Arc the lad was one of the first games released for the original Playstation in Japan. However, it wouldn’t be until late in the system’s life cycle that it would come over here, thanks to the now defunct Working Designs in the form of a 6 CD pack chock full of extras in the usual Working Designs style. It contained the series’s three entries, which gave players the entire saga of the struggle against Darkness. The thing I liked best was that each sequel took place only a short period of time after the previous entry vs the “thousands of years after the big battle” cop out of %95 of most other RPG franchises. Upon reading that SCEA of Japan was planning a PS2 sequel, I was somewhat skeptical, especially after Arc 3’s grand finale (Which in itself wasn’t even suppose to be released). This game takes place thousands of years after Arc 3, (but this time is understandable, seeing as how it would be impossible to follow up on the events of Arc 3) and it tells the storyline of the war between two races; Human and Deimos, and an evil empire which seeks to subjugate them both. In the middle of all this are two heroes, Kharg and Darc, both twins being born to a Human mother and Deimos father, but were separated at birth. You will alternate between both, and see the storyline from both viewpoints, and makes you feel sympathetic towards both causes. When the two brothers finally do meet, it’s a lead-in to some very big plot twists. Although the combat engine has some flaws (having to buy spirit stones to cast spells), the new free walking is a welcome treat versus the grid based strategy battles of not only Arc the lad, but most other Strategy RPGs. It may not be Final Fantasy of Kingdom Hearts, but this is worth checking out especially if you’re a fan of the series.

penny-arcade forum has the scoop from Nintendo Power’s latest issue. It looks pretty clear that this is going to have some of the greatest elements of the original SMB as well as a few things incorporated from SMW and SM64.
MAY 7 CANNOT COME FAST ENOUGH.

I like star wars, but some people can name every alien in the cantina scene, piss and moan over the extra minutes in the special editions, and argue to this day over weather Han or Greedo shot first, and that’s just scary. I’m not big on PC style RPGs, but this game is impressive. From the story line (which evolves as you become good or evil) to the cast of characters, this game is probably one of the better Star Wars tie ins. If George Lucas got the people at Bioware to write the script for Episodes 1 – 3, then they would have turned out much better than they did. My only complaint is the Real time – turn based hybrid battle system. It’s kinda retarded looking at them swipe each other and hoping that the enemie’s HP falls down in time. It would have been so much more cooler to actually control the jedi powers yourself.

Not unlike Ferris Bueller, I spent my day off in Chicago having an unheard amount of fun with 2 of my friends (powet forum regulars TheOrange and Phil Bond).
First up was GameWorks.  Instead of tokens or quarters they use some weird card system that depending on the day will subtract either points or time after you swipe into your cabinet of choice. As advanced and cool as this sound, the system was DOWN when we arrived and so all we could do was stare at the Mario Kart arcade machine.  A helpful attendant gave a free play while we waited for the card system to be fixed and we sat down to enjoy some MK action.
The action was less than spectacular.  We were not impressed and realized we were missing nothing by not having a machine closer to home.
Then the card system was working again so we gave the game another go.  Wow.  What a difference.  After adjusting to the controls and weapons system a little bit we were having a great time.  We tried most of the tracks and the ultimate conclusion is if these tracks and weapons don’t make it into the Revolution Mario Kart it’ll be a shame.
Elsewhere in GameWorks, my friends tried Guitar Freaks, a precursor to the PS2 hit Guitar Hero.  This game actually did suck, as it lacked any licensed music and controlled a lot simpler.
We had to hop out of there and head for another arcade, Nickel City, for the Soul Calibur III regional tournament.  Powet forum regular Phil Bond has been in Soul Calibur tournaments for longer than the site has been around, and though Chicago hosts some of the best players in the world, this was to be a great learning experience.
Nickel City charges $2 to get in and then after that none of the games take quarters or tokens, just nickels.  Dropping 8 coins into the Mario Kart machine there felt like a lot but for only 40 cents a play it wasn’t bad.  In the back of the arcade there was 2 rows of Free-Play machines.  Older games, but still some really good stuff.  Mortal Kombat 1, Killer Instinct 2, a half dozen variations of Street Fighter, TMNT the arcade game, Ms. Pac-Man, Tetris… yeah it was really worth the $2 to get in there to play all these games until you got tired.  I got a bag of nickels and ended up only really spending it on San Fransisco Rush 2049, which I’ve got on dreamcast in a closet somewhere.  It was a real throwback to about 6 years ago.
After a breif intermission at a Chinese Buffet and JToy (an import shop formerly located in the Japanese supermarket Mitsuwa), we retired to TheOrange’s apartment.  There we played some real Guitar Hero, Mario Kart and Meteos on DS, and I got to see what Halo 2 looks like on an xbox 360 (cleaner graphics, higher frame rate!).
It was the most sunrise-to-sunset gaming I’d done a long, long while.  Why haven’t we done this before?

This is an enhanced version of the third installment of the Elder Scrolls series, complete with all the content from Bloodmoon and Tribunal, the two expansion packs. I wasn’t even into PC style RPGS until this came along. Imagine the free roaming gameplay of Grand theft auto taken to a whole new level, in which you could go anywhere and do anything you wanted. THe whole world is open to you and you do not have to be confined by the main plot. Wanna rise to the top of a guild? Practice magic? Hunt for treasure in ancient tombs? WHatever you can think of it’s here. Only few issues with it are the combat, and the fact that besides teleporting, there is no alternative to walking across th eland. However, both of these issues will be corrected in the upcomming xbox 360 sequel, Oblivion.

Kikizo Games has an exclusive hands on with the final PS3 devkit running near final hardware, all backed up by anonymous developer comments.
The site is probably getting hammered with links right now so it takes a minute to load a page, but its an interesting read.

Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy sequelizes probably the best Star Wars game in years, and certainly the best based on the prequel trilogy. Doing episodes 4, 5 and 6 I really, really hope to get a LEGO Admiral Ackbar.

Well it’s getting real close now to the year’s most anticipated game*! Super Princess Peach, the Super Mario Bros. style side scroller for the Nintendo DS, is hitting stores in a little over 2 weeks now on Febrary 27th.

Check out the official site which has pretty much no information and a weird little flash magazine maker program.

* According to aDam