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble!
RPG Game of the Year - The Spirit Engine 2
Sim Game of the Year - Democracy 2
Sports Game of the Year - New Star Soccer 4
Strategy Game of the Year - Battle of Tiles

Technical Categories:
Game of the Year: Graphics - World of Goo
Game of the Year: Sound - Everyday Shooter
Game of the Year: Innovation - Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble!
Game of the Year: Multiplayer - Multiwinia

Special Award:
Arthouse Game of the Year - Gravitybone

About GameTunnel
GameTunnel (www.gametunnel.com) was created in 2002 as a news and reviews website covering the Independent Gaming scene. Since its launch Game Tunnel has published over 1000 reviews of Independent (or Indie as it is commonly known as) games. Its most popular articles include a review panel of what’s new in indie gaming called the Monthly Round-Up, and the yearly Independent Game of the Year Awards.

Heads up! I just spotted Gamefly having a Year End sale. They’re going up to 50% off their used PS3, 360, PSP, DS, Wii and PS2 games, all with Free shipping. This goes until January 5th, 2009. Spotted some games at 7.99!

GOG.com (Good Old Games)

GOG.com today added The Feeble Files and Broken Sword 2: The Smoking Mirror to it’s constantly expanding game list.

They also have some holiday promos still going: Fallout and Fallout 2: Buy both games for only 9.98. Descent 1, 2 AND 3, plus the expansion all for 9.98. Stonekeep and Lionheart as a package for only 9.98. Freespace 1 (with expansion) and 2 for only 9.98.  MDK 1 and 2 for only 9.98. HURRY, these Holiday deals are only last 2 more days. They expire on the 31st.

In case you haven’t visited GOG.com, not only do you get the games, you get PDF copies of the manuals and other goodies like art, expansions, etc. All guaranteed to work on XP/Vista.

over at Steam:

They’re still running their 10-75% off sale, with way too many games at unbelievable prices!  You can even get Spore, Call of Duty 4, Left 4 Dead or Far Cry 2 for 37.49 each! Bioshock for 4.99!  Fallout 3 for 39.99! 

Get the AWESOME id Software super pack (Commander Keen, Final Doom, Doom II, Doom 3 (+Resurrection), Heretic: Shadow Riders, Hexen (+expansion), Hexen II,Measter Levels for Doom II, Quake, Quake II (+mission packs), Quake III Arena (+expansion), Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Spear of Destiny, Ultimate Doom, Wolfenstein 3D!), normally 69.99, only 34.99!

25-75% off all Take 2 games!

These deals are still ongoing, but will end on the 2nd of January 2009.

Toys R Us is selling Leapfrog Leapster games 2 for 1 until January 3, 2009

Leapfrog.com is also having a 25% off sale on books, games and accessories. Sale runs until Janary 6, 2009

Check out your favorite stores this week as well, there’s a lot of them having huge sales to help them get rid of the overstock from Christmas. Let me know if you find some great deals out there, I’ll share them with the rest of you!

Signature Devices, Inc. (OTCPK: SDVI) is pleased to announce that the company’s subsidiary, Graffiti Entertainment, Inc., has chosen Reverb Communications, Inc. as its principal marketing and public relations agency. Reverb will be responsible for all media relations activities and provide tactical messaging for Graffiti’s upcoming titles Black Sigil: Blade of the Exiled, C.O.R.E. and Air Conflicts: Aces of World War II.

Reverb Communications is a full service video game agency that provides public relations, marketing, and sales services through one integrated campaign to the interactive entertainment and music industry. The company represents premier companies such as Harmonix, the developers of Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero II, the Rock Band franchise, as well as MTV Games, Cryptic Studios, Pangea Software and many others.

“We are very happy to retain Reverb Communications to help with marketing support to ensure continued growth and success of our soon to be released products,” stated Kenneth Hurley, CEO of Signature Devices. “Their experience launching exceptional game titles will help elevate Graffiti Entertainment and the forthcoming products, helping us expand in all of our market growth opportunities.”

For more information please visit www.signaturedevices.com

Yup. They are having their famous buy 2 get 1 free sale on used games at Gamestop. We just drove by and it was a madhouse. Probably a lot of DS and 360 games flying out the doors. I talked to one lady who bought 9 DS games for her kid, who got a shiny new DS for Christmas. I’m not too sure she knew the ESRB on the games she bought. One thing to remember: when you get a used DS game at places like this that sell games in generic cases (when someone just sells them the cart), remember o look at the actual cartridge for the ESRB rating. It should be on them. It should also be on the disc if you ar buying a Wii, PS2, PS3 or 360 game. Most good employees have an idea of the ballpark rating for a game or can look it up. Another good tip for buying something used that is in a generic package is to check out the new version of a game for the rating. Happy hunting!

-e

Every item on Steam is 10-75% off! 4.99 for Bioshock anyone? Fallout 3 for 39.99? All Ubisoft titles are 25% off! Check it out. Lasts until January 2nd.

I hope you all are enjoying your Holiday weekend, and have opened your Christmas presents. We’re busy playing Guitar Hero World Tour and mastering the new drums and mic. The boys are busy with their DS’ and our littlest is working with his spiffy new vTech laptop. We’ll report on the games in the next few days. Happy gaming!

-e and family