The Real Madden Curse

Mike Vick can tell you about it. So can Marshall Faulk, Donovan McNabb and countless others. For years, talk has spread of a curse that haunts any athlete that graces the cover of the latest edition of Madden. Well, kids, I’m here to tell you that the curse you think is real is not the curse you should be worried about.

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Casualties of Gaming

All this talk about the Wii being the bastion of casual gamers is really starting to stick in my craw. And I didn’t even know I had a craw or that such a thing could get stuck in it, but whatever. What bothers me is that casual gaming has been around FOREVER and it has nothing to do with the Wii.

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Castle Crashers and Braid Bring Joy

So this weekend my goal was to get through a couple of new XBLA games, Castle Crashers and Braid. I’ve been hearing a lot of great stuff about both of these games, and I wanted to check them out, with hopes of reviewing them sometime in the next week or so.

As of right now, I’m completely thrilled with and loving both of these titles. It’s funny, because they’re the exact opposite of one another in terms of their playing styles. Braid is a puzzle game and Castle Crashers is an old school arcade beat-em-up a la The Simpsons or Streets of Rage.

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GamerSushi Asks: Game Reviews

There’s an ongoing discussion around gaming media and the industry these days about the nature of gaming reviews, and whether or not they’re broken in their current state. We here at GamerSushi have been in a lengthy (pages of Facebook threads) discussion about what exactly makes a good game review.

Is it a percentage, a score out of 10, a letter grade, a thumbs up, or some other way of attributing a tangible rating to a product, like gold stars or smiley face stickers? Poop?

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PSN Store Update: 9/4/08

It’s Thursday! Time for another update to the PSN! This week brings a ton of video content and a new episode of Qore. If you have not subscribed to it, I highly recommend you do. It’s full of fun features and tons of info. And since I signed up for the first episode, I will be allowed into both the Resistance 2 and Socom: Confrontation betas! Eat your heart out! This month’s Qore features the Motorstorm: Pacific Rift demo.

Full list of new content after the jump:

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LEVEL UP! Call of Duty 4 Double XP Weekend 9/12-9/14!

Time to dust off that copy of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and kill some people online! According to Infinity Ward’s blog, IAMFOURZEROTWO, next weekend will be a double experience point frag fest for both PSN and Xbox Live.

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Rumor: Warhammer 40k Space Marine Video

A video of a new 3rd person action game in the Warhammer 40k universe titled “Space Marine” is starting to make its way around the web. This is an unconfirmed game, so it’s got “leak” written all over it. You might want to watch this one before it gets taken down!

Edit: The video we had posted was taken down, so this one appears courtesy of Kotaku.

How To Get A GamerSushi Avatar

I see that while many of you have registered, not everyone knows how to get a fun picture next to your name when you leave comments. That’s because you haven’t signed up for Gravatar yet.

Gravatar is an online tool that is essentially a universal avatar system. Basically, you’ll have the same avatar for any website that uses Gravatar instead of having to set up a new picture for every profile you create. It’s pretty cool, and it’s ridiculously easy to sign up for, so you should go get a Gravatar.

Swamped! Too Many Games, Not Enough Time

I used to have so much time to play video games. When I was a kid, if I got a new game, it would keep me going for months. At Christmas time, when I got a bunch of new games, I was set until NEXT Christmas. Continue reading Swamped! Too Many Games, Not Enough Time

The Hallowed Halls of PAX: A Gamer’s Dream

I knew I was in a different world when I saw Captain Falcon in the restroom. He posed. Or at least, he seemed to. It was hard to tell with all of those foam muscles. But rest assured, there was flexing of some kind.

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PAX: The Leftovers

The wild thing about PAX is there’s really so much to see and do, it’s hard to take it all in. I got to play a ton of great new games, many of which you’ve already read about. There were also a few other not-so-great ones, which you no doubt read about as well.

In the end, though, there were too many to do write-ups on all of them, so I just focused on the ones that stuck out to me most for some reason or another. However, I’ve put together a list of the other games that I saw, played and gathered some brief impressions of:

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PAX: Inside Bioware’s Dungeon

So right when you walk onto the exhibit hall at PAX, you come face to face with what looks to be a huge dungeon erected right in the middle of the hall. This ambitious construction belongs to none other than Bioware, makers of Baldur’s Gate, Mass Effect and one of my favorite games of all time, KOTOR. And inside, they were showing off their next PC game, Dragon Age: Origins.

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PAX: Gears of War 2

As many of you know, Gears of War 2 was playable in multiplayer form here at PAX for the weekend. While I somehow missed the Microsoft booth in its entirety yesterday, I got over there as soon as possible today to check out a number of games, most notably Gears of War 2, both multiplayer and single player campaign.

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Weekend Plans: 8/29-9/2 Labor Day Edition

With a long Labor Day Weekend finally here, I thought I would see what everyone’ big plans are. Mine consist of seeing a movie today, probably Tropic Thunder and trying to get some Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune in before Monday.

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PAX Update!

Wow. Seen a lot of crazy stuff at PAX today, but haven’t had any time to update about it because it’s been so nuts. Tonight, I’m going to be uploading my videos and pictures, and they’ll be released over the night and during the day tomorrow. Among some of the coolest things we saw: Little Big Planet, Resistance, the new Halo 3 map, a bunch of Wii games and Fallout 3. More to come!

PSN Store Update 8/28/08

In the first of what will become a weekly feature, I proudly present to you this week’s new offerings at the PSN Store. One new downloadable game, The Last Guy, which was previewed here earlier this week and a few demos, most notably Soul Caliber IV, which I am anxious to get my hot little hands on. Also, some Warhawk add-on’s which look fine and dandy. Rest of the update after the break:

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Sony Fanboy Rant: Trophies vs. Achievements

DISCLAIMER: ALL OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN THIS COLUMN ARE SOLELY THOSE OF A TYPICAL SONY FANBOY. GAMERSUSHI.COM IS MERELY A VEHICLE FOR THIS CONSOLE WARRIOR TO WIELD HIS BLADES OF FURY AT MICROSOFT AND NINTENDO. SHOULD OTHER FANBOYS WISH TO OPINE, THEY ARE FREE TO DO SO.

For eons it seems, I have been forced to listen to 360 fanboys declare the glory of Achievements. What a joke. Achievements? Anyone can achieve something. Just think of Little Lebowski’s Urban Achievers. Proud we are of all of them? I THINK NOT. Aren’t Achievements what they hand out at the Special Olympics in lieu of medals?

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PAX: That PS Triple

Get your envy sticks out, because I’m all set and ready to leave for PAX this weekend. While Microsoft has already revealed their lineup for the Expo (and it’s quite good), I’ve still been curious to see what Sony is going to have ready for the throng of gamers like myself.

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Little Big Planet Image Importing Only Via PS Eye

In news that may come as a blow to many gamers hoping to get their “create on” with Little Big Planet, in a recent interview with Joystiq.com, producer Pete Smith and interface designer Jim Unwin confirmed what many had feared:

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GamerSushi at Pax!

This weekend I will be attending PAX (otherwise known as Penny Arcade Expo), the gamer’s mecca, taking pictures and video of everything that the game devs are going to be showing off.

Things I hope to do include: get a hands-on impression of the new 360 dashboard, check out the playable Left 4 Dead, attend a screening of Second Skin the MMO documentary and play Rock Band until my ears bleed.

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