PS3 Fanboy

Ah, the things that could have been. Alex Evans, co-founder of Media Molecule, revealed in an interview with Kikizo that they were working on game "more Portally than Portal ... Portal, but with scale factor." They even met with Valve, who suggested they collaborate on a title (it is unclear whether it is the aforementioned one) together. "We were very tempted ... But in the end we decided to talk to Sony and they just got the game at the beginning." Considering Valve's history with Sony's console, PS3 fanboys everywhere are thankful for that.

The five page interview covers much of what the Media Molecule devs wants for LittleBigPlanet. "One of my personal ambitions is that I want to make this game easy enough for my mum to play, which is actually a very ambitious thing to say," Mark Healey stated. Awww! Jokes aside though, if Healey thinks LBP is easy enough for his mother to play, it might just help the PS3 find a whole new audience.

[Via Shacknews]

What happens when you take two great things and mix them together? Like peanut butter and jelly, the combination of Portal and Mirror's Edge is delicious. Someone managed to recreate the Alpha level shown in all of the Mirror's Edge trailers thus far in the Portal engine. What need is there for parkour when you can simply portal your way from one side to another? This is an incredible creation that manages to capture the spirit of both of these highly innovative games.

[Thanks, Chris!]

Addressing flying rumors that Portal: Still Alive might be going to PSN (really now?), a Valve spokesperson confirmed what we already know: it's not happening. "I'd call that today's rumor," said the spokesperson, further explaining the possibility with a simple and direct "no." So that's that. Anyway, for those of you who don't know, Portal: Still Alive is a digital downloadable version of Portal (off The Orange Box) with extra content. It's exclusive to the Xbox 360.

It appears that, for some reason or another, the PS3 offering of Half-Life 2: Orange Box might not be up to par with that of its PC and Xbox 360 counterparts, according to 1UP. After previewing the near final build of the game, they were met with framerate inconsistencies during the Half-Life series that made the game look more like a "slideshow" and thusly rendered it nearly unplayable.

However, Portal perfectly played fine, but they weren't able to play much of Team Fortress 2 because of server connection issues.

At this point, you're probably wondering what the deal is and why can't such a great development company like Valve get one of their shining jewels up to snuff, right? Well, one reason is probably because Valve isn't behind the PS3 port like it was for the other versions. Yeah, we're being serious. An unspecified internal EA development team is responsible for the PS3 version. With a Dec. 11 release date, we suppose there is still time for this issue to be rectified, but how many time have we, as gamers, told ourselves that in hope of getting a decent game? Probably way too many.

[Thanks for the tip, Conor!]

There have been rumours and plenty of speculation that the bundle of five games (Half Life 2, Half Life 2: Episode One, Half Life 2: Episode 2, Team Fortress 2 and, most importantly, Portal) wouldn't be out in Europe-land until January at the earliest seeing as retailers have continued to push the date back for a number of months now. These fears can now, finally, be put to rest.

For the uninitiated, Valve initially intended to release Half-Life 2 in two different options for the consoles. One was the Black Box that contained HL2: Episode 2, Portal, and Team Fortress 2. The other is the Orange Box that contained the aforementioned plus Half-Life 2 and Episode 1 expansion. Notice our tenses. One was. One is. That's right -- the Black Box is gone.

Doug Lombardi, Valve's marketing director confirmed it. "The Black Box has been cancelled. We're going to have one package, The Orange Box, available on the PC (US$49.99) as well as the 360 and PS3 (US$ 59.99)." While we're sad to see a cheaper alternative go down the garbage disposal, it's for the better. Getting the whole package is always a better alternative to getting a partial package. The only ones who seem to get screwed here are the PC owners. If they've already got the original game, they've got to buy it again if they want to get all three new products. Buying them separate might prove more expensive, anyway. Well, at least the console-lovers get everything at once, right?

[Update: Changed the title of the article to better reflect the idea of the post -- indeed, the Black Box was due out only on PC, as it would be silly to not give console owners the actual game. But console owners get a fantastic deal with the Orange Box, no?]

"Who touched Sasha? Who touched my gun?" is made hilarious once more by this Heavy Weapons Guy video, slated for the Team Fortress 2 packaged with the big Orange Box for the PS3 (it includes Half-Life 2, Episode 1, Episode 2, Portal, and Team Fortress 2). The video is set up like a documentary to show you the inner-workings of Heavy Weapon Guy's psyche and you know what? It's pretty funny. Check out the video, see the style of the game and give us your thoughts. We approve.

Doug Lombardi, of Valve fame, announced that Half Life 2: Episode Two, Team Fortress 2, and Portal will all be pushed back to February of next year. The reason? Valve was a bit aggressive with their release date. Too aggressive, they say. As a shift in management practice, Lombardi says: "our thing is always that we're trying to make really good experiences and so we're going to manage to that rather than the schedule." Good for you guys. Really.

Now, about Portal... seems Lombardi is interested in the idea, so much so that he wants to toss it into future episodes. It's that cool and fun to play with. This brings up memories of the gravity gun. You know, that insanely neat tool/weapon/toy used in the main game of Half-Life 2. Just for fun, what was your greatest moment with the gravity gun? Rig up any incredibly complicated traps just to get that one enemy? With that in mind, are you looking forward to playing with the portal gun on your PS3? Or PC, but PS3 eventually.

[update: fixed image... brain farts are not uncommon when portals are involved. Thanks, insane_cobra!]

Near the end of 2006 we can expect a lovely port of the more than lovely Half-Life 2 to the XBox 360 and the Playstation 3. But, we don't just get the great game, we also get the great two "episodes" also being released separately for the PC. The episodes are basically extensions to the story, sometimes explaining unclear parts of the main story. Oh, and they're insanely fun.

PC players won't feel too bad about the consoles getting the two episodes included with their copy of the game. At the same time it's released on consoles, PC gamers will have two other games to choose from: Team Fortress 2 and Portal. Still, would a console gamer be able to handle all that awesome in one package? Spacing it out on the PC may have been necessary to save our lives.